It had been a week since Seungwan’s embarrassing moment of panic and so far, she’d managed to avoid a repeat. She was keeping on top of her insecurities, making sure not to blow them out of proportion, and she was careful not to dwell on any negative thoughts whenever she spent time with Joohyun, devoting all her attention to her girlfriend.

On Joohyun’s part, she had slowed down her physical advances after their awkward discussion of where even the word had been carefully avoided. She seemed more aware of where their actions could take them and had adapted accordingly. This was a relief for Seungwan, who had begun to fear that she’d have to be the one to pace their moments of intimacy against all requests by her own libido.

All in all, everything was going great, and Seungwan felt happy and relaxed as she accompanied Joohyun up the stairs of their apartment building. They chatted about nothing in particular, and Joohyun was mentioning how a co-worker had returned to work after some health issues when she was interrupted by a notification on her phone.

“Sorry, that’s just my mother,” she excused herself distractedly as she tapped out a quick response.

“Oh, you text your parents?”

Seungwan avoided it with her own family, among other reasons because their excessive use of ellipses made all the messages sound passive-aggressive, which was a bit uncomfortable.

“Sometimes. I do prefer calling them.” Joohyun put away her phone and reached in her purse for her apartment keys, finding them easily. “We talk once a week, but when it’s something small they’ll just text me about it. How about you? Do you talk to your parents often?”

“Oh, uh, not really. Mostly just on birthdays and holidays,” Seungwan said, trying not to show her discomfort. She didn’t want Joohyun to think she was a bad daughter or that she didn’t care about her family. It was just that those conversations always ended up somewhere she didn’t want them to go, like her subpar job or her subpar love life, and her mother didn’t sound disappointed so much as sad for Seungwan. Like she could only imagine how unfortunate Seungwan’s life must be. But she didn’t want to tell Joohyun that, either.

“Sometimes it can be hard to keep in touch when you’re busy,” Joohyun remarked simply, shrugging off the issue. She turned away to open the apartment door and they stepped inside, an invitation for Seungwan not really necessary anymore.

Seungwan followed behind her, a little uneasy. Was Joohyun really not judging her or did she just not want to talk about it? Before Seungwan could decide whether to justify herself further, Joohyun’s phone lit up in her hand.

“Oh, my mother again,” she said with a slightly embarrassed smile. It grew a little more natural as she read the message, looking almost endeared at whatever her mother had said. “My parents have been a little excited ever since I told them I was dating,” she added with a chuckle.

Seungwan tried not to make the surprise too obvious on her face. “You told your parents?” she asked neutrally, even though her heart was beginning to hammer in her chest.

“Well, they’ve known about you for a while. Then last week I suppose I was a little too obvious when I mentioned you,” Joohyun admitted freely, a shy smile on her face as she paused on her way to the kitchen to turn to Seungwan. It fell slightly when they locked eyes and Seungwan immediately knew that she wasn’t being entirely convincing. “No pressure on your side, of course. You can tell your parents on the next birthday-slash-holiday or whenever you feel comfortable,” she quickly added, bringing a hand up to caress Seungwan’s arm supportively.

“No, I’m comfortable,” she reassured Joohyun, the words sounding entirely false as she said them. “It’s just, I don’t really talk about relationships with my parents,” she added in the hopes that it would explain her sudden nerves. If her mother had known about all the failed relationships in her past, Seungwan could only imagine how much worse her pitying comments would sound.

“You know, I call them to let them know and then two months later it’s over and I have to call again and they get all sad for me and it’s just…” she trailed off awkwardly, embarrassed that she’d nearly started complaining about her parents to Joohyun, right after finding out how close her girlfriend was to her own parents. She’d sound completely ungrateful, like talking to them was some chore.

Not to mention that this particular line of complaint led right to a discussion about her romantic past, which she’d been careful not to mention because nobody wanted to know about all the people she’d dated disastrously and all the ways she’d been dumped and what if Joohyun pitied her like her mother did?

“Is that the plan?” Joohyun asked, voice a little strange. Seungwan snapped out of her thoughts with confusion. She couldn’t believe she’d managed to fall right back into her insecurities, just as she’d been congratulating herself for avoiding such thoughts around Joohyun.

