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LONELY NIGHT 손조은 ― SON JOEUN
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"IS THAT DONG SICHENG?"
It is Monday afternoon, right after Joeun's 11am sociology lecture, and she is sat inside a coffee shop on campus with Yeonjung, studying for philosophy. It's not really her best subject, even on a good day, and it certainly doesn't help that she's still tired from the frat party she had coerced her friends into attending with her over the weekend.
Joeun isn't even sure why she signed up for philosophy — she can't stand sitting through the long lectures about empiricism and skepticism and whatever the hell else-ism.
(In case it wasn't obvious, she's not very well-versed in philosophy.)
Lucky for her, though, Yeonjung had taken a strange liking for the subject, and for some reason Joeun couldn't fathom, had signed up for the course because she wanted to.
"Hwhath?" Joeun, who was previously distracted by the coffee cake she had been stuffing her mouth with, looks up .
Yeonjung abandons her notebook to point towards a corner of the coffee shop, where a boy with high cheekbones, dark brown hair, rounded glasses, and eyes so focused Joeun couldn't help being slightly envious sat, peering over his laptop. He is, she realizes after a few seconds, pretty cute.
"Dong Sicheng, right? He's in our philosophy class—" Joeun crinkles her nose "—and friends with Jung Jaehyun, I think?"
Joeun snaps her fingers. "I know him! He's that boy who's in Donghyuck's little gang, and—"
She trails off. "—wait, why do you care?"
Yeonjung raises an eyebrow, as if to say 'me? care?'
"About Jaehyun?" Her facade doesn't break, but Joeun could swear she sees her eye twitch. "I don't."
Joeun's eyes narrow. "I meant Sicheng."
"Oh," Yeonjung says a moment later, at a loss for words.
"Well, um," she busies herself, flipping open her textbook to a random page. "What did Wittgenstein think that philosophy was a form of if done properly?"
Her change of topic is so blatantly obvious it's painful, but the moment Yeonjung asks the question, Joeun collapses back into her chair with a groan.
"Wittgenstein?" She mutters. "Who the hell is that?"
She rummages through her various papers (most of which are not related to philosophy at all) until she finds the one she's looking for.
"Aha!" Joeun exclaims, wielding the paper as if it's a weapon. "He believed that philosophy was a form of... of pasta?"
Yeonjung stares blankly.
"Not a form of pasta, duh," Joeun drops the paper back into her discard pile. "But apparently pasta is a form of philosophy to me."
She continues to search, not noticing that at the same time, Dong Sicheng begins to pack his things up and rise from the table he is sat at.
"Wittgenstein, Wittgenstein," she chants over and over to herself. Yeonjung watches on, wondering how exactly she became friends with someone so strange.
"Wittgenstein!" She announces at last, thrusting her arm into the air with the paper in her hand. Unfortunately, it is at the same exact time that Sicheng happens to be walking by, and rather than merely holding her arm up, Joeun manages to accidentally punch him in the stomach.
And, as if that isn't enough, he ends up dropping his cup, spilling its contents all over Joeun's bag.
Sicheng lets out a grunt of pain as Joeun's hand makes contact with him, and he hunches over slightly. Surprised to feel something other than just air, Joeun lets out a loud gasp, before turning around in horror to see the aftermath of her handiwork.
"Oh my god, I'm so sorry," she exclaims. "I didn't mean to hit you!"
She jumps up from her chair as a piece of ice lands on her shoe.
"O-oh," Sicheng stutters, staring at the puddle of water.
"And I made you spill your drink too," she groans miserably. "Oh, I'm such an idiot."
"No, don't worry about it," Sicheng says finally.
"I guess I should have watched where I was going."
Joeun reaches for a stack of napkins on the table as an amused Yeonjung watches, and she bends down to try and dry whatever she could reach. Following suit, Sicheng takes some napkins and kneels beside her.
"You don't have to—" Joeun starts to tell him, but even as she talks, he continues to clean the mess she made. "—oh."
There's something familiar about him — the way he carries himself, the way he talks, the way he walks — but Joeun can't put her finger on it.
"Well," Sicheng says moments later, straightening up. "No harm, no foul, I guess."
"yeah," she follows, standing up as well. "I'm sorry again. My name is Joeun, by the way. Son Joeun."
He smiles. "I know."
And then, he's readjusting his bag on his shoulder and walking out of the coffee shop.
"Well," Yeonjung says. "That was entertaining."
Joeun, who had previously been at a loss for words, slips back into her seat with a sour expression. "Shut up."
Yeonjung holds her hands up in surrender.
And then something clicks in Joeun's head, and her eyes go wide. She fumbles for her bag, which is now soggy and wet, and draws out her laptop, hitting the power button once, then twice, then a third time.
"No, no, no..." she groans. "It's dead!"
"To be fair," Yeonjung reasons. "It was never alive."
Joeun glares at her.
"Hey!" A mischievous, teasing smile lights up Yeonjung's face. "At least this gives you an actual excuse to call that guy at the campus' IT department. Maybe this week, you won't sound like a pining loser when you call him up!"
"I resent that!" Joeun says shrilly. "I do not sound like a pining loser..."
She trails off. "...Do I?"
"I don't know," Yeonjung says, blasé. "Why don't you call up your tech boy now and we can see?"
"He's not my boy," Joeun denies, "and I will not call him up now."
Yeonjung rolls her eyes.
"...Plus he only works graveyard shifts."
"Oh," Yeonjung cackles. "This is gold! I can't wait until I tell—"
