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chapter two

***

So something definitely happened in Thailand.

Rosé is certain.

Whatever that something is though, she’ll have to resort to guessing.

The possibilities are endless and Rosé needs some concrete evidence to back her theory. She’ll have a lot to work around with, careful not to act questionably shady. This makes her hypersensitive and super alert to every interaction between them, not to the extent that she’s trying to insinuate something about them.

Just enough for her to be able to figure out the mysterious Thailand trip.

And it doesn’t help Rosé’s case that Jennie is totally normal and seemingly unbothered.

That makes Lisa the sole person of interest here, so maybe she’s got these personal issues she can’t share yet and Rosé is unnecessarily reading into it too much.

Lisa, by some miracle, was able to revert to her regular self (as far as regular goes for Lisa) during their stay at the Blackpink House. She’s still weird, sure, but none of that fruit-launching and airplane-crashing kind of weird (sidenote: Jisoo has banned her from going anywhere near their fruit basket). Rosé supposes its due to the presence of the cameras, being under surveillance for a hundred days, that Lisa had trained herself to be extra mindful with what she does.

That meant Blackpink House had become uneventful much to Rosé’s dismay.

***

Rosé has this thought.

Ever since they’ve been trainees, Rosé has thought of how inexplicably different Jennie and Lisa’s friendship were from how they treat everyone else. It’s the type that would get people to question the nature of it all, whether it’s surpassing borderline platonic or just two chummy buds who have zero disregard for trivial things such as public skinship and whatnot. Rosé is aware how friends can go overboard in terms of friendly touches which could be misunderstood from other people’s perspective.

So there’s probably nothing suspicious going on between them.

Or is there?

Rosé doesn’t want to entertain that, her business or not, she feels she’s betraying them in some sort way.

As she’s stated, she’s not insinuating anything.

Although, it’s difficult not to when they give you reasons to do so.

***

“Aww, happy anniversary you guys!”

The girls are lounging in their living room one lazy night, and they’re sat on the couch with Rosé in one end, next to Jisoo who also sits next to Jennie, then Lisa beside her on the other end. Jisoo has utilized her bartending skills (no one knew where she’d learn it; another mystery to solve later) and whips out fancy fruity alcoholic cocktails which Rosé downs in one go.

Thank God for her high level of tolerance or they would have to peel her off the couch.

Not that there were that much liquor to begin with.

“Huh?” Jennie her head at Jisoo inquiringly.

“Look what the blinks are posting.” Jisoo flashes them her phone, arm slightly stretched outwards so everyone could have a proper view. The three move closer to inspect what’s shown on screen and Rosé sees how Lisa in a breath.

“It’s your trip in Thailand!”

“A year already?” Jennie sips on her cocktail in one hand, eyeing the photo more closely. She uses her pointing finger in her free hand to scroll through the comments of their fans.

Rosé catches a glimpse of the comments, most of them if not all, mentioning jenlisa jenlisa jenlisa and she sort of, kind of wants to laugh because she just finds the humor in it.

“Oh, wow, yeah, a year,” Lisa mutters softly, suddenly overly fascinated by her drink, moving the straw around.

Jennie glances at the maknae beside her. “Yah, there’s something on your mouth.”

“Where?” Lisa starts her lips blindly, inevitably missing the whipped-cream stain.

“Here.” Jennie playfully sticks her tissue onto the corner of Lisa’s mouth.

Rosé feigns disgust. “Gross, that was your used tissue,” she comments then settles back on her seat. “Get a room” was forming at the tip of her tongue but she decided against it.

“Aww that was an indirect kiss! Guess Lisa just kissed Jendeukie,” Jisoo sing-songs childishly.

A gagging noise escapes from someone, who Rosé  assumes to be Lisa, as the person is coughing and heaving badly like the time Leo accidentally swallowed the missing pair of Jisoo’s unattended Pikachu sock and Lisa had to perform a Heimlich Maneuver on him (her pet-care expertise had impressed Rosé that day). Rosé is mistaken, apparently, because as she arches forward, she catches Jennie’s eyes watering from her coughing fit.

