It’s always been considered sage advice to read the fine print.

Of course, no one ever does because who has the energy to read a daunting wall of tiny text, easier to just trust there’s nothing sketchy in there and scribble on the signature line. And of course, they usually end up being screwed over.

Sooyoung never reads the fine print. Unsurprisingly, she’s as oblivious to them as Jiwoo probably is when they both let themselves be cajoled into this scheme and signed the imaginary contract finalising their status as ‘Official’ Girlfriends.

She’s coming to realise that those unforeseen, meandering disclaimers and word-vomit clauses in the fine print of Fake Dating are sneaking in to surprise her much sooner than she expected.

Fake dating Jiwoo: a fun side job no different from any other part-time work? Oh, Sooyoung really thought, huh...

An abrupt cancellation of the dance club’s summer orientation meeting has Sooyoung aimlessly wandering the halls of the performing arts building.

She’s lost in her usual thoughts lately: self-reminders to buy more Salonpas, Jiwoo, organizing guest instructor workshops, Jiwoo, choreographing new lesson routines, her feelings for Jiwoo, intramural dance expo, Jiwoo, watering the plants, Jiwoo…

(Clause 6U: The cosigning party will encroach on even the most inaccessible crevices of your mind and subsequently annex all your thoughts. This is the beginning of Phase 2.)

Music travels through the walls as she listens to choruses sing over orchestraic pieces coming from elsewhere in the corridor. She often wandered these halls whenever she felt stressed or sentimental.

Entering the wing of individual practice rooms, a sweet melody piques her curiosity immediately. Sooyoung was used to hearing intense, polyphonic Beethoven pieces, classicals with elaborate trills, or the occasional dissonant tunes of modern pieces. The usual music students doing music things.

But this melody floating through the air isn’t like the usual; it’s not as technical, doesn’t sound like the pianist is playing as if their life depends on it, fingers smashing onto keys in a frenetic rendition of ‘I have an exam in three hours and if I don’t perfect this in time, I’ll set this piano on fire.’

So Sooyoung follows the inviting tune. Her ears take her to the furthest room at the end of the hallway, its door open a crack. She pokes her head in and, much to her (most pleasant) surprise, finds familiar dark auburn hair hunched over the keys of a grand piano.

Sooyoung can’t believe her luck.

She quietly slips into the room just as Jiwoo softly plays a finishing chord. It’s only silent for a second.

“Play another one.”

Jiwoo jumps at her soft voice, head turning around so fast it could give her whiplash.

“Oh my god, Sooyoung, you scared me!” she says, looking slightly frazzled as she brings a hand to her chest. She gets up from the bench.  

“Wait, you’re leaving? I wanted to hear you play,” Sooyoung says as she walks over, leaning over the piano to rest her chin on her palm. She gives Jiwoo an encouraging smile.

Jiwoo hesitates in her movements, but she doesn’t seem like she wants to leave either.

So she sits back down, barks out a little cough to clear and ease her nerves, and lets her hands do the magic.

And seriously, it is magic. To Sooyoung, at least, who knows jack about music, but has heard hundreds of melodies in all the time she has spent wandering these hallways. Sure, whatever Jiwoo’s playing isn’t as advanced as some upper year concerto piece, but it’s magical in its own right.

Or maybe Sooyoung just admires anything and everything Jiwoo does.

Jiwoo moves through the music effortlessly, immersed in a memorised piece. Somewhere along the way, Sooyoung’s gaze goes from the keys, to Jiwoo’s fingers dancing over them, and finally to Jiwoo’s face, where it lingers.

She doesn’t even realise herself staring until Jiwoo catches her gaze and messes up a key, the sudden discordant note abruptly cutting the piece short.

“Ah-“ Jiwoo mutters shyly, staring down at her fingers. “You distracted me…”

“Sorry, I didn't mean to,” Sooyoung says, “...do you have a habit of chewing on your lip when you’re concentrating? You’re going to accidentally cut yourself one day.” It’s an innocent observation, one she finds endearing, but it gave Sooyoung an excuse to look at Jiwoo’s lips while she played.

“I know…” Judging by the way Jiwoo’s murmured answer comes out automatically, it seems like it’s not the first time someone has pointed it out. She suddenly gets up, as if she was reminded of something unwanted, and grabs Sooyoung’s hand. “Let’s go somewhere else.”

The sudden proposition brings Sooyoung down from whatever cloud she had been floating on.

“But I still want to listen to you play,” she says, watching Jiwoo make a beeline for her backpack. “You’re really good.”

“I’ll play for you another day,” Jiwoo tells her, but Sooyoung feels like it’s probably another empty promise.

She sees the opportunity to ask Jiwoo something she's been thinking about a lot lately, the more Jiwoo floated into her thoughts: “Will you ever tell me why you stopped playing?”

Jiwoo looks at her for a moment before turning away, busying herself with the straps of her bag. “I told you, I had no time.”

