Title: These Are Ours
Pairing/s: Bona/Luda
Summary: Jiyeon has forgotten a lot of things. Luda helps her remember.
A/N: (bona = jiyeon, exy=sojung, eunseo=juyeon) ok but this has been sitting in my laptop for a month because i've been so busy with life. inspired by POP ETC’s song Speak Up. i highly recommend this song 10/10. to those who've been asking for bonlu for the longest time lmao im so sorry i made u wait fhsdhsdf. anyway this is just a cliche love story?? with slight angst??? and random ramblings??? idek a mess??   Unbetaed trash like me  comments and upvotes are appreciated!  I'll do that meiqi/dawon college au next 
 

They say Kim Jiyeon looked best with blonde hair. But she can’t really tell. She doesn’t remember ever dyeing her hair blonde.

“You looked like a goddess, unnie. Really.” Juyeon tells her one Tuesday night, when they decide to go home early from a New Year’s party. “It’s like you were born to be blonde.”

Jiyeon used to be fond of her memories. It shows in the organized corkboard wall in her room, flickers of moments cemented into frames, like a giant scrapbook, tacked with pictures, scribbled notes and colorful stickers.

Now everything’s a mess of what happened and what didn’t happen. The past three months are snatched from her, October to December of 2016, some kept in the dark, most gone with the dented steel and burning rubber along a slippery road in the middle of winter.

She stares at the clump of pictures with red push pins, faces of her in stunning blonde hair, and threads her fingers through her now brunette locks. “It must’ve been tiring, keeping the blonde.”

“You bragged about it for weeks and grew tired of it shortly after.” Juyeon gulps down the last of her ddeokbeokki soup, “Ah. Also you often complained that your hair was dying because of the bleach.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if I did.”

“Though I think it has something to do with Luda unnie too. I’m not sure.”

“That Lee Luda?”

Juyeon tries to hide it but Jiyeon knows her enough to see through the forced curl on her lips. “The only Lee Luda you knew.”

They say Kim Jiyeon loved Lee Luda very much. But she can’t really tell. She doesn’t remember meeting Luda before this week.  

(When Jiyeon wakes up again inside a box of white walls, they remind her the broken things; a part of her brain, a fractured left leg, a scraped shoulder blade, n number of ribs, three (four? Maybe more), some permanent scars, et cetera et cetera.

The only thing Jiyeon pays most attention to, in her post-surgery anesthesia induced grogginess and an intensive memory jog is that she lost a part of her memories three months prior to the car accident, which also explains why everyone looks the same yet so different at the same time.

They say she still needs to go through the memory tests again for assurance but Jiyeon thinks the doctor needs to work more on his poker face.

As if on cue, one of her best friends, Chu Sojung, swings the door to her private room open, her hair now the shortest Jiyeon has seen her in, bites into the straw of her coffee and beams, “Finally a day where you’re awake when I arrive. Look who I brought.” a girl walks briskly past her. “Luda’s here to see you.”

Jiyeon smiles politely, despite the dull ache spreading through her back. “Oh- Sojung-ah, you brought a friend?”

She doesn’t know why everyone stops moving, why Sojung’s expression changes like kaleidoscope swirls or why her brother runs his hands across his messy buzz cut and blurts out an exasperated, “Hold the f- Wait, are you serious?” that his satoori cuts clean through the silence.

“Y-You remember Nam Dawon, right? She’s her best friend. Lee Luda.” Sojung stammers, gesturing to the smaller girl beside her, who hovers a little too close to Jiyeon’s bedside. Petite, small shoulders and smaller mouth. Cute, despite the sad bloodshot eyes and fringes already a week too long. “If you don’t remember, well, Dawon is-”

“The love of Xuan Yi’s life.” Jiyeon interrupts. “The apple of her eye, the huǒ to her guō, the bap to her gim--” and the stranger beside Sojung turns around and chokes a sob.

Then Jiyeon realizes that this Lee Luda was introduced to her not just now by Chu Sojung but by none other than Nam Dawon, Xuan Yi’s girlfriend of two years, somewhere between those three months.

And that Jiyeon has forgotten a thing or two about her.)

A beep rings, a door opens and closes. Juyeon scrambles to the living room but Jiyeon stays still, eyes wandering around the faces under the red push pins for the hundredth time. She doesn’t need to check to know it’s Luda.

