Irene sat alone in the kitchen with her phone laying on the table untouched. She props her head on her hand while staring daggers at her phone. I’m sure she’s heard about it by now, she thinks. Would things be awkward if I bring it up?

 

“Joohyun, let’s be mature about this. We're professional.” Irene slaps her cheeks lightly, giving herself a pep talk.

 

She snatches her phone and goes back and forth between deleting and retyping the message. She makes up her mind and quickly types a message before slamming her phone back on the table face down. 

 

Bae Irene (8:01 a.m.): Have you seen the article?

 

Irene tries to distract herself while she waits for a reply. She could care less about the things that were spreading on the internet right now because she knew the truth. It’s not like anything bad was being said; she was just worried about how this could affect how she and Seulgi interact. Would things get awkward when they’re filming together? What if she’s just overthinking things. They weren't dating, it was just harmless gossip. It seemed like her mind was going in circles and she was just stressing herself out even more. 

 

Irene's phone pings and her head snaps toward the noise. She feels her heart beating against her chest. She slowly flips her phone ever to check the message. Her figure immediately slumps down onto the table and groans when she sees the text isn’t from a certain monolid-eyed girl. 

 

Manager Kim (8:10 a.m.): Irene, we need to head to the company to talk about that article. I’ll be at the dorm in about 10 minutes. 

 

Irene massages her temples in mild irritation. She assumes that her company would most likely have to put out a statement to address the rumor. She stays seated for a couple of moments longer before getting up to get ready.

 

 

一

 

 

Seulgi watches her boss pace back and forth in front of her. With how careless she could be within the public eye this scene was a common occurrence, but out of all the times she’s been in this seat, this was the most nervous she’s been. 

 

“Seulgi-yah…” the woman says but gets cut off by the singer.

 

“If this is about that article, we’re just friends,” Seulgi says, her eyes following the woman.

 

The CEO looks at her sternly before sighing for what seemed to be the hundredth time since Seulgi came into her office. 

 

“I mean, I knew it was fake right when I read the title. This is Bae Irene we’re talking about,” her boss says, finally cracking a smile. 

 

“Unnie!” Seulgi’s jaw drops in disbelief, “Are you saying that I can’t end up with someone like Irene-unnie? You know what, don’t answer that. Shouldn’t we be staying on topic?”

 

“Yeah, I couldn’t help it,” the CEO laughs. 

“I guess everything’s all good then. I’m gonna head out.”

 

“Nope, we still have an issue,” her boss says.

 

“What’s the issue? We’ll just tell everybody the truth.”

 

“Well, about that…” her boss starts. 

 

Seulgi squints her eyes, not understanding the situation at all. 

 

“This puts us in a really weird situation with the show.”

 

“But it’s just a show,” Seulgi says. 

 

“That’s true, but think about it this way; if you’re watching a couple on TV and you see an article about them dating, but then they deny that they’re dating, would you want to continue watching them? You two have been doing really well on the show. It’d be a shame if…” she trails off

 

“You want to ignore the rumor.”

 

“Exactly, I also got into contact with Irene’s company and we were on the same page.”

 

“So, we’re just going to go on like this article didn’t happen,” Seulgi clarifies. 

 

Her boss nods. 

 

Seulgi scratches her head, “Well, alright then.”

 

“I know the show producers would ask questions so just try to not give them a direct answer. Luckily the rumors look like they’re dying down but just try to keep your interactions with Irene outside of filming to a minimum.”

 

Seulgi gives the CEO a thumbs up as she gets up and heads to the door, “Got it, boss, I’ll make sure we don’t get caught the next time we’re hanging out in public.” 

 

“No, Seulgi I’m telling you to not go out in public with her,” the singer walks out, no turning back, “and she’s gone,” the older woman sighs, shaking her head. 

 

Seulgi whistles as she makes her way back to the van where her manager was waiting. 

 

“That went by quick,” her manager says as she climbs in. 

 

“Yeah, the boss says it’ll be alright if we just ignore it.”

 

Her manager nods, “The rumors will die down eventually.” 

 

Seulgi hums in agreement. She takes her phone out to try to reply to the dozens of messages she put off from this morning. She immediately clicks on Irene’s message and sends the older girl a reply. 

 

Kang Seulgi (8:23 a.m.): I saw the article.

 

Kang Seulgi (8:23 a.m.): I just finished meeting with my company about it.

