Seungwan woke up to find Joohyun looking at her. She lay in bed, head resting on her hand and eyes half-opened as she gazed at Seungwan’s face lazily. At her first stirrings of wakefulness, a smile grew on Joohyun’s face and she reached out to help brush messy strands of hair away from Seungwan’s eyes.

“Good morning,” she said gently, her soft voice flooding Seungwan’s chest with warmth. “You look cute when you sleep,” she added with a shy grin, stopping her grooming of Seungwan’s unruly hair to rest her palm against her cheek. Pulling her in softly, she leaned forward for a kiss.

Seungwan’s stomach somersaulted in anticipation as she studied the approaching lips. She felt like she still hadn’t woken from her dream, everything too comfortable and nice to be true. She let her eyes slip closed then suddenly froze as a thought hit her. Ducking backwards, she pulled up the sheets to cover .

“Morning breath,” she explained quickly, her voice still rough from sleep and nearly breaking as she spoke the two words. She cleared and looked at Joohyun sheepishly. Her brow furrowed cutely at Seungwan’s rejection, eyes twinkling with petulant displeasure, but she didn’t pursue it, settling instead for cuddling against Seungwan and letting their legs intertwine.

“And, um, good morning to you too,” Seungwan added after a moment. She probably should have started with that. Joohyun hummed against her chest and squeezed her a little tighter. “Did you sleep well?” she asked once silence began to settle. It felt like comfortable silence, but it might be awkward silence and she didn’t want to risk it.

“Very,” Joohyun replied with a satisfied sigh. Her foot brushed gently against Seungwan’s ankle, drawing slow circles against the skin. Seungwan waited for further elaboration, but Joohyun seemed happy to rest on top of her silently, occasionally reaching up to press her lips against Seungwan’s neck in short, chaste kisses.

The initial indecision eventually melted away and Seungwan shrugged off her doubts in favour of returning Joohyun’s tight embrace, closing her eyes at the tingles that spread from her neck and all through her body every time Joohyun kissed the sensitive skin. They remained in that comfortable position, limbs entangled and bodies moulding perfectly together, until Seungwan felt her mind slowly drift back to sleep.

She was almost startled by the sudden noise of Joohyun’s gurgling stomach and had to suppress a giggle at Joohyun’s embarrassed groan, her muffled voice vibrating against Seungwan’s neck where she’d hidden her face.

“Do you want to go have breakfast?”

“No,” Joohyun replied in a grumbling voice, tightening her hold to keep Seungwan from escaping the bed. “I want to stay in bed with you forever,” she continued playfully, even as she pulled her legs free from Seungwan’s.

“You’ll starve,” Seungwan pointed out gently, a smile growing on her lips. She tugged at Joohyun’s arm, which lay wrapped around her, managing to free herself without much force as Joohyun offered very little resistance.

“It’ll be worth it,” the latter replied with a cheeky grin as she pulled herself up to a sitting position and squinted at Seungwan. Her words had Seungwan’s heart faltering and beating with breath-taking force, all at once, and she was glad that Joohyun wasn’t wearing her glasses and couldn’t see the way her face clearly betrayed her flustered state.

She mulled it over all the way through their breakfast preparations. Joohyun was in love with her, or at least she’d said as much the previous night. Even if the words had come out in the heat of the moment, she definitely felt something, enough to wake up happily by Seungwan’s side and even want to kiss her again.

Her thoughts were interrupted when Joohyun was startled by the bread popping out of the toaster like she hadn’t been using it for years. Seungwan wrapped a protective arm around her, bravely taking charge of the toast portion of breakfast and leaving Joohyun to prepare their drinks in safety.

Sitting down with her food, she bit into a piece of toast covered in strawberry jam, trying to return to her previous train of thought. Joohyun sat in front of her, large glasses fogging up as she took a sip of her freshly-made tea, and the adorable sight made it hard to focus on anything too complex so she settled for vague musings on how Joohyun was cute and liked her and wanted to be with her.

