Wendy didn't like going out to parties - she was the kind of girl who enjoyed staying indoors under a warm matress, cuddled against her girlfriend she had been dating for six years now and living together for three years, eating a slice of pizza and talking about the silly things that happened in the random film that would be playing in the background. But this wasn't about her or pizza, not even about Seulgi - it was about her best friend, Joohyun, and she would do anything for her, even if that meant being out of her zone of comfort.

It was Irene's twenty six birthday and she had invited all of her friends to her apartment in Hongdae. And here they were, Kang Seulgi and Son Wendy, holding hands in the middle of a crowded party, talking to one of Irene's friend, a younger girl called Yerim who was a high schooler who lived next door to Irene during the girl's college years. 

The conversation was getting quite interesting as Seulgi and Yeri were talking about a passion they had in common - dancing - when suddenly Irene pulled Seulgi by the sleeve and muttered something on her ear that made her pale.

"Okay, don't panic because I don't know how, but Joy is here and she's really drunk."

This didn't go unnoticed to Wendy, who felt the grip on her hand tightening and furrowed her eyebrows with worry as she asked "What's wrong?"

"Joy is here" Seulgi sighed as she looked at the ceiling. She shook her head a little as painful memories and uneasiness hit her. "And she's drunk."

"How did she even get here?" Wendy wondered, since both Irene and Seulgi had stopped talking to her ever since the break up seven years ago. 

"I don't know" Irene answered, quite outraged that her birthday party was being trashed by no other than Joy. She rubbed the back of her neck and let out a growl. "I will try to tell her again to leave."

Seulgi nodded and she looked at Irene as she left, turning her attention back to Wendy who was giving her a worried look. She tried to flash her a reassuring smile as she loosened the grip on her hand to caress her palm. "I'm sorry, honey."

"Don't be." Wendy shook her head as she Seulgi's hand as well, the other letting out a small sigh. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, it has been a while since I last saw her and I have you now. I'm worried because you know that Joy used to be really agressive when she was drunk. I wouldn't stand it if she tried to hurt you" She explained her worries calmly, as they always did, and Wendy nodded in understanding. 

Yeri, who was standing in front of the now gloomy looking couple, tilted her head with genuine worry. "Are you guys okay?"

"Um, yes, sorry Yerim" Seulgi answered, giving her a smile. "We are just worried because my ex is at the party and she's drunk."

"That sounds dangerous" Yeri bit on her bottom lip, but just as she was about to say something else, someone in between the crowd, near the birthday girl, called her attention. "Oh, hey, Joy unnie!" 

The couple froze on the spot when Yeri waved her hand with a smile on her face, trying to call the attention of the person the couple didn't want her attention from. Wendy reacted first, tugging on Seulgi's hand and trying to pull her away from there, but they were stopped when an slender arm wrapped around the tallest's shoulder.

"Well, well, who do we have here?"

*

Seulgi shivered at the sound of that voice. Wendy had the urge to tear Joy's arm away from Seulgi's body, but she couldn't find the strenght to do so. She, however, pulled on Seulgi's hand again, pulling her enough for Joy's arm to slip from her shoulder, making the girl with the red lipstick smirk as the shortest stood in front of Seulgi in a protective way.

"Oh, so this girl in here is the ace girl you are dating now, right?" Joy looked at her like she was some kind of weird animal she had never seen, smirking at the sight like she was inferior. 

"Joy, get out of here" Irene warned her again, placing her hand on the girl's shoulder only to get smacked.

"How does it feel to be dating a person who is the closest thing to being a snail?" Joy laughed, the alcohol filling her laughter, the smell of the vodka almost unbearable. 

"Joy, get out of here" Irene's voice was getting thicker as she tried to pull the girl away, only to get another slap. 

"Has Seulgi here turned into a nun or something? Come on" Joy snorted, making the tense atmosphere turn even worse. "Hasn't she told you how she begged me to her? How she screamed my name like she was some kind of ? How is a snail like you going to-"

The change of song came just in time when a loud slap was heard. Joy's hair was all over her face as Irene stood there, breath uneven as she held her hand in a fist.

