Author's Note: 4 more chapters to go after this :)

Lifetimes

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"I found love in you,

Doing it right, doing it right,

I'll walk the world for you,

Doing it right, doing it right."

Her hands were shaking as she stepped back into the darkness and bowed and listened to the applause from the audience. The hosts played her off to the commercials and then the lights came on and the studio screens informed her she was off air. The first person she ran into after they had taken the soundpacks away was Sooyoung. She was stood just off from the stage behind the curtain and she smiled and said, ‘That was great. Really great.’

‘Thanks.’

‘How are you feeling?’

‘Not too bad,’ Wendy said truthfully. ‘Not as bad as I did about half an hour ago. I was so close to just…you know.’

‘Yeah. Don’t worry, I know. You looked fantastic out there. That was a really solid performance. That should get people talking.’

Wendy smiled. They were shuffling about behind her and people were busying themselves and her whole solo universe seemed to slow to a crawl. She said quietly, ‘Did you let her in? Joohyun.’

‘Yeah. I saw her outside asking about you.’

‘Did you know she was coming?’

‘No. Did you not? I thought that’s why she was here.’

‘She never told me. We had—’ Wendy trailed off. Then she said, ‘We had a falling out over something. Something stupid. Thanks for letting her in.’

‘You’re lucky I went out for some fresh air. They wouldn’t have let her in otherwise. Not once we’d already gone on air.’

‘I don’t know if I’d have been able to do the performance without her.’

She half expected Sooyoung to tell her that the bitter truth was she would’ve been forced out there on the stage either way, but she did not. She just smiled and pulled Wendy in for a hug such that Wendy could smell her perfume and cigarettes and the fresh air and then she said, ‘I’m proud of you. That was a great show you gave. You’re made for this, I just know it.’

‘Thanks. Really, thank you.’

‘Go and be with her.’

‘Do I need to do anything else tonight? Like, I don’t know…talk to anyone?’

‘No. You’re done for the night. We’ll talk again on Monday. About preparations for the tour.’

‘Right,’ Wendy said. ‘I forgot about that. Completely forgot about it. With everything going on and everything moving so fast I honestly forgot. .’

‘We’ll talk more on Monday.’

‘Okay. Thanks.’

‘Good luck,’ Sooyoung said, and said no more. Wendy went back through the private corridor to her room. Joohyun was sat at the table when she opened the door and closed it behind her and locked it just in case. She turned around. There was no time to react before Joohyun’s lips were on her, nudging her back against the door and fighting for control and her hands cupping her face and giggling into it and saying, with a glimmer in her eyes of pure love, ‘I told you. All you had to was believe in yourself.’

‘It wasn’t that easy.’

‘No. But you did it, didn’t you?’

Wendy smiled. ‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘Yeah, I did.’

Joohyun kissed her again. ‘I love you,’ she muttered.

‘I love you too.’

‘Don’t ever leave me again, yeah?’

‘You left me.’

‘Oh. Yeah. Well, still.’

‘About that,’ Wendy said. Joohyun took a step back and looked at her with a sort of concern that was startling. Wendy led her to the table and sat and Joohyun pulled up another chair and sat beside her. For a long time they were quiet. was dry and her hands still jittering a slight and her heart still felt as if it might burst and she would die. She thought about a thousand ways to approach it. Then she came out and said, ‘I’m going on tour.’

‘What?’

‘I’m touring. Once the album drops, I’m going on tour.’

‘So soon?’

Wendy nodded.

‘Are you serious?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Okay,’ Joohyun said, ‘no offence, but…do you have a big enough fanbase?’

‘I don’t know. I guess so. I honestly don’t know. Like I said, the agency handles it all. I have, like, no control over it. I just do what they say at the moment, upsetting as that sounds. So, I guess so. But Sooyoung went over the details with me last week.’

‘Was that who I saw outside?’

‘Sooyoung?’

‘Yeah.’

Wendy nodded. ‘My manager,’ she said. ‘The one that let you in.’

‘She seems nice.’

‘She is. A bit blunt, and definitely by the books, but she’s got a big heart. I can tell she cares about me, which is more than I can say for a lot of people. Anyway.’

‘You’re going on tour,’ Joohyun said.

‘Yeah.’

‘When? And where?’

