D-107 (pt.2)

“How was work?” Chaeyeon asked the moment Eunbi walked in the apartment.

The question should have been easy to answer. But Eunbi contemplates for awhile on what to say, more importantly, Eunbi weighs in her mind whether she should tell her wife about the fact that another woman was flirting with her, and the part where Eunbi didn’t immediately tell the woman to stop. In the end, Eunbi decided not to. “It was good. I actually helped with a few chord progressions for a bridge that they couldn’t figure out.”

“That’s amazing!” Chaeyeon smiles brightly. The same proud smile she gives only to her wife, the same one that Eunbi loves being at the receiving end of. Then, Chaeyeon surprises Eunbi by suggesting, “We should celebrate.”

“Celebrate, how?”

Chaeyeon stands up from the couch to follow Eunbi to their bedroom, but lingers in the doorway. “Yena and Yuri invited us to go out. I told them I’d see if you’re up for it. But seeing as we have something to celebrate, that's all the more reason to go.”

“What about Wonnie?”

“She’s 15, she can take care of herself. And we have leftovers from yesterday, so she can have that for dinner,” Chaeyeon answers smoothly, as if she already thought it through. “So...?”

Eunbi tilts her head unconsciously, thinking it over. Then decides, “Alright. Give me 10 minutes to freshen up.”

Seven minutes later, Eunbi was sharing the mirror of their bathroom, the one inside the bedroom, with Chaeyeon. They weren’t speaking to each other, only putting on makeup side by side in comfortable silence. Eunbi finished just as Chaeyeon was putting on lipstick. For some reason her eyes followed Chaeyeon through the mirror. At first Eunbi only studied Chaeyeon’s eyes, then the next second she was fixated on her wife’s still untainted lips.

It was only then did Eunbi realized that Chaeyeon was struggling to put on lipstick. The hand that held the lipstick kept backing away just as it touched her lips. Eunbi found herself being bold and took a step closer to Chaeyeon. “Here, let me.” Eunbi snatches the lipstick away from Chaeyeon and proceeds to help her wife put it on.

What Eunbi didn’t realize was that Chaeyeon had practically stopped breathing the moment Eunbi’s face became mere inches away from Chaeyeon’s face. The younger woman stared at her wife in silence.

Finally noticing her wife’s staring, Eunbi paused her work to meet eyes with Chaeyeon. “Something wrong?”

Chaeyeon’s eyes darted about before settling back on Eunbi. “We haven't done this in awhile,” she says in a hushed voice.

“Done what?”

“...You used to help put lipstick on me when we went out.”

Eunbi continues painting her wife’s lips, but wonders aloud, “You don't seem the type to be bad at putting on makeup.”

“I’m okay with makeup,” Chaeyeon admits. And she was hesitant to say more, but, “It’s because—it was our thing. You liked putting it on for me because it felt... intimate.” 

All of a sudden, Eunbi finally noticed just how close they were, and how her own hands was cupping Chaeyeon’s jaw, and the other still had the lipstick pressed to her wife’s plump, red lips. Eunbi doesn’t want to admit that she was staring, but when her eyes caught Chaeyeon’s gaze, they both knew she couldn’t hide that fact. Still, Eunbi looks away as if nothing had happened, and stepped back to create space between them, her own hands falling to her sides.

“We should go, Yuri would hate it if we were late.”

Eunbi nods in agreement and leaves their bathroom with quick steps, Chaeyeon following in silence, a certain kind of tension thickened the air around them.

After that debacle, things got a little out of hand. Yuri and Yena were already behind on the drunkenness scale––which was surprising, because they had arrived at the club much earlier than Eunbi and Chaeyeon did. Maybe it had less to do with what Chaeyeon said about being intimate, and everything to do with the unspoken fact that they were married and intimacy was surely a given, but even until today, Eunbi and Chaeyeon still slept on separate beds.

The thoughts could only be drowned in alcohol, and that was exactly what they both did. And it didn’t seem like they were stopping anytime soon.

“No! Chaeyeon, don’t you dare tell Eunbi that story!” Yena yells, her hand flailing about, trying to cover Chaeyeon’s mouth while the latter fends her friend off.

“Then take a shot, babe!” Yuri pipes up. “That’s the point of the game––we are still playing truth or drink, right?”

“Fine! Fine, I’ll drink!” Yena stops her assault on Chaeyeon and reaches onto the table cluttered with a number of empty shot glasses. “Oh, we’re out of drinks.”

“I’ll get us more,” Eunbi announced, trying not to stumble about as she walks to the bar. Thankfully, she got there in one peace. “Bartender! Six shots of tequila, please.” The bartender gave her nod but told her to wait, so Eunbi did.

While waiting, Eunbi turns around to watch her wife and her friends from afar. They were still laughing loudly, likely at something Yena said by the looks of her wild hand gestures. It made Eunbi smile to know that she’s surrounded herself with genuinely nice people.

But then Eunbi’s smile vanished when she saw Yena sit down on the sofa and pull Yuri by the waist to sit on her lap. Unconsciously, her brows furrowed at the sight. The back of her mind was nagging at her, did Chaeyeon expect that to happen between them? Was it something they used to do? Eunbi hates the fact that she doesn’t know what the normal is between her and Chaeyeon. Even something as simp