Red splotches formed the weak outline of lips she had tasted a million times before, had been found on nearly every mug, it existed as a visceral reminder of what she had lost, it had marked every cup with its throat slit for the entire world to see.

But Joohyun learned to ignore the gore and the crimson splotches that once danced across her skin, she learned to avoid the mugs that were black and green, those were all marked; along with her collarbone and the edges of her lips, but she learned to smear those away till the red blurred into her pale milky skin.

She learned to ignore the box of clothes that were two sizes too big for her and that smelled too much of luxury perfume and not enough of coffee and cheap deodorant.

Joohyun learned to wake up to the haunting smell of Sooyoung’s perfume weighing heavy in her chest, she was drowning in a sea of possibilities; of happier mornings, one filled with Sooyoung’s loud laughter and messy mornings where her hair puffed away from her scalp and lipstick dripped from her lips.

She hated admitting it but the world had grown cold without the younger woman. She managed to make everything feel as if the sun was gently and slowly kissing her tender skin, even when she buried herself into the crook of her neck and mumbled sweet words into her ear, even when she whined for attention with incessant pawing at her thigh till Joohyun would give in and run her fingers up and down her spine, sending ripples of heat to her nape.

But Joohyun fell in love with the way her hot breath had danced across her pale skin, the way her voice had made her want her heart want to freeze within her chest, just so she could to hear the beauty of her voice without the endless thumping of her heart tainting the gentle rasp of her voice. 

She swallowed the bitter taste of regret as she downed another cup of coffee. She learned to not touch her phone, despite curiosity wanting to lead her off a precipice, she would hold onto her sanity till her knuckles turned white and began to bleed, she refused to swipe on the messages with her name attached, she knew her name would yank her to the depths of her past that she so desperately wanted to avoid. 

The past was not a kind lover, she danced her fingers across her spine the same way Sooyoung did but faded away the second she turned to face her. She spoke with Sooyoung's voice, she echoed every word and every little rise and drop in her voice, but still failed to fill the emptiness in her home like Sooyoung did. 

I don’t want to forget you.

The words flashed across the screen and and almost lulled Joohyun into a world where everything hadn't gone wrong. 

She thought it would be easier if she just faded away.

She swallowed the lump in alongside the bitterness spreading across her tongue and allowed herself the pleasure of drowning in her dreams. 

A sharp ding cut through her kitchen, a quiet static flooded into the fresh wound and her voice rubbed and kneaded into a gaping cut:

Does everything have to end as a tragedy with you? 

The static cut off abruptly and Joohyun was left to drown.

There was a part of the couch that she couldn’t touch, it still had a blanket lazily thrown upon it. It was the corner piece, it was the closest to the window, closest to the sun’s endless warmth.

“Doesn’t the sun burn your eyes?” she had asked one day.

“Yeah, but the warmth is worth the damage.” Sooyoung replied promptly, Joohyun watched as she stared into the sun’s blaze.

She could always find beauty amongst the rubble.

The seat smelled too much like her, it smelled of endless night talks about a better life, one where she could shine in the luxury she had worked so hard for. But Joohyun always thought they already had the better life.

She had found sweetness in quiet mornings, in a coffee scented smog and bare traces of a perfume she could never afford with quiet laughs tracing across her bare skin.

But Sooyoung found sweetness in the endless screams of her name, the flashing lights as she strutted out of expensive restaurants, the way her pearls and gold shined as she walked up to receive an award she knew she was already going to win. Love was made out of flashing lights and secret late night talks, hidden from cameras and their impervious lenses. Metaphors and similes alluding to an unknown love in speeches made for the masses.

That love was never sweet.

But meeting Sooyoung had only echoed sweetness. Words that tasted like honey slowly dripped from her lips as she enchanted crowds of people with her toothy grins and flowing hair. She knew she was beautiful, she knew she was nothing less than divine.

The words pooled into Joohyun’s mouth, the overpowering taste of honey swept through her body and nearly shattered her ribs. Her lungs strained to carry the weight of her name, her flesh twitched as Sooyoung twirled around her and traced her slender finger up and down her arm.

She chuckled at Joohyun’s enlarged eyes. “I guess pretty girls don’t approach you often.”

A strained series of words managed to fly straight from her lips but not a single managed to land within Sooyoung’s field of attention.

