One of the great things about being with Lisa, was that no matter how long the silence stretched between them, it was never awkward.

“So...that was new…”, Lisa said, her thumb drawing circles on Handong’s bare shoulder.

“Uh?”, confused, Handong lifted her head from where it was resting comfortably resting on Lisa’s chest to stare at her questioningly.

Lisa clicked her tongue, “That thing you did...with your tongue…”, with her free hand she gave Handong a thumbs up, a smug look on her face.

Handong chuckled and lightly hit Lisa on her stomach, “You know what they say”, she rested her head once again on Lisa’s chest, dropping a short kiss there, “a dog can always learn new things”.

Lisa let out a laugh at that; even though they couldn’t spend as much time together as they used to, she loved the moments she spent by Handong’s side, there was never a dull or awkward moment between them.

They had spent a few hours losing themselves in each other’s body, they just knew what buttons to push and where to pull to drive the other crazy, the knowledge came from years of knowing each other like the back of their hands.

The aftermath

Handong couldn’t remember walking back home, everything after finding out that The Kims’ house was empty had been a blur.

She just remembers walking to the kitchen, where her family was already eating breakfast and then everything went black.

When she came back to consciousness, it took a few minutes for Handong to realize that she was in her bedroom, and that her father was sitting next to her, looking at her with worry in his eyes.

“The Kims were not the people we thought they were, Dongie. That family is nothing more than snakes, waiting for you to drop your guard before pouncing”, the way her father was talking made Handong realize that it was serious.

“What did they do?”

Her father almost imperceptibly hesitated before answering, something that made Handong think that he was holding something back from her, which was uncharacteristic of him, since he always told her everything.

“They wanted to hurt us, Dongie. But thankfully, a friend of ours helped us before that could happen.”

Her father’s words made Handong scared, had he had something to do with the Kims sudden disappearance?

As if reading her mind, her father just sighed before saying, “The Kims left before I could really confront them. We found out yesterday’s evening about everything”, he ran a soothing hand through her hair, “We didn’t want to tell you because you seemed so excited about prom”.

Handong’s hand bunched her blanket at the mention of prom, her eyes becoming glazed. 

There were so many things she wanted to say, like how she was only excited about prom because of Minji, how knowing that she had left her made her feel like dying, that prom had been a bust and she had probably become more of a pariah than she already was.

She wanted her father to comfort her and tell her everything was going to be alright, but was afraid that telling him how she really felt would make him look at her differently.

So Handong just it up and said, “Well, good thing the Kims are no longer in our lives, right?”

“Right”.

After that talk with her father, it seemed like life went back to normal, with the Han family doing what they did best: pretending that their problems didn’t exist; in this case, that they had never had anything to do with that family.

Of course, school was an entirely different story.

As soon as Handong walked in the following Monday, it seemed like not only the students but the faculty also knew about her biggest secret.

But no matter how much she wanted to crumble and hide, her father had taught her better than that; so she just made her way to her locker with her head held high, pretending that the whispers weren’t about her.

It had all worked out until one student, a guy from the soccer team, came right up to her and said, “You should be the one that moved out instead of Minji, at least she wasn’t a dirty dyke like you”.

Handong clenched her jaw, and was about to respond when someone else interjected with a yell.

“At least Handong gets more than you”.

The whole hallway went silent for a second before bursting into laughter, the guy turning bright red and trying to come up with a response but ultimately failing.

Not wanting to be around anymore, Handong fled to the abandoned restrooms on the second floor. 

Her breathing got heavy and she was trembling, the mere reminder of Minji was enough to set her off.

Handong was tightly gripping the sink in front of her, trying to calm herself down when the door suddenly opened and a girl made her way into the restroom.

“Sorry”, the girl seemed apologetic about something, “I just thought it wasn’t cool of him to come at you like that”.

Ah, that girl had been the one to yell at the other guy.

“It’s okay”, Handong whispered before reminding herself that she shouldn’t be showing any weakness, much less in front of a stranger, so she took a deep breath and steeled herself. “While I appreciate you intervening before I could rip him off a new one, I had it handled”.

The girl was in awe of how Handong changed from a girl on the edge of breaking down to a perfectly stoic business woman.

“That’d have been an interesting sight”, the girl snapped her finger with a smile.

Handong decided that she had had enough, already taking her phone out to text her driver to pick her up when the girl broke the silence once again.

“You know, I’m glad I’m not the only one”, her words made Handong stop typing.

“The only one?”

“You know...”, the girl made some weird sign with her fingers, making Handong confused. 