“As if I’d believe that,” Sooyoung softly sighs, “I wish you’d just tell me what you’re really thinking sometimes. You don’t have to hide anything from me…unless you want to keep this strictly business and cancel the whole friendship thing.”

On second thought, Sooyoung’s hope to become real friends with her might’ve been too zealous.

(Clause 3K: Development of a legitimate camaraderie, absent of any romantic intentions, between the participating parties is optional and nonobligatory.)

Jiwoo shakes her head, shuffling her feet. “No, no, of course not. I’m sorry, I don’t mean to keep things from you…it’s just that…” Her words taper away in hesitation. 

“Confessions are hard?” Sooyoung finishes her sentence for her. The fine print of this revelation? Simple: Jiwoo finds it difficult to say what she genuinely feels, repressing her thoughts and opinions with a smiley face bottle cap.

Sooyoung walks over to Jiwoo and meets her with a tilted head. “I understand. How about this…if I tell you a confession, any confession, tell me a similar one in exchange.”

She’s going to get something out of her, no matter what. The sudden proposal for a confession trade-off surprises Jiwoo, but she gives a subtle shrug and looks up at Sooyoung expectantly. She must be curious about her, too. All this time they’ve spent together and there’s still so much they don’t know about each other.

“Okay, let’s see,” Sooyoung purses her lips, leaning her shoulder against the wall. “Once, I accidentally dropped my sister’s toothbrush in the toilet. I just fished it out and acted like nothing happened.”

Jiwoo gasps at her, scandalised. “That’s so gross.”

“I was 8,” Sooyoung says, suddenly feeling the need to defend herself when she finds Jiwoo looking at her with gaping eyes.

Jiwoo’s wide eyes curve into crescents when she starts giggling. She directs her gaze to the ceiling. “Now I have to tell you a similar one? Hmm…okay, I also dropped something in the toilet when I was little. My dad’s keys. On purpose. No reason, aside from me just being a dumb kid.”

Sooyoung’s laughter comes out effortlessly. “Hey, keys would sink! Did you flush it down!?”

“I was about to!” Jiwoo exclaims with a grin, “but I got caught. Thank goodness.”

The thought of toddler Jiwoo being caught red-handed at the toilet has Sooyoung laughing again.

“My turn,” Sooyoung says once she could control her chuckles, “I’ve never told anyone this because it’s embarrassing, but when I was a freshman, I once got drunk on a few vodka coolers and-“

“Coolers?” Jiwoo bites her lip to tame her amused smile.

“Shut up, I was a lightweight…” Sooyoung answers sheepishly, “but anyway, I showed up at a girl’s dorm room. Like, knocked on her door at 2AM.”

Eyebrows fly up in surprise. “Why would you do that?”

“Because I wanted to see her again,” Sooyoung says plainly with a slight shrug, speaking reminiscently of the memory, “drunkenly told her I missed her.”

Looking over at Jiwoo, she finds the girl returning her look with a curious one, completely absorbed in her words like a child during story time. “And?”

“And she told me to go home and closed the door on my face.”

Ah. Sooyoung getting snubbed at 2AM by a Tinder hook-up. Good times. For a while, she missed the fine print there: a blind, reckless pursuit of someone after a one-night stand is destined to crash and burn.

“Ouch,” Jiwoo frowns, “I’m sorry.”

Sooyoung chuckles. “What for?”

“I’m sorry that happened to you.”

“It’s okay. At least I learned how to improve my sad alcohol tolerance and not drink at 2AM in the morning while thinking about someone.” The incident was one of her impulsive actions, albeit a drunk one, but it least had a takeaway. See? Useful lessons can come out of impulsivity! “It’s your turn.”

Jiwoo goes back to staring at the ceiling, thinking for a bit until her gaze floats over to the piano.

“Sometimes I come here to play by myself when no one’s around.”

“Why do you that?” Sooyoung asks, echoing the same question Jiwoo had for her.

And Jiwoo parrots back an answer like the one Sooyoung gave her. “Because I miss playing.”

A confession in exchange for a similar one – they both sought to remedy the absence of something fulfilling; music in Jiwoo’s case, desire in Sooyoung’s.

And this is the confession Sooyoung has been looking for. “Then why’d you stop?”

Jiwoo looks at her hesitantly, but Sooyoung’s gaze on her is patient and understanding.

“Because,” Jiwoo starts quietly, “the main reason I played was because Jungeun liked to watch me. But after she left, I didn’t feel like playing anymore. It started feeling…pointless? Almost.” She sighs, “which is stupid because I like to play piano, but she was always there watching me and suddenly she wasn’t anymore and…sorry, this probably sounds so lame...”

Sooyoung shakes her head. “No, I get it,” she says, “you felt like you had no one to play for anymore.”