“Is that the plan? Dating for two months and then it’s over?” Joohyun repeated harshly. Was she angry? Seungwan felt something hard and nauseating drop into her stomach as her thoughts began to grow fuzzy with panic.

“What? No, not-,“ she began to refuse, but froze at her slip. She didn’t want them to break up after two months. She didn’t want them to break up ever. But her lips had worked too fast for her brain and had spilled what she was entirely convinced was the truth.

“Not two months, then?” Joohyun completed the sentence for her, and Seungwan could only look at her with wide eyes, because there was nothing to deny. That was exactly what she’d been about to say. “So, what will it be? Three months? Six? And when were you going to let me know that?”

Joohyun’s voice was hard, so unlike the soft low tones that Seungwan had grown used to. It hit her like lightning, filling her entire body with nervous energy, and she began to feel the familiar pinprick of tears gathering behind her eyes. She blinked against them, willing them away.

She always did this. She panicked and cried and it made it impossible to argue with her. She was well aware of that, having been informed enough times by upset exes, but she just couldn’t help it.

“I-I didn’t mean it like that,” she stuttered out, forcing the sobs out of her voice. “I was just b-being dumb, I’ll call my parents, I’ll tell them,” she assured Joohyun, already patting down every pocket she had for her phone.

“Not if you’re just going to break up with me later!” Joohyun spat back, making a move to approach her then seemingly changing her mind and beginning to pace at a distance.

“Me?” Seungwan exclaimed with surprise. “I’m not-,“ she began, words once more pouring out of before she had a chance to filter them. All the fears that she’d kept at the back of her mind so she wouldn’t worry Joohyun. Now she was doing worse than worrying. Now she was ruining the first good relationship she’d managed to find herself in.

“Oh, I’m breaking up with you?” Joohyun asked in feigned surprise. She crossed her arms, paused her pacing for a moment to look at Seungwan with an anger that she’d never seen in Joohyun before.

She pressed her trembling hands against her body, trying to still them, trying to resist the urge to run to Joohyun and turn to a sobbing mess in her arms.

“I wish someone would have warned me,” Joohyun added sarcastically.

“That’s not what I meant,” Seungwan tried again in a wavering voice. “I meant- you- you don’t-,“ she stumbled over her words, finding it hard to phrase it so that Joohyun wouldn’t get mad again. How could she say that Joohyun would eventually see that breaking up was all Seungwan was good for without making it sound… Wrong? Like it was Joohyun’s fault or something.

“You just don’t know… You don’t know yet… But…” She squeezed her hands together desperately. The right words evaded her just as she reached for them and all she had were half-sentences that only made everything worse.

“Right, I just don’t know what I’m doing,” Joohyun cut her off darkly. It was hard to read her face, since Seungwan’s sight had begun to grow hazy and wavery with unshed tears.

There was an awful moment of silence as Joohyun only stood there, arms still crossed defensively over her chest, making her look so terribly unapproachable. “Why are you even dating me if you think I’m going to break up with you?” she finally asked.

Seungwan didn’t know the answer to that question herself, but Joohyun wouldn’t stop looking at her like she had to say something and she couldn’t think of anything beyond keeping the tears from falling, keeping her lower lip from trembling too noticeably. “I d-don’t know,” she finally admitted, looking down to avoid Joohyun’s angry eyes. “I wasn’t going to date anymore, I-I always mess it up.” Her voice that grew lower and lower until it was barely audible. She felt like a child trapped in a lie, finally confessing the awful truth.

“You were going on dates long before we got together!” Joohyun pointed out in a surprisingly loud voice. Seungwan cringed at the volume, wishing she could curl into a little ball and disappear. But she couldn’t just drop the argument like that, she couldn’t just break down and force Joohyun to push back her problems to deal with hers. That was selfish and childish and a grown adult like her should be able to have an argument without falling apart.

“I w-wasn’t… I-I was avoiding m-my feelings for you,” she choked out as her shoulders rose to shield her against Joohyun’s fury which was sure to come. She stood in place, staring at the floor and clenching her trembling fists. Joohyun wasn’t saying anything. She looked up, blinking the mist out of her eyes for at least a moment, and saw the way Joohyun’s face was no longer set in anger. She looked hurt, her own eyes distant and her jaw clenched tightly.

