"Seriously? Christmas, too? Joohyun—" Seulgi cuts herself off, sighs while running a hand through her hair in distraught. She catches the disappointment in the other's eyes before she rubs her temples and sets her palms down flat on the table. "Look, I'm... not mad, okay? I just— I don't understand."   "Seulgi..." Joohyun starts out quietly, eyes cautious as she stares at the girl for a long second before diverting her gaze to anything else that wasn't Kang Seulgi. "You know I can't control this..."    "And you know how important Christmas is. To us. To me." There's an essence of a whine that tails after Seulgi's words. She reaches across the table, gathers one of Joohyun's hands with hers and rubs the back of her hand with her thumb. "... There's nothing you can do to get out of it?"    "I know, I know, and it hurts me as much as it hurts you that we can't spend it together." A faint smile tugs at the corner of Joohyun's lips as she watches Seulgi physically deflate, shoulders slumping and lips dropping into a pout. "Not really, considering I didn't have much of a choice in the first place..."    Seulgi in a breath, obviously crestfallen at the outcome. "Christmas without Bae Joohyun is hardly Christmas at all," she blows a weak raspberry at Joohyun, playful. "But I guess that's how it'll be this year. When will you be back?"    Joohyun clicks her tongue, careful with the words that come next. "Next year—"   Seulgi is quick to interrupt, disbelief in her voice. "Oh, you've got to be kidding me!" Sooyoung, Seulgi's friend-slash-the-girl-who-gets-them-drinks-half-off, sends her a prompt "shut up, you're being too loud!" when she passes and Seulgi sinks into her seat, looking unbelievably more mopier than before. "I have to spend New Year's alone, too... you must hate me a lot, Joohyun."   "You know it's not like that." Joohyun gives Seulgi's hand a squeeze, hoping to relay some of the apologies through the gesture she already had on the tip of her tongue. "I don't want to, but you know how my dad is..."   "Apart from the fact that he hates my guts and wants you to marry that big shot Minho instead? Yeah, I do."    "Don't be like that." Joohyun swallows, feeling particularly crushed around the edges when Seulgi meets her gaze, utter melancholy swirling through her irises of delicate cinnamon. "He doesn't hate you, he's just... hard to... you know, please."   "I saved for your engagement ring for three years, Joohyun. Three years. I don't know what part about that makes your dad think I'm 'incapable' and 'not worth it in the long run.'"   "Seul—"   Seulgi gets up abruptly, her knees banging against the underside of the table. Joohyun knows it hurts; she sees it in the way the girl inhales sharply, but the other's already her heels before she can complain about the pain. "I— I should go. I'll see you later, Joohyun."   The girl's retreating backside, soft chestnut curls at her back are far too familiar sights for Joohyun and the guilt gnaws at her heart, forcing herself up from her seat and footsteps heavy as she pushes open the door and races after the other.    She slams straight into the taller girl's back, arms wound tight around her torso to prevent her from walking away further. They stand in silence, Joohyun's ear pressed up against Seulgi's back and Seulgi hunched over the slightest, shaky breath audible in the midst of the swelling cacophony around them.    "You're crying," Joohyun says, shuffling to the front to face the girl properly.   "I'm not." Seulgi in from her nose, eyes avoiding Joohyun's gaze as she totters in her spot, snow crunching under the soles of her shoes.    Tiny fragments of white flit in the air around them like speckled stars on Earth against a beryl canvas, sticking to Seulgi's hair, cheeks, eyelashes. Tears swell at the corner of her eyes and the tip of her nose is painted red, evoking a small laugh from Joohyun. "You are," she mumbles, hands reaching up to cup both Seulgi's cheeks tenderly.    Arms find themselves snug around Joohyun's waist and Seulgi returns a shy smile. "Well." There's a tear-choked laugh that rises up from , droplets of tears finally finding their release as they stain her cheeks wet and tinted crimson. "Yeah, I am."    "I'm sorry," Joohyun starts out, slow as she rubs the puffy creases under Seulgi's eyes. Her own tears start welling up in her eyes and Seulgi works a grin despite the tears and snorts that continue to wrack out of her, an "I knew you were going to cry, too," leaving her lips as she presses a sloppy kiss to Joohyun's forehead.    "Don't be," she mumbles against her skin, kissing her building tears away and leaving trails of light kisses all the way down to her nose and stopping short of her lips. "I should be sorry. I— I just... overreacted too much."   Joohyun hums, leaning in almost immediately to seal the deal when Seulgi falters for a split second too long. Seulgi is soft and warm, as usual, in all the right ways — all the right places. And the girl kisses back after a long while, presses lightly with a smile tugging at the corners of her lips.    "I love you," Seulgi whispers against , stray kisses finding their way to Joohyun's cheeks, eyelids, the tip of her nose. "I love you so, so much." Another kiss is pressed to her lips — sweet, tender at the edges. "I don't care about Christmas or New Year's anymore. I just want you to know that I love you."   "Love you, too." Joohyun says quietly, fingers tugging at Seulgi's sticky cheeks, courtesy of the remaining tears that clung to her skin. Seulgi's forehead rests against hers and the visible puffs of breath that lingers in the limited space between has them both grinning stupidly, the thick javan essence that sticks to Seulgi's skin from her coffee only drawing Joohyun closer. "Are we good?"   Seulgi's hand skates up to grasp Joohyun's tightly, fingers curling around the back of her hand and a thumb resting against her palm. She brings her hand toward her lips, planting a kiss to her knuckles, her engagement ring.    "So good."     -     Christmas holds a very dear place in Seulgi's heart. Not even her own birthday — nor Joohyun's — could trump the whirlwind of elation that hits Seulgi head on when Christmas week comes by. Whereas others found joy with hot chocolates during blizzards and gifts that only came once a year (sans birthdays), Seulgi writes her happiness otherwise, inked across her heart in the form of Bae Joohyun.    Christmas is when she meets Joohyun.   When she runs into her on accident at a college Christmas party she's not supposed to be at, cheap booze ending up all over the cute skirt spread over Joohyun's knees instead of the red cup in Seulgi's hands.   She's supposed to be studying with her roommate, not downing cups and cups of alcohol with classmates she barely knows. She's supposed to be shuffling through flashcards, attempting to bore every written note she wrote into her mind, not throwing her arm over her freshman year crush's shoulder and booking them another round of "obligatory" Christmas shots. She's supposed to be fussing over modern literature, not bumping into pretty girls with checkered scarves and getting liquor everywhere, especially on the said pretty girl's clothes.   Thousands of apologies and buzzed attempts of flirting, courtesy of Seulgi and the crappy beer that makes her head swim, later, they end up ditching the party for goldfish crackers and a hell of a game of Go Fish at Seulgi's dorm, Joohyun particularly happy on sparkling cider and Seulgi barely functioning past three in the morning with the bottles of (much better) alcohol she digs out from her roommate's "stash" in the fridge. They fall asleep to the four AM reruns of Rudolph and Home Alone, Joohyun drooling all over Seulgi's exposed collarbones when she wakes up to white cracks of light from the window, snowy kisses adorned across the other's skin when she's splayed out on top of Seulgi. The kiss to the cheek Joohyun gives her before she leaves, a hushed "best Christmas ever" against her skin, is the only thing Seulgi remembers. That, and the hangover she suffers throughout the whole day. But she doesn't think she'll ever forget. The kiss, that is. Not the hangover — definitely not the hangover.      -     When she breathes her words of endearment, a stuttery confession of sorts with nothing but the company of snowflakes decorated on her skin and reddened ears when she catches Joohyun an hour before Christmas ends.   It doesn't take long for Seulgi to find love in the girl she happened to spill beer all over two years ago on the very exact day. She works up the courage to toss her emotions into the air for Joohyun's taking — how coincidental, on the day they met — and she spends hours pacing in her room, a flurry of a hundred different ways to admit her feelings coursing through her head. She doesn't realize she's taken almost the whole day until her roommate peeks in, says something about Seulgi's favourite Rudolph special (which was coincidentally, also Joohyun's favourite) coming on in a quarter till eleven. She skips her favourite claymation for a date with a winter storm, and the snow burns when it sticks to her skin, makes her ears go red all the way to the tips, but she manages to run into the girl who stole her heart for too long — literally. Joohyun finishes dinner late, and she doesn't necessarily notice the eskimo that barrels into her until it happens. It feels like Seulgi; Joohyun fits into her arms like a jigsaw piece — perfect and snug — and no one radiated spontaneity and lived up to it quite like Seulgi. The hints of vanilla and occasional lavender she picks up only proves her suspicions.    Seulgi's winter coat is far too big for her lanky frame, and the hood drops over her eyes when she rambles off about love to a girl she hopes will understand. She says things that she's not sure if she means or not, but she lets them linger in the air for the girl's taking — if she wanted them or not. Love came when Joohyun did. Love is when Joohyun smiles at her, bright and toothy, and it feels like New Year's fireworks are setting off in the back of her head, burning off into something Seulgi tacks off as adoration. Love is when Joohyun laces their hands together, says something about it getting colder lately, and Seulgi can feel her heart run off. She doesn't want to catch it. Love is when Joohyun says hello to her, and only then does she realize she wants to say hello to Joohyun for as long as they live. Never goodbye.   Love is strange, but it fills Seulgi's heart with delight either way.    And strangely so, Joohyun pulls her hood off, brushes a curl of honey back behind her ear and grins, dusts away the flecks of snow that cling to Seulgi's face. There's a brief peck pressed to her cheek and Joohyun whispers her affections into her ear, arms hooked around her neck as she teetered on her tippy toes to match her height.    