I was listening to Kim Jong Wan's 'You & I' on repeat while writing this. Fit quite nicely.

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Seungwan opened her eyes for a brief second before closing them again as the sunlight through the window hit her face. Turning away from the light, frowning at the stingy pain in her eyes, she stretched her arms before laying them down again, one of them under her head.

She felt herself slip into dreamland again, ready to get some more needed sleep (or maybe the slight warmth from the sunlight caressed her just enough to give her some peace), but suddenly her brain registered a smell that was entering the room subtly. Spicy, aromatic, salty, rich… food. It smelled like soup. Like spicy short rib soup.

The blonde’s eyes flew open and she sat up in bed, her bangs wildly unkempt, one of her shoulders bare because she had purposely bought a shirt that was too big (it was very comfortable). Seungwan grabbed the phone on the nightstand and pressed the home button.

10:50am

Wow… it was later than she thought. She was so used to waking up at around 7, regardless of how long (or more how shortly) she had slept. For the first time in a big while, Seungwan had slept at least 7 hours. It felt… different, but nice. It felt like she had actually been able to rest well. No bad dreams. At least for all she could remember. Which then reminded her…

“How the hell did I get into bed?”, she scratched her head. Thinking back to the night, the last thing Seungwan could remember of it was that she was on the balcony because of her inability to fall asleep (as usually).

And what else…

The blonde pressed her eyes shut and massaged her forehead. Guess she was still in the process of waking up.

Looking at the sky. It was really pretty. The stars were visible and beautiful. Like Joohyun. Who joined her. Stood next to her, looked at the stars together. She rested her head on the older girl’s shoulder. And then…

Nothing.

That was it. All was black. And suddenly she woke up in bed.

“Did I really fall asleep on her shoulder…”, Seungwan whispered to no one. “Did she…”

Was that even possible?

Then the realization dawned upon her. The blonde jumped out of bed, walked towards the bedroom door, following the savoury smell. And when she opened it, her heart couldn’t help but skip a beat at the very homely (was she allowed to use the word domestic for this?) sight.

Joohyun had her hair tied up in a low ponytail, wearing a big black shirt and some sweatpants. She was bringing a wooden spoon to to taste the soup she was making. The raven then faintly smiled to herself, seeming pleased with the results. On the kitchen table there were a few side dishes. It seemed like it had taken her some time to prepare this.

A few minutes passed without Seungwan noticing that she had been following the older girl with her eyes while leaning against the doorframe. Trying to take all of this in, all of this that seemed too good to be true. Like a dream.

The sunlight coming in through the kitchen windows and resting on Joohyun made the dreamlike sight even stronger. She could look at her like this forever.

After some more time of being apparently unaware of being looked at, Joohyun suddenly caught the blonde’s gaze with her own. And then they just looked at each other without uttering a word, the faint sound of the soup boiling as the only interferer to complete silence.

Seungwan didn’t know where the feeling came from. It was unexpected, really. Just before she had been calm, bit in a dreamlike state.

But the sudden urge to kiss Joohyun was something that was hard to ignore at that moment. The flapping of wings caused a tsunami in her insides, the high and strong waves slammed against the walls of like the craving she was feeling. Her heart was shaking.

She inhaled sharply but as silently as possible and swallowed the lump in . Seungwan brought a fist to and coughed softly.

“W-well what a smell to wake up. It really smells amazing, Hyun”, the blonde smiled widely, ignoring the rampage within her.

Joohyun seemed to had been absentminded as it took her a few blinks of her eyes to react.

“Oh yeah, thanks! I made short rib soup for breakfast!”

“How… how long have you been awake?”, Seungwan moved away from the doorframe taking a few steps backwards towards the couch, a bit further away from the older girl. Maybe a slight bit of distance would help with the repressing of the urges. She hid her clenched fists behind her back while smiling. Hopefully Joohyun wouldn’t notice the tension she was in.

“I woke up at 7…”, Joohyun chuckled. “Funny… it looks like our roles were switched. The early bird and that.”

The older girl turned her gaze towards the stone bowl the soup was in.

“I thought: now that I’m up this early, why not make breakfast?”, she said while stirring softly.

Seungwan couldn’t help but tear up a bit at that. It had been a long time since someone had cooked for her like this. And Joohyun doing that like it was the most casual thing.

She quickly wiped the tears away before the older girl could notice. Unable to respond, she just watched how Joohyun tasted the soup once more before nodding satisfied.

“It’s ready!”, she excitedly clapped. Joohyun then turned around with a big smile. “Go sit down!”

Seungwan did as told, still silently observing the raven, but avoiding looking directly into her eyes. She had to avoid it. Who knows what would happen if she didn’t?

“Here”, the bowl was put in front of her. “Wait, let me get you some rice!”

Joohyun grabbed a tinier bowl and opened the rice cooker, scooping up the content. She then put that down next to the soup.

She then grabbed some for herself and sat down on the opposite side. The table was small, but big enough to have all of the dishes on it and some space to move.

Seungwan grabbed a spoon and blew on the hot soup in it after scooping it up.

“I hope you like it”, Joohyun bit her lip.