‘Starting September the tenth,’ said Wendy. She paused. As if formulating a way to say the next bit that would meet with the path of least resistance. ‘It’s four months long.’

‘What? What do you mean? What is? Your tour?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Are you ing serious?’

‘My last concert is the eighth of January. It’s mostly an Asia tour, with a couple stops in the US.’

‘Already?’

Wendy nodded. ‘I didn’t think I had an international fanbase either, but I guess I do. They’re small venues – couple hundred people in halls, no stadiums or anything – but it’s better that way. More chance of them selling out.’

‘Where are you going?’

‘Dallas, Seattle, Los Angeles, New York. And then two stops in the Philippines, two stops in Thailand, two in Vietnam. Two in China, four nights in Japan. Two in Indonesia, one in Malaysia. Then I come back and do three final shows here in Korea. Finishing in January.’

Joohyun was quiet for a long time. The silence was strangely comfortable and uncomfortable and the paradox made for a much worse time. Wendy studied her in silence. She looked very uncomfortable herself. Drenched and slowly drying and smelling of the air and faintly of Sooyoung’s cigarettes and with her hair matted over her face and her ruined clothes. ‘Are you okay?’ Wendy said.

‘What?’

‘You look cold.’

‘I’ll be fine.’

‘What if you get pneumonia?’

Joohyun giggled at that. ‘Seriously?’ she said. ‘That was your first thought?’

‘I’m just worried.’

‘Maybe I might catch the Plague as well.’

‘Don’t say that.’

‘It’s just a bit of water. I’m fine. Well, I was. Now I’m not.’

‘What?’

Joohyun fiddled with her hands. She said in almost a whisper, ‘Do you have to go on tour? Can’t you just, like, skip it?’

‘Skip it.’

‘Yeah.’

‘The whole tour?’

‘I mean…’

‘No. I can’t.’

‘I don’t want you to go on tour. I don’t want you going away again.’

‘Are we together again?’

‘I don’t know. Are we?’

Wendy smiled. She put a hand to Joohyun’s freezing cheek and said, ‘Yeah. I guess we are.’

‘Sorry. For being dumb and thinking it would be better if we were apart. I was just thinking about your career. I was scared that being with me was going to somehow mess up your career chances or put you in jeopardy or something.’

Wendy shrugged nonchalantly. ‘I was thinking the same,’ she said. ‘About you.’

‘What?’

‘I wasn’t worried about myself. The media don’t release gay couples. They’re not allowed to by law.’

‘I didn’t know that.’

‘I didn’t until recently. Or maybe I did, but I was so blinded by everything going on that I just sort of ignored it by accident. But yeah, they won’t reveal us. They wouldn’t anyway, because you’re not a celebrity, and they don’t do that. There’s no gossip to be had there. And I’m not, like, a full-on idol, am I? So, yeah. That wasn’t really my main worry. My main worry was that I didn’t want people harassing you, or stalking you, or trying to get information out of you about me. I didn’t want any of that. I still don’t.’

‘I’ll be okay,’ Joohyun said.

‘Yeah?’

‘Yeah. I don’t care about any of that. That wasn’t my concern. I was just worried about your career.’

‘My career will be fine. But that doesn’t mean we can be out in the open.’

‘No. Of course not.’

‘I wish we could, but you know…’

‘Yeah,’ Joohyun said solemnly. ‘I know.’

‘If only people were—’

‘I know. You did great tonight. Really great.’

‘Thanks,’ Wendy said with a smile. Her phone buzzed on the table and she picked it up and thumbed through it and smiled again.

‘What?’

She held it up. It was a text from Seulgi that said:

Just seen you on TV OMG IM FREAKING OUT RN THAT WAS AMAZING!!! I LOVE SO MUCH IM SO PROUD PROUD PROUD

Joohyun laughed. ‘Your number one fan,’ she said.

‘Number two. After you.’

‘Guess so. That’s cute. She’s cute.’

‘I know.’

Joohyun cupped her face and leant over and kissed her. The taste of Wendy’s lips was something she savoured a great deal. She tasted like salt and mint chewing gum and lipstick and coffee and it was so good and so right. ‘When are you going on tour?’ she asked. ‘What date did you say again? September tenth?’

‘That’s the first date. I have to leave earlier than that. I think the eighth, but I’m not sure yet. Sooyoung said we’d get to that bit later.’

