“You’re late”, was the first thing she heard when the passenger door opened.

Still feeling weird after her encounter with JiU, Handong just mumbled an almost inaudible apology to her friend, before starting the drive to their destination.

Since Handong had barely said a word since she got in the car, Gahyeon started worrying about her friend’s unusual behavior. Sure, Handong could sometimes be on the quiet side, but with her closest friends she was different, more warm and open, usually saying a witty remark or saying something savage.

“So...where are we going?”, Gahyeon broke the silence while bouncing in her seat, crossing her fingers subtly, hoping they weren’t headed to-

“Flavorish Palace”, from the corner of her eyes, Gahyeon could see Handong's subtle smirk.

That ! She knows I hate that place, Gahyeon internally groaned.

“Yay!” she tried but failed to keep her disappointment from showing on her voice, making the redhead chuckle.

The youngest then started telling Handong about the shenanigans she had gotten into this weekend, making her snort and shake her head in amusement. 

Ah, that’s the Handong I know and love, Gahyeon thought to herself, at least Handong seemed to be back to her usual self.

Suddenly, the car’s navigator screen changed and an automated voice said “Daddy long legs is calling”.

Handong’s good mood seemed to evaporate, she smashed a button on the wheel to accept the call, and before the caller could utter a single word, with her best menacing tone she said, “How many times do I have to tell you to not with my phone?”

It seemed like her tone had the opposite effect, instead of cowering in fear like people usually did, her friends just laughed.

“Wait till you hear what her ringtone is set to”, Gahyeon let out between laughs, wiping a tear from her eye.

“You said not to with your work phone, your personal phone is fair game”

“I swear to god, Kim Bora...”, of course her friends would find a loophole in her words, why was she even surprised.

“That’s why her personal-personal phone is a secret”, another voice on the other side of the line piped in.

The car went silent.

Of course, it lasted mere seconds before everything erupted into chaos.

“Yoohyeon! That was our secret!”, Handong scolded Yoohyeon, it was supposed to be their little secret.

“You have a personal-personal phone?”, Bora said.

“And Yoohyeon is the one who knows about it? Of all people, her?”, Gahyeon crossed her arms.

“Hey! It’s where we play coop games!”, Yoohyeon tried to defend herself.

“What?”

“Yoohyeon, please stop talking”, Handong tightened her hold on the wheel.

“We’ll talk about it at lunch. Where are we going, by the way?”

Now stopping at a red light, Handong turned to glare at her friend. 

“I didn’t know you were meeting us there”

“Bora said she has something important to tell us”, Gahyeon shrugged.

“Yes, I do. So, better tell me now, I’m tired of going in circles around the block”

“I told you we should have waited at the office for Gahyeon’s text”, they heard Yoohyeon’s muffled voice. 

Handong sighed as the light turned green, her hopes of a quiet and nice lunch vanished, “We’re going to Flavorish Palace”

The twin groans coming from the other side of the line comforted her a little, she knew her best friends hated with passion her favorite restaurant, but if she had to deal with their craziness, she deserved to have her favorite meal while doing it. 

“Why do you like that place? It’s for grannies and-”

Not wanting to hear Bora’s endless complaints, Handong just pushed a button and ended the call. 

“Uh, she’s going to be so mad”

“I can handle her”

Surprisingly, Bora and Yoohyeon had arrived first at the restaurant. Even if they hated the place, they still made sure to ask for Handong’s favorite table on the terrace.

As soon as they sat on the table, Bora and Yoohyeon looked up from their phones and shared a look. The mischievous smiles on their faces and the mirth dancing in their eyes made Handong wary, her friends were either about to come up with a clearly idiotic plan or they were going to tease the out of her.

If she was being honest, she didn’t know which one of those was the lesser of two evils.

“Someone has been busy”, Bora waved her phone at Handong’s face, while Yoohyeon made kissy noises. 

“What?”

“The country’s resident heartbreaker, Kim Global Union’s Kim JiU, was surprisingly spotted looking cozy with Han Consolidated’s CEO Han Dong.”, Bora dramatically swooned, clutching her chest with one hand. 

Handong immediately snatched her friend’s phone out of her hand and started skimming through the article. 

