Their CEO called just as Yong was preparing to look over the clips for her next Youtube video. Kim Do Hoon rarely ever called her, which is how she knew it must be serious, but Yong also wasn’t in what you could call a great mood. So. If her tone upon answering was a little more brusque than was necessary for a call with her boss, she just hoped he didn’t notice.

It wasn’t great news.

“Oh,” Yong said, once their CEO had given her a brief rundown of the morning’s events. “I suppose that means her comeback will be delayed, then.”

“Probably,” Do Hoon agreed. “Though it may be for the best, something tells me she wouldn’t have been emotionally fit to perform anyway.”

Yong slammed her laptop shut, leaning her chin on the palm of her hand. She tried to ignore how his last sentence sounded like it was directed at her. From her peripheral vision, she could see the corkboard she kept near her desk, the one that had photos of her family and Jing-jing and her members along with a few concert tickets and cheery greeting cards from fans. One particular photo smack dab in the middle stared straight at her, almost mockingly. She sighed.

“I can drive to the agency, to make things easier,” she said. “If you don’t mind waiting a bit.”

“Not in your condition,” Do-Hoon said. Yong heard him cover the phone and speak to someone else, the sound of it muffled. Then their CEO said to her, “Jaewon is headed there now in the company car. It’s faster.”

“All right, if it’s not too much trouble,” Yong said. She thought for a second, and then said, “Is it alright if I ask Jaewon to pick up a few things on his way here? I may need a few things…”

“I can pass it along,” Do-Hoon said. “Just text me the list.”

“Thank you,” Yong said, pushing off from her desk so that she could pace around her room. She suddenly felt very restless. “I’m sorry for the trouble this has caused.” Their CEO chuckled none too awkwardly.

“Well it was bound to happen. And ever since the two of you--” Do Hoon trailed off, Yong could picture him waving his hand in the way that he did when words began to fail him. Despite everything, the thought made her smile

“Yes,” Yong said, and then, “So she’s doing… That is, she’s— How is she?”

There was the sound of shuffling on the other end of the line, and then it was their CEO’s turn to sigh. “I guess you’ll see when they get there,” he said, and Yong had to leave it at that.

-

It was another hour before Jaewon made it to their apartment. While waiting, Yong had finished sorting through her solarsido clips before moving on to a few chores— changing the sheets, doing the dishes, sweeping the entire apartment. As she worked, she tried to keep her mind blank. There was no use worrying over something that couldn’t be helped, she reasoned. There was nothing she could do until she had the full picture.

When the doorbell finally rang, Yong almost yelped in surprise. She took a few moments to steel herself before wiping her hands off on a towel and making her careful way to their front door. She didn’t have to open it— there was a quick clatter from the outside and then Jaewon was opening the door, Byul’s key in hand and a plastic bag from the department store hanging from his wrist.

“Sorry for making you go through the trouble,” Yong said apologetically, as their manager stepped inside. “I can pay for the groceries.”

“It’s no trouble, I can pay for them,” Jaewon said. He used his free hand to brush his hair away from his face; the other held open the door. “CEO gave me a budget for her schedules today anyway.”

“Right,” Yong said, and then she couldn’t help herself. She tilted her head to the side, trying to peer around Jaewon’s body. “So, she’s…”

“Yeah,” Jaewon said, then called over his shoulder, “Byul-ah.”

There was a brief moment of silence, and then a familiar head of shiny black hair appeared from behind Jaewon.

Well, it was mostly familiar. For one thing, it was about sixty centimeters shorter than Yong was used to seeing it. She’d tried to prepare herself while waiting, but still found herself blinking, nonplussed.

“…Hello,” Yong said finally. It was really the only thing she could say.

A child Moon Byulyi looked up at her from where she was holding on to Jaewon’s hoodie. Her eyes were squinting at her, and she was wearing a pair of gray leggings, a black shirt and hoodie, and a snapback cap that was now too large for her head. Of course , Yong thought inanely, looking at it, why the hell not?

“I guess she should be around five,” Jaewon said, trying to nudge the girl— Byul, she was Byul— forward. “I sent her mother a picture and she said Byul looked it. I wouldn’t really know, though; I’m no good with kids.”

