---

"How I make you love me?

How do I make you fall for me?

How do I make you want me

And it make it last eternally?"

---

 

It isn’t Joohyun’s beauty that captivates Seulgi the way she does, although Seulgi knows she would be poorly positioned to dismiss that as a factor. It isn’t her smile, or the way she always comes into work in the morning with her hair down her back and then somehow by the end of each day it’s done up in a neat little bun with a single hair that falls down the nape of her neck so maddeningly. It isn’t her smile, slightly crooked and full of teeth and always immediately followed by the sweetest of laughs.

What has Seulgi so utterly hooked is just how cool Joohyun is. There’s a certain unspeakable truth about it in her mind, as if she would be unable to properly voice what that actually meant if prompted or probed. But it’s there. Something about everything Joohyun does has Seulgi enamoured. The way she arrives at the exact same minute every day, the way she always smiles to everyone before setting her bag down and grabbing a coffee and a couple creamers and blowing on it and getting to work almost immediately. Her professionalism on the phone, deftly handling a swathe of clients that argue and barter with a smile that suggests total control over the situation. Swivelling on her chair, phone to her ear, rolling a pen between her fingers with an acrobat’s gentle grace. And then she smiles at Seulgi as if to say: I know what I’m doing. I’ve got them right where I want them.

And Seulgi’s heart flutters, for reasons unknown to even her. In a psychology book she read a year or two ago on a whim there was a whole chapter about how feelings of personal attraction can cloud one’s judgement as to the true character of the object of their affection – that we tend to hide from or ignore certain flaws if the outcome thus becomes more palatable. A byproduct of this is the tendency to tolerate or even cherish one’s idiosyncrasies no matter how trivial or usual they may seem on the surface. To make them into something greater than they truly were. Love does strange and unintended things.

Seulgi also knows that Joohyun is not really the object of her affection. That would require her to have shown any sort of affection at all, instead of a silent, distant sort of teenage infatuation that is probably all too immature for a twenty-seven-year-old woman to be feeling. And yet it remains, small and occasional, but still there – a quick peek at the cubicle next to her when Joohyun is sat at her desk, a smile across the space of the office when they’re fetching coffee or coming back from a client meeting. The odd conversation about the weather or the news or whatever else. Anything Seulgi can get she takes with great enthusiasm.

It’s a Thursday afternoon that Seulgi works up the courage to ask Joohyun something that isn’t related to how cold it is outside. Instead, all she manages is: ‘It’s cold in here.’

‘Sorry?’ Joohyun says, not looking up from a stack of paperwork on her desk.

‘I just said…uh, never mind. Nothing.’

‘Did you ask for something?’

Joohyun looks up from her paperwork and turns to her. She’s so beautiful Seulgi has to swallow to stop from stuttering. The dark of her hair in a neat bun, the pale of her skin, her perfect features. ‘Oh,’ Seulgi said, ‘not really. Nothing. Just said it’s…cold. In here.’

‘Want me to turn the aircon down?’

‘Oh. No. It’s okay.’

Joohyun shrugs and smiles and goes back to her work. Seulgi tries to do the same. People come and go. Clients ring, phones hum in monotone signals around the office. They’re on the eighth floor and the enormous windows at the far side of the room give way to a copper dusk that burns at its hottest core somewhere across the horizon. The clocks hit 5:30 in the evening and Seulgi packs away and turns to Joohyun and clears and says, ‘Do you wanna go for a drink or something?’

‘What?’

‘Uh, a drink.’

‘Oh, I’m busy tonight,’ Joohyun says. ‘Got a bunch of stuff to do. Sorry. Tomorrow, though?’

‘Oh,’ Seulgi says, and pauses. ‘I’m busy too.’

‘Right.’

It’s a lie. Seulgi doesn’t know why she lied, only that she did. As if the courage to merely be around Joohyun is a mountain she has yet to fully scale. Joohyun sits and watches her for a moment, deftly rolling a biro pen between her fingers with a pianist’s sort of dexterity. ‘How about next Monday?’ she says.