She flashed her smile as Joohyun struggled to make sense of her words. “Pretty girls tend to stay away from other pretty girls.”

Joohyun laughed. “Are you calling me pretty?”

Sooyoung gave her a smile, “Sure, but I think beautiful fits you better- Beautiful girls scare away pretty girls.”

"You're not scared?" 

"No," she said with a slight smirk, "Beautiful girls pull me in like bees to a flower." 

Joohyun slid her arms around Sooyoung’s waist, she rested her hand atop her chest, feeling her heart sync to her’s. A beautiful melody began to play within the small thumps that echoed within her hollow bones, a quiet hum managed to slip between the cracks of Joohyun’s lips.

“I want to take you to Daegu.” Joohyun mumbled into Sooyoung’s nape.

“Hmm?”

“I thought you didn’t like taking people back home.” she whispered with a quiet yawn.

“I wouldn’t mind taking you back there.” she admitted after a few moments of silence as she buried herself within Sooyoung’s muscled back.

Daegu was a sea of memories that flooded into her lungs, it wrapped around her tongue and forced her words to drop from her lips in an awkward fashion that frightened Seoulites who found the way her tongue flicked with thousands of years of history terrifying, so she hid her history behind a sewed lips and kind glances that draped over the ferocity of her tongue.

Sooyoung turned, sending their mattress into a sea of creaks and groans. Her fingers wrapped around Joohyun’s face, spikes of cold drove into the tender spaces of her cheeks but she couldn’t bring herself to care.

“Let’s go then.” she murmured softly, the breeze rolled into their room and settled around them as the sun began to pour over Sooyoung’s frame, highlighting the curves of her hips and the puff of flesh of her cheeks.

“You’d like that?” Joohyun asked.

“With you I would.” she replied with her shining canines poking from underneath her plump red lips.

“Do you ever imagine the life we deserve?” she had asked one day, a Daegu breeze blew through her hair as the taste of historic royalty flooded .

Joohyun turned from the cherry blossom trees, her fingers toyed with the blossom, a sticky light pink dye spilled over her fingers as she watched Sooyoung gaze up to the sky.

“What’s wrong with the life we have now?” she asked, quiet as always, her tongue painfully aware of every letter that leapt from her lips.

“Don’t you want mansions? Expensive dinners, clothes only the rich can afford?”

Joohyun snuck a quick glance at herself, her clothes weren’t made out of softest silk and she wasn’t carrying the weighty letters of designer clothing; but her clothes had never been one of her concerns, but it was always Sooyoung’s.

“I like what I have now.” she answered as she sipped on her soda.

Sooyoung huffed quietly, “I’m not.”

Joohyun laughed, “You never are, you always want more.”

“Is there something wrong with that?” she asked with her eyebrows raising and her arms instantly crossing.

The laugh shattered in her lungs, the shards of a heavy laugh dug into the pulsating flesh of her lungs. “No, not at all.”

She huffed quietly before her cold fingers traced across her cheek the same way she used to do; when her voice used to shake when they made eye contact, when her eyes began to flame red as steamy tears ran down her plump cheeks every time she got kissed because she never thought she deserved love.

Her voice came out low and gentle. “We’re good people, don’t we deserve better?”

“You’re good,” Joohyun assured her, “You’re nothing short of absolutely divine.”

“And what about you?” she asked quietly.

“I’m good enough.” said Joohyun as she pushed herself further into Sooyoung’s hand, closing her eyes as her sharp nails traced barely above her skin.

Joohyun sighed as she collapsed onto the couch, the stack of papers in the corner of room caught her eye.

Stacks and stacks of folded papers with bold lettering and flashing colors, all reminding them of the endless amounts of money they owed just so they could exist. A bright flash of blue to remind them of the thousands of won they had to pay for clean water, flashes of red and yellow to hold them in a chokehold, to really remind them of how much they owed for heating.

She hid her eyes behind her palm, shutting them in the hopes that the flashing colors could be drowned out by a sea of black.

“Hey.”

She sighed in response, the heavy ache of the bills had forced her eyes shut.

“Joohyun,” she whispered, “I did it.”

“Did what?” she mumbled.

“I got the check from that movie I did…” she said slowly, her voice barely raising with each word, “Joohyun look!”

