Minjeong has a secret—a generational secret passed down from women to women in the Kim family. Her grandmother had sons, and her dad had a son before Minjeong, and neither inherited the gift. Only the girls do and it landed on Minjeong.

Sweet young Minjeong, who thought the gift was the best thing in the world. She’d grasp onto her school friend’s hands as a small child and declare their future. When she got older, it seemed people believed her less and called her a fib.

When she was nine, she predicted someone’s death for the first time.

“Grandma!” Minjeong had rushed into her house and clambered onto her grandmother's bed. Her hair was a mess and she was sure there was still the fuzz of dandelions in her hair from rolling around in the grass of their backyard.

“Minjeong, dear.” Grandma chuckled lightly and pulled Minjeong onto her lap. “Do you want to see something?” 

Minjeong nodded with a grin and her grandma took Minjeong’s small hand into hers and Minjeong’s world stopped for approximately five seconds—the average length of Minjeong’s visions.

It was quiet, and it smelt salty like she was at a beach. The sun was setting and her grandmother was sitting in a wheelchair with her family and other people Minjeong couldn’t recognise. She could hear the faint lulling of the ocean and then the scene stopped and Minjeong was pulled out and staring back into her grandmother’s eyes.

Her frail hand came to wipe at Minjeong’s cheek and Minjeong hadn’t realised she was crying.

“Grandma…” Minjeong blinked.

“Tell me about it, dear.” Her grandma encouraged her.

She described the scene and her grandma patted Minjeong’s hair affectionately.

“The thing with our gift, dear,” Minjeong listened carefully. “We will never be able to see our own future if lives are not interlinked.”

“Why?” Minjeong asked.

“It was just made like that.” Grandma chuckled. “My mother told me so, and so did my grandmother, and it was just like that.”

“Oh.” Minjeong was saddened.

She had always seen people’s futures and she hadn’t ever realised she had never seen hers.

“One day, Grandma will go somewhere very far.” Her grandma spoke gently.

“Will I be able to come too?” Minjeong had asked quietly and Grandma shook her head.

“No, dear, maybe in the distant future.” She had said.

“How about my future? What did you see? Is that the distant future?” Minjeong was a curious child.

With the gift of seeing the future, questions will just have to come automatically.

“I won’t tell you.” Grandma smiled and Minjeong frowned.

“Why? That’s not fair, Halmi.” Minjeong pouted. “I told you about your future; why won’t you tell me mine?”

“I saw something great and something beautiful.” Her grandmother had told her and Minjeong didn’t like the vagueness of it.

Minjeong would later come to the realisation that her grandmother’s future wasn’t too far away. In a couple of months, she was ten years old and her grandmother was hospitalised.

It was as she saw—her grandmother’s final wish was to pass by the sea and everyone came. The entire family came; a team of nurses was waiting, and Minjeong was sitting on the sand right beside her grandmother. She had predicted this day, yet it saddens her and she doesn’t like it one bit.

“Minjeong-ah.” Her grandmother’s voice was small and weak but Minjeong heard it loud and clear.

“Yes grandma?” Minjeong swallowed her tears.

Her grandmother reached towards her and held Minjeong’s hand. She couldn’t see her grandmother’s future anymore.

“Promise me, you’ll never be selfish with your gift. Don’t try to look for your future.” Her grandmother tells her. “If you search for it, it may never come, and you’ll change your fate. Don’t change your fate, because if you do, what you see may change when the day comes.”

“I promise, Halmi.” Minjeong nods.

Her grandma squeezes her hand and lets go of her. She faces the sea and Minjeong does too.

“She’s beautiful. You’re going to love so much.” Is the last thing her grandmother tells her and she realises she can't ask what it means.

—

Minjeong never holds another hand and she’s a recluse, if not for the persistence of her friends. She had met her best friend Aeri in high school and she saw her future. Aeri had taken a fall on the soccer field during PE, and without much thought, Minjeong had stretched her hand out to pull her up. It was bright, almost blinding and Minjeong heard the roar of a crowd and a mesopotamia of intricate clothing designs.

When Aeri tells her that she wants to be a fashion designer when they’re writing down aspirations for class, Minjeong thinks— yes, it’s going to come true. 

She meets more people along the way and Aeri almost becomes her spokesperson since she’s known Minjeong for a long time and always deters people when they ask too many questions about her best friend.

The thing with her gift is that she can only see someone’s future once. Only one touch will fill Minjeong’s mind and some visions are something to look forward to, while others haunt her and burn through her flesh down to her bones.

She discovers this the second time her hand touches Aeri’s. They’re drunk and Minjeong’s just fallen over a pot plant, which was in her way. Aeri helped her up and she had no vision.

She felt relieved but knew better to hold no one’s hand except for Aeri’s.

Along the way, most visions are a mistake from the brush of a hand and a thoughtless handshake. Minjeong makes sure to never hold hands.