She couldn’t believe her eyes, how could anyone think for a second that she and JiU had something going on? Much less from that single interaction? For god’s sake, she had been trying to get away from her, not on a romantic stroll.

(Still, there was a little voice inside of her saying she had enjoyed being in the other woman’s arms, even if it was just for a little bit. But not even if hell froze twice over would she ever admit that out loud.)

“This is ridiculous! She merely pulled me out of harm's way! And!”, she waved the phone around, “This happened like, mere minutes ago!”

Gahyeon snapped her fingers and pointed out, “Oh, so that’s why you were late”.

“Well, the devil works hard but the tabloids work faster. Right, Yooh?”, Bora nudged Yoohyeon, who was furiously texting someone. 

“Oh, man”, Yoohyeon lamented, “I can’t believe Daze magazine has the best scoop first, again!”

At Handong’s fierce glare, Yoohyeon stammered, “I-I mean, can-can you believe they would, uh-um, stoop so low as to-to publish this?”

Isn’t it hot in here?, Yoohyeon started fanning herself.

“That’s what I thought”, Handong mumbled while looking at the menu, not that she didn’t already know what to order, it was her favorite restaurant after all, she just wanted something to do in an attempt to escape whatever this mess was.

Gahyeon scrolled through the article’s comments, “I can’t believe people are buying this”

[Comments:

blueberry-eyes: omg! they look so cute together

kimsy: you can clearly see how much they love each other

not_mark: h o t

luvie101: i heard my cousin’s friend’s boyfriend’s friend work’s at HC and said they met at a business event and instantly fell in love

blueberry-eyes: @luvie101 fr??? that’s so romantic

load more]

“Right, as if Handong could seriously date someone”, Bora mumbled while also reading the article’s comments, snorting here and there when she found a particularly funny one.

“I could! If I wanted to”, Handong said.

“You’re extremely picky and too oblivious sometimes”, Bora pointed out.

Handong crossed her arms, “I am not!”

“Awww, it is cute how she really believes that”, Bora leaned over the table and pinched Handong’s cheeks.

“Gahyeon, tell her”, maybe having one of her best friends in her corner would help her case.

“Well...”, it’s not like she wanted to go against Handong, but there were something’s that had to be said.

“Not you too”, Handong groaned in disappointment. 

“There have been people lining up your door, waiting for a chance to date you for as long as we’ve known each other”, Gahyeon scratched the back of her neck, “And you have never really spared them a glance”

Wanting to end their conversation, Handong immediately flagged the waiter down to their table.

Giving the illusion of drinking from her glass of water, Bora muttered under her breath, “Yoohyeon knows that better than anyone”.

Yoohyeon started choking on her drink, Handong quickly started patting her back in an attempt to help her, but soon Yoohyeon waved her away.

“I’m fine”, she said in between coughs, “it just went through the wrong pipe”.

Thankfully for Yoohyeon, Handong had been too distracted by the whole situation to pay attention to whatever Bora had said.

Before they could continue talking, the waiter approached to take their orders and left. It seemed like the interruption had made them forget their previous conversation, and for that more than one of them was grateful.

It had been a long week for Handong, even if her lawyers had gotten Daze Magazine and other publications from talking about her (nonexistent) relationship with JiU, the damage was done. Although there were no more articles popping up about them, they were still the talk of the town online. 

Apparently, the possibility of two successful women in positions of power (JiU’s was still debatable) dating each other made the locals go wild. Even though Handong refused to use social media -her accounts being managed by her media representative and Gahyeon-, her friends had kept her up to date with everything people said about what the public had dubbed as JiDong; Handong could only roll her eyes at every wild thing her friends told her people came up with, from how they supposedly fell in love to that ridiculous portmenau.

HanJi was obviously a superior name, the redhead thought to herself as she made her way to her office. All she wanted to do after dealing with that was to drown herself in work and alcohol.

“Gahyeon, what are you doing here? Don’t you have a company to manage?”

The sight of her friend being at her office, particularly sitting on her desk with one leg swinging, was not an unusual one per se, she was just used to the other loudly announcing her presence whenever she came over or wanted her attention.

