When Jessica catches a break from her schedule, she doesn’t hesitate to pack up a bag and go home for the weekend. She desperately needs a break from one particular groupmate who’s been causing her a throbbing headache—for a spectrum of reasons—over the course of the past few months. All Jessica wants is a bit of peace and quiet, away from all the drama involved with the SoShi dorm.

On a lazy Saturday morning, she twists around in her bed, relishing in the comforting smell of home. When she cracks her eyes open in the soft morning light, she catches the time on her bedside clock and groans when she realizes she’s awake at 8:00AM. She tries to close her eyes and go back to sleep, but—even though it’s first thing in the morning—unwelcomed thoughts of a certain frustrating individual start to plague her mind again.

She sighs tiredly and crosses her arms over her eyes while her mind drifts off into a mountain of confusing thoughts as she’s unsure of her erratic emotions as of late.

Jessica thinks back to that stupid Ideal World Cup show they filmed a week ago and she huffs a laugh at the memory. The feeling is still crystal clear in her mind: a kind of unexplainable wave of shameful anger that boiled from her gut and swelled into her chest before vaporizing just as quickly as it came.

It felt a lot like the green monster.

But what’s there to be jealous of? Taeyeon looking at a bunch of attractive men?—correction—a bunch of pictures of attractive men? “That’s stupid,” Jessica laughs to herself.

There's no reason to be jealous…is there? She has to admit it’s flattering—and one hell of an ego booster—when someone tells you they like you. In fact, she’s no stranger to it since Jessica's had hundreds of fans confess their undying love to her…and yet, it’s so different coming from Taeyeon. Maybe it's because Taeyeon knows the real her and not some phony celebrity façade. Still, Jessica's confused whether or not that spike of jealousy from last week stemmed from the fact Taeyeon expressed interest in someone else (and by someone else, Jessica reminds herself that they were just pictures), thus, less interested in Jessica.

‘Absurd! That's absurd—YOU’RE absurd’, she laughs hysterically to herself. ‘What kind of theories are these?! Why on earth would you be vying for attention against PICTURES?’

“Stop it,” Jessica whispers to herself, slapping herself on the cheeks. “You're thinking about this way too much, Sooyeon.”

For a split second, she thinks she might actually reciprocate the girl’s feelings, but she quickly laughs that idea off too. ‘You're not gay; you've never even looked at another girl like that before. You're crazy for thinking that.’

Frustrated at a useless self-analysis, Jessica presses her palms into her eyelids till she starts to see spots, trying to alleviate the ache in her mind. After another ten minutes lapse, she hops out of bed, desperate to find something else to occupy her attention. She exits her room to find her parents out of the house and, surprisingly, finds her little sister cooking breakfast in the kitchen.

As she silently approaches the kitchen, she hears Krystal singing softly and bouncing around from counter to counter, dicing mushrooms on one board and green peppers on another. When the younger Jung hops to whisking eggs in a bowl, Jessica sees the spring in her step and thinks the girl’s in a suspiciously bright mood.

“You’re making Unnie breakie too, right?” Jessica greets the girl with a smile as she enters the kitchen and takes a seat at the table.

“Oh! Morning, Unnie. You want an omelet?” Krystal asks and her older sister nods eagerly. “What’re you doing up so early anyways?”

Jessica rubs at her eyes with the back of her hand. “Been having trouble sleeping lately,” she confesses to her younger sister.

“YOU?” Krystal laughs, “you’ve been having trouble sleeping?! How is the laziest person in the world having trouble sleeping?”

“Yah.” Jessica packs a mountain of irritation into one syllable for her sibling.

The younger Jung finally catches onto the exhaustion her sister is sporting so she tries to be a bit more sympathetic to her seemingly sensitive temper. “Is something wrong?”

“Just got a lot of my mind,” Jessica says through a yawn.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Krystal offers her ear.

“It’s just…work stuff,” Jessica tells the girl vaguely with a shrug.

Krystal raises her brows because she knows her sister very well. Jessica’s always been close with her groupmates and enjoys spending her extra time playing around with her members, so when she chose to come home for her short two-day vacation, Krystal suspects it has more to do with coworkers than ‘just work stuff’. “Did you…ever find out why Taeyeon-unnie was mad at you?”

‘Am I that obvious?’ Jessica almost asks Krystal how she knows her troubles involve the SoShi leader, but then she remembers that, a few months ago, she had come home and complained to her little sister about the situation, almost in tears about how she couldn’t understand why Taeyeon was ignoring her.

“Sort of,” Jessica elusively tells her, not sure how she could possible explain the gravity of her situation to the younger girl.

“So what was it? Was she just jealous that you and Tiffany-unnie were getting so close?” Krystal frowns.