 

Bae Irene (8:25 a.m.): I’m about to meet with my company too.

 

Kang Seulgi (8:25 a.m.): We can talk about it when we see each other later?

 

Bae Irene (8:26 a.m.): Sure thing. :)

 

Seulgi replies to a couple more messages before putting her phone away, content with just looking out the window.

 

“We have a few hours until you have to be at the broadcast building, did you want to grab something to eat?” She hears her manager ask. 

 

“Yeah, sure.” 

 

 

一

 

 

Irene enters the set and greets the staff inside. She crosses the room and sits on the chair in the middle of the room. The meeting she had with her company earlier was still on her mind. Honestly, she was a little shocked by the decision; not to address the article. Normally, the company wouldn’t hesitate to shut down any rumor. 

 

“Irene, we will go ahead and get started if you’re ready,” the director says, snapping Irene out of her thoughts. 

 

She smiles and nods, giving them the green light. 

 

“First, what do you think of your newlywed home?” 

 

Irene thinks for a while, recalling the day they first stepped inside the apartment, “We had no idea we were getting a place together. The staff just gave us an address and told us to go there.” She laughs, “but I feel like we’ve been spoiled with how nice our place is.” 

 

The director continued the interview and asked about specific moments from that day. They asked her how she felt and what were her thoughts. “During one of the games, Seulgi listed some things that she liked about you, like your smile and laugh. We want to turn the question back on you. What do you like about Seulgi?”

 

Irene’s eyes widen, not expecting to be asked that question, “What do I like about Seulgi?” She pauses for a bit before giving her answer, “Everything.” Irene covers , laughing. “Honestly, what’s not to like about Seulgi? I think we match well.”

 

"If you had to choose your favorite thing about Seulgi what would it be?"

 

"I like how considerate she is towards me. She would always ask what my opinions are on things and I appreciate that a lot." 

 

The interview goes on for another fifteen minutes, and once they got enough footage for the episode, they let Irene go. 

 

As soon as she’s out of the room she almost runs into a body. 

 

“Sorry, I wasn’t looking at where I was going.” She says, looking up to see a familiar face. 

 

“Unnie!” Seulgi is there standing in front of her with her usual bright smile. 

 

“Seulgi! I was going to call you,” Irene laughs.

 

“Did you do the interview?”

 

“Yeah, I just finished actually.”

 

“Nice,” there’s a pause, “Should we head to the apartment now or did you want to stop by to get anything?”

 

It was filming day and the staff was letting them do whatever they wanted today but they had another shoot the next day too. They were supposed to plan out the day and let the staff know so they can film everything. 

 

“We can just go straight to the apartment unless you need to go anywhere?” Irene asks, looking at Seulgi for a response. The younger just shakes her head and the couple head to where their car was.

 

“What did you think about the article?” Seulgi asks while the couple walks through the hallway. 

 

“I probably should have fixed my makeup if I knew they were going to take pictures,” Irene jokes, “but I kind of expected something like this to happen, with the show and us spending time together outside of filming.” 

 

Seulgi snorts, “Unnie, you can have no makeup on and still be the prettiest girl in the room.” 

 

Irene elbows Seulgi’s side gently, “Yah, the cameras aren’t filming right now why are you acting like that.” 

 

“Ah, you’re right,” Seulgi slaps her forehead comically, “I’ll say it again when they’re on,” Seulgi teases. 

 

 Irene shakes her head, “But I’m sure you already had the conversation with your company. I had to go in this morning to talk about the rumor.” 

 

“Yeah, I’m kind of surprised with their decision. I was so sure they were going to deny them.” 

 

“Me too, but this just means the show is doing well. Fans are looking at our interactions closely.” 

 

“We can boost the ratings if we’re seen in public together,” Seulgi jokes. 

Irene laughs, “Didn’t you get lectured about laying low?”

 

“I did! That doesn't mean we can't spend time together outside of filming. We just have to be extra careful next time.”

 

“There's a next time?” Irene raises an eyebrow.

 

“Are you saying that you don’t like hanging out with me?” Seulgi asks with a hurt expression. 

 

“We’ll both get in trouble if we get caught in public again,” Irene scrunches her nose. 

 

“Unnie, that’s why I said we have to be careful,” Seulgi pouts.

 

“Fine, but we can just stay indoors, so we don’t have to worry about all of that.”

 

“Is this your way of inviting me over to your place?” the taller girl asks, wiggling her eyebrows. 