‘So we’ve got, what? Four weeks?’

‘Yeah. Pretty much.’

‘Well.’

‘Well,’ Wendy said.

Joohyun smiled and cupped her face again. ‘Best make it count,’ she mumbled. ‘Every single minute.’

The courage it took to speak to even Joohyun was something Wendy thought she might never reconcile with. It was evident there was a problem even if she could not properly describe it. Like a crack in the glass of their relationship, or something seen through water, just under the surface, just out of reach. And both of them knew it. The first time either confronted it was when Joohyun came home from work the next Thursday to the smell of cooking the moment she walked through the door. Something in the kitchen was sizzling. It smelt of syrup and sugar and vaguely of raspberries. She set her bag down and went on through. Seungwan was busy cooking behind the counter. For a moment Joohyun just stood there in the doorway watching her with her arms folded.

‘Hey,’ she said.

Seungwan glanced at her. She was wearing Joohyun’s pink pinstripe apron and her blonde hair was tied back and she was concentrating harder than Joohyun had ever seen her concentrate on anything, even her music, and perhaps there was something comical and endearing in that. ‘Hey,’ she said, fiddling with the pan. ‘I didn’t think you’d be back for a while. Didn’t know if you were walking or not.’

‘Shouldn’t you be at the studio?’

‘Sorry. Did you not want me here?’

‘I didn’t mean it like that. I thought you had stuff to do.’

‘I probably should’ve text you before barging in. Probably gave you a surprise.’

‘I gave you a key for a reason,’ Joohyun said. Seungwan nodded absently and turned her attention to the pan. There was an array of bottles and clean plates and packages on the countertop beside the cooker. ‘What are you making?’ Joohyun said. She took a seat and crossed her legs and watched with a patient and loving smile. Seungwan shrugged. As if the answer was something she couldn’t quite come to terms with properly. She said something quiet enough that Joohyun had to ask her again.

‘Just some pancakes. Yeah, I know. Before you start saying anything, I know – it’s just pancakes. It’s easy. I even bought some of that ready-made stuff. All you’re supposed to do is pour it in the pan and voila, it’s done. But I’m useless at it. I don’t understand. How can I be so good at baking cakes but so useless at any other form of cooking? It makes absolutely no sense. God, I’m bad at this. Sorry. Really sorry.’

‘Why are you making pancakes?’

‘Just figured you’d like some, is all.’

Joohyun had to smile at that. ‘Is that what the berries are for?’ she said.

Seungwan held up the packet of raspberries and a small bottle of maple syrup. ‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘With maple syrup. Just like I used to have in Canada. Figured you might like them.’

At this Joohyun was quiet.

‘Sorry,’ Seungwan murmured. ‘I should just…not. I’m sorry.’

‘For what?’

‘I’m sorry. I’m making a mess of your kitchen and I’m being an idiot and I’m annoying you and I’m ing things up and—’

‘Seungwan, what’s wrong?’

‘I should’ve stuck to chocolate cake or something. At least I know what I’m doing there. You know, sometimes I think I have this inherent ability for baking that—’

‘I’m not talking about the food.

Seungwan looked at her.

‘You're being really weird. All apologetic and stuff over nothing. Kinda distant. I don't like it.’

Seungwan looked at her again. She looked at her for a long time. The pan was still sizzling, the batter burnt into a blackened puddle. She set it aside and turned off the gas and wiped her hands on the apron and nodded at nothing in particular. ‘Sorry,’ she said again.

‘For what?’

‘I just figured I’d do something to make it up to you this past week. Even something as small and as dumb as making you something to eat, thinking you’d like it. I just thought…you know.’

‘Make it up to me? What? For what?’

‘For everything.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

Seungwan sighed. She stepped around the counter and leant against the far side with her hands tapping nervously on the countertop behind her. For a good time she was silent and Joohyun didn’t much like it. Then she said, quietly, ‘For everything I did. It’s been eating away me this whole week. Basically since you came and talked to me when I was on SNL last week. Ever since then I’ve been feeling so guilty about it all, and you know what I’m like with confronting stuff like that – I clam up. I can’t do it.’

‘I know.’

‘I just—’

‘It’s okay,’ Joohyun said with a smile.