“So,” Joohyun began, smacking her lips with satisfaction at the pleasant taste of the tea. “We should talk.”

Joohyun was done with her. She was going to break up with her and they weren’t even officially dating yet. This was terrible. It was even worse than getting rejected straight away. Now she’d had all this time to build up hope, like an idiot.

She tried to nod like panic wasn’t washing over her in chilling waves, but she mustn’t have been very convincing because Joohyun’s eyes widened a little behind the oversized lenses. “It’s nothing bad,” she quipped lightly. Would ending things with Seungwan be considered something bad? It made sense that it would, right?

“Right, sorry,” she tried, chuckling to emphasize how much she wasn’t spiralling into the worst-case scenario. “My brain must still be waking up.”

Joohyun accepted the weak explanation without much questioning, suddenly looking a bit uncertain. She bit her lip, which might be y if Seungwan weren’t still trying to recover from her overreaction.

“I just, I was wondering. Are we… dating now?”

“Do you want to be?” Seungwan blurted out, probably sounding a bit too defensive. That was a dumb thing to say. She was really on a roll with the dumb reactions this morning. Joohyun’s brow furrowed slightly as she took in the words, looking more confused than offended.

“I meant, there’s not really a protocol. We kissed and all, but that doesn’t necessarily mean… Anyway, if we want to be dating then we are and if we don’t then we aren’t, I guess.”

Joohyun nodded as Seungwan spoke, as focused as if she were attending a lecture, but she didn’t say anything in response. She only sat in silence, waiting for Seungwan to continue. She wasn’t sure what else to say. “So, um, do you want us to be dating?” she tentatively added.

“Why am I the one who has to say it?” Joohyun asked. She didn’t sound upset by the situation, only genuinely uncertain regarding the proper way to proceed, asking questions in hopes of finding some logic to the whole thing.

“Because,” Seungwan replied eloquently. She paused in a desperate search for excuses. “I liked you first,” she added as quickly as it popped into her head.

“You don’t know when I started liking you.” Damn Joohyun’s quick thinking.

“I know when I started liking you.” Seungwan strongly doubted that Joohyun could beat her there. Her feelings had started before they’d even met, although admittedly the whole love thing only began later.

“Oh, when was it?” Joohyun asked curiously, their back and forth momentarily forgotten. Right, she shouldn’t have said that. Joohyun couldn’t know the embarrassing truth.

“Well, you know, those things are never really linear,” she began with no idea where she was going. She scratched the back of her neck as she babbled on. “It’s, uh, between liking and realizing you like and then loving and… All that, it’s…”

“I confessed first,” Joohyun suddenly declared with triumph. After a confused instant, Seungwan realized that they were back to their strange competition, thankfully. “Well, you kissed me, but you just said that doesn’t count. So I confessed first and you didn’t confess at all,” she added with finality. It was a little cute how she got so into it.

“Actually, I confessed first.”

Joohyun quirked a brow, clearly lost. “I said I loved you. Twice. You just didn’t realize I was confessing,” Seungwan concluded in a voice that trailed off to nothing as she avoided eye contact. Remembering her toast, she eagerly reached for it and took another bite just to have something to do.

There was a moment of silence. Seungwan looked up to see Joohyun’s eyes widened in realization, but they quickly narrowed so that she looked almost indignant. “Well, that doesn’t count. I love you is ambiguous. Friends say I love you.”

Joohyun paused her agitated arguing and took a calming breath. “This is dumb.” Seungwan had to agree. “I want to date you,” Joohyun mumbled, indignant energy suddenly gone. Was she nervous? Why would she be nervous?

“I want to date you too.”

“Alright, so we’re dating,” Joohyun said, even as she looked to Seungwan for confirmation. She nodded and the small furrow in Joohyun’s brow cleared. “Right. That was a bit anti-climactic.”