“What’s the point of being the boss if you can’t slip out every now and then?”, Gahyeon took a bite of the donut in her hand, “This are really good, by the way”

“Where did you get that?”, Handong approached her friend and frowned at the sight of the box next to her.

“It seems like you have a secret admirer”, Gahyeon waved the card she had taken from the box at her and started reading out loud with a terrible british accent, “If flowers aren’t the way to your heart, maybe a sweet treat will change your mind”, her barely contained snort made Handong sigh in frustration. 

The redhead punched a button on her desk phone, “Lia…”

“Yes, ma’am”

“Didn’t I give a direct order that gifts shouldn’t be brought into my office?”

“Yes, ma’am. I haven’t let anything pass since you told me that?”

“Why is there a big white box full of donuts on my desk, then?”

“I...I don’t know? B-but I’ll find the culprit behind this!”

Gahyeon pushed Handong away, “Lia, if anything else comes send it my way!”

“Uh...sure, ma’am.”

Handong pushed Gahyeon back, “What do you think you’re doing?”

“Finding more about your secret admirer, of course!”

“There’s nothing to find out. Kim JiU has been sending me gifts since last week”

Apart from the headache that had been dealing with the mediatic circus she had found herself in, Handong also had to deal with a persistent JiU. The blonde, thankfully, hadn’t shown her face at her building, probably scared by the way security had handled her the last time; but she had taken to sending her over the top flower arrangements two times a day -one in the morning and another in the afternoon- every single day for the past week.

Each arrangement came with a cheesy note about the flowers' meanings and the blonde’s number scribbled at the end with a ‘plis call me xoxo’ written in bright pink letters.

Handong had thrown every arrangement in the trash, no matter how beautiful they were, she refused to give Kim JiU the satisfaction of getting to her.

“What? Why didn’t you tell us?”, Gahyeon whined.

If Handong was being honest, she didn’t tell her friend about the flowers because:

1. She didn’t want to be teased about it.
2. She wanted to stop thinking about JiU (which was easier said than done).
3. She was afraid she wouldn’t be able to hide from her friends how much this whole JiU situation was affecting her.

And while Handong knew that if she talked to her friends about her worried and fears they’d be nothing but supportive, she wanted to stay inside her bubble as much as she could.

“I don’t want anything to do with her”, was the answer Handong settled with as she plopped down on her chair.

The action surprised Handong, since she had only seen the redhead like this when she was about to reach her limit, and that was something that happened every once in a blue moon.

“Why?”

Busying herself with some paperwork, Handong deadpanned,“I just don’t”.

“Come on Dongie, live a little! You have an extremely gorgeous woman after you, going through all these lengths to get your attention!” she took another donut from the box, they were extremely delicious and she made a mental note to find out where they were from before she left, “Isn’t that romantic?”

“Kim JiU is not interested in romance”, Handong looked up at her friend, “She just wants a quick ”.

“And? That’s still a good thing...you sure need it”, even though her last words were mumbled, Handong still heard them loud and clear.

“Hey!”

“I am just saying”

“If you’re so moved by her, why don’t you go after her”

Gahyeon made her way behind the desk, and before she could protest, her friend sat on her lap and wrapped her arms around her, “You know my heart belongs to my one and only, you”.

To prove her point, Gahyeon kissed Handong on the cheek with a loud smack.

“Sure”, Handong grimaced as she cleaned her cheek with her shirt’s sleeve, then she pushed her annoying friend off her lap.

“Ugh”, Gahyeon sat back down on the desk, “why can’t I just have a secret admirer like you?”

“It’s not a secret admirer if we know who it is”, Handong pointed out with a raised eyebrow.

“It doesn’t matter… I still want one”, Gahyeon whined with a pout on her face.

“Well, I´m pretty sure there is a line of people wanting to date you”

“There isn’t. But enough about me, let’s go back to JiU”, Gahyeon wiggled her eyebrows, “Get it? Because JiU sounds like you?”

“There’s nothing to talk about”, maybe if she went back to her paperwork, Gahyeon would get the hint and let the topic be.

But of course, her friend wouldn’t let go of the topic that easily, “Don’t tell me you aren’t a bit moved by her efforts?”