It could be a coincidence really, or the timing of Jisoo’s comment came perfectly before Jennie’s choking fiasco, not a domino effect.

But Lisa’s left a miniscule gap between them, noticeable enough for Rosé that she questions her intentions since the two were seated shoulder-to-shoulder up until that photo was shown.

Jisoo aids Jennie by patting her back repeatedly while Lisa rubs her back soothingly, though her gaze is targeted on the floor. Rosé would also offer some sort of assistance but her brain is so busy absorbing everything she’s noticed that she stays motionless in deep thought.

Then.

Oh .

Oh , oh , oh .

They kissed.

***

And that’s how Rosé brings herself to barge into her bandmate’s bedroom at one in the morning, ‘cause freaking finally, she’s got a good solid guess about the event that had transpired during their trip.

“I think it’s time we talked.” Rosé closes the door behind her.

Jisoo sighs in what seems like defeat as she settles comfortably on her bed, thumbs tapping furiously at the screen on her phone. Another one of her games no doubt. She lowers the device on her chest for a brief moment.

“Okay, I know it’s unsanitary but it only happened once. Fine. Maybe once a week but you know how I get when I’m really sleepy.”

“Um, what?” Rosé blinks at Jisoo, completely lost. Something tells her that they’re not on the same page.

Rosé’s confusion urges Jisoo to look up from her phone again. “Isn’t this what you’re talking about? Me using your toothbrush?” she says very casually, as if toothbrushes were designed to be shared.

“No—wait, what?! Unnie!” Rosé thumps Jisoo on the head. The younger girl grimaces at the horrifying revelation. She just brushed her teeth before she came in!

“Ow!” Jisoo waves her off dismissively. “Aish, I still wash it anyway. So what do you want to talk about then?” She places her phone on her pillow and pushes her body to straighten her back against the headboard.

“Jennie and Lisa,” Rosé supplies, settling on the edge of the bed across Jisoo.

“What about them?”

“You know…”

“I don’t…?”

“Are you saying you haven’t noticed?” Rosé asks incredulously. “Anything? At all?”

“No..?” Jisoo’s eyes wander around the room as if Rosé’s speaking a complicated alien language that she has to translate for her to comprehend.

Rosé casts her a look that basically says: what else?

Jisoo doesn’t immediately understand. A minute passes then her expression slowly progresses from confusion to acknowledgement. She backs up in her spot, eyebrows shooting up in shock. The oldest member whisper-yells, “No! What?! When? How?!”

“Oh my God! I thought you knew! I thought!” Rosé gets flustered. God she must have sounded delusional with what she was implying. She seriously assumed that Jisoo would at least have the faintest idea of this unspeakable tension that’s brewing between their bandmates but here she is, jumping to conclusions with baseless assumptions (everything is an assumption at this point). Rosé is so embarrassed that she’s planning to dig a hole and live there until, like, she dies from lack of oxygen and from being deprived of human interaction and—

“Nah, of course I know,” Jisoo’s demeanor changes instantly. She narrows her eyes and grins in satisfaction at Rosé’s panicked reaction. “How was my acting though?”

“Jesus Christ.” Rosé inhales and exhales multiple times to relax herself.

“The Lord’s name in vain, Chaeng,” Jisoo scolds her teasingly, smug- grin still present. She rises from the bed and switches off the lights. The only thing illuminating the room is the small light emitting from her phone that she’s brought underneath her chin, as one would when sharing spooky tales about the paranormal.

“Shall we begin?” Jisoo lowers her voice.

“We’re discussing about our friends here, not telling a goddamn ghost story.”

“Do you want them to listen to our conversation or what? If one of them sees the light under my door, they’re gonna find out we’re still awake.”

Rosé imagines Lisa bursting through unannounced halfway through their conversation demanding an explanation (in Rosé’s defense, Lisa would have to be the one doing some explanation but still, they’re talking about her and Jennie unbeknownst to them). It would be a nightmare having to be caught that way.

Or worse.

Jennie could come in.

“Fair point.”

