“Are you telling me you actually enjoy these movies?” Jessica asks to which Tiffany nods. This has been definitely a surprise, she would never expect to be watching Barbie movies at 31 years of age unless it was with a child. “Fascinating. It’s hard to remind myself that we’re the same age.” Her analysis of Tiffany’s taste in movies is interrupted by her phone ringing, “It’s my sister.” She looks up from her phone with wide eyes.

“You should pick it up.”

“But… it’s a video call and I haven’t told her about you,” The call ends and she takes a deep breath, just for her phone to ring again.

“Okay, you’re panicking,” She pauses the movie, “I will go to the balcony and you talk to your sister.” 

Tiffany walks away and Jessica picks up her sister’s call.

“Why weren’t you answering?”

“Hi to you too, Soojung,” Jessica says and Soojung rolls her eyes, “I was in the kitchen when you called.”

“Babe, don’t be rude to Jess.” Victoria appears behind her and waves, “Hi, Jess”

“Hi, unnie. It’s such a pleasure to see your beautiful face.” Soojung’s tone dripping with sarcasm.

“Hi, Vic. Thanks for teaching this brat some manners.”

“I try my best, but I guess she likes to be punished.” Victoria walks aways laughing, leaving a blushing Soojung behind.

“She’s kidding,” she says quietly, “now back to why I called you.”

“How dare you have an ulterior motive to call your loving sister?”

“We’ll need a ride to grandma’s house,” Soojung answers ignoring her overreacting sister, “can you take us? Please?”

“Sure, I… ,” Jessica hesitates for a moment, ultimately gathering the courage to get up from the couch and start walking towards the balcony, “I need to tell you something. I was going to wait until we got there, but I guess it can’t be helped now that we’re going together.”

“Something’s wrong?” Soojung’s bratty attitude was replaced by genuine concern.

“Nothing,” She opens the balcony door locking eyes with Tiffany, “Fany, come meet my sister.”

“Did you finally get a dog?”

“What? No!”

“I’m not a dog,” Tiffany says, approaching Jessica’s side, “I’m a girlfriend.”

“Why are you like this?”

“Some people would say I’m funny.”

“What?” Soojung almost screams and turns her face away from the camera, “Babe, come here, you need to see this.”

Jessica stops bickering with Tiffany, “Hey, no need to make a big deal out of this.” 

“Why are you screaming?” Victoria looks surprised at Soojung’s phone, “Oh, you weren’t there before.”

“Jess has a girlfriend!” 

“When did you get a girlfriend? I was only gone for a couple of minutes.”

“Guys, you’re embarrassing me.” Jessica covers her face while Tiffany goes into a fit of laughter, “Yes, I have a girlfriend and she'll be with me when we go to grandma’s place.”

“Hi, I’m Tiffany.” She smiles at the camera.

“How did this happen?” Soojung asks before realizing she’s being rude again, “Hi, I’m Soojung. Nice to meet the person who got my sister to date.”

“Hey, I’m Victoria, Soojung’s girlfriend.” Victoria sits besides Sojung, “Sooooooo… When did you guys start dating?”

“Well… the thing is…” Jessica definitely isn’t ready for questions.

“Officially we got together last week,” Tiffany interrupts and seeing the surprise in their faces she continues, “I know it is quite recent.”

Jessica decides to speak again now that Tiffany got the worst part out of the way, “And even though we haven’t been dating for long I just couldn’t imagine leaving Fany behind spending Christmas alone in Seoul.”

“We are happy for you, Jess,” Victoria nudges Soojung’s side, “Right?”

“Yeah, of course,” Soojung still looks like she can’t believe what’s happening. 

“I’ll text you so we can talk over the details of going together, gotta go now. Bye.” Jessica says and doesn’t even give anyone else a chance to say anything else when she ends the call.

“That went better than expected.”

“Are you kidding me?” 

“What?”

“I panicked when she asked questions, we need to get this story straight.”

“Oh, dear,” Tiffany puts her hand on Jessica’s shoulder, “how can we do that when there’s nothing straight about me?”

Jessica groans, tired of Tiffany playing around, “Can you please take this seriously?”

“We went on a date arranged by Chae, but neither of us knew it until she texted us when we were already out. We both thought it was just a friendly thing because she kept bugging us about being workaholics who don’t ever do anything with people outside of work. And since we were already at the café there was no reason for us not to hangout.”

“Okay, that works,” Jessica focuses for a moment, “but how did we go from that to a relationship?”

“I think I’m just what you needed to get you out of your boring routine” Tiffany chuckles at Jessica’s incredule expression, “Okay, maybe… something about you made me think I had to make you mine.” 

“Isn’t that a bit much?”

“I think it’s the most natural reaction a person could have to being on a date with you,” Her voice is softer now, “I’m lucky to be with you, even considering the nature of all of this.”

Jessica doesn’t know how to respond to that, so she opts to change the subject, “We should go inside, it’s too cold to be out here,” luckily Tiffany doesn’t protest and follows her back to the living room.

“We still need to go over possible questions,” She says once they’re both on the couch, back to eating candy, “I don’t want you to panic in front of your parents if they ask something about our relationship.”

“What could they ask?”

Tiffany shrugs with a mouth full of sour candy, after swallowing she replies, “We are talking about your family, you’re the one who should know what they’ll ask.”

“Probably how we met and how long we’ve been dating I guess.”

