TEN

Ah, maybe I should’ve used a lighter shade … well, it doesn’t look that bad. I can probably make up by using a darker shade of blue for the water. How about the boat then? It’s not like I can use a lighter shade of white. Actually … can I? I have a white—

The jarring noise of the house’s doorbell shattered my concentration. Luckily, the drawing wasn’t ruined as I was in the motion of reaching over to my box of colored pencils. Unluckily, in my shock, my hand slipped, causing the colored pencils to scatter across the desk.

“Taeyeon-ah! It’s me!” I immediately recognized the owner of the voice.

Tiffany? What was she doing at my house?

I quickly rearranged the colored pencils, removing myself from my desk, putting on my slippers and shuffling to the door. I paused as a thought entered my mind.

I only did very light makeup today. Was that ok? Should I do more? But Tiffany’s already at the door, and I shouldn’t keep her waiting. Should I just let her in and then fix my makeup?

“Taeyeon-ah, you don’t have to worry about makeup.”

I didn’t even know how to react to that. I would be surprised except for the fact that this happened before … Tiffany was just completely unpredictable, after all. “What … how did you—“ I cut myself off, realizing what finishing that sentence might mean, “I mean, I’ll be right there,” I concluded, hoping that Tiffany didn’t catch that. I had no such luck.

“What? So you were thinking that?” she teased from the other side of the door.

“No!” I stubbornly refuted.

“Aw that’s ok TaeTae, I’ll love you even if you don’t have makeup on,” she continued regardless.

“Yah, I’m not going to let you in if you keep on doing that,” I countered.

“Ah ok, I’m sorry,” she immediately replied. I wasn’t convinced of her sincerity but opened the door for her regardless. “Tae, let’s go out!” she said as soon as I opened the door, reaching for my arm.

I just barely dodged her, causing her to stumble a few steps. “Come in first,” I told her, opening the door for her and stepping back.

“Fine, but you have to keep your promise,” she told me, finding her balance and stepping in.

“What promise?” I innocently inquired.

I knew what she was talking about, but didn’t feel comfortable with Tiffany suddenly bringing that up. The gleam in her eyes as she answered all but confirmed my sneaking suspicion that she was planning something.

“Come on Taeyeon, I know you didn’t forget,” she said, unconvinced of my act.

I huffed, turning around and heading back to my room. Tiffany took her shoes off and followed me. “What is there to do outside anyway?”

“There’s a lot to do!” Tiffany countered, “There’s shopping, the beach, escape rooms, karaoke, arcades—you just have to look for them!”

“Ah, so you were planning on taking me swimsuit shopping and then immediately to the beach?”

Tiffany didn’t have a readily available reply. “Now I know how you felt on Thursday night,” she said, covering her head with her hands, stopping at the entrance to my room.

My face paled at the mention of that.

Although I couldn’t recall too much of that night, I figured it was for the best as the few memories I did have as well as Tiffany’s stories made me want to just hide in a closet for a good decade or two.

Tiffany, upon seeing my reaction, laughed. “Seriously though, how did you guess?”

I shrugged, swiveling back around in my chair to my desk. “The first two things you listed were ‘shopping’ and ‘the beach’, and since you just said, ‘go out’ instead of ‘go shopping’, I assumed that meant you wanted to do more than one thing. At that point, I just made a random guess that you only wanted to do one additional thing and that the two activities were linked, but also considering it’s you, it made sense to me,” I explained.

Tiffany walked behind me, peering over my shoulder. “Wow, you’re so smart … did you draw this too?” she inquired, gripping the backrest of my chair.

“I used a picture as a reference,” I told her, reaching for my white colored pencil.

“Wow, you’re just a perfect all-around artist, huh? What, can you play piano too?”

I shook my head, smiling. It was seriously hard to keep up with Tiffany and all her compliments—or ‘compliments’—sometimes.

“Seriously though Taeyeon, let’s go! It’ll be fun! I mean, don’t you want to see me in a swimsuit? You can even pick one for me!”

To say that I didn’t picture Tiffany in a bikini would be an upright lie. I scoffed, clearing my mind of the distracting image. “This is fun too,” I responded, carefully shading the planks of the boat with the white colored pencil.

“It’s only fun if you’re good at it,” Tiffany whined, patting my shoulder in protest, “Come on! Today’s my day off! Are you just going to leave me by myself?”

I started feeling uneasy as my excuses expired one by one. My will to stay home was slowly crumbling under Tiffany’s resolve—however, it was yet to be extinguished. “I have other plans for today,” I told her.

“Other than this?”

I nodded in response, silently concentrating on my coloring.

“Like what?”

“Something that I’ve been planning for a long time,” I responded vaguely, hoping Tiffany would drop the subject. Unfortunately, no such thing happened.

“As in…?” she pressed, leaning down and placing her head on my shoulder.

Calm down Taeyeon, this is what friends do. “It was just something that a friend recommended me do but I’ve never had the chance to do,” I responded, continuing to respond vaguely.

“Do you have to do it now?” she whined in an imitation of an impatient child.

“Well, I might not have enough time if I don’t start soon,” I told her.

“What is iit?~” she pressed harder. At this point, I became unable to continue coloring, fearing an inadvertent mistake from Tiffany’s proximity. “Teell mee~”

“It’s…” I started, feeling self-conscious. “It’s…” Should I really tell her? Would I be a bad person if I didn’t? “I was planning to watch an anime,” I quietly admitted.

“What?” Tiffany exclaimed in English, “Anime is more important than me? Taeyeon, how could you?”

I knew she was acting, but her aegyo was just too effective. How could a 22-year old’s aegyo be this good? Was she really 22 years old? “Fine I’ll go, but I’m picking my own swimsuit,” I said, setting my colored pencil down and rising from the chair. Tiffany jumped in excitement, quickly grabbing my hand.

“Ooh I bet you look so good in a swimsuit,” she commented, pulling me towards the door with all the energy she always had, “I won’t accept a one-piece.”

“You don’t get to decide that,” I stubbornly refuted. My words fell on deaf ears as we exited my residence, making sure to wear sandals. A quick taxi ride and a short walk later, we arrived at the clothing shop.

“Ok, meet in front of the changing room in ten minutes,” Tiffany said, pulling me towards the swimwear section. Why was Tiffany so excited to see me in a swimsuit anyway? It’s not like I was as naturally blessed as she was.

Tiffany skipped off, leaving me by myself as I browsed through the racks. I briefly considered running away but then imagined how Tiffany would react to that. Jessica never directly bothered me with these types of requests, but ‘subtly’ pressured me into buying one, occasionally saying such things as “Wow, this weather is perfect for going to the beach, huh?” and “Oh look at this one, I bet this swimsuit would look cute on you.” Seeing as how I never learned to swim, I never really had a need for a swimsuit, so I just resisted Jessica’s attempts to guilt-trip me into buying one. It seemed like Tiffany wasn’t about to let me employ that strategy, though.