Her phone chimed, breaking the silence of the room.

Wendy took a peek at the clock at the corner of her screen. It was a quarter to one. She hummed to herself. Irene was late today. She wondered if she had gotten caught up with studying. It wasn’t surprising since her messages usually came at odd hours.

Wendy swiped the screen to see a message notification from Irene, asking if she was free.

Wendy felt a smile grow on her face without her permission. They had established a code of sorts lately, with the amount of messages they were exchanging. Whenever Irene messaged “Seulgi” to ask if she was free, it was an invitation to talk about random things. Wendy wasn't an expert on reading Irene but that usually meant she needed a distraction, something that she was happy to provide.

She typed ‘yes’ without hesitation. Seulgi and her were dating so she didn’t have to pretend to play hard to get anymore.

‘Have you ever wondered what is between 1 and 3?’

‘Knowing you, this sounds like a trick question. I want to say 2, but I think it’s wrong.’

‘How are you so sure it’s wrong?’ She teased, imagining Irene huffing at her screen, as she always did when she encountered an issue.

‘Gut feeling. And you.’ The way Irene seemed so sure of her made her laugh.

Wendy had to admit, she enjoyed proving the older girl wrong. Especially once she realised that while Irene acted annoyed, she was also fascinated at being challenged.

‘Well, 2 is in the range of answers so you’re not completely wrong. However, the correct answer should be infinity.’

‘Okay, I’ll bite.’ Wendy could picture Irene’s amused smile behind the message. ‘Why is it infinity? There’s a limit of 1 and 3. How can anything be infinite when there is a finite range of numbers?’

‘Well, between 0 and 1, there’s 0.1 and 0.2 and so forth. However, between 0 and 0.1, there’s 0.01 and even 0.01. It just depends on how small you want the denominations to be.’ Wendy typed. ‘Finite things are sort of social constructs if you think about it. We only see whole numbers even though there is an infinite amount of possible combinations that would still get rounded up to the same whole number. For example, 1.0152972 and 1.020001 are essentially the same if you round off to the standard three significant figures. Yet, when you include all the decimal places, they look completely different.’

She paused briefly, wondering if this was her writing as Seulgi or as Seungwan. It was a difficult question to answer.

Nowadays, as Irene and her met up more often, she had to remind herself not to get too carried away when she texted or spoke with her. There were times when the older girl would glance at her when she thought Wendy wasn't looking. She didn’t know what to make of the expression on her face, but Irene was probably on the verge of getting suspicious. Ever since her minor slip up, Wendy had cautioned Seulgi about it, coupled with showing her their messages so that she had some context instead of getting caught off guard. Whether she actually went through and read the screenshots, is another matter completely.

‘So, if you imagine the possibilities just between 0 and 0.1, there is an infinite amount of numbers that could fill the space between those numbers.’

‘I can honestly say I have never thought of that.’

‘Now you have.’ She wrote. ‘Do you know what else is a human construct?’

‘What?’

‘Time.’

‘So, are you saying that time travel is possible?’

She grinned. ‘I don't think it’s impossible, but maybe some secrets of the universe shouldn't be discovered and manipulated.’

‘If you could time travel, where would you go?’

Wendy hovered over the keyboard. She wanted to ask Seulgi for her answer but the other girl was sleeping. It was usually the case whenever Irene messaged at night. It wasn't an issue because Seulgi trusted her to handle the messages. Yet, Wendy was starting to believe it might not have been such a good idea.

In a way, it was more dangerous because there were moments where she caught herself forgetting that she was supposed to be acting as Seulgi. There were even moments where she had gotten too comfortable and nearly called Irene “Joohyun-unnie” as a reflex when they were face to face.

‘Did you fall asleep?’ Irene messaged. ‘It’s okay if you did, I’m getting sleepy too.’

‘No, I’m thinking.’ Wendy typed quickly. Some part of her didn't want the conversation to end, but she wanted Irene to get enough sleep too. She didn't give herself time to hesitate as she sent her answer across.

‘I would go back to the first day we met.’

‘Why?’

‘So I can fall for you all over again.’ Wendy cringed at her own response.

There was a distinct pause before Irene replied, which made Wendy fear that she might have done something wrong. ‘How are you so sure that you would like me again?’

‘I’m pretty sure that even if we were living in alternate timelines, or as alternate versions of ourselves, every version of me would fall for any version of you, Joohyun-unnie.’

‘You’re something else, Kang Seulgi.’

‘So are you, Bae Joohyun.’

‘I’m more sleepy than anything else right now, so I’m going to bed. Thanks for talking to me.’ She sent a sticker of a rabbit waving.

‘Sleep well, unnie.’

Wendy closed the chat and flung herself on the bed. She could feel her heart hammering against her chest as she willed her heart rate to slow down.

It was unfair. All Irene had to do was send her a sticker and her heart would be soaring over the clouds. The situation was really becoming inconvenient. At this point, she was having serious doubts about how long she could keep up the façade and not fall in love with her.

~~

“Wannie, be careful!”

Wendy narrowly ducked as the ball nearly missed her head.

“Sorry!” Came the apologetic response as the short haired girl went to retrieve the ball, which had bounced to the end of the court.

“Okay, let’s do this again.” Wendy gripped the ball. She had researched this exercise online but she hadn’t actually tried it out for herself. However, within the first few seconds of trying it out, she was starting to have serious doubts on its effectiveness.