“Alright, then. I pushed you into this relationship, I don’t know what I’m doing and one day I’ll break up with you. That’s how you feel,” she enunciated slowly. Seungwan wished desperately that she could disagree, but she knew that she’d never be able to explain the subtleties of what she’d meant, how exactly it wasn’t Joohyun’s fault at all. How it was Seungwan who had pushed herself, Seungwan who had counted on Joohyun’s inexperience, Seungwan who would inevitably disappoint.

“I think I’d like you to leave now,” Joohyun said in a neutral voice, sounding painfully cold. A fresh wave of panic spread over Seungwan and her body began trembling so strongly that she thought she’d fall over right there on the carpet.

“Are you breaking up with me?” she finally asked, in a wisp of a voice. Joohyun looked at her with such a look of contempt that she immediately regretted the question. But still, like an idiot, she felt the need to ask again. What if Joohyun really did want to break up? And who wouldn’t, after this shameful display? After Seungwan had said wrong thing after wrong thing and hurt Joohyun, insulted her and wrongfully accused her.

Instead, she hung her head and turned to leave. Joohyun didn’t say anything else, not even as she faced her to close the door behind herself. She stepped into her own apartment quickly, before her legs could fail her, and fell heavily on the sofa, immediately breaking out in deep, heaving sobs.

She fumbled for her phone, paused as the sight of it reminded her of how all this had begun. Her vision grew entirely blurry for a second, then hot tears rolled down her cheeks, one after the other without pause. Through the haze, she found Seulgi’s name and called her, eyeing the phone lifelessly as it rang.

“Hey, Wannie, what’s up?” Seulgi’s effortlessly chipper voice sounded through the receiver. She tried to choke back a sob at the words, but it was in vain and immediately that carefree tone was gone from Seulgi’s voice.

“Wannie, is something wrong? What happened?”

“It’s Joohyun,” Seungwan mumbled into the phone, voice unreliable from crying. “I think I messed it up.”

“I’m sure it’s not that bad, Wan-wan. Can you tell me what happened?” Seulgi’s voice was gentle as she tried to reassure her, despite Seungwan’s certainty that it really was that bad.

“I don’t know, we were walking home and talking and then suddenly we were arguing because I said something dumb about my parents and relationships and Joohyun got upset and then I just kept saying the wrong things and upsetting her more and she got angry and told me to leave,” she managed to explain, pausing after every other word to sob or sniffle or take a gasping breath.

“I think she’s going to break up with me now,” she whispered after a pause. The words seemed to rip into as she said them and a fresh wave of tears sprang to her eyes.

“Wannie, she is definitely not going to break up with you over this. You two just need to take a breath and then talk about it calmly.”

Seungwan tried to take the words to heart but all she could think of was Joohyun leaving her and everything between them just being over in a second, which only fed her panic.

“What did you argue about? Can you tell me?” Seulgi carried on, her voice keeping Seungwan from losing herself completely in the feeling.

“I don’t even know,” she admitted somewhat truthfully. “I guess… I said I didn’t tell my parents about my relationships because they always end and she thought I meant that our relationship would end and then I couldn’t tell her no because I do think she’ll break up with me. I mean, why wouldn’t she? But it sounded really bad, like I didn’t trust her or I didn’t want to date her in the first place,” she recounted, speaking a little faster as if pushing the words out of would push the thoughts out of her head.

“Oh, well, that’s just a misunderstanding,” Seulgi commented after a slight pause where she must have been estimating whether Seungwan would keep talking. “I mean, she’s mad now, but she knows about your dating experience, she’ll understand that it doesn’t mean anything but residual insecurity,” she added in what she was sure was a great encouragement.

Except it wasn’t, because Joohyun didn’t know. She couldn’t know. It was terrible and embarrassing and if Seungwan told her then Joohyun would surely realize the truth. She dug her fingers into her palms and remained in guilty silence.

“Seungwan? Does she not know about that?” Seulgi asked suspiciously. She sighed slightly as Seungwan kept quiet. “You’re not in trouble, Wannie, you can tell me.”

She let out a nervous breath, well aware that Seulgi wouldn’t get mad at her over this. But the tender part of her, the one that was still hyperventilating over Joohyun’s reaction even if Seungwan herself had managed to slow down the sobbing, insisted that today was the day she burned all her bridges.

