Work Text:
It starts, as most things in Taehyun’s life do, with Kai.
“What are you thinking?” they ask, looking down at Taehyun with a soft look in their eyes. There was always something about the way Kai looked at her — as if they were seeing something new for the very first time and they forced themself not to blink lest they miss a single thing. Taehyun, in cases like these, would always opt to take a photo, but she’s memorized Kai’s argument about things being organic word for word by now.
Taehyun hums thoughtfully. The truth is, there were a lot of things she was thinking of at any given time. One thought: she still hasn’t processed the fact that she and Kai are university students. Another: it has yet to dawn on her that Kai is here, by her side, like they had always been, twenty years old (nineteen, Kai would say, taking every opportunity they could to remind Taehyun of the way international ages work) and about to experience what might be the best years of their life, if what their parents told them was true. And another: Taehyun wonders if Kai has any regrets. Yet another: she thinks that, maybe, she should be worried, but she has never felt more calm in her life.
“I don’t want to join a math club,” is what Taehyun says, a slight pout on her lips. “That’d be kind of lame.”
“Rude,” Kai says with a pout. It’s obvious they’re trying their hardest not to smile. “Plenty of people join clubs related to their majors.”
Taehyun scrunches her nose in feigned disgust. “Those people are losers.”
Kai starts to sniffle dramatically — which isn’t that hard, really, because the flowers and allergies are in full bloom with the coming of spring — and they put a hand over their chest as they wipe a fake tear from their eye. “I’m heartbroken,” they wail. “Absolutely wrecked beyond repair. I can’t believe my dad said that going to university with your childhood best friend was going to be fun, that lying bastard.”
“Hey!” Taehyun interjects, even if she can’t help the laugh that bubbles out of her. “You can be mad at me, but not your dad! That’s just not right.”
With a quick cross of their arms, Kai turns up their nose, and Taehyun has never hated more that they were so much taller than her. “You use my father’s name in vain—”
“Okay, okay,” Taehyun concedes, wrapping her arms around Kai’s waist. “I didn’t even say your dad’s name, dumbass,” she grumbles playfully. Taehyun all but snuggles against their body, and she remembers that she actually loves that Kai’s so much taller than her. Taehyun was the perfect height for Kai to lower their head and plant a kiss on her forehead (as long as she was on her tiptoes, because otherwise Kai would break their neck). Before that could happen, though, she looks up at them and blinks, summoning the best puppy dog eyes that could put four-year-old Taehyun to shame, and Kai groans.
“Alright, I forgive you,” they drawl out unenthusiastically. Kai looks down at her, the same gleam in their eyes as always, and they smile. “Buy me milk tea later?” they ask.
“With the mini pearls,” Taehyun confirms. Finally, she gets the forehead kiss she was waiting for.
Kai grabs Taehyun by the shoulders and pushes her away slightly, just barely enough that Taehyun still manages to have her arms around them. They’re not long enough to be wrapped completely around their waist, still, but she manages — she rests her arms on Kai’s hips as she fiddles with the belt loops on their jeans.
“Seriously, though,” Kai says, “nothing catches your eye?”
There are many things that catch Taehyun’s eye, if she wanted to be a smartass about it. There was the pond somewhere on campus where Taehyun hoped there were ducks, but she has yet to check for herself. There was the cute 35 millimeter film camera that the photography club had on display atop their club table, saying that anyone could learn how to take photos on a camera like that if they joined — and Taehyun honestly was tempted, because it would just be so much cooler to have those photos developed instead of using apps to make it look like it was taken by a 35 millimeter camera. There was Kai’s earring that shone with the reflection of the sun’s light, a single lavender crystal hanging from the chain in their ear that was whipped around with every turn of their head.
“I was thinking of dance, actually,” Taehyun states. They both look towards the small booth where students are advertising the dance club. There are only two students there, handing out flyers with large smiles to anyone willing to take them. Taehyun looks back at Kai with a small feeling of uncertainty. “That should be fun, right?”
Kai smiles, with teeth this time, and Taehyun feels herself relax. “Let’s go get you signed up, then.”
Dance, Taehyun finds, is not fun.
Perhaps “not fun” wasn’t exactly the right way to describe it. But it was exhausting, and she’s definitely too sweaty for the clothes that she’s wearing — she’ll have to make time to go shopping for real athletic wear, which will be almost impossible, considering her professors don’t believe in syllabus week. The worst thing of all was that dance practices were in the evening. She could easily be in her dorm room, on her bed and lying to herself about getting ahead on next week’s assignments, but she was stuck sweating in a slightly crowded dance studio until after the sun sets.
(On a video call the night before, Kai asked her why she didn’t just quit. The first thing Taehyun did after she got back from their incredibly informal dance ‘tryouts’ two days prior was slump against Kai’s door, baby hairs stuck to her face from all the sweat, and she just kept trying to even her breathing as Kai panicked and ran around the room looking for water. She didn’t need to be a part of the dance club if she wasn’t enjoying it to the fullest extent. But Taehyun insisted that all of the other clubs offered by the university just didn’t appeal to her as much as dance did. She didn’t want to be in a major-related club. She didn’t want to join a photography club because that was something she’s already been exposed to, and she’d much rather take a class. It had to be dance, Taehyun insisted.
“Why do you have to be in a club at all?” Kai asked with a laugh.
“Balance,” Taehyun said at the same time that Kai’s father did. Nabil Huening was a man who just got Taehyun. They understood each other. The two of them ended up laughing, and Kai threatened to end the FaceTime call by closing their laptop. Mr. Huening said that it was his and Taehyun’s job to team up on Kai — that it has been their job since they were both about five years old. Then Kai’s dad said he had to get ready for work, and he hoped his favorite kids were doing well, “but don’t tell your sisters I said that, Kai,” and he hung up as Kai and Taehyun both blew obnoxious kisses to the laptop camera.)
Taehyun at least hopes that Kai’s having fun tonight.
“Good work, everyone!” the dance captain says. “Next week, we’ll go over routines for the showcase, yeah? Goodnight, and get home safe!”
Taehyun lets out a sigh and reaches for her water bottle, taking about a gulp and a half before she realizes it’s empty. She whines to herself, getting her phone to text Kai that she’s going to die of dehydration and she’s bestowing everything she owns to Bahiyyih. Lea can adopt a pet snake in Taehyun’s honor; and Kai, of course, gets jack shit. Before she can finish sending the text, though, she feels someone tap at her shoulder. She looks to her right and almost drops her water bottle because standing right next to her is the tallest and possibly most beautiful girl she’s ever seen.
“Hi,” the girl says with a dimpled smile. “We’re gathering the information from all the first-years joining our club. What’s your name?”
Taehyun blinks. Kai would definitely be cackling if they were here. “Um. Kang Taehyun.”
“Can we get your Line ID, Taehyun-ssi?”
She realizes, then, that she’s still got a bit of a death grip on both her phone and her water bottle. Taehyun smiles, sheepish and awkward, before she opens the code for the other girl to scan with her own phone. Taehyun gets two immediate notifications: one saying that she had a new friend and another saying she was added to a group chat, and she makes a mental note to mute it later.
“Thank you!” the girl says, and Taehyun is using up all of her power to not poke her dimples. She sticks out her hand. “I’m Choi Soobin.”
“Nice to meet you, Soobin-ssi,” Taehyun says, finally gathering her own bearings. The studio is empty save for the captain and three other students, presumably the other first-years. “Are you the vice captain?” she asks.
Soobin shakes her head, but there’s still the remains of a smile on her face. “No, I’m just stuck here. Yeonjun”— she points over to the captain—“is a bit of a mess and forgets that he has actual networking to do. The vice captain is actually…” Soobin quickly turns her head and scans the room. “Oh. He’s gone.”
Their conversation is interrupted by a burst of shy giggles. Yeonjun stands by the supply closet, arms up as he flexes his biceps. His cropped long-sleeve is raised just enough that Taehyun can see light abs and a sports bra — and, of course, his entire outfit is coordinated, red and white workout clothes providing nice accents to his pink hair. He smiles widely and follows it up with a wink, and the first-years can’t help but laugh, cheeks stained pink and ears tinted red.
“When I first joined the dance club,” Soobin says, “he told me that he was about seventy percent of the reason why so many people want to join. I really didn’t want to believe him.”
“But?” Taehyun asks.
“Hm?” Soobin responds, finally tearing her eyes away from Yeonjun.
“I’m assuming there’s a but afterwards,” Taehyun says. She wonders if it’s too early in this acquaintanceship with Soobin to raise her eyebrow at her.
“No, that’s it,” Soobin says with a smile, and even if this was their first time meeting, Taehyun thinks the look in her eye is a little bit familiar. Soobin reaches for Taehyun’s hand and clasps her own hands around it as her smile grows, and Taehyun thinks that she might just be a little bit or a lot in love. She can’t wait to tell Kai about the latest development, that a pretty girl kind of held her hand and Taehyun was already planning a summer wedding. It was March, so she had time to plan if she just cast all other responsibilities aside. “It was really nice to meet you, Taehyun-ssi. Get home safe, yes?” And she makes her way to the supply closet where Yeonjun is as she gets ready to gather her belongings. Yeonjun catches Taehyun’s eye and winks at her before waving goodbye and turning to Soobin.
Taehyun takes a deep breath as she pushes the door open and makes her way out of the studio, grateful for the evening breeze that hits the sweat on her skin. There’s still a little hint of pink in the sky where the sun used to be, and Taehyun smiles.
“It doesn’t look like you’re on the fence about dance anymore.”
She almost gasps, but Taehyun finds herself too exhausted. This is a bit of a wakeup call, though, that she really needs to get into the habit of carrying her keys in her hand as she walks back to her dorm. Should she get a knife? A knife would be nice. But she’s not dying tonight — it’s just Kai, looking at her just a little bit smugly as they shake the water bottle in their hand.
“Do you know you’re my favorite person in the world?” Taehyun says, a little bit out of breath. She takes the bottle gratefully, all but inhaling it until it’s empty, and she pinches at the cloth of Kai’s hoodie. “You didn’t tell me you were coming.”
“I got your text,” Kai says. Even in the night, they still have the same look in their eye that they have during the day, and Taehyun finds herself mesmerized as always. “It was cut off halfway through, though. What were you going to say about unnie?”
“I don’t remember,” Taehyun says honestly. “How was practice? You got out early today.”
Kai reaches for Taehyun’s hand and she, naturally, takes it. She can feel the indentations in Kai’s fingers, straight lines across the pads of them. When they were children, Kai’s mother would kiss the pads of their thumbs after a long day of practicing. Taehyun itches to do the same, suddenly, to press her lips lightly to every one of Kai’s fingers before wrapping them up in bandages. Kai never complained about the pain, not for as long as Taehyun knew them, but she still believed that they deserved to be taken care of.
“The conductor wasn’t feeling well,” Kai explains. “Said something about how it’s a little too early for us to get into smaller chamber groups, so we just called it a night. And — oh my gosh, Tae-yah,” they exclaim, starry-eyed as they squeeze Taehyun’s hand. “My first chair — she’s so scary, but she’s so cool. She’s really small, maybe just a little bit taller than you, but it’s always the short ones that are scary — ow, fuck, Taehyun! — but she walked into the auditorium looking like a total punk rocker, and she had really loud music playing on her headphones. Everyone could hear it, Hyun. And it was, like, heavy metal, or some shit like that. There was so much percussion. But she walked in like she owned the place and just sat down — she’s first chair, Tae-yah. First chair. She could probably kick my ass in a fight. She’s so badass.”
Something that Taehyun grew used to a long time ago was the feeling of her cheeks hurting. She loved the way Kai told stories, loud and fast and captivating, albeit a little sporadic, and Taehyun could never keep from smiling. “What’s her name?” she asks.
“I had no time to learn her name,” Kai says. “I was too busy trying not to fucking die.” They let out a groan, and Taehyun coos softly as she lets them rest their weight on her body. She rubs their back quickly before wrapping it around their waist. “You’d think that, after passing my audition, they’d take it easy on me.”
“Kai-yah. Just say the word and I’ll end them,” Taehyun promises.
“I know you would,” Kai snorts, “which is why I’m not going to let you kill the entire university orchestra.”
“Not the entire orchestra,” Taehyun argues. She unlocks the door to their building with her keycard and they walk through the opening doors. The warmth inside the building is very welcoming after the cool breeze outside. “First Chair Girl sounds cool. I’ll spare her life just because you like her.”
They make it to the elevator. Luckily, there was no one else making their way up, allowing Kai to put down their case and roll their shoulders. Taehyun still holds onto her backpack — they were almost at their floor, and then a few more steps until she can throw the bag against the wall.
“She’s cool,” Kai agrees, “but she’s also scary. Did you hear the part where I said she was scary, Tae-yah? Besides,” they fish for their keys in the pocket of their jeans before pulling it out with a proud look in their eye, “you can’t have a two-person orchestra. That’s just a duo, and it doesn’t work like that.”
“Lame,” Taehyun insists. Kai pushes over the door to their room while Taehyun stays in the hallway. “It’s your turn to pick the movie, right?” she asks.
Kai looks to the side, a habit of theirs whenever they think. “Yeah, I think so. I’ll set it up while you shower,” they say. Taehyun, after walking together for so long, finally lets go of their hand. She shrugs her backpack further up her shoulders as she heads deeper in the hall.
“I’ll be back soon,” Taehyun promises.
Kai smiles as they lean against their door frame. “I know,” they say.
“Taehyun-ah!” someone croons, and Taehyun immediately freezes. She thinks it’s a little bit too early in the semester for any of her classmates to know her name, much less use such familiarities with her. She’s definitely in the same boat; she exchanged numbers with someone in her math philosophy class and has their contact listed as math phil kid with the earrings. But she turns around cautiously as she clutches her laptop closer to her chest, and she sees a head of pink hair all but dashing towards her. Taehyun finds herself looking up at a bright smile and wisps of hairs in front of sharp eyes, and she’s beginning to feel as if she’s been hunted down.
“Yeonjun-ssi,” Taehyun all but squeaks, “hello.”
“Ah, there’s no need for all that! Call me unnie,” Yeonjun insists. His smile, although welcoming, does nothing to put Taehyun at ease.
“Yeonjun,” another voice says, and Taehyun finally lets her shoulders drop. “You’re scaring her.”
“Yeonjun-unnie,” Yeonjun says, glaring at Soobin, but there’s no real bite behind his tone. “You and Beomgyu are definitely made for each other, my goodness.” He turns to look back at Taehyun before he can see the way Soobin’s cheeks begin to color. Yeonjun grabs a strand of hair that hangs over his shoulder and begins to twirl it around his finger, and — yeah, maybe Taehyun can understand why the other first-years in the dance club flock to him so naturally. Yeonjun was undeniably pretty, and Taehyun doesn’t think she’s seen anyone wear a messy ponytail so nicely.
“Hi, Taehyun-ssi,” Soobin says with a warm smile, ignoring Yeonjun completely.
“Hi, Soobin-ssi,” Taehyun exhales, equally grateful for and unnerved by Soobin’s presence. Maybe it was the fact that she was being metaphorically cornered by two beautiful upperclassmen. Hopeless lesbian, Kai would probably say, and Taehyun wouldn’t even try to disagree with them.
“Soobin-unnie,” Yeonjun says, looking Taehyun right in the eye. Taehyun opens her mouth to speak but finds herself at a loss for words. She looks at Soobin helplessly, and she only nods with a soft laugh, so Taehyun thinks that it might be okay. “Tae-yah, do you have class soon?” Yeonjun asks.
Taehyun shakes her head. She was done with classes for the day.
“Perfect,” Yeonjun says with a clasp of his hands. “How about your favorite unnie treats you to lunch?”
Taehyun narrows her eyes. “This is our first conversation and you already think you’re my favorite unnie?” She wouldn’t even be surprised if Lea texts her to ask if her spot as Number One Unnie has been threatened — Lea’s always had some sort of sixth sense when it comes to the most random things, but she’s never wrong. How she always manages to be right, Taehyun will never know. She and Kai stopped trying to look for answers when they were fifteen.
Yeonjun grins, crooked and just the slightest bit puckish, and Taehyun kind of feels like she should run for her life. “Kang Taehyun,” he says, “I have a feeling we’re going to get along very well.”
They might get into serious trouble if they ever get caught, but Taehyun and Kai copied their respective room keys as soon as they got them. They just thought it would be easy that way; they might not have been roommates per the university guidelines, but they knew each other’s habits better than they probably knew their own. Taehyun was prone to studying for hours on end, sacrificing sleep and meals until she finally felt like she confidently understood a concept. Kai, ever the perfectionist, would practice longer than they needed to and go completely missing in action. It was a simple matter of checks and balances, really.
Taehyun easily unlocks the door and pushes it open, only to find Kai facing the window. She exhales slowly, like all of her stresses and worries suddenly wash away as soon as she’s within Kai’s space. Careful not to disturb them, Taehyun crouches slowly to put her bag on the floor before she slips onto the couch with the box of takeout in her hand.
Kai has been playing the violin for as long as Taehyun could remember. She remembers seeing the case in Kai’s room the very first time she went over to their family’s home at the time. It was a tiny thing, very much fit for a child of five, and Kai popped the case open with the biggest smile Taehyun had ever seen. They held the bow in their tiny hand and claimed it was their magic wand, and with their trusty violin, Kai was surely going to be able to take on the world.
Now, though, when Taehyun watches Kai play, she’s not quite sure where Kai ends and the violin begins. Years and years of practice has caused the two of them to be melded into a single entity. The afternoon sun pours a light into Kai’s room that paints both their skin and the violin gold. This, Taehyun thinks, is when Kai looks the most beautiful.
The song comes to a close as Kai takes in a deep breath. Their shoulders relax as they lower the violin and the bow. Kai quickly puts the violin in its case without closing it, and they turn to Taehyun with a smile.
Jung Kai is plenty magical all on their own.
“Is that for me?” Kai gasps, all but falling onto the couch as they make grabby hands for the box of takeout. They still manage to shine even with the sun behind them, as if they were outlined by an aureate light. Kai’s smile is crooked and there are strands of hair that have escaped the hold of their hair tie. They only ever tie their hair for practice, but they hate the feeling of something tugging harshly at their scalp, so there are always opportunities for Taehyun to reach forward and move them away from Kai’s eyes. She doesn’t, though, not right now. The first wave of sunset has caused everything in Kai’s room to relax for just a moment; they move the same way that brigadeiro is torn apart — like the way condensed milk moves when squeezed out of the packet, the way Kai’s father always said was the only right way to make brigadeiro.
Taehyun thinks she might understand, maybe, why Kai always blinks so slowly.
“No, bitch,” Taehyun says with a roll of her eyes. She hands them the box regardless. Of course it was for Kai. Taehyun would give them the world if they asked for it.
Kai clicks the chopsticks, a habit they picked up as a child, before grabbing some food. “This tastes good,” they say with a full mouth. “Where’d you go for lunch?”
Taehyun laughs, “Kai-yah, you’re so gross!” She reaches forward and forces Kai to close their jaw and actually chew. “I don’t remember the name of the place, but we can try looking for it sometime. The dance captain treated me to lunch, actually.”
Kai, to their credit, actually swallows this time. “Choi Yeonjun?” they ask.
“How do you know Choi Yeonjun?” Taehyun questions. She lets her head rest on the couch as she brings her legs up to rest across Kai’s lap. Kai pulls her closer, quickly accommodating them so they’re both comfortable.
“Half of the orchestra is obsessed with him,” Kai snickers. “Apparently there was a show last fall — a dance recital with the orchestra providing live music from the pit. Since it was Choi Yeonjun’s first year as dance captain, he proposed a joint recital. There was a huge turnout, apparently. But all of the upperclassmen kept going on and on and on about how sweet Choi Yeonjun is, how cooperative he was with the orchestra, how hardworking he is, oh, conductor-nim, can we please do another show with the dance club?”
Taehyun moves into Kai’s space, close enough that all she can see is Kai’s eyes. She can see herself in the reflection of their pupils, but she wonders, fleetingly, if Kai pictures her in gold the same way Taehyun sees them.
“And what if you end up doing so?”
“I’d throw a fit,” Kai says through a mouth full of food.
Taehyun groans as Kai laughs, though it ends up being cut short as they choke on their food. Serves them right, but Taehyun wasn’t about to say that out loud. Kai narrows their eyes at her, silently judging her despite their own little coughing fit, and Taehyun can’t help her laugh.
“Every day,” Kai says with a hoarse voice, “I find more and more evidence to prove my dad wrong.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Taehyun says, flicking her hair dramatically over her shoulder. “I’m an angel.”
Kai reaches forward with their left hand and carefully tucks some hair behind Taehyun’s ear. Taehyun hums softly, leaning into the touch until Kai is all but cradling her cheek.
“Of course you are,” Kai whispers, and Taehyun believes every word.
She’s never really been picky when it comes to the kind of music she listens to, but Taehyun thinks that she might hate pop now. The factory-produced kind, the one that has the most basic beat and thus allows anyone to recreate it. She doesn’t know how many times they’ve played this song — she doesn’t even remember the name, but it’s a popular Western song and her blood pressure will most definitely rise if she ever heard the first note of it at the mall or a coffee shop. Wooyoung (the vice captain, Taehyun finally learned) tells everyone to take five, and Taehyun has never been more grateful for water. She’s located a water fountain nearby the studio if — when — she needs a refill.
Taehyun’s trying to regulate her breathing when Soobin approaches her and hands her a cloth. With every passing day, Taehyun is more and more convinced that Choi Soobin is the epitome of perfection.
“Thanks, unnie,” Taehyun exhales. She pats her neck dry before reaching for the nape of it.
“I always carry a spare,” Soobin says with a smile. “You’re a really good dancer, Taehyun-ah. Did you dance before this?”
“Not really,” Taehyun admits. “I was in ballet at the children’s center when I was about four or five, but that didn’t last very long. Maybe a week.” Soobin chuckles at that, and Taehyun allows herself to think that she’s actually making a friend. “And — and this is important — I spent a lot of high school trying to perfect girl group choreographies with my friends.”
“Of course,” Soobin says with a dimpled smile, “that’s the source of your mastery.”
“Obviously,” Taehyun smiles back. “What about you, unnie?”
Soobin shakes her head. “No dance background at all. This is only my second year in the club, actually.”
“Really?” Taehyun asks with a gasp. “You’re so good!”
Soobin nervously pulls at her own earlobe as her cheeks turn rosy. She blushes a lot, Taehyun thinks. It’s very endearing. “Thank you,” she says shyly. “Yeonjun-unnie likes to joke around and say that I’m basically perfect—”
“You are!” Taehyun insists, bouncing on the soles of her feet. She grabs Soobin’s free hand and encapsulates it in her own, and even with Taehyun’s two hands, her hands aren’t large enough to hold Soobin’s completely. “Soobin-unnie. You’re, like, the most perfect girl I’ve ever seen.”
Soobin’s lips part, just barely, as if she truly was surprised to get such a comment. She seems a little bit at a loss for words, which surprises Taehyun, because surely Soobin must be used to such compliments. Taehyun wonders if it might be a trick of the light, but she has a good eye for these sorts of things. Her sight is very seldom one to fail her; Taehyun thinks she sees Soobin’s eyes turn glossy, but Yeonjun calls everyone back for another run-down of the dance before Taehyun can say anything. Soobin is a little too quick to turn away.
And Taehyun thinks, Oh. This is actually kind of familiar.
Yeonjun leads the dance crew through a very quick stretch before he’s snapping his fingers to the beat of the song. Taehyun can’t wait for the moment that they’re officially through with this song — of course, there’s no way she’ll be able to avoid it during full rehearsals or the actual show they’re putting on to commemorate the beginning of the semester, but Taehyun is desperate to move onto a different song already. She doesn’t know how Kai manages to practice the same song over and over again until they think they’ve finally perfected it.
No matter how much she wants to, Taehyun doesn’t manage to keep her eyes on Soobin throughout the entire choreography. At some point, the dancers have to move to the other side of the room and Taehyun makes sure to keep track of her steps so she doesn’t trip or bump into someone. But she moves her arms along to the beat before they break into two crowds, making a human catwalk. They move their arms to reveal Soobin at the end of it. She strikes a cute pose and blows a kiss at the audience (it’s just the studio mirrors, but the rest of the dance crew is enamored with her all the same) before standing at her full 185 centimeters of height. She takes confident steps forward, her hips swaying as she goes. Once she’s at the front of the crowd, the dancers form a V-formation as Soobin dances; everyone follows suit in tiers.
Taehyun catches Soobin’s reflection in the mirror, even if it’s only for a second. She was in the middle of a spin, and while most dancers might be caught with the most embarrassing faces mid-movement, Taehyun caught Soobin with closed eyes and a small smile on her face.
Honestly, how could Soobin think she was anything less than perfect?
There’s a sound of sneakers sliding against the hardwood before there’s a loud shit! Everyone stops immediately, looking towards the source of the sound. Yeonjun’s legs were crossed over each other as he stood terribly off-balance; he would’ve fallen on his ass if not for Soobin catching onto his wrist. Soobin pulls him back up, and Yeonjun rearranges his footing, but he and Soobin stay all but pressed against each other.
“Thanks,” Yeonjun says.
“It’s no problem, unnie,” Soobin whispers. “I didn’t want you to fall.”
Yeonjun only blinks slowly. Soobin is still holding onto his wrist. “You…have really good reflexes.”
“Okay!” Wooyoung suddenly exclaims, his voice just a tad too loud for the room. “Let’s do a wind-down stretch and call it a night!”
Everyone immediately scrambles around the room for a quick drink of water before the stretch, but Soobin and Yeonjun still seem to be caught in their own little bubble. It hasn’t even been a whole month since the semester started; they were reaching the end of the third week, but Taehyun had already learned that Yeonjun was loudly ebullient. It was simply his character, and even if he exaggerated it sometimes, it was in no way fake. When it comes to Soobin, though, there’s a certain softness to Yeonjun that Taehyun doesn’t see anywhere else. It was as if all of Yeonjun’s luminosity manifested as a firefly in the night — like something virtually unattainable, but somehow, perhaps by pure luck or something akin to fate, Soobin could hold it in the palm of her hand.
“Jun,” Wooyoung calls.
Soobin is the one who pulls away first, putting her hands behind her back as she walks to find a place to stretch. Yeonjun doesn’t look at her as she goes, only heads to the front of the room next to Wooyoung so they can lead the stretch together.
The rest of the dance crew is quick to leave, but Taehyun hovers just a little bit — she wants to ask if Soobin and Yeonjun are alright. She hopes that it isn’t that noticeable, but Wooyoung catches her eye as he readies himself to leave for the night, and he raises a single brow.
“You don’t want to leave?” he asks.
Taehyun blinks. “Should I?” she asks back.
Wooyoung sighs, running a hand through sweat-slick hair. “Honestly, the reason I’m so enthusiastic to get out of here is one hundred percent because Jun and Soobin-ah are so fucking insufferable,” he sighs. “But if it doesn’t make you want to rip your hair out, then by all means.” He looks back at the two of them, where they’re racing to mop the floor of the studio as quickly as possible, and he gives Taehyun a hopeless shrug of his shoulders. “Get home safe, okay?”
“Thanks, oppa,” Taehyun says with a soft smile. “You, too.”
She looks back at Yeonjun and Soobin, and she wonders.
“This is homophobia at its peak,” Taehyun complains, groaning dramatically as she falls backwards onto her bed. “There is absolutely no way I’ll be able to memorize all this shit by tomorrow.” She looks to her side, where Kai is sitting on the chair by her desk, legs crossed. They only laugh to themself as they get up from the chair. Slowly, they put one leg over Taehyun’s body as they make it to the space between Taehyun and the wall. Kai grabs her by the waist and pulls her close, pressing a kiss to her temple.
“Tae-yah,” Kai whispers, “do you think it’s time to admit that being a math major was a stupid-ass idea?”
Taehyun gasps. “Jung Kai!” she yells. “How dare you suggest such a thing?”
“Kang Taehyun,” Kai responds easily, “it’s only the fourth week of the semester and you’re crying over an exam. That doesn’t normally happen to you until midterms. You love math and I just saw you look at a proof with disgust.”
“I’m not crying,” Taehyun disagrees. “Not yet, anyway.” She rearranges herself so she and Kai are face to face, and lets one hand rest on their chest while her other hand gently cups Kai’s cheek. She’s suddenly overcome with the desire to nip at the skin on their face, wondering if Kai’s cheeks taste like the cocadas that they’re so fond of eating. “I am willing to bet all of my life’s possessions that you’ll go apeshit at the end of the semester. Mark my words, Jung Kai, you will cry angry tears over music.” Taehyun pinches their cheek lightly before bringing her hand back down.
Kai only chuckles, and Taehyun can feel the way they vibrate against her. “You might be right. Why did I decide to pursue a degree in something I love to do for fun? Let’s drop out, Taehyun. I’m so serious.”
Taehyun hums. “We’ll start a strawberry farm in Japan,” she says — a fantasy the two of them had come up with when they were seven years old.
“Your Japanese sucks. You should take a class.”
“I thought we were dropping out of school.”
“…Fuck.”
The two of them burst into laughter, their foreheads touching as they lean into each other naturally. Kai presses another kiss to Taehyun’s forehead before resting her head against their chest and holding her tight. This was — and always will be — Taehyun’s favorite place to be.
“You’re going to be just fine, Tae-yah,” Kai whispers. “I promise. You work so hard.” Taehyun just hums into their chest. “And you’ve studied so much today, too. You’re going to be late for dance practice.”
“Shit,” Taehyun complains. “Can’t I just stay with you forever? We’ll leave for Japan tomorrow. I can learn Japanese on the way.”
Taehyun can feel Kai’s smile against her forehead. “I’ll walk you to practice,” they promise.
It’s oddly chilly for a spring night. All Taehyun has on is a very thin cropped hoodie, one that’s easy to work out in but doesn’t actually provide warmth outside. Kai has always had a habit of wearing layers though, so ingrained into their own being that they’ll suffer for it sometimes, and they offer Taehyun their windbreaker without Taehyun having to say anything. Kai’s wearing a thick hoodie underneath, even if this is nowhere near the weather for a thick hoodie and a thick windbreaker, so Taehyun doesn’t really feel bad — keyword: “really,” because the reason Kai wears so many layers is because they insist everything is important to their outfit. Kai even has Taehyun’s bag hanging off their shoulder because she was supposedly “too stiff to be doing anything else besides walking.”
“Taehyun-ah!”
Taehyun and Kai both turn around, and Kai quickly glances back at Taehyun with a raised eyebrow. Taehyun can see Kai’s knowing look from the corner of her eye and it’s honestly so infuriating, but she focuses on waving back to her upperclassmen. Yeonjun continues waving his arm dramatically, even if he’s been long acknowledged. Soobin waves normally, a wide smile on her face that has her dimples on full display. Wooyoung walks next to them, his hands in his pockets, and he just nods his head in greeting. Yeonjun jogs towards them.
“Taehyun-ah,” Yeonjun croons, circling around Taehyun and Kai as he inspects them. Taehyun immediately gets a sense of déjà vu — she thinks of the hallway right outside her philosophy class, of piercing eyes and a catlike grin. His eyes shine as he looks at her. It shouldn’t be possible, but Yeonjun’s smile grows more sharp as his eyes fall on Kai. “Who’s your friend?”
“Hi, I’m Jung Kai!” Kai says with a bright smile. Yeonjun takes their hand with a firm shake. “It’s nice to finally meet you, Choi Yeonjun-ssi.”
Yeonjun laughs, clearly pleased that he was already known. “Likewise, Kai-ssi.”
It was then that Soobin and Wooyoung finally caught up to them. “Now that you’ve met Yeonjun-unnie,” Taehyun interjects, “this is Soobin-unnie and this is Wooyoung-oppa.”
“Jung Kai, right?” Wooyoung asks, patting Kai’s shoulder like a grandfather to a young boy. Taehyun tries not to laugh, because Kai might just be ten whole centimeters taller than him. “Jung Wooyoung,” he introduces quickly. He looks to Yeonjun. “I’m going to go set up, okay?” Wooyoung says, walking backwards towards the studio. “Nice to meet you, Kai-ssi!”
“He just wants to go see his boyfriend,” Yeonjun stage-whispers.
Soobin smacks him lightly on his shoulder, but she smiles regardless. “Don’t tease.” She turns to Kai, and as Taehyun looks at her best friend, she can see the exact moment their pupils dilate. Taehyun really can’t blame Kai, because she’s pretty sure she had the same expression on her face when she first laid eyes on Choi Soobin. It feels different this time, though, like it’s something that Taehyun doesn’t understand. When Taehyun looks towards Soobin, she has the same exact look in her eyes that Kai does.