‘Monday I can do,’ Seulgi says too quickly, almost tripping over the words. Joohyun smiles and says okay and Seulgi watches her roll the pen between her fingers for far too long. Everything she does is cool. There’s an effortlessness to Joohyun that is deeply intoxicating and Seulgi’s infatuation is such that she can’t quite look away, even when she probably should.

‘Where did you want to go?’ Joohyun asks.

‘Sorry?’

‘For drinks, I mean. Anywhere you were thinking of?’

‘Oh, no,’ Seulgi says, smiling awkwardly. ‘Anywhere’s fine. I can do anywhere. You can decide, I mean. I mean, I’m not good. At deciding, I mean. Not good at deciding.’

Joohyun laughs. ‘Okay,’ she says. ‘I’m sure we can find somewhere. I like your hair today, by the way.’

‘Thanks,’ Seulgi says, leaning down to clear away her stacks of documents and highlighters and classified client information. And in her head, she makes a quick mental note to always do her hair like this going forward. Just in case.

 

 

The weekend comes and goes without event, as it usually does for Seulgi. Monday arrives and she’s done her hair in the same ponytail she had on Thursday and Friday and this time she hopes Joohyun says something, or at least notices and smiles, or does something, or anything at all.

She’s in ten minutes early, when the office is still quiet. A quiet murmur of people in the breakroom and printers buzzing and the low and steady rumble of a kettle boiling. Joohyun arrives five minutes later, always at the same time every day, five minutes before nine in the morning, always with a coffeecup steaming gently in her right hand. She smiles at Seulgi across the room and Seulgi smiles back and brushes a stray hair gently away from her face and waits for Joohyun to get closer before saying, ‘Morning.’

‘Morning. I like your hair today.’

‘Thanks,’ Seulgi says with a smile. ‘You too.’

‘Thanks.’

The rest of the day goes by quietly. It’s a busy day, where clients call every ten minutes and Seulgi’s called into her supervisor’s office no less than three times and the chatter of a day’s work in construction management is as general as it’s ever been. On her break she grabs a coffee from the breakroom and sits at the table and drinks it quietly. She’s halfway through when Joohyun sits across from her with a tiny smile on her face and says, ‘Mind if I join you?’

‘Oh. No, not all.’

Seulgi motions for her to make herself feel at home. It takes a long time for her to speak. For either of them to. Glancing at each other across the table intermittently, coffee in hand slowly going cold. Seulgi glances about and then leans forward a slight – perhaps a slight too much – and says: ‘Where are we going tonight?’

A pause. Joohyun sips her coffee silently, then says, ‘I don’t know. Anywhere. Where do you want to go?’

‘I don’t know. I don’t really drink.’

‘Why did you ask if I wanted to go for drinks, then?’

‘Don’t know,’ Seulgi replies with a shy shrug. ‘It’s just something you say, isn’t it? I meant, like…coffee or something.’

‘Just something you say,’ Joohyun repeats, clearly amused, watching Seulgi across the table. She finishes the last of her coffee, almost in a hurry, and says, ‘Well, coffee it is, then. How does seven tonight sound?’

‘Seven’s fine.’

‘Great. I should get back to work.’

‘Me too,’ Seulgi says. Joohyun nods, a sort of awkward acknowledgement that they’re not really going their separate ways or anything – their cubicles are next to each other. She puts her cup in the sink and disappears into the main room again and all Seulgi can do is smile dumbly and finish the last of her drink and think: Coffee sounds good. Anything sounds good.

 

 

Work runs past in a haze, time evaporating. Seven PM comes and she’s already ten minutes away from the bus stop and waiting for Joohyun not far from their offices and the night is bitterly cold and ringed in shoplight illuminations like a carnival. It smells of the cold and of the rain yet to come. She stuffs her hands in her pockets and waits on the street corner idly. Joohyun arrives at exactly seven PM, as punctual as ever. She’s wearing a thick black wool coat and gorgeous pearlescent earrings and she smells faintly – and strangely – of oranges, of citrus.

‘Hey,’ Seulgi says.

‘Evening.’

For a moment they just stand there, as if unsure of how to properly proceed. Then Joohyun gives a little shrug and nods in the direction of nothing in particular and says, ‘Coffee?’

‘Sure.’