Jessica laughs at one of the theories the two of them has brainstormed up the last time they talked about this. “No—far from it. We just had a bit of a miscommunication with some work stuff, but we talked it out. We’re fine now.” Jessica tries to quickly brush the topic aside before she accidentally spills all her pent up frustrations to her sister about Taeyeon’s surprise crush on her. “Besides, it’s Fany who’s crazy possessive over members. Sometimes, you can hear her breathing fire when she’s jealous.”

“I think it’s cute,” Krystal laughs at the thought because she’s always liked Tiffany. “You know jealousy’s born from fear when you’re really attached to someone and you’re scared of losing that. Tiffany-unnie just loves you guys too much.”

Jessica involuntarily clenches her jaw a little when her baby sister accidentally opens a door affiliated with Taeyeon-burdened-thoughts in Jessica’s mind, but the ice princess closes it as quickly as it’s opened though. “What are you, a walking dictionary? Where’s that omelet? Unnie’s hungry.”

Krystal rolls her eyes and turns around, going to light the stove. As the pan heats, she starts to dump in the ingredients and stirs them as they sizzle. Then it starts happening again: that singing. Jessica narrows her eyes because it’s not just singing, it’s singing that’s way too airy and bubbly for her sister’s personality. The older Jung lives with eight other girls, so this behavior is all too easy to decipher for Jessica.

“Soojung-ah,” Jessica coos, “who is he?”

“What?” Krystal says rather startled.

Jessica smiles at her adorable baby sister. “Who’s the boy you’re dating?”

“Unnie,” Krystal sighs, and turns around to face the older girl. “I’m sixteen and fresh off my debut,” she says, waving the spatula in the air, “what makes you think I’d have time to date?—actually—what makes you think that I’m stupid enough to try dating while I’m barely a year into my contract?”

“Because you’re in a weirdly good mood.”

“And that’s suspicious?”

“Yes,” Jessica says sternly and matter-of-factly.” First, you’re cooking,” Jessica starts, knowing that her sister takes after her and neither of them are very skilled—nor eager to become skilled—in culinary. “Second, you’re singing while cooking! You know where I’ve seen this before? Hyoyeon,” Jessica says with suspicious, narrow eyes. “Hyoyeon always gets freakishly happy when she’s chasing down a new boy.” And—God—does that happen often. “You have that…that lovesick glow about you, just like her!”

The younger girl laughs and rolls her eyes. “Unnie—”

“Who is he?”

Krystal smiles and blushes. “It’s j-just a crush,” she confesses and Jessica squeals.

“Tell Unnie everything!”

“What’s there to tell?” Krystal tries to shrug off the conversation and turns back to the stovetop to occupy her attention. “It’s not like we’re not dating—”

“Must be someone from your drama set,” Jessica interrupts her sister, talking more to herself than the other girl.

“It doesn’t matter, it’s not important—”

“It’s Kang Ha Neul, isn’t it?!”

Krystal’s eyes nearly pop out of her head and her cheeks turn to fire. “How did you—?”

“Oh my god, Soojungie!” Jessica bounces excitedly in her seat, “tell me all the juicy details.”

Krystal rolls her eyes—hard. “Unnie, I already said it’s just a crush. Oppa’s just really good looking and nice, but that’s it. I’ll date when I feel like I’m at the right age.”

“It’s not good to wait till you’re too old to date, Soojung. It’s good to do it when you’re young.”

“I am sixteen! It’s not like I’m turning thirty next year, geez! And, Unnie, that doesn’t mean you should just rush off and date whoever given the chance, just because you’re young.”

“Oh, so now my little sister is giving me life-experience advice?”

“I just think,” Krystal pauses when she gets a little lost in her thoughts, “I think when the right person comes along, you’ll just know. Like, I want to be so in love with someone so much that he can make me blush just from his gaze and make me weak in my knees and make my stomach feel like it’s filled with butterflies. You know? But Oppa’s just a crush—you’re making too big a deal out of this.”

“You’re getting waaaaay too into your drama,” Jessica laughs at all the lovesick stereotypes her sister mentions. “Come on, don’t you have an ideal type?”

“Not really,” the younger girl shrugs. “Someone handsome?”

“Haha! That’s not a type. Come on, what’s your ideal type?”

“Seriously, I don’t think I have one,” Krystal shrugs again, pulling a folded omelet off the pan onto a plate. “It’s not just about someone being attractive. I want to be able to talk to them and like…really get to know them, you know?” Krystal sets down the plate of food and cutlery in front of her older sister, who looks a little hypnotized by their conversation. “I just think it’d be amazing when you can bare your soul for someone and have someone trust you enough to do the same.”

“Yeah it is,” Jessica whispers faintly.

“Unnie, don't you want the kind of love where someone just occupies your mind for the whole day? Like you can't stop thinking about them no matter how hard you try?” Krystal says with a bright smile, lost in some sort of young fantasy.

Jessica turns away from her sister’s gaze when she's hitting too close to home. She sighs and it’s definitely more to herself than to her sister. “Yeah. I think I know what you’re talking about.” She puts a forkful of fluffy eggs into and it feels a little heavy when her sister’s words are busy burrowing their way deep into her consciousness.

 ***

When Jessica goes to bed that night, she tucks the covers up to her chest and pulls one arm over her head, like she always does. This is her weekend off at home, away from the dormitory—away from Taeyeon. She’s supposed to sleep fourteen hours a day and return to her dorm well rested before she gets back into her hectic idol-schedule. Sleep comes easy to Jessica. Sleep has always come easy to Jessica. Whether at home, at the dorm, on the road—heck—even during show filmings, sleep is Jessica’s forte.

But for the past few weeks, every time she closes her eyes and tries to let herself sink into something so habitual, she instead finds her mind wide awake, involuntarily plaguing her with memories of being stuck in a dark, abandoned, studio room with her groupmate kissing her. The more she tells her brain to, ‘shut up and go to sleep’, the louder the frenzy of memories of soft lips pressed against her own get dialed up.

Jessica sighs, knowing that sleep isn’t going to come easy again tonight.

***

After some much needed time at home with her family, Jessica finally returns back to the dormitory, only to be nearly trampled to death when she gets through the door. She shrieks at her customary shrill volume as Yoona and Sooyoung almost plow her into the ground while they fly out the door with Hyoyeon close behind them.

“Outta of the way, Princess!” Sooyoung yells.

“Sorry, Unnie!” Yoona calls out from down the hall.

When her heart finally settles a bit, Jessica rolls her eyes at her chaotic, but wonderful life with her eight members.

“Ice cream run!” Tiffany declares as she runs past Jessica too. “Text me what you want, Jessi!”

Leave it to the girls to be gluttonous enough to make an ice cream run in the middle of winter.

“Wait! I’ll come with!” Jessica calls after them, never one to turn down a good time with her members.

Just as she starts to follow Tiffany, a hand pulls her from leaving the door though. “Sorry,” Sunny tells her groupmate, “car’s full! We’ll pick some up for the rest of you though! See you later!”

Jessica pouts as the front door slams close, but decides to see where the rest of the girls are, so she kicks off her flats before making her way into the dorm. She stops when she sees the couch from the hallway and clearly spots only one occupant on it and, of course, it’s Taeyeon. Jessica stutters in her step for a moment, deliberating between being alone with Taeyeon and just locking herself in her room till the rest of the girls get back.

But between an indecisive mind and skittering feet, Jessica spends so much time hesitating in the hallway that she figures Taeyeon must have noticed her being creepy as hell lingering in the background like this. So, in the end, she drops her carrier in the hallway and chooses to go join her leader in front of the TV.

“Hey, Taengoo,” Jessica greets as she plops down beside her on the couch.

“Oh, hey.” If Taeyeon had any knowledge of Jessica hovering around in the hallway for the past minute, she certainly isn’t showing any signs of being mystified by it. “How was your weekend back at home?”

“Good,” Jessica replies, relaxing into the couch when it doesn’t feel as awkward as she thought it’d be talking to Taeyeon alone again. “Haven’t been able to see Soojung for a while since she’s been busy too.”

“How is she?”

“Tired, but she’s slowly getting the hang of the schedule-packed life.”

“Ah, that’s good.”

When silence begins to stretch for a bit too long, Jessica looks around nervously. “Where’s Seohyun and Yuri?”

“Maknae’s in her room studying and Yuri’s out filming right now—I think she said she’s going to be back soon though,” Taeyeon says, before she starts thumbing through her phone to check their group chatroom. “Yeah, she said she’ll be back in an hour—you know if you read the chat once in a blue moon, you’d know this?” Taeyeon looks at her groupmate.

“But my phone is alllllll the way in my purse,” Jessica drones.

Taeyeon looks down at the girl’s feet where her bag is. Lazy. Typical lazy Jessica. Taeyeon huffs a laugh, hating how cute she finds the girl.

Jessica wasn’t planning on bring it up again anytime soon, especially not with the lack-of-sleep-weekend she just had because of the entire situation, but Jessica thinks fate might be toying with the both of them when she turns her attention to the TV screen. It’s a drama playing and the lead characters are in a dimly lit room together where the man suddenly confesses to the woman and kisses her. Jessica internally rolls her eyes at the scene because, of course, it’s her and Taeyeon, alone in the living room watching a scene like this play on TV in front of them.