‘No. It’s not okay. You’ve done all this, and you’ve been through so much, and it’s all because of me. It’s all because I’ve been so selfish and I’ve been pretending I haven’t been, and you’ve been so accommodating of everything. It’s taken me this long to come to terms with the fact I’ve been taking and taking and never giving. Never putting you first. You ran out of your meeting in the pouring rain just to hold my hand and tell me it was going to be okay. And you might’ve saved my career in the process. And what have I done in return? Ruined your pancakes. Messed up your kitchen.’

Joohyun giggled softly.

‘I mean it, though. What have I done for you? I don’t mean here, but in general. I pushed you away, because I thought it was for the best, because I thought about myself. I didn’t take you into consideration at all and I should’ve and I ed up and I realise that now. Because I know that if you hadn’t have come and found me at SNL there was a very good chance I’d never see you again. It’d eat away at me and my anxiety would just get worse and worse and worse. And now I’m feeling so guilty about it and I don’t know how to get over it. I feel like I’ve ruined everything.’

‘What have you ruined?’

‘Your career, possibly.’

‘What?’

‘If you hadn’t have—’

‘It was my choice to walk out of that office, wasn’t it? Seungwan.’

‘Yeah.’

‘Well then.’

‘But—’

‘No,’ Joohyun said. ‘No ifs or ands or buts. I walked out of that room, and away from that deal, because I finally realised that you were worth more to me than anything else, and I couldn’t bear to let you go. I couldn’t live with myself knowing I’d done that. Knowing you’d done it. I had to choose between that deal and you, and I chose you. And I’d do it again, in a heartbeat. A thousand times over.’

Seungwan was almost crying. She held up her hands and wiped her eyes and said, ‘This is what I mean.’

‘What?’

‘How do I compete with that? What am I supposed to do? You’ve upended your life for me and I’ve done, what, exactly? Nothing. I’ve pushed you away, and I’ve hurt you, and I’ve forced you to make a decision you shouldn’t have ever had to make, and I’ve come out of it the other side with a record deal and a tour and you as well. I win. What do you get?’

‘It’s not a competition.’

‘I know. I didn’t mean it like that. Ignore that part. But what I meant was—’

‘I know what you meant,’ Joohyun said. The smile on her face was so warm and calming that Seungwan had to smile as well. The lodestone in the dark of her life. The guiding hand back to stiller waters.

‘Sorry,’ Seungwan mumbled.

‘It’s okay.’

‘Maybe it’s my anxiety playing with me again.’

‘I think probably it is. It’s not a competition. I love you. I’ll always love you, no matter what. Don’t think I value you any less because you haven’t been forced into making a sacrifice for me.’

‘I would. If I had to, I would do it.’

‘I know. That’s not the point. The point is the opposite – you don’t have to, and I don’t care. I’m not holding it over you. I’m not saddened because I walked out of that office.’

Seungwan was quiet. Her bottom lip was quivering and Joohyun hated it when that happened because it made her feel so helpless. ‘Sorry,’ Seungwan said again. ‘I’m really sorry.’

‘There’s nothing to be sorry for. Not anymore.’

‘There is. For ever pushing you away in the first place. For being so selfish and so emotionally immature. Hell, for still being so emotionally immature. I hate it sometimes. A lot of the time.’

‘I know. It’s okay.’

‘I just want whatever’s best for you.’

‘I know,’ Joohyun said.

‘If there’s anything I can do—’

‘Like what? I might still get the publishing deal. I doubt it, but you never know. All we can do now it wait and see. Just don’t leave me again, okay? Apart from on your tour, I mean.’

‘Never,’ Seungwan said, with such sincerity it was startling. ‘Do you…you know.’

‘What?’

‘Still want pancakes?’

‘If you’re offering, sure. Just don’t burn my apartment down, please. I can’t afford to have it refurbed if you destroy anything.’

‘Are you sure you trust me a frying pan?’

‘No. But I’m hungry.’

Joohyun spent a while watching her behind the counter. She squirted a dollop of pancake mix into the pan and set to work trying to spread it evenly so that it would form just right. The determination was enamouring.

‘Seungwan.’

She looked up and said, ‘What?’

‘Nothing.’

‘What?’

‘Nothing,’ Joohyun said with a soft smile. ‘Just…thank you.’

Seungwan never asked what for. Never needed to. ‘Pancakes coming right up,’ she said. ‘And not burnt this time.’