Seungwan 🐨: Hey! I’m finally flying out again ✈️✈️✈️

Seungwan 🐨: I should get to see you guys later—is Seulgi in this afternoon? 😁😁

Joohyun: No, she isn’t ☹️

Seungwan 🐨: Aw, too bad 😭 One of these days!!

Seungwan 🐨: I’ve got a down moment—we’re waiting for everyone to finish loading things up. Wanna facetime?

Of course.

She accepted the notification as it came up, getting a blurry picture of Wendy before the video went out.

“Ah—Wait! Hold on…” The video blinked back into Wendy’s wide-eyed expression, in an ‘o’ as she fiddled with the device. “Oh, there we go! Hi unnie!”

Joohyun couldn’t help but smile at Wendy’s bright expression. “Hi.” Today, Wendy was in a red gingham cardigan that looked too casual for business wear. Not that she would know; she was still a barista slash student after all. But she was beginning to think Seulgi might’ve been right with her guess that Wendy was a model. “Your hair looks lighter; did you dye it?”

Wendy laughed, flipping her hair with a dramatic wave of her wrist. “Do you like it?”

“It’s very… cute. Very cutesy.” Joohyun did her best to maintain a straight face. She couldn’t help but think that calling Wendy ‘cute’ sounded like a confession coming off of her lips.

“It kinda is, isn’t it?” She toyed with a strand, her eyes straining to look at the short strand in her fingers. “My hair’s been dyed so many colors, I didn’t really think about it.”

“Oh really?” Another point in the model column. “What’s the weirdest color?”

“Well…” She cupped her chin with a hand. Apparently, she’d had many. “Well, I’ve been entirely blonde a few times… But… Oh!” She pointed at the camera with a sharp motion as the thought came. “I had my hair plum this winter. A really deep purple. That probably tops the red, I think.”

“Do you have pictures?”

Wendy shook her head with an exaggerated pout. “I’m not much of a selfie person.”

“You’re telling me your hair was purple, but you have no pictures?”

“Nope, sorry. I know purple’s your favorite color,” she teased. Joohyun scrunched her face into a frown to hide how elated the fact that Wendy remembered made her.

“Seungwan-ssi!” A faint voice called from Wendy’s end. She looked behind her with a real pout this time.

“Looks like we’re ready to go. Are you at work already?”

“Yeah; it’s quiet so far. I ducked into the back for a second when I saw the notification,” she confessed.

“Rebel Joohyun!" She laughed at her own joke, and Joohyun pretended like she was unamused. "See you soon!” With a quick wave, the connection was cut. Joohyun couldn’t help the smile on her face as she made lattes for the next hour.

She spotted Wendy’s sweater from across the terminal. There were plenty of people snapping pictures, but Joohyun was used to the sight by now. They remained outside of the café, so she didn’t mind.

“Unnie!” Wendy called with a wave as she stepped inside.

“Look who’s finally here in person.”

“Look, I try.” But she was smiling too. Joohyun was right; the lighter honey brown was more of a sweet style than the more chic or boyish styles she’d seen the other girl in before. However, between the sparkle in her eye and the way the airport’s light never failed to make her glow, Joohyun thought it suited her just as well. (It couldn’t just be her obvious bias for Wendy…)

“Hey, so guess what I remembered?” Wendy said with a grin.

“What you’re going to order?”

“You distracted me!” Wendy squawked, and Joohyun burst into a laugh.

“By… existing?” It had been during Wendy’s last trip through the airport. She had stumbled in, looking worn out despite it being late afternoon. She had opened to speak, but never managed to say anything after she looked down from the menu to Joohyun’s face. Joohyun eventually had to prompt her to speak, which had only led her to admit that she’d forgotten entirely. Joohyun had pressed a latte with an extra shot into her hand and sent her off with admonishments to go to bed early that night.

“I…” Wendy shut with a click of her teeth. “Noooo, but I’d like a chai today, I think? No, I remembered…” She rummaged through her bag to pull out two jewel cases, one purple and one yellow. “Mixtape version two!”

“Mixtape two?” Joohyun exclaimed.