“Me either,” Yong said automatically. “She--er Byul’s mom isn’t too worried, then?”

Jaewon shrugged. “Said it was bound to happen to one of you sooner or later,” he said. Byulyi stepped into the hyeon gwan finally, and the door shut behind them. “And then she told me to tell you to send her pictures, so I guess she really isn’t bothered about it. Can you do your shoes by yourself, or do you need help?” This last bit he said to Byulyi, who was contemplating her sneakers. They were blue with golden stars on them.

Byulyi looked up at Jaewon, and then at Yong. Her eyes, impossibly, grew larger.

“Uhm,” Yong’s hand reached toward her knee. “My knee—”

Jaewon smiled and just shook his head and knelt down to help Byulyi with the velcro straps. The plastic bag rustled on the floor; he shook it off and handed it over to Yong. “I bought an extra set of clothes for her and some pajamas. And I guess… crayons? What do kids like?”

“I’m sure it’s fine,” Yong said. She peered into the bag. She saw Jaewon had folded Byul’s old clothes neatly alongside the new ones. Her sneakers, snug at the bottom, weighed down the plastic. “We can buy the rest whenever… I mean, I don’t know how long she’s going to be like this, but the clothes are plenty. Thank you.”

“Yeah, well,” Jaewon said. “We all know Byul can be stubborn sometimes but I’m sure she’ll snap out of it fast. Sorry, I forgot socks.” Byulyi’s bare toes wiggled on the tiles. “Come on, don’t be scared.”

Byulyi lifted up a tottery leg to climb out of the hyeon gwan, and Yong immediately caught on to her hand to help her keep her balance. It was warm and small in her own. “I’m sorry you had to delay her solo comeback,” Yong told Jaewon. “I know she was looking forward to it.”

“It’s really no big deal,” replied Jaewon, straightening. He shoved his hands in his pockets and blew a strand of hair out of his face. “I would have been working anyway. We can just plan a new schedule again when she’s feeling better. How’s the PT?”

“Fine,” Yong said, “Should be out of the brace by next month.”

“Cool,” Jaewon said, and then, his capacity for small talk having apparently been exhausted, added, “I should probably go. Just text me if you need anything. I can swing by later?”

Yong shook her head. “No, no,” she said. “I don’t want to put you out of your schedule. I’ll let you know if something comes up, but we should be fine.”

Jaewon made his good byes and then headed back out. Yong and Byulyi waved after him dutifully, and then stopped and looked at each other. The apartment seemed awfully silent.

“Well,” Yong said after a few moments of this. “Let’s make lunch.”

-

The thing about five year olds is. They were noisy and asked too many questions and usually ended up dirty at the end of the day even though they never left the house. It was always easier to fawn over them from a distance or have them give you a high five if their parents were around. Yong didn’t know how to handle one that was--

At any rate, she was sure it wasn’t safe to have a five-year-old clattering about while she tried to cook, so she set Byulyi down in front of the TV with some paper and her crayons. Their Netflix account was connected to the TV but Yong was at a loss for what Byulyi might want to watch. Eventually she settled on Larva Island and hoped that would be enough . 

She did a quick sweep of the room to make sure there weren’t any exposed wires or sharp objects left lying around, and then just as quickly retreated back into the kitchen. She wasn’t going to call Wheein.

She called Wheein.

“Wheein-ah,” she hissed into her phone. She held it up to her ear with one hand and used the other to root around in the crisper for some cabbage. “I have a problem. ”

“Hey, Unnie,” Wheein said cheerfully. “What’s up?”

Yong straightened, cabbage in hand. “Byul,” she said ponderously, “has turned into a baby.”

There was a brief pause. “Wow,” Wheein said. “That is a problem.”

“I know ,” she said. She didn’t slam the cabbage down onto the chopping board, per se, but some force was involved. “What am I going to do? I don’t know what a baby wants. I gave her crayons and now she's watching some cartoon on Netflix. And I have to make lunch .”

“How is the baby holding crayons?” was all Wheein said.

“She’s not a—” The full weight of the situation was beginning to hit her. Yong put her hand up to her forehead and tried to breathe in deeply. “She’s not a baby baby. Jaewon-ah said that her mom said she must be around five.”