“Hi, Soobin-ssi,” Kai says. Their voice sounds…different, somehow.
“Hello,” Soobin exhales. “It’s really nice to meet a friend of Taehyunie’s.”
Kai smiles as they look at Taehyun, and — and there it is, the look that she recognizes. “It’s really nice to meet her dance friends,” Kai says sincerely. “She almost didn’t join, you know.”
Yeonjun gasps, scandalized. “You’re joking! Oh, Taehyun-ah, you break my heart.”
“How can I have broken your heart?” Taehyun asks flatly. “I’m still here.”
“Kai-yah,” Yeonjun says, grabbing Kai’s hand once again, and it really gives Taehyun whiplash how quickly he decides to refer to someone so casually, “are you joining the dance club? Are you here to make sure Taehyun-ah never leaves me?”
Kai laughs. “I’m afraid not,” they say. “My schedule’s full, unfortunately.”
“Kai’s in the orchestra,” Taehyun boasts proudly, straightening her back as her body sways slightly. Kai rubs the back of their neck, a little bashful. This news has both Soobin and Yeonjun smiling broadly.
“No way!” Yeonjun exclaims, “Ah, it’s such a shame you two are first years. Last year’s show…” He blows a low whistle at Soobin, and she can only nod earnestly in agreement. “Oh, it was so much fun,” he continues, turning back to Kai and Taehyun with a fond smile. “Easily the best performance I’ve ever been a part of.”
Kai shrugs slightly. “You could put together another show this year,” they suggest.
“I’d rather die,” Yeonjun responds immediately, still smiling genuinely. “It was so much fucking work. I don’t know why I thought it would be a good idea to organize something to that scale. I mean, don’t get me wrong — I don’t regret it in the slightest!” Taehyun doesn’t miss the way Yeonjun spares Soobin a quick glance. “It’s just that there really is no faculty member that actively oversees the dance club; it’s virtually student-run. All the shows that we put together, it’s me and Woo filling out the paperwork and going to get the green light from the university. Dance majors come together to make the choreography for our shows, but we’re all in different fields of dance, you know? We’re not a dance school, so we don’t get a lot of donations at all, and the funding that we get from the university goes to outfits. It was honestly so lucky that the orchestra is so big in the university and the public, because they helped us out with costumes — do you remember how many costumes everyone had, Soobin-ah? And — man, it took so much work coordinating with the music department and actually getting them to agree to do the whole thing. That showcase was the best thing that’s ever happened to me, but I’m never doing anything like that again.”
Kai hums thoughtfully. “I get it. It’s like—” Kai inhales quickly, their chest inflating as they hold it in, lips pursed as if they’re trying to stop themself from saying something they don’t think is the right exact word. Their exhale comes out in a small huff. “I can feel it, how much it means to you,” Kai says. “I’m really happy for you, that you have an experience — a moment like that attached so strongly to your core. It’s like — like…”
“Like magic,” Yeonjun finishes, looking at Kai with awe in his eyes.
“Yeah,” Kai breathes. “It’s like magic.”
Taehyun looks at Kai, trying to take in everything that they are. Taehyun looks at Kai and sees a nebula — this person, at their very center, was Jung Kai. Huening Kai, if Taehyun used their father’s name. Kai Kamal Huening, as was their given name, one that Kai embraced with everything that they had. Surrounding them, like a veil of mist, are the things that Taehyun knows about them, each quality its own precious star. They love egg tarts. They think of their sisters like they are both the turning of summer, green leaves and white clouds and blue skies, because Kai was born in the summer and the three of them share the same blood. They were a little bit shy, but it only takes a breath for them to brighten up and flood the area with their presence. Kai’s expressions give everything away. Their love, whether it’s directed towards their family or Taehyun or even their plushies, burns hotter than the sun. And they love music more than anything in the universe.
Taehyun wonders if, when other people look at Kai, they can see the same thing.
“The recital’s tomorrow, right?” Taehyun asks.
“Yes, Taehyunie,” Yeonjun groans from where he’s sitting on the bench. “The recital is tomorrow.”
“This…” Wooyoung checks his phone, “is the sixteenth time she’s asked this week alone.”
“Oppa!” Taehyun complains, indignant. “You haven’t seriously been keeping track, have you?” She tries to make her way closer to get a glance at Wooyoung’s phone, but he moves his phone behind his back. When Taehyun pouts, he only sticks his tongue out at her.
“Of course, I keep track!” Wooyoung insists. “Being vice captain is a lot of work, you know. I keep everything written down and accounted for because that fool is too busy with…other things.” Yeonjun gasps, jumping to his feet with a comeback threat already on his tongue, but Wooyoung raises a single eyebrow. Yeonjun concedes, probably because this was their last rehearsal before the big day tomorrow, but mostly because Wooyoung was absolutely right and would dish the dirt out on Yeonjun if he wanted to. Yeonjun deflates with a sigh, and Soobin just snickers at him.
Taehyun wonders, briefly, if Wooyoung is the only person to get someone like Choi Yeonjun to stand down, then he must be much more terrifying. She should probably ask Wooyoung for all the leverage he has on Yeonjun. She’s a good dongsaeng. Wooyoung would give it to her, she thinks.
“I just wanted to make sure that I didn’t give Kai the wrong date,” Taehyun argues, although it’s mostly a mumble to herself. It happens to the both of them frequently, getting way too lost in their own things that they lose track of the days. Kai has a little calendar in their room that they cross the days off of as they go by — a habit they picked up as a child, even if they hate using paper, just because they can never remember the date for the life of them. Kai always had important dates written and circled in a bold red, and if Taehyun gave them the wrong date, then both of them were fucked.
“Well, you’ve shown up for practice all this time,” Wooyoung says wryly. He holds his phone out, he and Yeonjun immediately posing for a quick photo, before he throws his phone inside his sports bag. “I don’t think you have your dates messed up.”
“Come on, Wooyoungie,” Yeosang calls from the other side of the studio. He throws his arms over Wooyoung and Yeonjun’s shoulders when he approaches their little group. “Don’t you remember your first-year jitters?”
Wooyoung’s cheeks immediately flush, causing the upperclassmen to laugh boisterously. Taehyun has come to love and appreciate the sound of their laughter, recognizing it as one of her favorite things to hear, perhaps right after Kai playing music and then Kai themself. But Taehyun relishes in the way Yeonjun and Yeosang laugh, loud and boisterous, as Yeonjun claps his hands. Soobin has a large smile on her face, no doubt the expression of someone who might not have experienced Wooyoung’s predicaments herself but has heard countless stories, and there’s enough happiness in the room for anyone to bask in.
Taehyun feels safe in their presence.
She hopes that Kai feels the same with their own seniors.
The showcase isn’t an extravagant affair. They had a decent turnout, consisting of a lot of freshmen still trying to get involved with the university, as well as continuing students who came after hearing about the joint show last fall. Maybe they were expecting something equally great — unlikely, in Taehyun’s mind, because the academic year just started and she’s pretty sure only incumbent members of the dance club were able to practice over the winter break, if they practiced at all. Perhaps the majority of the crowd consisted of upperclassmen, friends of Yeonjun, Wooyoung, and Yeosang that came by to support them. It was really cute that they had those types of connections — Taehyun thinks that the loudest of whoops and hollers came from three boys in the front row, but she hadn’t seen them around before today. But the performance went by smoothly, and Taehyun didn’t stiffen up when Wooyoung grabbed her by the hips and lifted her into the air, so she would consider it a pretty good success.
For Soobin, though, ‘success’ was a little bit of an understatement.
Choi Soobin was, naturally, really quite popular among the student body. If someone knew anyone, chances are that person might know someone else who knew Soobin. They didn’t even have to know Soobin by name; if anyone asked if someone knew the really tall girl with the long black hair, everyone has seen her on campus at least once. But even if some don’t know Choi Soobin personally, she knew everyone. Taehyun’s still not sure how Soobin knows so many people. “It’s a really long story,” was all Soobin had said, and when Taehyun looked up at her with expectant eyes, Soobin only laughed in response. Taehyun doesn’t think that she’ll ever get all the details.
But Soobin was currently being crowded near the stage, enough flowers given to her by an abundance of people that it looked like an expensive, overstuffed bouquet. She was on her way backstage before being bombarded, but she doesn’t seem to be complaining. Yeonjun only peeked through the curtain and snickered at all of Soobin’s attention, only to turn around to meet Wooyoung and Yeosang’s identically accusing looks. From what Taehyun could see, though, Soobin’s smile is wide and her dimples are sunken deep as she tucks her hair behind her ear and converses with someone before bidding them goodbye and moving onto the next person. It was almost like she was an idol at a meet-and-greet. Taehyun wouldn’t be surprised if that was the actual case behind her “long story.”
Taehyun was sitting in one of the chairs, two of the second-years helping her remove her stage getup. Ryujin helped take all the pins out of Taehyun’s hair while Chaeryeong helped take off her fake eyelashes. Since the three of them were around the same height and build, they helped each other with costumes the most. Taehyun really likes them. Once there’s nothing left in Taehyun’s head besides hairspray, the older girls wish Taehyun goodbye with a tight hug before all but running out from backstage. Taehyun looks back in the mirror and reaches for a makeup wipe.
“Tae-yah!”
Taehyun moves the makeup wipe away from her face as she turns her head and looks for the source of the sound. It really shouldn’t be hard; there wasn’t that much space backstage and Kai was built like a stalk of sugarcane, but it takes a while before Kai appears in her field of vision.
“Kai!” Taehyun exclaims. She thinks she can feel the difference in her smile, the way her cheeks are a little more strained than they were when the dance club was giving their final bow to the audience. She’s quick to wrap her arms around Kai’s waist and squeeze with everything she has, Kai all but pressing her into their chest. When they pull away from each other, Kai’s presenting a small bouquet to Taehyun. There are only three flowers — daffodils, fresh ones, because they’re finally in season — but Taehyun has never felt warmer in her life.
“Congratulations,” whispers Kai, and Taehyun almost can’t hear them through all the bustling that’s going on backstage. “You were amazing.”
“Thank you,” Taehyun replies. Her cheeks are starting to hurt from smiling. “How’d you get backstage? I thought—”
“Yeah, they said that only the dancers were allowed back here until everything was cleared out,” Kai says, sheepish as they scrunch their nose slightly. Taehyun is reminded of all the times they were both caught doing things they shouldn’t have been doing when they were kids. “I actually came with—” Kai whips around quickly, but they don’t seem to find what they’re looking for. “I lost her.”
“How do you lose a person?” Taehyun laughs.
“With her, it happens more often than you’d think,” Kai smirks. “But I came with Beomgyu-unnie! My first chair.”
Taehyun raises an eyebrow. “How have I gone this whole time without knowing First Chair Girl’s name?”
“Am I just First Chair Girl to you, Jung Kai?” someone else demands. Taehyun and Kai both turn and are immediately faced with a sharp glare. A girl stands in front of the two of them, a little bit taller than Taehyun, her arms crossed over her chest as she looks at the two of them. Her cold visage starts to crack, though, the corner of her lips twitching into a smile, and her eyes have no real fire behind them.
“Of course not, unnie,” Kai insists. “I was just telling Taehyunie about how we broke in despite being explicitly told not to go backstage.”
“Well, what were they going to do?” Beomgyu asks, so very unimpressed that the energy could be fatal. “Stop me?”
Kai smiles, wide and full of mirth, rocking back and forth on the soles of their feet as they lean into Taehyun’s space. “Isn’t she so cool?” they whisper. It was still loud enough for Beomgyu to hear, if her light scoff was indicating anything, but she’s smiling regardless.
“It’s nice to finally meet you,” Beomgyu says, turning her full attention to Taehyun. “Kai talks about you all the time.” Kai’s smile drops as Beomgyu’s only grows. Taehyun doesn’t notice.
“It’s so nice to meet you, Beomgyu-ssi,” Taehyun says. “Kai really looks up to you. Wouldn’t shut up about you, actually, when they first met you. They said you were equally cool and terrifying.”
“Sick,” says Beomgyu.
“Now I know you’re just small and annoying,” Kai grumbles dryly, cheeks dusted pink after being so blatantly exposed. They were prone to keeping compliments to themself for fear of being found annoying, but Taehyun and Lea have worked very hard to help Kai build their confidence. Sometimes, though, they still needed that little push.
Beomgyu hums as she gives Kai a blank glance. She turns to Taehyun as quickly as one blinks. “You’re my favorite dongsaeng now, Taehyun,” she says, taking Taehyun’s hand, careful not to crush the daffodils. “Jung Kai’s dead to me. You can call me unnie.”
“Do you know the movie Scott Pilgrim, unnie?” Taehyun asks.
Beomgyu narrows her eyes slightly, a little thrown by the sudden change of topic. She holds her head up a little higher, though, like she’s not afraid of the challenge — like she refuses to be threatened by two weird twenty-year-olds. “The movie based off of the graphic novel by Bryan Lee O’Malley? I’m familiar.” Kai’s lips are pursed slightly, and Taehyun can tell that they already don’t like where this conversation is going.
“So you remember that Scott has to fight off all of Ramona’s evil exes, right?”
“That’s literally the whole plot, so yes.”
“I’m kind of in a similar situation,” Taehyun admits. “Except, instead of evil exes, it’s evil sunbaes.”
“One of them is my sister!” Kai says proudly.
Beomgyu raises her eyebrow slightly. Taehyun has piqued her interest. “After meeting this kid, I can confidently say I don’t believe that. Are you sure they’re evil?” she asks.
From the other side of the dressing room, there’s a muffled shriek. Yeonjun and Yeosang have Wooyoung cornered as he tries to sink further into the couch, as if he’s wishing for it to swallow him whole. Wooyoung’s hands are desperately trying to cover every part of his bare torso as Yeosong pokes his body and sends the other boy into a fit of giggles. Yeonjun, ever the warmonger, tries putting the throw pillow over Wooyoung’s face to muffle his squeals and cries about Yeosang biting him. Or maybe he’s trying to suffocate him. Taehyun’s still not exactly sure what it is Yeonjun is trying to do, ever.
“That’s three of them right there,” is Taehyun’s way of answering.
Beomgyu turns back to Taehyun and takes a step forward. She’s wearing platform boots and — fuck, she’s cool, Kai was right — lifts her hands to grab Taehyun’s face. Beomgyu’s hands — covered in fishnet fingerless gloves, what the hell — press against Taehyun’s face, enough that Taehyun’s lips are being squished between her cheeks, and she can only blink at the older girl.
“Kang Taehyun,” Beomgyu says seriously. “Listen to me. Run. It’s not too late. Leave this place and never look back. It’s for your own good, Taehyun. There’s only so much time before the likes of them get their hands on you. Choi Yeonjun and his friends — they’re a skulk, I’m telling you. That kind of evil spreads like wildfire. Taehyun — Taehyun, listen to me. Take Kai and run, I swear to God—”
“Beomgyu?”
Beomgyu takes her hands away from Taehyun’s face and smiles. “Hi, Soobin-sunbae.”
Soobin huffs out a small laugh as she smiles. “How many times do I have to tell you that you can call me unnie?” she says sweetly.
Beomgyu tucks some hair behind her ear and the only thing that Taehyun notices is piercings among piercings among piercings. They match perfectly, all the same color and metal, and Taehyung is amazed that any of the chains haven’t gotten tangled. “Right,” is all Beomgyu says in response.
It’s actually a little bit funny, because Soobin calls attention to her just by walking into a room, but Taehyun can already tell that Beomgyu has such a big personality that, in a way, makes up for her lack of height. Taehyun watches the way Beomgyu and Soobin look at each other and she can feel the power radiating from both of them, two strong women in their own right but not in a way that causes conflict. It’s almost a little too much to bear. Taehyun reaches for Kai’s hand as they both take a step back, and Soobin makes her way next to Beomgyu.
“Have you finally managed to catch a break from your fanbase?” Taehyun jokes.
Soobin smiles. “I was just saying hi to some friends, but yeah, I’m ready to head out. Oh, and — hi, Kai,” she adds, like she knows to keep them from feeling left out. Taehyun and Soobin spend quite a bit of time together, and Beomgyu, by the looks of it, seems to be familiar with her, too. This is only Kai’s second time seeing the rest of the dance club. Taehyun appreciates the gesture.
“Hi,” Kai says softly.
Taehyun looks up at them. She doesn’t think she’s ever seen Kai this shy.
“Are you coming to dinner with us?” Soobin asks. “Yeonjun-unnie found this really nice place that gives you a lot of food for a cheap price, so we’re thinking of checking it out. It was supposed to be a club thing, but apparently Jongho’s throwing a party tonight?”
Beomgyu nods sagely. “Mech engineering parties go hard.”
“I think Yeosang-oppa and Wooyoung-oppa are joining us, though,” Soobin says.
“No can do, Soobin-ah,” Yeosang says, skipping around her before he rests his elbow on her shoulder. Soobin’s just a little too tall for him. “Woo-yah and I are headed to Jongho’s.” He reaches for one of the smaller flowers in Soobin’s makeshift bouquet and tucks it behind her ear. “I know you’ll miss us, but will you be alright without us, Soobin-ah?”
Soobin reaches for another flower and tucks it behind Yeosang’s ear, its dark purple hue creating a stark contrast to his platinum hair. “Yeah,” she says with a crooked smile, only one dimple showing, “I think I can survive for one night.”
“Soobin-ah!” Wooyoung calls, running over to them. He finally has a regular shirt on, seemingly free from Yeonjun and Yeosang’s antics, although Yeonjun is right on his tail. Wooyoung has his eyes open wider than usual as he makes deep eye contact with Soobin. “Soobin-ah, if you’re going to miss me and Yeosang too much, just say the word.”
“Oppa,” Soobin says seriously, leaning down to match his gaze, “I know you’re just trying to get out of going to this party. Don’t be a coward.”
“I fucking hate this family!” Wooyoung all but wails before practically slamming his forehead against Soobin’s shoulder. Yeonjun pats his back in sympathy, but the smile on his face is anything but sympathetic. It’s actually a little bit wicked. “Soobin-ah, you were the last person I trusted, my only hope, and you betrayed me.”
“Have fun tonight,” is all Soobin says.
Yeosang claps his hands excitedly before going behind Soobin to grab Wooyoung’s arm. “We’re going to get wasted!” he sings, tugging Wooyoung as they both make their way to the exit. “Have fun at dinner, you crazy kids.”
“Text me when you’re home and safe!” Yeonjun demands. Wooyoung gives him a pathetic thumbs up before he and Yeosang walk out the door. Yeonjun sighs, glaring at the threshold even if his friends were long gone. “If they’re not together by the end of the night, I’ll literally go apeshit,” he confesses.
“I thought Wooyoung said he was going to confess,” Beomgyu says to Yeonjun, and — huh, they seem to be acquainted, too. Taehyun thinks of the joint showcase between the dance club and the orchestra, and it makes sense for them to have known each other already. Taehyun knows for a fact that Soobin and Yeonjun are both amicable people, and Kai is always singing Beomgyu’s praises, so it’s definitely possible that they’re all friends.
“That’s Wooyoung-oppa to you,” Yeonjun says. He looks at Kai and shakes his head disapprovingly, lips pressed into a straight line. “Kids these days, huh? So disrespectful to their seniors.”
“Um,” says Kai.
“Anyway!” Yeonjun says loudly, clasping his hands together. “Dinner?”
Kai has always been dangerously competitive for the passenger seat — definitely a result of having two other siblings, as well as a best friend that always went wherever Kai’s family went, since more people in the car brought the satisfaction of having had more people to defeat, apparently — and thus naturally gravitated towards the front seat of Beomgyu’s car. Taehyun had no problem with this, and this type of seating arrangement made the most sense anyway: the two orchestra members in the front, since Beomgyu was the only other person in the car with whom Kai was most familiar besides Taehyun, and the dancers in the backseat. But Yeonjun cleared his throat before Kai could get in the car, though, a sickly sweet smile on his face that caused Taehyun’s heart to drop from just looking at it.
Taehyun was starting to think that Beomgyu was right.
Yeonjun narrows his eyes at Kai, not bothering to hide the fact that he was analyzing them from head to toe. Taehyun thinks this is the first time that she’d seen him look so threatening. Perhaps it checks out, with him being the dance captain and all. Everyone else in the dance crew never seems to abuse the fact that Yeonjun is very lighthearted and easy-going. He never has to repeat himself when he’s giving orders, and Taehyun heard from one of the second-years that Yeonjun ran unopposed for captain. Kai only blinks owlishly at him, and Taehyun can tell that they’re trying hard to come off as nonchalant when the truth is, Kai didn’t want to have to throw hands with an upperclassmen until at least their second year.
“Why are you so goddamn tall?” Yeonjun asks, shaking his head in slight disbelief. “How old are you?”
Kai clears their throat. “Twenty,” they say quietly.
Yeonjun raises a brow, cocking his head to the side just barely. “You don’t sound all that certain.”
“Twenty,” Kai answers. “Eighteen internationally,” they whisper to themself.
“When’s your birthday?”
“14 August.”
Yeonjun gasps. “A leo!” he exclaims. “Okay, you’re officially in my good books. Not that you weren’t before, Kai-yah, but your sign is very important to me. I love you now.”
“Thanks?” says Kai.
“However!” Yeonjun says, putting his hands on his hips. His crop top slides up as he puffs up his chest, and his waist is noticeably small compared to his hips. Taehyun is equal amounts jealous and attracted. Kai has a considerable amount of centimeters over him, though, and they really don’t seem all that threatened. “As the oldest person here, I go in the passenger seat. That’s just the way the world works.”
“Can you please just get in the car?” Beomgyu asks monotonously.
Yeonjun blows Kai a quick kiss and throws a wink in their direction before sliding into the passenger seat. Kai quickly turns around and climbs into the backseat, but Taehyun doesn’t miss the flush on their cheeks. They really played themself, though, because they didn’t seem to realize that Soobin was getting in the car from the other side in their haste, so Kai ended up in the middle seat. The middle seat, where Beomgyu can look at them via the rearview mirror, where Yeonjun can quickly look over his shoulder with unintelligible glances, where Soobin and Kai’s dangerously long legs cause their knees to keep bumping into each other. Taehyun, tucked into her little corner, can only watch.
Hopeless lesbian, Taehyun wants to say. She hopes that somehow, Kai can read her mind.
And, as if Choi Beomgyu couldn’t get any fucking cooler: she drives a stick-shift. She throws her arm over Yeonjun’s seat as she looks behind her and puts the car in reverse, and everyone else in the car is just — looking at Beomgyu. Watching intently. After she pulls out of the parking spot, Beomgyu turns back around and raises the volume on her stereo as if she didn’t just do one of the hottest things on this earth. Taehyun doubts that she and Kai are going to live to see tomorrow.
The restaurant’s a cute little place, family-owned and welcoming. It reminds Taehyun of all the times Kai came over for dinner with her family, of her grandmother’s cooking and the way she always insisted that she and Kai were both too skinny and needed more food to grow properly, of she and Kai sharing whatever was in their lunch boxes when they were in primary school, of Kai’s mother always having their favorite homemade snacks ready for them when they returned home. The group is guided to a booth across the room from the entrance. Yeonjun insists on sitting next to Kai, his new supposed favorite person, so Kai is pushed against the wall as Beomgyu sandwiches Yeonjun. On the other side, Soobin slips into the booth first, so Taehyun has no choice but to sit near the aisle.
This is fine, she supposes, but she can’t help but feel like Kai was too far away. The servers are quick to bring glasses of water to their table. They brought a plate of thinly cut brisket to start them off, and they say they’ll return soon with the full menu. Another server comes around with a tray full of side dishes and quickly sets them on the table. Beomgyu reaches for the side dishes first, stretching to hand Kai the bowl of macaroni. Taehyun blinks before she passes the dduk bossam to Soobin. Kai makes grabby hands for the bowl of dangmyeon, and Taehyun has to press a little too closely to Soobin’s side in order to give it to them. Why was Kai so far away? She just hoped they were comfortable.
“Sorry for dragging you here,” Yeonjun says. Carefully, he puts the meat on the grill while Beomgyu and Taehyun help distribute the rest of the side dishes. “I might have just realized that you two might not have wanted to spend your Thursday night with some hags.”
“I only see one hag here, and that’s you,” Beomgyu says.
Yeonjun turns to look at her. “You won’t be getting any meat.”
Beomgyu leans into his space, lips curved into a smirk. “I can eat other things.”
Taehyun quickly reaches for a glass of water and drinks before she can choke on thin air. She almost misses the way Yeonjun turns away, ears the same shade of red as the still-raw meat on the grill.
“It’s okay, Yeonjun-ssi,” Kai says from their corner. Either they’re used to Beomgyu’s jokes or they’re just refusing to acknowledge it. Across from them, Soobin reaches for the plate of dduk bossam and begins dividing it into smaller stacks. “I’m actually really honored to have been invited in the first place, so thank you.”
“Jung Kai,” Yeonjun says, his voice lower than Taehyun is used to hearing. “You don’t have to use such formalities with me. I said you were my new favorite person, remember?”
Kai looks at him, which seems to have been a mistake, because they begin to blush from the eye contact. They look down at their empty plate. “Okay, Yeonjun-sunbaenim,” they murmur.
Yeonjun continues looking at Kai. From this angle, Taehyun can’t quite see the look in his eyes, but she imagines it’s intense. Just how much does Yeonjun see? He spends so long looking and watching that Taehyun is almost certain that he’s the type of person that can see anything. He watches everyone so closely that he can pinpoint the exact error in their movements. It’s almost like he has the ability to scan entire landscapes in mere seconds and use it to find a single head in a crowd. Every time Taehyun has looked into Yeonjun’s eyes, she feels too seen. She wonders if Kai feels the same right now. She also wonders what exactly it is that Yeonjun sees in Kai that she doesn’t.
“Mostly, though,” Yeonjun continues, “this is my way of saying thanks! To Soobin and Taehyunie for their hard work today, and to Beomgyu and Kai for coming to watch. I really appreciate it.”
Taehyun pouts. “Yeonjun-unnie—”
“I will not be hearing any buts!” Yeonjun exclaims suddenly. “I’m treating you to dinner because you did an amazing job today!” He’s almost yelling, and Taehyun looks around the restaurant to check if anyone is staring at them. “Soobin,” he says, looking across the table. Soobin doesn’t flinch; it might be that she’s just used to Yeonjun’s antics. “Do you think that Taehyunie did a good job today?”
“Of course,” says Soobin, like it’s obvious. Taehyun turns to look at her and is floored by how certain Soobin looks.
“Taehyun,” Yeonjun continues, “did Soobin do a good job today?”
Taehyun still hasn’t looked away from Soobin. Soobin turns to meet her gaze and offers a small smile, one that barely gives away an indentation of where her dimples should be, and Taehyun swallows. Of course Soobin did a good job today. The way that Soobin dances is effortless, like she was born to be seen.
“She was perfect,” Taehyun answers honestly.
“See?” Yeonjun says, a wide smile on his face. Taehyun knows this look — this is how he looks when he’s gotten exactly what he wanted. “Of course, we have to celebrate.”
“What about me?” Beomgyu asks. She tugs at Yeonjun’s shirt sleeve and pinches the skin on his elbow. “You said you wanted to thank me, unnie. Aren’t you going to thank me?”
Yeonjun sighs dramatically, shoulders rising and falling fast. He turns his body as best as he can to look at Beomgyu. Taehyun may have only met her tonight, but something tells her that this must be how most of their interactions go. Yeonjun looks like he’s trying incredibly hard to come off as unamused, and Beomgyu smiles like she knows Yeonjun will always take the bait, and they keep egging each other on. Taehyun glances at Kai, who only looks back at her with an amused smile on their face and shrugs as if to say they also have no clue as to what was going on. Taehyun looks at Soobin, who’s just watching Yeonjun and Beomgyu with a soft expression.
“Thank you for driving us here, Gyu,” Yeonjun says, and then looks up at the waiter. “We’ll start with bulgogi for now. Can we also get some rice? Thanks!”
The waiter only blinks at Yeonjun before nodding profusely and leaving without a word.
“They’re in love with me,” Yeonjun says. He might actually be right. Beomgyu just scoffs at this, though.
“Taehyun-ah,” Soobin calls. She reaches for Taehyun’s plate and places a small stack of dduk bossam on her plate. Taehyun hums happily, giving Soobin a bright smile. She loves dduk bossam, so much that it might be a little bit unhealthy, and Soobin laughs heartily at Taehyun’s reaction.
“Brisket’s ready!” Yeonjun sings, grabbing a pile of meat with the tongs before putting them on Kai’s plate. Soobin and Beomgyu both groan simultaneously before closing their mouths shut suddenly. The two of them look at each other with wide eyes as Yeonjun looks curiously between the both of them.
Beomgyu is the one to break first. “Sorry,” she mutters, resolutely breaking eye contact with Soobin. “I just—” She huffs and rolls her eyes. “I thought unnie was going to serve me first. It’s stupid.”
Soobin gives Beomgyu a crooked smile, only a single dimple on her face, and Taehyun notices the blush on her cheeks. “I thought unnie was going to serve me first.”
“I guess you just don’t have favorite person privileges,” Kai says through a mouth full of meat. Taehyun scrunches her nose in feigned disgust, and Kai beams. She’s never been more glad to see them slowly coming out of their little shell.
“You go first,” Beomgyu and Soobin say in unison. The two of them pause again, blinking slowly at each other. This time, though, Beomgyu doesn’t look away. The blush on Soobin’s cheeks has spread to her ears.
“Taehyun-ah,” Yeonjun beckons. Taehyun quickly picks up her plate as Yeonjun drops some meat on it. She smiles at him, and Yeonjun shrugs like it’s not that big of a deal.
“You go first,” Beomgyu insists. “We’re celebrating the dance showcase, after all.”
“You go first,” Soobin argues. “Unnie fed the kids first, so you’re next.”
“Are we kids?” Taehyun asks no one in particular. Kai is too busy trying to wrap their meat in dduk bossam, and Yeonjun seems content watching Beomgyu and Soobin’s back-and-forth like a Mii in a Wii Sports tennis game.
“If anything, you should go first because you’re older than me, unnie,” Beomgyu argues. Soobin perks up at the use of the honorific. Beomgyu seems to notice this, because her entire body freezes as her cheeks begin to pinken like she’s been caught in the act. Soobin stares back, seemingly at a loss for words.
“I HAVE TWO TONGS!” Yeonjun suddenly yells, pulling Beomgyu and Soobin out of their respective trances. He reaches for the second pair of tongs by Kai’s plate and grabs two clumps of meat and puts them on the girls’ plates at the same time. “Please eat.”
Soobin giggles at the action and tucks some hair behind her ear as she looks down on her plate. Taehyun had always known Soobin to tuck hair behind her ear at times; she thought it was simply habitual, but as Taehyun thinks back on all the times she’s seen Soobin do it, Yeonjun is always involved, somehow.
And — now that Taehyun’s really thinking about it, Wooyoung is always going on about how he can’t stand Yeonjun and Soobin. Taehyun always knew this to be a bluff, because Yeonjun is Wooyoung’s best friend and Wooyoung is very protective of and caring towards Soobin, but she thinks she’s finally connected the dots. Wooyoung’s not sick of Yeonjun and Soobin, but sick of Yeonjun and Soobin together — of their incessant flirting and shared glances that last a little too long, of their walks to and from the dance studio even though Soobin has said they don’t live anywhere near each other, of the way they always seem to meet each other in the middle.
Taehyun might be stupid.
“There,” Yeonjun exhales, noticeably relieved as he puts the last bit of meat on his plate. “Everyone has food now. Isn’t that better?”
“Yes, sunbae,” Kai says. Yeonjun looks at them, eyes narrowed as if to scold them for not using a more familiar honorific, but Kai smiles — teeth bright and mouth open wide as they always do when they’re at their happiest, and Yeonjun visibly melts.
Beomgyu sighs dramatically, poking at her bowl of rice with her chopsticks. “I’ve been replaced,” she tells Taehyun solemnly.
“I’ll take care of you now, Gyu-yah,” Soobin promises. Had it not been for the hot grill between them, Taehyun images that Soobin might have reached over to hold Beomgyu’s hand. Beomgyu looks at her for a second before laughing softly, like she can’t believe the other girl is serious.
“Sooner or later, you’re going to regret saying that,” Beomgyu promises in return.