The café they find doubles as a little late-night jazz bar. There are a handful of patrons at the bar and it smells of whiskey and of coffeebeans and faintly of cream liqueur. They sit by the window, canopied in the darkness of it, a thin bend of moonlight somewhere above the greater part of the city proper. The coffee tastes good. Joohyun looks better. Seulgi is loathe to think it but there’s not much else she can think.

Thinking to herself: I can’t get it out of my head.

‘This is nice,’ Joohyun says with a small smile.

‘Yeah.’

‘I don’t usually go out with people from work. I think the last time was this function thing we had, like, fifteen or sixteen months ago. Before you joined the company.’

Seulgi nods absently.

‘It was cool. Was fun. I don’t know why we don’t do it more often. Guess people just got bored of organising things. Can’t blame them.’

‘You seem very organised.’

‘What?’

‘I mean, just in general. You seem quite an organised person.’

‘Oh,’ Joohyun says, sipping her coffee. ‘I guess so. I like being punctual. I think it’s just a habit of mine, for better or for worse.’

‘It’s a good habit to have.’

‘Sure.’

Silence again. Seulgi picks up her coffee cup and holds it to and winces at the heat radiating off of it and sets it down neatly again on the table. There’s so much she wants to say or ask and nothing that comes out. Seulgi has never been one for small talk, or for conversation in general, with anyone. Even something as plain and simple as a text to a friend can take a Herculean effort when in the wrong mindset and Seulgi knows this and knows it all too well. So eventually she says, ‘What about you?’

‘What about me?’ Joohyun asks.

‘Just, like, in general. What about you?’

At that Joohyun has to laugh. It’s a low and throaty laugh and Seulgi wishes for all the world she could bottle it up and keep it in her pocket with her. Then Joohyun says, ‘What do you want to know?’

‘I don’t know. Anything.’

‘Well, I don’t know where to start.’

Seulgi is silent. Situations like these come rarely and she’s not quite sure what to say to advance the conversation in a manner that won’t feel awkward to her or to Joohyun or to both of them. So she just sits and sips her coffee. It smells of bacon and vaguely of sandwiches somewhere behind the bar and there’s a strangeness to that because this place doesn’t serve food at all. Joohyun studies her silently across the table. Her face is unreadable and it makes Seulgi uncomfortable, as if she’s being judged. Does Joohyun like her? Is she fed up with Seulgi already? The inability to gleam much of anything from her has Seulgi shifting in her seat.

‘You don’t talk much,’ Joohyun says, bemused.

‘What?’

‘You’re quite quiet.’

‘I’m not very good at small talk.’

‘Is this small talk?’

‘I don’t know,’ Seulgi says. ‘I guess so. I’m not very good at talking to people in general.’

‘Why did you pick a job where you have to talk to people every day then?’

At that Seulgi has to laugh. She thinks about it for a moment with more severity than she has in years. The answer she settles on is, ‘Because I did business management at university and this was the only job I could get, I guess.’

‘I see,’ Joohyun says, and sips her coffee. Then: ‘It’s a good thing I’m not your employer, isn’t it?’

‘Why?’

‘You’re not great at selling yourself.’

Seulgi laughs awkwardly. ‘Guess not,’ she says. ‘I don’t have to speak to anyone face to face. Maybe that’s why. It’s all over the phone. Nobody has to see me if I up or anything. Makes it more…impersonal.’

‘And you’re okay with that?’

‘I prefer it.’

Joohyun doesn’t respond. She watched Seulgi over the rim of her cup again, a faint glint in her eye that makes Seulgi feel small. Then she sets the coffeecup down and says, ‘I feel that.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Kind of. Sometimes I feel the same. But it is what it is.’

‘Yeah.’

‘Coffee’s good.’

Seulgi hums in agreement and drinks. The coffee is already going cold and she winces at the taste and sets her cup down again. Joohyun’s studying her across the table. As if she might be wondering what to say next in the same way Seulgi is. Eventually she says softly, ‘What’s your favourite colour?’

‘What?’

‘Your favourite colour.’

Seulgi laughs, then thinks about it, then says, after pondering: ‘Orange.’

‘Good choice. Good colour.’

‘What about you?’

‘Pink.’

‘Why did you ask that?’

‘Don’t know,’ Joohyun says. ‘Because I’m bad at small talk too.’

