Seulgi absolutely hates spiders. She hates them with a passion so hot and fiery that it may or may not be the reason why she has no passion for anything else at all. So of course, when she sees the huge spider in her bath tub when she steps into the bathroom, her first reaction is to swear and stumble out of the room with nothing but a towel around her.
“NOOO!” She forces her eyes shut as she slams the door.
“Okay, maybe it wasn’t actually a spider and I was just imagining things,” she says to herself, in a hopeless attempt to calm down.
She opens the door slowly. There it is, inside the bathtub, sticking to the white surface with its long, skinny legs that remind her of needles. She slams the door shut again.
“Alright it is a ing spider, oh my god, I’m going to have to move out of here and burn everything I own because the spider might have laid eggs oh my god.”
She’s beginning to regret moving out and away from everything she knows (even though it’s only a 45 minute drive away).
“I’m going to call Wendy.”

    The phone picks up after a few rings, “what do you want, loser?”
“Wendy there is a spider in my bathtub,” Seulgi says, panicking, because the spider might be calling its spider friends so they can have a spider party in her bathtub.
Wendy sighs, “okay, describe the spider.”
“Well it has really long and skinny legs and a tiny little body that’s like, a quarter of the length of one of its legs. And it’s brown.”
There is silence on the other line.
“Wendy?”
“You’re calling me because of a ing spider.”
“What was I supposed to do?!”
“I don’t know! Maybe kill it or something?!”
“But then there’s gonna be spider guts and stuff on my bathtub and that’s gross!”
“You don’t even use your bathtub.”
“…how would you know? Maybe I do, your accusation has no basis.”
“I am not arguing with you over this, Seulgi.”
“Can you come over and kill it? Please?” Seulgi is at her breaking point. Wendy is her last and only hope and if she doesn’t come to her rescue Seulgi might implode.
“Seul, I would, but I live 45 minutes away and right now I’m stuck at a family dinner.”
“.”
“Why don’t you ask a neighbour or something?”
“I don’t know anyone here!”
“No one at all? Not even anyone you’ve like, nodded at?”
In the time she’s lived in the apartment (approximately one month and three weeks) she didn’t recall meeting anyone else.
Except for that girl who lives across the hall. Who she does, in fact, remember nodding at a few times.
“Oh wait yeah there’s someone.”
“Okay good now I need to go because my cousins are having a drinking competition and I have to see this,” the phone clicks and Seulgi is left to listen to the dial tone instead of Wendy’s voice.

    The prospect of getting rid of the spider has Seulgi throwing the front door open, her hand holding on to the towel around like it’s her last shred of hope. She misjudges the distance between her door and the one opposite and, in all her towel-clad glory, she strides hastily, slamming into the hard wooden surface.
“Coming!” someone shouts from inside, and it finally dawns on Seulgi that she only has a towel on. But it’s too late for her to do anything about that because the door has opened.
“Hi—um,” the expression of who opens the door changes abruptly from friendly to taken aback when she sees Seulgi.
“Hi! I’m Seulgi I live across the hall and you’re the only person I’ve ever seen around here and the is a huge spider in my bathtub which is why I’m here with nothing on but a towel—because I panicked and rushed out without my clothes on—and I called my best friend but she lives 45 minutes away and she’s having a drinking competition with her cousins and I really really hate spiders please help me,” Seulgi spits out so fast and miraculously without stumbling over her words and she thinks to herself, with smug pride, that she could give all those Unpretty Rapstars a run for their money (especially Lil Cham, who can’t even rap to save her life and 10 dying puppies).
“Wait so you need me to get rid of a spider for you?” the girl asks.
“Well…I mean if you put it like that—yes please I need to shower and I’m basically help me.”
“Uh..alright?”
“THANK GOD,” Seulgi’s grip on her towel loosens and she almost lets go but at the last second, while she’s busy dashing into her house, excited with the thought of the spider finally being gone, she tightens her grip again. 

    The two of them stand in the bathroom, looking at the spider.
“That’s not even a poisonous spider; it’s a daddy long legs,” the other girl points out.
“Cool, but I hate all spiders and I just want it gone,” Seulgi says quickly.
“It looks like you never use this bathtub anyway.”
“Hey! I use it—that’s not the point here! Please take it away.”
With a quirk of her eyebrows, Seulgi’s across-the-hall-neighbour slides a magazine under that spider, who barely resists and just sits on the cover.
“Should I kill it or do you just want me to throw it out?” she asks.
“Anything, as long as it isn’t in this house,” Seulgi cringes at the sight of her eight-legged nightmare on Suzy’s face (‘I’m sorry Suzy’, she thinks, ‘I’ll wipe your face with a baby wipe and I’ll frame it so nothing gross will ever touch you again.’)
Her across-the-hall-neighbour walks carefully out into the hall, shaking the spider off the magazine and Seulgi feels herself unclench.
“Where do you want me to put this?” across-the-hall-neighbour asks, holding the magazine up.
“Uh you can just put it on the coffee table.”
“Okay.”
“And uh, thanks um…?”
“Irene. Or Joohyun, whatever. I’m going to go. I hope you get over your hate for spiders soon,” Irene (or Joohyun) flashes her a smile and heads back into her apartment.
“Yeah I’m never going to not hate spiders.”

