The faint orange hues blended with the shades of pink painting the morning skies; the sun had risen hours ago yet Kang Seulgi was only waking up now. After washing up and eating a mediocre breakfast of ramen which she almost burned, she headed to the living room.

“Saturday morning, Seulgi,” she told herself as she threw herself onto the sofa, grabbing a carton of soy milk from the coffee table and taking a long sip.

Her eyes momentarily gazed outside, casually stopping at the window of her neighbour’s house and that was when Seulgi began choking. Oh, Seulgi knew her neighbour. The latter had only recently moved in next door and they had not gotten off to a very good start. Seulgi later learnt that not everyone was accustomed to having a door slammed in their face when they showed up with a platter full of chocolate-chip cookies and a friendly “Hi, I’m Wonwoo and I’m your new neighbour”.

However, it wasn’t the memory of the impoliteness she had shown her neighbour Wonwoo that currently had Seulgi choking as her lungs gasped for air and the contents of her carton splattered around. It was the fact that Wonwoo was standing by his window wearing nothing but a white towel around his waist.

The moment Seulgi recovered from her choking fit, she turned away from the window at once. She had no interest in watching her handsome half- neighbour towel his hair dry. So what if his brown hair looked gorgeous as he ruffled it around? So what if his smooth porcelain skin was particularly attractive when it was glistening wet? And so what if Seulgi was staring at Wonwoo again because damn, Wonwoo was, like, super fit and two-four-six, yup, he had a six-pack and all.

Furiously blushing red, Seulgi grabbed a magazine from under the sofa cushion and hurriedly flicked through the pages to distract herself. Seulgi was reading about the soaring popularity of some new soy milk brand when her answering machine beeped and a familiar voice filled the room.

“Hi, Pikaseul, it’s Mummy!”

The named girl groaned. Why did her mother have to talk to her like she was still a baby? As if she hadn’t been the one trying to set her daughter up on dates the other day, she thought to herself.

“Don’t worry, I’m not trying to set you up with anyone this time! I’ve spoken with Daddy and we’ve decided that we’ll be understanding even though you got yourself a boyfriend without even telling us first.”

“What boyfriend?” Seulgi blurted out loud as she reached for her carton of soy milk again. “Oh. OH.”

Last time her mother had called, Seulgi had been so irritated by the former suggesting people for her to date and constantly nagging that the young girl abruptly snapped that she already had a boyfriend when in fact she wasn’t seeing anyone but well, she had really needed to get her mother off her back about the whole matter.

“We also decided that we’d like to meet him so we’ll be dropping by at noon and we’ll stay for the weekend. All right, darling? See you soon! Mummy can’t wait to see her precious little girl. Oh, and Daddy’s looking forward to seeing you too, of course.”

The moment those words reached Seulgi’s ears, her eyes widened in shock and next thing she knew, she was spitting out the soy milk she had just drunk, spraying her furniture with good nutritional value.

“No, no, no…” Her eyes darted for the clock and her shoulders slumped. “I do not have enough time to go out, find a soulmate, convince him to move in with me and meet my parents by lunchtime.”

Seulgi was panicking now. She briefly glanced outside again and when she caught sight of a (thankfully) fully-clothed Wonwoo sitting in his house watching what appeared to be a rerun of last night’s episode of Downton Abbey, an ingenious plan formed in her head. It didn’t have to be a soulmate; it could be an instant fake boyfriend.

After an eternity of knocking on Wonwoo’s front door, ringing his doorbell several times and calling “Neighbour~” in the sweetest voice she could muster, the front door finally opened.

“Well it’s about ti— I mean, how are you, neighbour?”

Wonwoo raised a questioning eyebrow and as Seulgi prepared herself to be scolded, she was surprised when she received an apology instead. “Look, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to keep you waiting for so long but I missed last night’s episode so I—”

Reading her watch and sweating when she saw that it was almost noon, Seulgi interrupted Wonwoo and desperately yelled, “Be my boyfriend!”

“Wait, what?” Wonwoo’s eyebrows were furrowed in confusion and it was evident to see that he genuinely believed that he had misheard Seulgi.

The shorter of the two gritted her teeth and slowly repeated herself. “I…need…you…to…be…my…boyfriend…”

“Oh, so that is what you just said. Uh, Seulgi, I don’t know how to put this… You’re a very beautiful girl and I would totally be honoured to date you but the thing is I’m really not looking to date anyone right now. I’m so sorry.”

“No, dude, what the hell are you talking about? My parents are staying with me for the weekend and I told them that I have a boyfriend when I don’t and on such short notice, I can’t find anyone else so can you please pretend that we’re in a relationship till they go away?”

Wonwoo’s mouth formed a small ‘o’ before he crossed his arms and leaned against the doorframe. “You indecently assaulted my doorbell, you interrupted me in the middle of watching my favourite show, you made me feel bad about rejecting you and now you want a favour?”

