“Oh, wow.”

Seulgi winced and waved a hand in front of her face to swat away the dust, coughing as she flung the door wide open to let the outside air and much needed sunlight rush in.

She stood on the doorstep of the dark room with Irene’s hand clutched tightly in her right hand, her other hand grasping the strap of her guitar case on her shoulder as both of them assessed the small, murky living space that would be their home for several weeks.

The place consisted of one small room that seemed to serve as living room, dining space – it was really just a small table placed on the floor – and kitchenette, and another small room that seemed to be the bedroom on the far-right corner. Another room appeared to be the bathroom beside it.

The air was stale due to long disuse, and the tinier nonhuman residents seemed to make themselves comfortable by decorating the place with their white cobwebs.

Seulgi found the light switch on her right and hit it on, grateful that the place at least had functional electricity. She laughed nervously.

“I’m sorry. This is not what happens when movie’s heroines take their lovers away for a romantic escapade.”

Irene followed her inside the poor excuse of a living space, emanating soft laughter as she nudged Seulgi slightly. “Come on, it’s not that bad. I’m sure a little cleanup and work on ventilation will do magic and will shoo away the spiders. It will be our place.”

A grin adorned Seulgi’s face with newfound optimism.

“Right. It’s ours. I mean, not ours ours but still ours.” She couldn’t keep shut and stop grinning even if she wanted to. Her language teacher in elementary school would be crying in pain at how inarticulate she was being but she didn’t mind.

“Let’s open the windows so the fresh air come in.” Irene padded over to the nearest one and pulled the curtain open, immediately attacked by a whirlwind of dust and reduced to a sneezing mess.

Seulgi laughed at her dismay and dropped her heavy backpack on the floor. “Maybe we should go shopping for masks, dusters and other cleaning utilities first.”

“Agree.” Irene made a last distasteful face at the dust assaulting her, turning around with a finger pressed below her nostrils to prevent further sneeze-fest. “The walls need some work too.” She said after observing the peeling, faded wallpapers that surely had seen better days perhaps one decade ago.

“And the roof.” Seulgi’s head was tilted up as she pointed at the water stains adorning the ceilings. “We better hope it won’t be raining any time soon, else we will be flooded.”

Irene let out a hearty laugh, tilting her head to the side and staring at Seulgi with so much light in her eyes it was as if Seulgi had just stated that they would be moving to a mansion in Jeju island and not stay in the rundown, crampy room at the backcountry coastal town.

“I wasn’t aware that the idea of being flooded amused you so much.”

“No, silly. I’m just happy.” The smile on Irene’s face remained lively. “This – all of this feels so good.” She gestured between them and towards the space. “Discussing what to do for our living space. It feels so – domestic. So natural. This is what my dreams are made of.”

Seulgi’s teasing grin softened into a tender smile as she padded over to take the messenger bag off Irene’s free shoulder and relieved her from the burden. Her gaze met the older girl’s as she lifted a hand to caress soft cheek.

“We will make the most out of this time, right? No sad thoughts, no growing anxiety about the impending future, no gloomy reminiscing about the past. Just now. We are going to live these few weeks in the present. You are only going to think about me. I’m only going to think about you.”

“That sounds like a very good way to live.” Irene murmured, eyes fixating on Seulgi’s very close lips. She went on her toes to press a gentle kiss on said lips until the owner hummed in satisfaction.

“That’s a breach of law.”

Irene pulled back and stared at her incredulously. “I can’t believe you are still going on with that.”

“I’m nothing if not a woman of my words.” Seulgi crooked her lips into a very cocky smirk.

“Fine.” Irene let go of her completely and drew herself backward, undoubtedly would have thrown both of her hands in the air if it wasn’t for the fact that her right arm was still in cast and sling. “Don’t regret your life decision when you are begging me for a kiss and I act like you are an invisible spirit of this forsaken place.”

Seulgi’s laughter grew louder as she clutched at her stomach. “I can’t believe you are really mad. God, you can be such a baby sometimes. Come here. I’ll give you a kiss.”

“No.” Irene withdrew from her further, rising her chin up defiantly. “No kiss until I’m off my cast. That’s three more weeks.”

“I was kidding! Alright?”

“Not my fault.” Irene stuck her tongue out, walking backwards and avoiding Seulgi as the girl chased after her. In a fraction of second, they were engaged in a chasing game around the small, crampy space.

Seulgi lunged at Irene around the kitchenette corner so easily and seized her by the waist as they both pressed together and broke into vivacious laughter.

“God, this place is so small, I can’t even run away from you if I want to.”

“Oh sure, blame it on the small place and not on you secretly wanting me to catch you.” Seulgi dipped her head and kissed Irene squarely on the lips, effectively shutting her up from all her arguments.

“Mm-hmm, I may agree with you on that one.” Irene murmured and smiled against her lips. Her good arm s upward to curl around Seulgi’s neck.

“Who is that?”

An unknown voice jolted them both from their self-induced haze, springing them apart like teenagers caught making out in a school’s locker room.

On the doorstep, stood an elderly woman with white hair and a feeble walking stick.

“Who are you people?” She squinted at them slightly, suspicion and wariness framing her face in the shape of a wrinkly frown. “How did you get the key to my place?”

The lightbulb seemed to pop on in Seulgi’s head as she immediately scooted forward and gave the old lady a polite bow.

“Grandmother, you must be the landlord of this place. We are Yura’s friends. The – uh, the tenant from Seoul who rented from you several months ago but left before the lease is up. She told us she has paid the fee up-front and that we could use this place for a while for – uh, holiday, if we want to.”