“Should I start crying again?” Seungwan offered with a relieved smile. She felt a new round of giddiness bubbling up inside her. Suddenly she couldn’t imagine eating another bite, stomach too full of butterflies and whatever else it was that made her feel like she was riding a rollercoaster while sitting at the kitchen counter.

“Please, not on my account,” Joohyun answered with a smile of her own. She tapped her fingers against the cup of tea and bit her lip again. Now it did look a little y. Seungwan swallowed drily.

“So when can I kiss you?” It was like Joohyun had read Seungwan’s mind. Or maybe she was just thinking the same thing. That was a uniquely distracting possibility. “What is the etiquette in that department?” she continued in an almost professional tone.

“There’s no rule, I think. Whenever you want to? I mean, when we both want to, obviously, but I’ll probably want to so just, as long as I’m not sending out signs that I don’t want to, you should be safe.” Seungwan felt like somebody had taken out her brain and replaced it with something fuzzy and uncooperative that just wanted Joohyun to shut her up in some fun way.

“Can I kiss you now?”

Joohyun definitely had to be reading her mind at this point. Seungwan nodded weakly and Joohyun was quick to get up and settle on her lap, arms wrapped around her neck. She moved in to kiss her. Her girlfriend moved in to kiss her. How had this happened? She had a girlfriend and it was Joohyun. Joohyun was her girlfriend. She was Joohyun’s girlfriend.

Yerim and Sooyoung would never believe this. Some part of her mind relaxed and took a long-needed breath at the thought that she wouldn’t have to worry about them anymore. That her feelings were out there, even reciprocated by some happy miracle, and now this source of pressure was gone from her life.

And then another part of her mind screeched to a halt as she reached a particular conclusion. “Wait,” she said hurriedly, stopping Joohyun inches away from her lips.

“You’re giving me very mixed signals,” the latter complained lightly, tapping her fingers against the back of Seungwan’s neck.

“Did you tell Yerim and Sooyoung about this?” she asked a little breathlessly. Joohyun’s face was still very close to hers and she wondered if this couldn’t wait until after the kissing, but now she needed to know.

“What do you mean? My feelings for you? Yes, of course I did. Is that a problem?”

Seungwan was quick to shake her head, squeezing her waist to reassure that she’d done nothing wrong. “No, it’s just that I told them about my feelings too. Well, more like they figured it out and teased me about it.”

Joohyun furrowed her brow. “So they knew about both of us and never said anything?”

“Yes!” Seungwan exclaimed with indignation. She paused as an even more inflammatory thought came to mind. “Seulgi definitely knew too, they would have told her!”

She carefully pushed Joohyun off her lap so she could get up and stride off to the bedroom. “I’m going to call her right now,” she announced as she walked.

A hand wrapped itself around her arm in what was beginning to feel like a familiar action. “Wait,” Joohyun called out in a worried voice. Seungwan immediately stopped in her tracks, turning to comfort her. “If you call her, Seulgi will know we’re together.”

Right. She hadn’t seen that one coming. She struggled for the appropriate response, brain frozen somewhere between confusion and a growing feeling of betrayal. Her hand was still in mid-air, halfway to Joohyun’s, but Joohyun didn’t seem to notice it in her agitation.

“We can’t tell her before Yerim and Sooyoung. But you probably don’t want them to know before you tell her. Maybe we should tell all three at the same time,” Joohyun quickly blurted out, looking genuinely distressed at the logistics of it all.

“Seungwan?”

Seungwan blinked as she realized that she still hadn’t moved and now Joohyun had finished talking and was studying her dubiously. She forced a smile on her face and continued the movement she’d paused, reaching for Joohyun’s hand and gently tugging at it to pull her closer. The contact helped dispel the ominous feeling that had begun to grow inside her and her smile became a little less strained.

Joohyun’s face brightened in response, pushing away the dark clouds even further until the sun was shining again inside Seungwan.