Sometimes, Jessica wishes she had an existing filter of some sort because moves faster than her brain can process thoughts, often resulting in her infamous Sica-effect atmosphere changes. “Hey, Taeng, can I ask you something?”

Taeyeon blows out a slow, long exhale because she already knows what topic is in question from the way Jessica asks—and the scene playing in front of them isn’t helping either. “Sure,” Taeyeon replies back, slightly hesitant as she does a quick look around to make sure Seohyun is still in her room.

“How long?”

“How long what?”

“How long have you known you liked me?”

Taeyeon sinks back into the couch a little farther when embarrassment is creeping under her skin again. “A while now.”

“If you’ve had feelings for me for so long, why did you treat me so badly?”

“Sorry. I just thought it’d be easier if I kept myself away from you. It just felt easier to hurt than be hurt. It’s like if I put you to arm’s length, then maybe these feelings would go away eventually.” Taeyeon watches as Jessica does that cute, pouting nod with that dimple that form in her chin. “But I guess that didn’t work very well.”

Jessica gives soft a chuckle at the statement because, even with the awkward tension, they’re now closer than they’ve ever been before. “Is it…is it okay if I ask you something else?”

Taeyeon nods, finding it sort comforting that she can actually talk about all these feelings with someone, even if that someone is the reason for all the pandemonium in her life right now. “Sure.”

“How did you know you liked me?”

“What?” Taeyeon laughs at the simple question.

“You know, like…what was it that made you realized you liked me?”

Taeyeon presses her tongue into her cheek, uncertain about answering. “I just…knew. It felt like a love song or like a rom-com movie.”

“What do you mean?”

Taeyeon laughs and pinches her eyes shut. “Please don’t make me say it. It’s embarrassing.”

Jessica smiles warmly, greatly anticipating what Taeyeon’s blushing about. “Tell me.”

“Sica,” Taeyeon laughs the girl’s name and shakes her head.

“Pleeeeeeeeeease?”

God, with aegyo like that, Taeyeon disintegrates like a vampire in the sunlight. The kid leader takes in a long inhale and sputters through laughter when she blows the air back out. “I don’t know…it just started happening. Being too close to you made me blush; when you smiled at me, it made my stomach flip; I think you gave me a back-hug once and I thought I was going to explode,” Taeyeon laughs, burying her redden face into her palms.

Jessica echoes her laughter, finding the statements so sweet that it makes her heart accelerate in the most wonderful of ways.

“There, are you happy now? I’m going to die of humiliation.” Taeyeon fans air at her face, trying to cool down her skin.

Jessica makes the heat much worse though when she doesn’t stop the next question that leaves . “Do you ever think about that kiss?” she asks quiet and bashfully.

“W-what?” Taeyeon replies, startled by the abrupt shift in the atmosphere. This is the Sica-Effect on a whole different level.

“You know, back at the studio, in that room?” Jessica reminds her. If Taeyeon wasn’t paralyzed by fear right now, she’d give the girl an eye roll because how the hell could she forget? “Do you ever think about that kiss?” Jessica repeats a little stronger.

Taeyeon gulps and doesn’t trust herself to answer, so she just lets herself sit in dead silence while Jessica’s question hangs uncomfortably in the air.

“Sometimes,” Jessica starts to whisper and it’s her turn to preoccupy her eyes by staring at her lap with hands nervously twisting around each other. “Sometimes, I can’t sleep at night because I think about it,” Jessica confesses in a whisper and Taeyeon’s skin flushes hot with embarrassment.

“Y-you should just forget it happened,” Taeyeon tells Jessica, also turning her eyes to her own lap in fear of seeing anything that might border on the resemblance of hope in the other girl’s face.

“Have you?”

Taeyeon’s eyes are still very much engrossed on her grey sweatpants, but she can feel Jessica’s eyes burning into the side of her head now.

“Have you forgotten?” Jessica asks.

“N-no,” Taeyeon’s voice trembles.

“What if…what if I was curious too?”

“W-what?” At the question, Taeyeon snaps her eyes up to meet Jessica’s out of alarm.

Jessica shrugs, trying to make light of the situation she knows she’s diving into. “What if I was…maybe bicurious too?” she offers Taeyeon.

Even though Jessica’s trying to gently ease into this, she’s reduced the older girl to a mess of frantic gulps and quivers though. “I-I don’t k-know.” Taeyeon marvels at Jessica’s composure because she feels like jumping off the balcony.

Jessica tries to tread lightly, but as her next sentence rolls off her tongue, the shock that swallows Taeyeon’s features looks like Jessica’s hit her groupmate across the face.

“Is it okay…if I kiss you?”