21. + 22. + 23. + 24. + 25.

Joohyun’s house is empty this weekend.

Her mother, step-father, Yerim, and Yeri’s boyfriend have gone away to visit some of Yeri’s extended family. The only reason Joohyun got out of it was because she had been on a school trip for the past three days and got home after everyone else had to leave. So she has the house to herself and her mother trusts her not to throw a giant party, namely because Joohyun would rather have dental surgery without painkillers than have a bunch of kids from school getting drunk in her living room.

On the Friday night, she does have a few people over though: Seulgi, Byulyi, Henry, Solar, some girls from Joohyun’s classes, and a couple people from her volunteer activities. They order pizza, watch a movie, and play Dance Revolution. It’s a pretty successful night, as far as Joohyun is concerned. Everyone has a good time, everyone was sober, and nothing in the house indicates that Joohyun had guests. She also tells everyone—except Seulgi, because duh—to head out by 1am. They spend the last hour playing spin the bottle despite the fact that everyone except Byulyi, Solar, and Henry thinks  Joohyun and Seulgi are a couple.

It’s a of good luck that every time Seulgi or Joohyun spin it happens to land on the other girl.

Four consecutive spins happen before Byulyi kicks them out of the round, saying they should just get a room already because obviously some supernatural elements are at play if it keeps landing on each other. Seulgi warns Byulyi that she sounds like her mother and Byulyi replies that that’s a compliment because she’s met Seulgi’s mother and she’s rad.

1am rolls around sooner than they thought it would. Everyone takes garbage and recycling with them as they leave, lingering in the front foyer as they make their goodbyes. Once the house is empty, Joohyun and Seulgi are at a loss. They could watch something on Netflix or going on a baking binge in the kitchen. Obviously, the possibilities are endless.

“We could go swimming,” Joohyun proposes offhandedly, tracing the pattern in the countertop.

The idea entices Seulgi until she remembers she didn’t pack a swimsuit.

“You could borrow one from Yerim?”

Seulgi’s answer includes two fingers and Joohyun didn’t have to look to know which ones they were.

“No one’s home.” Joohyun muses, resting her chin on her balled up fists.

“Your observational skills are second to none, Sherlock.” Seulgi replies as she swings open the fridge door in search of something to eat.

“We could go without suits.”

Seulgi doesn’t even pretend to think the suggestion through before she answers, “Lead the way.”

Five minutes later, Joohyun and Seulgi are standing buck in Joohyun’s backyard.

“Is it cold?” Seulgi wonders aloud, already chilly in the evening air. It’s June already, practically summer. Beside her, Joohyun grabs her hand and shouts, “why don’t we find out?” only to jump directly into the glistening clear water.

“BAE, YOU !”Seulgi curses because holy , who does that??

Head thrown back in laughter, Joohyun turns to her drenched friend and very mockingly asks, “Is it too cold?”

Pushing wet strands of hair out of her face, Seulgi lurches towards Joohyun. “I’m going to get you for that, Bae.”

Breaking into a , Joohyun manages to keep herself from ingesting any water while calling back, “You’re going to have to catch me first!”

Eventually Seulgi does catch up to her and yes, Joohyun appreciates how fitting that is. Grabbing at Joohyun, Seulgi bobs in the water. She assumes she kissed Joohyun first but it’s hard to remember when all she can think about is the fact that she is wet and warm and wrapped around her best friend, fake girlfriend. They’re kissing for a while and Joohyun’s s are round and heaving and feel incredible pressed up against Seulgi’s s. It’s an entirely new sensation that erodes Seulgi’s mind entirely. She can’t remember her own name, doesn’t know anything more than how perfect Joohyun feels.

They only get out of the water when they start to notice their skin getting all pruney.

26.

Seulgi’s appendix bursts and the nurses won’t let Joohyun see her until the day after her surgery.

She comes back ridiculously early the next morning and befriends a compassionate nurse, who says it’s okay if she hangs out with Seulgi’s room as long as she doesn’t disrupt Seulgi or the hospital staff in anyway. It was 7am when she bussed to the hospital and it’s not until 10am that Seulgi wakes up.

“Seul,” Joohyun breathes in a combination of gratefulness and fear. “You up?”

“Yeah,” she replies drowsily. “That you, Bae?”

Joohyun stutters her answer, too busy trying to blink away her tears to care about how stupid she probably sounds. “Yeah. Are you okay?”

“Everything hurts.”

“1 to 10?”

“15.”