“I think that sounds good. We can invite them over and then lock the doors and confront them on all their dirty lying,” she suggested casually.

“Yes, or,” Joohyun retorted, dragging out the last word with a playful smile. “We can politely ask them about it without trapping them,” she offered in alternative, slowly swinging their linked hands back and forth.

Seungwan nodded at her words, feigning thoughtfulness. “We should also bar the windows. The apartment’s not that high up and Yerim seems like a wild card in these situations.”

Joohyun couldn’t help but giggle at her ridiculous suggestion, which made it entirely worth it. She studied Seungwan with soft eyes, making her feel a bit too exposed. It was a dangerous sensation for someone who still had so much to hide, but something about it had her knees going weak so that she didn’t particularly want to avoid it.

“We’ll discuss the details later,” Joohyun concluded agreeably. “First, there’s something very important to take care of.”

Seungwan studied her curiously, but she didn’t offer up any explanation. Instead, she flashed a mischievous smile and stepped forward, releasing Seungwan’s hand to settle both hands on her waist and pull her into a kiss.

“Hmm, very important,” Seungwan agreed, her voice muffled by Joohyun’s lips pressing against hers. They shared matching smiles of amusement mixed with pure happiness, although they eventually faded as the kiss deepened and it became too hard to even concentrate on breathing properly.

Loose thoughts flitted through Seungwan’s mind, most of them entirely nonsensical, the remainder more vague concepts than anything. Then one of Joohyun’s hand landed on her and suddenly all her thoughts were more or less about that.

(…)

For the first time in her life, Seungwan wasn’t entirely happy about having a cat.

She’d never blame him, of course. Poor Mr. Fluffers had been prepared to support her as she grew old and lonely and really, none of them could have expected things to stray from this plan. Yet somehow, miraculously, Seungwan was now dating Joohyun and the fact that she owned a cat cruelly prevented her from just spending all her free time at Joohyun’s place.

It would have been easier if Joohyun could come over to her apartment, but unfortunately fate threw yet another wrench in their plans by making her deathly afraid of animals. If Fluffy had been one of those tiny, cuddly breeds with big round eyes that looked all harmless and furry she might have tried to do something about it. But of course he was about as big as a cat could possibly get, with a tiger-like face, an impressive mane and powerful paws. Nothing short of life-threatening illness could apparently get Joohyun to return to Seungwan’s apartment.

So it was with a heavy heart that Seungwan had to decline Joohyun’s invitation to come in for dinner in favour of going home and paying some attention to her neglected child. Joohyun pouted adorably at the rejection, but she didn’t push it. After all, they’d been spending every evening together and she was too selfless to deprive Mr. Fluffers of company forever.

“But you’re mine for the whole weekend,” she declared, her gentle tone communicating that the statement was far from a demand. Still, she seemed so excited at the prospect that Seungwan couldn’t have argued against it even if she’d had any problem with the plan.

Instead of turning to open her apartment door, Joohyun leaned against it and smiled lazily at Seungwan, hands wrapping loosely around her waist as she pulled her closer. Seungwan stumbled forwards, caught by surprise, and nearly banged her head against Joohyun’s, which had her girlfriend giggling silently. She barely had the time to ponder how she’d completely ruined the moment before Joohyun’s hands were moving up to lace behind her neck.

“I like you,” Joohyun whispered against her lips, pulling her in by the neck for a long kiss. Eventually, Seungwan’s hands grew tired of lying uselessly at her sides and reached for Joohyun’s waist, although she was fairly certain her brain hadn’t been involved in that decision. Mostly because her brain couldn’t be involved in any decision at the moment, already struggling with the essential tasks like breathing and maintaining a healthy heartbeat.

With a whine that made Seungwan a little worried she’d actually lose control of her legs and flop down in the middle of their hallway, Joohyun pushed herself off the door and closer to Seungwan, pressing their bodies together. Her tongue slipped into Seungwan’s mouth as her fingers ran up Seungwan’s scalp, nails pressing lightly against the skin.