“For the record, I didn’t feel hurt and you didn’t reject me because I wasn’t even asking you out,” Seulgi said. “Besides, it’s not a favour. I’ll give you these two tickets to this concert tomorrow night if you’ll live with me for the weekend and act as though you’re madly in love with me.”

“Cool, it’s a deal.”

Within minutes, Wonwoo was sprawled across Seulgi’s sofa watching Downton Abbey whilst Seulgi stiffly sat next to him with a stoic face.

“So, how did you two kids meet?”

Seulgi momentarily froze at her father’s question and she elbowed Wonwoo who had his feet on the coffee table. “It’s a funny story actually, Dad.”

“I’m sure we’ll all be thrilled to hear it!” Seulgi’s mother gushed.

There was silence except for the sounds coming from the TV and it wasn’t until the episode ended did Wonwoo turn to Seulgi’s parents with a smile and answer. “I brought cookies to her house and she slammed the door in my face. That’s how we first met.”

“Cookies? Aww, are you still a boy scout?”

“Oh my goodness, Mum…” Seulgi whined with her face in her hands.

“That’s one way to put it, I suppose,” Wonwoo replied with a small grin, draping his arm around Seulgi.

“Son, that football shirt you’re wearing… Is it what I think it is?” Seulgi’s father asked Wonwoo, the former’s cold expression melting away the moment he recognised his favourite football team’s emblem.

Wonwoo nodded. “Vintage. Are you interested in football, Sir?”

For the first time since stepping foot into the house, Seulgi’s father’s face was glowing brighter than his mellow wife.

“Your boyfriend is so adorable, Pikaseul!” her mother said happily as she and Seulgi watched Wonwoo playing football with Seulgi’s father. “I haven’t seen your father enjoying himself this much in ages!”

Seulgi grinned at the sight of her father beaming as he kicked the ball towards Wonwoo who may or may not have looked absolutely irresistible running across the grass.

Noticing the way Seulgi was observing Wonwoo, Seulgi’s mother chuckled merrily and tousled her hair. The girl squirmed free before she turned to open the picnic basket and fish out a sandwich along with a carton of soy milk.

“Daddy and Wonwoo wanted to come to the park to play football whereas you only wanted to come for the sandwiches~”

“Well, Mum, the food is the whole point of a picnic. Food is the point of everything actually.”

“Are cookies not food, too, Pikaseul?” Wonwoo asked playfully.

He and Seulgi’s father had returned from their mini football match and after exchanging a high-five, they sat on the colourful picnic blanket. Wonwoo lay his head in an aghast Seulgi’s lap, grabbing the latter’s unopened carton of soy milk and taking a swig.

Seulgi’s parents looked in horror from Wonwoo, who was calmly relaxing, to Seulgi, who was shaking in fury.

There were only two rules when it came to Kang Seulgi: no calling her “Pikaseul” (her mother was exempt to this) and no touching her soy milk.

That was why it was even more astonishing when Seulgi didn’t do anything but send Wonwoo a sweet smile.

To her parents, it appeared to be an I-love-you-in-spite-of-your-imperfections smile but as Wonwoo cutely fluttered his eyelashes at Seulgi and she stared daggers back, they both knew that Seulgi’s smile had meant something completely different. It was most probably something more along the lines of I-will-destroy-you-with-a-lightsaber.

“Challenge me,” Wonwoo whispered only for the two of them to hear. “I dare you.”

Seulgi smirked and reached for the carton that Wonwoo had drunk from. “I waste a drop of soy milk only because you spoiled the entire contents already.” And with that, Wonwoo found himself covered in good nutritional value.

Jumping up as though he had received an electric shock, Wonwoo backed up and armed himself with another carton of soy milk. He performed a series of odd movements that were meant to resemble Kung Fu techniques – although he failed miserably in the process – before pointing the carton at Seulgi and using his other hand to beckon the girl forward.

Seulgi had forgotten by then that her parents were there and walking past their bewildered faces, she brandished her carton as if it were an actual weapon. “En Garde.”

A fierce and violent blood bath, or in this case, a soy milk bath was what was meant to ensue. Instead, Seulgi found herself giggling along with Wonwoo as they played like little children, drenching each other in the healthy combination that made up soy milk. They eventually fell to the ground, laughing so hard that their sides hurt and it was then in their physical pain and the height of their glee that their eyes met. Their laughter slowly died down and right there, in that moment, they couldn’t help but feel weird.

After the picnic, the four of them embarked on an evening stroll through the city. Seulgi’s mother had insisted that it would be peaceful and romantic but as Seulgi was shoved by a crowd for the umpteenth time, something inside her snapped.

“Muuuuuum! People keep pushing me!”

Her mother rushed over to her at once and placed her hands o