"What?!" Arena's screeching surely reached Naha's next door neighbours.

"You don't want to?"

"N O, absolutely not, no." Arena was shaking her head and backing away from Naha, who was holding a needle in her hand.

"Why? It's much cheaper and quicker this way!"

"Naha we're not going to pierce our own ears, c'mon. You could get a serious infection." Arena tried to reason with Naha so the former wouldn't pierce her own freaking ears with a random needle she "sanitized" by running it over with water.

Naha studied the needle. "Would it then be okay if we sprayed the needle with medical dysinfectant?" She met her eyes with Arena's, whose' were filled with alarm.

"Nope, you're crazy. Put the needle away," Arena took a small step forward, hands raised.

"I just want more piercings." Sighed Naha and plopped down on the sofa, putting the needle onto the coffee table.

Arena rushed over, grabbed the needle and threw it into the trash can. "I'll take you to get more piercings if you want, but god just don't start making holes into your ears yourself."

Arena sat down on the wooden floor next to the sofa where Naha was currently lying and sighing loudly every 3 seconds. Arena let her head fall back onto the soft blue cushions. She closed her eyes.

"Will you really take me?"

"Yes." Arena didn't even open her eyes to answer.

"Before you go to Korea?"

Now that got Arena's attention. Her eyes snapped open and she jumped onto the sofa like a mountain lion, landing on Naha and almost crushing her.

"What do you mean? Have you heard anything?" Arena was breathing hard from the sudden movement, her heart pace quickening.

"NoIjustassumedthatyouwillpassanyway," squealed Naha. "PleasegetthehelloffmeIcannottbreathelikethis."

Arena rolled over and landed on the floor with a thud, not saying anything. She rose to a sitting position on the floor once again and turned her head exactly 90° to look at Naha, who had also sat up on the sofa, still breathing heavily and with difficulties. Arena was sure 76% of the heavy breathing was fake to make Arena feel bad about crushing her friend's windpipes.

"You think I'm gonna pass the auditions?"

Naha coughed a little before answering, "Positive."

"You really think they are going to let me become a trainee?"

This time it took Naha 10 more seconds to answer, "Who knows, I believe they might." She stood up from the sofa and walked over to the kitchen, dragging her steps.

Arena followed suit and watched as Naha poured herself a glass of water and took her phone from the kitchen counter.

"God, how much do you weigh?" Naha joked and took another sip of water.

"Dude, I'm like 117 lbs." Arena leaned against the doorway and crossed her hands over her chest.

Naha choked on her water and started coughing again. "Have you lost weight??" That left a little pool of water on the floor.

Arena gave a small but noticeable nod. "What can I say? It has been a rough couple of weeks."

Naha smiled a sad smile, "Come here." She opened her arms wide, indicating that Arena was supposed to run into her hug.

Arena did just that. Nevermind that Arena had like 2 or 3 inches on Naha, her smol friend gave the best hugs ever.

Naha basically drowned in her coral pink oversized jumper with her small height and tiny figure.

"Do you want to go today?" Arena asked, still caught up in the hug.

"Mhh?" Naha mumbled and held on tighter.

Arena patted her friend's head and started detangling herself from Naha's jumper, leaving her own bright red sweater all messy. Arena adjusted her clothes and sat down at the kitchen table.

"To get ear piercings. I'm not taking the risk of you doing..." Arena mimicked stabbing the air, "..whatever you wanted to do with that needle."

Naha settled down opposite her companion and smoothed down her blue hair that was coming undone from it's neat french braid.

"I mean, I guess we could. It's only," she turned to look at the oven clock, "it's only like 5 p.m."

Arena smiled and opened her phone, typing something to the search bar. "Cool because I know just the place that we could go to."

"Right now?" Naha fiddled with her fingers.

Arena finished her search and typed in a phone number, she looked at Naha and grinned, "Right now." She then proceeded to make a call getting them an appointment at a professional piercing salon. In two hours.

"How did you do that?" Naha was gawking at Arena. It was near impossible to ever even get appointments to such things and entirely impossible on such short notice.

Arena smiled and shrugged, "Old friend of the family does piercings there and she had a couple of free hours."

Naha mouthed 'wow' to herself and slipped out of the chair.

"Want some coffee?"

"You know I do."

***

"Ready?"

Naha looked scared despite already having two ear piercings. Her eyes went wide at the sight of the needle. She pointed at it and laughed nervously, "Hah, kinda like the one I had at home."

Arena sat down next to her, "Want me to hold your hand or something?" Arena had already gotten her ears pierced. 2 piercings one on each side as a kid and 3 new ones now, her ears were still red and swollen.

Naha swallowed and blinked at Arena, nodding, she said, "Yes please."

Arena smiled and took Naha's right hand, intertwining their fingers and giving it a small squeeze.

She held Naha's hand and suffered the intense squeezes every time the needle went through Naha's ear, and that was 4 times.

"I can't believe you got 4 new piercings." Arena shook her head as they were paying at the front desk at the salon. Naha shrugged and winced, the pain in ears hitting her suddenly.

"Ouch, yeah. You got 3 yourself, only one less than me...gosh how the hell do you deal with the pain? So uncomfortable."

Arena's vision clouded for a second, she looked at her shoes and said quietly, "This is nothing.."

Naha frowned.

She took Arena's wrist and steered her out of the beauty salon.

"Oh, it's already dark outs..," her mouth closed as she saw the sky, "Arena, look."

Arena looked. It was cloudless. Not a single one in the entire sky. The stars shined brightly on them. Lighting up the parking space with the help of street lights on every possible corner.

"Wow, it's beautiful."

Naha smiled and opened the car door while glancing one last time at the starry night sky, "They sure are yes."

They sat down and quickly started the car to turn heating on, because believe me, it was so bloody cold that even their sore and newly pierced ears didn't feel anything.

Slowly the car started getting warmer inside, but Arena and Naha were still in the same spot in the same parking lot as when they sat in 8 minutes ago.

"Should we go?" Arena buckled her seatbelt and rubbed her hands together.

"Your place or mine?" Naha looked over and ignited the car. They were so often riding each other's cars that it was very surprising they didn't have spare keys to their friend's car.

Arena shuddered, "Let's go to mine and you can stay the night?" She blinked fast as if that would help her warm up more faster. Spoiler alert : it did not.

Naha nodded and drove out of the parking lot,"Yes boss."

***

When Arena came back to her room from taking a hot shower, a towel wrapped around her dripping wet hair, Naha was pacing around the room. She didn't stop when Arena closed the door behind her and creeped forward her pacing friend.

"What's wrong?"

Naha jumped and clutched her heart , "Ohmygod do not sneak up on people like that! Gave me a heart attack, when did you get here?"

"I literally just stepped in and you didn't so much as look up. Why are you pacing anyway? You always pace when something happens. You've been doing that ever since we were children."

Naha bit her lip and stopped pacing.

"I think you just might've gotten an email from Starship Entertainment."