“After all these months, it finally exists.” Wendy held them out in front of her in both hands, bowing deeply over the counter. “I sincerely apologize for the long wait.”

Wendy had to stand back up straight and set the CDs on the counter because Joohyun was laughing too hard to take them.

“Ah, these are cute,” she said as the last of her giggles subsided, peering at the handwritten track list. “My laptop doesn’t take CDs, though.”

“Oh, I didn’t even think about that! Should I make a playlist, or something?”

Joohyun waved her comment away. “It’s fine; I can do it. You’re too busy.”

“I’m not that busy—”

“Large iced chai? Hot?”

“Iced,” Seungwan grumbled, but let Joohyun override her.

She made the drink quickly; it was simple, and she’d already kept the other girl too long. She could see Wendy’s usual entourage growing antsy outside the door. Wendy apparently noticed as well, following Joohyun’s gaze and biting her lip.

“Could you put together like… 4 more of those, actually? I should treat my staff for waiting for me.”

“Sure.” It wasn’t the first time Wendy had done it, and since it was Wendy, she wouldn’t complain even if it were four more special order lattes. She appreciated the extra minutes in person, even if they did text fairly frequently as of late.

As she put together the second order, she managed to find out that Wendy was on her way to Indonesia—“Indonesia?” “Yeah; I’m so lucky to get to go to so many cool places”—before she loaded a drink tray up and sent her away.

“Have a safe flight!”

“You t— I mean, have a good shift!” Joohyun had one final laugh as Wendy did a double take at herself before leaving the café.

Seulgi came in for her shift later that evening; Joohyun handed over the yellow case as she walked in.

“Missed her again, huh?” she said as she took the case, looking over the tracks. “The songs I recognize on here are pretty good. Think I can risk putting it on?”

Joohyun shrugged. “Do it anyways. Over half the songs are in English anyways.”

“We’re an international airport. There’ll be English speakers who’ll be able to tell if it’s inappropriate before we can,” Seulgi reminded her, but grinned. “If I’d brought in a CD, you’d be scolding me.” When Joohyun only rolled her eyes, Seulgi waved the CD at her gleefully before popping in the back to override the standard playlist.

The shift was fairly slow with both of them on the clock. Most of the time they spent chatting, taking care of overdue cleaning tasks, following along with the track list on Joohyun’s CD. As expected, the choices were excellent, and their shift went by faster than usual.

“I really liked that song.”

“Let’s see…” Joohyun was scrubbing out the back of a low cabinet, so Seulgi dropped her rag (which missed the counter and fell dangerously close to Joohyun’s face) to go look up the song. “It’s ‘Light Me Up’ by Red Velvet.”

“Red Velvet…” Joohyun crawled out of the cabinet, settling back on her heels. “That’s the group I liked last time.”

“Yeah I remember. Did you ever look up any more music by them?”

“No, I forgot…”

“There’s a second song by them on the CD too. I guess Wendy likes them.” Seulgi set down the case and pulled out her phone. “Let me take a look.”

“Remember the counter?”

“It can wait five minutes.”

Joohyun huffed, but without any real anger. It wasn’t like the counter was actually important. Or even anything they were doing that night, honestly. Mostly, she was just bored.

Leaving Seulgi to her own devices, she returned to scrubbing out the cabinet. The bottom was covered in coffee spills and bits of sugar; it had desperately needed a good wipe down.

“Hey unnie?” Seulgi’s voice sounded a bit… off.

“Yeah? Did you find them?”

“I… um…” Seulgi sounded stunned. “You should come here.”

“Give me a second.” She finished up the cabinet, loading everything back inside. She didn’t hear customers, so she took a moment to wash her hands as well. By the time she turned back to Seulgi, the other girl was fidgeting anxiously. “What is it…?”

“I…” Seulgi looked down at her phone, then back up at her before just holding the device out. “I don’t think you’d believe it from me.”

“What do you mean…?” Joohyun took the phone and looked down to the search page pulled up.