“I’m gonna go to the bathroom and you stay here and hold on to your phone,” Jisoo instructs her, shutting off the flashlight feature on her phone then leaves in a hurry. Rosé couldn’t even get a word out. She’s sitting alone in Jisoo’s dark room so she turns on one of her table lamps because Rosé can’t risk endangering her eyesight any further by texting in utter darkness.

Her phone buzzes in a matter of seconds.

Jisoo-unnie

hello

1:30 am

You

Why do we have to text?

We could just talk when you’re done

1:31 am

Jisoo-unnie

‘cuz I’m taking a dump chaeng that’s why

1:34 am

You

ew

1:34 am

 Jisoo-unnie

Don’t ew me when you do this all the time

1:35 am

You take almost 2 hrs to “shower” don’t even deny it

1:35 am

You

Whatever

1:36 am

Jisoo-unnie

So how do we do this?

1:38 am

You

Idk. You poop while I just keep you company???

1:38 am

Jisoo-unnie

No you dingdong I meant jennie and lisa

1:40 am

You think you were the only one playing detective?

1:41 am

You

Are you saying you know more than I do?

1:42 am

Jisoo-unnie

Like those dumdums would tell me

I have a good guess about Thailand

1:43 am

You

So do I

1:43 am

I think they kissed

1:43 am

Jisoo-unnie

Hahaha lol I think someone confessed

1:45 am

How about we put those guesses to good use?

Say, loser gets bathroom duty AND will be doing the dishes for a month

1:46 am

And lets throw in 50000 won

1:48 am

Chaeng are you there

1:50 am

Chaeng?

1:53 am

Its lonely in the bathroom and I’m not done yet :(((

1:55 am

Did you fall asleep cuz I will kick your out of my bed for sleeping on me

1:56 am

You

Woah wtf chill out. No need to flood me with messages

1:57 am

Jisoo-unnie

Where were you? I missed you ;( :(

1:57 am

You

Made a sandwich

hehe starving

1:58 am

Anyway. I’m in. What if none of our guesses are right?

1:59 am

Jisoo-unnie

The closest one will do

1:59 am

You

How do we get some answers?

Jennie is the master of poker face and she’s not the confronting type

2:00 am

Jisoo-unnie

What? She’s the most obvious

2:00 am

You

No way.

Compared to lisa, she acts pretty normal to me

2:01 am

Jisoo-unnie

Noooo. You gotta look where her eyes are.

It shows

2:01 am

Btw how can u sit in here for so long, my is numb.

Still not done :(

2:02 am

You

Wait a minute.

Their Thailand trip…

you mentioned that on purpose didn’t you

2:02 am

As Rosé bites into her sandwich, her answer is revealed through Jisoo’s cackling from the bathroom.

***

Rosé considers Jisoo’s words seriously. The older girl is more competent at this, in the field of spying on other people’s lives to win future bets that she could legitimately be hired for Dispatch. She’s got this uncanny ability in reading people so accurately and she’s read Jennie, of all people.

Jennie is one of the most complex human beings Rosé has had the pleasure of meeting. Like a fortune cookie with an ancient Chinese proverb hidden inside, she’s quite hard to break, both literally and figuratively.

She and Jennie are on the floor panting, cross-legged in the practice room while Lisa finishes the routine for her upcoming dance performance. Jisoo, once again, had disappeared somewhere.

Sweat is trickling down from Rosé’s neck to her spine and she’s on the verge of stripping off her shirt nevermind the other people in the room. That’s how sweaty she is. Lisa continues to dance fluidly, moving ever so gracefully, no signs of perspiration in sight.

What’s astounding about Lisa is that she may be a clumsy little dork on the outside, but once she’s on the dance floor, it’s like the girl who tripped on her own y trap to trick Jisoo ceased to exist (she tied a dental floss on both ends of a doorway; she almost lost her tooth).

Jennie has her phone in her hands, chatting or texting or whatever. From time to time, she does snatch a glimpse to Lisa’s way, ticking upwards. And when Lisa does this slow body roll effortlessly, she doesn’t take her eyes off of her, locked in a trance.