Oh God, oh God.Joohyun feels like she’s going to need a nurse in a second. Seulgi has never been able to handle pain—physical, anyway—and she looks so pale under the awful hospital fluorescents. She must have been in such terrible pain and her mother was probably so scared. Joohyun wishes she had been there when it happened but she knows she wouldn’t have been able to do anything to alleviate her friend’s pain. Seeing Seulgi exhausted, hooked up to machines, tears Joohyun apart in the worst possible way.

“I’ll get you a nurse.”

“Wait!”

Seulgi stops her by grasping Joohyun’s wrist. Her eyes are closed, lips parted. She looks so different in a hospital gown.

“Stay with me.”

“You need a doctor or a nurse or something. Let me get someone and then we’ll-we’ll—”

“Joohyun,” Seulgi means it to sound patient but it only comes out pained. “Please.”

It’s only one syllable but it takes the fight out of Joohyun, who sinks in to the hospital mattress. Leaning down, she brushes their lips together, feels Seulgi exhale softly at the contact. Her cheeks are wet but she isn’t sure if those are her tears or Seulgi’s.

“I love you.”

27.

“I can’t believe I have to go camping with the family for a whole week; no Internet, no cell phone. I’m going to be completely cut off from the world. I might as well go live in a pioneer village!” Seulgi whines as she forces yet another outfit into her suitcase. Meanwhile, Joohyun is sorting through all the crap in Seulgi’s closet, which she hasn’t cleaned in forever.

“Do you even care you’re going to be without my glorious presence for eight entire days?”

Joohyun hears Seulgi, acknowledges her with an affirming sound, but can’t take her eyes off the folded, nearly faded photograph in her hands. In the picture they’re both seven years old and wearing matching outfits for Twin Day at school. Their grade actually had three sets of twins, none of whom were actually identical, and they all came dressed up with friends rather than their siblings. It’s impossible for Joohyun to grasp nearly ten years later that they’re the same girls as the ones in the Polaroid. Over her shoulder, Seulgi is grinning down at the picture.

“Remember when you wore a ponytail for half a year?”

Yes, Joohyun does, and it’s because Seulgi had decided to play hairdresser with real scissors and cut a giant chunk out and the only way to hide it was for Joohyun’s mother to put her hair in a permanent ponytail.

“I think that’s when your mother started hating me.”

“Trust me, she has a lot better reasons to hate you.”

Seulgi knocks Joohyun’s shoulder, “Who pissed in your Cheerios?”

Ignoring her, Joohyun folds the picture closed, tucks it in the pocket of her overalls. “Remember when you dared Krystal Jung to eat an earwig?”

“Oh God, I did didn’t I?”

“Yeah and she did it.”

“Well she never backed down from a challenge I’ll give her that much.”

They spend the rest of the afternoon cleaning out all of Seulgi’s bedroom and packing for her outdoor excursion. Joohyun stays for dinner, which she and Seulgi and Seulgi’s mom all make from scratch. Salad and pasta and homemade bread. They’re eating in the backyard while Seulgi’s mother tends the garden in the front yard, talking about what the Kang’s have planned for their trip and what Joohyun’s going to do while they’re gone.

“Eat, sleep, Netflix, repeat.” Joohyun is not a complicated girl, she’s pleased with the little things in life like Internet browsing and eating until she can’t comfortably move. “I have volunteering Monday and Wednesday, and Yongsun invited me to the movies Thursday for this documentary double screening that sounds really cool.”

“Don’t have too much fun with me,” Seulgi teases but Joohyun sees the smallest trace of truth in her eye.

“Are you kidding? What kind of craziness am I going to get into without my partner in crime?”

With a lopsided smile, Seulgi turns towards Joohyun and presses a kiss to her lips, effectively taking away some of the mustard dotting the corner of .

“Food goes in your mouth, not around it.”

“Are you sure you’re only leaving for a week? What about two? Or a month!”

“Haha, you’re so funny.”

28. + 29. + 30.

To celebrate Seulgi’s triumphant return to the 21st century, she and Joohyun go out for dinner.

It’s a nice place, but there are no string quartets hanging around their table. Joohyun orders them sparkling apple juice and they fill up on bread even though they both know they better. They split their two entrees between them, eating off the other’s plate or taking bites from each other’s forks. Everything tastes amazing but that may just be because Seulgi has been eating “camp food” all week and literally anything would be preferable. After dinner they start walking because the restaurant is not too far away from Joohyun’s house and it’s such a beautiful evening anyway.