‘Red Velvet’ was in the search bar, and the very first result was the singer ‘Red Velvet’ with member… ‘Wendy’. And the picture attached was Seungwan, dressed in a blue gingham dress and staring over her shoulder with a smile like the sun.

In a daze, she tapped on Wendy’s name, pulling up an information page. By this point, Seulgi had moved to peer over her shoulder as they scrolled together.

“So, it’s her stage name…”

“That means she gave me her real name that day,” Joohyun mused.

“Makes more sense that her being a spy,” Seulgi laughed. “But really… wow. Then that was her singing…?”

“Let me just—” Joohyun dipped into the back, flipping through the tracks to pull up the Red Velvet track again. The song hit differently with the knowledge that it was their friend behind the track’s rich vocals.

“Wow,” Seulgi said as the song ended, and Joohyun had to agree.

In between making drinks, they delved into their search on Red Velvet, cleaning tasks forgotten. At one point, Seulgi pulled the mixtape to put on a playlist of Red Velvet songs. They got a few appreciative smiles from customers, and Joohyun wondered why she hadn’t known about Red Velvet before.

The songs switched back and forth from RnB to a more upbeat cheerful vibe without seeming to favor either. Joohyun could see why Wendy had tried to warn her that there might not be another song like ‘Last Love’. (And in retrospect, she imagined Wendy might’ve been trying to keep her from realizing who she was…) But despite the unexpected variety, Joohyun was enjoying herself.

At one point, ‘Red Flavor’ played, and even Joohyun recognized the catchy song that had been playing everywhere two years ago. Seulgi sang along as she wiped coffee from the counter.

“So… Do we tell her?” Seulgi asked when their shift ended, and they had closed up the café for the night.

“I mean, we have to, right?” Joohyun replied with a frown. “I don’t think it’d be right otherwise…” She couldn’t imagine how the conversation would go, but it felt wrong to pretend like they weren’t aware of Wendy’s identity.

“Yeah.” Seulgi looked down to the phone in her hand. “Now?”

Joohyun shook her head. “It’s late. And honestly… I want a chance to think it over. It’s… a lot.”

“Yeah, you’re right. I’m just so…” Joohyun looked over to see Seulgi looking at as much of a loss for words as she was.

“Tomorrow,” she said, and Seulgi nodded.

“Tomorrow,” Seulgi agreed. “I’ll see you Friday!”

“Get a good rest!”

That night, Joohyun did more searching of her own. From not having a clue that morning and casually facetiming Wendy that morning, she was now bombarded with media. Official MVs, fan cams, interviews, compilations… It was overwhelming that the girl who so sweetly teased Joohyun in oversized sweaters and flannels could also be the girl in leather performing ‘Bad Boy’ on stage in front of thousands of people. (And Joohyun didn’t want to think too hard about some of the comments underneath.)

It was early morning before Joohyun even realized. With a groan at her laptop reading ‘4:02 am’, she finally started closing out browser windows, her head spinning. Before she went to bed, however, she remembered to find a picture of Wendy with the purple hair. The hair color was as good on Wendy as she had imagined.

Joohyun went through her shift the next day in a haze, caffeine only managing to cut through the sleep deprivation. It did nothing for her brain getting stuck on their revelation from the previous day. Once she was able to hand off the café to the next shift, she found a quiet corner of the airport and texted Wendy.

Joohyun: Hey Wendy, can we facetime? I have something important to talk to you about.

Rather than a text response, the facetime request popped up almost immediately. Joohyun answered it with trembling fingers. She took a deep breath, letting it out slowly as the app loaded in the video stream. It was just Wendy still; Joohyun didn’t know what to say yet, but there was really no need to be so nervous…

The small rectangle representing her loaded in fine, but Wendy’s remained a black screen; Wendy must’ve turned off the camera. “H-hello?”

“Hi unnie,” came the familiar voice. It was no different than the day before. She sounded more serious, but that was likely due to Joohyun’s text. “What’s up?”

Joohyun swallowed. There was probably no perfect way to start, so she went with the simplest she could think of. “So, you know how you gave Seulgi and I the mixtape yesterday? And there was Red Velvet songs on it?”