A flood of white with the similar bolded numbers washed over her weary eyes, the lack of flashing colors had yanked her eyes towards the endless lines of zeroes that had filled their place.

“That’s so much…” she mumbled absentmindedly as she ran her finger over the first line of zeroes.

Sooyoung’s face leapt in front of hers, her teeth shined in the sunlight as a laugh spilled from the depths of her lungs. “I know! It’s so much!”

The younger woman fell backwards as a trail of loud laughter followed her fall.

Joohyun’s eyes trailed back to the paper, the zeroes began to fill the air in her lungs, the blood in her veins. She felt as if the zeroes were beginning to eat her alive.

“We can pay the bills…” she mumbled.

Sooyoung shot off the ground and landed with a smile. “And a lot more than that!”

“We can go to Daegu more often now,” she nearly shouted but she quickly paused, “Maybe I can take you to my home. Now that we have the money, it wouldn’t be a problem anymore.”

“Jeju is so beautiful Hyun, you haven’t seen beauty till you’ve seen the beaches there.” Sooyoung said quickly as she popped back into the older woman's vision.

Joohyun’s breaths came slow as her eyes wandered over to the younger woman's face, her eyes devoured the shine in her dark eyes, tearing apart any light in those dark pools of brown; while the bittersweet taste of Sooyoung’s lipstick flooded into and caused a sea of nostalgia to yank her downwards into the dark waters of her past.

“I’ve already seen beauty,” Joohyun mumbled as she ran her pale fingers through Sooyoung’s sea of dark hair, “I’ve seen you. Everything else pales in comparison.”

Sooyoung’s finger tapped against her nose gently, “You’ve always drowned in beauty.”

“As long as its your eyes and your husky voice, your loud laughs and smiles that I’m drowning in, I won’t ever mind.” she wanted to say, but the words were swallowed, they fought against the tender flesh of as they moved downwards.

“It’s not the worst way to go.” she said softly as she traced the gentle curve of Sooyoung’s jaw.

Joohyun’s world of quiet mornings and weary limbs wrapping around her as they collapsed onto bed at a time unknown to them, all they knew was that the stars weighed heavy in the night sky and it was surely pulling them down too.

But her world had been consumed by another, one of flashing lights that dug into her eyes and pulled out with her vision, one built with swarms of people flooding into every building. Their hunger for Sooyoung’s perfume sent them running into every luxurious building looking for the woman with plump red lips and dark hair that flowed past her shoulders.

Joohyun quickly learned that Sooyoung’s name was no longer her’s, it wasn’t reserved for tucked away nights where her tears stained pillows and she needed all the reassurance that her world would start again in the morning. It wasn’t for afternoons where the sun managed to crawl into their room as their laughs began to interlock with the quiet murmurings of their names, when loud raspiness ran smoothly through the quiet enunciation of her name. Sooyoung’s name now belonged to the sea of people that flooded streets when they saw the flash of her red lips and dark hair, when they heard the raspiness that Joohyun was convinced was made for herself.

She watched as the woman she loved turn to the flashing lights for the beauty she once found within her. Sooyoung loved the way the flashing lights embraced her, they brought a distinct feeling of warmth, they shot the sun’s brightest rays deep into her freezing bones.

Her life had fallen into sea of luxury, designer logos filled her vision, the brown shades of Sooyoung’s purse had become more familiar than her red lips and dark hair. Her calm nightlife had been replaced with parties filled with Korea’s top elite. The mugs of coffee in her hands had been replaced with tall glasses of amber colored champagne.

But Sooyoung loved it, the way people approached her and found difficulty looking into her eyes, solely because her reputation outshined the sun. The way black silk clung to her every curve and caused a worldwide hunger, saliva dripped off people’s teeth as their eyes followed her curves and watched as the tender flesh of her thighs glistened in the silvery moonlight.

Joohyun eyed the clock as Sooyoung entered their home, the sharp edges of their couch pressed into ribs as she quietly spoke.

“You’re late again.”

Sooyoung paused, her eyes narrowed as she entered the living room.

“I was shooting again remember?” she answered softly.

Joohyun looked up to the younger woman and felt something deep within her chest harden and quietly crack and thump against her ribs.

“You said that last time.”

She puffed air through the tiny slit between her lips, her voice began to shake as she spoke. “Do you think I’m lying?”

“No.”