“Oh, thank god,” Wheein said. “Five isn’t a baby. Unnie, you would kill an actual baby. You don’t know anything about babies. That YouTube video you did, doesn’t really count.”

“Don’t you start,” Yong said irritably. Although she would have told anyone the same thing, having it thrown back in her face made her hackles rise. “What am I going to do? I don’t know how to take care of a kid.”

“That’s because everybody’s too busy taking care of you,” Wheein said gently, and then laughed when Yong sputtered. “Kidding. Well, five isn’t so bad. You just have to make sure you feed her and give her baths and keep her entertained.” She added, with some authority, “Killing a five-year-old is much harder than killing a baby. You got off easy.”

“I am not going to— Nobody is killing anyone!” Yong said. She picked up a knife, put it down, and then said, “If it’s so easy, why don’t you do it?”

“Oh no,” Wheein said, already laughing on the other end of the line. “No way you’re passing this off on me. Your fiancée, your problem. Besides, if Byul’s mom isn’t too worried, then you’re probably fine.”

“Ugh,” Yong said. She wished her sister was here. This would have been easier with someone else.

Wheein laughed again. “Cheer up, Unnie!” she told her. “She’ll probably snap out of it soon. Remember, Joohyun-unnie turned into an actual baby and nobody managed to kill her. And Seulgi-unnie told us she was right as rain in, like, three days! What did you fight about, anyway?”

“We didn’t fight about anything,” Yong said quickly. Wheein made a disbelieving noise.

“Sure sure,” she said indulgently. “Have a good lunch, Unnie! Call your sister if you need any more advice.”

“Maybe,” Yong said, but Wheein had already ended the call. With no sympathy coming from that corner, Yong just sighed and got around to making lunch. Nobody would ever call her a culinary expert, but there were pre-prepared slices of chicken in the freezer and she was sure five-year-olds could eat those. Pretty sure.

She chopped the cabbage and got the frying oil ready. The faint sound of the TV drifted into the room, cartoonish noises that made the apartment seem livelier than it had all day. Yong sighed and made lunch and tried not to think about the way Byul had quietly gotten ready just that morning, how the door had clicked shut behind her without a word of good bye.

Ugh , Yong thought. She sliced up some sweet potato to fry with the chicken and then plated it, and the cabbage too. They didn’t have training chopsticks, but she supposed a fork would do. It took her ten minutes to set the table, and another five to get the counter cleared and put the dishes in the sink to soak. After two minutes of standing helplessly beside the refrigerator, she took a breath and made her way back into the living room.

Byulyi looked up at the sound of her footsteps. She was seated on a cushion on the floor, her arms around her knees. The sheets of paper on the coffee table were still blank; she hadn’t touched them. She looked awfully small. Somehow, this made Yong feel even more adrift.

She opened , and then closed it again. “Lunch,” she said simply.

She waited for Byulyi to get up and then led her to the table. The chair was too low for her, but after piling a couple of cushions on the seat she was able to reach her food comfortably. Yong found half a carton of orange juice in the refrigerator and poured them both glasses.

When they were both finally seated, Yong looked from Byulyi to the food then back to Byulyi. Yong offered her a small plate of kimchi.

“Would you like some?” she asked softly, trying to remember the actual research she did for that YouTube video. Sure, babies were different from five-year-olds, but having a calm demeanor and a soft voice surely helped the situation. Byulyi nodded, watching with wide eyes as Yong scooped a bit of kimchi unto her plate.

“Thank you,” she said quietly, then bowed her little head and mumbled a thanks for the food. Her voice was smaller than Yong had expected.

Yong stared at her for a long moment, then chuckled to herself. She dutifully took a picture of Byulyi poking at her sweet potatoes and then sent it off to Wheein and Byul’s mom. The rest of the meal, they spent in silence.

Wheein’s reply exactly two seconds later was unreadable and full of too many emojis to count as an actual message, but it also made Yong laugh.

-

Byul’s mom texted her while she was doing the dishes. Yong hardly ever contacted her future mother-in-law, but they got along well-enough, all things considered. Plus, she took the news of the engagement better than Byul’s father had. A memory that Yong wasn’t too keen to reminisce any time soon. 