"You will never talk about my friends like that in my house with that dirty tongue of yours."

Wendy was shocked because she had never seen Irene this furious. Seulgi, having known the girl for longer, wasn't. She knew she could get agressive when someone was trying to hurt her friends.

"This dirty tongue has made wonders on her. Why don't you tell her, Seulgi-ah?" 

"Get the out!" Irene screamed as she pushed her. A taller guy who happened to be walking by, a nice guy called Henry who happened to be Wendy's friend, pulled Joy by the arm and walked her to the door.

*

The music started again and people kept enjoying the party, but Seulgi and Wendy couldn't help the uneasy feeling they had, still startled with all that happened.

"Shall we head home?" Seulgi asked in a whisper.

"Hm" Wendy hummed, her head getting a lot of confusing thoughts. "Sure."

As soon as they got home after bidding farewell to Irene, who kept apologizing for Joy though it wasn't her fault, Seulgi headed to the shower to wash the unfateful events off her body. Wendy on the other hand just went to their bedroom and lay on the bed, facing the ceiling as she got her mind lost in all the thoughts she had.

Seulgi had gone six years without any ual because of her. It really hit her after what Joy had spat on their faces. Seulgi had given up her ual life in order to be with her romantically. And though she ocasionally asked her if she was okay with that and Seulgi always answered that she was, it really hit her hard that Seulgi could be enduring some hardships just to follow her aual lifestyle. 

She began to wonder if Seulgi had to touch herself when it got too unbeareable and though she couldn't understand how it could feel, she felt guilty that Seulgi had to deal with it alone. She had offered Seulgi to have just to please her just once, but Seulgi just smiled at her and said that she didn't need her to force herself to do things she didn't want to do.

Wendy wanted to do it, now more than ever. She wanted to help her, she wanted to please her. 

Just when that thought was becoming clearer in her mind, Seulgi walked into the room with a towel wrapped around her body and opened the wardrove to take out some . 

"Are those new?" Wendy asked out of curiosity, since she had never seen those. 

"Oh, these?" Seulgi asked as she took off the towel. "No, I had them for two years now. I bought them on a sale. Quite cute, aren't they?" Seulgi asked as she put the pair of underwear in front of her thigh, showing her girlfriend how it woud look if she wore them. She then slipped herself into the underwear and began to put on the body cream.

Wendy realized that she hadn't payed attention to her girlfriend's underwear in two years and though it was the anxiety of losing Seulgi talking louder than her rational self, she felt somehow guilty that Seulgi had bought cute underwear and she had never noticed. 

As Seulgi was humming and putting the body cream on her legs, a sudden idea crossed her mind and she took no time voicing it out. "May I help you?"

Seulgi looked up at Wendy, slightly questioning her, but since they had had bathed each other and cleaned each other's hairs, Seulgi thought it wasn't something that would feel any different than any other time, so she nodded her head. Wendy got closer to Seulgi and put some cream on her hands before she started massaging her girlfriend's ankles.

Seulgi hummed as they applied the cream in every single spot of the oldest's skin and Seulgi got the feeling that it felt different from any previous touch because Wendy seemed to be really into it, like searching for any kind of reaction in her. 

Once they were done, Seulgi put on her long promotional t-shirt of pringels and slipped under the matress next to Wendy, humming in contentment as she nuzzled her girlfriend's neck.

"And to think that I could have been cuddling with you here instead of being at the party" Seulgi muttered. She felt Wendy getting tense, her jaw clenching slightly. "Are you okay, baby?"

"Just a little bit startled still" Wendy answered and it was half true. Seulgi sighed and wrapped an arm around the other's waist.

"I wish it had just been the two of us and Irene. Just a calm dinner is all I need for a birthday" Seulgi caressed Wendy's hair with her free hand, absentmindly. "But well, it was Irene's birthday so we had to go along with whatever she wanted. I'm sorry for her, really. She didn't deserve her birthday to go that way because of Joy."

"Yeah, she didn't" Wendy agreed in a mutter. Seulgi looked up at Wendy, leaning on the pillow to look at her face.

