1 year.

It had been 1 year since Jihyo went back to Italy to continue with her job. One long year without feeling the warmth of each other’s body. No cheeky kisses, no stealing glances and no arguing about who had to take a shower first.

All thanks to technology and social media platforms, Jihyo and Jungkook could see each other and hear each other’s voice. With their 7 hour time difference, saying good night and good morning was a struggle. When Jihyo was about to wake up and start her day, Jungkook was just about to go to bed. It was difficult, but they both managed.

They celebrated their first anniversary through a video call. Jungkook bought a cupcake and a single candle to put on it while Jihyo cooked Jungkook’s favourite meal. It was heartbreaking to not be able to spend such a special occasion with each other, but they both knew it was going to be worth it in the end. After all, Jungkook had said, “This is just the first of many. We’ll just have to try better next time.” He was talking about their anniversary and Jihyo was so touched at his love and sincerity that it made her cry while talking to him. Jungkook just laughed at her and blew her a kiss to comfort her.

Birthdays were even lonelier without the presence of the other half. Despite Jimin, Yoojin and Taehyung throwing a party for Jungkook based on Jihyo’s instructions, a part of him was still incomplete, because the most important presence that he wanted that day wasn’t there. He even had crazy suspicions of Jihyo surprising him to be there for him on his birthday, but of course, Jihyo didn’t show up. Jihyo’s apartment was filled with presents upon presents when her birthday arrived and she only had one person to blame – her boyfriend. She was overwhelmed with the number of presents, but she was even more surprised to see handwritten letters on each box. Who knew her boyfriend was one of those guys we often see on social media? – Surprising their girlfriends with the sweetest, cutest and most cringe-worthy ways.

The couple barely had arguments, and whenever they did, it was about something silly or had erupted from something not worth arguing about. They were both always tired because of work, so whenever they tried to talk when the other one was overly exhausted, the triggering point and sensitivity was a lot higher causing for a small bickering to start. Realising how stupid they were being, they would both apologise to each other after a 10 minute argument on the phone.

The only time they had a big fight was when a girl came over to Jungkook’s place – which happened to be Taehyung’s cousin – and Jihyo misunderstood it and blew it out of proportion. Being physically far from Jungkook had made her more temperamental, but it didn’t mean that she trusted him any lesser. She still had her unaasertiveness, and when she saw a beautiful girl walk past in his living room, she just lost it. To be fair, she just had a heated meeting with her boss, spilled coffee all over herself and the taxi broke down in the pouring rain. She had a rough day and Jungkook received all of her pent-up stress that day. They both got over it and Taehyung just laughed whenever the topic came up because it was his younger cousin for Christ’s sake. The topic only came up once because Jihyo didn’t talk to him for an entire month after that. Taehyung learnt his lesson not to piss off Jihyo. Well, he should’ve considering he watched his friend nearly die from pain when Jihyo antagonised herself from everyone.

Planning to meet up wasn’t easy. Jungkook was dumped with schedules upon schedules while Jihyo had to work extra hours just to get days-in-lieu and to save up days for her annual leave. Jungkook had planned countless of times to surprise Jihyo in Italy, but all of them fell through because whenever he asked her when she was free, it didn’t match his schedule. Sure enough, making time for one another was unbelievably gruelling.

But they both knew that once day, no seas would be able to separate them from one another.

-

“Hey, let’s go bowling.” Taehyung nudged Jungkook’s elbow as he half focused on the soccer game playing on the tv. Jungkook looked at Taehyung with slight annoyance as he only groaned in reply. “What?” Taehyung quizzed.

“I think I’ve sent Jihyo 10 messages but she hasn’t reply a single one of them.”

Taehyung thought for a bit before he bit his inner cheek and said, “Maybe she’s just busy? You know how busy she can get.”