What a strange girl, Handong thought, missing some words the girl had said after.

“…I also wanted to tell you that I saw you at prom, and that you looked really pretty. Wanted to ask you for a dance but you left pretty fast”.

Oh, Handong thought, surprise evident in her face, was the girl in front of her implying that...

The girl scoffed at herself and facepalmed, “Where are my manners? I’m Lalisa Manoban, but you can call me Lisa”, she extended a hand at Handong.

Lalisa Manoban, Handong has heard about the elusive dance prodigy before but had never put a face to the name; Lisa was one of the most popular students in their high school, not only for becoming captain of the dance team when she was a sophomore but also because the girl seemed to skip classes almost everyday, but since the Manobans basically owned the school, no one ever said anything.

Lisa seemed to take Handong’s silence the wrong way, as she started lowering her hand; before she could do that though, Handong quickly took her hand and shook it.

“I’m Handong” 

“I know...and let me tell you, you’re even prettier up close”, Lisa squeezed Handong’s hand suggestively.

The gesture made Handong freeze. This was new, no one had ever dared to approach her -much less this way-, so she was at a loss at what to do.

Before she could respond, her phone buzzed signaling the arrival of her driver.

Lisa let go of her hand and nodded at the phone, “You should probably get that”.

“I...uh, I need to go?”

“Well…”, Lisa took Handong’s hand once again and scribbled something on it with a pen that she seemed to pull out of nowhere, “I’ll see you around”.

Those were the last words she said to Handong before winking at her and leaving the restroom.

Handong could only stare at her hand in shock. Had she just gotten a girl’s number? Maybe things were starting to look up in her life, she thought. 

And that was the start of a beautiful friendship(?).

The only sound that could be heard in the room was their breaths, and for a second there, Lisa thought Handong has finally fallen asleep, the woman spent from all the tears and the way they had ed each other senseless for a long time.

But then, with her voice being nothing more than a mere whisper, Handong broke the silence.

“I… I don’t know what to do”.

Knowing it took Handong some time to open up once something was bothering her, Lisa just ran a soothing hand along her back, the gesture meant to reassure Handong that she was listening and that she was there.

“It’s so dumb”, Handong’s voice cracked at the end, “It’s been years since I thought about her and I already moved on, but now she’s back…”, a lone tear escaped from her eyes. “She’s back and I feel like I’m back to that stupid seventeen year old girl that was madly in love with her and waited for her to come back in vain”.

Lisa felt her chest get damp from Handong’s tears and she hated it. Not that she minded giving comfort to the women she thought of as her soulmate, but she had always hated seeing the other cry.

To Lisa, Handong was a woman who just deserved the best in the world and Kim Minji was definitely not it. That stupid woman did not deserve Handong’s tears. 

What came next reminded Lisa of their younger years, her listening to Handong spill all her thoughts without restraint while she did what she always did best, hug Handong closer to her body and leave a soft kiss on her forehead to comfort her.

As best as she could, Handong explained to Lisa how she felt like her world had its axis, that the book that she had thought she had closed and archived suddenly opened its pages on a final chapter that never got a definite ending.

“Maybe that’s it”, Lisa said.

“Uh?”

“You never got closure. You always wondered what went wrong, the why and where she went were questions that you never got answers to”.

“So you’re saying that I should talk to her?”

That’s the last thing Lisa wanted but maybe it would help Handong finally close that chapter of her life for good.

So she settled with a, “I’m not saying that you should talk to her but I’m also not saying that you shouldn’t either. You should do what you think it’s best for you, I’ll support you either way”.

“You’re so confusing”, Handong playfully bit Lisa’s neck.

“You love me anyway”, Lisa lightly slapped Handong’s .

In retaliation, Handong just buried herself deeper into Lisa’s side.

The bubble they were both in made Lisa feel a little brave to say, “Sometimes I wish I could be what you deserve”.

As soon as the words left , Lisa felt Handong tense, she knew by heart what came next.

“Sometimes I wish that too, but we both know that in this life we’re just not meant to be”

Ah, Lisa felt a pang on her chest, here we go again.

“Maybe in another one?”, you might call her a fool but Lisa was hopeful that in another universe they were two hearts dancing to the same beat. But sadly, in this one, even though they were signing the same song, the lyrics just weren’t the same.

“Maybe…”, Handong relaxed once again on Lisa’s embrace, her tone was almost wistful and bittersweet, “…but in this one, I’m quite content with what we have, you’re one of my best friends”.