“She… doesn’t,” she admitted slowly as her nails dug deeper into her palm.

“That’s okay, Wannie,” Seulgi replied immediately, her voice even softer. Seungwan hated being so sensitive about these things, how fragile and unsure she became whenever she started a relationship, like some terrible auto-pilot kicking in. “I understand why you wouldn’t want to tell her. But I think you have to, or she won’t know how to help you.”

“Why can’t I just get over it on my own?” she asked, feeling pathetic even as she said it.

“It doesn’t matter, because you don’t have to,” Seulgi said simply. It managed to make her feel simultaneously comforted and embarrassed. She wished she wasn’t in this situation. She wished she wasn’t like this.

A ringing sound right by her ear startled out of her thoughts, confusing both her and Seulgi.

“Wait, I think someone’s calling me,” she informed pointlessly. Pulling back the phone, she saw Sooyoung’s name flashing on the screen. She felt a different kind of panic, not the existentialist dread of being alone and unloved, but rather the instinctive fear of bodily harm that was innate to all living creatures. “It’s Sooyoung,” she said in a dull voice.

“You have to answer that,” Seulgi stated at once, something comically close to fear tinging her voice. It seemed fear of Sooyoung was also innate to all living creatures.

“Ok, I’ll call you when I’m done, I guess.” She resisted the urge to say something dramatic regarding the possibility of her not coming back out alive, then ended the call with Seulgi to answer Sooyoung.

“Oh hello, Seungwan. Do you happen to know why your girlfriend just called me in tears about how you didn’t believe in the future of your relationship?” Sooyoung immediately asked, cutting off any greeting that Seungwan might have been about to say.

Seungwan barely had the time to cringe at Sooyoung’s aggressive tone before the meaning of her words hit her. “Wait, Joohyun was crying?”

“No, not at all. She was totally cool with the first argument of the first relationship she’s ever had. She just called me to go get lunch tomorrow,” Sooyoung replied sarcastically. There was a beat of silence where Seungwan genuinely considered asking for clarifications, only held back by her slight fear of the woman on the phone with her. “Yes, she was crying! She was very upset, obviously, you idiot!”

“She wasn’t crying when I left,” Seungwan defended herself weakly. She heard a strangled sound, like Sooyoung had stopped herself from starting another angry tirade. Then a heavy sigh.

“Okay, idiocy aside. I told her you loved her a lot and there must be another explanation for what you said. So now I’m calling to get that explanation.”

“You did?” Seungwan was honestly surprised that Sooyoung had taken her side like this. After all, she was Joohyun’s friend first. Seungwan had just kind of come around and awkwardly joined the group.

“Well yeah, I know how much you care about her. And you wouldn’t be an about this. At least not on purpose,” Sooyoung added in an incriminating tone. Before the guilt could begin to settle, Sooyoung was already talking again. “So what exactly did you mean when you said she was going to break up with you?”

“I don’t know, that sooner or later she’ll realize she can do better and end things,” Seungwan eventually replied, once the silence made it clear that she wouldn’t get away without an answer.

“You’re right, you don’t know. What you just said is dumb and makes no sense,” Sooyoung deadpanned without hesitation. Now she was just being mean.

“Come on, Sooyoung,” Seungwan insisted, a little hesitant at the thought of refuting anything her scary friend said. “I know you’re trying to cheer me up, but you know what I mean.”

She didn’t want to say the words out loud, but Sooyoung insisted on remaining silent, awaiting Seungwan’s elaboration.

She sighed, feeling herself deflate as she spoke. “I just- I . You guys know that, but Joohyun doesn’t yet. She hasn’t seen that side of me like you have.” It was hard to explain without sounding like she blamed them or thought they mistreated her or something.

“I don’t- Is this because of our teasing?” Sooyoung asked, sounding genuinely puzzled. Seungwan didn’t have to speak, because only a second later she sighed deeply like she already knew the answer. “Seungwan. There’s a difference between thinking you’re kind of a nerd and thinking you’re unlovable,” she said slowly and deliberately, her voice betraying some frustration.

“You’re just saying that,” Seungwan immediately replied, insecurities winning over her fear of opposing Sooyoung.

“No, I’m not. Listen to me. There is no doubt in my mind that you’re good enough for Joohyun, just like she’s good enough for you,” Sooyoung insisted, pausing to let her words linger. Seungwan cringed, unwilling to contradict her friends but equally unwilling to accept their words as truth.