It isn’t fair. Sooyoung can tell Jiwoo clearly loves to play and she shouldn’t have to stop just because of a breakup. It’s just not fair at all how much her ex has deprived her of things. And it’s probably not right to blame Jungeun if she doesn’t know, but it’s just so easy to do so when Jiwoo’s in front of her, looking this sad.  

And Sooyoung thinks it’s not fair for Jiwoo to feel like she’s been stripped of things; of playing piano, of feeling happy, of getting closure, of getting the chance to move on. She shouldn’t feel like she can’t do any of these things because she can and Sooyoung’s supposed to help her realise it. Pull her out of the whirlpool and all.

(Clause 19T: Allocation of emotional support must be provided with solicitude at your own discretion, if the situation warrants it.)

“You should just play for yourself,” Sooyoung suggests, her voice softening, “you enjoy it, don’t you? Don’t let someone else, or lack of someone else, keep you from doing something you love.”

“You’re right. I guess I never realised that before…” Jiwoo murmurs as her head tilts to the side. “I like having someone to play for, though. It makes it more enjoyable.”

Sooyoung smiles. “What about me?”

Jiwoo’s eyes turn to her with a flutter of her eyelids. She's got a curious, wholesome look on her face that suddenly diminishes all of Sooyoung’s confining misgivings into nothing.

“Play for me,” Sooyoung tells her, “I’ll offer you my ears and attention.”

“Really?”

‘Absolutely’ threatens to leap out of Sooyoung’s mouth, straight from her heart, but Jiwoo suddenly narrows her eyes suspiciously, her teeth peeking from behind her lips in a cheeky grin. “You’d bother showing up to boring recitals and stuff?”

“Won’t be boring if you’re playing,” Sooyoung hums. “Besides, it’d be girlfriend duty.”

She wouldn’t mind at all listening to Jiwoo’s fingers flitting over keys for hours on end. She could fall asleep to it and she’d wish to wake up to it, a lulling melody playing in her head as the image of Jiwoo in front of a piano paints her last thoughts of the night and her first thoughts of the morning.

She’d spend all day thinking about it. And she probably will, starting today.

“I’d even show up in an ‘I heart Kim Jiwoo’ shirt but instead of a heart, it’s your face with your cheeks puffed out.” Sooyoung pokes her on the cheek. “Would that be allowed? I don’t know, I’ve never been to a piano recital.”

Jiwoo breaks into a loud laugh, impossibly wide, and it’s a prettier sound than any piece Sooyoung has ever heard in these hallways.

“That’d be so embarrassing!”

“Hey, more so for me than you! But I don’t mind. I’ll wear it proudly, like your most loyal cheerleader.”

With all her teeth in full display, the liveliness just bursts out of Jiwoo, brighter than the fluorescent lights above them. How could anyone keep themselves from smiling if this ball of joy was right in front of them? Sooyoung beams.

“That’s really sweet of you,” Jiwoo says sincerely.   

No doubt, happy Jiwoo is her absolute favourite Jiwoo.

“Is that a yes, you’ll play for me?”

Jiwoo smiles at her. “Sure, okay. You can be like my muse,” she replies thoughtfully, “if you prepare a full cheerleading routine, pom-poms and all.”

Sooyoung rolls her eyes to the sound of Jiwoo’s endlessly amused giggles. “You just want to see me in a short skirt.”

The younger girl gasps, lightly shoving her on the shoulder. “Not true! Wow, okay, I’m changing it to a full mascot. You would look so silly showing up at the recital, it’d be so funny.”

It’s Sooyoung who shoves her on the shoulder this time.

Oh, if only Jiwoo knew that Sooyoung wouldn’t hesitate to make a fool out of herself if it means getting to see that brilliant smile over and over again.

(Clause 9C: Progressing with Phase 3, you may find yourself engaging in an emotionally-driven provision of services outside the periphery of the relationship agreement, with no incentive besides self-fulfillment and budding feelings.)

As a typical hard worker, Sooyoung likes to put her all into everything she does, willing to do something repeatedly until she gets the result she’s looking for. The pain relief patches all over her body are a testament to that, and so is the third plate of omelette she shoves aside.

Her mom would literally kill her if she were to find out just how wasteful Sooyoung is being right now. She’s so occupied with perfecting this omelette that she no longer winces every time she cracks an egg. Making ruthless sacrifices (like perfectly good eggs!) is a vice she has yet to fix.

But she had promised Jiwoo that her rolled omelettes will be the best she’s ever tasted.

That was an impulsive promise, of course (is it even surprising at this point?), put forward because her confidence had gotten the best of her.

Sooyoung pushes the plate (her fourth omelette of the day) towards the two girls sitting across the counter.

Hyunjin groans, sick of eating omelettes, but Heejin forces chopsticks into her hands.

“Heejin, isn’t this power harassment or something?”

Sooyoung narrows her eyes. “What are you talking about?”

“I just came here to pick up Heejin from her dance club meeting, but you’re keeping her back as your omelette taster and she can’t say no because she’s your junior and now I’m stuck here being an omelette taster too,” Hyunjin complains, grimacing at the piece of omelette Heejin offers her. She eats it anyway.