I remember that age, Byul’s mom had sent. She’d also sent a snapshot of a photo from Byul’s childhood home. It was a framed shot of Byulyi as a child, grinning up at the camera, the photo rich in reds and blues. The glare of light coming off the glass covered the date. It came with the caption, Byulyi at age 6.

Yong looked from her phone to Byulyi, who was back on the floor, eyes glued to the television set. The TV was now set to the children’s programming channels, it was an old rerun of Digimon. The crayons and paper sat on the table, still untouched.

Thank you eomeonim, Yong sent back, along with a picture of Byulyi watching TV. Byul doesn’t seem to be talking much. I don’t know why.

She was a lot shyer as a child, came the reply a few minutes later. Yong had sat down on the sofa and gotten interested in the show, in spite of herself. It was the episode in the coliseum, with Greymon. You’ll have to be patient with her.

Yong frowned at the message. She wasn’t used to this anymore. Not with Byul at least. Byul was never the shy one. She was outgoing and charming and friendly and greasy and--

Yong sighed and leaned forward, just a bit. The sound of the sofa creaking under her weight seemed to startle Byulyi, who looked over her shoulder at her. Half her face was obscured by her hair, which reached just a little past her shoulder blades. Yong briefly wondered if five-year-old Byulyi would like her hair in a low ponytail as much as thirty-year-old Byul did. 

“Uh,” Yong said. “Do you… Do you like Digimon?”

Byulyi nodded, and then glanced back at the TV.

Okay. That was a start.

“Me too,” Yong said, and watched as Byulyi’s attention snapped back to her. “I used to watch it a lot when I was a kid. Byul— Do you mind if I call you Byul?” A blank stare. “Byulyi-ah?” Byulyi hesitated, and then nodded shyly. “Okay, Byulyi-ah. My name is Yongsun.” She reached out a hand for a high-five, then promptly felt stupid when Byulyi just stared blankly at it.

Byulyi bobbed her head, her eyes wide and cautious. “Hi,” she said quietly. She shuffled around to face Yong, resting her chin on her knees. Her fingers fluttered against her arms; her feet looked so bare and small.

Yong found herself at a loss. She had been quiet too, even as a child, it was true, but this was different. She’d been aloof, perfectly polite, sometimes excitable, shy too, but not quite to this degree. She found herself wishing, impossibly, for Byul— her Byul— to show up and kill the silence with some funny comment, or a kind word. This was way beyond her powers.

“Do you like to draw?” she said after a minute. Even a baby Byulyi would have been better than this, she thought to herself helplessly. At least babies didn’t talk. “Jaewon-ah bought you some, uh, nice crayons. It’d be a shame if no one got to use them.”

Byulyi hid her face behind her knees for a bit before glancing back up at Yong, and then at the crayons on the table.

“They’re all yours,” Yong said in what she hoped was an encouraging voice. She reached out a hand then thought better of it. “You can draw whatever you want with them.”

Byulyi looked back at the floor. She was quiet for so long that Yong was about to give it up and just go back to watching the Digidestined kids learn more about digimons and each other in a painful silence, but eventually she said, “Is it really okay?”

“Yeah, of course,” she said quickly, and then reached for the set. She peeled the flap open and tipped them out onto the table. “Look, here. You can draw all the Digimon you want, or… whatever, whatever you want. It’s all for you.”

Byulyi picked up the orange crayon and glanced back at Yong, as if asking for permission, before bending her head to the paper and slowly, carefully, sketching out a shape.

Yong let out a breath she hadn’t even known she was holding. She felt like, ridiculously, like she had accomplished some impossible feat. As soon as she thought that, she could almost hear Byul’s loud, full-bellied laughter in the back of her head.

Cute, she thought, and then brought out her phone to take another photo.

-

“What are you doing?”

Yong looked up to find Byulyi peering at her from behind the doorframe. She had left her in the living room drawing quietly an hour ago, intending to spend the rest of the afternoon keeping herself busy. At the moment, she was trying to wrangle the dry laundry from earlier in the week, warm from the dryer.

“I’m folding laundry,” she said, underscoring it by smoothing her palm over a sweater. “Are you finished drawing?”

“Yeah,” Byulyi mumbled, wiggling her toes. She looked up at Yong, chewing on her bottom lip.