Their greetings don’t come in “Hello’s” and “How are you’s”, but in “Juyeon said she suddenly needs to be somewhere else.” , “Sojung unnie has a date to catch,” and occasionally “Xuan Yi unnie needs to study for her exams.” .

Today, it’s a much simpler version.

“Juyeon already left.” Luda mumbles and stands beside her, neither too far nor too close, mimics the way her arms are loosely crossed over her chest and pretends to look at the pictures with the same enthusiasm, thinking Jiyeon wouldn’t notice.

“What happened to my blonde hair?” Jiyeon asks.

“We had a bet.” Luda says, “Whoever scores lower in last semester’s finals has to go back to the natural color of her hair,” she squints and leans closer to the corkboard. “See, here, it’s not clear in some pictures but the color of my hair used to be-”

“Pink.” Maybe if she looks at them long enough, she’ll remember- was what Jiyeon used to believe. “And you won.”

“Yes, I did,” Luda says proudly. “but it was a close call so I dyed mine closer to brown.” Her hair now is in a light shade of cappuccino, sometimes honey and even a shade of mocha, depending on the angles of light that hit her face.

“I think you’d look cute with whatever hair color.” Jiyeon says, and quickly realizes she probably told her the same thing before one too many times because Luda’s face turns blue all of a sudden. “I’m sorry.”

Luda purses her lips to a straight hard line and swallows the lump in . “It’s not your fault.”

Probably, Jiyeon thinks, but she’s still sorry. “I know you’re younger than me but when exactly is your birthday?”

Luda chews on her bottom lip. “March 6, 1997.”

“Only child?”

“No. I have an older sister. Unnie, why are you asking about me all of a sudden?”

“I barely know you.”

“Oh. Oh. Right.” Luda coughs in her fist, pained smile and trembling lips. “Yeah, right. I mean, I’m sorry.”

Jiyeon frowns. “It’s not your fault.”

After a flurry of questions and answers, Jiyeon finds out Lee Luda is a Chemistry Major enrolled in the same university as her. March 6, 1997. 157cm. Blood type A. Pisces. Straight Dean’s Lister since her Freshmen year. Spent her entire life in Seoul. Plays a lot of Overwatch in her free time, a Taeyeon fangirl, prefers computer over console games.

Jiyeon also finds out that they first met back in October through Dawon, became friends in November and started dating in December. Like these three months, Luda faded away with the rest of her memories.

It’s almost seven in the evening when Luda leaves, and she might be fighting a sob down when she turns down the corridor but Jiyeon couldn’t be too sure. She isn’t paying attention anymore.

+

They say Kim Jiyeon might get her lost months back. But she can’t really tell.

It’s been a month and she still can’t remember anything beyond flipping the calendar to October 2016 two weeks late (Xuan Yi nagging in the background because it’s already October 15 and it’s Mei Qi’s birthday) and texting Sojung what she wanted for her birthday.

Think. Remember. Jiyeon wants to remember. For the first time, she grasps the straws on the bottom of the chasm of her memories only to find there are fragments she lost.

Sometimes there’s bits and pieces of warmth, a lingering scent of cinnamon and vanilla when they stand a little too close to each other, a tiny cold breeze in Jiyeon’s back when her lips curl around the syllables of Luda’s name, but they’re not enough.

Somehow Jiyeon knows nothing will ever be.

Lately it’s become a routine of questions and answers. Factual. Mostly dots to mark the places she’s already been to, the trains she missed, GPAs, the car she used to drive, what she ended up getting Sojung for her 21st birthday (which lamely turns out to be a bundle of gift cards).

Jiyeon doesn’t ask Luda how many kisses they’ve shared or if they fell in love at first sight.

(Things like those don’t matter anymore.)

But it’s always in the smallest things, and at this point Jiyeon thinks Luda knows her more than she knows herself.

Like when she separately asks Juyeon and Luda the possible reasons why she drove her brand new Porsche off the road and ran into a post when a bus suddenly swerved against the sharp curb,

Juyeon says, “It’s that lamp post or that passenger bus. Unnie, you’re the kindest person I know. I think you’d choose to save others before yourself.”

