The time in LA went by very, very slowly for Jungkook. Every time he facetimed Chaeyoung he realized how much he missed her. They talked almost every day (or was it night? The crazy time difference between LA and Seoul got him all confused), for at least an hour. One time, Jungkook nearly shared with the world that he and Chaeyoung were facetiming. He’d entered Jimin’s hotel room unaware that Jimin was doing a live at that very second, he’d turned his phone around in order for Chaeyoung to say hi to Jimin. The eldest BTS member was fast enough to block Jungkook’s phone, but the next day fan theories about rosekook flooded the internet. Both of them had been slightly reprehended by their managers. Neither of them cared, they laughed about it for almost one hour straight.

“I can’t believe you did that!”, Chaeyoung laughed melodically through the screen.

“Did what?!”, Jungkook playfully asked, he knew what she was referring to, but he just loved hearing her voice.

“You know… Barge into Jimin’s room! While facetiming me of all times!”, Chaeyoung answered him exasperatedly, she was half-mocking, half-worried of Jungkook’s apparent lack of concern over people finding out they were hanging out/talking/dating?/facetiming everyday/she didn’t know what they were.

“Chae, Jimin is one of my best friends. I barge into his room all the time.” Jungkook answered, then continued on slurping his noodles.

“I know but…you have to be careful. My manager unnie is onto me, she suspects something is up”, Chae said as she played with her food. They were both eating different foods, in different rooms, and in different continents: he was eating ramen, she was eating pasta; he was in a white, lavishly designed hotel room, she was in her blackpink dorm room.

Jungkook left his noodles for a while and pondered Chaeyoung’s words. Something is up. What does she mean about something is up? We are clearly dating, that is what is up. Did she not know they were dating? Was he the only one who thought that way?

“And what is up, Chae?”, Jungkook took a chance and decided that he wanted to hear her say it, he wanted to hear her say the words “dating” and his name in the same sentence pronounced by that beautiful voice that could melt an iceberg.

“What do you mean?”, she answered, clearly not following.

“You said your manager might suspect something is up”, Jungkook began.

“Yes…”, Chaeyoung followed.

“I’m asking you, what is up?”, Jungkook finished, he was now crossing his arms, his relaxed stance from before changed. He was not angry, but he was serious. Man, was he the only one that believed they started dating? Was that almost kiss that she started not an indicator that they were something more?

“I… I…” Chaeyoung started to mumble. She was not ready to show her real feelings. She thought they were dating, but the fear of her loving him more than he loved her was just too much. It was not that Jungkook did something to make her feel this irrational fear and doubt, if anything he did quite the opposite. And yet the fear remained. She had a long, long history of loving more and receiving less that this reaction was natural for her. She felt guilty for feeling this way because frankly Jungkook was certainty and love and there she was feeling uncertain and unloved when she literally had no grounds to make that assertion. She wanted to cry.

“I… I gotta go, Jisoo unnie is calling me.” Chaeyoung ended the call.

Jungkook looked at the screen, the connection ending, and his face in the mirror in front of him. He didn’t even get to say goodbye, he didn’t even get to show her his new rose tattoo behind his ear. Had he pushed too far? Was he really asking for too much? The connection and attraction were there. She even kissed him on the cheek, he could still feel the way his body fitted her curves so, so nicely.

Amidst the dawn of a breakdown, Jungkook took a deep breath.

“I’ll show her what is up”, he said to himself then he started dialing away on his phone. Concocting a new plan to show Chae that whatever they had going on, it was worth it.

He ho