Sooyoung fell to her knees as she desperately clawed at the older woman’s hand. “Then why?...”

Ragged breaths stumbled from her lips as she continued to whimper. “Why won’t you believe me?... I did this for us Hyun… Why don’t you believe me?”

Joohyun felt a bitter scoff tear through her supple lips. “Why do you always use that as an excuse?”

“Did you like being poor?” Sooyoung shot back sharply, “Did you love the way we struggled?”

“Not as much as I loved you,” she mumbled flatly, “Not as much as you love your fame.”

Her eyes drifted from the younger woman to the wall straight ahead, she felt her heart deflate and hang limply within her chest.

She heard a quiet sigh slip from the younger woman’s lips. “I don’t know what do Joohyun-”

Joohyun fought against the searing pain within her eyes and buried the hunger for Sooyoung’s warmth under layers of cold flesh and bone. “I’m done.”

“W-What?... Joohyun- Wait. Just wait one second- Please.” she begged.

“I’ve already waited two years Sooyoung… I’ve waited for you to come back for so long.” her voice wavered as she spoke, her eyes tightly shut to keep the sea of tears at bay.

She stood from the couch and began walking towards the door.

Sooyoung’s quiet whimpers had been cut by her sharp voice, it shook with anger and a mix of heart clenching betrayal. “I did all of this for you… What the hell do I do with it now?”

Joohyun turned at the door and watched as the younger woman crumpled to the ground. “I don’t know, maybe you’ll learn how to,” her lips trembled as she spoke her last words. “For all it’s worth Sooyoung, I really hope you do.”

Hefty silence filled the entrance of their once laughter filled home, the uncomfortable pause pushed into her ribs as she watched Sooyoung stare up at her with dark eyes filled with heavy tears and simmering anger.

“Leave.” she spat as tears ran down her cheeks, her thundering eyes and pouring tears echoed the distant rainfall they once ran under, with their hands clasped and heartbeats dancing to the song of their laughter. 

Joohyun sniffed lightly, the light smell of flowers floated around her slowly as the warmth of another wrapped around her freezing body.

“I didn’t think you’d watch the awards.” Seulgi mumbled into her thigh as she peered upwards with curious eyes.

Joohyun’s lips trembled for a split second as the entire screen became devoid of color and all that remained was her flowing black hair and tender red lips.

“I wanted to see her again.” Joohyun said softly. Her voice echoed from the tv and yanked Joohyun into a world filled with her most colorful sorrows and blooming happiness. It was a world she had tried to scrub clean from herself but had failed to do so a thousand times.

A laugh echoed from the tv as her voice began to wash over her again.

“I’d like to thank the crew and the writers and director who helped shape this movie into the work of art it is,” she said slowly, her eyes glanced over the crowds of actors and actresses who smiled back at her. “I’ve always dreamt of being up here- It’s different from what I imagined-”

She paused for a second as her finger ran up and down the golden award. She chuckled to herself and looked upwards into the camera with a crack of melancholic grief flooding her expression, her smile fell for a second as her eyes filled with a weariness unfamiliar to her.

She gulped quietly before speaking again. “I always imagined her to be sitting beside me… But I don’t know where that person is anymore.”

She sighed as a melancholic smile stretched across her face before running her hand over the award. “But I genuinely hope they’re happy wherever they are.”

Sooyoung hesitated before speaking again, her lips twitched with a sadness she had buried so long ago, but it had ripped through her flesh and began to pour from her lips.

“Do good without me Hyun.”

The tv came to an abrupt stop, Joohyun’s hand curled around the remote as she fought against the hot tears burning her eyes.

Seulgi’s warmth breath tickled her thighs as she spoke slowly. “Have you ever stopped thinking about her?”

Joohyun stifled a heartbreaking chuckle as she the younger woman’s hair. “Never.”

I tried something new with this story, it doesn't really take place in chronological order but rather the way Joohyun remembers it, the bitter and then the sweet and then the bittersweet.

I didn't want either Sooyoung or Joohyun to seem selfish for acting the way they did/leaving, so I wanted their conflict to be complex and have them both have massive gains and losses with both staying in their relationship and by leaving.

So I've been working on this for a couple of weeks, I don't really like it, it's probably one of my least favorite pieces of writing thus far. But I promised a joyrene fic, so here it is.

Let me know what you think ;).