Always Been You (Ryeji Converted)

Chapter 7

Ryujin woke up with a face full of brunette hair. As her eyes focused on her surroundings, she realized she was still in Yeji's room. The blonde vaguely remembered falling asleep; her eyes had been getting heavier when Westley was tortured in the Pit of Despair. And she had been aware of Yeji moving the laptop off the bed and settling in next to her.

Now, Yeji was wrapped around Ryujin and sleeping soundly.

"I like waking up with you," the blonde said quietly. Yeji shifted her hand up until it rested in the middle of the blonde's chest. To Ryujin, it felt perfect: it was as if Yeji had a quiet but unambiguous claim to her body. She struggled to process the collision of wish and reality. The imminent rupture between her and Julia only served to stoke the resurgence of Ryujin's long unspoken desire for her friend.

She took a deep breath and tried to get her heartrate down from Yeji's unintentional caress. Her thoughts were interrupted by a gentle buzzing. With her free hand, the blonde fished her phone out of her pocket and checked her messages. Nothing from Julia. The writing's on the wall, I guess. There was a new text from Jonnie wondering where she was and asking if they were still on for their morning run. "Shit," Ryujin rested the edge of the phone on her forehead, "I forgot about that."

Ryujin started to shift out from under Yeji. The brunette sighed and turned back towards the window. Ryujin leaned in to her ear and said, "Yeji, I've got to go meet Jonnie for a run. I'll see you later."

Yeji reached behind her and grabbed Ryujin's arm, bringing it across her body. Here comes the dream again...Yeji froze. No, wait, this isn't the dream. This is Ryujin's arm. She quickly let go and sat up. She blinked at Ryujin, who started putting on her shoes.

Ryujin smiled, "Gotta go,Yeddeong. Wanna come over for dinner tonight?"

Yeji nodded, heart pounding. She didn't move until she saw the blonde jogging across the front lawn, pulling her sweatshirt over her head as she headed home.

"Thank God!" Yeji said under her breath, and dove back under the covers. Two more seconds and Ryujin would have witnessed me having that dream. That would have been so fucking embarrassing.

***
Just over an hour later, Ryujin glanced up at the brunette's window as she passed the Thirlwall's house at the end of her run. She smiled, happy to have finally found some time to spend with her friend.

"How was the run, kids?" Alexander Shin looked over the top of his paper as his children walked in.

"She kicked my ass, I'm going to go cry in the shower now," Jonnie grabbed a glass of water and trooped upstairs.

"Which route did you take?"

"We went round Standard and up Haverford. Then all the way up Crown Hill...." Ryujin put her foot on the counter and started stretching her leg.

Alexander let out a slow whistle, "You guys weren't kidding around!"

"Foot off the counter, honey, we put food there!" Ryujin's mom admonished.

"Morning darling," Debbie said, giving Alexander a kiss before turning to her daughter, "And you! You didn't come home last night."

Ryujin looked from her mom, to her dad, and back to her mom again. "I fell asleep at Yeji's," she said simply, "I told you I was heading over there."

Her parents looked at each other, and turned back to her.

"We watched a movie. We fell asleep. Why do you look so shocked? This is something that we have always done. Oh, hey mom, can you teach me how to make lasagna? Like the one with Nona's recipe?"