Powerless to resist and slightly afraid to take control of the kiss, Seungwan followed Joohyun’s lead as they continued to make out in plain sight of anyone who might walk by. A distant, apparently still functional part of her brain insisted that they should probably stop at some point, but the voice grew weaker as time passed and soon all she could focus on was Joohyun.

And then Joohyun pulled away, letting her head rest against the door, and gazed at Seungwan with dark eyes that took a distractingly long time to clear. “Are you sure you don’t want to come in for a little while?” she asked, still a bit out of breath.

Seungwan knew she didn’t mean what it sounded like she meant, but her body reacted nonetheless, stomach lurching in a way that wasn’t entirely pleasant nor unpleasant. She swallowed drily, momentarily unable to respond, but Joohyun only let out a light laugh that immediately dispelled the thick atmosphere.

“Don’t worry, I know you have to go see Mr. Fluffers,” she said with an understanding smile. “I was just trying my luck,” she added with a wink.

Seungwan nodded distractedly, trying very hard to process what seemed to be Joohyun flirting. She was aware that she was failing as Joohyun’s eyes squinted in a mix of amusement and confusion at her speechless gaping.

She attempted words. “I’m sure you’ll get lucky soon enough.”

Her attempt was terrible. She was almost glad that she had to end this interaction and go home alone.

“I’m looking forward to it,” Joohyun replied, her crooked smile bearing a distinct hint of mischief. How could she say these things and expect Seungwan to carry on being a functional human being?

“I should… I have to… Uh, cat.” Joohyun’s smile grew. This was beyond embarrassing. Why did she keep talking?

“Go on, then,” Joohyun said mercifully. She pulled Seungwan in for one last quick kiss then turned her around towards her own apartment, setting her on her way with a tap on the backside. Seungwan swallowed down a surprised yelp. “I’ll miss you,” she added playfully.

Crossing the hallway and rummaging in her bag for her keys, Seungwan tried to calm herself, soothing her wild thoughts. It shouldn’t have come as such a surprise, given how touchy Joohyun had been before they were even dating, but she really couldn’t wrap her mind around how much and how often Joohyun wanted to kiss her.

She wasn’t complaining, far from it, but it was a strange situation nonetheless, and one that she wasn’t entirely sure how to navigate. The thing was that she was definitely aware of how physical intimacy evolved and what followed what, and so whenever their kissing grew a little heated or Joohyun’s hands started roaming towards her her body helpfully provided all the reactions that had become muscle memory by now.

And this wasn’t ideal when she was sure that Joohyun was exploring physical intimacy for the first time with her and her mind definitely didn’t jump straight to whenever she d Seungwan.

She just didn’t want to put any pressure on Joohyun or unwittingly guide her towards something she wasn’t ready to do yet. She worried that she might keep things going for longer than Joohyun was comfortable and make her feel like she had to keep up. And to be quite honest, she also worried that Joohyun herself might go a little further than she was ready for and it would be up to Seungwan to stop them.

Her hands trembled slightly as she turned the knob and entered her nice, quiet apartment. She could use some quiet, it might help her stop thinking about stressful things like with Joohyun.

Only the apartment wasn’t quiet, because the TV was on and something quite loud was playing. And sitting on the sofa was Sooyoung, watching the show with interest, Mr. Fluffers spread luxuriously by her side as she petted his head. Now Seungwan really needed to stop thinking about with Joohyun.

“Hey, did you run into Joohyun?” Sooyoung asked casually. It was an innocent question, probably, so Seungwan just needed to relax and try not to act suspicious.

“Yes, I did do that. We both got home at the same time, you know how it is,” she attempted, immediately concealing a cringe. She wasn’t usually this bad at lying, really. She was just at a particular disadvantage this evening, what with the distracting thoughts and all the kissing she’d just done and she really should stop thinking about the kissing now.