They make an unplanned detour through their old grade school where they hang upside down on the jungle gym, reminiscing and talking about the present and talking about the future and about random threads of conversation in between. From there they carry on to a little pond where they sit and huddle close because Seulgi didn’t bring a jacket, thinking it wasn’t fancy enough for the restaurant they ate at. They also hands but that’s not really because it’s breezy out. At the pond they kiss once, taking the time to explore one another. When they walk the rest of the way back to Joohyun’s, they stop at the end of her driveway and kiss once because they think they’re saying goodbye until Joohyun invites Seulgi inside and they end up kissing in the kitchen while her parents are at a friend’s barbeque and Yeri is out with friends.

“If this is what happens every time I leave I better take more trips.” Seulgi kids, her lips swollen and smiling.

Joohyun grins back and drops her forehead against Seulgi’s, “Don’t you dare.”

31.

For Seulgi’s birthday Joohyun plans a party.

She’s not a party person herself but she knows Seulgi would get a kick out of it and really, it is her special day (or in this case, her special weekend). Of course, she still does the tried and true scavenger hunt but she saves that for a different day. Joohyun and Byulyi make use of the space at his house and they invite a bunch of people over to hold a roast for Seulgi. Everyone is in hysterics and Seulgi drinks up the attention and the love, feeling lighter than she thinks she ever has. She tells Joohyun it’s the best birthday party ever but yeah, she’s excited to celebrate her birthday with just Joohyun too and that admission leaves Joohyun with heart palpitations.

On her actual birthday, Seulgi does her birthday present scavenger hunt (collects 16 gifts for 16 years) and lets Joohyun take her on a picnic for lunch where they have her favourite meal complete with desert.

“Oh, I almost forgot your last gift.”

More?Joohyun thinks. This weekend has already been so incredible far beyond what she’d ever imagine. It’s too much and she says so, tries to be appreciative but firm that really, everything is perfect already.

“I already got 16 gifts.” She points out. “You’re spoiling me rotten, Bae.”

“It’s nothing,” Joohyun argues as she fishes a small baggie out of her purse.

When she hands it to Seulgi though, she knows it’s not nothing. Undoing the drawstrings, Seulgi shakes loose the contents of the little bag into the palm of her hand. It’s a silver necklace chain with a matching silver heart pendant on it. On the back of the heart there is an indentation of: 07-23-06

“The day we met,” Joohyun offers as way of explanation as if Seulgi needed on. “The first day of school ten years ago.”

She knows that date better than her own birthday. Seulgi wants to say so, tell her how much she loves this gift and, of course, how much she loves Joohyun. But again all those words are lodged in and she can barely breathe let alone speak.

“This is perfect,” she finally expresses when she can manage it. “Thank you so much, Joohyun.”

Joohyun is insistent in her belief that it was “nothing” but she’s smiling too so Seulgi knows she’s glad the gift was well received. Then, with her heart in her hand, she cups Joohyun’s cheek and pours all the words she wants to say into one drugging kiss.

32. + 33. + 34.

The necklace becomes a permanent fixture in Seulgi’s wardrobe.

She wears it every day and only takes it off to shower or sleep or cheerleading in case it flies away during a roundoff back handspring or something equally acrobatic. Joohyun doesn’t say anything about it although she beams whenever she hears someone compliment Seulgi on her choice in jewelry. Shamelessly, she always slings her arm around Joohyun and says, “Joohyun picked it out actually” with all the pride she can muster.

It’s just another school day: Joohyun and Seulgi bus to school together, walk to class together, depart with the promise of seeing each other next period. They make it through their morning classes and meet up for lunch. Since all of this started little more than a year ago, Seulgiand Joohyun have found themselves a niche in their own social circle made up of Byulyi, Henry, Yongsun, a few of Seulgi’s friends from cheerleading and dance crew, a few of Joohyun’s friends from the school’s social justice team and Student Government. They’re all hanging out, swapping items from respective lunches, and bouncing conversation back and forth until the bell rings for next period. The afternoon drags on for approximately a thousand years before the final bell sends students rushing towards the exits. Joohyun has a Student Government meeting after school and Seulgi has cheer practice so they meet up afterward on the edge of the football field.

Joohyun’s meeting ended early so she’d waited for Seulgi to finish her routine and cool down activities in captivation. Those skirts were cruel. Amazing and wonderful and cruel. As Seulgi bounds up to her, all sweaty with her ponytail flying behind her, Joohyun can’t help but be a smartass about it.

“I didn’t know you could split your thighs so wide, Malibu Barbie.”

“And how was Student Government, you big sell out.”

This isn’t necessarily true—they both know it too—because Joohyun only joined Student Government by default by being president of the social justice team. They needed a representative to help run all the social justice events at school and make sure they had funding for trips and guest speakers and such so Joohyun was elected by the team to be theirs. Ever since Joohyun’s been forced to sit through biweekly meetings while Yeri presides over the meetings as the events representative.