Well, at least that was better than nothing. Being considered as one of Handong’s best friends made Lisa’s worries and pain in her heart fade, how lucky was she to be considered part of Handong’s more trusted circle.

“Don’t let Gahyeon hear you say that, she’d riot”, Lisa’s words made both laugh because they knew how possessive the younger one could be about her status in Handong's life.

With that, the bubble they were in burst and the moment was over.

Lisa ignored the weird feeling in her gut telling her that she should do something more.

Before she could dwell on it, Handong left a last kiss on her neck before standing up and stretching.

“I need a shower”, Handong said.

Lisa’s eyes couldn’t help but follow Handong’s body as she made her way to the private bathroom in her office.

(Of course one of the main improvements Handong had done to this office when she had been made CEO was to install a fully functional bathroom with a marble tub.

Her couch also was a really comfortable pull out bed -that she had used more than Handong liked to admit.

She had also been this close to installing a kitchen but that’s where her friends had drawn the line, saying that there was no way they’d let her turn this office into an apartment.

They were not going to let her turn into that kind of workaholic.)

Handong stopped just at the bathroom’s doorway and gave Lisa a look that always made her knees go weak.

“You coming?”, Handong’s voice dropped an octave.

Sometimes Lisa couldn’t believe the stamina the other woman had, for someone that spent ridiculous hours behind a desk Handong was extremely fit.

“I’ll be there in a sec, just need to feel my legs again first”, her words made Handong snort and look at her teasingly.

“Oh? Did I tire out The Great Lalisa Manoban? Thought you were supposed to be one of the ‘Top Ten Idols who could give Olympians a run for their money’?”

“I might be but I got nothing on you, babe”, Lisa winked at her.

Handong just shook her head in amusement and headed into the bathroom.

“Don’t take too long or the water will get cold”.

“We can always heat it up again”.

Once Handong was safely inside the bathroom, Lisa got to work.

She hurriedly made her way to Handong’s desk and rummaged through the papers there till she found what she was looking for.

Sure, she shouldn’t be doing this but they never kept secrets from each other, so what she was doing wasn’t technically wrong. 

This won’t know what hit her, were the words running through her mind as she looked at the piece of paper with those cursed 10 digits.

Lisa took a quick picture of it with her phone before putting everything back where it was.

@LaChismosaBlog: inside sources tell us jiu was seen going into han consolidated today once almost every employee had left. it seems like the lovebirds are passing this wonderful night together 😉 #jidong

   └ @jidongsupremacy: omg so cute!!

   └ @rbwertainment: they have been radio silent about their relationship so i doubt they’re really dating 

   └ @titsoutforhandong: @rbwertainment handong has always been a private person tho 

   └ @oneinamillion: a close family friend told me jiu has been sending gifts for the past few weeks to handong, that’s so romantic

   └ @stanbvndit: @oneinamillion need me a freak like that 

   └ @whatbesttitletrack: @oneinamillion jiu is whipped lol

   └ @titsoutforhandong: @whatbesttitletrack it’s handong we are talking about, who wouldn’t be whipped

Minji was extremely (but pleasantly) surprised when an unknown number texted her phone.

[unknown]
I’m ready to talk. When can we meet?

It had been no more than a day since she had revealed her real identity to Handong when the other woman was already reaching out to her.

She really had thought that Handong would take at least a week to get back to her. If the woman was anything like she had been back then, she would surely make a pros and cons list followed by a thorough simulation of likely scenarios that may happen with each choice she could make before coming up with a final decision.

It seemed like in their years apart things had changed, and while it pained Minji to see that maybe she didn’t know Handong as well as she did before, she wouldn’t complain when those changes seemed to be working in her favor.

Not being one to make Handong wait, she immediately texted back a time and place for them to meet.

[unknown]
No, that place is too public.
Let’s meet at your apartment instead.

[KM]
Ok.
[location]

Minji thought that maybe Handong would say something else but all she got after waiting a few minutes for another text was being left on read.

Something that was foreign to her because Minji was always the one that left everybody else on read. It seemed like she would be experiencing many firsts with Handong.

(Not that she really minded.)

sorry for the long wait! i've been having a hard time writing, it's like once i want to write what i think of down my body just error 404 lol but i am slowly getting back to it. don't know how often imma be able to update since work has been kicking my but this is me trying.
 

hope you like it!! let me know what you think uwu

disclaimer: all mistakes are mine, english is not my first language.

you can also find me on
tw: @anothershipper
cc:/anothershipper
☕: /anothershipper