Soobin raises a brow. “I love a challenge.”
Across the booth, Kai looks at Taehyun with raised eyebrows and she tries hard not to smile. So the two of them might like gossipping about other people a little too much. But it really wasn’t their fault when they were with such an interesting group of seniors.
“Beomgyu-unnie,” Kai calls, breaking the tension, “you didn’t tell me you were such good friends with the dance club.”
“She didn’t tell you?” Yeonjun asks, visibly intrigued. While he’s too busy looking at Kai, Beomgyu steals some of his meat.
Kai hums as they shake their head. “When the semester started, all of the continuing orchestra members kept asking conductor-nim if we could work with the dance club again. Everyone was singing the dance club’s praises — especially yours, Yeonjun-sunbae — but Beomgyu didn’t really say anything. When I asked her about you, she was just like, ‘Eh.’”
“Choi Beomgyu!” Yeonjun scolds, turning back to face an unimpressed Beomgyu. “You wound me.”
“What are you going to do about it?” Beomgyu asks, batting her eyelashes at him.
Yeonjun rolls his eyes. “She’s so annoying,” he says to Kai. “I’m pretty sure she has a crush on me.”
“Doesn’t everyone have a crush on you?” Kai asks.
“You’re right!” Yeonjun exclaims. A waiter comes and takes away the empty brisket plate and replaces it with bulgogi. “Thanks for reminding me, Kai-yah.”
Soobin puts the meat on the grill since Yeonjun’s a little bit preoccupied. “I know that the dance club got a bit of recognition after the showcase last fall,” she says, “but no one talks nearly enough about the orchestra, in my opinion.”
“Everyone was looking at you,” Beomgyu says, dipping a piece of meat in one of the sauces before setting it on a small bed of rice. “We provided the audio, but you brought the visuals, you know?”
“That showcase would not have been the same without the orchestra!” Soobin insists. “I’ll always be impressed because of that. Seriously. Especially you, Beomgyu-yah — you were incredible.” She says the last bit a little softly, like she’s telling a secret she wasn’t quite ready to let out.
“She’s not the first chair for nothing,” Kai pipes up.
“Yeah!” Soobin agrees enthusiastically, looking at Kai with a wide smile. Kai blushes a little bit under her gaze. “I’m sure you’re amazing, too, Kai. We just have to wait until tomorrow to find out.”
“You’re going to the orchestra concert tomorrow?” Taehyun asks.
“Of course,” Soobin says easily. “You’re going, aren’t you? Your unnies aren’t just going to let you sit alone, Taehyun-ah.” Taehyun’s eyes widen as she turns to Yeonjun, who gives her a wide smile and a small nod. Taehyun glances at Beomgyu, who has a relaxed smile on her face, and then at Kai, who’s looking back at Taehyun with an equally-surprised look on their face. Here were three upperclassmen who have swooped in out of nowhere and taken Taehyun and Kai under their wings, but their relationship is turning into something more than that, and it feels like… It feels a little bit like—
It feels like dawn.
“Tae-yah,” Kai whispers, long after Beomgyu dropped them off at their dorm building and the two of them had gone through their bedtime routines, only Seoul and the moon providing any sort of light in Taehyun’s room. Taehyun hums softly as she looks at Kai. Even with their back to the window, there’s a strip of moonlight on the edge of their cheek. Taehyun wonders if she touches Kai’s cheek, she’ll be able to touch light, too.
“What’s up?” Taehyun whispers back.
Kai blinks — slowly, as they always do. Taehyun imagines that moondust gets stuck in their eyelashes, that their eyelids refuse to close until they’ve absorbed all the light in the room.
“I want to talk to you about something,” they admit to the night. “This is going to be something you don’t quite understand, and that makes me wary.” Kai sighs, their eyebrows creasing as their face contorts into a small frown. “But I love you, and I want to tell you everything.”
“You can always tell me anything,” Taehyun confirms. She begins to draw aimless patterns on the dip of Kai’s waist while they tangle their own legs with Taehyun’s. “I might not understand, but I’ll always try.”
Kai lets out a long exhale, and Taehyun scoots a little bit closer to press a light kiss to their forehead. They still smell a little bit like barbecued meat, and Taehyun is so fond.
“You remember when I came out to you as non-binary?” Kai asks.
They were fourteen. Kai’s mother suggested that maybe it was time that Taehyun sleep somewhere other than Kai’s room, because they were no longer children and there were still so many conversations about safe sex that needed to be had, so Taehyun slept in Lea’s room. This wasn’t a problem, because Lea was Taehyun’s Number One Unnie and Taehyun enjoyed spending time with both of Kai’s sisters, but she missed Kai. When everyone reconvened for breakfast the next morning, Kai showed up with red, puffy eyes and deep bags underneath their eyes. Bahiyyih couldn’t even finish asking what was wrong before Kai cried out, “I’m not a boy!” and ran back up the stairs in tears. There were lots of tears, kisses, and conversations that day.
“Of course,” Taehyun whispers back.
“I think…I felt really lonely, back then,” Kai says. “Lonely in the sense that I didn’t know anyone else like me, you know? I know I’ve always had you, Tae-yah, and we had our friends in grade school, and I was backed by so much support from my family and yours, but I didn’t know anyone else who wasn’t cis.” They close their eyes as they breathe in, and Taehyun pays attention to the way Kai’s body moves. “I don’t think it’s taken a toll on me. But I’ve been thinking a lot about it lately, and it kind of really sucked that I was the only trans or non-binary person I knew in grade school.”
“Kai-yah…” Taehyun murmurs, “I’m so sorry you’ve been feeling this way.”
“It’s okay,” Kai says. “Honestly, it is. That was back then, and we’ve entered a new chapter of our lives and broadened our horizons. I can’t do anything about the past, but I know now that I don’t want to be lonely in that regard anymore. I want to make those kinds of connections now. I’m going to put that foot forward.”
Taehyun lifts her hand from Kai’s waist and cups their cheek, rubbing her thumb across the soft skin. “I’m happy for you,” she says. “And I’m very proud of you, too.”
Kai smiles, close-lipped and soft, and Taehyun wants nothing more than to embrace them. So she does.
Taehyun squeezes tight for as long as Kai will allow her.
Being a mathematics major might have been the wrong move.
Okay, that was a lie. It wasn’t the wrong move at all. Taehyun loves math, and she’s ecstatic over the fact that she’s able to study something she loves so much. The thing is, it was just such a pain in the ass sometimes. There were labs that she had to take, things she had to learn that weren’t even quite math-related, but her advisor insisted she needed to know. Taehyun doesn’t think she’ll ever need a coding class ever again, because she had no plans of going into the computer science field, but she supposes it won’t hurt. Coding is fun, even, when she’s not crying over it. Things were okay most of the time. Right now, however...
“Are you sure you can’t come with us, Taehyun-ah?” Yeonjun asks for the thousandth time, pleading a little less than gently as he holds Taehyun’s hands. “Absolutely certain? I think you can miss one lab, right?” He’s so eager and earnest that he causes Taehyun to take a step back over the threshold of her dorm room. He’s completely blocking the entrance now, which inspires Beomgyu to grab him by the arm and pull harshly. Yeonjun makes a noise of indignance before pouting at Beomgyu. Kai only looks at the two of them with some sort of hope that the two of them wouldn’t start roughhousing in the middle of the hallway.
“Unnie,” Beomgyu says with finality. She firmly grabs Yeonjun’s hand so he can’t start shit, and she doesn’t let go. “Please stop before you start grovelling.”
“Yeah, there’s no getting Tae-yah out of this one,” Kai laughs. “Trust me,” they say seriously. “I’ve tried.” It’s true. After being rejected time and time again, Kai had officially given up last week.
“I did this to myself,” Taehyun says with a deep sigh. “Only a masochist like me would willingly take a math lab on a Friday afternoon.” Her first mistake was enrolling in her classes over the winter and thinking, yeah, I could handle class on a Friday. It’s only three hours and I used to go to school for almost three times as long. God, was she fucking wrong.
“One day,” Yeonjun promises, escaping Beomgyu’s grasp to grab Taehyun’s hands once again. He squeezes softly. He’s all but squeezing Beomgyu against the door frame, and Kai snickers from behind them. “One day, I’ll rescue you from this misery. I swear it.”
“Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” Taehyun deadpans.
Yeonjun groans. “You never let me have any fun, Taehyun-ah!” he exclaims, throwing his hands in the air. Taehyun and Kai’s hallmates might poke their heads out their own doors just to see why the hell someone was being so loud. “Don’t you want to be dramatic?” he asks. He puts his hands on Taehyun’s shoulders as he looks down at her. “Think about the drama, Kang Taehyun.”
“I have no need for it,” Taehyun says. She quickly waves them away. “Now shoo, go pick up Soobin-unnie before someone files a noise complaint against me.”
“The walls are thick,” Kai counters with a quirk of their eyebrow.
“But you’re in the hallway, Kai-yah.”
“Fair.”
“Do you want us to get you anything?” Beomgyu asks, squeezing past Yeonjun’s pouting self to softly pinch Taehyun’s cheek. Taehyun giggles softly as Beomgyu scrunches her own nose at her.
“Any kind of sweets, if you can?” Taehyun asks. “Otherwise, I’m good.”
“Okay, beautiful,” Yeonjun says before blowing a kiss at Taehyun. She turns her head away just to get a reaction out of him. It doesn’t quite work. “We’ll see you tonight!”
Taehyun hugs her friends goodbye — friends plural, because it’s not just Kai at her side anymore — before closing the door to her room. She really wishes that things could have been different, but Beomgyu and Kai had one last rehearsal in the morning, so breakfast wasn’t an option. The two musicians had to check in for soundcheck in the late afternoon, so they could barely squeeze in lunch. Taehyun feels more bad about the fact that she can’t attend more than she feels bad about being the only one unable to make it.
Especially since Kai will be alone. Kind of.
That wasn’t entirely true. Kai has Beomgyu, but it’s obvious that Beomgyu has known Yeonjun and Soobin for a longer time. Taehyun won’t be able to act as some kind of bridge, so that responsibility falls on Beomgyu’s shoulders today. She’ll take care of Kai, Taehyun knows she will. This is a good opportunity for Kai to branch out more than they already have, anyway.
Taehyun sees the three of them walking outside her window, Yeonjun’s arm wrapped around Kai’s waist as Beomgyu walks on Kai’s other side. The three of them are laughing, probably at one of Beomgyu’s corny jokes, and Taehyun feels warm all over.
It’s a little bit too hot.
After pushing open the doors to the auditorium, the first thing Taehyun saw was different crowds of people in all different parts of the room, from the emergency exits to right beside the pit. They had to be early to get the good seats — thank goodness for first come, first serve seating because Taehyun would have lost it if she had to sit in the balcony. Soobin and Yeonjun were already here somewhere, having dropped off Beomgyu and Kai for their check-in.
“Tae-yah!” Soobin exclaims when Taehyun is closer to their seats by the stage. Soobin turns in her place after standing up from her seat, causing the skirt of her lavender spring dress to spin, and all Taehyun can pay attention to are legs. Yeonjun turns from his spot beside Soobin and flashes Taehyun a broad smile. He moves around Soobin and shuffles his way out of the row of seats and into the aisle. Taehyun saw that he was wearing a long sleeve, but she realizes now that it’s actually a romper and all she can pay attention to are legs.
God. Taehyun is so gay.
Yeonjun excuses himself as he squeezes past random attendees in the aisles before he grabs Taehyun by the waist and pulls her into a hug. Taehyun has no choice but to throw her arms over his shoulders — which she doesn’t mind in the slightest, really, because Yeonjun is short enough that neither of them have to make so much effort to reach the perfectly balanced height (along with the fact that Taehyun might even adore Yeonjun, but she’d never tell him that). Yeonjun pulls away with an elongated wow! and gently touches Taehyun’s dangling earrings. Taehyun can’t even blink; she’s seen Soobin and Yeonjun in costume, and they both look beautiful in the outfits that the dancers wear for performances, but Yeonjun cleans up nicely.
“You look so good!” Yeonjun excitedly exclaims. He puts his hands on his hips. Thin, thin waist. “I hate that you have such good fashion taste, what the fuck.”
“I’m coming for your crown,” Taehyun threatens playfully. “You look amazing, too, unnie.”
“You bet your ass I do,” Yeonjun smirks. He shakes the clutch in his hand. “I’m headed to the concession stand to get some drinks. Do you want anything?”
“Anything is fine,” Taehyun says with a wave. Yeonjun is quick to run past her, probably intent on buying the drinks and making it back before the place can get anymore crowded, and Taehyun makes her way to Soobin.
“Taehyun-ah!” Soobin croons, pulling the shorter girl into a tight hug. Their cheeks are squished together and Taehyun hopes that her foundation didn’t smear on Soobin’s face. If she’s lucky, then her makeup managed to set a long time ago. “You look so cute! Oh, it feels like I haven’t seen you in forever when I literally hung out with you last night.”
Taehyun chuckles to herself as the two of them sit down. “Did you miss me that badly, unnie?” she jokes.
“Always,” Soobin replies. “How did your lab go?”
“I need to email my lecture professor,” Taehyun admits. “I zoned out for a second maybe halfway through and now I’m totally lost.”
“Poor baby,” Soobin sympathizes with an exaggerated pout. “Why are you a math major again?”
“It’s fun!” Taehyun insists with a whine as Soobin cackles. “What’s your major, anyway, unnie? I’ve never asked.”
“Linguistics,” Soobin says with a shy smile, a single dimple on one of her cheeks.
Taehyun blinks. “What the hell is that?”
Soobin laughs loudly, throwing her head back before she folds back into herself. Her dimples are as deep as they can be, and Taehyun doesn’t think she’s ever seen Soobin smile this widely. Taehyun’s eyes fall to Soobin’s neck, where Soobin is fidgeting with a choker necklace that matches her earrings.
“If I put it in really basic terms, it’s the study of language,” Soobin says.
“So… studying Korean grammar and shit like that?” Taehyun asks. She quickly puts a hand over her mouth, because physically restraining herself from speaking will be the only way to prevent her from saying anything dumb, but Soobin is still smiling. “I’m really sorry,” Taehyun apologizes quickly. “I interrupted, a-and I might have called your major shit—”
“Tae-yah,” Soobin says calmly, letting go of her necklace to grab Taehyun’s hand. “It’s okay, I promise.”
Taehyun nods slowly for lack of anything better to say.
“That’s part of it, though,” Soobin says. “It’s not just grammar, but also words that languages borrow from each other, and hidden meanings behind the way we speak, and how we use language to communicate with each other, what languages say about the kind of person you are or are trying to be.”
“You can tell all of that just from how someone speaks?” Taehyun asks. “Just by listening to them?”
Soobin nods excitedly. “Isn’t it so cool?” she says. “Semantics might be my favorite thing of all. I could say anything, but how would you understand it? If I tell you, oh, that violinist is cute, how do you know which violinist I’m talking about? I could be talking about Chang Youngjoo, maybe. Maybe we’re at a random solo concert in…I don’t know, Japan, or something. Maybe we’re watching a concert held by the university orchestra and we both personally know the violinist I’m talking about.” Soobin shrugs, a teasing smile dancing on her lips. “Sometimes, we expect the other person in the conversation to be able to figure things out for themself. If I leave you hanging, and there are so many questions you have to ask yourself in order to understand what it is I’m talking about — the fact that we can do that in less than seconds? Tae-yah,” she says, squeezing Taehyun’s hand, “isn’t that amazing?
Taehyun smiles. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she says honestly, “but I’m so happy that you’re happy.”
“Drinks are here!” Yeonjun announces once he reaches their row of seats. “Taehyun-ah, how do you want to sit?”
Taehyun narrows her eyes at him. “You’re just going to say that you have seniority rights if my choice conflicts with yours.”
“I honestly feel so loved that you know me so well,” Yeonjun croons, reaching forward to plant a kiss on Taehyun’s forehead, but she doesn’t feel like getting lip gloss all over her face right now. This only causes Yeonjun to cackle as Taehyun begrudgingly gets up from where she was sitting. Yeonjun takes his place next to Soobin in the aisle seat, but not before handing Taehyun her drink.
“Taehyun-ah,” Soobin says, “doesn’t Yeonjun-unnie look handsome?”
Taehyun grimaces. “I miss Wooyoung-oppa.”
“Taehyunie just doesn’t want to admit that she has a crush on me,” Yeonjun says.
At this point, Taehyun has long learned to ignore any and all of Yeonjun’s baiting. She’s not the type to be so easily flustered, anyway. But if Yeonjun and Soobin were going to be flirting so shamelessly right in front of her metaphorical salad, Taehyun was going to have to leave. She’d go out the other end of the row of seats if she had to. Taehyun had always been the type of person to completely avoid situations she didn’t want to deal with, but Wooyoung definitely wouldn’t put up with any of their shit. Yeosang would probably encourage the chaos, as would the rest of their friends, apparently — Taehyun doesn’t know whether to be relieved or glad that Yeonjun’s other friends weren’t joining them tonight. Seeing them making fun of Yeonjun would have been a plus, because Taehyun greatly enjoys the moments when her Not Number One Unnie is flustered, but Yeonjun is equally enabled by his friends as he is embarrassed. "They get along a little too well, I think," Soobin confessed over dinner, when the upperclassmen’s friends invaded the room backstage yesterday and caused the loudest volume Taehyun might have ever heard in her life. Beomgyu says it’s actually because everyone born in the year 1999 was genetically and biologically evil.
Perhaps it’s for the best that Wooyoung isn’t here, then.
The lights dim slightly as the maestro makes her way up the stage, clad in slacks and a lovely button-down shirt. Soobin claps excitedly in her seat, careful to be quiet enough, while Taehyun and Yeonjun give her fond smiles. As she looks back at the maestro, Taehyun thinks about how she never quite understood the monochrome dress code; it was always black in high school unless the music teacher said otherwise, and it doesn’t seem like it’s going to be any different now. Kai always said there was a beauty in the simplicity and uniformity of everyone wearing the same thing — Taehyun can agree after seeing what the entire dance crew looked like in their outfits, but very seldom was the high school orchestra ever perfectly coordinated.
Taehyun had never seen anything quite like this, though.
All the musicians begin to take their place in a queue, starting with one Choi Beomgyu. She’s always had her own way of carrying her body while she walks, but it feels different this time. Her back seems a lot more straight — not to the point where it looks stiff, but like she knows she’s right in her territory — and her eyes flit to the audience like she knows they’re there for her. The sleeves of her loose silk blouse rests comfortably on her forearms as she stands in her position with an enunciated click of her heels. The other violinists in her row follow suit, walking to their assigned seat and standing in front of it. The first row of second violinists take their seats, followed by the woodwinds and the larger strings. The second row of musicians start to take their places, and Taehyun tries very hard not not to clap with so much fervor, or worse, start cheering.
Kai stands in front of their seat and looks forward, as if they were deliberately trying to bore a hole into the back of Beomgyu’s head. They probably do this to annoy her, but Beomgyu doesn’t seem particularly bothered by it right now. Kai spent forever fussing over their outfit for the concert, so much that Taehyun was never allowed to see it, but God, was the wait worth it. They’re wearing a silk black jumpsuit with a plain white mock-turtleneck underneath, and Taehyun has never been more glad that she brought her polaroid camera with her.
Yeonjun lets out a soft laugh. “They’re matching,” he whispers.
Soobin and Taehyun both look at him curiously.
“Kai-yah’s headband,” he explains. “That’s Gyu’s ribbon.”
Taehyun looks back up at the stage, ignoring the way the other musicians are continuing to crowd the stage. Kai has a glittery cloth wrapped around their head to hold back their bangs. Taehyun looks at Beomgyu, who’s wearing a choker made out of the same material.
“That’s so cute,” Soobin admits. It might just be the reflection of the stage lights, but Soobin’s eyes shine as she looks towards the orchestra.
Taehyun sits back in her seat.
The applause is abundant when the concert is over, as was the usual reaction if Soobin and Yeonjun’s words were anything to go by. It would be a moment until the musicians cleared the stage and grabbed a hold of their instruments, but Taehyun spends the most of it looking over the photos that she took of the violinists. It was easy to take pictures of Kai and Beomgyu from where they were seated, and Taehyun managed to get a good shot of Beomgyu during her solo performance, which Yeonjun all but begged to be sent a copy of — Taehyun had a lot of editing to do later. Once the auditorium began to grow more empty, Soobin pulled her phone out from her purse and began to look for a place to grab food.
“Oh, I’ve really been craving Vietnamese,” Soobin says aloud. She leans into Taehyun’s space to share what was on her screen, and Taehyun hums.
“That looks really good,” Taehyun agrees. She doesn’t think she’s had a lot of Vietnamese food in her lifetime, but Soobin seems like a really big fan, and to her own knowledge, Kai doesn’t hate it. It would be a nice change from the barbecue they had last night.
Soobin keeps scrolling through her phone, but doesn’t move away from Taehyun, and Taehyun smiles despite herself. She glances towards the stage to see if the musicians are finally making their way out of the auditorium, and she finds Yeonjun making his way towards the stage. She didn’t even notice him getting up from his seat. Beomgyu appears from behind the curtain and hurriedly makes her way down the steps — as best as she can in her platform heels, because of course, she’s wearing those — before wrapping her arms around Yeonjun with a broad smile on her face. Beomgyu’s taller than Yeonjun because of her shoes, but not by too much, considering that Yeonjun was also wearing heels, but she seems to be teasing him about this regardless. Taehyun looks back down at the phone when Soobin mentions a Japanese place closer to them than the Vietnamese restaurant.
Taehyun narrows her eyes in consideration. “A nice, hot bowl of udon sounds pretty good right now,” she admits.
“Right?” Soobin agrees, looking up at Taehyun with a smile. “But, we could also get pho.”
“Hard decisions, indeed.”
“What’s up, what’s up, what’s up!” Beomgyu announces, making herself comfortable where Yeonjun was once sitting. She crosses one leg over the other as she rests her elbow on the armrest. With the tip of her shoe, she gently taps Soobin’s leg repeatedly. “What are we eating for dinner?”
“I was thinking that Yeonjun-unnie should cook, actually,” Soobin says, removing one hand from her phone to reach for Beomgyu’s own.
“Ooh, I agree,” Beomgyu says, squeezing Soobin’s fingers.
“I am not cooking,” Yeonjun says sternly, crossing his arms over his chest as he stands in the aisle. Beomgyu and Soobin both look towards him and stick their tongues out at him in unison. Yeonjun rolls his eyes and turns away, but his ears are starting to go a little pink.
“Ah, Taehyun-ah!” Beomgyu calls, straightening up so she can look at Taehyun over Soobin’s slouching figure. “Are those flowers for me?”
Soobin looks up from her phone and quickly turns to Beomgyu. Taehyun notices that the grip on her phone is a little tighter than it was before. “Did you want flowers?” she asks the violinist.
Beomgyu’s eyes widen. “No, it’s okay!” she insists. “Really, it is. I’m just teasing, unnie, don’t worry. I’m not a very big flower person anyway.”
Soobin boos at her. “What’s wrong with flowers?” she asks playfully. “Do they not go with your little emo image?”
Beomgyu narrows her eyes into a glare. “I’m going to ignore your use of the word little,” she says. “But why do you want to know so badly?” she asks, eyes narrowing just a little bit more. Beomgyu’s eyes widen as she gasps. “Choi Soobin, do you want to buy me flowers?”
“Can’t I just ask a question?” Soobin demands, voice rising an octave. Taehyun is curious at the fact that Soobin didn’t say anything about the lack of honorifics, but she supposes that it might just be a thing that Yeonjun insists is important. Maybe Beomgyu was just more comfortable with banmal. Before Beomgyu can make a retort, though, Soobin looks towards the stage and visibly lights up. “Kai-yah!” she exclaims.
Kai wears a crooked smile as they wave in response. Their hair is completely loose now, bangs all but completely covering their eyes, and Taehyun notices the strip of cloth that they’re holding in their other hand. Since he was standing in the aisle, Yeonjun is the one to hug Kai first. The two of them hold each other for a good minute, and even after separating, Yeonjun spends a time with his nose pressed into Kai’s cheek. They must have grown a lot closer during their lunch today.
Taehyun finds herself wishing that she was there to see it.
Beomgyu gets up from her seat and hugs Kai next, the two of them repeating praises to each other. It’s so obvious how much Kai admires Beomgyu, their eyes shining just from listening to her speak. Even though Kai has taken on the role of Choi Beomgyu’s annoying little dongsaeng, they duck their head in an attempt to bow when Beomgyu starts complimenting them.
“You’re a natural, Kai-yah,” Beomgyu says, pulling Kai’s head down so their foreheads were touching. “I already knew this, but God, I can’t wait to perform with you again.”
“My turn!” Soobin exclaims, finally standing up. “Jung Kai! How come you never told me you were so talented?” She pulls them into a hug, and for the first time tonight, Kai looks small. The way their nose is tucked into the crook of Soobin’s neck, it looks a little bit like they enjoy feeling a little bit tiny. Taehyun can’t seem to stop staring. Soobin pulls away first, raising a hand to brush the bangs away from Kai’s eyes. “You were so incredible tonight,” she tells them.
Kai smiles broadly. “Thank you, unnie,” they reply.
They were using more familiar honorifics now. Taehyun feels weightless and a little bit warm.
When Kai looks at her, Taehyun pulls out the bouquet of flowers out from behind her back. She tried so hard throughout the entire performance not to accidentally crush them, and she really hopes that they were cute enough for Kai’s liking. Kai was simply the type of person to appreciate anything that was given to them, so Taehyun wants Kai to love them.
“Iceland poppies for my favorite poppy,” she says softly, and Kai takes the bouquet in their hand before hugging Taehyun tightly.
“These are so pretty!” they exclaim. “They look so fresh, too; how’d you manage to get them to look so good during this time of year?”
“It’s not that hot,” Taehyun chuckles. “They’re still in season.”
Kai laughs. “Daffodils going in season and Iceland poppies going out of season,” they sigh. They lift a hand and carefully brush against the edge of a petal with their finger.
“I’m sure somebody has written something poetic about this,” Taehyun says. Like the rise and fall of the sun, she doesn’t say.
Kai blinks and says nothing. Taehyun tunes into their breathing as the smile on Kai’s face gradually grows. Taehyun almost can’t believe that she’s fortunate enough to have someone as beautiful as Jung Kai in her life, with all their love and warmth that’s simply exuded with a single breath. Kai was golden tonight, sitting underneath the yellow stage lights as they poured their entire heart into their performance, sending chills down everyone’s spines as a thin layer of sweat built up on their forehead. Even now, exhausted and worn-out and a little bit hungry, Kai still looks like they paint everything ochre. Do they know exactly how incredible they are?
“Maybe spring was made for just the two of us,” Taehyun adds in a whisper. There’s a slight shrug of her shoulders as she readjusts her earrings.
Kai hums in response. their smile unmoving. Carefully, they pluck one of the flowers from its stem and tucks it into Taehyun’s hair, right next to the pin that’s holding her updo together. “Maybe.”
Taehyun doesn’t register the sound of the door unlocking, but she does feel someone else’s presence in the room. She highlights the last thing in her notes before capping the marker and exhaling slowly. God, she’s been studying for so long — she’s used to this, of course, but this is the first time in a while that she’s gone literally the entire day without doing anything other than study. It’s a miracle that the words in her textbook are still mostly coherent and the formulas haven’t turned into incomprehensible jumbles of characters. Her eyes don’t even hurt that much from having her laptop on all day, and Taehyun’s convinced that blue light lenses are the best purchase she’s made in her entire life. Right now, though, she all but throws her glasses onto her desk and rubs at her eye.
“I brought leftovers,” Kai says quietly. The close proximity of their voice sends chills down Taehyun’s spine as she drops the marker.
Kai laughs out loud, and Taehyun quickly sits up and turns around in her chair to see her best friend with their head thrown back as they all but stumble onto the couch. She hates that they always sneak up on her just to whisper right in her ear, but what she hates more is that she never sees it coming. Taehyun clicks her tongue as she narrows her eyes at Kai, but they both know she can never be truly mad at them. Kai smiles cheekily as they pat the spot next to them on Taehyun’s couch, and Taehyun plops down unceremoniously.
“Treated yourself to lunch?” Taehyun asks, bringing up her knees as she rests her head on them. Maybe, if she curls up into a ball and manages to form some kind of cocoon, she’ll never have to study math again.
Kai shakes their head. “I, um, actually met up with Soobin-unnie for lunch. You know. Because it’s Saturday.”
“That’s really nice, Kai-yah,” Taehyun mumbles sleepily. She’s allowed a single cheat sheet for her exam tomorrow, and she has to think about which things to put on there and how exactly to organize them. The mockup she did on PowerPoint was still a major work in progress. Her professor said she was going to write down all the major formulas they needed to know on the whiteboard, so Taehyun didn’t have to worry about that, but she really needed to be absolutely certain about her concepts.
It’s not so much something she’s beginning to practice, and it might just be out of pure drowsiness than anything else, but Taehyun blinks slowly. There must be some sort of art to it, if her best friend does it so frequently. Kai looks good — they seem to be wearing a perfume with a smell more fruity than Taehyun is used to associating with them, and they put more effort into coordinating their jewelry than going out with whichever earrings they forgot to take off the night before. On Kai’s left hand is a single silver band, the ring their dad gave them the year they turned eighteen, the one Kai has been wearing every single day since then.
As her mind slowly starts to drift away from mathematical concepts and applied theories, Soobin’s words start to flood into Taehyun’s brain. She thinks of Soobin’s rich voice talking about the way people communicate with each other and how listeners of a conversation are always working to put together the pieces of what is being said. Slowly, Taehyun opens her eyes.
“Jung Kai,” Taehyun says slowly, lifting her head up from atop her knees a little too quickly — she might just be getting vertigo at the ripe age of twenty — and uncurls herself to look at her best friend accusingly. “Did you go on a date with Soobin-unnie?”
Kai’s shoulders tense up as their cheeks flush red. They’re still holding onto the bag of takeout and it looks more like Taehyun caught them elbow-deep in the cookie jar. Her eyes widen and she takes a deep breath to stop herself from screaming, and that takes all of her power.
“Kai, holy fuck—”
“It wasn’t a date—”
“The more you stall, the more it sounds like it was a date—”
“Bitch, can you please chill for a second?” Kai laughs, though it sounds a little bit panicked. They put the food down on the floor, because it’ll definitely be knocked over and spilled if they keep fucking around like this. “It’s my turn to speak! Shit.”
“Okay, okay, okay,” Taehyun concedes. She sits back down on her ass and hugs her knees as she looks up at Kai expectantly, her toes wiggling with excitement. Taehyun was going to be the best listener. She quickly inhales as she pinches the cloth of her sweatpants and rubs it between her fingers, and she waits.
“I can see how much you’re struggling to hold it in,” Kai says monotonously.
“I just have one question before you start,” Taehyun rushes out.
“I know,” Kai weakly groans.
“Did you get your shit rocked?”
“KANG TAEHYUN,” Kai all but shrieks, and — fuck, this was going to be their second noise complaint since the semester started, and they’re not even halfway through April. Taehyun lets out a loud cackle despite herself, and Kai tries to physically silence her. This, of course, involves Kai all but lunging for Taehyun’s throat and straddling her hips as Taehyun holds onto Kai’s wrists — the way it’s been since they were kids, no thanks to Kai’s ridiculously unfair height advantage and Taehyun’s proneness to start petty arguments (mostly the former, obviously). But Taehyun’s been working out, so she knows she’s able to hold them off. Once the majority of Taehyun’s giggles have left her body, Kai lets out a resigned sigh.
“Did you, though?” Taehyun asks in a whisper. One of their neighbors — or worse, an RA — was definitely going to knock on the door if they didn’t get their shit together.
“No!” Kai hisses back. “First of all, if I did have sex I would have immediately called you afterwards, so I’m offended that you even had to ask.”
Taehyun lets herself relax against the couch as she finally releases Kai’s wrists. “I’m asking out of genuine concern for your well being!”
“I’m fine!” Kai insists.
“What’s the second part?”
“Hm?”
“You said ‘first of all,’” Taehyun explains softly. There’s a glow to Kai that she doesn’t think she’s seen before, like they’ve never been quite this happy. “What’s the second part?”
Kai blinks. “There’s no second part,” they say. “I’m just being dramatic, you know me.”
“I hope you know you’ll never be as dramatic as me,” Taehyun says. She slides up on the couch, grabbing Kai’s thigh with a single hand to drag them with her; she didn’t want them to fall off her lap. “What’s for lunch, then?”