Seulgi laughs. She doesn’t know why, but she laughs. There’s something about Joohyun that sets her at ease and she isn’t sure what it is but she wants more of it. Joohyun laughs too, a quiet hum in the back of that sounds satisfied at having amused Seulgi. They talk a while longer. Small talk turns idle – stories Joohyun tells of her family to make Seulgi laugh and Seulgi waxing nostalgic about moments in her past that she still remembers fondly, things to pass the hours. By the time they leave it’s almost midnight and the sky lies so sprent with stars it looks like Braille above the distant nightlights and there are almost no cars at all. All holds within it a beautiful sort of sentience. The world hums around them.

They walk down the end of the street with their hands in their pockets and stop and turn to each other and Seulgi smiles against the biting cold and says, ‘Let me walk you home?’

‘I live, like, fifteen miles away.’

‘Oh. Right.’

‘I mean, you’re free to walk it if you want.’

‘No thanks.’

Joohyun laughs. ‘Yeah,’ she says, ‘me neither. Gonna grab a cab.’

‘Sure thing.’

‘See you Monday?’

‘Yeah,’ Seulgi says with a smile. ‘Of course. I’m going this way anyway.’

‘Right.’

For a while Seulgi doesn’t move and Joohyun doesn’t ask her to. Doesn’t even nudge her. Instead she just smiles. The silence is good because the silence is comfortable, because nothing needs to be said, and Seulgi prefers it that way.

‘I should…you know. Ring for a cab,’ Joohyun says.

‘Yeah. Right.’

Seulgi stands with her hands in her pockets and waits. She waits all the way up until the cab pulls up at the kerb about eight minutes later and then with a faint smile she says, ‘Guess that’s your ride.’

‘Yeah.’

‘See you Monday?’

‘Of course,’ Joohyun says. And then, with a hint of a smile herself: ‘Thanks for tonight. I enjoyed it. Makes a change.’

‘Yeah. Likewise.’

 

 

In a move that is profoundly stupid and rather childish Seulgi finds herself accommodating for Joohyun more than usual. It’s a silly notion but she does it anyway. Alters herself in little ways, mostly unnatural, such that Joohyun might take more notice of her around the office. When Joohyun mentions to a co-worker that she likes the smell of lemons and Seulgi overhears it, she goes out of her way to find a perfume that smells vaguely lemony. When Joohyun mentions her love of caramel, Seulgi packs an extra packet of caramel biscuits and makes a show of offering them around. And most embarrassingly of all, when Joohyun mentions her love of ‘80s music, Seulgi invents ways to make herself more ‘80s, to become something of the past in a way that might be immediately recognisable – hours spent researching the most popular songs of the decade, casually humming them, and when Joohyun notices she says things like, ‘Oh, I just had it on my mind. Just a song I used to sing.’

‘You like that sort of music?’ Joohyun asks one quiet afternoon, devoid of clients or any sort of rush hour.

‘Yeah,’ Seulgi says at nonchalantly as possible, with a shrug.

‘You never mentioned it.’

‘You never asked.’

‘I love ‘80s music,’ Joohyun says.

‘Really?’

Joohyun nods and hums in affirmation. Seulgi already knows this because she’s heard Joohyun mention it to someone around the office before but that would be creepy to mention and so she doesn’t. She just says, ‘That’s so cool.’

Joohyun hums again and smiles and gets back to her work. The afternoon crawls by, everything at a dismal pace. The office at this hour looks rather miserable – the yellowing of the pencils, the wilting of the potted plant flowers, the tickticktick of the wall clock. Phones ring and printers buzz and Seulgi’s developing a headache. By the time she talks to Joohyun again it’s almost five in the evening and they’re ready to go. She says, with a great deal of reluctance: ‘Do you wanna do something this weekend?’

‘Like what?’

‘Like…I dunno. Anything. If you’re not busy, of course. I mean, if you are, then…’

‘I’m not busy,’ Joohyun says casually. ‘What did you have in mind?’

Seulgi shrugs. ‘I don’t know,’ she says. ‘Something fun.’

‘I think I’m too old for clubs now.’

‘Yeah. Me too. Maybe.’

‘But maybe something a bit quieter.’