"You are not affected by what she said, aren't you?" She asked, her voice gentle as she kept her hair. Wendy shook her head at first but then she sighed as she noticed that knowing gaze Seulgi was giving her. 

"I just- I don't know. Are you okay with not having ?"

Seulgi nodded without a doubt. "Sure."

"But Joy said-"

"Joy is an " Seulgi stopped her as she placed her hand on Wendy's cheek, making her face her. "I don't miss having , Wan-ah. All I really need is to be with you. You bring calm to my life and that's all I need."

She pressed a chaste kiss on her lips and she rubbed her nose against hers. Wendy sighed and shut her eyes tight, holding back her tears. 

"What's wrong, honey?" She asked sweetly as she rubbed her thumb on the shorter's cheek.

"I-I don't know what got over me. I just wanted to please you and I don't know, I just turned to be awkward Wendy."

Seulgi grinned cheekily at how cute her girlfriend was and pressed a kiss on her nose.

"Geez, you silly. Don't you know you are all I need?"

"I know, but-" Wendy let out her tears, feeling full of relief though the doubts were still there.

"I love you, you know that. I love you from here to the moon and back. I love you with a vanila, chocolate, honey with a cherry on top" Seulgi whispered as she caressed her cheeks and wiped her tears away with her hand.

"I love you too" Wendy answered, smiling at the sweet words she had used. "But d-do you... Um, do you seriously not need ?"

Seulgi shook her head. "Honestly, if you had ask me six years ago, my answer would have been that I need it, but thanks to you I started apreaciating the things I hadn't experienced before. I started loving the way you left a note on my locker every single morning so I would go to class with a smile. I started loving having lunch with you, just making you laugh so you would almost choke on your food because gods, your laugher is so adorable. I started loving the way you touched my hair, the way you played with it when we cuddled to watch a movie. And I loved the way you pressed a peck on my lips when I pouted, so much that I even pouted when it wasn't necesary for you to kiss it away."

Seulgi pressed a kiss on the girl's nose again. Wendy was touched with her words, but she still had a doubt on her mind and she was unsure on how to voice it out. 

Seulgi however read her like an open book. "Are you wondering if I e, Wen?" 

Wendy was taken back by the question but once she got out of her initial shock she nodded timidly.

"Well, I'm not going to deny that there had been some times I had to have a cold shower. When we first started to date, before I knew you were aual, I did touch myself thinking about you, but once I got used to it, I learnt to live without it. And it's not as everyone thinks it is - it's not that hard. At least, not when you are with the right person you want to spend all your life with."

Wendy nodded in understanding but a question remained. "But would it be okay if we - I don't know, someday when I'm ready, if we try and-" Wendy didn't know how to end her sentence, but Seulgi understood.

"Just when you are ready, Wen. Though I still think that you don't have to force yourself."

"But I don't want you to deal with it alone" She muttered, pouting slightly.

"I don't have anything to deal with right now, hon. I'm just fine with laying here with you, cuddling and thinking about what name we should give to the first kitten we adopt."

Wendy giggled at that statement. "I prefer a dog"

"Oh my, we are going to get into our first arguement, aren't we?" Seulgi chuckled, making Wendy giggle again like she was a schoolgirl again. "A dog is also fine to me."

"A labrador retriever" Wendy muttered and Seulgi hummed in answer.

"Aren't those quite big?"

"They are. But they are cute. They kind of remind me to you" Wendy sighed with relief at how easy everything was with Seulgi, how content she made her feel.

"Do they?" She asked, grinning as she pressed a kiss against her lips, pulling away to look at Wendy's face. The younger stood there looking back at Seulgi with a small smile on her face.

"Thank you, Sseul" Wendy whispered sweetly. 

"There's no need to thank me" Seulgi shook her head. 

"Still, thank you for staying with me even when your drunk ex calls me snail."

"Thank you for staying with me after my drunk ex called you snail" Seulgi repeated, bringing her hand to her girlfriend's back and rubbing it gently. Wendy chuckled and closed her eyes, relaxed at Seulgi's touch.

"I love you."

Seulgi hummed and pressed a last kiss before they went to sleep.

"I love you too, awkward Wendy."