“Dinner,” Kai corrects. “It’s a little after five.”
“Shit,” Taehyun groans, letting her head fall back. “The last time I ate was around 8:30. Fuck.”
“I know, dumbass,” Kai says fondly. “Who else is going to feed you if not me?”
Taehyun looks back up and lets out a deep breath through her nose. Sometimes, she looks at Kai and she can’t quite believe how much the two of them have grown, how much the two of them have experienced together.
“I know you said not to apologize,” Taehyun whispers, lifting a hand to gently pinch Kai’s cheek, “but I’m sorry you went through all this just to get me food.”
Kai narrows their eyes as they give Taehyun a knowing look. “You already know what I’m going to say.”
“I know,” Taehyun grumbles to herself.
“Do you want me to apologize for loving you?” Kai asks softly, their voice so quiet that Taehyun almost misses it. They rearrange themself so they’re lying horizontal on top of Taehyun’s body, and they burrow their nose into the crook of Taehyun’s neck just because they’re well aware that she’s a little ticklish there. “Nothing I do for you is out of obligation, Kang Taehyun.”
Taehyun hums, pressing their temples together as she wraps her arms around Kai’s back. They’re so warm. Taehyun thinks, for a second, of how quickly life would deplete on earth without the sun. She’s not dependent on Kai; she actively tries not to be, but she wishes she could do more to show them that she appreciates them. People don’t quite worship the sun the way they used to.
“Jung Kai,” Taehyun whispers, holding them tight. “You are love personified.”
“I want you to know,” Taehyun says seriously, adjusting the strap of her bag, “that you’re the weirdest person I’ve ever met. And I’ve known Jung Kai basically my entire life.” She looks down at her jeans and realizes that she owns another pair of pants that go better with the tank top she was wearing. Curse Choi Beomgyu for rushing her to get dressed so quickly. Her hair’s barely dry.
“I believe it,” Beomgyu says, like it’s something that she’s proud of. Taehyun admires her confidence — it’s no wonder why Kai was so drawn to her when they first met Beomgyu.
“I just think…” Taehyun clicks her tongue and sighs. Sometimes, she has trouble putting things into words. “There could have been more…orthodox ways of going about this, maybe?”
Beomgyu hums and tilts her head slightly, like she’s seriously considering that it might have been just a little bit weird that she showed up at Taehyun’s door in a fluffy jacket that was just on the edge of inappropriate for springtime, and then sat on the couch while she waited for Taehyun to shower and get ready before she dragged the younger girl out to do who knows what — instead of scheduling something ahead of time. Granted, Taehyun could have avoided all this if she had just answered the phone when Beomgyu called (the first time, at least), but she never takes her phone off silent mode in the first place, so it wouldn’t have helped. Taehyun just has to live with these circumstances.
“Country girls make do,” is all Beomgyu says.
Taehyun snorts. She decides she’s not going to give Beomgyu the satisfaction of responding to her comment, because she’s well aware that they both know what the original meme is about. “What are we doing again?”
Beomgyu skips in her step, turning and walking backwards so she can face Taehyun. She looks like the type of person who skates. “We’re looking for a gift for Kai-chi,” she announces, smiling bright and wide. Taehyun can’t believe Kai ever found her terrifying. “And since you grew up with them and know them objectively better than anyone else in the entire world, you’re going to help!”
Of course, Taehyun smiles, because anything that has to do with Jung Kai is bound to make her smile. “Okay, now I’m positive that there were more orthodox ways to go about this,” she says, continuing her little act of annoyance, because she has a persona to upkeep. “What did you even—? Actually, I don’t want to know.”
“I wasn’t looking through your things while you were showering,” Beomgyu dismisses easily. “And I definitely didn’t come across the vibrator you keep in the drawer in your nightstand.”
“Of all the ways you could have made me believe you, why did it have to be that one?” Taehyun groans. “Oh, right.”
“Everyone keeps their vibrator in the drawer in their nightstand,” Taehyun and Beomgyu say in unison. Beomgyu smiles, her entire face brightening up like she’s glad that she’s found another way for the two of them to connect, and Taehyun tries very hard not to hope that she miraculously wakes up from this hell of a dream. That would be rude.
“So what kind of gift is this?” Taehyun exclaims loudly. They both needed to focus.
“I want this gift to be personal, Taehyun-ah,” Beomgyu explains. She turns back around and returns to Taehyun’s side. The two of them walk in tandem, like Beomgyu had never moved away in the first place. Kai has said before that, even if there are always even breaks in between, it’s completely unintentional. Beomgyu walks in the same way, and Taehyun finds it easy to match her pace. She’s come to appreciate rhythm in the past few weeks. “I’m going to be honest with you, Kang Taehyun. I’ve never connected with a dongsaeng quite like this before.”
“Aren’t you a second-year?” Taehyun interrupts. “You were the dongsaeng until an hour ago.” She fights the urge to chuckle at her own joke.
“I love Jung Kai,” Beomgyu says, completely ignoring Taehyun’s remark. “I look at them, and I want to give them the entire world. I would literally do anything if they asked it of me. Do you get what I’m saying?”
Taehyun turns and looks at this enigma of a girl — some who evokes an image of rebellion and revelry until the second she opens her mouth — and then towards the sky — the sun’s home. It’s funny, the fact that she was thinking of this very thing just recently. It’s almost like Beomgyu was inside her head.
“Completely,” she answers.
“I want this gift to be something personal,” Beomgyu continues. “They’re so talented. I’ve never met anyone who loves music as much as I do. And I know that they don’t love music the same way I do, and that makes it more special to me, you know? The way I think of music is different from how Kai sees it, and we find a connection in that. And it’s not the same as—” She stops herself suddenly, stuffing her hands into the pockets of her jacket. “I know it hasn’t even been two months, but Kai means so much to me already. And it kind of freaked me out, how quickly this happened, but I figure it’s best if I act on it, right?”
When Taehyun turns her head, Beomgyu is looking back at her expectantly. And it’s a little bit weird, because Beomgyu just described everything that Taehyun feels for Jung Kai — she remembers being five years old in kindergarten, letting go of her mother’s hand to run to the kid that had the same rain boots that she did, looking into the brightest eyes she’d ever see for the rest of her life, and declaring that kid to be her best friend forever without even learning their name first. Taehyun doesn’t know why it feels weird, and it’s making her nervous. The fact that she’s starting to feel a little nervous only makes her feel worse. Taehyun loves when other people notice how incredible Jung Kai is. Kai means the world to her, and the fact that other people are able to share those sentiments brings a joy to Taehyun that she can’t even begin to describe.
The way Beomgyu talks about Kai, however… Why does it make her feel uneasy?
“What are you thinking of getting them?” Taehyun asks, because she’s too scared to answer Beomgyu’s question.
“Some stickers for their violin case,” Beomgyu says easily, tucking some hair behind her ear. “Maybe a charm, too, if I come across something nice. Charms are cute. We should bring charms back.”
Taehyun looks at her for just a moment, before it lasts long enough to be considered staring. Just how strongly does Choi Beomgyu love? Taehyun has only known her for maybe three weeks, but she feels like she has Beomgyu figured out already — behind her punk-ish exterior and her soft interior resides a spark unlike anything Taehyun has ever seen before.
“This might have been easier to do online,” Taehyun suggests.
“I know,” Beomgyu admits. “I just wanted to spend some time with you.”
Perhaps it really is that simple. Taehyun doesn’t get flustered easily, but she feels herself blush from Beomgyu’s candor regardless. She adjusts the strap of her bag one more time even though she really doesn’t need to. Kang Taehyun and Jung Kai have been Taehyun-and-Kai for so long that Taehyun is used to the two of them being considered a unit. They had their little groups of friends in school, or classmates with whom one was more familiar than the other, but Taehyun doesn’t think she’s ever experienced a friend of Kai’s — a friend that Kai made all on their own — actively going out of their way to also befriend Taehyun. Beomgyu could have easily invited anyone else along as a buffer, considering that she and Taehyun are the least familiar with each other in their group of mutual friends, but she made the effort to hang out with Taehyun alone.
Taehyun thinks she has Choi Beomgyu figured out: grand gestures and a fierce determination to show love.
“Just text me next time,” she scoffs, because Taehyun doesn’t cry before noon.
Beomgyu snaps her head towards Taehyun. “I tried!” she yells, and Taehyun cackles. “God, I try to do something nice and I just get disrespected. I fucking hate it here.”
“Okay, okay, I’ll be nice,” Taehyun says. Beomgyu doesn’t seem to believe her. She’s right not to.
They end up at a little stationery store in a shopping center right in the heart of Seoul. Taehyun finds herself in front of a shelf with nothing but post-its, each with their own cute little designs, and she knows for a fact that she doesn’t have nearly enough won in her bank account to buy them all. She sure would like to.
“So, you’re one of those people,” she hears Beomgyu say.
Taehyun doesn’t look away from the shelf. She just spotted various packages of post-its that look like all the planets in their solar system, and she’s trying so hard to convince herself not to buy some. “Hm?”
“Taehyun,” Beomgyu calls, and Taehyun can’t help but feel her voice sounds a little bit accusatory, “you’ve been standing here for five whole minutes just staring at post-its. Did you even notice that I left and just came back to you now? You haven’t moved at all.”
Fuck, the planet post-its come with an extra pack of moon post-its if she buys the entire boxed collection. She could have the entire solar system in the palms of her hands. Taehyun longs. “Aren’t you supposed to be looking for a gift?”
“Aren’t you supposed to be helping me?” Beomgyu retorts, mimicking Taehyun’s tone. She scoffs, realizing that Taehyun is still far too distracted to answer, and she grabs Taehyun’s hand. “Come on, I’m going to buy a plushie.”
Taehyun reaches for the shelf dramatically as if she were the protagonist in a movie promising her love interest that she would return to them, come hell or high water, but Beomgyu doesn’t stop tugging her away. The post-it collection is calling her name. Before they can reach the plushies on the other side of the store, though, Beomgyu stops, almost causing Taehyun to crash into her. The complaint is just about to leave Taehyun’s mouth before she registers who’s standing in front of them.
“Unnie!” Taehyun exclaims happily, letting go of Beomgyu’s hand to wrap her arms around Soobin’s waist. Soobin is way too tall for Taehyun to throw her arms over her shoulders, especially when she’s wearing heels, but Taehyun will experience the feeling one day. She just has to make a running start, probably. And perhaps warn Soobin in advance.
“Hi, hi,” Soobin giggles, hugging Taehyun back just as tight. When Taehyun lets go and pulls away, Soobin and Beomgyu are staring at each other without moving. “Hi, Beomgyu,” Soobin says softly, and it sounds more like an exhale than anything else.
“Hi, unnie,” Beomgyu all but murmurs.
It takes everything in Taehyun not to roll her eyes. What a fucking disaster.
“Unnie,” Taehyun says, beckoning Soobin's attention before the staring could go on for any longer, “what are you looking for?”
Soobin — reluctantly — looks away from Beomgyu. They were right in the middle of the pencil aisle, and Taehyun could scream. “My, um, highlighters officially died out. I should’ve bought some earlier, because I knew this day was coming, but I’ve been so caught up in studying that I forgot.” She takes a quick swig of her water bottle. “What are you two doing here?”
“Beomgyu-unnie kidnapped me,” Taehyun says with a sly smile. “You know how it is.”
“Ah, if only Beomie would whisk me off my feet,” Soobin sighs wistfully, tucking a loose strand of hair behind her ear and then tugging on her earring. Taehyun doesn’t know if it was something in the light, or if it was makeup, but she thinks Soobin has had rosy cheeks this entire time. “I think she’s intimidated by me, though,” she stage-whispers to Taehyun. “Which is ridiculous, because I don’t bite.”
“I do,” Beomgyu blurts out a little too loudly. A few heads turn in their direction. Taehyun can’t stop herself from cringing.
“We’re looking for a gift for Kai,” Taehyun says, desperate to move the conversation elsewhere.
“Oh!” Soobin chirps. She quickly looks around the store, her eyes falling on the plushies against the wall. “Kai-yah really likes penguins, don’t they? And unicorns.” Soobin looks down at the watch on her wrist. “I have a club meeting to go to, so I have to get going, but I’ll see you both soon, yeah?”
“Bye, unnie!” Taehyun and Beomgyu say in unison, and once Soobin has purchased her things and walked out the door, Taehyun smacks Beomgyu’s arm.
“What the fu—”
“What the hell is wrong with you?” Taehyun asks, her voice hushed because at least she knows about public decency. “You can’t flirt to save your fucking life.”
Beomgyu’s eyes widen. “What are you talking about?” she asks, everything about her giving herself away, from her expression to the higher pitch of her voice.
“You’re so gone for Soobin-unnie,” Taehyun says, laying it out plain and clear. “And she’s so obviously into you.” She grabs Beomgyu’s arm and drags her to the corner of the store, just in case Taehyun needs to suffocate her with a plushie. Instead, she grabs Beomgyu by her shoulders, and the fact that Beomgyu’s jacket feels just like a teddy bear really doesn’t help. “I’m going to drop the honorifics because I care about you, so don’t kick my ass. Choi Beomgyu. Choi Soobin is quite possibly the most perfect girl to ever walk this earth and she just said, out loud, that she wants you to take her out on a date. The fact that you’re not already dating is a literal crime.”
“I can’t even be mad at you for not saying that I’m perfect because you’re right,” Beomgyu says in a single breath. She inhales quickly, shaking her hands before the nerves travel through her entire body. “But she probably meant, like, a friend date, or something.”
Taehyun’s eye catches the enormous Snorlax plushie in a display case about a meter behind Beomgyu, and Taehyun thinks she could hide a body in there. If she grips Beomgyu’s shoulders a little tighter than before, Beomgyu doesn’t say anything.
“Soobin-unnie has been flirting with you way too much for it to be considered platonic,” Taehyun says instead, because keeping her cool is important.
“What if she’s just being nice?” Beomgyu asks.
Taehyun lets her head fall, releasing her grip on Beomgyu to pinch the bridge of her nose. “I hate lesbians. So much.”
Beomgyu makes an affronted sound. “Hey!” Her glare doesn’t last for more than a second. “Yeah, that’s understandable, actually.”
“Tae-yah,” Kai says, all but bouncing on the soles of their feet as they circle around Taehyun on the sidewalk. Taehyun makes sure to pull them close so they don’t end up crashing into any passersby, but no one really pays them any mind. At the end of the day, they’re all just university students trying to get by. Once they’re in the clear, though, Kai goes right back to encircling Taehyun — like they were a satellite of some kind, when Taehyun is almost certain that she was the satellite. “You’re coming to lunch with us tomorrow, right?”
Taehyun smiles, partially because Kai’s question is a little bit ridiculous, but mostly because she really can’t help herself — she never can, when it comes to Kai.
“Of course,” she says. “I’ve already confirmed it in the group chat, oh, just a thousand times.”
Kai stops circling around her then, falls flat on their feet right next to Taehyun. They resume their walk, steps completely in conjunction with Taehyun’s like Kai was never rotating in the first place, just like Beomgyu the other day. Taehyun thinks, briefly, of how Beomgyu described her love for Kai, and something in her stomach churns.
“I know,” Kai says. “I just wanted to make sure.”
“Make sure of what?” Taehyun asks, feigning offense, because that’s better than thinking of whatever it was she was feeling. “Kai-yah, are you doubting my word? You wound me, Jung Kai. And here I thought, my best friend whom I’ve known for almost the entirety my life would most certainly believe—”
“Okay, okay!” Kai groans. They swing their arms dramatically as they walk, snatching Taehyun’s hand in one swift movement. Taehyun doesn’t mind in the slightest; she just makes sure to grab her backpack strap with her free hand so it doesn’t slip off her shoulder like it’s prone to do. Kai holds Taehyun’s hand carefully, calloused fingers brushing over the soft skin of her palm. These are hands that Taehyun has held so many times before. She knows these hands. She welcomes the feeling.
She wonders, then, why there’s a warmth blooming in her chest that she doesn’t quite recognize.
“Soobin-unnie,” Taehyun calls. She hugs herself tightly, the strap of her duffel bag digging uncomfortably into her shoulder, but she needs the sense of security. She digs her fists into the dips of her waist, her skin still clammy and a little bit moist from post-exercise sweat, but Taehyun finds herself too lazy to wipe the sweat on her shirt. She stays still.
Soobin and Yeosang both turn, which is kind of the opposite of what Taehyun wanted. But Yeosang, ever the angel, takes one glance at Taehyun’s face and immediately takes the hint. She has to buy him flowers someday, takes a mental note of it. He gets up on his toes and presses a quick kiss to Soobin’s temple — even if it comes out as a loud smack more than anything else — before wishing both girls goodnight. He blows a kiss to Taehyun that Soobin doesn’t see before he jumps on his skateboard and rolls away. Taehyun starts to walk.
“Taehyun-ah,” Soobin says softly, meeting Taehyun halfway. Taehyun quickly looks back at the studio; the door is still propped open and she can see Yeonjun and Wooyoung sitting on the floor discussing ‘captainly topics’ as the last of the dancers make their way out. She wanted to talk to Yeonjun about this — he was sure to give sound advice, but Soobin wasn’t even waiting for him like she usually does, so he was actually busy, not I’ll-be-there-in-five-minutes busy. Taehyun walks slowly, Soobin silent at her side, as Taehyun touches the strap of her duffel bag in order to ground herself.
“I’ve never…” Taehyun looks down at her feet and swallows. “In high school, I never dated anyone. And I worried that there was something wrong with me for a while.” Taehyun looks up to meet Soobin’s concerned gaze, and she tries her best to brush it off. “I know there’s nothing wrong with me now! It was just a little funk I went through. I’ve made my peace with it. But… I don’t know if it’s because I was closeted in high school, or because I never really put myself out there, or if it’s because I’m incapable of love—”
“Taehyun-ah—”
“Unnie,” Taehyun says with finality, “how do you know if you have a crush on someone?”
“Um,” is all Soobin says. She’s quiet for a moment, only staring at Taehyun with wide eyes, her lips pursed in a tight pout. “It — it’s different for everyone, Taehyun-ah.”
Taehyun blinks.
“I…can’t really say that I know the universal feelings of having a crush,” Soobin admits, tugging on her earlobe. It snaps back into place before Soobin fiddles with the hoop. “It’s like — you want to be around them all the time, but in a romantic way. When it’s platonic, it’s more like… Ah, you love them, but you don’t want to kiss them, you know?”
Taehyun frowns. “You don’t kiss your homies?”
Soobin laughs and immediately stops herself like she wasn’t expecting to laugh in the first place. She lifts a hand as she pretends to smack Taehyun, causing the shorter girl to giggle. As Soobin’s arm dangles, Taehyun reaches for her hand. The two of them stop walking as Taehyun takes both their hands and presses their palms flat against each other. Soobin’s hands are so much bigger than hers, and Taehyun might swoon if she were a lesser woman. They’re soft — Soobin has said before that she suffers from dry skin and carries a bottle of lotion around with her everywhere — but still a little bit firm, and it makes Taehyun want to ask her what exactly her story is. It’s not entirely clear.
Jung Kai has their entire life laid out on their hands.
“Violinists’ hands…” Taehyun murmurs, “they’re very calloused.”
Soobin hums in agreement. Taehyun doesn’t pay attention to the way Soobin’s eyebrows are set, her features no longer relaxed.
“Unnie,” Taehyun says again. “What do you think of soulmates?”
Soobin’s hands go stiff for half a second — she relaxes it once more, but Taehyun already noticed. Taehyun pulls her hand away.
“Don’t laugh at me,” Soobin says softly.
“I would never,” Taehyun promises.
They resume walking, and Taehyun returns to her position of wrapping her arms around herself. In the cool evening breathe, the sweat on her skin has just about dried out. Soobin huffs out a small laugh like she’s chucking at herself, and Taehyun waits. The only thing she hears for a while is their steps on the concrete.
“When I was in high school,” Soobin starts, “I thought that I fell in love a lot.” She looks towards the sunset, taking in the last bits of light. “It was the girl who helped me out with the math homework because I wasn’t paying attention in class that day, and every day after that, I would pretend I didn’t have a calculator. It was the girl who got off on the same bus stop as me, and we ended up sitting next to each other every day — and because public transit is tricky, we would stand together if there weren’t enough seats for the both of us. It was the barista at the tea house I used to frequent with friends who always gave me a small discount because she thought I was pretty. It was the RA my first semester of college who tried her best to make sure I adjusted to the new living situation. There were so many other people. The universe does many things for us — it provides us life, and love, and hope, but when it comes to soulmates…
“Taehyun-ah, do you know what we are literally made of stars? In the large span of things, we are so, so young. We’ve hardly existed for any time at all. Stars much older than we could ever imagine have contributed to the creation of life on this plate, to the creation of our own bodies. People say that there’s a possibility that you and someone you love were created from the same star, and that’s why you were drawn to each other. You’re a mathematician, Tae-yah. Think of the numbers. There are so many stars in this galaxy alone that we cannot begin to identify them all; we’ve run out of names for them. Of all the stars that we see in the sky now, how many are dead? How many of them were just recently born? How many deceased stars are there that we don’t even know of because we were born too late, or because their light could not travel far enough? What is the probability, truly, that someone I love has the same stardust in their bones that I do?
“What I’m trying to say is, while the universe provides so much for us, there are some things that we have to do for ourselves. All the people I was infatuated with when I was younger… I looked at every single one of them at some point and I thought, This is my soulmate. I chose them. The universe didn’t choose that for me. I chose that for me. And if it turns out that the stars decided differently, then—” Soobin shrugs, and the smile on her face is so bright. The setting sun casts a gentle glow on her face, her dimples form the deepest shadows. “What are they going to do? All that matters is that I pour my love out to the people I deem worthy.”
Taehyun nods, completely at a loss for words. She thinks, briefly, of Beomgyu’s sickeningly obvious crush, of the fact that she asked about crushes and Soobin mentioned love. She thinks, briefly, of the long glances that Soobin shares with Yeonjun, the two of them uncaring of how many people are watching them. If the stars might not determine soulmates, Taehyun hopes they at least offer a little push in the right direction, wherever it might be.
“Thank you unnie,” Taehyun says softly. The sun disappears behind the horizon with a quick exhale of their breaths.
Kai always falls asleep before Taehyun does.
This has happened ever since they were children. They’ve tested it before, too — once in Kai’s childhood bedroom, lying in bed and staring into each other’s eyes until one of them fell asleep, and another time in Taehyun’s bedroom, just to remove any bias. Whenever Taehyun thinks back on the memory, she feels the need to do the study all over again because of their atrociously small sample size. Then she remembers that she wasn’t yet a math fanatic back then, and also, they were nine.
Taehyun had always known that Kai has long eyelashes, and has spent the majority of her life both jealous and appreciative of this fact, but now, she takes the time to really focus on them. Taehyun imagines that moondust gets stuck in their eyelashes from time to time, that their eyelids close just because of the astronomical weight. How they manage to do it every single time without fail, Taehyun doesn’t know.
“Kai-yah,” Taehyun whispers into her pillow, “what do you think of the stars?”
Outside the window, the moon shines bright.
When they were children, Taehyun’s father would sometimes joke that Taehyun and Kai were bound to get married someday. Not because of anything they did in particular, but simply because they were children and — as best friends — together all the time. Taehyun’s mother would lightly smack her husband’s arm while he looked at her with a seemingly innocent smile, would say that the children were too young to be fed such gender normative ideas of marriage. Taehyun didn’t know what that meant at the time, but her mother always told her that if any grown-ups made comments about her and Kai getting married, be it the ahjummas or the ahjussis, then Taehyun should do her very best not to listen to them. Taehyun didn’t have to think of marriage anytime soon, and she could marry whoever she wanted, her mother said.
Taehyun didn’t really understand until she was about thirteen.
Kai never said anything about the comments of the two of them getting married, not even when they were children. Marriage was…a tricky topic, to say the very least, after the divorce of Kai’s parents. It took a lot of therapy, communication, and effort for Kai and their sisters to understand why their parents were no longer together and why their father wasn’t around as much anymore. It took a lot more communication and work for their parents to be healthy co-parents, even if Kai’s father was halfway around the world most of the time, but it was something they were all proud to have succeeded. And it was never like Kai’s mother was truly alone — Kai and their sisters had wonderful grandparents, aunts, uncles, and an abundance of cousins that were always around to offer support when Kai’s father wasn’t in the country. “Yeah, it’s a little bit unconventional,” Kai would say whenever they were asked about their familial situation, “but we’re all happy.”
When Kai came out at fourteen, this sparked a different kind of conversation. Still, they never said anything.
Taehyun wasn’t stupid in the slightest; it was quite the opposite, really — her mother would always say that nothing was able to go past her large eyes. She was quick to notice that any comments about marriage between herself and Kai immediately ceased to exist. Even her father stopped making comments for a little while, but Taehyun had never been afraid to talk to her parents about these things.
Her father sighed and took his glasses off. “I hate that this is the first thing that came to mind — your mother said that it’s because of my own internalization, but… When parents think of their kids getting married, it’s not usually…it’s usually because they’re a little boy and a little girl. And now that Kai is no longer a boy—”
“They’ve never been a boy,” Taehyun said pointedly.
“Right,” her father said, eyes briefly closed with his inflicted chastisement. “That’s my bad. Now that Kai is out, the first thing that might come to mind is, What would other people think? And — I know, I know,” he scrambled, trying to ease Taehyun’s frown at his remark, “that’s not a good thought to have, but those kinds of things are, unfortunately, normal in our society. So, because all the adults that said something before are used to the idea of marriage between a man and a woman, they don’t know what to say now. A-and it doesn’t matter what they think. That’s not your problem, nor is it Kai’s. You know this already, I’m sure, but I just want to reiterate it.”
“What about you?” Taehyun asked softly. “I don’t care about what all the ahjummas and ahjussis said growing up. You made comments like those, too.”
“Yeah,” her father sighed. “It’s something I have to own up to. Would I have made comments about you and Kai being best friends for life if they come out earlier? Probably, I admit that. But Taehyun-ah, it doesn’t matter what kind of people you and Kai are. And it doesn’t matter if you two get married or not.” He took her hand and squeezed gently. “I know I participated in a lot of things that aren’t hip,” at which Taehyun snorted, “but I’m working on my biases. And I’ll be defending you and Kai-yah until the ends of the earth. Believe me, my dear. I love you both so much.”
“Thank you, appa,” Taehyun whispered. “I love you, too.”
Her father kissed her forehead and promised that nothing around the house will change unless Kai wants it to. There would be plenty of conversations to be had so everyone was on the page, but it was going to work out.
“Please do get married, though,” Taehyun’s father murmured against her temple. “Nabil and I might have had a bet going on all these years.”
“Eomma!” Taehyun yelled. “Appa’s being weird again!”
It’s not until May that Taehyun learns that Wooyoung and Yeosang actually live together. This, in Taehyun’s mind, makes things worse.
“How long have they lived together?” Taehyun whispers into Yeonjun’s ear.
Yeonjun leans into her space, much closer than necessary, and Taehyun shakes her head as she gives her unnie a knowing look. Their noses almost brush against each other. “They’ve been roommates since freshman year,” he whispers back. “That’s how they met.”
And Taehyun thought Beomgyu was bad.
(Needless to say, Yeonjun almost threw a fit when he found out Wooyoung and Yeosang didn’t get together at Jongho’s last party.)
Taehyun lets her head rest on Yeonjun’s shoulder as he wraps his arm around her. Their legs are both crossed, their knees barely touching. Taehyun has never thought herself to be someone who craves touch, but she loves this. She loves that she’s reached a level of comfort with people she can truly call her friends. Right now, though, she’s trying to ignore the fact that Yeonjun is eighty percent legs. On the floor in front of the couch, Jongho’s telling a story that has Kai laughing so loud, Taehyun feels like she’s truly on cloud nine.
“—and, I have to be honest, I was really fucking high,” Jongho says. Taehyun had a feeling that this was the case when Jongho barely started his little tale, and Wooyoung’s snort only seems to confirm this. “Okay, not really, but I wasn’t completely sober. Which isn’t good. Don’t try this at home, kids. But man, I was just thinking about how all of this was going to be worth it in the end. So I’m driving my little brother around, and this fool is still crying right? We’ve been driving for two whole hours. Two hours, and he hasn’t stopped crying once. I don’t know if he’s drinking ten liters of water a day, but holy shit, I have no idea how he never ran out of fucking tears. But he looks at me and goes, ‘Hyung, have I ever told you how much I love you?’ And I do not want to be having this conversation with my little brother when he’s drunk out of fucking mind, but I go, ‘Yes, I know, I love you, too.’ And this motherfucker starts sobbing again because turns out, it’s midnight, and we both lost track of time as to how long I’ve been driving and I had an assignment due at 11:59. Now he’s crying harder about how he’s the worst brother on the planet, how I’m going to get zero marks on that assignment and then fail that class and then flunk out of school and then our parents would disown me for being dumb and I’m cast out to live on the street.”
“Hey!” Wooyoung interrupts. “Your parents wouldn’t cast you out, come on.”
Jongho blinks. “That’s the part that you deem unrealistic?” he asks. “Not the part where I flunk out of university?”
“Are you having another party anytime soon?” Yeonjun asks.
“Yeah, in two weeks, why?”
Wooyoung and Yeonjun share a glance before bursting into laughter, and it’s strong enough to make Taehyun’s body shake along with Yeonjun’s. Kai seems to find this incredibly funny — their laughs are loud and short, the way they are when Kai’s feeling completely unrestrained, so the edible’s probably kicked in by now. Jongho has a pout on his face that makes Taehyun want to lean forward and pinch his cheeks, and — yeah, okay, maybe she’s a little bit wine drunk.
“Continue your story, oppa,” Taehyun prods when she’s done being jostled around by Yeonjun.
“Okay, okay.” Jongho breathes in quickly and straightens his back as he prepares himself. Kai doesn’t stop themself from giggling. “So, it’s a little after midnight when we finally get home, maybe closer to one. I take my time parking because I don’t want to trigger the motion sensor, and when I turn to ask my brother if he’s okay, he’s dead asleep. Which is better than him crying his eyes out, obviously, but waking him up is the hard part. This dude sleeps like the fucking dead. But — but we get inside, right? And because of all the stress, I’m completely sober at this point. My neck is killing me, I’m fucking hungry, and I’m the one who’s dehydrated from seeing my brother cry so much. My sandwich is still on the kitchen island; my sweet, delicious sandwich that I was supposed to have for dinner. You would not believe how good this sandwich was. Perfectly toasted bread, just a little bit of mayonnaise, vegan ham, an egg that’s perfectly runny, a fuckton of tomato and lettuce—”
“The boy loves his lettuce,” Wooyoung says, nodding sagely.
“—and then — do you guys remember the In-N-Out pop-up last week? The American burger chain?”
Taehyun nods. Kai really wanted to go, but it was way too crowded. Seoul has far too many people.
“So I remember that my brother still has some of their sauce in the fridge somewhere. I don’t know what the fuck they put in that sauce, but on God, that shit is so addicting. I’ve never had anything like it in my life. I almost said it’s like a drug, but addiction is a real disease and that would be real fucked up of me, but that shit’s like — like, ambrosia o-or something. So I grab the little packet from the fridge, and I spread it over my perfectly toasted bread, and I’m thinking, oh, this is going to absolutely smack. I take a bite, and that shit’s expired.”
Everyone explodes with laughter, and it probably isn’t that funny, but no one’s completely sober and Taehyun’s laughing so hard she thinks she might just start crying. Jongho continues sitting on the floor, cheeks pink from all the attention, but his smile is wide.
“And then what happened?” Kai asks.
“Nothing happened,” Jongho says. “That was it.”
“Boo!” Beomgyu exclaims as she comes back from the kitchen. “What a shitty ending! Please tell me you made a new sandwich, oppa.” She sits on the floor next to Kai, Soobin right on her tail.
“No, ma’am,” Jongho replies with an exaggerated shake of his head. “I just brushed my teeth and went to bed.”
“I’m going to buy you a sandwich, Jongho-yah,” Soobin promises, sitting between Beomgyu and Jongho and patting his shoulder sympathetically.
Jongho pretends to wipe away a tear, letting out a fake sob. “Thank you, Bin.”
“Hey!” Wooyoung calls. “What’s taking you guys so long?”