“Honest thoughts?” Sooyoung asks, eyeing both of them hopefully as they chew on a mouthful of omelette.

“It’s spectacular,” Heejin exclaims. There’s fine print to that too: while it may sound like a winning compliment, she’s already used it for the previous three omelettes, so it already lost its merit by the second time around.

“Yeah, spectacularly mediocre. They’ve all tasted the same.”

Sooyoung rolls her eyes at Hyunjin’s honest review of her spectacularly mediocre omelette, even though she asked for it. She takes their plate and pushes it aside. “Fine. Fifth time’s the charm, I guess.”

Hyunjin groans for the fourth time in the past hour or so, dropping her head on the counter with a resounding thump. “Heejin, please stop her.”

“Heejin, it’ll be the last one, I promise,” Sooyoung says, already getting ready to crack the bazillionth egg.

The girl at the centre of the tug of war looks visibly conflicted, eyes going back and forth between the two.

“Heejin, I was going to take you out for lunch, you know? I even had a reservation. But now we’re full from these twenty million omelettes.” Hyunjin pouts.

That appeared to be the winning tug because a deep remorseful frown begins to pull on Heejin’s pretty features. She turns to the older girl. “Sooyoung, your omelette tastes fine, I promise.”

“Fine isn’t enough, it has to be the best!” Sooyoung says, passionately whisking eggs in the bowl like her life depends on it.

There’s something glaringly obvious about her determination to make the best rolled omelettes of her life for Jiwoo, but Sooyoung has half the mind to think about it any deeper.

(The fine print: …nevermind, it’s obvious, isn't it?)

“You don’t look like the type who can cook a mean plate of rolled omelette anyway, I doubt Jiwoo has much of an expectation,” Hyunjin quips absentmindedly and Sooyoung has an inkling feeling that the girl is fully aware of her comments’ insulting undertones.

Was this really the same girl who raved about her all those weeks ago, calling her a godly-woman-hotter-than-the-sun-and-has-descended-upon-us-like-a-guardian-angel? Sooyoung finds it hard to believe.

She glares at Hyunjin, feeling slightly betrayed. “You used to think I was kinda cool.”

Hyunjin thinks for a moment. “Well, you do seem kind of cool slaving away in this kitchen for Jiwoo,” she says and Sooyoung’s passionate whisking wavers a bit, “but the coolness is cancelled out by the mediocrity of your boring omelettes.”

Sooyoung's jaw drops open, as if someone just called her mother ugly. “Wow, that is so unfair. And that doesn’t even make sense!”

“Yes it does, it’s algebra-”  

Heejin interrupts their childish back-and-forth – something she’s used to, considering the personalities in her friend group and the ridiculous things they talk about daily. “Jiwoo will like whatever you make!” she tries to add helpfully before Sooyoung could crack an egg on Hyunjin’s scalp.

Sooyoung shakes her head. “It’s her favourite, she’s going to Gordon Ramsay the hell out of me.”

“No, Jiwoo is too nice for that.”

“Maybe to you guys. She teases me at every opportunity...”

Hyunjin suddenly leans in, resting her elbows on the counter. “Hey, you know she only teases girls she likes?”

That makes Sooyoung completely freeze in the middle of whisking as she looks at Hyunjin, eyes wide open in sudden interest. “…Really?”

Hyunjin nods her head with a hum. She gauges the older girl’s reaction for a few seconds and Sooyoung has no idea what she has possibly inferred from it, but Hyunjin suddenly turns smug and nudges Heejin.

“See, Heejin, I told you. You owe me twenty thousand won.”

Heejin's eyes narrow in slight suspicion at Hyunjin’s conclusion as Sooyoung’s eyes flitter between the two of them, guileless blinks displaying her confusion.

“Told her what?” Sooyoung asks tentatively.

“That you have a thing for Jiwoo.”

Sooyoung just stares at them in the most drawn out three seconds of their lives.

“…No, I don’t,” she counters belatedly (and weakly) in defence, “I mean, there’s potential, but- nevermind, you seriously bet on this?!”

Damn, these kids are intuitive. First, Chaewon and now these two? Can they read her mind? Is Sooyoung’s fine print actually ginormous print?  

Does Jiwoo suspect it too?

Hyunjin shrugs. “For someone who looks all cool and standoffish, you’re kind of transparent sometimes.”

“How?”

“Um, I dunno…? You seem too eager to impress and…you’re all flirty with her or whatever,” Hyunjin explains apprehensively, clearly not expecting such interrogation.

“That’s because I’m supposed to act like her girlfriend.”

Heejin interjects this time, sharply nudging Hyunjin, “I told you. She acts that way around all cute girls like Jiwoo, it doesn’t always mean anything.”

Speak of the devil, the door to the dance wing’s communal kitchen swiftly slides open and Jiwoo’s dazzling grin from the door lights up the entire room.