‘What about a roller disco?’

Joohyun laughs, louder than Seulgi’s ever heard her laugh before, but not loud enough to disrupt the rest of the office.

‘What?’ Seulgi says.

‘A roller disco?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Do they even still have roller discos?’

‘I guess,’ Seulgi says quietly, almost a mumble. The truth is she saw one in a movie from 1983 before and it’s the first thing she could think of that has that ‘80s aesthetic to it and maybe just maybe Joohyun might love it more because of that. Is it stupid? Maybe, she thinks. But it’s worth a shot. She says: ‘I just thought about it. I think they’re cool.’

‘Have you ever been?’

‘No.’

‘Can you skate?’

‘No. Can you?’

Joohyun makes a face that says: Not really.

‘We can learn, then,’ Seulgi says. ‘Unless you wanna…you know. Do something else.’

‘I don’t mind,’ Joohyun says, smiling. ‘Roller disco it is.’

‘I’ll have to, like…find one first.’

‘Sure.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Am I sure of what?’

‘Are you sure you’re sure?’

‘Yeah,’ Joohyun says with a laugh. ‘You crack me up.’

‘What?’

‘You’re funny.’

‘Right,’ Seulgi says, blushing a slight. ‘Thanks.’

‘When do you wanna do it?’

‘Pardon?’

‘Roller disco, I mean. When do you wanna do it?’

‘Oh,’ says Seulgi. ‘I dunno. When are you free?’

‘This weekend.’

‘I can do this weekend. This weekend is fine.’

‘Do they have drinks at a roller disco? Or is it a strictly sober affair?’

‘I have no idea,’ Seulgi says. ‘Never been before.’

‘Guess we’ll find out.’

‘Yeah. Guess we will.’

 

 

The week passes slowly. Minutes seem to crawl by and then as if by cruel sorcery turn themselves back so that Seulgi has to relive them again, as if the moment will never come. She takes comfort in small things, the normality of it all, a smile always on her face. When Saturday rolls around she’s still smiling. Joohyun is parked at the kerb outside in a chalkycoloured Mazda that wouldn’t look too out of place in a Japanese anime, the engine murmuring on idle. In the early hours of the evening the sun is already setting and it burns to its rawest red corner across the western rim of the world with such staggering beauty it takes Seulgi’s breath away.

The first thing Joohyun does when she steps out of the car is lean against the door and laugh and say, ‘What are you wearing?’

‘What?’

Joohyun nods to her. ‘Those pants,’ she says. ‘Frilly bottoms? Seriously?’

‘Is it too ‘80s?’

‘Maybe a little.’

‘I thought they were back in style.’

‘You thought frills on pants were back in fashion?’

Seulgi shrugs and all Joohyun can do is laugh again.

‘I guess not,’ Seulgi says. ‘Should I go and change?’

‘No. You look good. Very retro.’

‘Thanks, I guess. Where are we going?’

‘I found a roller disco place,’ says Joohyun. ‘It’s not far.’

‘Does it serve drinks?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Should you be driving then?’

‘What?’ says Joohyun, laughing. ‘I’m not drinking now, am I? I’ll just find somewhere to park the car and pick it up tomorrow or something.’

‘What if there’s nowhere to park?’

‘Then I’ll find a place. Seulgi.’

‘What?’

Joohyun smiles warmly at her. ‘You overthink things,’ she says. ‘Just go with the flow.’

‘Sorry.’

‘It’s okay. Get in.’

The interior is plush white leather the same colour as the car and a retractable canvas roof and a dashboard of polished and renovated walnut that gleams in the thin light. A single little scented tree hangs from a string over the centre column. ‘Like it?’ says Joohyun.

‘Is this yours?’

‘Who else would it belong to?’

‘It’s not what I expected you to drive.’

‘Why? What did you expect me to drive?’

‘I dunno,’ says Seulgi sheepishly. ‘Like…an Audi or something. Or a BMW. You just give those vibes. Like, businesswoman vibes.’

Joohyun laughs again. It’s the type of laugh Seulgi is sure she wants to hear a lot more of. Without a word she starts the car and pulls away. They’re on the road five minutes before she says, sheepishly, ‘Can I turn the radio on?’