“I am not. I don’t trust her”

“Have you at least looked at her file? I’m sure Bora’s men found out some juicy stuff”

Ah, JiU’s file. The file that Bora had apparently gotten her private investigator to compile after she had left Handong all alone in that gala. The file that Bora had given her last week during their impromptu lunch at Flavorish Palace. That file.

The same file that Handong had stashed in one of her drawers as soon as she got back to her office. The file that she refused to look at because she would not, under any circumstances, learn more about the woman that she was trying so hard to forget about.

“I already told you guys, I’m not interested in her”

Before Gahyeon could protest, a knock on the door interrupted them.

“Come in”, the youngest called out as if it was her office. 

“Sorry to interrupt, ma’am”, Lia made her way inside her office, a young woman with ginger hair trailing behind her, “It seems like I’ve found the culprit”

The culprit in question was extremely nervous, who wouldn’t be when they were taken to the big boss’s office on their second week on the job. To make matters worse, Miss Han was looking at her with a stoic face, making her shake in place.

Since the ginger walked into the office, Gahyeon’s mind went blank, the only thought running through her head was “oh my god, she’s so cute”.

“It seems like Dahyun here”, Lia put a hand on Dahyun’s shoulder and pushed her a little, “received you know who’s package and put it in here. Despite being clearly instructed not to”.

“I a-am sorry, Miss Han,” Dahyun looked at the floor as she talked, “I-I thought th-that Miss JiU was you-your girl-girlfriend”, Gahyeon, seemingly back to her senses, snorted at that while Handong just clenched her jaw, “An-and I thought i-it was sweet?”, Dahyun shrugged, her hands playing nervously with each other.

“Well, Miss Kim…”, Handong put a hand on her desk.

“Ple-please don’t fi-fire me!,” Dahyun pleaded.

The poor girl seemed close to tears, and if there was something Gahyeon hated more than working on a Wednesday, was seeing a pretty woman in distress.

“She’s not firing you!”, Gahyeon chuckled and then gave Handong, who was looking at her with fire in her eyes, her best puppy eyes, “Right? Cause she was just doing her job?”, she then turned to look at Dahyun, “You were just doing your job, right?”

Dahyun seemed to freeze in her place, being put on the spot like that making her forget everything she wanted to say, so the only thing she could do was nod furiously.

“See?”, Gahyeon side hugged Handong, “Now, why don’t you gals leave us be?”

Gahyeon gave Lia a look, the assistant just sighed, knowing that the other woman always got her way, and grabbed Dahyun, who was still in a daze, and pulled her away and out of the office.

Once both women left them, Gahyeon let out a deep breath.

“Who is she? What’s her job? Why is she so cute and how does she like her eggs in the morning?”, Gahyeon’s words came out in a flurry, the previously collected woman seemed to lose her cool. 

Handong looked at her in awe, she knew her best friend was a gay disaster, but never this much of one.

“She is my new assistant”

“Wait, what about Lia?”

“Lia’s still my assistant, but since we’re acquiring YG Entertainment, I need a new one”, Handong said as if it was nothing.

“Woah, what? Didn’t you say that entertainment agencies were a waste of your time and resources?”, something that Gahyeon never got, since the idol industry could be quite lucrative and one thing Handong loved more than anything was making Han Consolidated money.

“They’re but this is a special favor for a friend”, Handong refused to look at Gahyeon, knowing her friend would instantly know something was up if they made eye contact.

Since Handong was avoiding her eyes, Gahyeon raked her brain, trying to think about the friend Handong would go these lengths for. As she swept her eyes around her friend’s office, a light bulb suddenly in her brain when she saw a particular pink object on one of the shelves.

“Oh my god! Did you do this for your ex?”

Handong scoffed, “Lisa is not my ex. She’s just a close friend”

“Right”, Gahyeon rolled her eyes, “And weren’t you high school sweethearts?”

“No! We just were really close! She was there for me when I was going through a rough time”

“Sure, Jan”

Another week had passed and it seemed JiU was getting tired of sending gifts to her. Or that’s what Handong told herself to make herself feel better.