Sooyoung's eyes go wide. What on earth is the light of her life Jiwoo doing here? 

“Hey friends! Hyunjin told me there was free food here so I came running,” Jiwoo skips into the room just as Sooyoung shoots Hyunjin a pointed glare.

(“When did you snitch?” Sooyoung furiously whispers.

“On the second roll of your fourth omelette.”

“Goddamnit, Hyunjin.”)

“Jiwoo! Perfect timing, Heejin and I were just leaving. Look, Sooyoung made you your favourite,” Hyunjin greets before lowering her voice to a whisper that Sooyoung overhears anyway, “it’s her fourth attempt.”

Heejin lets herself get dragged out without much resistance, waving rushed goodbyes to the two of them. Sooyoung wishes she could floor it and chase after Hyunjin to tackle her, but she finds her feet planted to the floor and her entire body frozen over as Jiwoo looks at her expectantly.

“You’re making me rolled omelettes?”

There’s a distinct twinkle in Jiwoo’s eyes that sets off all sorts of lovely, tender illuminations inside Sooyoung and the sincere smile she can’t hold back offsets the nervous chuckle that slips from her lips.

“Well, I did say I would.”

Jiwoo squeaks in excitement as she plops onto a seat and pulls the fourth plate of omelette towards her.

No, Jiwoo, not the spectacularly mediocre one!

Sooyoung stops her, pulling the plate back to her. “Wait, I’ll make you a new one.”

She looks down at her sad bowl of chopped veggies swimming in forgotten whisked eggs. Her impulsivity kicks into high gear as she lets the voice in her head take charge, practically demanding her to trash the bowl and crack new eggs. Her hands almost act on their own.

But just before she could reach for the almost empty carton of dozen eggs, warm fingers wrap around her wrist tightly and the action makes Sooyoung stop.

“What’s wrong with the one you already mixed up?” Jiwoo asks her innocently, glancing at the bowl Sooyoung had shoved aside. “Cook that one and in the meantime, I’ll eat this one. It’d be a shame to throw it away.”

Sooyoung’s too focused on Jiwoo’s hand around her wrist though, too busy debating whether she should smoothly turn it into a hand hold or not, but Jiwoo lets go before she could decide on something.

With bated breath, she watches Jiwoo pick up a piece with a pair of chopsticks. The whole thing feels like a confusing mix of a slow-motion scene from a B-list action flick and a dragged-out verdict scene on MasterChef.

Sooyoung seriously has never felt this nervous in her entire life and it’s so trivial because it’s just Jiwoo tasting her rolled omelette, but she wants to impress the girl so bad and Sooyoung can’t even begin to think of how embarrassed she’d feel if she falls short.

“Mmmmmm.”

Unexpectedly, Jiwoo digs in like Augustus Gloop at Wonka’s chocolate factory. Sooyoung’s brain fails to compute how deliciously she’s eating because Hyunjin was just mumbling about how mediocre it tasted a few minutes ago.

Maybe Jiwoo’s just being nice.

“You…like it?” Sooyoung dumbly asks.

Jiwoo’s mouth is too full to really say anything, but she gives Sooyoung an enthusiastic nod.

As much as Sooyoung would love to relish in this apparent success and give herself a much-needed pat on the back, she doesn’t really feel shameless enough to congratulate herself if she knows Jiwoo’s just saying what she wants to hear out of pity (Hyunjin did tell her this was her fourth attempt…).

In other words, she wants to read the fine print (for once!) beneath Jiwoo’s unexpected response.

After hearing a garbled ‘I love it!’ from the munching girl in front of her, Sooyoung can’t help but narrow her eyes in suspicion. “…Actually?”

Jiwoo abruptly stops chewing as her eyebrows knit in the middle in confusion. No one’s probably doubted her positive food reviews before.

She resumes her chewing as she brings a finger to her chin in thought, swallowing with a satisfied nod. “It’s soft and not too salty. Some people may like it a little browner, but this,” she pokes at a piece before shoving it in , “this one’s just perfect!”

Sooyoung still feels doubtful though, even if Jiwoo does sound pretty sure and convincing.

Sensing Sooyoung’s reservations, Jiwoo rests her arms on the counter and puts on that cute teasing expression of hers that makes Sooyoung want to drop everything just to squeeze her cheeks.

“You don’t believe me?”

“Heejin and Hyunjin didn’t seem to enjoy it as much.”

“Heejin and Hyunjin’s favourite food isn’t rolled omelette,” Jiwoo counters matter-of-factly. Sooyoung gives her a slight shrug and that’s when Jiwoo picks up a piece and offers it her. “Say ah.”

Sooyoung’s eyes trail from the piece of omelette in front of , up the outstretched arm holding the chopsticks, and finally to the sweetly smiling girl at the end of it, prodding her with such inviting cuteness.