“Okay,” Sooyoung replied, dragging out the word as she raised her eyebrow at Seungwan. “Anyway, I came to visit Fluffy. I think he missed me, he’s been super clingy ever since I got here.”

“Yeah, he really likes you,” Seungwan offered neutrally, turning to put away her things and avoid incriminating eye contact for as long as possible.

“So, how’s Joohyun?” Sooyoung carried on in a careless tone. “I tried to come over but she’s been busy all week, you know anything about that?”

“Um, no, not really, why would I know?” She pretended to be looking for her slippers, which happened to be right by her feet, to conceal the way panic had suddenly seized her features. With a discrete sigh, she relaxed back into an innocent expression.

“Because you were just with her?”

Right, she had said that.

“Yeah, but we didn’t talk about why she was busy.” She put on her slippers and reluctantly padded towards the sofa. “We talked about other stuff.”

“Oh, what did you talk about?” Sooyoung lowered the volume on the TV, which was a bad sign because Seungwan would prefer for Sooyoung’s attention to drift further away from her and not the opposite.

She paused in search of a valid conversation topic that wouldn’t completely expose her. “Other stuff,” she finally repeated.

Sooyoung narrowed her eyes at her. “You’re acting weird,” she said slowly.

This was bad. Being accused directly like this made her nerves skyrocket until it was impossible to pretend she wasn’t lying.

“Did you embarrass yourself in front of Joohyun again?” Well, she had, kind of. But she didn’t want to admit that. But it was better than admitting the full truth.

“Maybe,” she replied dubiously. Sooyoung nodded wisely and returned to the TV. Crisis averted.

Seungwan’s phone began to ring and she dug it out of her pocket to find Joohyun calling. Of course this would happen to her. She weighed her options. She couldn’t just not answer her girlfriend and she couldn’t run off with the phone without making Sooyoung suspicious.

She put the phone to her ear with an inward groan.

“I miss you,” Joohyun’s voice said sweetly, sounding a bit distorted over the line. With a herculean effort, Seungwan resisted the smile that tried to take over her face.

“Oh hey Joohyun,” she said brightly, not sure where she was going with this. But if she acted weird enough Joohyun would catch on, right? Unless she already thought Seungwan was weird and this didn’t even register, which was a distinct possibility.

“Yes, it’s me,” Joohyun replied after a pause. Sooyoung’s eyes were on Seungwan again. “Did you not check your phone before answering?”

Joohyun definitely wasn’t catching on. “Sooyoung and I were just talking about you, she’s here at my place,” Seungwan attempted, opting for a more direct approach.

“Oh, I see.” Good. The issue of Joohyun thinking Seungwan was being weird or blowing her off was solved. Now she just needed to find a reasonable explanation for why Joohyun would call her right after they’d seen each other.

“So why are you calling? Did you forget to tell me something before?”

“Did I tell you you’re cute? Because I definitely meant to say that.” Seungwan wished she’d stop saying things that made her feel all giddy and dumb in front of Sooyoung. “But you probably want an excuse to offer Sooyoung, don’t you?”

Seungwan hummed noncommittally and snuck a peek at Sooyoung. She studied her with amusement. The TV was turned off, which was probably a terrible sign.

“Why don’t you tell her you left something at my place and I forgot to return it to you?”

Because she wasn’t supposed to have been at Joohyun’s place this week, Seungwan thought but didn’t say for obvious reasons.

“Oh, right, I forgot about that,” she said instead. She needed to end this call as soon as possible. Squinting at her watch, she furrowed her brow before continuing. “It’s kind of late now, but maybe you can give it to me next time?” she blurted out without thinking and immediately felt like she’d talked herself into a corner.

“Alright, let me know how it went with Sooyoung after she leaves,” Joohyun replied, understanding Seungwan’s intention easily. “Also, you sound nice on the phone and I still miss you, so call me.”