    With the removal of her greatest enemy from the bathtub, Seulgi steps into the shower. Under the warm water, she dreams of a world where there are no spiders.
And then it dawns on her, “I just spoke to a total stranger, without any clothes on, nothing but a towel. Oh my god.”
In her shock she drops the 1 litre bottle of conditioner she’s holding onto her foot, “!”

    “What do you want now, Seulgi?” Wendy answers irritably.
“How do you recover from throwing away all of your dignity because of a spider crisis?” Seulgi asks.
“Was your neighbour person hot?”
“That’s not the problem here. The problem here is that I went out across the hall in nothing but a towel and yes my across-the-hall-neighbour was hot. And cute. Oh my god.”
“I don’t think there’s much you can do now, to be honest.”
“Thank you for you help, Wendy.”
“Maybe you could…seduce them with your awkwardness?”
“Seduce her with my awkwardness?” Seulgi hisses into the phone.
“Oh it’s a she?” Wendy teases.
“Shut up .”

    The next day, Seulgi finds another spider in the bathtub. Rushing out into the hall again, carefully not to slam in to Irene’s door, she knocks.
“Coming!” Irene says in the same happy voice she did yesterday.
“Oh, hi Seulgi.”
“Hey, um, there’s another spider in my bathtub,” she grins sheepishly.
Irene laughs, “well at least you actually have clothes on.”
“I panicked last night, okay?!”
“Sure, okay, let’s go get that spider.”

    It soon becomes a frequent thing; Seulgi sees a spider and goes running to Irene for help. Soon, Seulgi doesn't even bother leaving her door, she just throws something across the hall, something hard enough to thud against Irene’s door, but not hard enough to damage it; like a shoe. Irene starts to not bother to respond, she just throws the shoe back and grabs a random magazine from Seulgi’s coffee table and sweeps the spider onto it. Other than for spider extermination purposes, Seulgi and Irene don’t really see each other. Seulgi becomes painfully aware of this when the spider population of her apartment begins to dwindle. With each lessening spider, Irene comes over less. 

    It’s been two weeks. Two weeks since Seulgi has seen a spider. Two weeks since Irene has been in her apartment. Seulgi misses Irene’s playful teasing, the comfort she brings into Seulgi’s life, just Irene’s presence in general. Lying on her sofa, Seulgi frowns. They’re not even friends. There’s no reason why Seulgi should look Irene up, other than for….exterminating purposes…
“Wendy there are no spiders in my house anymore,” Seulgi sobs into the phone.
“And this is a problem because…?” Wendy is confused.
“This is a problem because this means no spiders, and I won’t need anyone to come and get them out for me, which means that Irene won’t have any reason to come over!”
“You could just…ask her out?? Like a normal person would??”
“What?! That’s weird, why would I do that? I don’t even know her that well.”
“Well you could always do things the Seulgi way and buy fake spiders to lure her into your trap of stupidity,” Wendy suggests.
“Okay!!”
“Wait no! Seulgi don't—!” Seulgi hangs up in excitement.
Now where could she acquire a fake spider?

    Thump. Irene whips her head in the direction of the sound. It’s been a long time since she’s last heard that sound. She smiles and heads to the door, laughing when she sees the familiar shoe at her doorstep. She walks into Seulgi’s apartment, placing the shoe on the shoe rack and closing the door behind her.
“Are there spiders to be disposed of, Kang Seulgi?” she asks.
“Well yeah, I mean, I did throw the shoe, didn’t I?” Seulgi smirks.
Irene laughs, “Where is it?”
“In the spider hotspot, the bathtub.”
“Let’s check it out,” Irene leads the way to the bathroom. Seulgi trails behind her, watching the way Irene’s feet tread softly on the wooden floor and how her blonde hair falls freely over her shoulders and back. Irene is so pretty it kills Seulgi to look her in the eyes.
“Seulgi,” Irene’s voice pulls Seulgi out of her head.
“Yeah?”
“This..this isn’t a real spider, you know?” Irene holds up the bright purple plastic spider in her hands, looking slightly amused, “it’s plastic.”
“I..y-yeah,” Seulgi stammers, rubbing the back of her neck sheepishly.
“You’re so adorably stupid sometimes,” Irene giggles. “Are you sure you didn’t know it was fake?”
“A-actually…I did. I just put it..there…so that I would have an excuse to see you again. I really like you will you exterminate spiders for—I MEAN—will you go out with me sometime?” Seulgi sputters.
Irene laughs, “you’re so stupid.”
She throws the spider at Seulgi. Seulgi screams. Irene laughs some more.

    The first time Irene kisses her, Seulgi realises that it is indeed possible for her to love something more than she loves hating spiders. Having Irene so close to her makes her so happy. She laughs into the kiss, and so does Irene. Seulgi fingers find themselves threading through Irene’s hair and Irene does the same to her.
“Why are you laughing?” Irene asks, their eyes still closed and faces against each other.
“Will you exterminate spiders for me forever?” Seulgi asks.
Irene bursts in to laughter, “you’re so, so stupid.”
Seulgi smiles and kisses her again, “yes or yes?”
“Yes.”