‘Sure.’

She thumbs idly through the radio stations, some the news and some commercials and a handful playing ballads or bubblegum pop or trot music. The one she settles on has Joohyun grinning from ear to ear. It’s a litany of classics drenched in ‘80s synths – I Ran and Out of Touch and Thriller and Blinding Lights and so many others.

‘What station is this?’ says Joohyun.

‘103.5 Dawn FM.’

‘Never heard it before.’

‘It’s pretty good.’

Seulgi can only agree. The ride in the car is only about ten minutes or so, right into the heart of Seoul. Here in the waning light the facades of streetfacing buildings glint like paperwrapped buildings and the streetlights are already on and it takes Joohyun a long time to find somewhere to park the car and walk back to where they’re going. From the outside the roller disco looks like any other club, as nondescript as possible. An illuminated pink image of a pair of rollerskates hangs above the door and inside the room is immediately enormous, a long slanted ramp down into an area that looks almost like a bowling alley, a reception desk and bar on the left side and a wide gymnasium floor on the right and an actual, real disco ball hanging above.

‘Is that—’

‘A real disco ball,’ says Joohyun. ‘Wow. Shall we?’

Seulgi smiles. The receptionist on the left of the room is almost too friendly in welcoming them and asking what they want and handing them two pairs of red rollerskates and taking their money. It takes Seulgi a while to accustom herself to the skates. She almost slips and has to hold onto Joohyun’s arm and Joohyun starts laughing to herself. ‘You okay there?’ she says. Seulgi nods with a smile. There’s barely anyone on the dancefloor and it’s better that way. The music blaring through the speakers is perfectly ‘80s and Joohyun is a great mover, an expert in her bright red skates. Seulgi smiled at her again. She is so beautiful it makes Seulgi’s heart swell. The wash of the disco light in glittering strobes and she and Joohyun drenched in neon and laughing and for a while the world without ceases to exist. It’s just her and Joohyun, forever. Moments like these she will come to remember as important. Memories fostered in times of solitary beauty, sequestered away from all their worries and work and troubles and whatever else. With Joohyun she can be herself, grinning dumbly to herself as she struggles to skate about with any sort of dexterity. They dance and dance. The disco ball shines on, a great beauty to it. The neon burning like garnet. She understands now with great clarity that Joohyun is the woman she loves. That there exists between them a spark, in its infancy, slowly smouldering. Later she’ll remember the moon outside as they leave, a great globular skull swaged into the wayward cloudbanks and purpled by the night and bitterly cold. And they’re still smiling dumbly at each other, four or five cocktails down and flushed red and fighting back the windchill.

For a while she just stands there outside, staring at Joohyun. Joohyun does the same in kind. The silence, for the first time in years, is comfortable. Times like this Seulgi’s tongue trips over itself, the words lost at the back of , the anxiety swelling in her stomach. Now with Joohyun beside her she smiles and brushes a sweaty strand of hair out of her face and says, ‘That was a lot of fun.’

‘So much fun.’

‘We should do it again sometime.’

‘Yeah,’ says Joohyun. ‘We should. Or just drinks. Or both.’

‘What about your car?’

‘I’ll find it in the morning. Can get a cab back.’

‘Wanna share one?’

‘Sure.’

Seulgi nods and is silent. Thinking about what to do next. What to say. With a faint smile all she can manage is, ‘I’m really glad I met you.’

‘I’m glad I met you too.’

‘I mean it.’

‘I know,’ says Joohyun. ‘So do I.’

She leans forward and cups Seulgi’s cold face with one raw hand and brushes her hair away and says softly, ‘Thank you for tonight. I’ll remember it for a long time.’

‘Me too,’ says Seulgi, still smiling. ‘For a very long time.’

 

 

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A/N: Sorry for the delay and for this being really short and not all that inventive but I ADORE ADORE ADORE this album and I am so infatuated with the beautiful sound it makes and I just had to write something. Hope y'all understand and I hope you still enjoy it! Also I've had a bunch of DMs in my time away telling me how much they've enjoyed my writing and my prose style and honestly I can't y'all enough for the support it means so much to me! <3 

P.S.  Bonus points  for finding the Weeknd references in this chapter lol