Hard to love (ChaeSoo Fanfiction)

Chapter 17 - Dinner

Chaeyoung POV, five days later

I'm about to find out J's full name...

It was a crazy thought. Over the past couple of weeks, I only knew her as J. And while I had a good idea of what it might be, I still couldn't be entirely sure until she officially told me. Again, there weren't that many names with four letters, starting with "Jan". But it really wasn't about getting to know J's real name. It never was. It was more about the gesture.

"The moment I give you my name, I give myself to you as well."

Was I ready for that? Handling another relationship? It's been so long, I surely would be really awkward and mess up a lot of things. On the other hand, I handled myself pretty good around J so far. But I wasn't making any illusions about it, I knew that an actual relationship came with much different requirements than casual sex. Yes, she was great to talk to, and the sex was amazing. Honestly, I couldn't find anything negative about this woman so far. But was that enough reason to commit myself? I wanted to get over one lost love, was jumping head first into the next one really the most healthy way to do that? Well, there were worse alternatives.

Is that my only argument? Getting shot in the leg is better than getting shot in the head, but that doesn't mean its automatically good

"Can't you shut up for like two seconds? I'm trying to think here." I groaned in annoyance as I stirred more and more sugar into my coffee.

"I'm... sorry? I didn't say anything."

I raised my head to look into the confused eyes of a certain Thai girl. God, I was so lost in my thoughts that I completely forgot about her presence. "N.. No Lisa, I'm sorry. I was talking to myself."

"Hehe, so you ordered me here so I can watch you talking to yourself? You're strange, Park."

We both laughed, and as we did, it felt like we traveled ten years into the past. Just what I was hoping to happen.

"Actually, I wanted to talk to you."

"Oh, so you didn't come to spill the newest tea regarding you soon to be girlfriend?" The younger one's eyebrow went up in a teasing manner, causing me to look to the side.

"Lisa, I'm trying to be serious here."

The teasing expression quickly faded from my friend's face and made space for something more worried. "Did something happen?" And when I didn't reply immediately, she continued. "You know that you can talk to me about everything. I'm your friend, remember?"

Those final four words almost brought tears to my eyes. "And.. you see.. this is what I wanted to talk about. So much stuff happened. I.. I know that you never openly said it out loud, but ever since we met at Jennie's party, and we started talking more again, this feeling didn't want to go away. Every time we met, there was this cloud above my head, so that is why I wanted to meet you alone, without Jennie." When I took a pause to catch my breath, Lisa used this chance to voice her confusion.

"Chaeyoung, what are you talking about?"

"You hate me, don't you, Lisa?"

The silence that followed after that question was deafening, and it seemingly stretched into infinity. Like the seasons passing by in front of the cafe window, I could see the emotions wash over Lisa's face, one by one. From confusion, over surprise, to disbelief and lastly, anger. "Excuse me?" And boy, I don't think I've ever seen Lisa that scary, I was frightened.

"Yeah, I mean.. after Jisoo and I broke up-"

"For fuck's sake, Chaeyoung, can't you let the past rest?" She didn't straight up yell at me, but the anger in her voice was more than audible. "We already talked about this, didn't we? Yes, I was angry. We all were! Jisoo, because you cheated on her. Jennie, because she thought you were better than that. Me, because I lost my fucking family because of you. I left my parents behind to become a member of Blackpink, my only family I would constantly see from then on. And I loved every second of it. Yes, even the hard work. The countless nights we spent on minimum sleep to train, to become the fucking best at what we did! The times where I fell into my bed unconscious, I loved it. Because I did it with you. The only people that knew me as well as my mother and father did, you three. And then, it was all gone. Just like that." The more of our shared past Lisa recalled, the more I could see control of her emotions slip through her fingers to the point where her eyes began to grow teary, just like mine. "It seemed that it was all for nothing, as if all the hard work was thrown into the garbage because you couldn't respect the most basic term of a relationship and had to cheat on Jisoo. How could I not get angry at you? But hate?" The woman across from me shook her head. "I never hated you, Chaeyoung. I love you. I love you like the sister I never had. After we disbanded, we all needed some time to find ourselves. We went our own paths, but I always thought of you, and always thought of you as my best friend."