While Luda says, “You’ve always been kind and selfless. But you probably got distracted because it’s the first snowfall and the last I’ve heard of you, Tinashe was playing full blast on your speakers.”

Or when she separately asks Sojung, Xuan Yi (who still looks odd with her bright blonde) and Luda why her favorite color’s sky blue,

“You’re favorite color’s sky blue?! I thought it’s pink?” Sojung says, between boisterous laughter.

Xuan Yi says, “It’s because it’s calming, isn’t it?”

While Luda says, “Birds? You told me once you always like to see birds in the sky.”

Today, when Sojung and Xuan Yi leave, Luda meets her in balcony of her penthouse; striped turtleneck, cream coat, a strained smile, and greets Jiyeon with, “They said they’re-”

“You don’t need excuses when you come here.” Jiyeon interrupts.

Luda looks away first and sits on one of the chairs, phone at the ready. Jiyeon leans on the railing, watches the steady stream of cars on the highway and counts how many people on the sidewalk can she see are wearing yellow.

The afternoon sun bathes them in shared solitude, whispers the last of the winter winds and hints at spring with stolen glances and hesitant smiles.

“Don’t you have anything to ask me?” Luda asks when the sun starts to set.

“I’ve exhausted every possible question without getting too personal.” Jiyeon bends over the metal, dangles her arms until the tips of her fingers reach the edge of the plantbox. “Ah, wait. I have one.” she turns and leans against the railing. “Do you know what animal you remind me of?”

“Is this a question or a joke?”

“Just ask me “What” and let me live.”

Luda frowns. “Okay, then, what?”

Jiyeon beams and says, a little too sudden against the wind, “You remind me of a puppy.”

“What?”

“I said you remind me of a puppy.”

A heartbeat falters before Luda replies. “How so?”

“I don’t know, just your overall appeal, I guess.” Jiyeon shrugs and squints at the spontaneous drop of Luda’s expression, as if she’s slapped across the face with bad news. “Yah, why are you frowning? You should be grateful! Puppies are cute. I could’ve compared you to a rat.”

Luda’s grimace gets carried by the wind as the breeze lifts the white curtains up, a stretch of it molding the soft contours of her face.

Jiyeon isn’t sure what’s funnier, the way Luda gently set her phone down as the cloth masks over her head or the way she stayed still right after for a couple of seconds as if she’s done with life.

When the fabric slips away and their eyes meet, Jiyeon laughs and the irritation on Luda’s face melts into a smile.

Luda laughs too, eventually, bright and loud, caramel hair gleaming under the afternoon sky and for the first time she seems more alive than the pictures on Jiyeon’s wall.

+

February dissolves in Jiyeon’s mouth and she can’t remember what it tasted like; the planks of chocolate, love letters murmured in scented ink, rose petals stuck between her teeth and the roof of .

Sojung immediately digs in the mini mountain of chocolates and flowers Jiyeon dumps on the dining table. “Luda wanted me to give you something, but only if you want it.”

Jiyeon grabs the bundled stash of love letters she received throughout the day. The one in her hand reads, in fancy typography, “Jiyeon sunbaenim, my heart flutters every time you pass by the corridor at three in the afternoon with your friends. I think you are very pretty. Even prettier than the roses I sent you.” she folds it back and reads other ones that say, “Kim Jiyeon-nim, I’m not good with words but I love you.”, “Jiyeon-ah, it’s your favorite church oppa-”, “Jiyeon-ssi, I’d like to know you better---”

“Sojung, do you think-” she folds and unfolds the corner of the last letter she read, and waits for her best friend’s full attention, which she receives after a stretch of silence and a half-bitten bar of chocolate. “-that I should let her go? Luda, I mean. Do you think the Kim Jiyeon before would want me to be so hung up trying to recover my past?”

Sojung bites another mouthful into her chocolate and scoffs, “The Kim Jiyeon before would tell you to leave Luda and live your own life, but-”

“But?”

“But naturally, you’d be drawn to her since you’re curious. Well, you spent most time with her during those three months so there’s that.”

“And?” Jiyeon doesn’t realize she’s been tearing up the corner of the letter in her hands until Sojung glances a little too long at the shredded paper below her fingers.

“And what?”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“I don’t have any. If she makes you uncomfortable, you would’ve shoo