“Sell out? You’re the one who joined the pompom squad!”

“I’ll have you know cheerleading is a very respectable sport.”

It’s a lot harder than Seulgi makes it seem, Joohyun knows that but she loves teasing Seulgi about it anyway. “I’ll take your word for it.”

“You’re coming this weekend, right?”

Joohyun has had Seulgi’s regional cheer show thing circled on her calendar for weeks now and almost weekly, Seulgi asks if she’s still coming. It’s a big deal for her not just because she’s got social standing now but cheer is important to her. She’s physically challenged and she’s surrounded by a ton of new energy—which her mom tells her is the best thing for her right now because of the placement of the moon or something that Seulgi doesn’t quite remember—and she looks really good in her uniform so that doesn’t hurt either.

“Is that this weekend?” She’s pulling Seulgi’s leg but Joohyun’s sense of humor earns her a jab to the ribs all the same.

“You’re coming if I have to strap you to the roof of the bus or shove you in my duffel bag.”

“You’re all talk, Kang.” And before Seulgi can argue otherwise, Joohyun swoops down and pecks her on the lips.

When she pulls back her eyes are the same glorious colour they’ve always been and her smile is the same one Seulgi’s been looking at for the last eleven years and one stupid little kiss shouldn’t make Seulgi’s mind split off like the spokes of a spider web but it does, it does, oh God, it does.

“32.” Seulgi mutters, her gaze jumping from Joohyun’s lips to her eyes on a loop. It probably looks like she’s having a but really she can’t believe it. 32 times.

“32 what?” Joohyun asks, pressing her lips together.

“Kisses.”

Joohyun repeats the word simply, a bit awkwardly, “Kisses.”

“We’ve kissed 32 times.” Seulgi confirms, her head spinning and all those words tangled up in the bottom of are starting to spill out, all at once and out of control. It’s like opening floodgates; once it’s started it can’t be stopped. All she can see is Joohyun staring right back at her, looking stunned, the very picture of ‘we’re talking about this now???!!?’

“You kept track?” Joohyun’s voice is barely a whisper, it’s so quiet that Seulgi thinks she maybe didn’t hear her right. But she’s searching Seulgi’s face for an answer so she must have, she must have said it.

And then, because she’s really ing stupid and she’s going to need her foot surgically removed from , Seulgi nods and whispers back, “Is that weird?”

Mutely, Joohyun shakes her head, hair catching in the wind. “32 times? Really?”

“Yeah, can you believe it?”

“No,” because honestly Joohyun can’t believe. She lost track after the time they practiced in Seulgi’s bed. She lost track because she had been so determined to remember every other little detail (how many moles Seulgi had on her shoulder, the way her lashes dipped down when her eyelids fell shut, her voice when she said Joohyun’s name after they’d been so, so close). “I can’t believe you remembered.”

An apology bubbles off of Seulgi’s lips, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything. I didn’t mean to, I just don’t know when to shut up and then I do like this and yeah, I’m sorry.”

Wait, what? Why is Seulgi apologizing? Joohyun steps forward, places her hands on her friend’s arms.

“Can I kiss you again?”

Seulgi looks at Joohyun like she just grew a second head. “You want to kiss me?”

It’s probably inappropriate but Joohyun laughs anyway, “I’ve kissed you 32 times before, why are you surprised now, you huge doofus?”

“Don’t call me a doofus, doofus.”

“I’m going to kiss you now, okay?”

“Okay.”

Dropping her over the shoulder duffel to the ground, Seulgi moves her hands to Joohyun’s hips. She squeezes them when she feels Joohyun slip her tongue inside , pushes them under her top when Joohyun nips at her lip. Seulgi only pulls away when she feels all those words coming back up again.

“Can we be girlfriends?”

“I thought we were?” Joohyun jokes. “I mean that was kind of the point of all this wasn’t it?”

Right, that whole pretend lesbian thing. Okay so Seulgi’s foot is shoved in again, whatever. Joohyun should know what she means. Still, Seulgi tries again.

“I want to be your girlfriend girlfriend though, I want to kiss you for real.”

“As opposed to all those fake kisses?” Joohyun intones like the total smartass she is.

Seulgi huffs a fondly annoyed (and why do those two words always come up when she thinks of Joohyun? Probably because she’s impossible and Seulgi loves her).

“I don’t want an excuse to kiss you, I just want to do it. I want to kiss you a hundred times, I want to kiss you until I lose count.”

Flushed and grinning like a huge dork, Joohyun tugs Seulgi closer. “Can we start now?”

Finally, Seulgi thinks as she closes the space between them, which is only half the distance since Joohyun is inching forward too.

Number 34.