“Do you want to help me?” Yong asked, disbelievingly. She should have expected that even a kid Byulyi would be a little weird. It was, she admitted to herself, very cute. Too bad Byul wouldn’t remember any of this when it was over.

“Okay,” Byulyi said, scampering into the room and flopping down beside her. Yong gave her some socks and taught her how to match them and roll them up properly. Byulyi applied herself with a look of concentration that made Yong want to squeeze her little cheeks. She settled for taking another picture to send to Wheein.

They worked in companionable silence for a little while before Byulyi said, very gravely, “What are you wearing on your leg?”

Yong’s hand went automatically to her knee. “It’s a brace,” she said evenly, clenching and unclenching her fist.

“What’s ‘brace’?” Byulyi asked, trying out the word.

“It’s like… a bandage. I hurt my knee and it keeps me from moving it wrong,” Yong said. She looked down at the shirt she was folding and smoothed out the edges. It was one of Byul’s pajama tops, the one she had given her so they could match in bed.

Byulyi rolled up another sock. “Does it hurt now?” she asked in a small voice.

It had hurt, when she fell from the choreographed lift during practice. Yong wasn’t one for dramatics, but the sound of her knee popping wasn’t something that she was likely to forget. The feel of the rehearsal room floor, cold against her cheek. It had hurt. The visit to the doctor had hurt. The physical therapy hurt. Byul walking eggshells around her since the injury and trying to take care of her at every turn, that had hurt too, but in a different way. But all she said was, “Not right now.”

Byulyi put her small hand on top of the brace. Yong could feel the warmth of it through the bandage. “Sorry,” Byulyi said.

Yong smiled and brushed Byulyi’s hair behind her ear.

-

Dinner had gone better than lunch had. By then Byulyi had become comfortable, even cheerful, asking about the apartment, about the food, about whether Yong lived alone. The surreality of telling the five-year-old version of her fiancée that she was engaged to the thirty-year-old version of her wasn’t lost on her.

“What’s ‘fiancée’?” Byulyi asked, before spooning some more rice into . Grains scattered across the placemat.

“It means she and I are getting married,” Yong said primly. “Maybe. Eventually.”

“Okay,” Byulyi said. “Why don’t you have a cat?”

“We like dogs a bit more,” Yong said. This was apparently information that held some weight, as a serious expression crossed Byulyi’s face. She stared curiously at her, which was looking up at her with wide eyes, “Do you like cats?” Yong asked

“They're okay,” Byulyi said honestly. “I like dogs. You just look like a cat person.”

Wheein and Byul’s mom had replied to her periodic updates mostly positively (Byul’s mom) and incoherently (Wheein), and with an implicit faith in Yong’s child management skills that she personally felt was unwarranted. At some point in the late afternoon, Wheein had let slip to Hyejin that Yong was unwillingly learning the ins and outs of young parenthood. Hyejin called her after dinner. Yong only picked up after the third call.

“I can’t believe your girlfriend is a baby ,” even through the static of a phone call, Hyejin’s raspy voice still managed to contain every ounce of sadistic glee that it would have were she right there in person. “That’s so funny. Serves you right!”

“Shut up,” Yong said, without heat. Byulyi was back in the living room, working on a drawing that seemed to involve a lot of spiky green shapes. “She’s my fiancée.” Hyejin made a gagging sound on the other end of the line. “And she’s not a baby. She’s five…ish.”

“Nah, you’re right,” Hyejin said. “Joohyun-unnie was a baby. You’re so lucky Byulyi-unnie turned into a kid. You’d kill her if she was a baby.”

“Why does everybody keep saying that?” Yong demanded.

“Come on Unnie, in your relationship you’re like the baby,” Hyejin said simply. “I bet Byulyi-unnie spoils you. I bet she buys you your favorite food whenever you want or lets you cuddle against her in bed or whatever.”

Yong flushed, because it was true. But she wasn’t about to tell Hyejin that. “Well, it’s been twelve hours and no one has committed infanticide, so. There.”

“Cool,” Hyejin said. “What happened, anyway? You had a fight, huh?”

“No,” Yong lied. “She was supposed to have her Comeback Stage on MCountdown the same time as the drop of the MV, then she turned in the bathroom. That’s what Jaewon-ah said at least.”