Sooyoung clasps Jiwoo’s hand with her own to keep the chopsticks steady (really, it’s just an excuse to touch her) and eats the piece of omelette.

The verdict: alright, it’s not bad. In fact, Sooyoung can’t decide whether it’s spectacularly amazing or spectacularly mediocre. Based on taste alone, it’s no different from any other omelette she’s eaten. In this aspect, it’s the epitome of spectacular mediocrity.

But why is it also spectacularly amazing? She reasons it’s only because of the girl feeding it to her. Sooyoung widely opens again.

Jiwoo giggles. “See? I told you it’s good! You want another one?”

They sit there, leaning over the counter as they feed each other and share a plate of spectacularly mediocre rolled omelette. They’re a tad bit closer than they have to be, but Sooyoung doesn’t notice.

All she’s aware of is the shimmer in Jiwoo’s eyes as she talks about her day with full, how readily she feeds Sooyoung another piece whenever she opens , every soft chuckle that falls from her lips and every scrunch of her nose.

All she can see is Jiwoo.

What was that about Sooyoung liking Jiwoo? That there’s potential?

Confession hour:

There isn’t a single day that passes without Sooyoung entertaining the thought. How often Jiwoo comes to mind speaks louder volumes than what she’d admit out loud. But Sooyoung feels held back.

Maybe it’s the shame of knowing that if she and Jungeun were hanging off a cliff and Jiwoo could only save one, Sooyoung’s sad, mangled body would still be found at the bottom, broken bones caging a broken heart.

Alright, maybe that’s a grossly extreme and violent hypothetical situation, but the point is, Sooyoung’s had her fair share of unrequited crushes and just because she’s experienced it before, doesn’t mean it hurts any less every time. It’s only natural to want to avoid it.

But she’s not quite ready to give up with Jiwoo just yet. She wants to let things play out. Even if she wants to go ghost, she can’t. Like literally, contractually can’t because her current job is to be the fake girlfriend and Sooyoung wants to prove to herself that she can keep a job for once.

(It’s not even in the fine print! She agreed to do this all the way!)

So she’s going to see this to the end of the summer, with unrequited feelings or not. Maybe if Jiwoo can stop being so lovely and cute and fun to be around, this wouldn’t be so hard.

Oh but of course Jiwoo can’t stop being so lovely and cute and fun to be around because she can’t just stop existing.

“God, you are so cute.”

It’s said without much thought, but the way Jiwoo puffed her cheeks when she tried to put a chair on a stack taller than her warranted it. Compliments come out far too easily around her anyway, Sooyoung could probably shower her with them all day.  

“But you probably get that a lot,” says Sooyoung.

Jiwoo blinks at her before letting out a small, flustered chuckle. “What are you talking about…”

“Nothing. You’re just really, really cute. I’ve never met anyone like you.”

She finishes stacking the last of the chairs. It was supposed to be Heejin helping her clean up the practice room after a club meeting, but excuses were made, mischievous grins and knowing winks given (one-sided; Sooyoung had no clue what they meant), and suddenly it’s Jiwoo helping her put away chairs and brochures at 8pm on a Friday night.

Not that there’s any reason to complain, but Sooyoung thinks Jiwoo must have something better to do with her time. She feels guilty for keeping her here.

Was there anything in the fine print that says Jiwoo was obligated to do this? Or maybe it’s in line with Clause 9C? (Control/Command F ‘Clause 9C’).

Heejin insists that Jiwoo didn’t mind doing this for her. So maybe Sooyoung can be hopeful.  

“That has to be a lie,” Jiwoo deadpans almost humorously.

Sooyoung’s rendered speechless for a second. “What, that I’ve never met anyone like you? I mean it!” (read: ‘you’re one of a kind’). “And it makes it easier for me to act head over heels for you.” Apparently, it’s still confession hour.

Seeing Jiwoo turn quiet, Sooyoung speaks up again with a teasing smile, “see how naturally compliments are supposed to come out when two people are dating?”

“Oh, I see. You just want to fish for compliments.” Jiwoo narrows her eyes. Maybe she’s right.

Sooyoung blinks at her innocently. “I’m just trying to give you tips on how to make us seem more realistic. You need some, clearly.”

Jiwoo dramatizes her own gasp. “I don’t need tips, I’m doing a fine job of fake dating you.”

“Hm, I don’t know, if I was Jungeun, I’d be suspicious."

“How come?” Jiwoo crosses her arms.

Sooyoung lightly shrugs. “I’m always the one initiating. You have like, zero guts. How can you convince yourself you’ve moved on, much less anyone, if you can’t even reach for my hand first? Or do anything without me having to prompt you, I guess.”

While it’s certainly not difficult to act in love with someone like Jiwoo, it takes two to tango and fake dating is a close-embrace, artful two-step. For once, Sooyoung wants to try being the Follow instead of being the Lead.

Jiwoo responds to her challenging stare with pursed lips of her own, offended by Sooyoung’s honest criticism. And so she acts, marching over to grab Sooyoung’s hand.

