It was strange to arrive somewhere and feel proud for not seeing the person I was to meet there, but that was the case: it was the first time I ever arrived at our designated location before Tiffany, after all. I stopped by a bench outside the ticket booth and checked my phone, verifying that I had no texts from her recently. However, when I looked up, a familiar figure entered my view.
“Sica!” Jessica turned around, donning a shocked expression. “Sica, it is you! What are you doing here?”
“What are you doing here?” she replied as we approached each other.
“Fany asked me to come here; this is perfect, we can enjoy the zoo together!”
A knowing expression washed over her face, something by which I was completely oblivious of. “Ah, so Tiffany—yeah, I’m also here because of her.”
“Oh, she invited you too? Hm, why didn’t she tell me?”
“Yeah, she didn’t tell me either. Shall we wait for her?”
I agreed, and when the clock hit 10:00, instead of Tiffany arriving in person, both our phones rang at the same time. I glanced over at Jessica, noticing that her phone had also received a text from Tiffany. “Oh, that’s interesting,” I noted, pulling up the text that appeared on my phone. However, instead of gaining a better understanding of the situation, Tiffany’s cryptic text only made me more confused.
‘For the next few hours, don’t worry about me, ok? Have fun with Jessica!’
I read the text a few times over, not really understanding what she meant. What was obvious to me was that she wasn’t coming and that she intended Jessica and I to meet here and hang out at the zoo, but why didn’t she tell either of us? What did she mean by ‘not worrying about her’?
I looked over at Jessica, hoping to gauge an answer as to what was going on, but she was just nodding in an understanding manner, as if this was exactly what she was expecting.
“Sica~” I whined, grabbing her arm, desperate at this point, “What’s happening? What did Tiffany text you?”
“I’m not telling you,” she retorted in a teasing tone, “Let’s go.”
I reluctantly nodded, linking arms with her and walking towards the ticket booth. After entering the gates of the place, when we rejoined our arms, Jessica glanced at my bare shoulder and noticed something. “Oh, I never noticed this until; when did you get this tattoo?”
She was pointing to the puzzle piece tattoo I had gotten earlier with Tiffany that was on my shoulder. I was reluctant to reveal much information about it because I feared Jessica would tease me to no end about it, but now that I was caught red-handed, I felt I had no choice. The best I could do was answer vaguely, but Jessica could probably just figure out by herself eventually. “Ah, it was a few weeks ago, but honestly, it’s sorta hard to spot because it’s usually covered.”
“Ah, so were you wearing this cute thin-strapped top because you wanted to look good in front of your girlfriend? Or maybe you wanted to flaunt your matching tattoos?”
I pulled my arm away from her and hit her on the shoulder, eliciting a chuckle from her. I didn’t really have a reason to hit her, it was just an automatic reaction to her teasing that I had accumulated over the years to her teasing.
“Ah Taengoo, you’re so cute,” she laughed, patting my head.
“Yah, how many times do I have to tell you to not do that! I’m older than you!”
“Uh huh, sorry unnie,” she replied with a smirk on her face. “Oh! Look over there, we have to get one of those first!”
She was pointing at was a stall that sold animal ear headbands. It was always something I wanted to wear with a significant other and was something I was looking forward to doing with Tiffany, namely because Tiffany would look absolutely adorable with cat ears attached to her head, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t willing to wear them with Jessica. In fact, Jessica would also undoubtedly look cute in cat ears as well.
After picking out our headbands: a pair of fluffy, pointed, white cat ears for Jessica and a similar pair of grey dog ears for me, we took a picture together and headed off.
“By the way, how did it go two days ago?”
From the way she sounded when asking the question—the slight unevenness in her voice near the end of the inquiry—I could tell that she was burning to ask the question for some time already. Given that she was the one who acted as the broker in establishing the meeting but not actually taking part in it, I could tell why she was curious; however, I noted to myself that I should be careful in the details I revealed.
“Um, well it started off pretty well but then my—something happened, and after Tiffany’s dad told a story about his past, Tiffany went back to disliking her father, although I think it’s more because of what he did, regarding the story he told, rather than him as a father. It felt a little bad to see them start to make progress only for it to end that way, but it’s progress at least, so I’m happy with that.”
“Ah, ok,” Jessica replied, “Did the story come with an NDA?”
I shook my head. “My—” I stopped myself just as I was about to tell Jessica that my parents instructed me to not tell anyone, which seemed a bit surprising to me since they still criticized Tiffany’s dad for his actions, primarily citing the fact that the inherent bias in his narrative only construed the events in a way that threw suspicion onto the criminal organization when, in fact, considering the information given, the accident seemed like just that: an accident. “Sort of,” I answered vaguely once again.
“Now I’m curious,” she pondered as we started approaching the first few animals, “What about you? What do you think of it?”
I pursed my lips, tapping into my memory. “It shocked me. I didn’t … I didn’t really know what to think of it, and although I sort of knew a bit about what the story was about already, the degree at which it happened made me realize that reality is scary, sometimes.”
She nodded. “I’m getting a clearer picture of what happened, but I still feel like I could be completely wrong…”
I smiled sheepishly. “Sorry, but it’s hard for me to say how much I can say, so I’m just being careful.”
She chuckled and patted my head. “I understand.”
I swiped at her hand, but she retreated before I could hit her. “Yah, I said not long ago to not do that!”
“It’s so hard to resist, can you blame me?”
“Yes, I can!”
“Hm, well if you were in my shoes, you’d understand.”
“I don’t want to understand!”
“Oh, look over there! We should go there!”
“Yah Sica, stop distracting me again—” I was cut off as she pulled me along, my eyes inadvertently following her finger to the petting zoo she was pointing at. I sighed, wondering why I let her get away with always doing such things, but as I started observing her more, I started to realize just how well those cat ears suited my best friend. “Wait, Sica, stop for a second.”
“Hm?” she said, turning around as I took out my phone.
“I have to take a picture.”
“Wha—What? Why?” she stammered, taking a baby step back.
“Those cat ears just suit you so well, I thought you might want it for your social media or something,” I told her, opening up the camera on my phone. When she didn’t respond, I lowered my phone and looked over at her. “What’s wrong?”
She shook her head. “What do you mean?” she replied, somehow sounding not exactly sad but disappointed or let down. “Ok, I’m ready!” It might’ve just been my imagination though, because she then proceeded to pose cheerfully, tilting her head slightly and smiling brightly, both hands at the sides of her face curled in the form of paws.
After taking the picture, I admired it for a second before lowering my phone. “Oh yeah, you really look cute in this picture. I’ll send it over to you right now,” I told her, constructing the text and attaching the picture.
“You shouldn’t say that to another girl when you already have a girlfriend.”
“Ah, really? She texted me earlier today to not worry about her though?”
Jessica looked at me strangely. “What?”
I pulled up the text and showed it to her. “See, that’s what she said. I didn’t really understand what it meant, though.” However, from the look on Jessica’s face, it clearly appeared as if she clearly knew what Tiffany meant. “Wait, what is it? Are you leaving me out of something again?”
Jessica laughed and went to pat my head, but this time was blocked by my hand. “Maybe you can convince me if you do some aegyo for me.”
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