Chapter 12!

When Yujin moved away to Seoul, it had been rough at first.

Her once simple life of schoolwork, chores, and the free time that came after was replaced with hours upon hours in the practice room. Vocal lessons strained her throat until every swallow felt raw, dance practices pushed her body until her calves burned and her lungs begged her to stop, and there were always more classes, language, etiquette, media training, each one carving away at the girl she had been in Gyeokpo-ri.

At first, she told herself it was worth it. That the exhaustion was a tax on her dream. She counted bruises like proof of progress, each ache in her body a reminder that she was moving forward.

But nights were the hardest. Nights meant silence, no ocean hum to cradle her to sleep, no faint clatter from the kitchen where neighbors lingered over late meals. Only the flat hum of the city, her tiny dorm room, and the ache of being both too tired to move and too restless to sleep.

She would lie awake staring at the ceiling, wondering if the others back home ever thought of her.

Wondering if he did.

“Can’t sleep?”

Yujin blinked at the voice that came from the bunk bed on top of her. A head then peeked down from the side, their long hair dropping down like a bundle of vines.

She looked at the person whom she’d become friends with immediately when she moved and the only person who knew what she had left behind, Jang Wonyoung.

“I snuck over some snacks if you want some.” She smiled, cheeks rising as the sound of ruffled plastic followed.

Yujin sat up, rubbing her eyes. The room was dim, the only light coming from the street lamps outside the dorm window, staining the walls in a soft orange glow.

“Snacks? At this hour?” she whispered back, her voice still hoarse from training.

Wonyoung grinned, dangling the contraband from above. “Rules don’t count when you can’t sleep. Besides, if the manager asks, I’ll say I forced you.”

Yujin caught the small bag of chips when it fell into her hands. The plastic was warm from being tucked under Wonyoung’s blanket, and something about that detail—the quiet thoughtfulness—loosened the knot in her chest. She tore it open carefully, trying not to wake the others.

The two of them ate in silence for a while, crumbs scattering between their bunks, until Wonyoung spoke again, softer this time.

“So…what were you thinking about?”

Yujin froze, chip halfway to her mouth. No one had asked her that since she’d arrived, not really. Every question was about improvement, about goals, about debut. But this—this cracked her open in a way she wasn’t ready for.

She swallowed, the salt stinging more than it should have. “…Home.”

Wonyoung hummed softly, “I get it. It must be tough moving out here all alone but you do call your family when you get to, right?”

Yujin nodded.

“I do but there’s another reason.”

Wonyoung shifted, resting her chin on her folded arms as she peered down at her. “Another reason?”

Yujin hesitated. The words pressed against her throat, uncertain whether they should come out. She’d never said his name here—not once. Saying it would make him real again, like pulling a ghost out of the ocean and setting him down in the middle of this city that had already taken so much of her.

Still, Wonyoung waited, her gaze soft and patient in the dim light.

“There’s someone back home,” Yujin finally said, voice low enough that it barely carried past the sheets. “We… grew up together. I guess you could say we were close.”

“Ah.” Wonyoung’s lips curved in understanding. “A boy, then?”

Yujin blinked, caught off guard by how easily she’d said it. She looked away, pretending to focus on the crumbs in her hand. “Something like that.”

“What happened?”

The question was simple, but it unspooled something deep in her chest. Yujin sighed.

“Nothing. It’s just that, if I had a reason to stay, to keep myself from ever going here to become a trainee, it would be him.”

Wonyoung’s brows lifted slightly. “He must’ve been really important to you then…or maybe he has dirt on you.”

Yujin rolled her eyes and shifted herself on the bed. “I just didn’t want to leave him when…when he had everything going wrong for him.”

“What do you mean?” Wonyoung asked once more.

“I left when his parents passed, one after the other. His mom went when she delivered his baby sister and his dad followed when he got into an accident a year later. Now he has to raise the baby all on his own. They have no other relatives around. I know my mom would surely lend a hand but…I don’t know. I want to be there with him but I didn’t want to let this opportunity pass either.”

Wonyoung’s face softened as the words sank in. The teasing slipped away, replaced by a quiet, almost reverent silence. She propped her chin on her arm again, eyes tracing the faint patterns of light on the wall.

“That’s… a lot,” she said finally, her voice barely more than a whisper. “For someone our age to go through. For both of you, actually.”

Yujin nodded, staring down at the half-empty bag in her lap. “He was always the kind of person who’d rather shoulder everything alone. Even when people tried to help, he’d smile like it was fine. Like he was fine. But I could tell.”

Her throat tightened, and she pressed her lips together before continuing. “Before I left…we had an argument at the pier. When I told him that I had to leave, he asked me to stay. I explained why I couldn’t but then he asked me again, stay if I cared about him but…I just pushed past him and left.”

Wonyoung stayed quiet for a long time after that. The kind of silence that didn’t ask for more, but simply held the weight of what was already said. Her expression softened, almost cautious, as though she knew that one wrong word might shatter something fragile in the air between them.

“So you never talked again?” she asked finally.

Yujin shook her head. “No. Not once.”

The admission came out small, barely above a whisper. She let out a shaky breath, eyes tracing the faint outline of the window blinds. “I wanted to. So many times, I thought about calling. Or even just sending a message. But every time I reached for my phone, it felt like I didn’t have the right anymore. Like I’d already chosen.”

Wonyoung leaned back against the wall, knees drawn to her chest. “You didn’t do anything wrong, you know. You were trying to chase something. That’s… kind of the point of all this.”

Yujin smiled faintly, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Yeah, but chasing something means leaving something else behind.”

The dorm light flickered once, and for a moment, the shadow of her reflection caught in the windowpane—tired eyes, hair sticking to her cheeks, the faintest hint of a girl who used to spend her nights by the sea.

“I keep thinking about the look on his face,” she said quietly. “When I walked away. He didn’t yell or try to stop me again. He just—stood there. I didn’t even turn around.”

Her fingers tightened around the bag of chips, crinkling the plastic softly. “I used to think that maybe, if I became successful, it would make up for it somehow. Like it would make him understand why I left. But I don’t know anymore.”

The words hung heavy in the air, the kind that could only come out when the rest of the world was asleep.

Wonyoung reached out and brushed a crumb from Yujin’s sleeve, a small, calm gesture. “You’ll see him again someday,” she said softly. “And when you do, you’ll know what to say then.”

Yujin looked up at her, the faintest glint of longing in her eyes. “You think so?”