“Maybe if you helped, the food would be ready sooner!” comes Yeosang’s disembodied voice. San pokes his head out of the kitchen and sticks his tongue out before making more obscene gestures. Mingi walks out, holding a pair of chopsticks with both hands as he begins to make obnoxious kissy faces. Yunho walks out last and stands by his friends’ sides, arms crossed over his chest as he smiles. He doesn’t do anything to make fun of Wooyoung; he just wanted to be included.
“Yah, Youngie,” Yeonjun chides lightheartedly, “go be a good host.”
“I can’t believe I’m being disrespected under my own roof,” Wooyoung grumbles.
“Our roof!” Yeosang yells from the kitchen.
Wooyoung’s greeted with an abundance of loud smacks to his back and butt before he rolls up his sleeves and gets to work. If it was even possible, the noise from the kitchen gets even more loud. Taehyun catches eyes with Beomgyu, who only raises both her eyebrows in response. Taehyun doesn’t think she’ll ever forget what Beomgyu said about people born in 1999.
When Wooyoung and Yeosang invited her to their little post-midterms get-together, this wasn’t what Taehyun was expecting. She thought it was going to be dinner and drinks at a bar where everyone would drink a little too much, but Yeonjun snorted and said his friends don’t have that much money. Wooyoung said that it would be dinner and a game night at their apartment, food cooked and prepared by the two gracious hosts, and Yeosang said that they’d provide the cheapest variety of alcohol they could afford.
“Jun is bringing Beomgyu, of course,” Yeosang also said, looking at Taehyun with bright eyes. “You should bring Kai, Taehyun-ah.”
She appreciated it, that Kai was also invited.
When Taehyun looks back down at her little crowd of friends, Soobin is inspecting a disgustingly large scab on the backside of Beomgyu’s arm. It was still a little bit bloody, absolutely slathered in an antiseptic ointment, and Taehyun grimaces at the thought of skin being scraped off the body.
“This is just what I get for trying to do tricks I haven’t practiced yet,” Beomgyu says with a shrug. Of course, she skates. She’s so fucking cool.
“Really?” Soobin gasps.
“No,” Beomgyu laughs. “I rolled over a crack in the concrete and then ate shit in the university parking lot.”
“I keep telling you not to go downhill,” Yeonjun sighs. Taehyun can imagine his eye roll, but she doesn’t see how fondly he’s looking at Beomgyu.
“I’m practicing, unnie!” Beomgyu insists. If I have my shoe gently scraping the floor, then it acts as a break. I just…put it all the way down at once and that caused me to fall over because of all the inertia.”
“Hold on,” Jongho says, resting his elbows on his knees and then his chin on the palms of his hands. “Let’s keep talking about inertia.”
“You’re joking,” Soobin says monotonously.
“I am one hundred percent serious,” Jongho replies. “Forgive me for wanting to talk about things related to my major all the time, but I love it.”
Kai laughs, short and loud, and something in Taehyun’s stomach starts to grow warm. “That sounds like someone I know,” they say.
Taehyun pouts, perhaps protruding her lips a little too much, and Kai just blows a kiss at her. They’ve been spending way too much time with Yeonjun.
“What’s your major, Taehyun?” Jongho asks.
“Math.”
“I see the vision and I respect it,” he says with a nod. He stands up from the floor with a stretch of his arms. “I’m getting another drink. Does anyone want anything?”
“Water, please,” Kai begs. “My cottonmouth is no joke.”
“Ooh, can I have a Capri Sun?” Beomgyu asks.
“I’ll have another seltzer,” says Yeonjun.
Soobin reaches for her mug to take another sip, but whines when she finds that it’s empty. “More soda and wine, please?”
Jongho laughs. “Taehyun?” he asks.
“I’ll come with,” she says, disconnecting herself from Yeonjun as she gets up from the couch. He complains at the loss of warmth, but he’ll just have to deal with it. “I might just get a Capri Sun, too.” She gasps. “Capri Sun mixed with liquor! Ooooh, I’ve cracked the code.”
“I’m pretty sure that’s what the creator of Capri Sun had in mind,” Jongho chuckles.
The kitchen is a little bit chaotic, and Jongho can’t get to the fridge without being sucked into Yunho and San’s weird little dance competition, but he does manage to come back with some Capri Sun and the Ramune that Soobin likes. Taehyun’s already filled Kai’s mug with ice cold water, just the way they like it. She grabs a seltzer from the little cooler they have set up, and she hopes that Yeonjun likes the mango flavor.
“So,” Jongho starts as soon as he’s back at Taehyun’s side, “how long have you and Kai been together?”
“Huh?” Taehyun asks.
“Oh, I asked—”
“Hold on,” Taehyun interrupts. “Sorry, I just processed what you said. Um. We’re not together.”
“Oh,” Jongho replies. “Sorry for assuming.”
“You don’t have to apologize,” Taehyun insists. She smiles as she mixes Soobin’s soda and wine. “It’s funny that you mention it, though, because when we were kids, everyone thought Kai and I were going to get married.”
“How cute!” Jongho exclaims with a slight gasp. “It’s like two baby gays but when they were actually babies.”
“Our dads have a bet going on, actually,” Taehyun continues. She pours some more wine into her own mug. “Kai doesn’t know, though.”
Jongho hums as he pours a little bit of vodka into Beomgyu’s mug of Capri Sun. Taehyun, a little perturbed by his silence, looks up at him, but he’s looking back at her.
Taehyun flushes. “I know how it sounds,” she whispers.
“It’s okay,” Jongho insists. “No one’s forcing you to say anything.” He gently bumps shoulders with her. “Besides,” he adds in a whisper, “are you really gay if you haven’t been in love with your best friend?”
Taehyun’s face burns, and not from the alcohol.
“Are you speaking from experience?” she asks, feeling bold.
Jongho chokes lightly on his drink. “Anyway!” he is all he says, voice obviously hoarse and a little too high, and Taehyun laughs as they make their way back to the couch. She feels weightless.
“Taehyunie,” Yeonjun sings, gently grabbing Taehyun’s hand before spinning her around. “We have somewhere to be!”
Taehyun sighs, because she really should be used to Yeonjun’s antics, but she doesn’t quite have the energy to indulge him today. Midterms have only recently ended but all of her professors are talking about final exams and projects, but Taehyun mostly wants to lie on the grass and curl into a fetal position before letting the earth consume her. She planned for this, too, has had it marked in her calendar for ages. It’s not like she has any sort of excuse.
“I still don’t understand why you and Wooyoung-oppa insist on having a freshman initiation process halfway through the semester. And oppa isn’t even here, least of all the other freshmen.” She goes on her toes and takes a small step to the side. Yeonjun spins her around again, this time in the opposite direction so she doesn’t get dizzy.
Even if Taehyun doesn’t understand Yeonjun’s antics, she’ll always have time to dance with him. Always.
The two of them move into something akin to a waltz, except it’s a lot less stiff and a lot more giggly. They dance their way out of the studio, Yeonjun grabbing Taehyun by the waist and lifting her up as he makes the quick trip down the set of stairs. Taehyun knows that he studies contemporary dance and it’s obvious in the way he moves: with fluidity and grace. His eyes are closed as he dances, moving to the beat of whatever rhythm that he’s created in his head, and he guides Taehyun with ease. She can’t help the laugh that bubbles out of her — they dance all the way to the parking lot like neither of them are carrying their own bags, and Yeonjun ends the dance by dipping Taehyun down low.
“How come you never do that with me, unnie?”
“Don’t wish for that,” Taehyun says, fighting the urge to spit and cough as she shakes her head. “His hair’s all over my face, what the fuck.”
Yeonjun cackles as he lifts Taehyun back up with ease, but Taehyun has to flick her hair over her shoulder to see that Beomgyu’s waiting for them outside her car. Taehyun smiles bright despite almost having been suffocated.
“Are you taking me to the place of my death, Beomgyu-unnie?” Taehyun asks.
“Something like that,” Beomgyu says with a slight laugh. “Alright, let’s go, because I have to go to practice.”
“Going, going,” Yeonjun says, dashing to the front seat. He puts his seatbelt on quickly and is bouncing in his seat before Taehyun can even accommodate herself.
They never talk when they’re in Beomgyu’s car. Taehyun tries to think of all the conversation’s she’s had in the passenger seat of a car (because she has no interest in learning how to drive, not when Kai knows how to), and they’ve all been especially noteworthy. She imagines that, for Beomgyu, she might be more comfortable having conversations like these with the car still parked. Beomgyu’s the type of driver that spends her time listening to music because any other stimulation would distract her and affect her performance. The stereo turns on as soon as she puts the car in ignition — it’s colorful today, unlike the solid color Beomgyu usually has it set to, depending on what she describes as “the vibes.” The colors change alone with the beat of the music. Yeonjun flicks the little treble clef charm Beomgyu has hanging off her rearview mirror, then the air freshener behind it, and the two of them move like Newton’s cradle.
Taehyun loves Beomgyu’s car.
Taehyun lets herself relax against the backseat of Beomgyu’s car as she looks out the front windshield. Beomgyu drives with one hand, her other arm completely sprawled over the storage compartment, as if she was reaching for something. When Taehyun moves over and turns her head to look, Yeonjun is holding Beomgyu’s hand, rubbing his thumb lightly over her skin. With his other hand, he draws aimless patterns over the inside of Beomgyu’s wrist with his finger.
Huh.
Beomgyu turns on her emergency lights and stops in front of an apartment complex. “Alright, kids,” she sighs, “last stop.” She turns her head to look at Taehyun and smiles softly. “Don’t die,” she says. She slightly leans over the tunnel console as Yeonjun presses a deep kiss to her cheek — Taehyun knew they were roommates, and it makes her smile that they were this close with each other. Taehyun steps out of the car and rearranges her clothes, Yeonjun following shortly afterwards. He takes her hand as he guides her to the entrance of the apartment building.
“I’m beginning to think you lied to me,” Taehyun admits as they step into the elevator.
“Oh, definitely,” Yeonjun confirms. “Freshman initiation in May? Come on,” he laughs. “We’ll just be doing, as the kids say, hot girl shit.”
“Why are you so old?” Taehyun groans.
“Twenty-three is not that old!” Yeonjun insists. “But, God, I already feel the back problems coming.”
“You can’t lie to me more than once in a single day,” Taehyun says. “But what are we doing here, unnie?”
Yeonjun doesn’t answer her question. He only unlocks the door to his apartment, then holds it open for Taehyun to enter. “Come in, come in, please put your shoes on the rack, you can hang your bag there, make yourself comfortable.”
Honestly, Taehyun can’t believe she’s gone this long without seeing the place. It’s very homey, with a lot of plants and succulents and perhaps the most comfortable looking couch she’s ever seen in her entire life. They have a large plush rug in the middle of the living room that Taehyun can only imagine must have cost at least a hundred thousand won, and she kind of wants to just lay on it for a little while. She can only imagine the love that was put into making this apartment a home.
“I’m going to make tea,” Yeonjun says. “Gyu used to work at a tea house, so she thinks she has refined taste or whatever. We have just about every tea you’ve probably ever heard of, so let me know what you want?”
There’s something endearing about Yeonjun posing the request as a question. Taehyun hums and thinks about the kind of tea that she wants. She’s usually not prepared for such things; she only ever goes to the nearest tea house at Kai’s request or if she has a really specific craving. “Surprise me,” she says eventually.
Yeonjun smiles, wide and wicked, but Taehyun has long learned that he’s actually harmless. “Go, go, sit on the couch,” he ushers before making his way to the kitchen. He quickly flips on the switch of an espresso machine and puts water to boil in the kettle before opening a cabinet dedicated completely to assorted teas. Taehyun takes a seat on the couch — it’s more comfy than she could’ve ever imagined — and she pulls her legs up to tuck them underneath her body.
It’s no doubt that Yeonjun works quickly — he’s always been light on his feet, and this is his home. He pulls out two tea filters and a spoon before taking down a box of tea from the cabinet and filling up the filter. Beomgyu seems like the type to drink loose-leaf tea; it checks out. Before the kettle whistles too loudly, he pours a little bit of water into two separate mugs, putting two spoons of powdered milk in each before stirring and bringing them to the espresso machine. He turns on the steamer for a few seconds before setting the mug aside and putting in the filters. Slowly, Yeonjun fills the mugs with water and reaches for a jar of honey. It’s probably organic. Taehyun wouldn’t be surprised.
“Here we go…” Yeonjun says slowly as he carries both mugs to the couch. He carefully hands a mug to Taehyun, who takes it with both hands lest she spill a bit onto the couch, and Yeonjun makes himself comfortable. Taehyun blows lightly into her drink before letting her arms rest. Her mug has a Kuromi design on it. Yeonjun’s mug has a My Melody design.
Taehyun is so homophobic.
She brings the mug gingerly to her lips, blowing on it once more before taking a quick sip. She likes honey milk tea, but she’s never been comforted by warm tea like this before. She’s not even bothered by the fact that it’s a black tea; oolong is definitely one of Taehyun’s favorites, and she thinks that this kind of tea right before bed could put her right to sleep. Taehyun feels safe here — hot tea prepared by her oldest unnie as she sits on his couch, her arm against a clearly handknit throw, all her assignments finished for the weekend. Yeonjun gives her a smile as warm as the tea, and Taehyun feels okay.
“Would you believe me if I told you that Beomgyu and I got off on the wrong foot when we first met?” Yeonjun asks.
Taehyun blinks — slowly, like Kai always does. The pink in Yeonjun’s hair is finally starting to fade, but his roots grow more obvious every day. He asked Soobin for her opinion on the idea of him dyeing his hair back to black, but she only blushed and told him to do whatever he wanted. Yeonjun’s hair goes down to his lower back and he might cut it shoulder-length. He’s wearing makeup today; he usually doesn’t, because he says there’s no point in him wearing makeup if he was going to sweat it off every day, but it’s something he enjoys regardless. It’s one of his more subtle looks, only some light lip gloss and glitter around his eyes, but Yeonjun always looks so beautiful.
“I think I’m biased,” Taehyun replies, “because I see you two bickering all the time, so I thought that was just what your relationship was like.”
“It’s part of it,” Yeonjun agrees, “but it wasn’t always like that. We didn’t get along when we first met. I wanted to do something incredible for my first year as dance captain, and the orchestra conductor was really excited to help put something together, but practice was…excruciating. The two of us are both real perfectionists, not in a bad way, I don’t think, but with Gyu… Ah, she pissed me right the fuck off.”
Taehyun leans forward in her place. “How so?”
“Beomgyu was second chair last year,” Yeonjun explains. “So everyone in the orchestra knew that she was some sort of prodigy. I thought that, if that was the case, then it should be easy to work with the orchestra, right? And it was, for the most part. There were times when the orchestra didn’t quite get the tempo right, or when we were off beat, but when it came to the solos, it was a different story.”
“You and my oppas all had solos, right?” Taehyun asks. She can almost picture it in her head.
“Yeah,” Yeonjun says with a shy smile, like he’s recalling the memory fondly. “Wooyoung had a solo with the pianist and harpists, and Yeosang had a solo with the woodwinds. I had a solo with the violinists. And this was a huge performance, right? So we were practicing for the entire year for this showcase, and we practiced our other things when we needed to. There was a lot of compartmentalizing involved. But because I only figured I was dancing to whatever music the violinists were playing, I didn’t realize that Beomgyu had a solo of her own. She likes improvising, likes playing whatever feels right to her in the moment. But because I already planned out the rough choreography in my head, I didn’t want her to improvise.”
“So you told her not to,” Taehyun guesses.
“I told her not to,” Yeonjun confirms. “And she thought my ego was getting in the way because apparently I was some hot shot third-year who thought he was the very best — and I was, don’t get me wrong. But practices and rehearsals would go totally fine until it was time to practice the solos, and we were both really passive-aggressive with each other. She would tell me that my dance didn’t match the music, and I would tell her that her music didn’t match the image I was going for. Just a lot of bickering. Everyone was so sick of us. I confronted her one day, before the spring semester ended, saying that she didn’t know a thing that we were trying to accomplish and literally all she had to do was read some sheets of paper, she told me to shut the fuck up, I told her to make me. Turns out, there was a huge miscommunication between the two of us. I was dancing the way I thought violins sounded, and she played to elevate the way I moved. So we continued bickering, but we finally understood each other. It took a bit of time and communication for me to realize that bickering is how she shows affection. Or, one of the ways she does.”
Taehyun narrows her eyes slightly. “I think that’s just with you and Soobin-unnie,” she confesses.
Yeonjun blinks, realization hitting him slowly. “Yeah, I guess she does that with Soobin, too, huh?” he asks.
Taehyun gives him a single nod. “But while you pretend to ignore Beomgyu-unnie, or maybe take the bait that she’s putting out, Soobin-unnie will one-up her. Kai all but idolizes her, and Beomgyu-unnie dotes on them, and with me, she’s like…like a helping hand I didn’t know I needed.”
Yeonjun only looks at Taehyun for a second before nodding, his lips curving into a small smile.
“I love her so much,” he whispers. “I haven’t told her yet.”
Realization dawns on Taehyun like a smack to the back of the head, or falling on her ass after a misstep, or slamming the brakes way too hard in the car, or maybe — falling off a skateboard. She tries not to let it show on her expression, hopes that her visage doesn’t give it away.
“Why haven’t you yet?” she asks.
Yeonjun’s smile turns sad. “Soobin,” is all he says.
Taehyun realizes then that she actually doesn’t know the dynamics of their relationship. She knows that Beomgyu has a crush on Soobin that can be seen from space with just the naked eye, and that Soobin reciprocates those feelings. Yeonjun and Soobin are always flirting with each other, perhaps more than Taehyun would be comfortable with if she were the one in the situation, but she doesn’t know how they label their relationship. There are so many questions that Taehyun wants to ask but won’t, just for fear of invading Yeonjun’s privacy.
“What are you thinking about?” Yeonjun asks, his voice soft. “Your thoughts seem so loud.”
Taehyun huffs out a small laugh through her nose. “Kai says that all the time. That I’m thinking too loudly.”
Yeonjun snorts. “How long have you known each other again?”
“Sixteen years,” Taehyun answers quickly. Counting comes to her easily. “Isn’t that so crazy? I’ve known Kai for basically the entirety of my life, and they’re still in my life. I never thought of myself as someone people might get tired of, but…there must be something for us to have been at each other’s sides for all this time, right?”
“What do you think it is?” Yeonjun asks. He takes a long sip of his tea.
“I think it’s a lot of things, honestly,” Taehyun replies. “Our families were — are — really good support systems. Our parents are really good friends, and Kai’s sisters have treated me like part of their family forever. Like, I was never just ‘Kai’s friend’ to them, but I’m their friend, too, you know? And Kai…” Taehyun breathes in slowly, like she’s taking in sunlight. “With Kai, I feel like I can do anything. They inspire me to be a better person. They’ve been through so much, from their parents’ divorce to coming out to hormone therapy, but they’ve never let anything bring them down, and they’ve never taken shit from anybody. It’s like… It’s like the sun is always shining down on Kai, and I want to make sure that they always get that light.”
“Even on cloudy days?”
“Even on cloudy days,” Taehyun confirms. “But when it’s cloudy, the sun is never truly gone. It’s just hidden behind a few layers, like it’s taking a nap.” She takes a quick sip of her tea and smiles. “Kai always says that rainy days are their favorite. People think that rainy days are inherently gloomy because there’s no sun, but just because the sun’s gone doesn’t mean that there’s no light. The sun still gives us enough light to see. Isn’t that such an endearing thought?”
“It’s a good analogy to friendship, isn’t it?” Yeonjun responds. “Sometimes, it takes a bit of time for people to realize that the world doesn’t revolve around them. This happens with everyone, you know? We might not have completely registered that we’re not the only ones who feel things. If someone we love says that they’re having a bad day and they need some space, if we haven’t learned that yet, we might take that personally. But when someone does tell us that they need a day for themselves, that doesn’t mean that they love us any less.”
“Right!” Taehyun agrees. “I really like photography and taking pictures,” she says shyly, rubbing her finger in circles along the side of her mug. “My favorite thing to take pictures of is the sun right after the rain clears out. Just that little bit of sunlight that peeks through the clouds, it reminds me that nothing is permanent. I find a comfort in that, you know?”
“What about Kai?” Yeonjun asks.
Taehyun looks up. “Hm?”
“Is Kai something permanent to you?”
Taehyun stares for a moment, processing the question. “Well.” She blinks once. Twice. “I’ve never really thought about it. I guess I just assumed that Kai would be a constant in my life for the rest of my days. It’s not something I ever questioned. I feel like I just know. And if I think about it now, I still have no doubt in my mind that they’ll continue to be in my life. I think sometimes we get anxious over how our friends might see us, and we wonder if we’re truly their friend or if they really do love us, but I’ve never felt that way with Kai. I never feel like I should be worried about something. I’m calm with them. We’re secure.”
“You really love Kai-yah, don’t you?” Yeonjun asks, a gentle smile on his face.
“More than anything,” Taehyun says. She’s never been more sure of anything else.
Taehyun thinks, then, of how much she loves Kai. Kai has always been the embodiment of everything good in Taehyun’s life, a bright smile that reminded her that everything was going to be okay. Jung Kai was like a nebula, a cloud of mist that floods Taehyun’s senses until all she can feel is comfort. Kai was like the turning of the seasons, warmth and cold and everything in between, a precession that kept Taehyun grounded no matter how many changes the two of them would face. Kai, whose love burns hotter than the sun. She would do anything for them, truly. But…
“Unnie,” Taehyun murmurs, “do you think that love can change?”
“Change how?” Yeonjun asks, a slight furrow in his brow.
“Change, like…” Taehyun clicks her tongue before pouting. “I don’t know how to describe it. Not love changing into hate. It’s still love, but it changed.”
Yeonjun hums. “I think love evolves,” he replies, “just like everything on this earth evolves. Everything that we could ever possibly think of evolves. Life evolves, from ichthyostegas to the dumb bitch who cries over apparently really bad movies.” Taehyun snorts, because Yeonjun’s taste in movies truly is ridiculous. “You’re right, Taehyunie, nothing is permanent, but evolution doesn’t mean that the thing that has evolved has lost its core. All of these huge fucking chunks of land were once connected, and just because they’re separated now doesn’t negate the fact that they were once together. I grow and learn more about how I like to dress and present myself, and I use a different set of pronouns than I did, maybe, five years ago, but that doesn’t mean I’m not still a lesbian, or non-binary. Evolution is something…inherent. Everything that has ever existed has evolved and will continue to evolve — except maybe sharks, but they’ve unlocked a perfection that we can only dream of achieving.
“We live to evolve. Do you think that it’s as easy to breathe as it was before, that the intake and outtake of air was something so automatically done? How long did it take, you think, for neurons to move as quickly as they do? Do the trees not come back stronger every time they’re burned to the ground? Was the sun not deadly before? Without even thinking about it, we are learning and growing and living and adapting and dying. Everything is broken down and chipped to its core and the cycle repeats itself over and over and over again.
“This isn’t to say that we only evolve in the way that scientists have discovered we evolve. We evolve in the way we speak, and language evolves with us — I’m sure Soobinie has told you about this. Or — think of math, Taehyunie — we evolve in the way we make our calculations, and math continues to evolve the more we study it although I really wish it didn’t. Art was created to evolve. Happiness evolves to take the forms of things we learn to appreciate. Sadness evolves into the single note in a song that suddenly brings you to tears. Grief has evolved, sex has evolved, humor has evolved… Nothing ever truly stops evolving.
“Love, I think, has evolved most of all, and will continue to evolve more than anything. Love is the one thing in the world that can take any form. Love is the sharing of fruit, or a thought of remembrance, or a kiss to your favorite mole on someone’s body, or the night giving the sun a break, or an ocean wave. Love is the idea of shooting stars, even if they are just burning little rocks. Love is the planets revolving around our sun, out of all the suns in the galaxy, of all the stars in the universe. Love is a storm, or the cycle of rain, using the same water to replenish us and the earth before it settles down again. Love is the trees breathing in the air we breathe out and vice versa. Love is being.”
Taehyun looks into her tea. It’s still hot in her hands. Warmth spreads from the edges of her fingertips to the cells in her blood like a Pacific wave washing over her skin.
“I love love,” Taehyun says, “so much that I want to burn in it sometimes. But death… Death is also a form of evolution, right?”
Yeonjun smiles, a crooked thing with a little bit of teeth showing. “Everything evolves.”
With a slow sip of her tea, Taehyun takes the moment to rejuvenate her body. She loves tea, and she loves this comfortable couch, and she loves being in the company of her friends. She loves her friends, and she loves their happiness, their joy. She loves Kai, she loves their warmth, and she loves their love.
“I can’t wait until we all turn into crabs,” Taehyun says into her tea.
Yeonjun laughs, bright and loud, and Taehyun begins to laugh with him. Tears begin to form at the corners of her eyes; she sniffles, almost taking another drink of her tea in order to drown the lump in her throat, but evolving is being. Slowly, as the last of her giggles escape her lungs, Taehyun lets her tears fall.
“I love Kai,” Taehyun says. She looks Yeonjun in the eye. “I love Kai,” she says again, more confident in her speech despite the lodge in her throat. “I love Kai the way that stars die.” A steady growth, an explosion that causes her to collapse unto herself until her soul is boundless. A core so dense it outweighs the sun. A place where time does not exist, a lover’s breath surrounding her wherever she goes.
And still, her love blooms.
“Doesn’t that feel good to let out?” Yeonjun gently prods.
Taehyun freezes momentarily. “What makes you think I had something trapped inside of me?”
“The way you move,” Yeonjun admits. “There’s been a hesitance in the way you dance, lately, and I wanted to ask what was wrong. But with all your gentle warmth, Taehyun-ah, your core is so solid. I’m glad you’ve opened up on your own terms.”
So Yeonjun does see everything. Taehyun wants to ask if his sight evolves, too.
“Thank you for this, unnie,” Taehyun sniffles. “I didn’t know I needed it.”
“Always,” Yeonjun says softly.
“I love Kai,” Taehyun whispers to herself. It feels like the first aurora to hit the skin. It feels like the twilight she sees out her window. It feels like warmth, like a chill down her spine, like everything in between.
“For what it’s worth,” Yeonjun says, “I think Kai loves you, too.”
When Taehyun pulls out the tea filter, she sees that it’s shaped like a star.
Taehyun takes her time walking. The sun has just finished setting, the last remnants of light still lingering in the clouds, kissing the clouds goodbye until they have to leave for the night. The sun’s warmth still lingers despite the breeze. The moon hasn’t quite made its presence known yet, still laying the sun to rest, but Taehyun feels like the night is going to be promising. There was something in the air tonight: call it home, call it desire, call it devotion, call it opportunity, call it love. With every intake of breath, Taehyun feels filled to brim with it.
With every step she takes, Taehyun imagines a tune playing in her head. She’s never had such a personal relationship with music, not like Kai does, not like Beomgyu or Yeonjun do, or like Lea and Bahiyyih do, but she appreciates it regardless. She loves music because the people she loves also love music. Jung Kai’s love for music burns hotter than the sun, but Taehyun knows they wouldn’t describe it like that. Kai has always said that loving music is like magic.
Taehyun thinks she might understand, or at least grow to.
It’s only just past seven, so Taehyun’s not in a rush. She knows full well that it always takes a while for everyone to make it out of the auditorium. She sees people in the distance making their way out of a building, each going their own separate ways, and Tahyun knows that she’s right on time. Taehyun takes another step, a stronger one this time, and she resumes her little melody. Each step she takes is equally calculated and simple — she imagines Soobin and Yeonjun by her side, each moving to extra beats in the music that Taehyun has yet to imagine, and she imagines Kai and Beomgyu playing their violins, Beomgyu quickly moving her bow while Kai plucks at the strings. Another step, and the arrangement changes. Taehyun feels like she can take off into a running start, like she can pull the moon down with just her fingers. Daffodils and Iceland poppies are both out of season now, but Taehyun still feels golden, like the sun had painted everything ochre before it made its leave. There’s something poetic to be written about this, Taehyun thinks. Perhaps someone already has.
When Taehyun finally makes it to the main entrance of the building, people are shuffling out of the room by themselves, in pairs, or in small groups, either taking their own instruments with them or locking them inside the storage room. Normally, she’d just wait for Kai so the two of them can make their way home, but there was something different in the air today. Opportunity, maybe. Magic, perhaps. There’s still some music playing from inside, possibly from people doing some last minute practicing, and as people continue shuffling out, Taehyun waits until there’s an opening. She takes in a deep breath of air and exhales slowly.
She loves Kai. She’s so full of love she might just burst.
Taehyun slips inside the auditorium, still looking at her feet as her shoes continue their cadence against the hardwood floor, and she feels like she’s gleaming. Perhaps it was the evening spring air. Perhaps it was something more stellar involved. The seats in the auditorium are blocked with caution tape in preparation for the monthly concerts at the end of the month. Taehyun looks up. There’s still some chatter inside the room, possibly some students talking to the conductors or the maestro. A few music stands are still scattered across the room, probably belonging to the few people still in the room. One student is struggling to pack up the xylophone as someone comes to their rescue. And up on the stage—
Up on the stage, there’s Kai. Jung Kai will always be the first person Taehyun will ever notice, whether it be from miles away or when she’s not even looking. Maybe music is magical, the way that Taehyun is being sucked in, and she can’t help but wonder if this is what a quasar feels like. All of Kai’s beauty is surrounding them in a gentle haze. Their hands move quickly across the piano, playing a combination of chords in a major key and a few extra notes just to spice things up a bit. If nothing is predetermined, perhaps this was: Kai’s hands were made to play the piano, made to play any instrument they could touch. Kai’s hair is pulled back loosely, a low ponytail on the base of their neck. It’s as if they were announcing that they were done with practice but still have yet to get out of the mode. Taehyun loves when Kai’s hair is loosely tied like this. She wants to push their bangs away from their eyes, wants to see that their pupils are varnished with gold. Across the stage stands Beomgyu, strumming a guitar as she all but dances across the stage, laughing loudly.
Kai’s love burns hotter than the sun, and they love music more than anything. Music brings them a joy that Taehyun can’t even begin to fathom, much less understand. She can understand magic, but what is Kai’s love for music, really? She supposes she never really has to know; she only wants to support Kai in doing the things they love, whether it be right now, or tomorrow, or every day for the rest of their lives. Kai’s smile right now is the embodiment of light, and Taehyun wants to drink this sight in forever.
She understands now, with absolute certainty, why Kai blinks so slowly. Taehyun wants to drink in this entire view of Kai smiling while doing what they love most, hair cascading down their face in a way that makes Taehyun want to kiss them — and God, she wants to kiss them. She wants to kiss them just like this, as they’re wearing their favorite shirt, as they’re wearing the rotten pair of converse they promised they’d throw away six months ago, and a pair of corduroy pants Taehyun doesn’t quite like but Kai insists is fashionable. They’re playing piano, and they’re smiling. Kai looks —
Kai’s looking right at Beomgyu.
And perhaps this is way that stars die — quickly, pathetically, until there’s no trace left but a small rock floating endlessly into the unknown. No explosion. Only a slow deflation until there’s nothing left. Taehyun had always known that she was small, but this feels like a physical belittling, like she was being crushed by outside forces until she was nothing.
Taehyun loves Kai.
She should’ve known sooner that it didn’t mean that they loved her back.
“What movie are we watching?” Kai asks that night. They still have a towel wrapped around their head from their shower, and the TV light makes their face mask look funny. They’re so beautiful. Taehyun loves them.
“You pick,” Taehyun says, hugging her legs and digging her chin into her knees. Maybe the couch might swallow her whole this way.
Kai frowns. “It’s not my turn.”
“I know,” Taehyun murmurs. “I don’t feel like choosing this time.”
If Taehyun did choose, she’d choose Kai. Always. She doesn’t pay attention as Kai browses for a movie to watch. She only stares at Kai’s wall above their desk, their posters and photos and art. There are many things that Kai does that Taehyun doesn’t understand, and something at the top of that list is Kai’s love for poetry. They collect too many poetry books for their own good, work too hard to understand a poem’s original language if it’s not in Korean because they know too well that things get lost in translation. With every little quote they have on their wall, Kai has both the original script and its Korean translation. Even after Kai has picked a movie, Taehyun’s eyes don’t turn towards the screen. She stares at the hangul until it becomes too blurry for her to read.
“Only the sun has come this close,” the poem reads, “only the sun.”
If Taehyun falls asleep halfway through the movie from sadness and pure heartbreak, even though she never falls asleep during movies, neither she nor Kai says anything.