“We have that covered already,” She offers the bag of candy to Jessica, “What else?”

“I don’t know,” She plays with the candy on her hand, “I don’t have experience with taking people to meet my family.”

“They might be curious about how we actually got together,” Turning to Jessica she continues, “What made you decide to agree to being my girlfriend?”

“What? You know that I didn’t want to pretend to be dating.”

“I mean… what made you agree in the version we’re telling your family?”

“Oh,” She nods in understanding, “we have a lot in common I guess, and you are pretty, and fun to be around… and… why are you looking at me like this?”

“You think I’m pretty.”

“Yeah… who wouldn’t?”

“Lots of people?” She smiles, but it is clearly fake.

“I have no idea what they’re thinking,” Jessica’s face turns serious, “You are beautiful, Tiffany. Doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks.”

She barely finishes her sentence before Tiffany engulfs her in a hug. Jessica had never thought that this would be something she would be insecure about. Seeing this new side of her, vulnerable and in need of reassurance, she does her best to comfort the other by gently caressing her back. 

“Can cuddling become a regular thing?” Tiffany’s voice sounds muffled with her face snuggled against Jessica’s shoulder.

She chuckles, finding the question adorable, “You want to cuddle me more often?” She feels Tiffany nod, “You’re too cute.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“Okay, this can be a regular thing.”

Hearing that Tiffany clings even more to Jessica’s side. They fall into a comfortable silence for a few minutes, just enjoying each other’s warmth on a cold December afternoon while Barbie and the Secret Door plays in the background . 

“I wasn’t lying you know?”

“Hm?” 

“When I answered your question, I...” Jessica stops to organize her thoughts in a way that makes sense, “I really think you are beautiful. I thought that since before we met ‘cause I’ve seen pictures, but when I first saw you in person it was just… wow.”

“So you wanted to have a beautiful girlfriend to show off to your family?” 

“It is a nice bonus,” She teases back, “but we also have things in common and from the start I felt like you’re a person I’d like to have around.”

“Thanks, Jess,” She gives her a peck on the cheek, “you’re a good friend.”

The remainder of the afternoon was spent like that, comfortably in each others’ arms while watching random things on Netflix. As the night approached Tiffany decided to go home, leaving Jessica home alone as she is most of the time. Only this time, she felt lonely.

Over the next few days they finished coming up with answers to any questions they could think someone would possibly ask. Tonight is the ultimate trial, they’re going to have dinner with Chaelin. Chaelin promised to act like the most nosy person to have ever walked this Earth and ask every detail about their relationship.

Jessica offered to pick Tiffany up so they could go together, at the moment she is sitting in her car at the parking lot of Tiffany’s job. She doesn’t know what to expect from tonight, which makes her anxiety a lot worse. It really doesn’t help that Tiffany is taking so long, she really doesn’t want to be alone with her own thoughts right now. 

What if Chaelin says they are not convincing enough as a couple? Or something even worse. What if she embarasses Jessica? A light knock on the window gets her out of those anxious thoughts. When Tiffany enters the car Jessica can’t even have thoughts anymore, anxious or not. 

“Jess?” She looks at her concerned, “You okay?”

“You… your hair…”

“Did you like it?” Tiffany runs her hand through her platinum blonde hair, “I felt like trying something new.”

“You’re blonde… like… really blonde.”

“You didn’t like it.” Her smile disappears.

“No, it’s not that,” Jessica shakes both her hands nervously, “I just wasn’t expecting it, but of course I like it,” she sighs and gently places her hand on Tiffany’s arm, “it suits you. You look stunning.”

Tiffany smiles at her, “I was a little worried, it’s the first time I do something this bold with my hair,” she places her hand on top of Jessica’s, “you scared me for a second.”

“As long as you like how you look doesn’t matter what other people think.”

“I know, but it’s hard,” She squeezes her hand, “it helps when I have someone to say something nice.”

“I’ll gladly be this person.” She smiles at Tiffany, finding her adorable, “We should go now, before Chaelin gets mad at us.”

Their dinner started out nicely. Chaelin was at her best behaviour, barely any teasing, just asking questions about their relationship. Overall, a pleasant time between friends.  Things changed when Tiffany excused herself to go to the bathroom.

“You should check your nose,” She chuckles seeing Jessica’s confused expression, “you know, in case it starts bleeding.”

“Bleeding?”

“Yeah, from all the staring you’re doing.”

“I’m not staring at anything.” She still doesn’t get what Chaelin is talking about.

“You’ve been staring at Tiffany since you got here, Jess,” She looks towards the direction of the bathroom to make sure Tiffany isn’t coming back, “It’s like in cartoons when a ert sees a pretty woman and their nose starts to bleed.”

“Stop it, I’m not doing that,” She can’t avoid blushing at the comment, “you’re such an arsehole.”

“I might be an arsehole, but that doesn’t mean I’m wrong,” She says as Tiffany walks back into the living room, “I know I’ve said before, but you look amazing with the new hair. Doesn’t she, Jess?”

Jessica is about to say something to Chaelin for annoying her, but she remembers how insecure Tiffany was before. Giving her full attention to Tiffany she replies, “You look stunning no matter what.” This gets her one of Tiffany’s signature eye smiles.

“This is too gay even for me,” Chaelin interrupts their moment looking almost offended, “and I read fanfiction. You guys passed the test, very convincing couple.”