THEY say you meet your soulmate when you’re least expecting it. So when Minju deleted all her dating apps not to follow her friend’s advice of “soul-searching”, she knew that she wasn’t searching anymore. The one had come but at the wrong time.

Due to the stay-at-home order implemented by the COVID-19, Minju took the chance to focus on hobbies she put on the back burner during her hectic school year. One of them being her passion to write as well as read fanfiction. For Minju, fanfiction is an escape from her dull and nonexistent love life. It seems that the nonexistence of it has reached an all-time low because she finds herself reading more than she writes.

One particular author catches her attention. She goes under the alias ‘kwangbae20’. Minju thinks the username is weird, but nonetheless her works begin to captivate the girl behind her screen. The way the author portrays such emotion with precise details that Minju could almost feel she was in the scene — she could not resist requesting a prompt in her one-shot collection.

It was about one in the morning, just as Minju was bored out of her mind (nothing unusual) when the author private messaged her back concerning the request.

“Hi! I’ll try my best to complete your request but I’m a bit slow on requests because of online classes :(“

Minju doesn’t know why a smile forms on her face as she reads that, lying on her bed. She responds back not long after.

“It’s okay! Take your time, your updates are always worth waiting for.”

Ew, kinda cringe? Minju thinks just as she presses the ‘Post’ button but she didn’t overthink it further.

Minju checked the author’s profile and felt slightly disappointed when she didn’t see a country of origin next to her name. A part of her feels curious out of the blue and she starts to type again.

“Btw, what country are you from?”

“Korea, you?” ‘kwangbae20’ responded about an hour later.

Upon reading that the author is from Korea, she feels a sense of comfort as if she never left home. Her whole life she’s been yearning for a connection with her hometown, and as if the sky has been listening to her, she receives this message. The two continue to exchange messages about random things like asking each other what time it is in their place and whatnot.

At one point, Minju even feels an emotion towards her new online friend which feels almost unfitting. Care.

‘kwangbae20’ responds at 2:59 AM when she tells Minju that they’re the same age and both in university. That’s when Minju first feels the unfitting emotion she speaks of.

“She’s still awake? Weird,” Minju thinks in broad daylight.

Throughout the next day or so, the two continue to talk about things like the SaMo, aka the ship that 'kwangbae20' wrote her fanfics about. It becomes a surprise to ‘kwangbae20’ that the two even start to ask questions about their plans throughout the day. Minju wasn’t sure if she was just really bored or if she just wanted someone to talk to. Maybe it was both.

It didn’t take long until Minju asked for the other girl’s Twitter because she wanted to keep talking to her frequently and realizes AsianFanfics is a weird site to use as a chatting platform. On Twitter, the way they interacted becomes more casual because of those “react” buttons which both of them found super entertaining. The second day they met online, Minju could finally put a name to her friend.

Hyewon.

Minju felt a sense of unrealness to the way her name rolled off her tongue. There was a part of her that wanted to know Hyewon for who she is, not only for what she wrote. Perhaps knowing her name was the start of it.

Without directly saying, the two started to talk in their native tongue. Hyewon did something that Minju doesn’t encounter quite often; she gets a nickname - Min. Minju mentally thanked her parents for teaching her Korean as someone born and raised in the U.S.

Ironically as ‘Min’, Minju felt like she had nothing to hide. Hyewon became the last person she texted before going to bed, the first person she texted as she woke up, and a diary throughout the day. Minju found herself smiling at every small random thing they talked about. It didn’t have to be K-pop related; actually, most of their conversations became about their personal lives.

Minju worried that she was losing herself at one point. At first, it was overwhelming to her. As someone with abandonment issues, she put one foot on the gas pedal and another on the brakes. She feared that she would reveal too much of herself to a girl she didn’t know in person...

(... a girl who would probably get sick of her in time.)

Yet as if there was a voice reassuring her, she simultaneously felt at peace whenever she felt a wave of worry.

Day by day, both of them had a fair amount of stuff that they shared. Minju's foot on the brakes would gradually loosen until it barely covered the pedal. Perhaps it was the anonymity of their situations or the loneliness during this quarantine that affected how quickly they were able to open up, but neither questioned it. At least not vocally.

“So you met this girl online and you don’t even know what she looks like?”

“I don’t and maybe that’s what’s bothering me! Am I superficial Yujin?” Minju groaned while the other side of the line just laughed. She thinks it's funny, wow. Why did I call her again? Minju thinks in annoyance.

“No, it’s a valid concern. I mean, maybe this just means it’s different from your old crushes, you know. Instead of liking her for her appearance, you’re liking her for how she speaks to you and who she is as a person.”

“Crush? I don't like her that way. I mean we're just starting off as friends right now!” Minju denies even though the connection is making her doubt her own words.

The thought of that frightened her even more. Emotional attachment basically led to nothing good for her. At least with her last crush, it was more physical so she could get over that quickly. But emotional attachment to this girl while having abandonment issues? That hurts.

“Give it a week, it’s only been a few days right?”

…

She followed Yujin's advice and gave it a week. In that time, Minju learned that Hyewon has a girlfriend. Minju remembered how she was actually grateful for once about their online situation because she is able to hide her disappointment through text.

“Wait, seriously?”

She gets a laughing reaction from the other. Hyewon tells her how she feels about her relationship of more than 3 years. In short, the relationship has ended a long time ago even though neither of them has made an effort to officially end it.

It’s bittersweet. The two tastes Minju likes the least. Minju rates her favorite tastes in the following order: spicy, sour, salty, sweet, and bitter. She sighs as she stares at her phone for a long time. What has she gotten herself into? Not only is she forming an emotional attachment to someone far away, faceless to her mind, but also struggling to leave a relationship?

Screw that, Minju groans and curses herself before crafting a response that is still genuine despite her messy thoughts.

“Break up with her, you fool” she types but hesitates for a second before she sends it. I’m saying this as a friend. Yes, friend. I want her to be happy and clearly she’s not happy with that girl.

She presses send and fortunately, it seems like Hyewon has already received that advice multiple times from her own circle of friends.

All of a sudden, Hyewon becomes her reflection. She sees how her past self would’ve reacted to her encounter with Hyewon. Her past self would’ve labeled it as love. Her past self would have called Hyewon the one.

Minju used to confess to her crushes as if she were Lara Jean in To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before, except she never hid her letters. After the third time, she realizes the third time isn’t a charm.

Confessing isn’t the hardest part. It’s getting rejected over and over again. Minju used to think there was no harm in confessing if it would set her free. Being a future-oriented person, she wanted to know everything. She hated the waiting process and most importantly, she hated the thought of waiting for someone that as it turns out, would never feel the same way.

So here, she is, realizing that maybe she’s met someone special. In a week, she wouldn’t know if Hyewon would be another crush or just an ordinary connection, but she feels something that she’s never felt before. Minju doesn’t even have the words to describe it.

Hyewon, as she sees it, is someone that she wouldn’t mind waiting for even if she doesn’t spill out her feelings as she usually does. She realizes that the first time she and Hyewon talked, she already knew that she would end up waiting for her.

One day became two, two became three, and before they knew it they knew the most random details about each other’s childhood and adolescence.

kwangbae20: “join in on my school’s live stream if ur bored lol”

gaeguri05: “okii”

It was maybe their third night that one decision led to another. Minju out of boredom clicked on the Facebook link and chuckled at the absurdity of the things she would do to feel that Hyewon is, in fact,