When she’s in college, Minjeong meets Yu Jimin.

“Woah.” From the get-go, Minjeong feels a pull and she knows it’s going towards Jimin. They’re all the same age and Jimin slides into their friend group along with her friends seamlessly. She meets Ningning, Jimin’s best friend and stumbles into her when Ningning’s running down the hall. She flies into Minjeong and Minjeong holds her—their hands brush against each other and Minjeong is assaulted with a bright and vivid vision, and it feels like a memory.

Ningning and Aeri are at a wedding and it’s all so loud and bright—a flower bouquet launches into the air and lands in Jimin’s hands. She’s sure it’s Ningning and Aeri’s wedding, since Ningning is the one throwing the flowers and Aeri is right beside her—the glinting of two rings sitting on Ningning’s ring finger and Aeri’s ring finger. 

Minjeong realises then that she’s seeing the split vision of Jimin catching the bouquet from her own eyes, which means her fate is interlinked with this one.

She will be there at their wedding and she doesn’t know how far along that is, but they look happy and Minjeong hopes she will be too by then.

“Is it okay if I hold your arm?” Jimin asks shyly and Minjeong nods. As long as their palms do not meet, Minjeong won’t see her future.

Minjeong and Jimin had grown close. It turns out that Jimin is a little more persistent than what she puts out. Jimin had immediately found Minjeong cute and always cooed at her as if she were a small creature. She had called her ‘puppy’ once and the nickname stuck with the entire friend group. It makes her blush but she thinks sometimes it’s okay if Jimin calls her softly.

They're at a party tonight and Jimin had firmly stated she didn’t want to lose Minjeong in the crowd. Minjeong snorted and said as if. It would make more sense if Jimin were to go missing due to her friendly nature.

She’s almost friends with the entire student body and the entire world. Everyone wants a piece of her, whether it's a single or a minute-long conversation. She’s had numerous people ask her out, boys, girls and others alike. With a radiating smile and a beautiful personality, Minjeong understands why people would want to fall for Jimin.

After all, Minjeong harbours some sort of feeling under all of her mysterious demeanour towards her friend. 

She wouldn’t chase Jimin if she could, because there’s a chance that if one day Minjeong took Jimin’s hand in hers, she could predict a future without her in it. She’d rather go blind than see someone else in love with Jimin.

“Hey.” Jimin nudges her softly.

“Hm?” They’re no longer inside the house and Minjeong blinks.

“I lost you for a bit there.” Jimin chuckles and Minjeong blushes.

“Sorry.”

“What were you thinking about?” Jimin asks, her hand no longer holding onto Minjeong’s wrist but her jacket instead.

Jimin is a clingy person, from what Minjeong has observed from the length of knowing her. She’s always latching onto a person, whether it be by the hand, the arm, or the shoulder—quite literally hanging off of a person, but indeed, Jimin is very touch-friendly, while Minjeong is not—for obvious reasons. Jimin is aware of Minjeong’s boundaries and has been quite serious about them. Out of all her friends, Minjeong has met hands with them by accident very early on in their friendships, but with Jimin, it’s been months and years, and never has she touched her hands. 

Jimin has adapted to Minjeong’s aversion to touch; rather than grabbing onto her hand without thought, Jimin asks whether she could hold her wrist and arm or would just hold onto a piece of Minjeong’s clothing.

“Nothing.” Minjeong smiles softly.

“Oh, I see.” Jimin smirks. “You were thinking about me.”

Minjeong rolls her eyes.

“Okay, I guess so.” Minjeong shrugs.

“Why? Am I pretty today?” Jimin flutters her eyelids.

“You’re always pretty.” Minjeong doesn’t need to think to answer.

Minjeong chuckles. It’s always almost too easy to fluster Jimin. Her cheeks grow pink and her ears burn red immediately.

Minjeong reaches over and rubs the tip of Jimin’s ear between her thumb and index finger.

“Your ears are red.” Jimin only turns even redder and it’s not the teasing, but it’s Minjeong’s cool touch to her burning ear.

Minjeong does admit to herself that sometimes she craves touch—the burning ones and even the most gentle ones. If she is one to not receive it, she will always be willing to give it, especially if it makes Jimin stutter and blush horrendously bad.

“Hey!” Jimin whines, pushing Minjeong away.

It only makes Minjeong laugh even louder.

—

“So what are you going to do about Aeri?” Jimin asks Ningning once she’s located her in the cafeteria.

“What about her?” Ningning is jumpy and blushing the moment Jimin mentions the name.

“Uh-huh, yeah, keeping real cool about it, aren’t you?” Jimin snorts and Ningning whines.

“I can’t! Every time I’m around her and I try to ask her out, I literally word-vomit and want to be eaten alive by a pothole.” Ningning pouts.

“I’m pretty sure you’re fine just the way you are. She likes you; I’m sure of it.