Broken

61

"You are worried."

"You didn't see her before she left. When you two met in person, she was already someone completely different, physically, at least."

"Maybe, but I know her now, and I can tell you she will be more than fine."

"Unnie, please remember I love you very much, but I'm not quite taking your word for it."

"Choco, I know where you are coming from, I do, but I know parts of her that you don't, and I know that she made this decision for herself and she is more than ready to do it."

"It's just- I just worry about her, I don't want to see her like she was back then."

"And you won't, Chris and I are here with her, you all are here with her. She is not the girl who left, scared and alone anymore."

Dahyun reaches out and holds Tzuyu by her waist (it was the only place she could reach, leave her alone), and they make their way to Mina's porch, who was waiting, patiently, for them with a loving smile. The Chou sisters were really cute whenever they were trying to be serious with each other, it looked like two cupcakes trying to look grown up and wise, but nobody had the heart to tell them that.

"You two look serious." Mina hugs both when they get to her.

"Jihyo went out to meet with Jeongyeon and Sana." Tzuyu still sounds defeated.

"Oh." The older one offers a sympathetic smile.

"I told her it's going to be alright, Jihyo's got this. But she isn't taking my word for it." Dahyun huffs, frustrated.

"Hyunnie, I understand you know things we don't, and that you are trusting the Jihyo you fell in love with to pull through, but we also know things you don't and we worry about the Jihyo we sent off that day." Mina reasons.

"I know, and I understand all of you, I really do." Dahyun gives both girls a kiss on their foreheads. "But I just wanted you to trust her a little more. You know, just-"

"Unnie, come sit back down." Tzuyu calls for the distressed girl pacing in front of the steps they sat down at.

"We are trying, I promise." Mina, despite herself, was great at diffusing nervous breakdowns. "Please sit here and talk to us more."

"Shouldn't we be heading to Chaeyoung?" Dahyun frowns, but sits down anyways. "It's just that Chris and I get a little frustrated when you get that overprotective over her. He might not come out and say it, but I'm the one that listens to him complaining every time."

"We didn't know you felt this way." Tzuyu mumbles.

"That's because we never told any of you directly. But when you get overprotective of her and all that, it feels like you don't trust us to catch her, or that you don't trust her to take the steps she knows she can. It feels like none of you trust that Jihyo is someone else now, and that she has everyone by her side to keep her from falling, that you will never stop seeing who she was, instead of learning who she is now."

Mina and Tzuyu are just looking at the pale girl with watery eyes, it looked like Dahyun had been holding that in for a while, and it made them realise, even though they said they understood, none really showed it very well. Dahyun's cheeks are pink and she looks agitated, although she did seem to have, finally, let everything out of her chest. Tzuyu shared an understanding look with each other and decided it was time to calm things down, or, at least, divert the subject a little.

Dahyun is still moving rather agitated, not exactly pacing from side to side, but she was restless enough that it would bother anyone watching, so Mina did what she knew would completely change the pale girl's train of thought. The older got up, Tzuyu was having a hard time holding her laughter, stopped right in front of her target, got Dahyun's face between her hands and planted a very loud, very obnoxious kiss on the girl's lips. Then she drew back before Dahyun was able to register anything that was happening, looking smug as ever, the youngest couldn't resist anymore and broke out in loud and fitful laughter.

Breakdown averted, Tzuyu got up, still shaking from laughter, took her sister's hand and they all headed for Chaeyoung's, Dahyun was out for the time being, so they might as well just get a move on, there was a very real chance their smallest girlfriend would still be sleeping, at ten thirty in the morning, when they told her they would be there around nine. Yes they were 'late', but with Chaeyoung and early mornings, you had to tell her you would be arriving about an hour before you really intended to get there, if you wanted there to be a chance that she was awake. (She was still sleeping)