Pure Intentions

It took a while for Mina to calm down after Sana told her the rest of the story of what happened to her at the club.

Mina had made it clear that she was fine with Sana working at the strip club. Also agreeing that she had never heard of it before, but as long as her best friend was true to her words that she was taken care of, then Mina had no reason to worry that much.

But for the fact that they encountered another member of the Dong Sok, started to make her uncomfortable. Or scared. Both, maybe. 

She thought about it, maybe because of what happened, there was a possibility that they were now prime targets of the gang, and they want to get something out of them.

But Mina had nothing; she lived a pretty normal and simple life, her family was fairly ordinary, she didn’t engage in anything shady during her school years and she had a boring job.

Sana was the same from what Mina knew, except for the boring job part, of course. Not anymore. So aside from Sana working at the club, there really wasn’t a valid reason for the Dong Sok to be on their asses this much.

Sana tried to calm her down, telling her that maybe everything was just absolute coincidence. Sunny was pretty vague when she had to explain about the Dong Sok to her that night and they never really talked about it after.

Or when Mina found the gang members hanging around the convenience store, the cashier was pretty clear when she said they liked to hang around there. Sana even mentioned that maybe the reason why Chaeyoung visited them that day was because she was really sorry about what happened to Mina. It was either that or Chaeyoung was attracted to Mina and that was why she showed up.

Mina immediately dismissed the last option. There was no way that Chaeyoung could be attracted to her and that she wasn’t attracted to the other as well.

She considered herself crazy if she was, completely ignoring the fact that she found herself entranced by Chaeyoung’s beauty the first time they met. Mina was probably dead set in denying everything.

But she contemplated whether or not to tell Sana the part where Chaeyoung said that she wanted to meet Mina in different circumstances, since it had been bugging her.

Ever since that day, she wasn’t sure how to deal with it when the thoughts got too much. But her mind was strong, she knew that this person was dangerous and nothing good would come out of it if they had a relationship or became friends.

There was a part of Mina that wanted Sana to quit her job at the club, only because she didn’t want them to be involved with the gang. They owned the Lazy Sleeper and according to her best friend, they asked someone else to manage it, but it was still under the gang’s protection, whatever that meant.

Sana tried to explain that some gangs in Korea were mostly hired as muscle to protect local businesses from competitors or shady businesses. But that was all that Sana said and that didn’t really convince Mina.

She felt like she was a mess; her thoughts were all over the place and the feeling of paranoia was creeping up behind her, knowing well enough that she might have another breakdown if it got any worse.

“Hey—“ Nayeon suddenly placed her hand on Mina’s forearm, successfully taking her away from the thoughts. “You haven’t touched your food yet.”

Mina shook herself awake and the feeling of the cold chopsticks come back to her senses, gripping them between her fingers. She tried to come back to reality, remembering that they were in her apartment that night and having dinner together.

Nayeon was able to take a break from her writing to actually spend time with her friends. Knowing that Momo and Sana had work at night, it made sense to Nayeon that she should keep Mina company. At least just for dinner, since she knew that Mina enjoyed her alone time.

“Right, sorry,” Mina said as she started picking on her food.

The older friend stared at her for a moment, before going back to her food. “You’re thinking about something,” she said before taking a few servings of her rice. Her cheeks slightly puffed up from the food. “It’s either—” She took a moment to chew and quickly swallowed her food. “You did something wrong, something happened or you’re in love.”

Mina whipped her head at her friend. “What?!” She started stuttering. “I-I am not in love. I haven’t even met anyone interesting!” Despite having Chaeyoung’s face flash in her mind, she quickly dismissed it. She was definitely not in love, but she did meet someone interesting. Oddly enough.

Nayeon giggled. “I’m kidding about the last part.” She grabbed the cup on the table and gulped down her drink. “But at least I got you to react.”

She couldn’t help but look away, she hated how observant Nayeon was. “I’m sorry. But yeah, I think I am kind of lost in my thoughts.”

The older woman shrugged. “Well, if you wanna talk about it, we got the whole night to ourselves.”

She wasn’t sure if she should voice out her concerns, but there was no point in hiding it if it meant that it was going to eat her brain if she repressed it again. She sighed, taking in a messy lump of food in her mouth. “I’m just...” She started, then swallowed her food. “I’m just kind of paranoid lately.”

Nayeon hummed, waiting for her to continue.

“I think I’m being followed,” Mina said softly, as if she was worried someone was listening in on their conversation. “After the encounter with the gang, I’ve been seeing them in places I’ve been to and then Sana works at a club that’s owned by them. Plus we have a new neighbor and we don’t even know what they look like.”

“It could be a coincidence?”

That was the third time someone told her that. Her brow twitched, feeling somewhat irritated by it.

“And perhaps, your new neighbor isn’t a friendly person,” Nayeon quickly added. “Did you actually think that your neighbor is part of the Dong Sok?”

It did sound ridiculous.

“I don’t know. I guess that’s why I said I was paranoid.” Mina’s voice was trailing off, feeling her heart drop. It really was starting to get to her.

“Maybe you are,” Nayeon said with a shrug, finishing the last of what was in her bowl and placed her chopsticks down gently on the table. “It could be because you’ve never heard of them before or seen them in person, that’s why you’ve never noticed. Now that you have, you can already spot them without even trying.”

Mina wasn’t really satisfied with that answer, but she kept quiet.

“I want to trust Chaeyoung?” Nayeon continued but the way she said it was like a question. “She told you that night that you were just involved with their business and even made a great effort in bringing you back home safely. And how long has it been since that day? Nothing bad happened to you, not even Sana.”

She nodded, Nayeon had a point. But there was something in her that still didn’t trust it. Which was, of course, understandable.

Mina was damn lucky that nothing bad happened to her that night, but she still couldn’t shake off the fact that they weren’t entirely the safest people to be around and who knew, maybe they would trick them into devious acts that will ruin them for the rest of their lives.

But Jeongyeon’s words played in her mind again.

“Chaeyoung is scary, she can even get out of control at times. But believe me, depending on who she’s dealing with, she’s actually a very kind person.”

There had to be a reason why she said that to her.

“I actually have a confession,” Nayeon started, leaning back on her seat and nibbled on her thumb. Her eyes glued on her friend across the table.

Mina was hesitant for a bit, but nodded. “Okay?”

Nayeon bit off a bit of skin from her thumb and continued to chew on the sore finger. “I… I have been contacting Dahyun since that day.”

“What?”

Nayeon sighed and couldn’t control the smile creeping on her face. “I know, it’s dumb—” She leaned her body forward onto the table. “But I think we have a connection and she’s been very sweet to me.”

“B-but she’s part of the mafia?” Mina tried to not raise her voice, the panic in her heart was rising up again. This was like Sana all over again.

“Yeah, she is,” Nayeon said and shrugged again. “But she’s also still a normal person too.”

“You can’t consider someone who chose to be in the mafia as a normal person,” Mina snapped; her patience was running out. “It’s hard to trust these people when they involve themselves in crime and they will manipulate you into doing something you don’t want to do. You really shouldn’t let yourself get involved because once something bad happens and if you get caught in between that you wouldn’t be as lucky as me.”

Nayeon was quiet, she scoffed under her breath and stood up suddenly, making Mina flinch. “I’ll wash the dishes for us,” she said in a neutral tone, trying to smile at her worried friend.

“Nay—” Mina tried to call her, reaching out a hand but retracted it, feeling as if it was no use. “I’m sorry if I sounded rude. But I… you know why I’m not really okay with this.”