She lifts up their intertwined hands and shakes it in the air. “I totally can, see?”

Sooyoung’s puzzled look turns into an amusing one. “Really? You do this with your friends.” Come on Jiwoo, leading takes more effort than that!

Seeing the way Jiwoo narrows her eyes in determination, Sooyoung knows she’s doing a fine job of egging her on. The girl grabs her other hand in a (frankly) pathetic attempt to one-up herself and Sooyoung is not impressed at all.

When Jiwoo promptly drops both of her hands, Sooyoung experiences a momentary feeling of regret, but it’s short-lived because Jiwoo acts fast, wrapping her arms around Sooyoung’s waist and pulling herself in.

It startles Sooyoung at first; her brain takes a whole second to catch up and only then, she belatedly reciprocates.

She’s never thought about it before, but she realises this is the first real hug they’ve ever done. It certainly trumps over their thousand fleeting half-hugs that she’s grown used to.

(Clause 11S: After Phase 5, unsolicited and authentic exhibitions of affection courtesy of the other party will engender the release of catecholamines. This is a relatively innocuous side-effect of the agreement.)

Sooyoung wraps her arms around the younger girl, tries not to think about how snuggly Jiwoo fits right in, debating whether she should say something or just let themselves thaw into the silence. It’s comfortable, just standing here. Sooyoung’s hugged many girls in her life, but Jiwoo’s got a different hold, a different scent, and a different feeling.

“See…isn’t this nice?”

Sooyoung’s half expecting some witty reply, but Jiwoo just nods into her shoulders.

She takes the initiative of pulling away first, leaning away just enough to look at Jiwoo in the face, but still keep her in her arms.

Jiwoo’s bold enough to look her in the eyes, considering the rosy tint painting her cheeks. Sooyoung smirks. “You’re blushing.”

The girl's eyes go wide, as if she had never realised it, and hurriedly detaches herself from Sooyoung, taking tiny steps back. Sooyoung’s too amused to be disappointed over it.  

Jiwoo starts busying herself with the chairs again. But Sooyoung isn’t quite done with this yet and after that hug, she feels more adventurous than usual.

"Do you remember when I told you that if you wanted to kiss me, you can?"

The question clearly catches Jiwoo off-guard because she almost drops a chair on her foot, catching it only at the last minute as she shoots Sooyoung a startled look.

Jiwoo coughs and puts the chair down calmly, sporting her best attempt at looking cool and collected. “Yes. Why?”

“Well, that was half advice, half invitation,” Sooyoung says, stepping right in front of Jiwoo, “and I’m kind of disappointed you didn’t catch on either of those. You don’t really pick up on hints well, do you?”

She moves the chair that separates them out of the way and leans in only a little, looking at Jiwoo with narrowed eyes.

“I do!” Jiwoo retorts in offence, “I just- there’s a time and place for everything, I can’t just kiss you randomly, it would, like, make no sense!”

Sooyoung tilts her head. “Wasn’t it you who suggested that we practice holding hands before Jungeun came? Why haven’t we practiced kissing?” (Practicing gestures of affection is certainly no fine print, it'd be like the second paragraph!)

The blush has spread to the tips of Jiwoo’s ears by this point, but she refuses to look away, refuses to back down.

Her words aren’t really helping her case though. “B-because!” she stutters, “I don’t know. Holding hands and kissing are different.”

“Not really.”

“It’s not- ugh- you just want to find excuses to kiss me!” Jiwoo crosses her arms.

Oop. Sooyoung raises her eyebrows in surprise because that’s exactly it. “Well- yeah,” she sheepishly admits, “I mean…I kind of have to. It’s my job. Literally. But you won’t let me. Is it because you don’t want to or you can’t…? It’s fine if you don’t want to, it’s ju-”

“It’s not that I don’t want to- a-and, I can,” Jiwoo squirms under Sooyoung’s inquisitive gaze, seemingly at a loss for words as she struggles to find answers. “I...I can do it, you know!”

Sooyoung narrows her eyes in suspicion. “You can’t.”

“I can!”

“…Then do it.”

It’s taunting, almost like a dare, and it came out of Sooyoung’s mouth before she really even thought about it. 

Jiwoo’s eyebrows unknit as fast as they fly up. She doesn’t seem to realise that she practically led the conversation to this. “What?”

“If you say you can kiss me, then kiss me.”

Silence hangs in the air, fingers grasping on the edge of the cliff. It’s tense and Sooyoung waits for something to happen, for Jiwoo to do something, anything. To kiss her, or to blush, or maybe to scoff at her face, to push her back, or turn away.

But alas, nothing comes.

Jiwoo just looks at her with a vague expression harder to read than ten pages of fine print. Sooyoung should’ve seen this coming. It was bold of her to expect Jiwoo to be gutsy around her for once. If she can’t do it here, then she can’t possibly do it anywhere else, much less in front of Jungeun, who is really the only person they should be kissing in front of.