The taller girl shifted into position, arms raised in front of her. “I’m ready.”

“Remember, the goal is to keep the conversation going,” Wendy reminded her, “and to get you used to speaking to Irene normally so you can start taking over the messages without her thinking that you’re a weirdo.”

“Got it.” Seulgi replied instantly, before she blinked and processed the exact words she had heard. “Hey!”

“It was a joke.” She chuckled. “But now that you’re paying attention, we can begin.”

The other girl nodded in concentration.

“Okay, now, pretend I’m Irene.” Wendy bounced the ball on the floor once in her direction.

“Hello Seulgi, how was class today?”

Seulgi caught the ball and giggled. “Joohyun-unnie wouldn’t say that.”

The other girl bounced the ball back to her. Wendy rolled her eyes. “Seul, come on. The idea is to keep the conversation going. I’m not exactly going for accuracy here.”

“Right, okay, sorry.” Seulgi acquiesced. “No bouncing the ball without continuing the conversation.”

“Let’s try this again. Think of me as Irene, and try to think about what you want to tell her.” The ball bounced on the floor and flew towards Seulgi, who caught it with ease. “What do you like to do in your free time?”

“Dance.” Then, the ball came flying back to Wendy, who barely caught the ball this time. She held the ball in her hands and gave her a pointed look.

“What? I answered the question.”

“Irene knows you like dancing. She’s in your dance troupe.” Wendy stated. This was going to be harder than she thought. She didn’t understand why the other girl was like this. Seulgi had a number of friends and most people found her easy to talk to. It didn’t make sense that when it came to Irene, all her social skills were reduced to nothing. “What about other things?”

Seulgi thought about it, and her eyes lit up. “Food.”

Wendy gave her a wry smile. “Okay, we can work with that. Where did you grow up?”

“My family’s from Ansan.”

Bounce. Catch. Bounce.

“So…… How did you end up moving here?”

Bounce. Miss.

“I don’t really need the practice.” Wendy supplied.

“Oh…” Seulgi trailed off. “It just seems like a pretty short conversation if it’s just one-way…”

Wendy caught the ball and paused. She had a point.

“I was born in Seoul. My sister went to study in Canada and I followed her for a while. It got too expensive to live in Seoul and since unnie wanted to stay overseas, my parents decided to move here to settle down.”

“But you don't really like it here, do you?” The taller girl held the ball in her hands for a few seconds too long. “You seem… I don’t know the right way to say this, but you’re too smart to be in a place like this.”

Wendy shrugged. She wasn't very comfortable with where the conversation was headed. “It’s alright. What matters is that I can get a job and support my parents.”

She caught the ball and changed the topic.

“What are your plans for the holidays?”

A hum. “I don't really have plans… Spend time with friends and family, I guess? Maybe choreograph a few dance projects while I’m at it. I’ve been thinking about whether I should increase my portfolio and maybe pursue dancing as a career in future. It’s a bit of a stretch, and my parents would probably not support me, but I want to see how far I can go. What about you?”

The casual response startled her out of her concentration. This time, the ball came into contact Wendy’s leg when she tried to catch it. It bounced off innocently to the side, causing Seulgi to snicker as the other girl ran after it.

Wendy was panting when she returned to the lanky brunette. She definitely needed to exercise more if she wanted to be a dancer’s best friend.

“Okay, that’s good Seul.” She acknowledged. It was way better than the previous attempts. “What changed suddenly?”

Seulgi blinked, as though she had just realised something. “Oh, I forgot to imagine you as Irene-unnie.”

In that moment, Wendy mentally berated herself for not realising what had been wrong with her approach. It made more sense for Seulgi to relax first, instead of forcing her subconscious to get used to someone who made her nervous.

“Do you think I’ll be able to speak to her normally?” Seulgi asked.

“I think so. Now that we seem to have found a method that works, you can try that next time.” Wendy encouraged, injecting more confidence into her tone. “Things will get better.”

The taller girl gave her a smile that reached her eyes before she clapped her hands gleefully.

“Great! Oh, as a side note, we may have to work on your passes. It’s a miracle you survived physical education lessons.”

Wendy flung the ball with such force that it whizzed by Seulgi’s ear.

“Hey! That’s foul play, you didn’t continue the conversation Seungwan!” Seulgi called out as she chased after the ball.

Already having difficulties stifling her grin, Wendy allowed her laughter to break loose the moment the other girl’s back was turned.

It was only after both girls were red in the face from chasing one another on the court that they decided to call a truce. They retired to the benches where they left their belongings for a short break.

“Seungwan-ah, what do you think love is?”

Wendy took a sip of water. After spending hours writing an essay about it, she was really beginning to dislike this question. She wasn’t going to pour out her essay to the poor girl, so she summarised her answer as best as she could.

“That’s a complicated question with an even more complicated answer.”

“Well it’s definitely more complicated than I realised.” Seulgi’s legs were pulled up to her chest, her arms wrapped around them.

“I think everyone has their own conception of love.” She rotated her body to face the other girl. “Take yourself as an example; why do you love Irene?”

She had asked Seulgi a similar question when they first met, so she didn’t expect the other girl to take such a long time to think about her answer.

“Unnie...” she began hesitantly, “she’s kind and patient with me even though I have a lot of things to improve on.”

Wendy was about to make a comment