Sooyoung sighed again, filling the silence that stretched between them after her statement. “Nobody ever believes they’re good enough for the person they love. That’s because they love them and they see the best of them and they don’t see the best of themselves. But it’s not the truth,” she said in a slightly gentler tone.

Seungwan listened with a heavy heart, the two sides of herself fighting a raging war. She knew, like an established fact, that she wasn’t good enough. But Sooyoung kept saying all these things with such conviction that she had no choice but to go along. She felt torn between two irreconcilable realities. She took a shaky breath.

“What is there even to love about me?” she finally asked, in a low, wavery voice. She fiddled against the fabric of her sleeve as she awaited an answer that she doubted she’d believe.

“I think that’s a question for Joohyun.”

“But that’s scary,” Seungwan complained childishly, unable to properly express how the suggestion filled her with uncertainty and dread. She didn’t want to expose her insecurity and need for reassurance like this, to show Joohyun just how needy she was.

“Look, Seungwan. You need to stop putting Joohyun on a pedestal because it’s unfair to both of you. You’re not as flawed as you think you are and she’s not as perfect as you think she is. You’re both just human beings in a relationship. If you have a problem, you need to tell her about it. Even if it’s scary.” Sooyoung’s voice had grown a little rougher, but Seungwan could tell that it was the tough act she used when she was trying not to get too sappy.

“Now do you want to know what’s really scary?” she continued, her tone definitely becoming more aggressive yet somehow sounding less terrifying than when the phone call had begun. “Me sneaking into your house in the middle of the night to beat you up for refusing to talk to your girlfriend.”

Seungwan managed a chuckle at Sooyoung’s well-meaning threat.

“I’m serious, I told you I could physically overpower you and I stand by my words,” Sooyoung insisted, though her voice was tinged with amusement.

“Okay, I’ll go,” Seungwan gave in, any trace of enjoyment quickly fading from her words as she was reminded of just what she had agreed to do. The little confidence she had managed to grow seeped out of her in an instant. “But, uh, first I have to call Seulgi back. You kind of interrupted our conversation and-“

“I’ll call Seulgi,” Sooyoung interrupted, her tone strict and allowing no room for argument. “You go. Talk to Joohyun. Everything’s going to be fine.”

After their quick goodbyes, Seungwan hung up and stared at the phone for a very long time. She knew she had to go over there. She had to tell Joohyun everything, even the humiliating things that she’d hoped would remain in the past, because it was becoming clear that they wouldn’t. And the thought of saying those things out loud, of telling the one person that she wished would never find out, was absolutely terrifying.

But she’d made Joohyun cry. That was what hiding things had achieved. And beyond all the worries and doubts that constantly plagued her mind, she knew one thing for certain. She never wanted to make Joohyun cry again. So she put her phone back in her pocket, got up and walked out the door.

Joohyun opened the door to her apartment after a few seconds of waiting. Her face was blotched and marked by the tears that had streaked through her make-up, and her glasses, which she must have put on after Seungwan had left, were slightly fogged over. She barely spared a glance at Seungwan before she was throwing her arms around her and sobbing into her shoulder.

“Oh, Seungwan, I’m so sorry,” she gasped out in a thick voice, gripping so tightly that Seungwan couldn’t pull her away.

“It’s not your fault,” she immediately reassured Joohyun, giving up on her attempt to look her in the eyes and settling for caressing the back of her head comfortingly. “I’m the one who-“

“I yelled at you. I made you cry,” Joohyun cut off in a desperate voice. Her fingers nearly clawed at Seungwan’s back in their attempt to cling to her.

Seungwan was shocked into silence for a moment. The thought that this was what Joohyun would care about after everything Seungwan had said, that her first concern would be to apologize, only made her feel guiltier. “You’re crying too,” she pointed out hesitantly, even though she was mostly sure it wouldn’t bring Joohyun’s anger down on her.

“I just,” Joohyun began, pausing to let out a hiccupping sob. “I don’t understand why you’d say those horrible things. Is that really how you feel?”

