::

chapter prompt: always choosing to be partners for anything in order to have more time together

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With her latest album on its last legs of some final tweaking, polishing, and the promotions had built up a hype buzz about Kim Yongsun—Solar’s—new album, there’s one final thing missing: the album photo.

The album in itself is intimate and it says a lot about Yongsun’s growth as a musician—if she can say so herself, but the album also holds some of her first compositions so she thinks she can brag about that one—and she remembers a setting in an asian movie she and her best friend watched the weekend before that fits what she envisions her cover to look like.

It’ll be perfect.

Now, she contemplates, pulling up her and her best friend’s synched calendar, checking the other woman’s schedule and wonders where she can fit herself an overseas photoshoot.

::

Her palms are sweaty. The phone in her hand shows that only a minute passed since the last time she checked and Yongsun really can’t afford to miss her flight and she knew she should’ve dropped by their apartment despite her recording and meeting lasting well over midnight last night but at least she wouldn’t be panicking right now and—

There’s a cold press of a nose at the nape of her neck, the heavy weight of a person draping itself across her back with an arm draped over her shoulder, circling across her collarbones and the warmth of a palm pressing itself against the light fabric of her shirt.

“Oh, god,” Yongsun sags behind her in relief, sees her manager shake her head lightly at the person behind her before wheeling the familiar gray suitcase right next to the matching white of Yongsun’s own suitcase. “Took you long enough.” There’s no real venom in her words, knowing full well how hectic the other woman’s own schedule is.

“Sorry,” Byul whispers the apology against the collar of Yongsun’s shirt, hold tightening before she lets it loose enough to let Yongsun turn and face her. “, almost slept through all of my alarms.”

Yongsun sees the airport clock behind her best friend’s head—03:27, it says—and she feels the guilt bubbling up in that Byul shushes with a squeeze to her hip, eyes still closed from being half awake.

“Let’s go,” Byul says, not knowing that she’s dragging Yongsun farther from their airport gate, following Yongsun’s steering blindly with her eyes half closed. “, I can always catch sleep in the flight.”

And even though Yongsun had to endure almost three hours of the flight sitting up straight just to provide her best friend the ideal shoulder height to sleep comfortably in, she thinks it’s worth worming her way into Byul’s schedule.

::

She doesn’t remember how she got home but judging from the faint smell of Byul’s shampoo from the abuse pillow being crushed between her arms, Yongsun can safely assume that she’s in her bedroom.

There’s a deep-seated ache that settles in her bones as she tries to flail her arm around her bed, swatting in the general direction where her phone vibrated just seconds before, and she feels so sluggish that Yongsun opts to forget about her phone if not for the damned device vibrating again a few minutes later.