 

“My members want to see you too,” Irene says, avoiding her gaze.

 

Seulgi glances at Irene and giggles, “Unnie, you can just say you want to see me. There’s no shame in that.”

 

“Anyways, do you know what we should do today?” Irene doesn’t know how to respond so she changes the subject.

 

“Um,” Seulgi racks her brain for an idea, “Oh!” She exclaimed, catching Irene off guard with the sudden exclamation. “Our furniture!”

 

Irene stares at Seulgi confused, before realizing, “That’s right, the furniture.” 

 

Seulgi groans, “If we hurry we can probably get everything done and have time to do something afterward.” 

 

Irene nods, thinking the same. “Sounds like a plan,” she says, smiling at her fake wife.

 

“Something like learning how to ride a bike?”

 

“You’re still going on about that?”

 

“Unnie, this is an essential skill we’re talking about!”

 

“Seulgi, if we’re going to talk about essential skills, let’s talk about your lack of cooking skills.”

 

“You’re underestimating my cooking abilities,” Seulgi crosses her arms. 

 

“You told me all you knew how to cook was rice and ramen.”

 

“That’s all a person needs to know!”

 

Irene shakes her head, “What if I teach you how to cook something?”

 

“Fine, if you let me teach you how to ride a bike, you can teach me how to cook.” 

 

“Deal.” And they shake on it. 

 

 

一

 

 

The couple arrives at their apartment and they get straight to work at building their furniture. They gather the boxes and move them to the living room where there’s space for them to assemble everything. Before they start, Seulgi finds a mat to spread on the floor so they don’t accidentally scratch it while they work. 

 

“Seulgi-yah, get the scissors from the kitchen. I can’t get this thing to open,” Irene says, pointing in the direction of the kitchen. 

 

“Unnie, leave the big boxes alone for now, they’re really heavy I’ll help move them when I come back.” Seulgi goes to grab the scissors from the kitchen in a hurry. 

 

“I swear last week it didn't like we had this much to put together,” Irene says loud enough to reach Seulgi. 

 

“At least everything we got was free,” Seulgi says, coming out of the kitchen with the scissors. She hands it to Irene and goes to the box that Irene was struggling with. She positions it so it’s lying flat on the floor, and it's easier for them to take the heavy pieces out. 

 

“Have you done this kind of thing before?” Irene asks while opening up the box. 

 

“I have. I’m pretty good at these kinds of things.” She helps the older girl take all of the pieces out of the box. “Have you?”

 

“Yeah,” the idol grunts, sliding another box over to their work area. 

 

“What did you make?”

 

“I made a bookshelf for my room.” 

 

“Well then, this will be smooth sailing from here!” Seulgi next to Irene who was reading the instructions. She tiptoes over, careful to not step on the pieces lying all over the floor. 

 

“There’s a bookshelf, a table, chairs, and a storage unit,” Irene lists out. “Let’s work on the chairs first, since they look the most simple. We can work on the bigger ones together.” 

 

“Okay,” Seulgi starts to work on her chair. She looks through all the parts and purses her lips, trying to figure out where to start. She grabs a leg and looks over to Irene, who already looks to be halfway done with hers. “Unnie, did you see where the instructions went?”

 

“Huh?” Irene lets out absentmindedly. 

 

“The instructions. I can’t find it anywhere,” Seulgi says, looking around their cluttered workspace. 

 

“It should be around here,” Irene says, finally looking up from her chair. “We can share this one if you want,” she waves the paper in her hand. 

 

“It’s okay, I’ll just go with my feeling,” she grins. 

 

Seulgi references Irene’s chair from time to time but she did fine without the instructions. After about ten minutes, both chairs were assembled and ready. Irene moves the chairs off to the side so they can move on to the next piece of furniture. 

 

“Let’s do the table next, Unnie.” 

 

“This one doesn’t look too complicated,” Irene says, looking through the instructions while Seulgi takes out all the contents from the box. 

 

“We just have to screw in the legs for this one,” Seulgi says. 

 

Irene grabs one of the legs as Seulgi holds the top part of the table still so she could screw it in. 

 

“All done,” Irene cheers. 

 

The couple high-five then look at the last few boxes they’re left with. They decide to do the bookshelf, saving the storage unit for last. 

 

“Oh no, where did all the screws go,” Seulgi lifts the plastic wrap and cardboard with her free hand, trying to find them. She puts down the piece she was holding to get a better look. 