The warmth that blossoms in her chest with every word Joohyun utters is foreign, but that's okay.    Seulgi is in love.      -     When she kisses her for the first time under a dilapidated reindeer ornament instead of the usual mistletoe, Joohyun's favourite peppermint mocha left on her tongue for the rest of the night.   They've been together for exactly a year, and Seulgi ends up being too shy to plant her lips anywhere else except for Joohyun's cheeks, sometimes her hands. First kisses are important — they both agreed when they discussed it during spring break. Seulgi doesn't think Joohyun knows she hasn't had her first kiss yet. Not a first kiss between them, but a first kiss as in first, first kiss. How cute of her to fret about firsts, her roommate tells her on the morning of Christmas, wrapping paper stuck in her hair. And out of everything her chatty friend says, the only thing that sticks to Seulgi's mind is the hushed words of "kiss her today, it's Christmas after all," and also our anniversary, Seulgi thinks but doesn't say out loud, only gets up in a hurry, tissue paper and gift wrap shreds flying through the air as she gathers her roommate into her arms and breathes out a "thank you, I will!" before jetting out the door, coat barely on her body and bomber hat flopping in her hands.    Joohyun's dorm is five blocks away, and snow and water coat her knees by the time she makes it to knock on her door. Wisps of warm air tickle her cheeks when Joohyun peeks through the small crack in the door, brows furrowed at the sight of her girlfriend unannounced, positively soaked over by her own sweat and snow, strands of hair sticking to her forehead and cheeks glowing red. Joohyun's roommate — Yongsun, was it? — hollers from the living room, tells her to close the door because it's cold and who in the right mind would be out there in this kind of weather? Joohyun ends up closing the door behind her, clad in nothing but a thin sweater and Seulgi immediately shrugs off her thick coat, much to the other girl's dismay.    She goes off on a tangent, rambling off about the emergence of a wintertime fevers and all sorts of sicknesses that came with not properly dressing for the cold. Seulgi shuts her up by moving in close, cool palms cupped around Joohyun's cheeks and happiness swirling in pink tides under her skin.    It's hushed, when she whispers "can I kiss you?" under the company of the ruffled reindeer ornament hung on the threshold of the door above Joohyun. She her head up to stare at the swaying decoration when the winter breeze flutters by; half of her expects the common mistletoe and the other half expects a ball of snow to hurl down at her head, but she gets the twinkle of the bell from the ornament instead and Seulgi wouldn't have it differently. Joohyun laughs in that cute way she does, eyes curved into crescents and nose crinkled for a snort or two. It takes a minute for Joohyun to react, arms looping around her neck and she somewhat tries to shuffle Seulgi into the warmth of the coat, too. She kicks at the ground bashfully for a second longer, bites down on her lip shyly and tells her yes.   They're all nose bumps and forehead clashes and awkward smiles because Seulgi's about to kiss the presumed love of her life and her heart hammers off far too quickly under her skin, shooting all sorts of tremors straight down her legs and up to her fingertips. But Joohyun is kind; she's the pulse that keeps Seulgi alive each and every single passing day, the warmth of delight that spreads in her chest and courses through her blood, rich and raw like it always has ever since Bae Joohyun had unceremoniously squeezed herself into her life. The paperweight that rest snug in her heart so she doesn't float away from being too much in love.   Her fingers slip in between honey combed locks and she cradles the back of Seulgi's head in her palms lightly, lips ghosting over hers just barely. It's comforting, how Joohyun's calm affections are soft on her ears and easy on her heart. And Seulgi is far too shy, too red-faced to do anything in the moment. She swallows hard, obliges with the way Joohyun tugs her closer with an equally shy smile. Lips meet lips briefly — timid and awkward, but it brings elation to a pulse in her veins nonetheless. Joohyun leaves tastes of peppermint mocha on her lips, and they're reduced to stupid smiles and red flushed cheeks afterwards. Seulgi doesn't think she'll ever forget the beautiful smile Joohyun gives her, pink of her lips curled and sparkling teeth out for show.    And when Seulgi kisses Joohyun for a second time, far more confident and definitely less fidgety than before, she thinks she won't mind getting used to this. She can get over the joy that squeezes her heart, the mountains of everlasting joy that swell and build in her chest, the jar of her thrumming heartbeat loud in her ears. She can get over anything if it means kisses with Joohyun under a reindeer ornament on Christmas.    Joohyun nips the swell of her bottom lip and smiles against skin, and definitely, Seulgi thinks. She could definitely get used to this.     -     When she fumbles with the velvet box in her pocket, skin ablaze when she slips the ring on Joohyun's finger and comes to the realization that yes, this is the girl I want to spend the rest of my life with.   Seulgi gets the idea of wantin