“Right, sounds good, bye.” She hurried to end the call, nearly cutting off Joohyun’s “I love you,” then struggled to maintain a stony expression even as a blush crept over her cheeks. Damn Joohyun and her sweet words and compliments.

When she finally turned to face Sooyoung, she looked right back with expectant eyes, head slightly tilted. “She, uh, I was going to borrow a book but then we forgot,” Seungwan explained weakly.

“You two are either together or planning something dumb,” Sooyoung deadpanned. The look on Seungwan’s face must have been answer enough, because Sooyoung’s jaw nearly dropped as she studied her.

“When?” she immediately demanded. “How? Which one of you confessed first? Was it you? I may or may not have a bet going with Yerim.”

“Who did she bet on?”

“Neither. She said you’d be oblivious idiots forever,” Sooyoung admitted with a shrug. “I bet on you, though.”

“Oh, thanks. I’m actually not sure which one of us confessed first, it depends on your definition.” Sooyoung grimaced at that, probably wondering how likely it’d be that Yerim would pay up in these conditions.

“So you two finally did it. Never thought I’d see the day”, she quipped after a moment of thoughtful silence, sounding only somewhat joking. “I cannot believe you thought you could keep this from me. Seulgi or Yerim, maybe, those two aren’t the brightest, but me? I know everything that’s going on.”

Seungwan considered protesting the statement, but it wasn’t entirely wrong. She’d more or less known she was doomed from the moment she opened the apartment door and saw her inside.

“I’m happy for you guys,” Sooyoung said, pulling Seungwan away from her thoughts. “Now tell me everything, obviously.”

“Actually… We’re telling everyone officially on the weekend, so maybe you could save the questions for then?” Seungwan suggested cautiously. “And also maybe pretend like you don’t already know so I don’t get in trouble?”

“Give Joohyun some credit,” Sooyoung scoffed, her voice light with amusement. “You won’t get in trouble over something like this, she’s like super into your nerdy .”

“Right, obviously,” Seungwan riposted with an eyeroll, trying to sound more confident than she felt. That was a topic she didn’t feel like unravelling at the moment. “But she’ll be upset, which is even worse.”

“Fine, fine, I’ll act so surprised she’ll never suspect a thing.” Sooyoung threw her hands up in the air for emphasis, then paused as a thought occurred to her. She narrowed her eyes at Seungwan. “So, you probably figured out that-“

“That you knew about both of us? Yes, as a matter of fact we did. And we’ll definitely get into that on the weekend,” Seungwan quickly replied, attempting to sound menacing as she shut down the topic.

“Okay, got it, no more talking about your relationship until this weekend.”

Sooyoung slumped back on the sofa and returned her attention to the TV. “So, if that’s off the table, do you want to watch Pretty Little Liars with me? It’s kind of dumb, but they’re really pretty.”

“Oh, uh, it’s getting a little late and I was mostly just going to eat something and go straight to bed, so…” Seungwan mumbled, trailing off weakly.

“Are you trying to get rid of me so you can call your girlfriend or go over there or something?”

“Maybe?” Sooyoung only sighed, already getting up from the sofa. “Sorry, I don’t mean to be that lame person who only talks to her girlfriend, it’s just she asked me to call her and I didn’t want to –“

“Please, one time I walked in on Yerim and Saeron making out even though I’d texted her that I was coming over and she’d answered that it was cool,” Sooyoung cut off with an eyeroll. “As long as you don’t manage to top that, you’re still the less annoying couple.”

“I don’t think I want to top that.”

“That’s all I ask for,” Sooyoung said with an exaggerated grimace. Seungwan followed her to the front door, where she paused before leaving. “Have fun with your girlfriend,” she added in a tone halfway between teasing and fond. Then she walked off, turning at the stairs to give Seungwan a thumbs-up and a wink.