“Early bird once again.”

Jihye smiles at her stylist and greets everyone in the make-up and dressing room. “Good Morning to you too, unnie.” she places her bag and purse on the empty section of the long vanity table. “I got everyone coffees by the way. A little caffeine to start the day.”

She starts handing her staff their share, bowing whilst telling them another good morning and please take care of me today again, unnies before she heads back to the table and sits on her chair.

“You’re 30 minutes ahead of your call time today, you woke up early again huh?” Dami says while loosening her hair strands, eyes looking at their reflections through the mirror.

“Yeah, I slept too early last night too so there’s that.”

“I see. Eunbee will be here shortly.” Dami grabs a hairbrush before she continues. “See? You’re even earlier than your makeup artist.”

Jihye just shyly chuckles and sips from her drink while scrolling through her social media account.

Not long after, Eunbee finally arrived and starts working on her face. She has a photoshoot for a brand of hair products that recently selected her as their brand muse and it will be featured in a magazine. As she watches a random movie on Netflix she saw on her recommended, her Instagram notification pops out and it says:

leejung_lee has started a live video. Watch it before it ends!

With a slight raise of an eyebrow, she pauses what she was watching and quickly clicks the pop-out notification that directs her straight to Leejung’s live video. Curious about the noise, Dami slightly leans in and peeks — Eunbee just finished her makeup and went out for a quick break so it’s just Jihye and Dami in the vanity area.

“Leejung? Where is she going?”

Jihye bites the tip of her straw, biting a smile from creeping out of her face after seeing Leejung’s sudden smile while probably reading comments. “Meeting some of her friends.” Jihye replies.

There’s always something about Leejung’s smile that would automatically make someone mirror it too. Jihye may have seen that all the time but she would still be held captive. She’s not complaining either, never will she.

“I see.” Dami looks at her work one last time before she says. “What a lovesick puppy.”

Jihye looks at Dami through the reflection with a playful glare. “Let me be, unnie!”

Dami laughs. “Is what I am about to do. You’ll be called shortly so just be ready.”

She looks at her phone screen again before she replies. “Got it. Thank you, unnie.”

Not wanting to be called out by anyone other than Dami, she grabs her earphones and connects them to her phone. She knows Leejung is going to have lunch with her friends and will be attending a girl group concert by the night but the Instagram live came out of nowhere. Don’t get her wrong, it’s not like their relationship would always require them to report what they would do or want to do but she’d appreciate a heads up just so she could wait and watch it from the very start.

Oh, how lovesick can someone be, Jihye is for sure slowly turning into another lost case.

“Baddie in a good way. Yeah, that’s me.”

She had no idea why she feels her cheeks burning, could be because of the way Leejung said it, or could be the smirk after that, or could be just of Leejung, or.. all of the above.

There’s always something about the confidence that Leejung always wears that attracts Jihye every single damn time. Leejung could just sit still, do basically nothing, and Jihye will still find that attractive.

See? A whipped lovesick puppy.

She wasn’t really paying too much attention to the comments as she’s already having all her fun and satisfaction just by listening to Leejung who’s asking her viewers if they had good Christmas or had they eaten well until a familiar username starts popping in and out of the comments feed.

Jihye swipes her screen down to see the previous comments and instantly regrets it when she sees the first comment of the user followed by another two.

“My wife.”

“Leejung’s been mine for a while now, everyone else bye.”

“LEEJUNG IS MINE. You can fight me.”

And Jihye knows Leejung had read all of those just by the way she’s smiling, the timing of every comment is in sync with her wide smiles, and how her eyes are moving. Jihye’s detective work has pieced two and two together and she’s slowly getting so irritated.

Making things even worse, Leejung really has the audacity to read one of her comments out loud, “Leejung yeobo, mine. Everyone stop.”

And comments keep coming, Jihye has no idea how hard she’s gripping her phone, the end of her straw has been torn apart at how hard she’s biting it, the cup sleeve of her drink is now soaked with the sweat from her palm — that’s how irritated and annoyed she is.

“Annie’s ideal type is actually Leejung.”

“You can no longer get married. Everyone, she’s already married to me.”

“Leejung, you’re already married to me.”

She’s still very fully aware that Leejung is talking about Spider-man but the smile that the younger is having while obviously reading Annie’s comments really stirred off the remaining calmness out of her. She grabs her personal phone, opens a messaging app, and immediately messages the culprit of her irritation.

“Seems like you’re having too much fun being claimed like that, huh?” 

She doesn’t even wait for it to be delivered before she turns that phone to silent. She then heard the messaging app’s default ringtone notifying Leejung about a new message in the live. It’s the KakaoTalk ringtone.

She knows Leejung would only be able to read it once the live is done but she doesn’t care, she needs her to know she’s not pleased.

“Leejung, don’t Merry Christmas. Marry me. Oh, that’s a good one.”

Jihye shuts her eyes, takes a deep breath before slowly sighing. Why are you such a flirt? Why? Why? Jihye, relax. Relax.

When she opens her eyes, she tries not to think of anything but just Leejung being interactive with her fans. It’s the only way for her to calm her raging emotions and her mind that is already running at a high speed.

She feels a pat on her right shoulder which effectively bursts her bubble. She pulls her earphones out and looks at Dami’s reflection in the mirror. “Is it my turn?”

“Shortly but are you okay? You seemed.. off.”

“I am fine. Just trying to hear what Leejung’s saying.”

Dami stares at her for a few seconds before she hums. “Okay, the director will call you in probably 3 minutes. Be ready.”

She hums and forces a smile. “Thanks, unnie.”

She watches Dami getting back to where she was earlier before she stares at her phone again.

“Guys, if you have any suggestions of what I should wat