Yonghee looked on, amused, as she supervised the unexpected photoshoot she was summoned to. She watched as Irene twirled around, posed with a crepe in her hand, and either smiled demurely or glared fiercely at the camera. Surrounding her was a large troupe of friends, photographers, and even admirers. And at the head of it all, standing behind the camera, was none other than Yonghee’s self-proclaimed advertising pro Byulyi.

“Excellent, unnie! Now take a bite from the crepe. Look like you really like it, like you’re in love with it,” Byulyi directed.

Doing as instructed, Irene bit into the crepe she was holding. “Hey, this is pretty nice!”

Byulyi looked up for a brief moment at her remark. “Really? That’s great! We’ve been experimenting.”

“What crepe’s that, then?” Yonghee asked, surprised. She had not been aware of any new additions to her menu as of yet.

Byulyi shot a grin at her before turning back to her camera. “It’s a secret, Yonghee-unnie. Can’t tell you unless Yongsun-unnie gives me the okay.”

Yonghee gaped at her, shocked. The nerve of it all! Why was she not allowed to learn about new developments to her own shop’s menu? She pursed her lips and put her hands on her hips. “Fine. I’ll go ask her instead.” She spun on her heels and strode out, pulling out her phone to call her younger sister.

“Hello!” A chirpy voice answered. “You have been redirected to The Best Art Team Ever ™. How can I help you?”

“Wheein, where’s Yongsun?”

“Oh, unnie! Yongsun-unnie isn’t available right now. She’s out with Hyejin and Eric-sunbae. They’re looking at furniture and decorations and all of the things that I actually wanted to look at except they decided it was better I work with Seulgi to illustrate some posters and-”

“Wheein,” Yonghee interrupted before the girl could launch into a full-blown rant. “Do you know where she went?” 

When Wheein replied in the negative, Yonghee sighed. “Okay. How about when she’ll be coming back?”

Another negative. Resigned, Yonghee hung up. She couldn’t remember the last time her younger sister acted so mysteriously, nor could she remember Byulyi ever actually denying her anything. Maybe, if she pestered some more, Byulyi might give in and update her on the situation. Or she could call Eric and find out where they were. After all, she did own the crepe shop.

Smirking, Yonghee punched in another series of numbers on her phone. “Eric? Is Yongsun with you?”

“Oh, hello,” Eric answered. Yonghee thought he sounded exhausted. “Yeah, she is, I think. I’m not totally sure she’s even still here. She and Hyejin immediately started running around the department store the minute we walked in, and I’ve been trying to find them since. I tried calling Yongsun, but…”

“But she left her phone somewhere, yeah, I just tried calling her. Tell you what: I’ll go over to wherever you all are, and I’ll help you look for the girls. Two pairs of eyes are better than one.”

Indeed they were, Yonghee knew, and she’ll pry all the information she wanted to know out of Yongsun while she could.

*

“And pray tell, why in the world did you buy so many things?” Yonghee griped as she hauled plastic bags full of random decorative items. Or so she assumed. Honestly, she couldn’t even tell, as she didn’t get the chance to interrogate Yongsun nor could she identify what they had purchased before the bags were forcefully dumped into her arms.

“Because we need to make the shop look really nice!” Yongsun rolled her eyes exaggeratedly at her sister.

“Oh, and, Yonghee-unnie,” Hyejin piped up. “Do you know what you’re going to name your new shop? Wheein was asking, she needs to know so she could write it on her posters.”

Yonghee paused. In her pursuit of knowledge of Yongsun’s secret menu, she had completely forgotten to think of a new name for her shop. “Can’t we just use the old one?”

“What, ‘Suzette’?”

“Well, yeah.” Yonghee shrugged. “I mean, it was originally named after a really famous type of crepe.”

“Damn it!” Yongsun suddenly exclaimed, casting her eyes heavenward. “She’s figured it out!”

The other three turned to look at her. “What did I figure out?” Yonghee asked, flummoxed.

And then: ah. The secret menu.

“No way,” Yonghee breathed. “You managed to make a Crepe Suzette?”

Yongsun flushed. “Well, technically, Byul did. We tried and figured it out over at her place.”

Yonghee was stunned. She remembered mentioning it offhandedly to her younger sister, a long time ago, at the very beginning when they were still newbies in the world of crepe-making, that there was a particular flavour that she always wanted to taste. Curious, the two girls had ventured into a popular crêperie where they had their first taste of the mythical crepe of their dreams.

“At that time, we had to share one crepe between the two of us since we couldn't afford it, remember?” Yonghee reminded her younger sister fondly.

“Yeah, and after that, you tried so hard to replicate the flavour, but for some reason it never turned out the same.”

“And you're telling me Byulyi, of all people, Moon Byulyi figured out the recipe?”

Yongsun grinned at her bemused sister. “Amazing, right? Let's get back to the shop. She can have the honours of preparing a Crepe Suzette for you.”

*

“Ladies,” Byulyi made a sweeping gesture with her arms, “gent,” she nodded at Eric, “welcome. On this episode of my cooking experience, we will be making a Crepe Suzette.”

Seulgi clapped her hands together enthusiastically.

“First of all, the ingredients.” She arranged eggs, cups of flour, milk, salt, sugar, butter, and water on the counter in front of her. “These are what goes into your everyday crepe.” They watched as she whisked together the ingredients and poured the batter into a few already hot and waiting skillets. Yonghee nodded approvingly when Byulyi smoothly flipped over the crepes with a flick of her wrist. When they were cooked, she folded and slid them onto plates to cool.

Byulyi then took out a bottle of Grand Marnier and another of Cognac. “These are essential when making a Crepe Suzette,” she said solemnly. “Orange liqueur and brandy go oddly well together, and you will also find out why we use these.”

She took both bottles and poured them together into a small soup pot. She then set the pot on a stove and turned the fire on low.

She held her hand out to Yongsun. “Did you manage to buy the fruits, babe?”

Yongsun fished around in one of the many plastic bags that they carried over to the unopened shop, and came out with a net of Jeju tangerines. “They’re really fresh,” Irene remarked, catching the fragrance of the tangerines as they were passed around.

“Yongsun-unnie, please peel one of them and give the fruit to me.”

Byulyi took the orange carpels and arranged them in a neat pattern. The result was a plate of four crepes arranged in a four-leaf clover pattern, and crescents of sweet tangerine meat forming a flower, each carpel a distinctive petal on the crepes.

Byulyi took another one, untouched, and weighed it in her palm. “Perfect.” She whipped out a small knife, peeled strips of rind so they flowed from the fruit in pretty curlicues. Stabbing the peeled tangerine with a skewer, she held it above the plate of crepes for her audience to see.

Using a ladle, she scooped up the cocktail of Grand Marnier and Cognac, still hot and bubbling. With a grand flourish, she poured the ladleful of alcohol onto the peeled tangerine.

Yonghee caught herself staring at the streams of flambeed tangerine peel and juice with open in amazement. It was as if fire was surging through the citrusy fruit to infuse the crepes with sweet, sweet flavours, and the heavenly scent made her want to weep.

In Byulyi’s words, it was, indeed, perfect.

“Ladies and gentleman,” Byulyi slid her finished plate of dessert across the counter, “my Crepe Suzette.”

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(hello everyone i am going away for a week thank you for reading sorry for any mistakes i'm kinda in a rush but i wanted to upload two chapters for y'all so thanks for reading again bye)

(p.s. if you ever get the chance to try a crepe suzette you definitely should bc it's really delicious trust me)