Her first instinct was to deny it, to insist that of course she didn’t. But she did, and she couldn’t lie anymore. “It’s… complicated,” she admitted, hating the way Joohyun’s fingers slackened in their grip. “But it has nothing to do with you, I promise, you’re doing everything right. It’s, uh, I’m the one who…” she trailed off.

She didn’t even know how to finish the sentence without repeating what she’d been telling Sooyoung and Seulgi just moments before. That she was terrible and irredeemable and unworthy of Joohyun’s love in the first place.

Joohyun tried to pull away then, but she couldn’t handle seeing her quite yet, so she tried to keep her in place as she continued to talk to the back of her head. “Do you remember when you told me you wished you’d met me sooner? It’s not the same for me. I’m glad you didn’t meet me at sixteen, or eighteen, or twenty, because I was a mess. And I thought I wasn’t a mess now, but I guess I still am,” she said quickly. Then she released her grip, shakily lowered her arms to let Joohyun move away.

She looked confused, a little uncertain, a little worried. But she didn’t look angry. She seemed to be waiting for Seungwan to elaborate, but there were so many thoughts in her mind, so many things she needed Joohyun to understand, things that she didn’t particularly want to share.

She bit her lip, willing the words to spill out, to form a coherent picture out of the jumble of memories that she struggled through. Without a word, Joohyun reached for her hand and led her to the sofa, where they sat side by side, hands still linked.

“Right, uh, I guess I’ll tell you about my first boyfriend?” she asked more than stated. Joohyun only nodded with incredible patience. Seungwan really didn’t deserve her. Willing those thoughts away, she continued her story.

"I was fourteen, I think. He was an older kid. Not, like, weird old. Just fifteen or sixteen. He got my number through mutual friends or something and we started texting.”

Joohyun didn’t make any move to interrupt, silently listening along. Seungwan began to wish she would say something. She felt silly for talking about this like it was some big thing, but at the same time she began to feel incredibly vulnerable. Like she was sharing an intimate secret.

“Then one day we met and we talked about whatever. I don’t even know anymore, TV shows or something. Suddenly he leaned in to kiss me and somehow, I hadn’t realized that that was what we were doing and I was so surprised that I just backed away. He laughed and apologized for startling me and just kept talking like it was fine. Then a while later he leaned in again and I thought, I’m not surprised anymore and it’s not like I’m scared of him or anything. He’s older and cool and he likes me. And so I… let him kiss me,” she said as casually as she could manage. Why was she already feeling like this? She hadn’t even gotten to the bad part yet. She clutched at an invisible thread on the sofa with her free hand until Joohyun’s gentle pressure on the other caused her to slowly relax her fingers.

“After that, we started dating. And then, after a week, he broke up with me. He said I was, uh, childish and clingy,” she slowly recalled, like the words weren’t fresh in her mind. “And I guess I’ve been proving him right ever since.”

She only realized she’d begun crying again when Joohyun carefully disentangled their hands to brush away the tears. “I just keep ruining all my relationships and I don’t even… I don’t know, I can’t help it. I’m clingy. I cry too much and apologize too much and I stress out over dumb stuff and have to be reassured all the time,” she enumerated around the knot in , blinking rapidly to stop the tears.

Joohyun had a frown on her face, her brow furrowed with concern, but still she said nothing, like she sensed that Seungwan wasn’t done yet. She supposed she wasn’t. “Then I met Seulgi and that was the first time I felt good with someone. Confident. So I stopped dating and since then I figured I’d gotten over it but I’m starting to suspect that maybe I didn’t.”

She forced a chuckle at her own understatement, trying to inject some humour into the heavy atmosphere. Joohyun smiled a little, but it was still tinged with worry.

“Okay, so that’s my tragic past,” she said with forced cheer. She patted Joohyun’s hand, which had settled back on the sofa by hers. “Now I can explain what I meant when I said those, uh, horrible things,” she concluded with a slight wince.

“I think I know what you meant,” Joohyun finally said. Without further elaboration, she leaned in for another hug, gently caressing Seungwan’s back and nape. They remained in that for a moment, Seungwan desperately fighting off the urge to break into large, ugly sobs, until finally Joohyun moved back.

“I’m sorry for the way I reacted, Seungwan. I really am,” she began softly. “If I’d known about all this, I would have done things very differently. But the truth is that I didn’t know, and in that moment it only seemed like you didn’t take us seriously. I’m fully invested in this relationship and it hurt that you would be dismissive of it. And it was… humiliating, that going all in from the start might be some naïve mistake born out of my own inexperience.”