Gahyeon, seemingly enamoured with her new assistant (the one she told her explicitly not to go after, since the girl was damn good at her job), had taken to coming over every single day with the excuse of ridding Handong of JiU’s gifts, but always stayed sharing whatever the treats the boxes had with Dahyun, not without sending Handong a picture of the box and the card attached to it first.

The only consolation that Handong had was that Dahyun seemed confused at her friend’s attempts at flirting. She had to admit that it was extremely funny seeing Gahyeon fumble with her words and stutter whenever Dahyun tilted her head in confusion. 

On the downside, the amount of texts reaking of gay panic that Gahyeon sent her after every interaction were a little too much. When asked why she didn’t take a more direct approach, Gahyeon always said that if she wanted to successfully woo Dahyun, she had to be like a scalpel, not her usual chainsaw self. 

Handong shook her head as she passed her -now empty- assistants’ desks. 

There was something about having the whole building (excluding security and the few workers that always stayed past their shift) to herself, she felt some comfort in knowing there was no one else who could botter her this late, her only company being the four walls she basically grew up in.

“Hey”, that voice made her stop right at her office’s doorway.

“What are you doing here?”, Handong said with a clenched jaw, she couldn’t believe the audacity of this woman. Maybe I should call security, her eyes went to the emergency button on the doorway.

Minji saw Handong’s decisive look, so before the redhead could say anything, Minji got up from the couch with her hands up.

“Wait… I’m just here to talk to you”

Handong gave JiU a long look, the blonde seemed tired and… defeated? It was weird seeing the cocky woman this way, if her past weeks gestures were anything to go by, she expected the blonde to do something grand to get her attention, like starting a flash mob or hiring a plane to write a message in the sky.

But seeing her looking uncharacteristically small and nervous was all it took for Handong to give into the other’s request. 

Handong walked to her mini bar and poured herself a drink, and if the mood in the room was any indication, she was going to need it.

“What’s there to talk about?”

“Since it seemed like my gifts didn’t work, I thought I’d come in person. To apologize. Again”

“Okay, let’s hear it”

“I know I’ve been coming on too strong”, Handong snorted, “and that to you I might be nothing more than the womanizer the media paints me out to be”, the blonde took a step towards her, “but I want to show you that I’m more than that. You’re different from anyone else I have ever met”.

The redhead crossed her arms, “I bet you tell that to all the girls.”

“It’s the truth”, JiU gazed into Handong’s eyes, hoping to convey her sincerity, “I want you to know me, and I want to know you.”

Handong observed JiU with caution, there was just no way that the woman in front of her just wanted to get to know her. There was also the fact that the JiU standing right before her seemed like a completely different JiU from the one she had met and that everyone talked about.

Seeing Handong’s wariness, JiU simply sighed and took out something from her pockets. Handong couldn’t really identify what it was, but from the way JiU was handling it in her hands, it must have been something really important.

The blonde walked to the CEO’s desk and carefully put what she was holding on top of it. 

Curious, Handong walked to her desk as JiU walked to the door, when they crossed paths, the blonde said softly, “Maybe after you see that, you’ll change your mind. You know where to find me”.

With that, JiU walked right out the door, giving Handong one last look before leaving.

“What?” Handong looked at what JiU had left there, it seemed to be a simple polaroid upside down, but as she looked at it closer, there was a faded KM&HD scribbled on it.

There is no way, the redhead thought as she sat down in her chair and started searching for the file Bora had given her, her eyes never leaving the polaroid, afraid it would disappear if she looked away for even a second.

Once she found what she was looking for, Handong took the polaroid without turning it around with one hand and opened the folder with another. 

Staring right back at her, was a 5x8 picture of JiU smiling right back at her; Handong put the polaroid facing up right next to it, the image of her younger smiling self hugging her tightly stole the air right from her lungs.

It seemed impossible, but the file -the name in all caps glaring back at her- and the polaroid couldn’t lie. Handong couldn’t believe her eyes, after all these years, she was back.

Kim Minji.

sjdgsdaj sorry this is kind of a mess.
all mistakes are mine, english is not my first language.

hope you liked this update! next chapter we'll get a glimpse at minji's side of the story.

you can also find me on tw: @anothershipper
cc:/anothershipper