Dance is fun. Taehyun longs for this feeling now, of letting the music provide energy for her. It lights something inside her that she can’t quite describe. Even when her body starts feeling fatigued, if she loves the music enough, then she’s determined to keep on going. And she does love the music, because Soobin has impeccably good taste, and they were just dancing to a choreography that Wooyoung came up with for an assignment. It was still rough around the edges, but Wooyoung insisted that it was a good thing. In fact, he encouraged everyone to move however they felt comfortable. Music was the best at guiding, anyway.
As the weeks went on, Taehyun was more and more grateful that dance practice was in the evening. It was getting a little too warm for comfort, especially with all the bodies in the studio. The sweat on her skin could only do so much, and turning on the air conditioner was counterproductive right now, so Taehyun would just have to relish the cold air once practice was over. Right now, though, Taehyun danced with Ryujin and tried to maintain her regulated breathing.
It was hard to improvise with two people because it’s always a bit hard to tell what the other person was thinking, but Taehyun didn’t feel nervous. Part of dancing was knowing your surroundings and being aware of them, so Taehyun danced with a certain confidence that she wasn’t going to knock Ryujin over — and even if she did, the second-year was going to be more than nice about it, because she was just an angel like that. The song ended, and the two of them had strikingly different finishing stances, but Taehyun found herself laughing.
“Let’s call it a day?” Yeonjun asks, his chest just short of heaving. Everyone is undoubtedly tired after coming up with their own takes of the choreography. People immediately line up in their stretching arrangement, and Wooyoung begins to lead them through their cool-down stretches.
When they’re done, everyone exchanges goodbyes as a few people start making their way home. Taehyun lingers, like she always does, taking her time drinking water as her oppas start to prepare the mops. Taehyun tosses Soobin an extra towelette — they return the favor to each other every week, and it’s become an endless loop at this point. Yeonjun lies down on the floor as he checks his phone. Yeosang gently kicks his side, telling him to get up before he dumps Fabuloso all over him.
“Oh!” Yeonjun exclaims. “I’ll be right back; Beomgyu’s outside.”
Yeosang groans. “Wooyoungie!” he yells towards the supply closet. “You’re sweeping this time!”
Soobin looks towards the door with curious eyes. “Unnie’s dumb,” she says. Taehyun snorts. “Beomie’s dumb, too. I’m going to tell them to both come inside before they get sick.”
Taehyun raises an eyebrow. “It’s May,” she says, but Soobin is already up and on her way.
Taehyun sighs. Wooyoung sighs dramatically from the other side of the room just to make fun of her. Momentarily, Taehyun considers smacking her shoes against each other to put dust someplace Wooyoung had already swept, but she’s not mean. She takes another drink from her water bottle before putting all of her belongings in her sports bag and getting ready to go home. Kai had postponed their movie night for the weekend, saying that they had an exam for their poetry class that they haven’t really studied for, so Taehyun thinks she might just crash as soon as she touches her bed.
Soobin all but runs back into the studio, eyes glossy with tears yet to be shed. Taehyun’s eyes widen as she looks at her unnie, but Soobin just shakes her head. She tries her best to force a smile but it comes out wobbly and broken, and Taehyun runs to her and, after a quick nod from Soobin, holds her tight.
“Um,” Soobin whispers, her voice cracking, “can we leave?”
Taehyun scrambles to grab both her and Soobin’s bags before Soobin reaches for her hand. Soobin is quick to go down the steps, still tugging Taehyun’s arm, but when Taehyun turns to look, Yeonjun and Beomgyu are standing and talking as the two of them sport wide smiles. Taehyun looks back at Soobin, who is resolutely looking at the ground as she sniffles, and Taehyun doesn’t say anything.
“Fuck,” Soobin hisses. “Fuck, my apartment is in the same direction as Yeonjun and Beomgyu’s, how am I supposed to go home?”
“We can go to my dorm,” Taehyun offers, confused and panicked and concerned for her friend. “It’s not all that far from here.”
“Okay,” Soobin sniffles. Her eyes are still glossy, eyes narrowed like she’s deliberately trying to keep herself from crying. Taehyun squeezes her hand and the two of them make their way to the dorm building.
Something in the air doesn’t feel right. The air feels suffocating, the slight warmth uncomfortable. Taehyun feels like her hand is clammy against Soobin’s. Perhaps this is the storm that Yeonjun has mentioned before, the kind that swoops in without any kind of warning beforehand. Taehyun’s nervous, and not the good kind. She doesn’t know what’s wrong.
Soobin doesn’t let go of Taehyun’s hand once.
Taehyun has never unlocked the door to her room so quickly. She kicks her shoes off and pulls Soobin inside as the older girl struggles to kick off her own shoes. Taehyun wordlessly takes both of the bags, putting her own underneath her bed like she always does, and Soobin’s near the closet. Soobin all but collapses on Taehyun’s couch and immediately bursts into a sob.
“Yah, yah, unnie,” Taehyun hushes, falling to her knees in front of Soobin, “what’s wrong?”
“I’m an idiot, that’s what’s wrong!” Soobin exclaims. She wipes tears from her eyes with the heels of her palms. “I can’t even be mad at Yeonjun and Beomgyu, because this is one hundred percent my fault…” Her face falls back into her hands.
“Unnie, I don’t understand,” Taehyun admits.
“Can I shower?” Soobin asks, looking down at Taehyun suddenly. “Ah, never mind, I don’t even have any clothes.”
“I’ll ask Kai for some clothes,” Taehyun says. “They’re just down the hall. Here—” Taehyun gets up and dashes to her closet before pulling out a towel. “I have an extra. There are little ones, too, by the shower. Toiletries are all in the bathroom already, feel free to use any of them. All my skincare stuff is on the sink if you want to use those, too. I’ll be right back, okay?”
Soobin hesitates before she nods, slowly standing up and heading towards the bathroom. Taehyun makes her way out of the room as she fiddles for her keys. Is this something she needs to interrupt Kai over? She feels like she should probably let them know what was going on, but she didn’t even know what was going on. Taehyun holds Kai’s room key in her hand as she stands before the door.
She knocks.
Kai takes a second before opening the door, expression turning confused when he sees that Taehyun’s the one at their door. “Hey, Hyun,” they say, lips in a slight frown. They were clearly in the middle of studying — they’re wearing a hoodie that was way too large, even on them, hair untidy from having been brushed with their fingers too many times, eyes tired, and glasses just about to fall off the bridge of their nose. Kai looks so beautiful.
“Hi,” Taehyun says, a little bit breathless.
Kai furrows their eyebrows just the slightest bit. “Are you finally going to tell me what’s wrong?” they ask.
Taehyun blinks. “What?”
“Come on, Taehyun, I know you,” Kai sighs, growing more visibly peeved by the second. “And I know that you like taking your time, so—”
“What are you talking about?” Taehyun asks. “Actually, no — this—” She exhales, pinching the bridge of her nose before she looks up at Kai once more. She hopes the pleading is evident on her face. “This isn’t about me right now. Soobin-unnie’s not okay. She’s showering in my place right now and she needs some clothes.”
Kai’s eyes widen. “Oh shit, okay, come on, help me look for something.”
Taehyun tries to laugh, but it really doesn’t sound like one — it sounds more like a choke. “It’s just clothes to sleep in,” she says, stepping into Kai’s dorm. Kai opens one of their drawers and pulls out a random shirt, inspecting it quickly before throwing it behind them. They open another drawer, looking for a few seconds before pulling some sweatpants. Taehyun snatches it from their hand before they can throw it on the floor again.
“Do you think she’d want underwear or boxers?” Kai asks, looking up at Taehyun.
“Get both, just in case,” Taehyun answers. Kai nods. “Which plushie are you willing to give up for tonight?”
Kai makes a noise like a whine, but it lasts only for half a second. “The rabbit,” they say. “That one looks like unnie.”
Taehyun makes her way to Kai’s bed, climbing up the ladder before grabbing the giant plush rabbit from next to the pillow. The two of them make their way out of the room and back to Taehyun’s.
Taehyun swallows before she unlocks her door. She turns to Kai, but she doesn’t quite look them in the eye. “I know you’re studying—”
“It’s okay,” Kai insists. “If Soobin-unnie needs help, it’s okay.” Whatever’s bothering them will have to wait, too. Kai’s good at putting things in the backburner if something more crucial comes up.
When they’re inside, Taehyun grabs the pile of clothes from Kai’s hands and heads to the bathroom, carefully putting them atop the sink. When she’s back in the main room, Kai’s sitting on her bed, the strings to their hoodie drawn all the way.
“So what happened?” Kai asks softly.
“I don’t know,” Taehyun tells them. “Soobin started crying at the end of dance practice, but she didn’t want to go to her apartment, so I took her here.”
Kai frowns. “Yeonjun-unnie didn’t do anything?”
Taehyun sighs, sitting next to Kai on the bed. Automatically, they lean towards each other, Kai wrapping their arm around Taehyun’s waist as Taehyun rests her head on their shoulder. “I think Yeonjun-unnie and Beomgyu-unnie have something to do with it,” she whispers.
Kai hums, letting their head rest atop Taehyun’s. Taehyun can feel that they want to ask a question. There’s always been a stiffness in their muscles when they have something they want to let out, and Taehyun wonders why Kai’s holding their tongue. They usually don’t.
Soobin comes out of the shower fully dressed, still towel drying her hair, as Kai runs up to greet her. They hug each other tightly, snapping to each other like two pieces glued together, like compatible magnets, and Soobin sniffles when she pulls away. “Hi, Kai-yah,” she whispers, voice a little bit hoarse. Taehyun can tell that she was crying in the shower.
“We’re ready to listen whenever you want to talk, unnie,” Taehyun says. Kai walks Soobin to the couch as Taehyun meets them there. They set Soobin in the middle as she holds onto the towel. She sniffles some more, although seemingly a lot more prepared to talk about her feelings than she did a moment ago.
“I’m in love with Yeonjun,” Soobin whispers miserably. Kai and Taehyun share a look, but Taehyun doesn’t know what they know. “But I’m stupid, because I obviously misread the whole situation. I thought he was seriously flirting with me.”
“Isn’t he?” Kai asks gently.
“Apparently not!” Soobin exclaims, slowly starting to cry again. “I thought we had something going on with all the flirting and the touching a-and the joking. I thought the way he looked at me meant something. And it was so hard for me because I spent the entirety of my freshman year looking for club after club to join, switching major after major after major, and I know it sounds dumb, but I chose dance like I chose Yeonjun. I chose him, because I looked at him and I thought that there could be something made out of this. And it really was just a crush at first, or maybe even a potential hook-up, but he was always holding my hand and inviting me out to lunch and looking at me with those eyes…
“I thought for a second that m-maybe it was just the way he was with his friends, you know? But when we hung out with Beomgyu, Yeonjun would still only act that way with me. And it was especially bad because the more we hung out, the more I thought, ‘maybe I can love him.’ And I’d look at Beomgyu and go, ‘maybe I can choose her, too,’ and I did. I started falling for Beomgyu as quickly as I fell for Yeonjun-unnie b-but… Neither of them have feelings for me.”
“How do you know?” Kai asks. Taehyun winces and hopes that no one notices.
“I saw Yeonjun and Beomgyu kissing after dance practice,” Soobin answers.
“Unnie,” Taehyun tries, “that doesn’t mean—”
“But it does!” Soobin exclaims, voice cracking once more. “Why do you think Beomgyu acts so weird around me? It’s so obvious that I’m into her that I make her uncomfortable every time we hang out. And if Beomgyu knows that I like her, then she definitely knows that I like Yeonjun, too. Fuck.”
Taehyun doesn’t know what to say. “I think you just need to talk to them, unnie,” she suggests.
“For what?” Soobin asks helplessly. “For them to reject me? You should’ve seen the way they were looking at each other, Tae-yah, it was like they were the only two people in the world. Even if they did have room in their relationship, it’s not for me. They don’t like me like that.”
“What are you talking about?” Taehyun says. “Soobin-unnie, whenever I’m with Beomgyu-unnie—”
“And I can’t believe I’m crying over this when you’re not,” Soobin cries. “I haven’t even asked if you’re okay, Taehyun-ah, I’m so sorry.” She pulls Taehyun into a hug, holding her tight. Taehyun’s eyes are wide as she looks at Kai, who only looks back at her with a similar expression. “How are you holding up?” Soobin asks into Taehyun’s hair.
“I-I’m fine,” Taehyun stutters, “but this isn’t about me—”
“It is,” Soobin says, teary-eyed once again. “The last thing I wanted was to hold it against you, Taehyun-ah, because you’re one of my closest friends and I love you, and I’m so sick of the idea of girls fighting each other over a person they both like. I know you have feelings for Beomgyu, so I just want to know if you’re okay.”
Kai looks…hurt, almost. “You have feelings for Beomgyu-unnie?” they ask, no louder than a whisper.
“I don’t have feelings for Beomgyu-unnie!” Taehyun almost shouts. There’s so much going on too quickly. “Kai-yah, if I did have feelings for someone, you’d be the first person to know, always. I’m sorry. Please don’t be so sad.” Because Taehyun can only imagine the pain Kai might feel, being the last person to receive some news. “Soobin-unnie, I don’t have feelings for Beomgyu-unnie.”
Soobin whimpers softly, wiping tears away from her eyes. “But when you were asking me about crushes, I thought…”
“Crushes?” Kai asks, breathless. “You have feelings for Yeonjun-unnie?!” they yell, standing abruptly from the couch.
Taehyun doesn’t know why Kai’s so upset and it’s making her nervous. “No, I don’t have feelings for Yeonjun-unnie! Unnie, when I asked you that question, there wasn’t anyone that I had in mind. I just wanted your perspective.” She wraps her arms around Soobin as best she can and rests her head on Soobin’s shoulder. “I thought you and Yeonjun were already an item when I first got to know you both. I wouldn’t want to encroach on that. I don’t.” Taehyun looks at Kai, then — makes direct eye contact to somehow let Kai know that, despite their feelings for Beomgyu, Taehyun would never get in the way of things.
“I didn’t want to say anything,” Soobin says miserably. “I wanted to talk to unnie and Beomgyu together and tell them that I liked them both. But they’re together already, so clearly, it doesn’t matter.”
“Unnie,” Kai sighs, “that train of thought is unreasonable and you know it.”
“Is it me?” Soobin murmurs, her voice breaking. “Would they…not want to date me?”
Now, Kai looks furious. They kneel on the floor, taking Soobin’s hand and looking her directly in the eye. “Unnie,” they say, voice serious. “Choi Soobin, I can guarantee with every fiber of my being that my unnies are head over heels for you and that they like every little thing about you. You’re a strong and beautiful woman and anyone would be lucky to have you so much look at them. We’ve talked about this. You’re perfect, Soobin-unnie. Yeonjun-unnie and Beomgyu-unnie know that, too. And if they do end up being transphobic pieces of shit, then I’ll personally fight them for you. I promise.”
Soobin exhaled through her nose, closing her eyes as she lets her head fall a little. “I hate this,” she whispers to Kai. “I love myself, and I love who I am. I love my body. I’ve spent so long learning how to love myself more and forgive myself every day, but it’s like one inkling of doubt sends me spiraling all the way down. I’m sick of thinking that other people’s opinions have anything to do with my self-worth. I know they don’t matter. And I’ve cut transphobes off before, without ever looking back, because I don’t need to deal with that shit. So…” She starts crying again. “Why does this feel different?”
“That stupid fucking inkling,” Kai answers softly. “Sometimes we underestimate it. But it’ll go away one day, unnie, the more you keep loving yourself. Besides, you know deep down that you’re strong enough to walk away if you have to.”
“I really hope I don’t have to,” Soobin sniffles, smiling sadly.
“I don’t think you will,” Taehyun whispers, holding Soobin tighter. “But I’ll also help Kai fight if needed.”
“You’re so small,” is what Soobin replies, “but I appreciate the thought.”
Taehyun laughs lightly. “When you talk about it, everything will be fine,” she promises, because she wouldn’t promise if she didn’t know.
Kai climbs back onto the couch and wraps their arms around Soobin, meeting Taehyun halfway. Taehyun doesn’t say anything about Kai’s hand on her arm or their finger drawing light circles around her elbow. Soobin gradually evens her breathing, letting the very last of her tears shed. Taehyun and Kai hold her with the certainty that eventually, everything was going to be okay.
No one hears a word from Soobin the entire weekend. Kai and Taehyun expected this, but neither of them say anything, and no one asks them.
Yeonjun looks a mess when Taehyun meets up with him for his lunch break. There are bags underneath his eyes that seem to have been there for days. His hair is tied up into a tight bun so as not to give away his messy hair, because everyone would know how bad it was if he let it loose. Taehyun doesn’t force him to eat, but she does eat her own food in hopes that he’ll end up copying the action. But he does need to eat when his job relies on using up energy and burning calories. Taehyun’s never really been one to use force; she knows that people cope in their own different ways and that Yeonjun’s is driving over potholes right now, but she does smack Yeonjun’s arm when he’s about to start biting his nails.
“Hey,” Kai says through a breath, “I’m here, I’m here.” They take in a deep inhale in an attempt to even their own breathing. Did they run all the way from the bus stop? “You need to eat, unnie, come on,” they prompt.
Yeonjun nods as he hesitantly reaches for his chopsticks. Kai puts their bag on the bench next to Taehyun as they go to Yeonjun’s side, ready with a brush and spare hair ties. Taehyun doesn’t even know how they manage to fit so much shit in a messenger bag, but Kai says it’s all in the pockets. Yeonjun finally begins eating as Kai undoes his hair and begins brushing.
“I know Soobin needs time,” Yeonjun says after he swallows. “But I can’t help but be worried about her, you know? It’s not like we text all the time, anyway, but something feels off. I don’t know what’s going on, and neither does Gyu. Wooyoung and Yeosang said they can’t tell me anything, which — fine, I respect that, but…” He haphazardly puts more food in his mouth like he’s trying to stop himself from saying something that’ll make him too sad.
“It’s okay to be concerned, unnie,” Taehyun says. “You care about her.”
“It’s more than caring about her,” Yeonjun says softly. “I wish I could be comforting her, even though I know she wants space from me right now.”
Kai works quietly. They finish detangling and brushing Yeonjun’s hair and then split it into two sections before starting to braid. Taehyun puts some of her own food into Yeonjun’s tupperware. Food she stole from the dorm’s breakfast hall probably doesn’t hold a candle to whatever Yeonjun prepared for his lunch, but she hopes that he appreciates the gesture. And the carbs.
“I know that we’re going to be alright,” Yeonjun says, his attitude a little more defiant than he was a second ago. “We’re going to have a conversation and work things out.” He nods with fervor and immediately winces from Kai holding onto his hair too tight. “Fuck, Kai-yah, I totally forgot your hands were in my hair,” Yeonjun hisses lightly.
“Kai has a good hand,” Taehyun says with a smile. Kai was always the first person to go to for haircuts; they cut their sisters’ hair as well as their and Taehyun’s moms, and, of course, Taehyun’s. Lea’s fallen asleep while Kai was dyeing her hair on more than one occasion — a testament to how soft Kai’s hands really are.
Kai looks up from their work, and Taehyun looks back at them. There was always something about the way Kai looked at her — as if they had finally adjusted their eyes to the pitch blackness of the night and were suddenly exposed to bright light. For a moment, Taehyun forgets how to breathe. She looks back down at Yeonjun.
“I didn’t make you mess up, did I, Kai-yah?” Yeonjun asks.
“No, unnie, you’re fine,” Kai replies. Their voice is unusually soft.
They’re still upset. Taehyun still doesn’t know why.
Yeonjun takes in a deep breath through his nose before exhaling slowly. “Thank you both for being here,” he says. “I’d hate to make you feel like you have to pick sides, though.”
“There are no sides to pick, unnie,” Taehyun assures. “I’m speaking for Kai as well when I saw that we love you and Soobin-unnie so much. We’re here for you. Things are going to turn out alright.”
Kai hums in affirmation, nodding once. They continue braiding, long and nimble fingers holding onto multiple strands of hair at once, and Taehyun wonders if this has anything to do with all the instruments Kai plays or if it’s because they’re just that talented. Perhaps hair is an instrument of some kind. Once Kai has finished braiding up to the nape of Yeonjun’s neck, their hands move incredibly quickly as they finish the rest of the braid. Taehyun doesn’t even register that they secured it with a hair tie already. Kai takes a step to the side and begins working on the second braid.
The sun burns almost uncomfortably hot outside.
Silence is not something Taehyun associates with Kai.
Kai has been playing the violin for as long as Taehyun can remember — has been playing and creating music ever since they developed the ability to grab things and hold onto them. Taehyun was four years old when she went to Kai’s house for the first time. It was a two-story home, a baby grand piano in the living room on the main floor, three different acoustic guitars hung on the wall, an electric guitar on a stand, a record player next to the television, a set of drums in the garage. The kitchen island had sheet music scattered all over it, pages that Kai’s father hastily moved out of the way as Kai’s mother placed snacks before the children. The walls of the staircase were decorated with vinyls still in their casings; the album artworks all complimented each other. More vinyls hung up in the hallway upstairs along with an abundance of family and baby photos. Lea had a ukulele and a soprano saxophone in her room. Bahiyyih still had a musical mobile above her bed. Kai had their violin and their magical bow.
There was always noise in that house. There was never a cacophony of any kind, and Taehyun doesn’t remember any dissonance. Lea and Kai would put on shows for the rest of their family and Taehyun would always try to clap the loudest. Kai’s mother was always singing. Kai grabbed each and every instrument they could get their hands on and always fell asleep from practicing so much. Noise was good.
Even when times were sad, there was still noise. Kai poured their heart into the piano, creating a melody that matched the time that raindrops would fall. Kai’s mother never stopped singing. Kai’s father would play songs with his children over Skype. Music has always been a little bit magical in that way. Perhaps it was the way that Taehyun was immediately sucked in — she wouldn’t know it yet, but it was something like a quasar.
Now, though, when Taehyun walks alongside Kai, she finds herself at a loss for words. She’s not quite sure where Kai ends and the silence begins. Years and years of noise has caused some sort of ringing in Taehyun’s ears. She tries to focus on something, anything, that will provide some sort of sound: the sound of their shoes hitting the concrete, the friction of their clothes rubbing against each other while they move, the wind whistling through the leaves and the grass.
Taehyun wonders when the wire is going to snap.
“—hyun!”
Taehyun blinks slowly. Wooyoung is running towards her and Kai, his hair bouncing up and ricocheting off his forehead. He looks like he’s moving in slow motion. His face looks bright, like he’s ready to take on the world or more.
“Oppa, he—!” Taehyun cuts herself off with a short laugh as Wooyoung wraps his arms around her waist and spins her around. He’s laughing when he puts Taehyun on the ground and she just looks back at him with a confused smile. Wooyoung turns to Kai, his expression not dimming once, and Kai only chuckles as they indulge Wooyoung with a hug of their own.
Wooyoung grabs both their hands, swinging them around as they stand in the middle of the walkway. “Yeo kissed me,” he says. He sounds like he still can’t quite believe it. “Holy fuck, Yeosang kissed me.”
“Oh, you’re together now!” Kai exclaims. “I’m happy for you, hyungje.”
Wooyoung’s face goes blank. “Well,” he drawls out, “we haven’t really…talked about it?”
Taehyun nods in understanding. “So he kissed you and you went screaming it to everyone you knew,” she says.
“You get me,” Wooyoung replies.
“I’m glad you finally got your shit together, though,” Taehyun says. “Yeonjun-unnie’s been complaining about it for what feels like a century.” Kai nods in agreement; they probably heard similar complaints from Beomgyu.
Wooyoung squeezes their hands. “They’re going to be okay,” he whispers. “When Soobinie told us what was going on, I think a switch flipped in my head. Like, I’ve lived with Yeosang for so long and I didn’t tell him how I feel for almost four whole years. I had to do something about it, you know?” Wooyoung looks up at the sky and laughs. “He beat me to it, though, the fucker.”
“I’m really happy for you, oppa,” Taehyun sighs, but the only thing she hears is do something about it. Do something about it. Do something about it. Do—
Taehyun continues to smile as Wooyoung continues talking, but she can almost hear the burn that comes from Kai’s gaze. Her body feels way too tight.
Kai always falls asleep before Taehyun does. This has happened ever since they were children. This time, though, Kai looks at Taehyun with something heavy in their eyes — like they were seeing something in a new light and forced themself not to blink so they can process every little detail. Despite the moondust caught in their eyelashes, despite the astronomical weight of sleep taking over their body, Kai keeps their eyes open.
Taehyun looks back. There’s a new moon tonight; no extra light that seeps into Kai’s skin, but Taehyun finds herself wanting to place a hand on their cheek regardless. Anything, to simply be able to touch them.
“I miss you,” Taehyun whispers into her pillow.
Kai blinks — slowly, as they always do.
“Then come to me,” they whisper back.
This must be love, Taehyun thinks: the fact that, even though every bone in her body feels like they each weigh a ton, moving towards Kai is completely effortless. It’s like the way stars die: not a vacuum, but simply gravity, pulling and pulling and pulling until everything is absorbed. Kai’s arms wrap around Taehyun’s waist, holding her until her back is pressed firmly against their chest, and Taehyun knows for sure that this is a quasar.
Taehyun doesn’t sleep all night.
When Taehyun checks her phone the next morning, the first notification she sees is a text from Yeonjun in their group chat. It’s a selfie of him, Beomgyu, and Soobin, all clearly disheveled from having just woken up. They’re in Yeonjun and Beomgyu’s apartment, light barely seeping in through the kitchen windows. Yeonjun looks infinitely better than he did before, though his eye bags are still visible behind his glasses. Beomgyu’s basically still asleep. Soobin’s eyes are puffy, like she cried before she went to sleep, but she has such a big smile on her face that her dimples look like an extra pair of smile lines.
Taehyun is so glad they’re okay.
“Taehyun-ah! Kai-yah!”
Taehyun and Kai both turn their heads, and Kai quickly glances back at Taehyun with a raised eyebrow. This feels a lot like déjà vu. Yeonjun waves his arms dramatically from a few meters away, even if he’s been long acknowledged. Just because they love him, Taehyun and Kai both break into a running start in order to jump and greet him. Soobin waves both hands to the best she can while still holding onto Yeonjun and Beomgyu’s hands. Beomgyu only cackles when Taehyun and Kai attack him, the contents of her case shaking about as her shoulders move with her laugh. Taehyun jumps into his arms as Kai wraps their arms around the two of them, their violin case smacking against Yeonjun’s back and causing him to groan.
“Fancy seeing you here,” Beomgyu says. Her eyes gleam with something Taehyun doesn’t understand.
“Hyun always walks me to class and you know it,” Kai dismisses. They look like they bloom underneath Beomgyu’s gaze. “You seem to have some company, though. That’s new.”
“My partners are walking me to practice,” Beomgyu stage-whispers, eyes wide and bright. “Can you believe it? My partners. These bitches are stuck with me.” Soobin lightly smacks Beomgyu’s arm response, and Beomgyu flashes her the biggest smile in return. Soobin immediately softens. Taehyun can’t believe there was ever a time where Beomgyu seriously thought her feelings for Soobin weren’t requited.
“Taehyun-ah,” Yeonjun croons, shimmying his shoulders despite still being trapped in Kai and Taehyun’s arms. His eyes shine as he looks at her. A single eyebrow of his is raised, smug and knowing. He’s such an ass. “What are you doing, walking Kai to practice?”
Taehyun is a master at avoiding Yeonjun’s teasing by now. She reaches for a loose strand of hair by the name of Yeonjun’s neck and twirls it around her finger. Her hand brushes against Kai’s sternum, though, so she lowers her hand.
“I don’t know, unnie. How come I’ve never seen you walk your girlfriend to practice before?”
“I’ll have you know, Kang Taehyun, that I am a responsible student and I have a busy schedule!” Yeonjun all but yells. Taehyun and Kai finally let go of him. “But my schedule has miraculously been cleared for tonight, so here I am. With my two girlfriends. Both of whom I adore.”
“Unnie and I are going on a date,” Soobin beams, dimples deep in her cheeks. Taehyun thinks that none of her friends know just how happy this makes her. Love is such a good look on Soobin. “So we thought we might as well smother Beomie on the way!”
Chills run down Beomgyu’s spine as her smile fades away. “I feel like I’m in high school again.”
Kai snorts. “The ‘no PDA’ rule haunting you to this day, unnie?”
“I feel like Maestro’s going to appear any second now and threaten to make me do laps,” Beomgyu shudders. She smacks her free arm against her leg before turning to face Soobin. “Kiss me?”
Soobin quickly obliges.
“H-hold on,” Kai objects, “I thought you were scared of the ‘no PDA’ rule in high school!” Yeonjun laughs and reaches to pinch Kai’s red-flushed cheeks. Taehyun looks at them curiously. She wonders if it’s hard for Kai like this, to see the girl they like with other people. Yeonjun even goes as far as trying to ruffle Kai’s hair, but he’s much too short to reach the top of their head. Taehyun looks at them, and she longs.
“Jun,” Beomgyu calls. Yeonjun whips his head around with pure astoundment on his face, but Beomgyu doesn’t react — not really, anyway. Taehyun thinks she sees the corner of Beomgyu’s lips perk up, but she doesn’t say anything. “I have to go.”
Yeonjun lets go of Kai’s face and skips to Beomgyu, leaning down slightly so he can press a kiss to his girlfriend’s lips.
Kai looks at their phone and gasps softly. “Shit, we’re cutting it really close,” they say. Kai reaches for Taehyun’s arm and begins to lean towards her before stopping themself abruptly. They look down at Taehyun, inspecting her almost, the eye contact so direct it almost makes Taehyun nervous. Taehyun looks back. Kai looks away, and Taehyun doesn’t think she’s ever seen them blink so rapidly. Kai turns to look at her once more, a slight furrow in their brow.
“Have the movie set up by the time I get back, yeah?” Kai asks.
“Of course,” Taehyun replies.
Kai squeezes her arm.
“You really should go,” Taehyun murmurs.
Kai nods, their brow still furrowed. “I’ll see you soon,” they whisper. They finally let go of Taehyun’s arm. “Bye, unnies!” they say quickly before sprinting to the auditorium doors. Beomgyu shouts at their back, saying that she’s not wearing the appropriate shoes for a race, but she jogs after Kai regardless.
“Kang Taehyun,” Yeonjun tuts, and Taehyun immediately freezes. Yeonjun wraps an arm around her shoulders as Soobin steps to her other side, and Taehyun’s beginning to feel as if she’s being cornered. It’s an oddly familiar feeling.
“Yes, unnie?” Taehyun asks.
Yeonjun only hums, turning to look at Taehyun with a sharp smile. His eyes look focused like he’s locked onto her. Taehyun can’t help but narrow her eyes. She knows what Yeonjun’s going to say and she doesn’t want to talk about it. She’d much prefer if the topic wasn’t brought up at all, actually.
“Unnie,” Soobin sighs. She always has a way of making Taehyun feel more relaxed. “You’re being weird again.”
“I heard from the grapevine,” Yeonjun starts, ignoring Soobin completely, “that you have feelings for me. Would you like to speak into the microphone, Kang Taehyun-ssi? The people want to know.”
Yeonjun puts his hand in a fist and holds it close to Taehyun’s face. Taehyun leans down like she was actually preparing for some kind of interview.
“Get fucked,” Taehyun says into Yeonjun’s closed fist.
Yeonjun lets out a scandalized gasp. “Don’t be fucking rude!” he exclaims. Pulling Taehyun with him, they begin to walk. “But seriously, Taehyunie,” Yeonjun says in a low tone, “how are you doing?” From Taehyun’s other side, Soobin grabs a hold of her hand.
“I’m going to be okay,” Taehyun states, looking towards the horizon.
Yeonjun makes a displeased noise. “I don’t like the exclusive first person,” he grumbles.
Soobin perks up. “Please keep talking,” she pleads.
Yeonjun groans. “Women,” he says to Taehyun, like he’s letting her in on a secret. “They only want me for my body and my extremely limited linguistic knowledge.”
Taehyun scrunches her nose. “Sure,” she deadpans.
Soobin squeezes Taehyun’s hand gently. “Kai-yah’s been a little bit off lately,” she admits. “Is the finals stress getting to them? I know a good student center where they can get help if they really need it. The one at the library isn’t all that great, but if you go to the dorms, that one’s good!”
“They’re upset with me,” Taehyun admits. “I don’t know why, though.”
“I think we have very different ways of defining the word upset,” Yeonjun snorts, “because you and Kai-yah still seem as touchy as ever.”