 

Irene gets up from her spot to help find the pieces Seulgi needed. She immediately finds one near the spot that Seulgi was sitting. 

“Here’s one,” she says as she scans the ground for the rest.

 

“I swear I’m not this disorganized,” Seulgi says, following Irene. 

 

“How did they get over here,” Irene laughs, wiggling the pack of screws in Seulgi’s face.

 

Seulgi shrugs her shoulders sheepishly. She takes the bag back to her spot and carries on. 

 

It took them two hours to finally finish putting together the rest of the furniture. They would have finished sooner but the couple decided to take a small break in between. Now it’s just moving the furniture around to fit their liking. 

 

“The chairs and table should be in the kitchen.” 

 

“We can leave these in the living room,” Seulgi says, patting the bookshelf. 

 

“Should we put the bookshelf against this wall?” Irene tilts her head, trying to picture it in her head. “Or next to the TV?” 

 

“Let’s see how it looks like next to the TV,” Seulgi and Irene move the bookshelf to the spot where Irene had suggested. Seulgi take a few steps back to look at it at a better view

 

“How does it look?” Irene asks, stepping back to look too. 

 

“I think it looks good.”

 

“I agree,” Irene says, smiling. “And we can just push the storage thing up against that wall.” 

 

“There!” Seulgi dusts her hands, “Our home is complete.”

 

Irene places her hands on her hips and admires their work. “Now we just have to fill the empty shelves.” 

 

“We can probably find some things when we’re out today.” 

 

“That’s what I was just thinking,” The couple shares an impressed look and high-fives. 

 

Seulgi plops down onto the couch and checks her phone for the time. “We can leave after lunch?” 

 

Irene takes a seat next to Seulgi and leans her head back, “Sure.”

 

“Alright, I’ll cook us lunch just stay here,” Seulgi says, turning to the older girl. 

 

Irene raises an eyebrow, knowing Seulgi’s cooking skills who knew what would come out of the kitchen. “Are you sure? I'd be more than happy to cook us something,” Irene gets up to follow her wife. 

 

Seulgi turns around and gently pushes her back down onto the couch. She places a cushion on Irene’s lap for good measure, before turning back, “You sit here and relax, I’ll handle it."

 

“Seulgi-yah, do you even know where everything is?” She calls out after Seulgi. 

 

“It’s okay I’ll be fine,” Seulgi’s head pokes out from the other room, “Unnie, I’m serious just stay in here, okay?”

 

Irene nods reluctantly, and that seemed to satisfy the younger girl.

 

Once inside the kitchen, Seulgi goes straight to the cupboard where the staff stashed the ramen. The singer grins and takes two packs and sets them down on the counter. She checks the entrance to the kitchen from time to time to make sure Irene hadn't snuck past her.

 

“Hello everybody, this is how to make Seulgi’s famous ramen,” Seulgi says, starting an impromptu cooking show. “First, we need a pot to boil water in,” she opens and closes the cabinets until she finds a pot that she’s happy with. “Now that we have a pot let’s fill it up with water, and we just wait until it starts to boil,” she says to the nearest camera. 

 

She leaves the pot to boil and takes a peek into the living room to see what the older girl was up to. She sees Irene tidying up the scattered plastic and styrofoam from the boxes. 

 

"Unnie, I thought I told you to relax." 

 

Irene's head turns to look at Seulgi. "How could I relax with all of this mess in front of me."

 

Seulgi's body slumps forward in a defeated matter, "We can take care of it when after we eat." She grabs the older girl's wrist and gently pulls her to the couch. "I'm almost done, don't worry." 

 

Before Seulgi can walk away, Irene grasps Seulgi's hand, "Can't I come with you and watch?" Seulgi has to look away from Irene, or else she'll give in to the puppy dog eyes she was giving her. 

 

"Unnie-"

 

Irene holds her hand tighter, "Please, I won't even say anything! I'm just going to watch." 

 

"Fine," Seulgi groans and pulls Irene up. Both now were very aware that they were still holding hands. Only when they get to the kitchen do they both let go.

 

"I knew you were cooking ramen," Irene laughs, bringing out their bowls and utensils. 

 

"It was supposed to be a surprise until someone decided to spoil it," Seulgi clicks her tongue, carrying the cooked ramen to the table

 

"It's not a surprise if I already predicted it," Irene teases.

 

Seulgi rolls her eyes playfully, "Mhmm, just hurry up and eat."