Everything You Are (Chaelisa)

Chapter 23

It had been a few days since Chaeyoung had been visited by Ava and she had assumed the woman was just trying to scare her but then she had gotten a call saying her attendance was no longer required for a medical conference she was supposed to be going to the following week.

“Maybe they really didn’t need you to come anymore,” Seulgi tried as Chaeyoung pulled on her scrub top.

Chaeyoung closed her locker and looked at Seulgi. “It’s Ava. I know it is. Jokes on her, though, because I didn’t really want to go.”

“Have you mentioned this whole thing to Lisa?” Seulgi asked, curiously. “Because she could stop Ava from doing anything else.”

Chaeyoung sighed. “I just want to talk to Sana and I haven’t had the chance because the two haven’t met up since that lunch a few days ago. If Sana did accept the pay-off, I want to be the one to break it to Lisa and if she didn’t, then I won’t have any reason to bring it up. I’ll just deal with Ava on my own.”

“If she did accept the offer, could you really blame her?” Seulgi asked. “Her medical bills were probably horrendous. Ava knew what she was doing with that offer. It’d be hard for any ailing person to turn down. I don’t know why she thought it would work on you. You don’t need the money. I mean, it’s a nice chunk of change but still.”

Chaeyoung sighed. “It’s the exact amount it would take to pay off my student loans. I don’t know how she found that out but Ava Manoban is obviously capable of doing some sketchy things to get what she wants.” Chaeyoung’s phone beeped and she quickly picked it up from the bench. “Gotta run.” She grabbed her lab coat. “We’ll talk later,” she said before running out of the locker room.

Later that day, Chaeyoung entered an on-call room and smiled when she saw that Lisa was already there taking a nap. She closed the door softly and crawled into the bed beside her girlfriend. Her smile widened when Lisa snaked an arm around her waist and pulled her closer. “Long day?”

“Mmhm,” Lisa replied, tiredly. “You?”

“Yeah, lots of traumas today. Idiotic traumas that could’ve been avoided. People are stupid.”

Lisa chuckled and placed a kiss to the back of Chaeyoung’s neck. “You were gone this morning when I got up.”

“I had to be in earlier than you. I didn’t want to wake you.”

“Okay, but you’ve also been semi-distant the last few days,” Lisa pointed out. “If I did something wrong, I’d like to know so I can fix it.”

Chaeyoung had been distant but that was only because she was busy worrying about Ava and how to approach Sana about the situation. “You haven’t done anything.”

“Okay, do you want to talk about whatever’s bothering you?” Lisa asked. “I know something is. I can read you, Chaeyoung.”

Chaeyoung knew there was no point denying something was wrong. “I’m not ready yet, but we’ll talk about it soon.”

Lisa pressed another soothing kiss to the back of Chaeyoung’s neck. “Okay.”

“Have you spoken to Sana lately?” Chaeyoung asked, conversationally.

“Yesterday,” Lisa replied. “I checked in on her to see how she was doing.”

“No plans to hangout?” Chaeyoung asked. “We should have her over for dinner. Seulgi and Jisoo can join us to make it less awkward.”

“Really? Just the other day you said you weren’t ready to meet her,” Lisa pointed out.

“Well you know what they say,” Chaeyoung began. “Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.”