Most people would feel discouraged and embarrassed to be single in February. It was the month of lovers after all. The commercials, movies, candy, even clothing were geared towards that one special day.
February 14.
Valentine's Day.
The well-known day where lovers send roses and gift teddy bears to one another. Dinner reservations are booked and restaurants grow dizzyingly busy. Stores are crowded and streets are filled with couples holding hands. Everyone dresses up and smiles fill each public and private place. .
Of course its infamy abounds as well. The single people frown and declare that the holiday is simply designed by the Greeting Card companies and meaningless. Secretly they sigh and buy the discounted chocolates the day after and se wish they had someone to share the day before with. Some of them push aside the sadness and spend the day loving themselves and those closest to them.Whether you are content or not, you belong to one of these groups.
However, something she had long ago admitted about Valentine's Day. It was a miserable day to spend alone.

By fate, or some lucky chance, she belonged to neither camp on the dreaded day.

It wasn't that she didn't date or wasn't interested in a boyfriend. It was just that she always seemed to be single by the time the holiday crept back around. However, it wasn't a miserable arrangement.
She always had someone to spend Valentine's Day with.

Taehyung liked the holiday. Being an affectionate person and possessing a love for giving gifts, he thought the holiday a nice opportunity to show someone love.
However, it always seemed that he too was single when February the fourteenth had cycled back to the present.
He didn't mind though, after all, it just gave him a good excuse to see her.

The two had been friends for years, as they had attended the same high school. They'd pulled late night study sessions so they could pass their math tests together. They  had orchestrated the best pranks the student body had experienced in the past decade. They'd worked their first summer job together at the tea shop in the mall, whiling away the dull hours with bad jokes and reenactments of their glory days in high school.
She'd supported him when he'd gone away to become a trainee and her support had never wavered in the slightest.

They were the best of friends; they were there for one another through thick and thin.

So, when they winded up alone every February fourteenth, they spent the day with one another. It was almost like a secret arrangement between the two of them, an unconscious tradition they upheld religiously. Taehyung would send her flowers and a cute cat plushie to her office during the day, complete with a cheesy card.

She would rush out of her office at lunch hour and hurry to bring Taehyung lunch from his favorite takeout, whether he was recording, practicing, etc. That night Taehyung would pick her up from her apartment for dinner and a movie.
The two preferred to eat at the pizzeria and then to go and watch a romantic comedy, as there always seemed to be a new release on February the  fourteenth.

This year, the two planned to do the same.

However, as Taehyung began to make his preparations things weren't as simple as he'd hoped they would be.
Then again, they hadn't been simple for a long time.

One of the best parts of the friends' arrangement was that they didn't harbor romantic feelings for one another. They were able to freely enjoy all of the best things about the holiday without the strings attached. They weren't anything more than friends, and that was the point.

Except Taehyung had long ago lost that benefit.
He didn't want her to just be his friend, and so the traditional celebration had started to carry a weight.
He wanted to hold her hand on the street.
He wanted to share the popcorn and icecream they bought every year.
He wanted to kiss her and whisper how much he loved her at the end of the evening.
He wanted to give her the real notes he'd been writing her for years, the ones that clearly articulated his true feelings for her, and not just the cheesy, punny ones.
He wanted to be just like the other couples.

He just wanted her to know how he felt.

However, they had a nice arrangement, and he didn't want to complicate things for her. If she was happy this way, he could be too.

Taehyung didn't know though that she wasn't completely satisfied with the way things were.

She had always enjoyed Taehyung's companionship, but as the two of them had grown older, and especially as they'd entered adulthood, she had begun to see him with new eyes.

She noticed and cherished things she'd never found or admired about him before.

She cherished the way he smiled, his lips forming a boxy shape and showing off his perfect teeth.

She loved the way he could be silly one moment and then serious and thoughtful the next. The conversations she had with him could be so deep and meaningful, but he also knew exactly how to make her laugh.

She loved the freckle on the end of his nose.

She appreciated  his energy and passion for the things he cared for.

She admired his voice, each rise and fall both in his speech and in his singing.

She thought the way his hair fell in his face when he laughed was lovely and she often found herself wondering how someone so inwardly and outwardly attractive could hang around with her.

There were a lot of things she was a skeptic about, but she knew one thing was for certain.

She was in love with Kim Taehyung, and there was no way she could continue to ignore her feelings.

Her life had been filled with dreams, some realized and some put on the shelves of her mind. She had come to realize that there was one common thing about dreams. It was this, in order for them to be realized, one must first take the first jump into them, however big or small it may be.

Taehyung was one of her dreams, and up until this point, she had set him on one of the shelves, allowing time, and opportunity, to pass by.

Maybe it was the season of romance that fueled her resolve, or feeling that eventually, her chances would run out.
Regardless of the cause, she had resolved that she was going to take that first jump. It scared her, and the jump seemed to be over a chasm hundreds of feet deep to a ledge that may be an illusion in the end. She was very aware that she could take the risk and come to find that Taehyung didn't hold mutual feelings for her, at least not the kind that she held.

It was frightening, maddening even, but he was worth the risk.

So, with her mind made up, she prepared for Valentine's Day, promising herself that no matter what happened between her and Taehyung, she would always have her collection of cat plushies.

A/N:  College essays and applications and scholarships are kicking my butt right now, so if I don't get part two up today
Well, you know why

Also if I'm honest, I wrote this specifically for @chaelattae
Love you babe!

Happy Valentine's Day! If you have a special someone makes sure to show them your love and appreciation! But if not, bot worries! Show yourself and those around you love and appreciation! I love you!
Please eat well and take good care of yourselves