The Neighbours (Sahyo)

Chapter 12

Jihyo and her rippling back muscles that her really thin, white shirt she's wearing does nothing to hide, is loading up the industrial washing machine in their building with Sana's dirty, sweaty, clothes, carefully sifting them so they don't bunch up when the cycle starts.

Sana swears if she were a computer, she'd be suffering a catastrophic blue screen of death right about now.

She's still staring at Jihyo wordlessly, seeing but not seeing - she'll blame it on being sick - when Jihyo finishes, pouring a generous amount of laundry powder into the machine and then starting it up.

"Now that that's done, I can make you some soup," Jihyo announces as she turns back to face Minatozaki, clapping her hands together.

Sana's sure she looks like the dumbest person on the planet, with the way her jaw is hanging open, hands hanging limply by her side as she stares at Jihyo .

"I can cook." Jihyo reiterates her statement from the day before. "And I make a mean chicken noodle soup, so how about you go back home and settle in, and I'll bring some over when it's ready?"

No words. Sana has no words. "You... soup?"

"Yeah, soup," Jihyo repeats. She enunciates her words clearly, like she's worried that Sana doesn't understand her. "Chicken noodle soup. Is that okay?"

That actually sounds heavenly. It's been a really long time since someone fussed over her like this, let alone offer to make her comfort food. She shouldn't look a gift horse in it's mouth, right? If Jihyo 's so willing to help her out...

Sana nods, licking her lips as she thinks of warm, soupy goodness. "Uh-huh. That's okay. Thank you."

"Cool! Great!" The grin on Jihyo's face blooms wide, and Sana notices that Jihyo 's not just devastatingly hot, but extremely adorable like this; cheeks puffed up, teeth catching her lips as she realises she's managed to wear her down. "I'll get right on it, and then you just let me know when you want me to come over?"

Jihyo waits for Sana to nod in agreement before she rushes out the laundry room without another backward glance. Just like that, Sana's left alone with the steady thrumming of the laundry machine as background noise to the far less soothing throbbing in her head and the lingering source of confusion that is Park Jihyo .

There's no question that Jihyo's a strange Woman. A little over a month ago, Jihyo'd been so wasted she thought Sana was a Hamster, and now she's claiming she can cook and has offered (begged) to make Sana food, twice.

The parade of women waltzing in and out of Jihyo's penthouse since the day Sana moved in has dwindled and now, the only woman she's seen heading up to the penthouse recently is Dahyun. Did Jihyo undergo a personality transplant?

Ugh.

Thinking about Jihyo only makes Sana head hurt worse, and with a painful sigh, she pushes Jihyo out of her thoughts and drags herself out of the laundry room. At least she has chicken noodle soup to look forward to, even if she's still marginally skeptical about Jihyo's purported cooking skills.

It occurs to her as she slowly makes her way back to her apartment that she doesn't know how to tell Jihyo to come over. Being sick has really compromised her brain functions, she laments dejectedly, and that means she has to hack her way into Jihyo private access elevator to tell her -

Oh.

No, she doesn't.

She leaves her front door unlocked so she doesn't have to get up to let Jihyo in once she's settled in, and flops down onto her couch, her body sagging with relief into the comfortable cushions. Her fingers stumble clumsily over her phone, eyes squinting against the screen glare, hoping that Jihyo's reconnected her speakers.