The old grandmother who looked rather spunky in her black Rockstar t-shirt and white knitted cardigan finally relaxed and let her facial creases fall. “Ah, yes. That noisy, lively redhead with aversion to any clothes that can cover up her s. I remember her.”

Seulgi heard Irene’s breath hitch slightly beside her in a comical way and she couldn’t help but grow a smile too. “Yes, that would be the one.”

“Odd person, that one.” The grandmother lifted her walking stick, gesturing at the room they were standing in. “Renting this pitiful excuse of a room for six months only to spy on her lover who was having affair with another woman in this town. Wanting to catch them red handed, she said. Though I admit, I would have done the same and whooped anyone who dared to cheat on me.”

The old lady shook her white head, finally looking at them again. “So, are you guys like her too?”

“Huh? We are not here to spy on people.”

“No, silly. I mean are you guys lovers?”

Seulgi’s breath stopped for a second as her smile fell at the totally unexpected, straight forward question. Beside her, she could feel Irene tense greatly.

The older girl fidgeted before Seulgi squared her shoulders and stood on her feet taller.

“Yes.” She said with her chin high up, moving her hand to the side to find Irene’s anxious fingers and intertwining them with hers. “Yes, we are.”

“Alright, no need to go all Rambo and daring on me, child. I’m not one who is against girls going down on other girls.”

Seulgi nearly choked, in total disbelief and amusement at what she had just heard. Irene seemed to think the same because the look on her face was priceless too.

“I live downstairs with my cat.” The old lady explained, already turning to leave them alone. “It’s just me in this place. There’s no other tenant. This isn’t exactly a holiday spot. There is convenience store, local market, and some eateries down the left road. The right road will lead you to the beach. It’s quiet and good for relaxing, I suppose. Knock on my door if you need anything.”

She poked her head back inside when they thought she was gone. “And please be quiet at night. We won’t – want the neighbors to sue me.”

She waved and then disappeared, leaving Seulgi and Irene to stare at each other in awed silence.

“Wow.” Seulgi said, blinking her eyes several times.

---------------------------------------------------------

Seulgi had never really liked shopping since she was a kid, but maybe she had only been doing it with the wrong people all this time.

She found herself being dragged willingly by the arm across the local stores, feeling zero annoyance and about a hundred scale of amusement as she spent more time watching Irene babble excitedly about things she wanted to buy than actually assessing the said items.

Irene held up a fluffy purple towel, sporting patterns of tiny, white bunnies.

“Don’t you think we have bought enough purple stuffs for today? We have purple wallpapers, purple bedsheets, purple curtains and purple –”

“They are all different shades of purple.” Irene said seriously as if it would justify her purple frenzy and left no room for arguments.

Seulgi raised both hands and laughed. “Alright, alright, no need to send me death glare.”

She tailed Irene and watched her pick up some more house essentials, juggling with the shopping bags in her own arms. “But I will get to pick our toothbrushes, our socks, and our sweaters. I want us to be one of those gross, twinning couples. You can’t say no to me.”

“Deal.” Irene glanced at her, smirking as she picked yet another purple item from the rack. Was it purple duster and purple Downy? This woman really didn’t joke around.

At this rate, Seulgi worried she might be painted purple too.

They left the store and visited a convenience store after that, buying milk, eggs, noodles and other dietary supplies before heading out to get Irene some new clothes.

While Seulgi had brought hers from home, Irene didn’t have much to begin with. They also got their identical socks, sweaters and toothbrushes before padding home.

There was advantage to living in a quiet outskirt, Seulgi thought. The streets were sleepy and empty, and nobody seemed to notice who Irene was. Nor did anybody see them hold hands and practically skip their way back. Excited and happy like little schoolgirls on their wayward trip.

“Ready?” Seulgi said, armed with her purple rubber gloves and purple mask. Her hair was tied up into a ponytail. In front of her, Irene stood with similar look save for her casted arm in sling. She bumped a tiny fist to Seulgi’s. “We are going to make this place shiny!”

They flung the windows open and ripped the dirty curtains off, peeling dusty bedsheets and carrying all the filthy textiles out of the room as the quirky grandma watched them from her porch downstairs with unveiled interest. A loud rock music was blaring from her radio and Seulgi had to chuckle at her feisty landlord.

The next thing to be carried out was the old, heavy mattress because it severely needed sunlight to dry.

“No, I can do it!” Irene insisted, wrestling with her side of the mattress which was proven to be difficult to be done with one arm.

“It’s only single-sized. I can carry it alone.” Seulgi tried to pull the thing to herself.

“No, we are doing this together. I only broke one arm, not both!”

The adorable stomp and frown were enough to make Seulgi give in their little tug-of-war with laughter. In a way, she was happy that Irene seemed to want to do more and more things even though the stubbornness gave her headache sometimes.

Next, they peeled off the old wallpapers and replaced them with the new ones, helping each other to measure the length and width of the papers to match the walls’ size. When everything was fixed and cut, they both plastered their parts on the walls and smoothed them over.

Seulgi had to work on the ceilings alone though, as Irene held the ladder – borrowed from the spunky grandma – steady for her.

“Careful up there.” Irene looked concerned from floor level as Seulgi continued to replace the old, water-stained ceiling wallpapers with the new ones. It was white with geometric pattern to compliment the purple walls.

“Done!” The taller girl chirped and climbed down the ladder, jumping to the floor from the second-last step as she landed right into Irene’s space.

They were both face to face as Seulgi