“Someone’s thirsty,” Rosé says nonchalantly.

“What?” Jennie snaps out of it, her eyes drilling holes onto Rosé’s.

“I said Lisa could use a drink.” Rosé tries to play it cool by acting she isn’t the least affected (or ing terrified) by Jennie giving her that look.

“Okay..?”

“Jeez, I’m saying hand her her water bottle.”

“Why me? Why cant you do it?”

“You’re right next to it, dummy.”

So Jisoo could be right. Jennie’s eyes do say a lot. Then again, Rosé would have done the same thing if she were paying attention to Lisa as well. Her first impression of Lisa had been: damn, that girl could dance.

***

"What time is it?”

Rosé’s phone is charging on the opposite end of her room and her clock hasn’t been functioning since this morning. It’s a hassle to roll out of bed when she’s all snug and comfy under her sheets.

It’s another one of those nights that Rosé couldn’t be bothered to sleep so she’s been watching Masterchef on her MacBook, which probably wasn’t the best idea since it’s only gotten her extremely hungry from seeing those savory dishes she wished could teleport from her screen to her bed. Lisa has been chilling in her room with her, lurking around social media on her iPad (for memes purposes she says. “Gotta keep myself updated, Chaeng!”). They’ve been doing their own thing for what felt like hours and Rosé is beginning to wonder if the sun has risen outside.

“Lemme check.” Lisa walks over to where Rosé’s electric guitar is standing, she grabs it and before Rosé could reprimand her, Lisa plugs it in to its aux then strums a chord deafeningly that it reaches to the other girls’ bedrooms.

“OHMYGOD IT’S 2AM!”

“It’s 2 am,” Lisa repeats for Rosé, which was pointless really.

Jennie enters Rosé’s room with an Airpod hanging in one ear, presumably listening to an ASMR video to lull her to sleep. Her hair is in disarray and her eyebags are becoming more evident, an indication that she’s desperately been trying to steal some shut eye for a while now to no avail.

Rosé braces herself for the wrath of an annoyed and sleep-deprived Jennie, cowering in place, whereas Lisa has kept a straight face.

“I’m tired and sleepy! You have no idea what I’m capable of!”

Lisa’s straight face dissipates when she giggles. “I’m sorry, I feel like I’ve been threatened by a marshmallow.”

Rosé sends a warning look at Lisa.

Do you want us to get killed?

Rosé wants to apologize but Jennie is having none of Lisa’s antics so she saunters out of the room, closing the door with a very loud bang which ultimately means you judging by her body language.

The older maknae hits Lisa using her pillow. “Dude.”

Lisa merely shurgs. “She’s just cranky.”

Rosé is rethinking the whole situation now and she’s second guessing that maybe, she and Jisoo were wrong after all. Maybe Jennie’s near-death experience with her drink was a coincidence. Maybe what happened in Thailand had nothing to do with Jennie.

Maybe it’s only Lisa.

***

The following afternoon, Rosé returns to the dorm after a quick photoshoot and she’s craving for some much needed sleep. She doesn’t even make it to her bedroom, crawling onto the couch and passing out in an instant. Her nap is disturbed when she hears Jennie’s voice.

“Hey, get up.”

“Wake me up when I’m dead.”

“You can’t wake up when you’re dead.”

Rosé lifts her arm then cracks one eye open. “Okay, good point. But I’m still not getting up.” She returns to her previous position.

“Fine. I need you to tell Lisa something.”

“You haven’t forgiven her yet?”

“It’s not that, it’s…” Jennie heaves a sigh exasperatedly. “She’s avoiding me?”

“She is?” Rosé is unaware of this, or hasn’t even witnessed Lisa distancing herself from Jennie.

“She’s been weird, okay. And, I don’t know, Rosie. I want to talk to her but I’m still really pissed off.”

So yeah, maybe it is just Lisa.

***

But life has a way of surprising you, surpassing all your expectations when you least expect it.

“I wanna tell you something,” Lisa says.

“Something happened in Thailand. With Jennie.”

edited.