“No,” Taehyun sighs. She doesn’t know how to quite explain it. She finds this happening a lot of the time. “It’s kind of like…being mad at someone you really care about. Like, something they might have done was kind of irritating, but you still love them more than anything at the end of the day. And you’re confident that, whatever it is, you’ll be able to work it out. So for the time being, it’s like putting a pin in it. Not ignoring it, but tabling the inevitable discussion for later. Kai’s not the type to give the cold shoulder, anyway.”
“Are you two going to talk about it?” Soobin asks gently.
“Tonight, probably,” Taehyun says. “We’ll be alright.”
“There you go!” Yeonjun explains happily. “There’s the inclusive I was waiting for.” Soobin hums like she’s about to swoon.
“Yeah, yeah,” Taehyun grumbles. “Don’t you two have a date to get to? Maybe, instead of pestering me about it, you could try to do literally anything else?”
“Why are you so mean to your favorite unnies, Taehyunie?” Soobin whines. God. This is the part of their relationship where they begin to absorb the worst qualities of each other. Taehyun has to text Lea. “We’re just walking you to your dorm building.”
“For legal reasons, you two are not my favorite unnies,” is all Taehyun says.
“But you love us so much,” Yeonjun argues.
Taehyun looks at the ground so Yeonjun and Soobin can’t see the blush beginning to form on her cheeks. They see it anyway — Yeonjun coos at her while Soobin pokes her cheek and Taehyun pretends to be annoyed. Afterwards, though, the three of them continue walking, Yeonjun’s arm still wrapped around Taehyun’s shoulder and Soobin holding Taehyun’s hand. Two of her unnies, talented and beautiful and magical. Where would she be without Choi Yeonjun and Choi Soobin, without their gentle care and firm guidance? Taehyun absolutely adores them.
“I do,” Taehyun says proudly.
Taehyun doesn’t have an actual movie set up, but instead a short series that she’s been thinking of watching. She found a brownie recipe on Naver that was supposedly foolproof, but the oven’s starting to smell a little bit funky and Taehyun’s beginning to wonder how badly she could have fucked it up. Maybe it wasn’t too late to order some food for delivery, but she doubts it would get to the building before Kai got back from practice.
She hopes Kai likes burnt brownies.
Taehyun has one hand on her hip and one hand on the counter while she inspects the tray of what she thinks might be a dessert when she hears keys by the door. Kai comes in and puts their violin case by the door before quickly making their way to Taehyun, wrapping their arms around her waist while they hook their chin onto her shoulder — and Taehyun thinks she’s a fool, honestly, for not realizing sooner how much she loves having Kai near, how much she wants to feel the touch of their skin. Taehyun all but snuggles against Kai’s body, remembering that she loves that they’re so much taller than her. Kai might seriously be slouching right now, but maybe if they lifted her up…
“Hi,” Kai whispers next to Taehyun’s ear.
Taehyun hopes the chills down her spine aren’t totally obvious. “Hello,” she whispers back. “I don’t think these brownies are entirely edible.”
“I’ll eat them anyway,” Kai says. “If I die, then so be it.”
Taehyun removes the hand from her hip to pat Kai’s cheek. “You won’t be dying today.” She tries her best to turn around in Kai’s grasp. “Did you eat dinner?”
Kai looks behind themself and at the paper bag set up on the coffee table. They look back at Taehyun with a wide smile, wagging their eyebrows exaggeratedly, and Taehyun could kiss them.
She doesn’t.
“What are we watching?” Kai asks, pulling Taehyun to the couch by her hand. Taehyun wants to hold their hand all the time, nowadays.
“This web series I heard of,” she says. “It’s really short; only eight episodes. We could probably finish it tonight, if you feel like binging it.”
“We deserve a night off,” Kai says in response. They aren’t wrong. Preparations for finals before the summer break were slowly chipping away at Taehyun. She deserved a night on her couch, watching a drama with her best friend on her laptop that Kai always made fun of for being way too large, but its large screen was so perfect for screening that it made Taehyun feel almost weirdly vindicated. It was a much better alternative to studying until she fell asleep at the library and leaving Beomgyu to wake her up. Taehyun could always continue studying tomorrow. She deserves to relax.
Kai opens the paper bag to pull out whatever food they bought and the smell of seafood instantly makes Taehyun’s mouth water. She puts the video on full screen before Kai places a tray of food on her lap, causing her to squeal.
“Is this—?”
“The seafood place you wanted to try, yeah,” Kai answered. “Ah, the owner was so nice, Hyunie! She told me she opened it because her wife loved the seafood she cooked for her. It’s so cute, my heart could burst, Hyun. Burst.” They quickly bring their legs up on the couch and fold them, placing their tray of food on their lap. “I want to do that,” Kai admits. They turned down the lights, but Taehyun thinks that Kai’s ears turned red.
“You want to open a restaurant for your wife?” Taehyun asks. “Kai-yah, you can’t cook to save your life.”
“No—” Kai groans when Taehyun lets out a cackle. “Gestures like that, I want to do those kinds of things for my wife. I’d write songs for her, compose symphonies that remind me of her laughter. I want to love her to the point of creation.”
There are two things that Taehyun’s certain of right now: first, her cheeks are definitely warm, and second, she’s pretty sure her heart just dropped into her guts at the thought of Kai talking about love so candidly, like they already have a specific person in mind when they speak. For lack of anything better to say, Taehyun snorts and goes, “Kai-yah, that’s gay.”
“I’m literally a lesbian,” Kai says monotonously.
Taehyun laughs and hopes that it doesn’t sound too awkward. “That’s cute, though,” she says softly, and she truly does mean it. Maybe it won’t work out with Beomgyu, or maybe it will — Taehyun might just cry if she has to end up fifth-wheeling her closest friends, but she hopes that whoever Kai loves, whether it be now or in the near future, knows that they’re being loved by the best person in the universe.
Kai smiles, crooked and shy. God, Taehyun wants to kiss them. “I know it sounds cliché,” they admit.
“Cliché is okay,” Taehyun reassures. “It’s like,” she pauses for just a beat, “the idea of soulmates.”
Kai scrunches their nose in distaste. “I don’t believe in soulmates,” they say. Taehyun feels it — the way that her insides churn until it feels like a stone inside of her, any sort of warmth leaving her skin until there’s nothing but cold, the inevitable explosion. And perhaps this is way that stars die — short and rapid breaths so she can hold onto whatever air she has left in her body, her organs crumbling into fragments into the space in front of her. Then, like into a garbage chute, she falls.
“Oh,” Taehyun tries to say, but she can’t quite bring voice to her words.
“They’re just so unrealistic, you know?” Kai continues. “I just hate the idea of looking at someone and thinking that, somehow, they were made for you — even if that person knows you inside and out, or if the things you do complement each other, or even if they’re your best friend. The world just doesn’t work like that. It’s not some sort of coincidence. It can’t be a coincidence mathematically, right, Hyun-ah?”
Taehyun stares before clearing her throat. “Statistically, probably not,” she says.
Kai smiles. “See? You get it,” they say with a quick nod. They look down at Taehyun’s tray of food and blink. “Yah, Taehyun-ah, you haven’t even taken a bite! Your food is going to get cold. I’ll press play.”
Taehyun doesn’t think she wants to eat after her world was just shattered. Kai’s rejection couldn’t have been any more obvious.
“Unnie,” Taehyun whines, “do you really have to go back to Daegu? I thought we were going to fuck shit up this summer. Wreak havoc. Go stupid. Go crazy. You know, hot girl shit. You promised me that we would, unnie. You’re going to leave me just like that?”
Beomgyu looks down at Taehyun with a frown on her face. Taehyun thinks she understands, now, why Soobin and Yeonjun are completely weak when it comes to her. They can’t deny her a single thing. Beomgyu could have anyone at her beck and call with a single glance and her partners only help prove the theory. But right now, Taehyun’s trying to make Beomgyu feel just the right amount of guilty for being further than she’d like for the summer. It just wouldn’t be the same if it wasn’t everyone in Seoul.
“Daegu has a hold on me that I cannot sever,” Beomgyu confirms solemnly.
“She’s just going back for two weeks,” Soobin sighs with a slight shake of her head. “Beomie, you’re so dramatic.” She lets her body fall back onto the couch, her head dangling over the armrest, hair cascading like silk. Couch hog. Beomgyu pushes Soobin’s legs off from her lap and begins to crawl on top of her girlfriend, forcing Soobin to look back up at her.
“Soobin,” Beomgyu says, “you’re allowed to admit that you’re going to miss me dearly. It’s okay. I know I’ll be gone for some time, and that it might be hard for you to go on about your daily life while your heart aches so, but I promise you that I will return. I only ask that you and unnie think of me constantly during my absence. I’ll try my best to send letters. I’ll even try to put in a daguerreotype or two. But you must soldier on, my sweet.”
Soobin gives Beomgyu an unimpressed look that rivals Beomgyu’s most jaded expressions. It really is awful, how much the three of them are learning behaviors from each other. Beomgyu just continues to smile back at her. Taehyun doesn’t miss the way Beomgyu’s hand just barely rests above Soobin’s torso, her fingers drawing circles onto Soobin’s stomach underneath her shirt, and Taehyun has to look away. It’s a tragedy, really, because Yeonjun and Beomgyu have the comfiest couch that Taehyun will probably ever sit on, and now she knows she can never sit on it again.
“I hate gay people,” Kai announces.
“Tell me about it,” says Yeonjun, sitting on the floor with a dramatic sigh. Kai takes the bowl of chips from his hands. “Can you believe that Gyu was the one who came up with the ‘no sex on the couch’ rule? And now—”
Taehyun just groans loudly, purposefully blocking out anything her unnies say about the horrible things they’ve done to that poor, beautiful couch. She really didn’t need confirmation. She might be a STEM major, but she knows how to connect the dots, thank you very much. Taehyun thought the thing she hated most was the fact that she recognized Beomgyu’s bedroom eyes by now (because Beomgyu has absolutely no shame nor decency), but the loss of the couch is truly so much worse. Taehyun falls back onto the floor with her arms over her face to block the light. At least she still has the carpet.
Unless—
No. Taehyun can’t handle another loss today.
Taehyun feels someone lying down on the floor next to her, and she’s almost tempted to stay where she is before remembering that ignoring others is kind of rude. She moves her arm after turning her head. Kai’s looking at her, a pleasant smile on their face. Their wrists are crossed over each other, their cheek pressed against the back of their hand. They look gorgeous, as always. Taehyun doesn’t know how they could possibly smile during a time like this, though.
“We can just buy the couch ourselves, you know,” Kai says. They’re not whispering but their unnies can’t hear them over their own bickering. Taehyun doesn’t want to listen to what the three of them were saying, anyway. “Gyu-unnie told me what furniture store Yeonjun-unnie bought it at.”
“You’re the only good thing left in this world,” Taehyun tells Kai. She truly does mean it. “Where would we put it, though?”
Kai shrugs to the best of their ability considering they were lying down on their side. “We’ll worry about it when we get a place of our own,” they say easily. “Or your parents can finally replace the couch you guys have in the living room.”
“That’s the best couch in the house and you know it,” Taehyun argues.
Kai snorts. “Yeah, because it’s been worn-in for a good twenty-five years. Maybe longer than that. Just how long exactly have your parents had that couch? The recliners stopped working five years ago, Tae-yah. It’s falling apart.”
Taehyun huffs.
“Tae, you might even have been conceived on that couch—”
“I’d like to go home now!” Taehyun yells, getting up from the floor a little too quickly — but she’s taken her iron supplements, she’s fine. She heads for the door. “Thank you for having me, unnies, but I suddenly need to be as far away from this university as possible. I love you, have a nice summer. I’ll see you again in September. Goodbye.”
“Unnie’s not picking us up for another hour, Tae-yah,” Kai says from the floor.
Yeonjun looks scandalized. “Just who is this unnie whose name I do not know and how is it such that this unnie can go unnamed while still being recognized by my dear Taehyun-ah?” he asks. “My darling Kai-yah, you have a lot of explaining to do.”
Kai rolls their eyes, but they’re smiling. “It’s just my sister.”
“Unacceptable!” Yeonjun exclaims. “If you are going to refer to someone as simply unnie, then you have to be talking about me!”
Soobin sighs. “Unnie—”
“You don’t count,” Yeonjun pouts. “I’m the only one here that’s older than you.” He looks towards Beomgyu, who doesn’t say anything. Yeonjun sighs through his nose. “And this one doesn’t even use honorifics, so I won’t even bother.”
“Yeonjun-unnie,” Taehyun says, “can you please let me out of your apartment?”
“No,” Yeonjun replies quickly. He looks back at Kai. “Kai-yah, how old is your sister?”
“Twenty-two,” Kai responds. They’re still starfished on the floor.
“Nice! I win,” Yeonjun says proudly. “Okay, you’re allowed to leave now.”
“Freedom at last,” Taehyun exhales. She has no plans to put her shoes on. Beomgyu notices this and laughs at her. Kai sits up finally, smiling at Taehyun with closed lips. It’s a request. Taehyun knows that she can never deny Kai of anything, so she walks back to where the couch is and sits back down on the floor with Kai. She reaches for the bowl of chips before registering that Kai is holding the bowl closer to her.
If nothing else, at least Taehyun can have Kai like this.
She’d never tell Kai this, but Bahiyyih’s room is Taehyun’s favorite room in the entire house. There’s just something about the way it was decorated. Bahiyyih is just loudly and unabashedly herself, and it showed in the posters, paintings, and décor she put in her room. It was the stickers on her door that her mother reminded her she might grow out of eventually, but Bahiyyih knew that and accepted that. She let herself enjoy things, like the tacky little mushroom lamp she has on her nightstand, or the ticket stub to the movie she went to go see by herself, or the most embarrassing photos of her siblings that she has framed on the wall. It was everyone’s favorite place to be. The four of them could spend the entire day in Bahiyyih’s room doing nothing but passing the time. Bahiyyih was currently getting more and more upset at the game she was playing on her PlayStation, Lea was reading a book, Kai was scrolling through Pinterest, and Taehyun was laughing at the occasional TikTok.
Taehyun loves summer. She basks in the nothingness of it all.
“Ugh,” Kai groans. “I’m fucking hungry now.” No one bothers to tell them that this was the consequence of looking up recipes and cooking videos; it always falls deaf on Kai’s ears. They get up from where they were lying down on the edge of Bahiyyih’s bed and make their way to the door. “I’m going to spend forever in the kitchen making myself a complicated vegan meal that I will probably end up butchering completely. Does anyone want anything?”
“A tangerine, please,” Lea says.
“I meant a prepared meal,” Kai retorts.
“I know,” Lea confirms. “I just don’t feel like being your lab rat today. A tangerine’s good.”
“I’m good, hyungje, thank you — oh, what the fuck, come on!” Bahiyyih yells.
Taehyun snickers. “I’ll just take a bite from whatever you’re having, Kai-yah,” she says.
Kai gives Taehyun a look like they know full well Taehyun’s going to eat more than just a bite. Taehyun blinks innocently. Kai doesn’t say anything. They wave lazily as they make their way out of Bahhiyih’s room and then close the door behind them.
After it’s heard that Kai has gone downstairs, Lea immediately closes her book and Bahiyyih pauses her game. Lea all but jumps off the loveseat by the window while Bahiyyih crawls across her bed until she’s at the foot of it. The two sisters look down at Taehyun with wide, expectant eyes.
“Spill,” is all Lea says.
“There’s nothing to spill,” Taehyun sighs.
“Unnie, you’re such a bad liar,” Bahiyyih scoffs. “You just came back from your first semester at university! Did you go to any parties? Did you or Kai have any bad trips? Did you throw hands with the one arrogant bastard in your class who thinks they’re hot shit? Give us the juicy details.”
“Oh, speaking of juicy,” Lea says, raising her eyebrows suggestively.
“Stop being nasty!” Bahiyyih laughs, hitting her sister with a pillow. Lea just holds onto Taehyun, though, making Taehyun take the majority of the hit. Honestly, the things she suffers through at the Jung household. “I don’t need to hear about anyone’s sex life, thank you very much.”
“Talking about sex is healthy and I hope you know you can talk to me or Kai-yah about it anytime,” Lea says pointedly. “But Tae-yah, tell us, tell us, tell us!”
“About what?” Taehyun laughs exasperatedly. “There’s nothing to tell you guys. Nothing happened this semester.”
“Clearly not nothing, unnie,” Bahiyyih croons.
“Don’t think we didn’t notice that you have abs now,” Lea teases.
“Okay, yeah,” Taehyun admits, “I’m more sexy than I was before I left for college. That’s just the way of life. But besides that, nothing happened.”
Bahiyyih looks at Taehyun from her bed, and Taehyun feels like she’s being picked apart with just her gaze alone. Bahiyyih’s glare is potent, unnerving Taehyun until she feels like she has to squirm. It’s hard to, though, while she was in Lea’s arms. This kind of tag-teaming was a different kind of cruel.
Taehyun sighs as she covers her face with her hands. “I’m in love with Kai,” she groans.
“Tae-yah, we all know that,” Lea scoffs.
Bahiyyih climbs off her bed and joins the other girls on the floor. “When are you going to tell them?” she asks excitedly. “You’ve always been my unnie with a plan. You have some sort of idea, right?”
Bahiyyih’s eyes shine with some sort of hope, and it pains Taehyun to have to let her down. “There’s no plan,” she admits softly. “They don’t like me like that.”
The hope in Bahiyyih’s eyes is gone before Taehyun can even blink. “You’re no longer my unnie with a plan. Now you’re just my unnie with no brain cells.”
“Yyih!” Lea exclaims, obviously trying to cover her laughter. “Don’t be rude!” She reaches forward and pats Taehyun’s cheek a little too harshly. “You are being dumb, though. What makes you think that?”
“Kai has feelings for someone else,” Taehyun says. Saying it aloud makes it feel so much worse. The cracks in her heart deepen a little bit more. Taehyun honestly thought she could live with it — she can, of course, because unrequited love isn’t the end of the world, but she knows now that it’s going to hurt a little more than she originally thought. She’ll be okay, though, in time.
Lea sighs. “You’re the smartest person I know,” she says. Her eyes are narrow as she looks at Taehyun — Taehyun has known these eyes all her life, has been at the receiving end of glares like this one so often that she doesn’t even remember the first time it happened. Jung Lea, Taehyun’s Number One Unnie, with eyes so full of concern and disbelief that it’s making Taehyun a little bit dizzy.
There are so many things Lea can say next. She could say, Why did you let yourself fall, then? or Why did you do nothing? She could say, You should’ve known that falling in love with your best friend was stupid. Taehyun remembers being a child and feeling such a huge gap between herself and Lea because she was two years older and that felt like a lifetime to Taehyun. They’re young adults now, and the gap has significantly decreased, but there are moments like these where Taehyun realizes that the gap is still there. Two years may not be so long in the long run, but they’re still so incredibly young, and Lea has seen Taehyun grow.
“You’ll figure it out,” Lea murmurs, holding Taehyun close. Taehyun hopes that, somehow, Lea’s right.
The fire alarm goes off downstairs and everyone lets out a collective groan.
Kai, Taehyun, and Beomgyu huddle together as they look into the display case. Kai, ever the asshole, uses their height as an advantage to look over Taehyun and Beomgyu’s heads, not that the girls can do anything about it. Taehyun finds that she’s growing numb to the feeling of Beomgyu’s cheeks being pressed against hers. Their faces are close enough to the glass that Taehyun’s breath is just barely showing. There were just so many desserts to choose from, every single one as enticing as the last. Unfortunately, because they didn’t have unlimited amounts of money, Taehyun was only allowing herself to just buy one thing.
Making the choice was the hard part.
“I think we’ve been here for ten minutes already,” Soobin says from behind them. She flicks her wrist like she’s checking the time even though she’s not wearing a watch.
“We can just leave and they wouldn’t even notice,” Yeonjun says to his girlfriend.
“If you didn’t want us to notice, you wouldn’t have said anything,” Kai informs them. They look up at the vendor with an apologetic smile. “Can I get some songpyeon, please?
Beomgyu makes a disappointed noise. “I was going to get the same thing,” she mutters.
Taehyun separates their heads so she can give Beomgyu a look. “You can,” she says.
“No, it’s not the same anymore,” Beomgyu insists. She straightens her back as she waits for the vendor to finish giving Kai their bag of songpyeon. “Can I please get some bukkumi?” she asks sweetly.
Taehyun ends up ordering some bungeoppang before the passive-aggressive line of waiting customers finally pushes them to the side. The five of them continue walking without a care in the world. Taehyun wasn’t exactly sure what Soobin was planning when she said she wanted to go to a marketplace, but this bodega setup they had in Itaewon was proving to be really cute so far. If Taehyun was going to blow tens of thousands of won today, she’d rather do it here.
Yeonjun stops by a stand selling only sikhye. They’re selling them in mason jars that they’re allowing the customers to keep for themselves, a small ribbon wrapped around the glass. He stands still for a good minute before regaining his composure.
“Today’s your cheat day, Yeonjun-ah,” he tells himself, pressing his finger pads together as he shuts his eyes tight. “But you’re going to eat shaved ice later. You have to think of your sugar intake.”
“You put three spoons of sugar in your tea yesterday, Jun,” Beomgyu says.
“I’m cutting off sugary drinks from my diet!” Yeonjun exclaims. “Please, take me away so I can no longer be tempted.”
“Why did we decide to go out and about on the hottest day of the year?” Taehyun groans, fanning herself dramatically. Summer was a double-edged sword, really: it was too hot to wear pants but wearing shorts guaranteed that her thighs would get sticky with sweat. Kai told her about one of those Instagram hacks of running a deodorant stick over the thighs so they wouldn’t stick, but it wasn’t proving to be a fruitful effort. Mostly, though, Taehyun was upset that Yeonjun looked fine in the ridiculous outfit he was wearing. Any normal person wearing a beret and a cardigan was sure to start sweating.
“Yah, Tae-yah,” Yeonjun chides, “There are tarps everywhere. We’re in the shade.”
“Plus, it’s poetic!” Kai chirps with a bright smile. “When I was a kid, my dad told me about this Mexican myth about the stars. He said that this star cluster represents a marketplace and that the Aztec calendar was based around it. Every fifty-two years, the people would wait for the star cluster to move into place and cross the meridian at midnight. I guess it was considered a marketplace because it created some sort of bridge between the heavens and the earth so people could present their offerings for the rebirth of the sun.”
“That’s cute!” Soobin says at the same time Beomgyu goes, “You’re a nerd.”
Kai pouts. “I like the stars.”
Yeonjun hums. His eyes are sharp, always full of knowledge that he might share if he decides to make the effort. Yeonjun’s eyes fall on Taehyun as they shine with a larky kind of mirth. Taehyun tries not to let the heat get to her cheeks; she put on sunscreen earlier today but maybe she can blame her red face on the heat if worst comes to worst.
“I think you’re valid for loving the stars, Kai-yah,” Yeonjun assures. “Tell us more star stories.”
“I want to hear more about the marketplace,” Beomgyu says.
“I thought I was a nerd,” Kai retorts.
“You are and I love you,” Beomgyu says easily. “So was the marketplace on earth or in space?”
Kai chuckles. “It’s a metaphor, unnie. The stars were the marketplace. It was like…well, right now, there are so many stands with different people selling different things, and groups of people coming over to buy those things or simply look around. It was a place to gather. But more than that, it was like a celebration, you know? It was the coming together of the infinite cosmos and the insignificant humans, but they were all celebrating life and its cycle.”
“So the marketplace was in space,” Beomgyu responds.
Kai grimaces. “Yeah,” they sigh. “Yeah, the marketplace was in space.”
“Holy shit,” Yeonjun exclaims. “Look at those bucket hats that person is selling. Let’s go, let’s go!” He runs in between Beomgyu and Kai as he grabs a hold of their hands, the three of them running to the vendor’s stand.
Soobin has a fond expression on her face. She reaches inside Beomgyu’s paper bag of bukkumi and takes one for herself. “He acts younger with them,” she says. She glances at Taehyun. “Or, with all of you, I suppose.”
Taehyun hums. “So you noticed that Yeonjun acts younger around certain people but you didn’t think he was into you?”
“I regret opening my mouth,” Soobin says immediately.
Taehyun snickers. looping her arm around Soobin’s as they stop in front of someone sending handmade jewelry. They both greet the merchant with informal bows before Soobin leans down towards some of the necklaces.
“I’m beginning to think that you dragged us all here with ulterior motives,” Taehyun admits.
“Ulterior motives?” Soobin laughs. Her eyes stay on a pair of dangling earrings that look like feathers. “Me? Never. I just thought it would be nice for all of us to hang out again since Beomgyu just got back. This has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that Junie and Beomie’s one-year anniversary is in three days.”
“Unnie!” Taehyun exclaims. She gives the merchant a quick apologetic look. “I have to admit, this is really cute, though.” Soobin tells the merchant that she’s definitely going to buy the feather earrings. She reaches for one of the cute little boxes she has on her sides and prepares the earrings for their display case. The packaging is really cute. “How is that working, though?” Taehyun asks softly. “Your collective anniversary, I mean. How are you all going to celebrate?”
Soobin shrugs. “The actual date doesn’t really matter to me. We agreed that we were all in a relationship earlier this month. Yeonjun and Beomgyu got together on the 30th of last year.” Soobin points at another set of earrings; hearts, one a stud and the other a heart on a chain, and the merchant begins to box it up. “Maybe June can just be our month.”
“Making it real obvious,” Taehyun snorts.
“I feel morally obligated to make it obvious,” Soobin says pointedly.
“Hi, hi,” Kai announces, taking their place next to Taehyun. They bow at the merchant before inspecting the jewelry. “These are all so cute, oh my goodness.”
“Right?” Soobin exclaims happily. She reaches inside her bag for her wallet and finalizes her purchase. Taehyun, having paid attention to her unnie this entire time, finally takes a moment to look down at the jewelry.
“Oh, I really like those,” Taehyun and Kai say at the same time. They give each other the same surprised look: bright and wide eyes. Soobin laughs beside them.
“Which ones were you talking about?” Kai asks.
“The daisies,” Taehyun answers.
Kai blinks. “Me, too.”
“Ah, I’m really sorry,” the merchant chimes in. “Those are the only daisy earrings I have left. I have other flower earrings, if you’d like?”
Kai hums, a soft smile on their face. Taehyun thinks they’d look especially cute with daisy earrings. It was something they tackled for a really long time: the idea of being soft and allowing themself to look soft. It’s something Taehyun hopes Kai has talked to Soobin about, although Kai has already mentioned it to her in passing. How do they present themself in a way that doesn’t allow others to infantilize them? It took them a while to learn that it wasn’t up to them to dress a certain way, but it was instead up to cis people to simply stop infantilizing non-binary people. “I fucking love flowers,” Kai had said, and that was that.
Kai takes a quick glance at the earrings before looking back at Taehyun.
“We can match,” they suggest softly.
Taehyun hopes her ears aren’t burning. “Yeah!” she chirps, her voice far too much higher than it is usually. She clears her throat. “Yeah, we can match.”
“Perfect,” Kai says. They’re already pulling out their phone to make the payment, waving Taehyun away before she can even protest. They bow once more to the merchant before making their own way again, only to be approached by Yeonjun’s bright smile and Beomgyu’s brighter hat.
“Oh, God, you actually bought bucket hats,” Soobin groans.
Yeonjun lifts up the bag with his newest purchase and shakes it around a little. “It doesn’t go with my outfit, so I won’t wear it right now, but I’m obsessed. I bought one for Gyu, too!” He holds out his arms towards Beomgyu like he was Will Smith and she was on a red carpet.
Beomgyu blinks, the hat pushing her bangs into her eyes. Blinking doesn’t really help. Soobin can’t help the giggle that bubbles out of her as she reaches for her girlfriend’s face and brushes the hair away from her eyes. Beomgyu looks grateful.
“This hat is a lot more colorful than what you usually wear, honey,” Soobin says. It’s an understatement, to say the very least. Not even Choi Beomgyu was enough of a fool to wear all black on a hot summer day, but a white band t-shirt and ripped jeans didn’t exactly pop. The bright orange bucket hat didn’t necessarily clash with her outfit, though.
“I’m broadening my horizons,” Beomgyu answers. “Okay, but seriously, I actually really like it. It’s a cute color! And it gives me another excuse to steal all of Junie’s clothes. He has something that would go with this, I’m sure.”
“I’m returning the hat,” Yeonjun says.
“It’s too late,” Beomgyu replies quickly. “I’m already wearing it. My DNA is on this hat, Yeonjun. They can’t take it back.”
Yeonjun grunts, leaning into Beomgyu’s space. “Choi Beomgyu, I will wash and sterilize that stupid fucking hat myself—”
Beomgyu grabs Yeonjun by the chin and leans in to kiss him.
“I want to go home,” Kai says.
“So do I,” Soobin sighs, her eyelids low and her voice just on the verge of suggestive.
“I want to go home,” Kai emphasizes.
“If we leave now, we’ll probably be able to catch the next bus,” Taehyun offers.
Kai looks at Taehyun. “Japan?” they ask.
“Japan,” Taehyun answers.
Beomgyu pulls away from the now tongue tied Yeonjun. “What are we going to Japan for?” she asks.
“Reparations,” Taehyun answers easily.
“Nice.”
“I want bubble tea now,” Kai says. They pinch the fabric of Taehyun’s shirt with two fingers and gently tug. “Can we go? We can get Yeonjun-unnie’s shaved ice, too.”
“I think Yeonjun-unnie’s broken,” Taehyun says, “but sure.”
Kai reaches for Taehyun’s hand and she allows herself to intertwine their fingers. Taehyun thinks that she can indulge herself just this once. Even in the summer heat, Taehyun loves the feeling of Kai’s hand in hers. There’s a spark of fire that hits whenever the back of her hand brushes against Kai’s thigh, touching the skin just underneath their skirt. She supposes she can understand this feeling of warmth, though, like love was something that the sun provided. Only, she forgot her sunglasses like a fucking fool and she was starting to pay the price for it now.
Kai seems to notice and lets go of Taehyun’s hand. She doesn’t have time to mourn the loss of contact before Kai is standing in front of her, holding her by the shoulders so they can reposition themself so they’re blocking Taehyun from the sun completely. Kai really was a sugarcane stalk of a human being. The two of them stand there for a little while as the crowd of people part around them.
“It’s like an eclipse,” Kai murmurs. They let their hands slide down Taehyun’s arms until they’re holding her hands again.
“How are we supposed to celebrate and appreciate the sun’s rebirth if you’re blocking it?” Taehyun jokes. If she starts blushing again, she can’t blame the sun now.
“I am appreciating the sun,” Kai retorts. “I always am.”
Taehyun hums. Kai’s father had always loved space and Kai picked it up from them. To this day, they have glow-in-the-dark stars and planets on their bedroom ceiling. Taehyun thinks that Kai is more stellar than most things in this universe.
“What is the sun to you?” Taehyun asks.
Kai blinks once. Taehyun pays attention to every little part of the movement, the way their moondust-covered eyelashes come together slowly despite the strand of stray hair in front of their left eye, their eyes becoming unfocused but never once moving from Taehyun’s face. They’re absolutely shining with the sun behind them, like they were outlined by an aureate light, their skin a glimmering gold. Taehyun is starting to think that she fell in love with Kai at the speed people close their eyes. She thinks falls in love with them every single time she opens her eyes, over and over and over again until there’s no way to tell how many times she’s blinked.
Perhaps it’s the same number as there are stars in the sky.
“You are,” Kai says without hesitation.
Taehyun doesn’t quite understand.
Maybe it was simple fact, or maybe it was just Taehyun’s gay little heart, but she was thinking that it had been too long since she and Kai had a night of their own. It wasn’t that they weren’t able to spend time together; it was quite the opposite, really, with Kai or Taehyun going to each other’s houses. They’d watch shows or movies, work on their resumes, fill out applications to jobs they were never going to hear back from, attempt to and fail at baking, or pass the time with their respective families. They managed to make time to spend with their friends whether it was alone, with some, or with the entire group — Kai and Soobin still had their Saturday lunches, which Taehyun was really happy about. But Taehyun and Kai were always doing something. She feels like they haven’t had the time to just exist around each other.
“You know,” Kai says, “it’s hard to plan a surprise when I’m the one driving us there. And I’m helping you put everything in the car.”
“Trust the process!” Taehyun insists.
“I don’t think that saying applies in this scenario,” Kai snorts.
