“Sometimes I’m just scared,” Tiffany admits.

Jessica glances at her. “Of what?”

“Of…you.”

“Me?” Jessica’s eyes widen. “I scare you?”

“Yes, you’re terrifying,” Tiffany deadpans, and Jessica laughs. “No, I mean. I’m scared of. Of waking up one day to find that you aren’t here anymore.”

“What, did I die or something?”

Tiffany groans. “Oh my god, you’re awful. Why do I talk to you?”

“Because the alternative is talking to yourself?” Jessica suggests. “Which, now that I think about it, you do a lot of anyway…”

Tiffany glares at Jessica, who just gives a sweet smile back, until Tiffany’s glare subsides into a sigh. “Why do I talk to you,” she grumbles, but it sounds fond, almost.

“Because you love me,” Jessica quips.

“I do,” Tiffany says without missing a beat, and Jessica’s eyes get that shining look in them that Tiffany’s words still bring after all this time.

“Don’t be scared, Steph,” Jessica says softly. “I’m here. I’ve always been here, haven’t I?”

And that isn’t true, exactly, but there’s no point lingering on the times they wasted and chances they missed, when Jessica’s here now, with her, giving her that soft but intense expression that undid her as a teenager and still undoes her now.

Jessica holds out her arms and Tiffany steps into the embrace, closes her eyes and rests her head against Jessica’s shoulder, finding warmth, comfort, solace, the way she has so many times before.

Jessica murmurs something, lips brushing against her temple, the words threading themselves into Tiffany’s hair, and she doesn’t catch them, exactly, but she hears them. It brings a smile to her face. Even after all this time, Jessica has trouble saying the words, sometimes.

But it’s okay, because between them there’s no need to say, right?

“Sometimes I’m scared too,” Jessica says, much later. Night has fallen around them like a blanket, and she feels safer swathed inside its dark, velvety underbelly.

She can’t see Tiffany clearly, but she knows Tiffany’s looking at her. “Of?” Barely a second later she adds, “You’d better not say my volume.”

Jessica bursts into laughter. “It’s good to know you have some self-awareness.”

“What are you scared of, Jessi?” Tiffany asks, her voice soft, so soft.

Jessica swallows. That one day you won’t want me anymore. Or even if you do, you’ll end things for some stupid noble reason because you’re you.

“Oh, you know,” she says casually. “Cucumbers. Running. The air conditioning breaking down.”

“What are those, part of the ten plagues in your world?”

Jessica bursts into laughter again. “Wow, you know me so well, Steph. What are the other seven?”

“Of course I know you,” Tiffany says, with a certain frisson of possessive satisfaction that sends a shiver down Jessica’s spine. “Um, let me think. I mean those are the main three, right?” And it’s still too dark for Jessica to make out her face, but she can see the way Tiffany’s eyebrows scrunch up in concentration, treating the question like a million dollar one.

I love you, Jessica thinks, and it’s not an epiphany or anything close, because she knows this, has known this for a while now, maybe earlier than even she herself realizes. Stephanie, Miyoung, Tiffany; friend, bandmate, lover; she’s loved this woman for so long, every version of her, glossy and shining or bare-faced and exhausted, her larger than life laugh and sweeter than life smile. Still, the thought will pop up at times, like her mind is a whack-a-mole game, except she has no urge to beat it down.

“…cooking?” Tiffany says tentatively. “Wait, no! Losing your fake eyelashes.”

Jessica pretends to be offended. “Are you saying I have skimpy eyelashes?”

“You were the one who made it sound like you couldn’t live without your fake ones!”

“Hmph, all this time I’ve been complimenting your eyes while you think lowly of mine. I see how it is.”

“I don’t think lowly of your eyes—”

“I see how it is,” Jessica repeats loudly, drowning out Tiffany’s voice for once.

Tiffany, unexpectedly, laughs. “I think I should be the one scared of you.”

“Yes, fear me. I’m fearsome and frightening.”

“Definitely,” Tiffany says solemnly. “I’m terrified.”

Jessica grins and, effortlessly in the dark, finds Tiffany’s hand. Their fingers slip together in a well-learned rhythm, a duet without words, and Jessica knows that in this song called life, they’ll go on singing it together.

A/N: Originally I just wrote the first part and was debating about whether to post it as a standalone drabble or not, because it seemed too short, and then I wanted to write a bit more to it, like a part 2, and the second part was born.

I was definitely thinking of this moment at the fake eyelashes part: