fumbling around, sooyoung eventually slips the translator earpiece into her ears. great. already starting off on the wrong foot.

"-lovely meeting you!" in a voice akin to seungwan's mother's actual voice is all she hears. seungwan and her mother all but float around the halls, guiding sooyoung to another room. 

every custom that seungwan detailed dissolves in the ripples of sooyoung's worry. this weaker gravity has to be doing something to sooyoung. she feels light. light headed. or maybe it's because she holds her breath everytime seungwan's mother looks at her. 

sooyoung squeezes the life out of seungwan’s hand. seungwan smiles through it anyway, gently trying to pull sooyoung’s fingers loose occasionally. 

the tour ends with a massive feast at the dining table. it hits that seungwan hasn't been home in years, (or whatever unit of time they used). she was keeping her little girlfriend to herself. not that she told seungwan not to go home. but still. should she apologize?

"tell her to sit and have some." seungwan's father tells them, and sooyoung sits with a forced smile. she lets go. seungwan stretches her fingers, smiling anyway.

seungwan's family catches up with her. there's talk of life. friends. work. leisure. what seungwan missed. what her parents missed.

sooyoung. 

when she comes up as the conversation topic. she shifts in her chair. her leg bounces at a seemingly inhumane frequency. suddenly she's getting hot.

so she shoves full of this amazing alien food to appease her appetite and giver her the energy to continue bouncing her leg.

there’s some underwhelming relief to being plainly accepted. seungwan’s parents barely react. not that sooyoung was expecting celebration, but still. shouldn’t they have been happier? she can’t complain about the response. quick translated affirmations aren’t bad. they aren’t the words of disapproval she expected. so she eats, her hopes shifting to actually digesting the alien nutrients she swallowed nearly whole. 

“that couldn’t have gone better!” leaning into her resting pod, seungwan closes her eyes with the brightest smile sooyoung has seen since they arrived on that sweltering planet. she lays on her super-cooled mattress, elbows propping her up. 

“it couldn’t?” sooyoung half asks. it’s meant to be a rhetorical question, but seungwan will probably answer. she waits for it, like clockwork. that knowing dynamic was part of that cheesy love story she wants. at least she thinks it is. 

“of course not. they loved you. and i have suppressants, so now,” seungwan bounds out of her spot onto sooyoung’s mattress. it’s not supposed to be big enough for the both of them, but they’ll fit if they hold each other tight enough. “i can do this with zero hesitations.”

“you sure they loved me?” sooyoung’s fingers card aimlessly through seungwan’s hair. sometimes up. down. uncertain. she’s easy to read. especially for kindergarteners and aliens who are fully aware that she is madly in love. seungwan knows.

“they did. i promise” 

sooyoung tries to let herself doze off. that’s all there should be to it. she met the parents, and they liked her. seungwan has the pills. this weekend trip was never supposed to be more, yet there she is. laying expectantly, like there’s an amendment to the conversation. something to add. 

should she ask? no clearer communication than a plain out verbal conversation. straight to the point. should she get straight to the point this early in their relationship? it’s not binding, and truly, sooyoung is just curious. will 

“by the way, before we left, i asked them if they are okay with me staying on earth with you. indefinitely.” seungwan pauses, seeming to pull herself together for something serious. “they laughed at me and asked why i wouldn’t stay home.” funny. all this time sooyoung worried they might secretly hope their little girl would come home to them. but they’d already accepted seungwan was home with sooyoung. 

“is that what you want?” 

“yeah. why else would i ask?” 

“then it’s settled. you’re stuck with me.” and sooyoung finally gets to kiss seungwan. the kind of kiss that lingers. the feeling even lingers on their lips when seungwan’s mother awkwardly vaporizes the door-thing and asks if sooyoung needs an extra cooling unit.