Taehyun hoists up an old backpack of hers that’s currently about to explode from all the blankets inside before throwing it to Kai. They catch it with their stomach more than with their hands, groaning slightly before putting it in the trunk along with everything else Taehyun has packed. Taehyun grabs some throw pillows, most of which she had in her room and maybe one or four that she stole from the couch, and throws them into the trunk. It hits Kai’s arms as they’re carefully placing the backpack next to the ice cooler.
“Hey!” Kai exclaims, sending Taehyun into a fit of giggles. Kai tries to give her a glare but it looks more like they’re scrunching up their nose. Taehyun wants to kiss them there. Kai relents with a small sigh, probably knowing they can’t get into an aggressive pillow fight in Taehyun’s parents’ driveway, and they close the trunk of Lea’s car.
“Are you ready?” Taehyun asks, rocking back and forth on the soles of her feet.
“Whenever you are,” Kai answers.
Taehyun claps quickly before all but running to the passenger seat. She can hear Kai’s laughter from outside the car before they finally get inside. Taehyun looks up the directions on her phone so Kai can’t see the destination, and the two of them make their way.
Jung Kai loves music, and they have a playlist for each and every situation anyone could ever think of. They have two different playlists for going to the beach in the morning and going to the back at night — and a third one for being at the beach while stoned. Taehyun was content listening to her collection of girl groups and whatever songs her friends showed her, but Kai insists that everything has a mood. Taehyun doesn’t know the mood that Kai’s going for right now, but she thinks it fits.
“It’s one of my late night driving playlists,” Kai says, but Taehyun doesn’t think they’re telling the whole truth. They’re usually more a lot specific.
Taehyun looks out the window. Even with all its light pollution, Seoul is beautiful. They were going to be driving for quite a bit but she’s certain that the end destination would be perfect. She’s planned the entire night carefully and tried so hard to ensure that Kai would love every minute of it. Things were going to turn out wonderfully.
“Where are we going, Tae-yah?” Kai asks. They make a left off one of the main streets.
“You’ll see,” Taehyun answers. Kai narrows their eyes slightly, their smile far too excited to match the stern look they were going for, and Taehyun beams. Kai continues to drive while they hum along to the song playing on the car stereo. Taehyun thinks the song is in Portuguese.
It’s funny, if she really thinks about it. Right now, Jung Kai is just existing. They’re sitting down, back completely resting against the driver’s seat, their right hand holding languidly onto the wheel while their left hand rests on their lap. They look stunning. Taehyun is so deeply in love with them. Kai keeps their eyes on the road, not paying attention to the way Taehyun looks at them. The stereo casts a dim light on their face, and Taehyun notices that they’re wearing the daisy earring.
Taehyun looks down at her lap, willing away the warmth that’s starting to spread to her face. She was wearing her daisy earring, too.
Kai pulls into the parking lot after giving Taehyun a skeptical look. Sure, the park might technically be closed at this late hour, but there is no way of actually preventing anyone from going inside. Taehyun only smiles wide, teeth and all, and that seems to put Kai at ease.
“If we get caught, though,” they whisper, “I’m totally throwing you under the bus.”
“Noted,” Taehyun says at a normal volume, because she is certain that no one is here.
Kai grabs a hold of the cooler and a few pillows while Taehyun struggles to put the backpack over her shoulders. They walk a good distance into the field before Taehyun all but throws the backpack onto the ground, falling to her knees to unzip it. She makes a show of taking the blanket out, spinning around and pretending it’s some sort of ribbon although she’s not trained in ribbon dancing in the slightest, but Kai’s laughter makes it all worth it. She sets down the pillows for them to sit on and places the cooler on the edge of the blanket. Taehyun takes Kai’s hand, pulling them with her as she sits down. She keeps the backpack close, should they get a little bit cold.
“You could’ve just told me we were having a picnic, you know,” Kai drawls out. Their eyes are shining. They love picnics.
“I could have,” Taehyun agrees, because she knows they love surprises just a little bit more.
She reaches for the cooler and reaches for the contents inside, holding out her second surprise for Kai. They don’t even try to contain their gasp, their eyes growing wide as Taehyun puts the bowl carefully in their hands.
“I’ve been craving these so fucking badly,” Kai admits. Taehyun hands them a spoon and they immediately take a bite. “Holy shit, it tastes just like how my dad makes it.”
Taehyun feels bashful from the praise. “I called and asked him how to make it,” she admits.
Kai looks at her like she’s a little bit incredulous. “You’re incredible,” they say. “Next time my dad visits, I’m going to tell him that you make better quindim than him.”
“He’ll kill me!” Taehyun laughs. “I bet it tastes nothing like it does in Brazil, though.”
“Let’s go, then,” Kai says easily. They take another spoonful.
“Yeah?” Taehyun breathes.
Kai nods. “Why not? I’ve never been.”
“Say goodbye to our strawberry farm in Japan?” Taehyun teases with a smile.
“We’ll live by the ocean and catch fish,” Kai says. “Become suppliers for street cooks.”
Taehyun hums. “We’ve never seen the Atlantic Ocean.”
“I want to see it,” Kai says softly. “With you.”
Taehyun would do anything with Jung Kai. Maybe they might follow their father’s footsteps: get a degree in music production and then travel the world as a musician. Taehyun could become a teacher. She’s never really given any thought to their future before Yeonjun asked. She had only known that Kai would be in it, somehow, but now, Taehyun dreams of it every night. There are so many possible futures they could experience. Taehyun would be content with any, as long as she had Kai.
Once Kai’s finished with their little bowl of quindim, Taehyun reaches into the cooler and pulls out a much bigger bowl.
“Holy shit,” Kai exclaims.
Taehyun laughs, the bowl moving with her body. “Yeah, I kind of went all out with this one.”
“That isn’t even a brigadeiro anymore,” Kai says seriously. “That’s a brigadeirão.”
Taehyun blinks.
“It’s fucking huge,” Kai explains.
Taehyun snorts. “That’s a little bit of an understatement,” she admits. She pulls out another spoon from the cooler. “Do you think we can kill it, though?”
“Now you’re speaking my language,” Kai says excitedly.
They both begin to tear apart the brigadeiro with their spoons, Kai making happy noises as they eat. Taehyun figures that, for her very first attempt, this really isn’t bad at all. It’s just short of chewy, a little bit firmer than the way condensed milk moves when squeezed out of the packet. Technically, it’s a perfect dessert, but it’s a little too chocolaty for her despite her sweet tooth. If Kai’s enjoying it, though, then Taehyun can allow herself to believe that she did a good job.
“If you’re just going to fill me up with sweets the whole night, then I have to take a break,” Kai exhales. So maybe the brigadeiro was too chocolaty. Kai stabs the dessert with their spoon and sets the bowl aside. “Lie down with me?”
Taehyun smiles, reaching to put her spoon in the bowl before lying parallel to Kai. Kai smiles back at her, their eyes misty with contentment, and Taehyun’s heart soars. Kai reaches for Taehyun’s hand, holding it gently as they reposition themself to lie down on their back. They draw aimless patterns onto the back of Taehyun’s hand as it rests above their stomach, right on top of their solar plexus.
“Kai-yah,” Taehyun whispers into the night, “what do you think of the stars?”
“I love the stars,” Kai says as they look at the sky. Not all the stars are visible, the light pollution in South Korea affecting the entire country, but it’s a bit better out here. “The sun is a star, and I love her, too.” With their free hand, Kai points at the sky, just above the trees. “It’s better to see it during winter, but Pleiades is right there. The marketplace.”
“Where the sun is reborn?” Taehyun asks.
“Yeah,” Kai whispers. “People don’t quite worship the sun the way they used to.”
She had been fine the entire night, but Taehyun isn’t sure she knows how to breathe anymore. She loves Kai the way that stars die, and perhaps this is a part of it: the air escaping her lungs until there was nothing left. Normally, in cases like these, Taehyun would love to take a picture, but it doesn’t seem right to do that here. A camera would not do Kai’s beauty justice. Taehyun blinks slowly, trying so hard to pay attention to everything in front of her. Kai looks at the sky, their hair falling away from their face. Taehyun had always known that Kai has long eyelashes and takes the time to really focus on them. She can see the moondust that gets stuck in their eyelashes. The moonlight brightens their entire face this time, no longer creating only a silhouette in a dark room. Taehyun wonders that, if she touches Kai’s skin, she’ll be able to touch light, too.
Taehyun sits up.
“Can I tell you something?” she asks.
Kai pushes themself up on their elbows before sitting up completely. “Anything,” they say.
“I’m in love with you,” Taehyun confesses. Only the night is her witness.
Kai’s eyes widen slightly, but the first thing that Taehyun notices is that they’ve let go of her hand. They fidget a little bit, a finger tapping against their thigh as their eyes flit around quickly, and they suck in their lips.
“Dope,” Kai responds.
Taehyun doesn’t know what to say for a bit. “Dope,” she repeats slowly.
Kai doesn’t say anything for a second, but they look like they’re about to explode. “Is this a joke?” they blurt out quickly.
Taehyun recoils. “Why would it be a joke?” she asks. It sounds more like a statement, but she’s trying not to get upset. Kai not returning her feelings is one thing, but asking her if she was joking is another thing entirely.
This is someone that Taehyun has quite literally grown up with — will continue to grow with, because no one ever truly stops growing. Jung Kai is the one person who would know Taehyun better than anyone else on this earth, perhaps even more than her parents. Kai knows Taehyun. They know that she puts her everything into the things she does, that she’s a little too headstrong for her own good sometimes, and that, more than anything, she always tries to stay true to herself.
“Hyuka,” Taehyun states — a nickname she hasn’t used since they were five years old. Kai freezes. “I’m in love with you.”
“Holy shit, you’re serious,” Kai whispers. “You’re serious,” they say to themself.
Taehyun can’t help but roll her eyes. “You can just reject me normally, you know,” she spits.
Kai lets out a laugh, short and panicked and a little too loud. Taehyun seethes with something she can’t quite name. Kai quickly repositions themself so they’re on their knees and reach for Taehyun’s hand.
“Why would I reject you?” Kai asks like they’re out of breath. “Kang Taehyun, I’ve been in love with you forever.”
Taehyun’s eyes stay narrow in her glare. “Don’t you have feelings for Beomgyu-unnie?”
Kai almost chokes on their own spit. “Beomgyu-unnie?” they ask in a hoarse voice, like the idea really is so ridiculous — and it really isn’t, if you ask Taehyun, considering Beomgyu has secured two partners for herself already. “I love her, but definitely not like that, no. She’s just my jjokkomi unnie.”
She doesn’t know where exactly it comes from, but Taehyun’s eyes grow teary. Maybe it was the thought that she really was going to endure the pain of Kai not loving her back, and even if it would only be temporary, it would still hurt. Maybe it was the thought that they could have talked about this much sooner if Taehyun wasn’t so much of a coward. Maybe it was the thought that Kai has truly been waiting for that long.
“You said you didn’t believe in soulmates,” Taehyun says quietly, her voice breaking.
The look Kai gives her is sad. “I don’t,” they confirm. “But that doesn’t mean I love you any less. I don’t like the idea of soulmates because of the idea that someone was made just for you, or made to love you.” Kai gently squeezes Taehyun’s hands. “Tyun,” they whisper — another nickname that hasn’t been used since they were children. “I love you because I want to love you. I don’t know you the way soulmates are supposed to know each other. Learning who you are and all the things about you was a conscious effort, an effort I made because I want to love you.”
Taehyun feels the lodge in her throat and it feels like it’s preventing her from breathing entirely.
“I’ve waited so long for this day,” Kai admits in a murmur, “not because it was predestined, but because I keep putting in the effort to make it a reality. Because what else can I do besides love you? I just kept giving you my love over and over and over again because I knew it would be worth it. It’s something I’ve worked for. My loving you is not a coincidence.”
Taehyun sniffles. “God, I really thought you didn’t return my feelings.” She wipes at her eyes to get rid of any trace of tears, but her eyes are still red.
Kai lets out a small laugh. They lean closer, and Taehyun can’t get enough of them.
“Tyun-ah,” they whisper. The nickname is foreign and familiar at the same time. It feels like coming home. “You’re a little bit stupid.”
Taehyun rips her hands from Kai’s grasp to smack their arm. “Hello?” she asks, dumbfounded.
This time, Kai’s laugh is unabashedly loud. “Kang Taehyun,” they announce, “the day I met you, my dad picked me up from kindergarten and asked if I made any friends.” Taehyun looks at them softly, waiting for them to finish but bracing herself for any insults. “And I said, her name is Taehyun, and I’m going to marry her.”
Taehyun starts crying for real. “That’s really gay,” she sniffles.
“My goodness,” Kai grimaces, but they’re chuckling regardless. Taehyun closes the gap at last, letting their foreheads rest against each other.
“You’ve been waiting for that long?” Taehyun murmurs against Kai’s skin.
Kai only hums. “You like to take initiative,” they say as a way of response. It’s true. “I knew you would make the first move when you came around to it.”
Taehyun puts a little bit of space between their faces. She’s looking right into Kai’s eyes and can see herself in the reflection of their pupils. She used to wonder if Kai pictures her in gold the same way Taehyun sees them, but maybe it was just Taehyun that was incandescent. She was going to spend the rest of her life drowning Jung Kai in light if they let her.
“So you like when I take initiative,” Taehyun says. It’s not a question.
Kai only stares back at her, so Taehyun dives right in.
It shouldn’t be surprising that Kai tastes like chocolate and sugar, but it still is. Maybe the surprise is feeling Kai’s lips against hers. It might be the glaze of quindim still on their lips, but Kai tastes just as sweet as Taehyun imagined. Their lips are soft and supple, almost malleable if Taehyun really wanted to test it — the exact opposite of Kai’s course, calloused hands. One thing is the same, though. Jung Kai kisses the same way they play music: with every little thing they have, with a magic Taehyun can’t begin to understand.
Kai pulls away first, Taehyun subconsciously chasing their lips. Their foreheads are still pressed together and Taehyun can still taste Kai on her mouth.
“You’re so far away,” Kai murmurs against Taehyun’s lips. “Come to me.”
Who is Taehyun to deny them anything?
“You’re so dumb,” Taehyun giggles softly, nosing Kai’s cheek as she moves closer, closer, closer. Gently, she pushes Kai back until they’re sitting properly, no longer kneeling, and Taehyun makes herself comfortable on their lap. “How am I far away?” she asks, tucking some hair behind Kai’s ear. Their daisy earring shines underneath the moonlight. “I’ve been right here for sixteen years now.”
“And never quite close enough,” Kai answers, wrapping their arms around Taehyun. Long, long limbs. One hand rests on Taehyun’s lower back while the other is just above her shoulder blade.
Perhaps stars choose to smash into each other, sometimes.
“I’ll be as close as you want me to be,” Taehyun promises. She presses her lips to Kai’s cheek. “You’ll never get rid of me now.”
Kai hums before kissing Taehyun once more. They taste a little less sweet than before, like Taehyun kissed away the lingering chocolate, but Kai wasn’t any less intoxicating. Slowly, Taehyun opens her mouth, quietly asking Kai to do the same. The angle’s not quite right, and Taehyun thinks their noses are right next to each other, and she pulls away with a laugh.
Kai pouts, lips roseate from being kissed so much. “Come back,” they whine.
“Sorry, sorry,” Taehyun smiles. She adjusts the pillows around them. “Lie down?” she asks.
“Are you seriously going to make me lie down on the grass just so we can make out?” Kai asks. “Out here on a summer night? In the middle of nowhere?”
“We’re on a blanket,” Taehyun reasons. She pushes against Kai’s chest lightly. “And you have pillows.”
“But we could be making out on a bed,” Kai argues.
“But consider: it’s romantic.”
“Getting mosquito bites is romantic?”
“Do you have mosquito bites?”
“Not currently.”
“Lie down, Kai-yah.”
Kai closes their mouth so quickly Taehyun’s pretty sure she hears their teeth click, but they all but fall onto the pillows. Taehyun thinks she understands poetry, now — Kai looks ethereal underneath the moonlight, like there’s a mist surrounding them that gives them a different sort of glow. Taehyun has always known how beautiful Jung Kai is, but she takes the moment to truly appreciate it right now. The slope of their nose, the mole at the corner of their mouth, their collarbones. Taehyun lets herself sink into Kai’s body, lowering her head so she can press light kisses on their face. She kisses the mole above Kai’s mouth, then the one on their cheek before nipping at the skin with her teeth.
There was clearly a lot of effort into not doing so, but Kai bursts into laughter — high-pitched and loud shrieks, completely unrestrained. Taehyun’s laughing, too, resting her forehead on Kai’s neck as Kai thrashes about. Kai’s arms are wrapped completely around Taehyun’s waist so they’re holding onto her as they shake with laughter.
“Oh, you ruined it,” Kai sighs, their laughter finally dying down. “I want to go back now.”
“No,” Taehyun whines, bringing a hand to Kai’s face. Kai drags her down to the floor so they’re both lying down, facing each other.
“What the fuck was that for?” Kai laughs, pulling Taehyun closer.
Taehyun kisses the spot she bit on Kai’s cheeks. “I don’t know,” she says. Presses a kiss to the tip of Kai’s nose. “It’s like — I adore you so much that I don’t know what to do with myself, and I need to put that energy out, you know?”
Kai furrows their eyebrows. “So you decided to bite me.”
Taehyun purses her lips. “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”
“You could put that energy out in other ways,” Kai states pointedly.
Taehyun gasps. “Jung Kai!” she shrieks.
Kai’s eyes widen with realization. “H-hold on, wait — that’s not what I meant,” they sputter, sitting up properly on the blanket as they wave apologetically at Taehyun. Taehyun knows her face is terribly warm right now, and Kai is blubbering about how they didn’t mean it in a sexual context, that they don’t mean to pressure Taehyun in any way and the park was a terrible place to have sex, anyway, they’ve never considered themself much of an exhibitionist but they’d be willing to indulge Taehyun’s fantasies within reason—
Taehyun can’t help but smile.
“Oh, no,” Kai moans, their face falling. “Is public sex non-negotiable for you?”
Taehyun blinks before coming back to her senses. “Kai-yah,” she laughs, “first, nothing is non-negotiable when it comes to you. The second thing is, I’m so in love with you it’s almost ridiculous.”
Kai nods once, eyebrows still furrowed. “So. I was rambling about sex. With you. Which was a conversation I wasn’t expecting to have. And I’m freaking out because I thought I freaked you out. And the only thing you got from that entire thing was that you love me?”
“Precisely,” Taehyun answers.
Kai sighs through their nose, closing their eyes shut as they try to fight the smile curving their lips. “I’m going to die,” they say. “This isn’t good for my health.”
Taehyun crawls closer and kisses their forehead.
“I’ve been replenished,” Kai states, opening their eyes once more. “I can take on the world.”
Taehyun just shakes her head, very fond and very in love with the person in front of her. “Let’s go back,” she suggests softly. “It’s probably better making out on a bed, anyway.”
Kai reaches for the brigadeiro before putting it back in the basket. “I’d hate to say I told you so…”
Taehyun throws one of the pillows at them. Kai only laughs, packing up everything else they brought out to the grass. Taehyun drops a pillow here and there, forcing Kai to help her pick it up, and she’d kiss them every single time. It may or may not have inspired gravity to pull a pillow to the ground a few more times. Kai opens the trunk to the car, not bothering to organize the way they put things before closing it shut at pressing Taehyun against the door, kissing her with a little more fervor than earlier. Taehyun gets on her toes, wrapping her arms around Kai’s neck, one hand in their hair as she kisses them back.
And perhaps this is the way that stars collide: coming together like a tree plants its roots in the earth, growing and growing until they’re so tangled with each other that there’s no possible chance of separation, a gentle kiss goodnight before they become something new.
Taehyun sits comfortably in the passenger seat as she looks at Kai. It’s funny, if she really thinks about it. Right now, Jung Kai was just existing. They were sitting down, back completely resting against the driver’s seat, their right hand holding languidly onto the wheel while they set the directions to home with their left. They look stunning. Taehyun is so deeply in love with them. Kai turns to Taehyun slowly, meeting her gaze, and smiling softer than moondust on the skin. The moon rests behind them, casting them in a gentle silhouette, their earring still catching light from the stereo.
“You look like you want to devour me,” Kai says.
“You put the idea in my head,” Taehyun argues. She raises her eyebrows slowly, and Kai laughs loudly.
“Not in my sister’s car,” they say, putting their phone on the dashboard and starting the car.
Taehyun perks up. “That’s your only issue?” she asks curiously. “Noted.”
Kai scoffs, shaking their head as they smile brightly. “Do you think we can recreate that scene from Fast and the Furious?” they ask as they pull out of the parking lot.
“You’re going to have to be a lot more specific.”
Kai turns on the turning signal despite there being absolutely no one else on the road right now. They turn onto the street. “The one where they’re in the car—”
“Isn’t that, like, every single movie?”
“—but Han’s driving and he has the chair reclined basically all the way so the woman — I forgot her name — so she can sit on his lap and they’re making out as he drives into the distance.”
Taehyun snorts. “And they don’t die?”
“No,” Kai says. “She doesn’t die until the next movie. And Han dies in Tokyo Drift.”
Taehyun hums. “It actually reminds me of this one American show—”
“You’re going to have to be a lot more specific,” Kai mimics.
“—where this couple was in the car and the woman was giving the driver head from the passenger seat, and he lost control of the car and they got hit by a truck and died.”
“Romantic,” Kai says flatly.
“She bit his dick off,” Taehyun finishes.
Kai smiles. “Classic.”
They sit in silence as the music plays, Taehyun resting her head on the passenger seat as she looks at Kai. They’re beautiful, and she’s in love with them. They’re in love with her, too, and it’s not miraculous by any means. That’s just the way life goes — how they make it out to be. Taehyun glances at Kai’s phone. It’s still unlocked; they have Melon open instead of the map, but they have the home page opened instead of having the album art on display.
The playlist is called you’re in a car with a beautiful girl.
Taehyun wakes up to light kisses on her neck and sweat on the dip of her back. She can feel it against the cloth of her shirt. She’s slept in the same bed as Kai many, many times before, but they’ve never fallen asleep holding each other so tightly. There was always the cuddle before the eventual separation in their sleep, or their somnolent-induced brains seeking warmth come daybreak, but Taehyun fell asleep kissing Kai’s forehead and clearly didn’t move the entire night. Perhaps the only downside to being in love was waking up sweaty from being tangled into each other like tree roots. The fact that it was summer didn’t help at all, either. Taehyun wanted nothing more than to just sit in front of the fan for a little while, maybe even indulge herself and turn on the aircon. But first, she had to say good morning to her partner.
Partner. Because Jung Kai was more than just her best friend now. It doesn’t feel all that different, but at the same time, it’s like Taehyun’s world has shifted.
Taehyun hums as Kai’s movements become less like kisses and more like pecks to the crook of her neck. It’s getting a little too warm. “I have morning breath,” she croaks out.
Kai snorts. “Hyun, how many times have we woken up together? I know what your morning breath is like and it hasn’t scared me off all this time.”
Taehyun moves slightly so she’s more on her side than on her back, ready to return the favor to Kai and press kisses all over their skin. “This sounds like a challenge,” she mumbles. She kisses a spot just underneath Kai’s jaw — they’re sensitive there, which is something absolutely delightful that Taehyun learned the night before. “I’m only going to eat odorous foods before bed now,” she promises.
“Okay,” Kai sighs blissfully. Taehyun wonders, purely for scientific purposes, if she should look into learning how to give hickeys. Were they too old for that now? She could get away with leaving a few hickeys on Kai’s torso, probably — their chest, maybe, since they were both fond of wearing cropped shirts in warmer weather. Kai reaches for Taehyun’s face and gently pulls her away from their neck, finally kissing her on the mouth. Their lips are a little bit chapped, but Taehyun doesn’t mind in the slightest. They’re still just as soft as they were the night before. “Good morning,” Kai whispers.
“Good morning,” Taehyun says. She leans in to kiss Kai once more, but they don’t meet her halfway. Kai just stares, half-lidded and cloudy eyes staring right into Taehyun’s own. “What’s up?” she asks.
“Nothing,” Kai answers, tucking some hair behind Taehyun’s ear, brushing their thumb along her cheek. “You just shine like the sun.”
Taehyun gets it now.
There’s a knock on the door while the Kang family is eating dinner. Taehyun’s parents share a glance like they’re silently hoping that whoever’s knocking ends up leaving them alone, or perhaps mentally arguing over who should get up and open the door. Taehyun imagines forming some sort of telepathic connection with Kai and she feels her cheeks warm up. Kai does the impossible and risks checking their phone at the dinner table while Taehyun’s mother is distracted, and they put it back down with a shrug of their shoulders. Taehyun nods in understanding. Their friends haven’t texted, so it wasn’t them at the door.
This telepathy thing was actually kind of easy.
After a minute, there’s another knock. Taehyun’s parents glare at each other now, most definitely arguing over who’s going to get up, and Taehyun’s father ends up relenting. Kai eyes the dumpling left in the basket — the very last one, which would probably have gone to Taehyun’s father, but everyone knows that if you snooze, you lose. Taehyun’s father takes off his slippers before slipping into the sandals he has by the door, and he looks to see who’s outside. His face lights up with recognition.
“Nabil!” he exclaims. Taehyun and Kai perk up. “Come in, come in, we were just eating dinner. Let me get you a plate.”
Kai’s father steps into their home and bows slightly, waving when he makes eye contact with Kai. “Ah, enjoy your meal!” he says. “I hope I’m not interrupting.”
“Nonsense,” Kai’s mother says. “Let me get you a drink.”
“Pai!” Kai exclaims happily. They quickly excuse themself from the table before jogging to hug their dad. They’re taller than him now, something that their father doesn’t seem all too happy about, but Nabil holds his child close and kisses both their cheeks. It’s been a good few months since Kai’s father was in Korea; the last time he came was for their high school graduation. Kai guides their father to the table where Taehyun is ready to greet him, too. There’s a new kind of nervousness pooling in Taehyun’s stomach. This was her best friend’s father, a man she’s known almost all her life, but they were seeing each other in a different context. Now, this man could possibly be her father-in-law. Kai squeezes Taehyun’s hand as they sit back down like they could sense her nervousness. Telepathy again.
“I figured you’d be here,” Kai’s father explains to Kai. “I stopped by your mother’s place thinking all three of our kids were going to be there, but my middle child is a bit of a vagabond.”
“I’m going to disappear under mysterious circumstances,” Kai says with a nod. Taehyun catches their eye, causing the both of them to smile. Japan and Brazil were still up in the air. Maybe they can do both.
“I hope you’ll forgive me,” Kai’s father says out loud. “My Korean is very rusty.”
Taehyun’s father puts a plate in front of Kai’s father while Taehyun’s mother places a small cup of tea nearby. Kai’s father inclines his head at them as they resume their spots at the table. Taehyun reaches for the last dumpling in the bowl on the table and puts it on Kai’s plate. Kai splits it in half with their chopsticks and gives one half to Taehyun. She thinks she might just scream.
“Ah, we’ll make it even right now,” Taehyun’s father says, patting Nabil’s shoulder. “You owe me a hundred thousand won.”
Kai’s father snaps his heads towards Taehyun and Kai. Taehyun cut her half of the dumpling into two more pieces and is trying to put one on Kai’s plate, but Kai keeps putting it back on Taehyun’s plate, and then Taehyun puts the other quarter piece on Kai’s plate. It’s an endless loop — a stellar cycle.
“Fuck,” Kai’s father says.
“Noona,” one of the kids says, tugging on Beomgyu’s sleeve, “I need help with my bracelet.”
“Okay!” Beomgyu chirps, inviting the boy to sit next to her at the table. Taehyun watches intently and hopes she’s being discreet. Kai snorts — so she must not be. Ass. “So, to make sure the bead doesn’t slip, you need to tie a knot. You remember how to tie a knot, right?”
“No,” the boy says sadly, sadly spinning the loose bead around. “Can noona do it for me?”
“Hm,” Beomgyu says, elongating the sound. “It sounds like you want me to make this bracelet for you.” The child giggles like he knows he’s been caught, and Beomgyu smiles fondly. “Alright, I’ll help you with the bracelet if, and only if, you master your D minor scales.”
“Noona!” the boy whines. “Those scales are so hard. My thumbs can’t move fast enough.”
“Well, what’s harder?” Beomgyu asks. “The scales, or making the bracelet?”
“I’ll practice my scales.”
Beomgyu nods like she’s incredibly proud of herself, and Kai just snorts again. Beomgyu’s smile immediately slips from her face and she’s staring at Kai with a blank face that makes Taehyun want to jump to their partner’s defense. Kai starts giggling, the way they always do when they’re thinking of causing problems on purpose, and Taehyun decides that they’re on their own. It’s over.
“Don’t diss the art just because you don’t understand it, Kai-chi,” Beomgyu says, her voice sickeningly sweet and threatening. “I’m willing to bet my next paycheck that you wouldn’t last a day working here.”
“Aw, fuck,” Kai says, “now I have to fill out a job application just to prove you wrong.”
One of the children at the end of the table messes up on her knot, her strings no longer even and unable to move back into place. “Aw, fuck,” she says.
Beomgyu’s smile only grows. Kai nods in solemn defeat before resting their forehead on the table. Taehyun goes back to working on her bracelet, struggling to get a knot close enough to the bead so it won’t slide anywhere, and she fucks it up. She only sighs. Beomgyu snickers, clearly relishing in the fact that both of her dongsaengs are being inconvenienced today. She finishes the knot on one of her bracelets, placing it with the other two she made earlier. They all match.
“Gyu-noona!” one of the children calls from the keyboards. “Can you help me with this measure, please?”
“Coming!” Beomgyu calls back. She excuses herself from the table as the other children wave at her like they’re sending her off to war. Taehyun reaches for Kai’s bracelet and inspects it, trying to see where they tied their knots to get it to look so neat. She might scream if she never gets this right — which is ridiculous, because Taehyun thinks the least appropriate place to scream would be the children’s center in Seoul where her friend works. For Beomgyu’s sake, she tries her best to keep her composure. It’s just a bracelet.
“Sunbaenim,” someone says, gently poking Kai’s arm. Kai lifts their head up from the table and lets their hair fall right into their eyes. “You can read sheet music, right?” the kid asks. “I’ve seen you play on the grand piano before.”
“Um, yeah,” Kai says, their ears turning pink. Taehyun loves this juxtaposition of Kai performing in front of crowds without a problem but being shy around someone less than half their age.
“What’s the difference between ties and slurs?” the kid asks, crawling onto the seat next to Kai.
Taehyun sees the way Kai blooms. Taehyun looks at Kai and sees a nebula. She knows now that this is what a quasar feels like — so much love she doesn’t know what to do with herself. Kai’s expressions give everything away; Taehyun notices how all the shyness leaves their body in a single breath when they begin to explain ties and slurs to the child. Part of her wishes that Beomgyu was here to see this so Kai can prove her wrong, part of her wants to keep this image to herself. Taehyun wants to capture this moment, perhaps take a picture, or perhaps keep this shitty handmade bracelet she attempted to make to remind her in the future. She wonders if these are the kinds of moments Kai writes songs about.
Taehyun looks at Kai and sees love personified.
Even in a room full of tens of people, in an auditorium full of hundreds, an open crowd full of thousands, Jung Kai will always be the first person Taehyun will ever notice. She might not even be looking at them. They gravitate towards each other like the first planets coming together, like stars slowly colliding. It wasn’t predestined, but instead something they’ve learned to do. Maybe music is magical, the way that Taehyun is being sucked in. Kai moves their hands as they explain things, gesticulating perhaps a bit more than necessary, like they were made to play any instrument they could touch. Kai glows with it — can other people see it, too, the gentle mist surrounding them?
Taehyun never wants to blink. She wants to drink in this entire view of Kai smiling while doing what they love most, hair cascading down their face in a way that makes Taehyun want to kiss them — slowly, gently, like sunlight on the skin. Kai’s smile right now is the embodiment of light, even while doing something so mundane, and Taehyun wants to bury herself in it.
“What are you looking at?” Kai asks after a moment, long after the child has left. Taehyun burns with love for them.
“Nothing,” Taehyun says. “I think I love you the way you love music.”
Kai laughs like liquid gold, like Pleiades falling into place. Perhaps this is the way that stars die: a steady growth, an explosion that causes her to collapse unto herself until her soul is boundless. A core so dense it outweighs the sun. A place where time does not exist, a lover’s kiss surrounding her wherever she goes.
“That’s funny,” Kai says, “because I love you more than I love music.”
The blossoming is infinite.