Seungwan shook her head hurriedly, eager to dispel this idea. Joohyun had done nothing wrong, nothing at all.

“I don’t blame you, Seungwan, really. And I wasn’t trying to justify myself, only explain why I reacted that way,” Joohyun quickly added, hands reaching up to caress Seungwan’s cheeks. The stress and nausea were still there, but the gesture somehow managed to reassure her despite everything.

“I love you, alright? I love you so much. And if there are ever any problems, then I’ll deal with them. But I need to know that they’re there. I need you to tell me,” Joohyun said, hands still on Seungwan’s face, keeping it in place as she gazed deep into her eyes.

“I don’t want to ruin this,” Seungwan breathed out, then she bit down on her lip, hard, to keep herself from crying.

“You won’t,” Joohyun insisted with certainty.

“I always do,” she pointed out. She wanted to look away, but Joohyun was still holding her face and the movement would have broken her grip.

“It sounds like that might be your side of the story,” Joohyun suggested sweetly. She let her hands drop to toy with Seungwan’s fingers.

She took a deep breath. The thought of doing this, of really trying, of showing Joohyun all of her fears and vulnerabilities, filled her chest with something painful, paralyzing. But it also lit up a spark of something that she hadn’t imagined she could still have.

Hope. Hope that this would really be it. It had been so long since she’d actually hoped that a relationship might work out. She squeezed Joohyun’s hands as the tears finally won over, but she stubbornly looked down, avoiding all of Joohyun’s attempts to see her face.

“You don’t know what I’m really like,” she whispered in a vain attempt to conceal the crying. “I’ll get really clingy. I’ll apologize for dumb stuff and ask if something’s wrong all the time.”

“And if there is, I’ll tell you,” Joohyun replied simply.

“And you’re not mad?” Seungwan added after a nervous pause. There it was, the question that she’d avoided asking for as long as she could. But she was supposed to be honest, so she couldn’t not ask.

“I’m not. It’s fine. Or, obviously it’s not fine for you. I’d prefer if you didn’t feel this way, because you’d be happier and I want you to be happy. But I meant for me. For me it’s fine. It doesn’t- what?” Joohyun finally demanded, flustered at the way Seungwan had begun to smile at her through the tears. It must be a strange combination.

“I just really like you,” she admitted shyly, endeared at the way Joohyun had been ready to ramble on forever. It was strange to consider that Joohyun was insecure as well. Of course, nobody could be confident all the time, but it was still an odd notion.

“Oh,” Joohyun said, the momentary embarrassment fading. She smiled at Seungwan with her own shy grin. “I really like you too.”

They sat there, playing with each other’s fingers and avoiding eye contact like lovestruck teenagers. Seungwan felt a strange mix of relief and pressure that was hard to digest.

Communication. That was the thing. Sooyoung, Seulgi, Joohyun, they had all insisted on that. Communication. Right.

“Joohyun?” she began hesitantly. “Why do you... I mean, you already answered that, but I didn’t… Why do you, um, like me?” she stuttered out with an inward groan.

Joohyun seemed to be mulling over her words. “You didn’t believe me?” she asked very gently, clearly trying not to spook Seungwan or sound imposing in any way.

“It’s not that I think you’re lying or something,” she quickly explained. “It’s hard to put it into words. It’s like I know that you know me and that you’re a good judge of character and that you wouldn’t just say that stuff, but at the same time I also know that I’m not those things. It doesn’t sound anything like me. It feels like there has to be a loophole somewhere.”

Joohyun hummed thoughtfully. Then she shifted in the sofa, straightening herself. “Alright, I’ll try again,” she said simply, a small smile reassuring Seungwan that there was no resentment in her words. Or trying, at least. “I like you because… your sense of humour matches mine and your jokes make me laugh. Because you don’t make fun of me for being afraid of your cat, or push me to get over it so we don’t have to spend all our time at my place. Because you put everything aside to help Yerim when she asked you. Because you shared your experiences with Sooyoung to cheer her up and encouraged her to accept herself. Because you dared to befriend Sooyoung and Yerim in the first place,” she added with a giggle.