“Poor Byulyi-unnie,” Hyejin said sympathetically. “I guess they moved the release of the MV too huh? Hope the moos aren’t too disappointed. Hey, when do you think she’ll turn back? Is it weird if I start a betting pool on that? Like, would Byulyi-unnie get mad?”

“Yes, it’s weird, Hyejin-ah,” Yong said, laughing. “And why would it matter if Byul got mad? She’s a baby.”

“Five isn’t a baby,” Hyejin told her matter-of-factly. “ Joohyun-unnie was a baby.”

“I remember,” Yong said. They talked a bit more; about Hyejin’s vacation plans after her own comeback and Yong’s last PT session. Though less on the latter, if Yong could help it. Eventually Hyejin had to end the call and Yong was left feeling a little better than before.

-

“Help, please.”

Yong looked up from her phone to find Byulyi standing in the hallway, dripping wet and holding a towel around her shoulders. She stood quickly, her knee sparking with a little bit of pain, her fingers going automatically to her contact list. She had a basic understanding of first aid, but not for kids— if there was an emergency—

“What’s wrong?” she said, walking up and grasping Byulyi by the shoulders, trying to look her over to see if there was blood anywhere while simultaneously ignoring the pounding in her ears. “Are you hurt? Did you hit your head? Let me call your mother—”

“No,” Byulyi said, biting her lip. The fist that wasn’t holding her towel was clutching the purple loofah that Yong kept in the shower. She shoved it up towards her. It was covered in suds. “I don’t know… I can’t, umm…” She gestured wordlessly to her back, and then held the loofah back up to Yong again.

“Oh,” Yong said, taking it. It stuck to her fingers limply, like a fluffy jellyfish. “Okay… well. You could have just called me.”

Byulyi, already on her way back to the bathroom, looked over her shoulder at Yong as if to say, Me? With my voice? The expression looked almost like something her Byul would give. Yong laughed and followed her in, kicking off her slippers and hiking up her sweatpants before stepping onto the tile.

Byulyi was already squatting on the floor, her arms around her knees again. She said, “Can you wash my hair, too?”

“Of course,” Yong said softly, looking around for the bath stool. She eased herself down onto it with a grunt, stretching out her right leg carefully, and then rolled up her shirt sleeves too. It took no time at all to get a good lather up. She brought the loofah up to Byulyi’s back, scrubbing gently over the wings of her shoulder blades, marveling at how small she was. “Next time, try and yell, okay? You could slip and hit your head if you went out without drying off.”

“Mmkay,” Byulyi said.

Yong soaped down her back with the loofah, and then another time with a soft washcloth. The silence between them was— nice. Companionable. Even after all this Yong would never be able to bring herself to say that she was good with kids, but Byulyi, like always, made even difficult things easy. She tried not to miss her.

She had just started massaging shampoo into Byulyi’s hair when Byulyi said, “Where’s your, um. Fancy?”

Yong’s hands stilled. “My fiancée?” she said. “She’s… not here right now. She’s out.”

“Okay,” Byulyi said. When Yong moved her hands away, she reached up and shaped her hair into two little pigtails, and then flattened it again. “Is she nice?”

“She’s very nice,” Yong said quietly. “Close your eyes.” She reached around and put her hand up to Byulyi’s forehead, shielding her eyes before running the showerhead over her hair. The water sluiced down around her thin shoulders, rinsing out the soap and shampoo.

Byulyi rubbed her face, and then giggled when Yong brought the showerhead back over her head. After a final rinse, Yong helped her dry off and get dressed. She showed Byulyi the hairdryer and ran it over her head, again and again, until the soft black strands fluffed up, warm and dry.

“Did you have a nice time today?” Yong asked later, helping Byulyi into their bed. She looked even smaller, dwarfed by the duvet and the pillows.

“Mm-hmm,” Byulyi said sleepily. Yong tucked the blankets in around her, fluffing up a pillow and putting it in between her and the edge of the bed. Byulyi immediately reached an arm out and pulled it to her chest, snuggling her face into the softness.

“Okay,” Yong said with a smile, leaning back and watching her. “Tomorrow we can call your mother and ask for advice, okay? And we can get you some more clothes, maybe a… a toy, if you want. Or video games. I don’t know.”