“Ah.” It was a simple, flat ‘ah’. Joohyun couldn’t make anything of it but pressed on anyways.

“We liked the songs, so we decided to look the group up…”

“Oh, I see…” Joohyun heard Wendy sigh, but she continued in a more chipper tone than Joohyun had expected. “I guess I was playing with fire, including them on the CD, huh?”

“Is this the mysterious unnie?” A voice Joohyun didn’t recognize spoke loudly, and she jumped in surprise.

“Maybe…?”

“Maybe? Just turn on the camera, unnie. There’s no need to leave it off anymore, it sounds like to me.” The voice grew louder as it ostensibly addressed Joohyun. “You’re not going to take screenshots, are you?”

“No…?” Joohyun frowned, and she heard the voice laugh.

“Too bad; maybe then people would get to see my work up close because someone won’t post selcas to the official Instagram.”

“Ugh, leave off, Joy.” The video flickered on, and Joohyun saw Wendy sitting in a chair as another girl peered over her shoulder.

“She’s pretty cute, though. What’s her name?” The girl, presumably ‘Joy’ turned to Wendy with a wide grin, but Wendy just shoved her face away.

“It’s ‘unnie’ to you.” Wendy rolled her eyes, but her expression was fond. “Hey.”

“Hi,” Joohyun said, suddenly feeling shy. “You look… pretty.”

“Someone appreciates my work, thank you!” Joy shouted off screen.

“Thanks.”

“Is this a bad time? It looks like you’re getting ready for something…”

“No, I mean. I’m just going to be sitting here while Joy finishes up my makeup.”

“You’re going to sit quietly while I put on your lip color.” Joy came back in view, a brush in one hand and three lipstick tubes between the fingers of her other hand. “If you want to have a serious conversation, you’re going to have to wait until after I’m done.”

Wendy didn’t get a chance to reply, Joy starting in immediately. Joohyun apologized for the both of them with a quick ‘sorry’.

“You managed to catch Wendy right before a performance,” Joy told her. She didn’t look away from Wendy’s lips, carefully applying shades of red. Joohyun did her best to do the opposite. “She’s gotta be on stage in, what, 30 minutes?”

Wendy nodded carefully, trying not to nudge Joy’s hand.

“So if you’re going to talk, make it quick. But in the meantime, I want to know about ‘mysterious unnie’.” Joy turned to give the phone Wendy was holding another bright, sharp grin. “Unnie won’t tell me anything, but then still whines to me—”

“Sooyoung!”

The younger girl cackled. “You’re way too easy to tease. Now hold still a sec—” Joohyun watched Joy lean in to swipe a third color onto Wendy’s lips before nodding in approval. “Okay, now let me see that.”

The video jostled and for a moment, Joohyun got a startlingly close view of Joy’s face before the camera flipped to show Wendy sitting in her makeup chair with a frown.

“C’mon, Joy. Really?”

“Yes, now model for me. Show unnie your pretty performance outfit.”

“It’s okay…” Joohyun said, but Wendy just shook her head and stood up.

“Head up, chest out—this shirt is kind of hideous actually.” Joohyun snorted at Joy’s obvious distaste.

“I dunno, I kinda like it. It has these ribbons on the sleeves.”

“Zoom in on sleeve ribbons.” The camera got dizzyingly close to the ribbon Wendy was toying with. Mostly what Joohyun saw was white as the camera failed to adjust before Joy pulled it away. “And there’s this cute floral skirt.” Wendy played along, framing it with her hands as Joy panned the camera down. “Oh and the boots. Probably the best part of this outfit, to be honest. Man, I miss RBB era.”

“Zimzalabim is fun though!” Wendy protested.

“Let’s be real, Zimzalabim works because SM managed to find the vocals to power it.” The camera panned back up to Wendy’s blank stare, and Joy laughed, the camera shaking with her. “No, it’s good. They love it, I love it, and you kill it. I do hate the outfits though. Anyways, go have your five minutes before someone chases you down.”

“Thanks, Joy.” It seemed like the phone made it back into Wendy’s hands; she saw Joy for a few minutes before the camera flipped to show Wendy's face again.