Seungwan only tried to hide her face at each statement, offering weak counter-arguments such as “it’s the least I could do” or “she bullied me into it,” which Joohyun waved away with an amused smile. Finally, she clung to Joohyun’s hands and silenced her with a worried look.

“What if I never do those things again? What if, from now on, I just do boring and terrible things and you stop liking me?” she asked with her heart in .

“Of course I can’t predict the future. But you do those things every day. Even today. Even just now.”

Seungwan gazed at her in confusion. All she’d done was make Joohyun mad and nearly ruin their relationship.

“I know you were very afraid to confront your fears and this entire situation, but you still didn’t give up on us. You came back and you talked to me.”

“What else could I do?” she mumbled awkwardly.

“You could refuse to face this. You could close up and say that you’d been wrong to start this relationship and let things end,” Joohyun’s voice trembled slightly as she suggested it. “But you didn’t. That was very brave of you.”

Seungwan sighed deeply, holding Joohyun’s hands tightly for support. “I just get worried that one day you’ll wake up and realize I’m not that great and that you can do so much better.”

Joohyun smiled sadly at her words. “I don’t think that there’s anything I can say to convince you otherwise. From what you told me, I feel like this concern doesn’t stem from my own behaviour so much as your past experience,” she pointed out with a sympathetic squeeze of Seungwan’s hand. “The only thing I can do to prove I’m not going anywhere is to not go anywhere. But that’s going to take time.”

Seungwan tugged on Joohyun’s hand to bring her closer so she could burrow into her shoulder. “Promise not to go?” she requested in a muffled voice.

“I pinky-promise,” Joohyun said with amusement. “You can sic your cat on me if I do.”

“I don’t think it’s possible to sic Mr. Fluffers on anything,” Seungwan replied with a one-armed shrug.

“Well, he’s very large, so just dropping him on me would already be very scary.”

“Okay,” Seungwan relented. “But I’d prefer it if you just didn’t leave.”

“I won’t.” Joohyun suddenly sounded gravely serious. “I won’t,” she repeated, pulling Seungwan back until their eyes met. Then she leaned in for a gentle kiss, finally resting their foreheads together as her fingers caressed Seungwan’s temple. “I won’t.”

Seungwan closed her eyes, letting herself be enveloped in the comfort that Joohyun’s words afforded, even if it was only temporary. She fought back tears because she refused to cry for what would probably be her fourth time that day.

“You know what else I like about you?” Joohyun asked out of the blue, her tone suspiciously playful. Seungwan hummed, trying to convey her suspicious assent, which admittedly was a tall order for a mere hum.

“Well… You poke your tongue out when you’re concentrating and it looks very cute and very distracting. And you scratch the back of your neck when you’re embarrassed. And you smell nice, like coconut. And you have these adorable cheeks, like a little chipmunk.”

Joohyun paused only long enough to pull away and poke her finger into one of the aforementioned cheeks, earning an exaggerated groan from its owner.

“You look so peaceful when you sleep, but every once in a while, you’ll scrunch up your eyebrows like you’re so offended,” Joohyun added with a chuckle, while Seungwan reached for her wrists and struggled to pull her hands away from her face, where they now attempted to poke at her forehead.

“And your smile is more beautiful than I can describe,” she concluded, taking advantage of Seungwan’s moment of surprise to break her defences and land a finger right on Seungwan’s lower lip.

“Are you done?” Seungwan grumbled while she reached for Joohyun’s hands and laced their fingers together.

“Not even close,” Joohyun replied with a crooked smile. “But I can stop, if you want,” she added cautiously.

“I suppose it would be a little… rude not to let you finish.”

They both grinned at Seungwan’s words and Joohyun took the time to settle more comfortably on the sofa, pulling Seungwan to cuddle against her side, before carrying on with her assault of compliments.

Seungwan listened patiently, trying her best not to blush at Joohyun’s apparently endless praise of everything from her ears to her fingers and even her . And for once, it actually made her feel good, rather than stressed at the thought of her secret being found out. For once, she actually believed one or two things. Her was definitely one of them, Joohyun’s hands were always landing on it.

For once, she felt happy without any lingering worries to cloud her mind. And for the first time in so long, even if it was just a little, even if it was just in the tiniest corner of her mind, she began to feel safe in someone else’s arms.