“Okay,” Byulyi mumbled, closing her eyes.

Yong sat looking at her for a few minutes, watching the rise and fall of her chest. Before she could talk herself out of it, she leaned over and gave her a soft kiss on her forehead. And then she picked up one of the other pillows and headed out, towards the living room, to make her own bed.

-

Yong started awake, her heart thundering against her ribcage. The room was dark, a sliver of moonlight coming out from behind the curtains. She put a hand to her forehead and shuddered out a breath, then another, then another.

What had she been dreaming about? She couldn’t remember. The apartment seemed to stretch out around her, bigger and emptier than before. 

“Ugh,” she said, throwing her arm over her eyes. It was the change in sleeping arrangements, or maybe that she’d forgotten her eye mask. Maybe the stress of finding out her partner of four years had turned into a child. Whatever. The morning would bring clarity. She’d just laid her head back when she heard it, thin and reedy.

“Yongsun?” It was Byulyi.

Yong made her way to their bedroom as quickly as she could, pushing open the door and turning on the bedside lamp. The warm yellow light saw Byulyi curled up in a ball, her cheeks wet with tears.

“Did you have a bad dream?” Yong said softly, running her hand through Byulyi’s hair. It was lightly damp from sweat. Byulyi nodded and knuckled at her eyes. “Do you want me to stay here with you until you fall asleep?” Byulyi nodded again.

Yong sighed and climbed into bed behind her, leaning over her to shut the light off again with a click. She lay back down and ran her hand over Byulyi’s back, down and then back up again, just like her own mother used to do for her. Down, and then back up. Down, and then back up.

In the darkness it felt like time existed somewhere else. She didn’t know how long it took for Byulyi to settle back into sleep; she wasn’t so sure if she was all the way awake herself. Every time she blinked her eyes back open, it was as if an age had passed.

The scent of their sheets and the familiar warmth of their bed had her imagining Byul’s slender frame, her strong arms that wrapped around her when they slept, the feel of her hands running through her hair. Byul at twenty, needling her into extra practice. Byul at twenty-four, smirking at Yong and biting her lower lip just so, the air between them so heavy with feeling that there was nothing that needed to be said. Byul at thirty, a day ago, here in their bed, her face twisted with frustration before she turned away entirely.

I wasn’t mad at you, Yong thought, or maybe spoke aloud; she wasn’t sure, I know you were just trying to help, I’m still not really used to opening up emotionally to someone else. But I’m trying. In her mind, she thought she could hear Byul saying something in reply, but she was already fast asleep.

-

“Unnie,”

“Mmf,” Yong said, burrowing her head back into the pillows. The sound of laughter, low and familiar, and then a hand down from the crown of her head, caressing the nape of her neck. Yong cracked an eye open, scowling.

It was Byul, back to normal. The morning light haloed her head, limning her in golden light. Annoying.

“Hey,” Byul said gently, her fingers running a smooth path from Yong’s cheekbone to her chin. “Good morning.”

“Ugh,” Yong said, flipping around so that her back was to Byul. Her head felt cottony with sleep but her heart was beating quickly, rabbitlike in her chest. She didn’t bother suppressing the smile on her face. 

“Yong,” Byul said, snuggling up to her, fingers now dancing just near her tickle spot. “You aren’t still mad, are you?”

“Go away,” Yong told her. And then, after a moment, “No.”

“Okay good,” said Byul, smudging a kiss against her ear. Yong, infuriatingly, felt her whole body heat up. That was cheating . “Because it wasn’t my fault.” She paused for effect. “Huh, weird. I don’t hear a sorry anywhere. Do you?”

“Ughhh.” Yong pulled the pillow up over her head. From underneath it she said, “Nngh.” Then, quieter, “I’m sorry.”

“Love you,” Byul said sweetly, pulling her closer, back to chest, careful of her knee. “That wasn’t so hard, was it? I didn’t even have to ask you twice.”

Yong tore the pillow from her face and launched it at her fiancée, who dodged it easily. “You were so much cuter when you were a baby.”

“Oh?” Byul said, with interest. “A baby? You mean like what happened to Joohyun-unnie?”

“Ugh!” But Yong was laughing. They were laughing together. 

It was a happy ending, all things considered.

End.