The space between her and Jiwoo grows when she straightens her back. “I'm sorry, nevermind, let’s just go back to work and-“

And Sooyoung doesn’t get a chance to finish what she says because Jiwoo cuts her off with a simple gesture.

It doesn’t process immediately, really, because Sooyoung had already thrown in the towel, but in the next second, there were soft hands cradling her face and a pair of even softer eyes staring back at her, inches away.

Her brain short-circuits.

At their new proximity, the determined intensity behind Jiwoo’s eyes diminishes into a smaller, timid flame. That fire must’ve passed on to Sooyoung’s cheeks because her face suddenly feels hot under Jiwoo’s touch.

Jiwoo blinks back at her, seemingly finding this turn of events as unexpected as Sooyoung does, despite being the one who initiated it. In the next second, her gaze drops down to Sooyoung’s lips, and in the second after that, she retracts her hands immediately and stumbles backwards.

“I-“

Sooyoung’s daze is only momentary. “…Good. Uh. That was good. That’s…that’s how you do it. Yeah,” she coughs, trying to get her confidence level back up, “good start. Um, next time, you just gotta…I guess, go for it and-“

And again, she doesn’t get to finish what she says because this time, Jiwoo goes for it. Steals her words with a kiss.

Her brain short-circuits. Again.

And in the second after that, Jiwoo’s lips start moving against hers steadily, as if she isn’t really sure of what she’s doing or if she’s doing it right, but Sooyoung moves with her just as slowly.

They kiss at an unhurried, almost dreamy, pace. One of her hands instinctively grabs on to Jiwoo’s waist.

They part at what Sooyoung thinks is just the right moment. It’s weird, how natural everything is. Sooyoung’s not the mawkish type, but she feels like she’s dreaming.

They’re still close enough that Jiwoo’s breath runs across Sooyoung’s lips when she speaks.

“See…" Jiwoo murmurs, "I told you I can."

Sooyoung’s breath hitches. “…I guess you can. I’m impressed.”

Sooyoung waits, hyperaware of her rabbit heartbeats, quick and pounding. She waits and waits, wondering if Jiwoo will take her hands off her face; if Jiwoo will stop looking at her lips; if Jiwoo will take a step back and end this prematurely.

But she doesn’t do any of those. Her thumbs stay grazing and her eyes stay locked.

So Sooyoung dares to make the move this time and dips her head to meet Jiwoo’s lips again.

It’s a different kiss the second time around as her other hand settles on the small of Jiwoo’s back, pulling the girl flush against her. Closer, as if she’s worried Jiwoo will slip away if she lets go.

The younger girl seems to have no qualms about it because she returns the kiss with matching fervour. Sooyoung feels the hands leave her jaw, but she doesn’t get the chance to miss Jiwoo’s touch because arms suddenly wrap around her neck to hold her in place.

Jiwoo is surprisingly passionate and it sets off all sorts of fireworks in Sooyoung's chest. She pulls away for a breath and it’s Jiwoo who chases after her lips, eagerly connecting them together again as if Sooyoung would disappear if she didn’t.

Sooyoung reciprocates, almost like a reassurance that she isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. She could do this forever, she thinks, if Jiwoo would allow her.

A hand runs through her hair and the feeling of fingers scratching against her scalp draws out a quiet, pleased hum out of Sooyoung that only spurs Jiwoo to deepen the kiss.

Sooyoung’s mind starts running what feels like a thousand thoughts per second.

This is nice.

Is this really happening?

This is so nice.

Wow I like this.

I wonder if she likes me too.

Her lips are so soft.

Peach chapstick. Fitting.

, my heart is beating like crazy.

Does she feel the same way?

Sooyoung doesn’t want to get her hopes up, but then Jiwoo's tongue brushes across her bottom lip and Sooyoung’s thoughts go haywire before completely dissipating, like smoke into thin air.

‘Well, a little hope never hurt anybody’ is the last thought that leaves her mind before she becomes too occupied with floating on cloud nine to think any more.

(Clause 1: Active engagement in this venture will galvanize your hypothalamus into active production. Any and all liability falls on you, having consented upon the signing of this contract.)

They say the most perplexingly explained disclaimers are the trickiest, most dangerous pitfalls. They make no sense, carefully worded to make the prospective signatory scratch their head and either second-guess (at worse) or move on (at best).

So let’s put this in layman’s terms.

The fine print, in all its verbose glory, is there like a walkthrough guide delineating the One Big Implication of signing this damn agreement in the first place:

Clause 1: You will fall in love. And that’s on you, bro.  

It’s the finest print there is, so fine that sometimes it’s not even put in words. Instead, it’s hidden between the lines, snuck in to the contract as if it was smuggled goods.

Fine print is designed to screw people over.

And Sooyoung, a steadfast ignorer of the dangers of fine print, is going to let herself fall in love.