“Love you too!” Wendy just smiled and waved over her shoulder as she left the room.

“Okay, so let’s hope…” She watched Wendy duck her head into a room before walking in. “No one’s in here, but Joy’s right about the ‘five minutes part’. Actually, we’d probably be lucky for a full five minutes…”

Wendy seemed to have entered into some kind of break room. She passed by a table covered with bottled water and food. Most notable was a large decorated cake and a banner with Wendy’s face on it. Somehow, that more than anything drove home the point that this was real and not some weird dream.

“So, was there anything else in particular?” Wendy looked back at the camera, and Joohyun was struck how beautiful she was all made up. While it was evident normally, Joy’s handiwork enhanced the curves of her lips and the soft pink of her cheeks. Joohyun swallowed.

“Not really. It simply isn’t… every day you find out your friend is one of the most famous idols in the country.”

“I guess that’s pretty unusual, huh?” Wendy chuckled before looking away from the camera. “I mean, more seriously, I guess I have to ask you to not share my phone number, or any screenshots of any of our conversations or any personal info.”

Joohyun’s eyes widened. “I hadn’t even thought about that.”

“People will pay just for flight information. It’s… a real danger for me, honestly.”

It was the second time reality hit her. Joohyun had seen the news stories of idols getting stalked before, but never imagined it’d ever be relevant to her life. The moment Wendy had scribbled down her number months ago, she had placed an enormous amount of trust placed in her and Seulgi.

“I understand,” she said as emphatically as she could.

Wendy’s face brightened. “I didn’t think it’d be a problem, but… you know. Better safe than sorry.” Joohyun nodded. “So how are things there?”

“The usual. School, work. Getting one of the biggest shocks of my life.” She shrugged nonchalantly, succeeding in getting the laugh she wanted.

“The usual,” Wendy echoed. “I… What time is it?” Joohyun watched her swivel her head around before frowning. “I really can’t hide out here any longer, I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s my poor timing. Hey Wendy?”

“Yeah?”

“Good luck. I hope it goes well.”

“Thanks. There’ll probably be a video up tomorrow. Usually there’s a few online, if, you know. You wanna see…” Wendy trailed off, peering at the camera with furrowed brows. 

“Of course.”

The worried look faded away. “Well, have a good evening, alright? I- oh sh… Whoops, I gotta go! Bye!”

Joohyun barely had time to squeak out a response before the connection was cut.

She turned off her phone screen, slumping down into her chair. For a moment, she simply stared blankly out the window in front of her. Without her input, her life had suddenly become the plot of a drama. Or more like a comedy, if she were being honest.

Joohyun: I told Wendy that we know

Kkang Sseul 🧡: oh good

Kkang Sseul 🧡: i texted earlier, but didn’t get a response :(

Joohyun: She’s about to go on stage, is why

Kkang Sseul 🧡: makes sense if she flew out yesterday. i’ll just text her good luck (:

Joohyun: She said to not share any of her personal info

Kkang Sseul 🧡: oh yeah. Np

Kkang Sseul 🧡: sounds like it went ok though!

Joohyun: She didn’t seem upset about it. I don’t think so, anyways

Kkang Sseul 🧡: i’m sure wendy wouldn’t be upset

Kkang Sseul 🧡: it’s kindaaaaa her fault :p

Kkang Sseul 🧡:  anyways, i’m headed out for dinner with Sunmi

Kkang Sseul 🧡: catch ya later

Joohyun: Have fun

Seulgi seemed at complete ease with the situation after a night to let it sink in. Joohyun wished she could say the same for herself.

She stood up with a stretch. Really, when she thought about it, it was an adjustment, but didn’t really change much. She still had dance practice in the morning, and work in the evening. Wendy would still be slow to respond to texts as always. She would just also take a moment tomorrow to look up the concert and see if Wendy was right and someone uploaded a video.

Joohyun exhaled. It would be the same old thing tomorrow as it was yesterday. Just like always.

...Y'all in the comments are too smart for me. 💕 💕

(credit for the picture I edited to hell @wenever )