“I think I would like anything you make”, Seungwan said softly. Before Joohyun could respond, she quickly brought the spoon to .

It tasted like she expected.

It tasted like home.

She could feel the burning tears resurface behind her eyes and inhaled sharply to stop them.

“It tastes amazing, Joohyun…”, Seungwan looked up, gathering some strength to look into the older girl’s eyes for a moment so that the latter knew how true her words were. “I mean it.”

Joohyun let out a breath of relief.

“Thank god… I was kind of scared that it didn’t taste as well as I thought…”, she smiled.

“It does, really…”, Seungwan allowed herself to look a little longer. And then Joohyun looked back. The blonde felt it again. That’s when she decided to break the contact and focus on the food in front of her. She cleared and scooped up some rice from the bowl.

Sensing some tension (probably because of the sudden silence from Joohyun, Seungwan wondered why), the blonde decided to break it.

“Finally some sunlight after all those rainy days… guess that's why last night it was suddenly so cloudless”, she smiled while looking at the window.

“Yeah… I’m glad there is some light again…”, Joohyun said. Somehow Seungwan sensed a deeper meaning to those words. She couldn’t agree more though.

“Want to take a walk later? Like to the park or something? Get some fresh air?”, the blonde suggested.

“Sounds perfect.”

Seungwan wasn’t looking at her, but nevertheless she could see the big smile on Joohyun’s face. And that was the reason behind her own smile.

She was glad there was light again.

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Despite the sunlight, it was still cold. So both had wear scarfs and thicker jackets. The breeze, however, was very calming. It was a peaceful looking day overall. The rays of sun softly kissed the leaves on the trees which were slowly turning green. The birds in the park were chirping. People were enjoying the nature sitting on benches or walking around.

Joohyun and Seungwan belonged to the latter group. They were quietly walking side-by-side yet very content.

When given a chance to look without being caught, Joohyun’s gaze shifted towards the blonde whose eyes sparkled as she looked around. The older girl often found herself to be intrigued as the younger’s eyes conveyed a lot. Sometimes she was able to read the message they sent. But sometimes, it proved to be quite cryptic.

Like earlier that morning.

Frankly, Joohyun hadn’t really stopped thinking about it. About what had happened. About what the silence possibly meant when they had locked eyes for the first time that day as Seungwan had leant against the doorframe. There had been something in her gaze that Joohyun hadn’t been able to look away from.

And to be very honest… thoughts of kissing her hadn’t really stopped since then. Earlier that morning, when they had looked at each other in silence for the first time as well as the second time at the table, Joohyun had felt the strong desire to taste the blonde’s lips. She didn’t know why it had been like that suddenly. But she knew she wanted it.

And she had also wondered both times what would have happened if Seungwan hadn’t broken the eye contact. Would she have done it? Wouldn’t that be too crazy though? Just because they had both confessed to each other, it didn’t mean that Joohyun was allowed to kiss her.

They hadn’t even talked about it further. No “what is the next step” (if there even is one). Besides, how would one do that? Take the next step? Or kiss? Joohyun had never done these things before. She felt kind of silly about it sometimes. What if she screwed up everything?

Honestly, despite the mutual feelings, Joohyun felt a bit embarrassed about this urge. She knew it was normal to have it (at least she hoped it was normal). She liked Seungwan.

No, scratch that.

She loved her.

And yet, she didn’t know how this work. Were these thoughts appropriate? Were they okay? Did Seungwan ever think about it? What if she didn’t?

Joohyun felt her face heat up when she suddenly remembered that day. When she had sat with Seungwan on that bench outside after everything with her mother and the conversation about Yeri, and their uncle and aunt. When Joohyun had felt the same urge to kiss her after realizing how close they had been.

Had Seungwan felt the same?

The raven sighed softly.

Control yourself for the love of God.

She carefully looked at the blonde again from the side. Her beauty was surreal. Joohyun couldn’t get the perfect words to describe her, but oh how deep she felt it.

Her gaze travelled over the side of her face. Her eyebrows, her eyes, the bridge of her nose, her jaw, her lips.

And then she focused on her lips. And she felt it again.

It was growing more intense than she could handle it to be.

Oh for s sake.

Joohyun looked forward and exhaled loudly, grabbing Seungwan’s attention who had jolted a little because of the sudden sound.

“Isn’t the air so damn refreshing?”, she asked almost aggressively. Probably because despite being outside, it still felt like she couldn’t breathe.

“Wow, what did the air do to you?”, Seungwan chuckled.

“Well, it’s more about what it isn’t doing… which is its job”, Joohyun smiled.

The raven could feel the blonde’s gaze on her. And it wasn’t helping her case. It was the remainder of the air out of her lungs.

“Do you want to get some hot chocolate?”, Joohyun suggested. Some good hot chocolate as a remedy. Sounded nice. She needed it. Something sweet on her lips.

“Sounds good.”

The raven looked at her.

“Glad to hear”, her smile widened.

Seungwan returned the gesture and then broke off the eye contact to look forward. Joohyun was glad she did that. Though a bigger part of her wished that the blonde stopped doing it.

A few minutes later and the coffeeshop was already visible from behind the park’s trees. They were