Chapter 3 (1/1)

Months passed and Christmas came. Dara volunteered to help with setting up the Christmas Ball for the school which was being held at a hotel ballroom that year. The teacher in charge assigned Dara at the sign up table, knowing she would help boost ticket sales – and she was right. Tickets were sold out a week before the event! In addition to being one of the top sellers Dara also received a lot of offers to the ball but she turned them down, saying that she was attending with her brother.Jiyong came to buy a ticket for him and Chaerin. Dara smiled at him, masking the pain she still felt when she saw him and Chaerin. But he was happy and in love so she was happy for him. Seunghyun finally got up the nerve to ask Bom out and they were attending the ball together as a couple. Bom called Dara to go shopping together for their dresses. When Dara showed up at the mall she saw a third person there – Chaerin. Bom had become good friends with Chaerin since she was Jiyong’s girlfriend and hung out with them more.“I hope you don’t mind that I’m joining you two,” Chaerin said. Dara smiled and shook her head.“It’s fine.”They went through the shops then looking at dresses. Chaerin was a nice girl and she was trying her best to be closer to Dara since she knew Dara and Jiyong were close friends from childhood. She along with Bom picked out several dresses for Dara but they were all too sexy for Dara’s taste. She ended up getting a simple white dress with gold embroidery that ended just above her knees and that had a matching jacket. Bom and Chaerin both went for killer mini dresses that looked amazing on them.On the night of the ball Dara showed up on her brother Thunder’s arm and they made a striking couple. As it turned out Dara was the only one in a white dress, and though it was modest, she stood out amongst the crowd. She wore heels to help make up the difference between her and Thunder’s height because he was so tall. But she needn’t have worried because once she got there she had so many offers to dance from all of her underclassmen who knew her from tutoring and other activities. Thunder didn’t mind since it meant that he was able to mingle with his friends and dance with some of the other girls there. But he always kept an eye out for where Dara was and checked on her through the night.Dara was having fun but she purposely tried her best to avoid her group of friends other than Bom. When it was nearly 10pm she’d had her fill of dancing and acting happy. She wanted to go home but felt sorry for Thunder since the night was still young and he was having fun with his friends. Dara stealthily made her way out of the ballroom where the event was being held and decided to take a walk around the hotel enjoying the shops and view of the garden through the windows. She found a seat further away from the ball and gratefully sat down to rest her feet. She pulled out her phone and checked her messages and then decided to take a selfie. After reviewing the photo she uploaded it to her Instagram with the caption “#escaped!” Dara smiled at the photo and then put her phone away and stared out the window at the garden which was lit up with white Christmas lights.Inevitably her thoughts went toward her friendship with Jiyong – a subject she had avoided as much as possible. She’d seen him earlier with Chaerin at the ball and she had smiled and waved at them from across the room before heading in a different direction. Occasionally he still called her but she either ignored the call or made some excuse to end the call after only a few minutes. His texts to her were responded to with brief messages or a happy face. She’d done her best to distance herself from him without being overly obvious. What she hadn’t been successful in doing was distancing him in her heart. If anything, his relationship with Chaerin had only succeeded in revealing to her how she really felt about him. Jiyong she concluded, was her first love. Unrequited – yes, but nonetheless she had to admit he was the one that would hold that title for her of her first love.She was so lost in her thoughts and staring out the window that she didn’t hear anyone approaching until Jiyong plopped down on the armchair across from her. He flashed her his phone with her Instagram photo on it. “I caught you!” he said, grinning.Dara rolled her eyes and smiled. “What are you doing checking your Instagram?” she asked. He shrugged and told her he was bored and had decided to check it for fun.“Where’s Chaerin?”“She’s dancing with Seungri,” he answered. His eyes were focused on her while she had pulled her phone back out and was playing with it. “You look beautiful,” he said, and her eyes flicked up briefly to meet his. She smiled in answer before returning her gaze to the phone. “Are you avoiding me now days, Dee?” he asked, suddenly.Dara looked back up at him, being careful to keep her emotions from her eyes. “No,” she answered.“You’re lying,” he countered, and she scoffed at him as she returned her attention to her phone. Jiyong leaned forward and grabbed the phone away from her, forcing her to glare at him.“What are you doing?” she asked.“That’s what I want to ask you,” he said, his eyes on her. “What are you doing, Dee? I never see you anymore. You hardly hang out with us. Even tonight – we’re all at one table but you put yourself at another table with Thunder.”“We’re seated with his friends,” she explained.“But this is your ball,” he countered. “You’re the senior here. I know he’s your brother but it should be your preference tonight. You should have been seated with us – your friends. Or are we no longer that to you?”“What?” Dara glared at him, her lips turning into a deep frown. His accusation stung.Jiyong sighed and leaned back in his chair. This talk wasn’t going the way he intended. When he saw her photo she’d posted he’d gone out to look for her immediately, seeing the opportunity to finally be alone with her for a few minutes and find out what was happening.“Sorry,” he said. “I just meant that we miss you. I miss you.” He paused and gave her a small smile. “I thought we were best friends?”She sighed and looked off to the side, out the window and at the lights in the garden. “Maybe it’s good that we spend time apart,” she said quietly. “You know this is our senior year. In a few months we’ll be graduating and heading out on our different paths. We won’t always be close as to how when we were growing up.”He frowned at her words. “Why does graduation have to mean separation? We’ll always be good friends right? Dee, we only live two blocks from each other and we’ve been friends all our lives. Aren’t we going to the same uni as well?”“Whatever,” she said, and stood up. “Let’s go back. Chaerin and Thunder must be looking for us.” She began walking without looking to see if he was following. Jiyong watched her with a frown before he stood up and followed. He was getting frustrated with how Dara was always brushing him off lately. And he was being honest when he said he felt like he wasn’t even her friend any more. Even Bom had complained that Dara never seemed to be around. She was always off busy with school projects, and tutoring, and hanging out with other people that she never used to before. And what did she mean by that comment that graduation would mark a time they would go different paths?