Chapter Text
Typically, married people are…married.
Yu Jimin and Yu Minjeong are married and…dating.
Minjeong doesn’t know how the hell she’s going to tell her parents she married her girlfriend before they became girlfriends.
Maybe what they don’t know won’t kill them. She doesn’t need them to know that she drank an obscene amount of alcohol and married a pretty stranger just because of a good feeling. They’d never let her out of their sights again.
(Minjeong shivers.
She moved for a reason.
She wanted freedom in every regard.
She wanted to be a new person in a new place, unrestrained by old working conditions, free from whatever dated perceptions people had of her. Minjeong moved because she felt stuck. She couldn’t look back at her year and be proud of what she has done, couldn’t be proud of her creations, couldn’t be content about the lackluster way she lived, the utter loss of control she had over her happiness and worth.
So, she moved across the whole damn world to try to change that.)
Jimin was never in her plan, but really, who plans to marry someone the way that she did?
And who ever thinks that someone straight from fantasies actually exists?
And is actually obtainable?
Certainly not Minjeong.
Because she was so fucking wrong about Jimin being emotionally unavailable. While she is dedicated to her job, lucky for her, Drunk Minjeongie hard carried and worked her way into Jimin’s heart, made herself an exception to her workaholic tendencies.
Sure, Jimin likes her for more than her cute drunken habits, but there’s no denying that Jimin fell for her in a night.
It’s also pretty hard to deny it when Jimin teases her about liking her at first sight.
“Minjeong, you might not remember how I looked at you, but I remember the world stopping when I saw you.”
Does she not get tired of saying shit like this? Like, how can she drop a line like this without losing her soul? Minjeong would need to go through severe hell just to say these things without shuddering.
It’s funny how she hates the thought of even saying romantic things and how much she loves hearing them.
She acts like she’s throwing up, acts like she hates it.
She acts.
And Jimin knows.
Jimin knows because she wouldn’t go out of her way to seriously bother Minjeong. Sure, she’d tease her and flirt with her just to see her reactions, but she’s good at getting her annoyed instead of mad.
And plus, who doesn’t like to know they’re wanted?
Minjeong may be an anti-romantic, but she isn’t heartless. She wants to be wanted like anyone else would.
It’s just a fucking miracle the person she wants, wants her back. It’s a miracle sent straight from heaven that it’s Jimin who wants her. It’s a miracle because Jimin feels heavensent.
Which makes Jimin her miracle.
Or whatever.
This time, Minjeong remembers how they became girlfriends. She can’t have a 0-2 record in the memory department.
She also made up for the piss poor proposal she gave Jimin. Though, Jimin argues it wasn’t piss poor, says that it was cute and romantic and silly—just the right amount of sincere and unserious. Minjeong still questions Jimin’s taste, but she won’t put up a fight.
Jimin is hers. And if a Fat Tuesday was going to be the thing to start it, so be it.
But, the thing that gets Jimin to be her girlfriend starts with Jimin working eighteen hours straight.
According to Jimin, she and her team have been grinding to write out a proposal for a new ad campaign with Samyang, getting respectable content creators to try their different Buldak flavors like an Advent calendar. Jimin argues that it’ll be non-secular and interactive, that, “who doesn’t like opening up a treat everyday?”. When Jimin tells Minjeong about work, she tries to keep up. Since they’re both in different departments, a lot of times, their work is unrelated, meaning Minjeong loosely knows what the hell Jimin is talking about. All she’s really sure about is Jimin’s positive about this making profit and increasing brand promotion and recognition, that if she gets it just right, Samyang will agree to this initiative.
Minjeong listened to her rehearse a pitch and by the time Jimin was done, she was craving a carbonara Buldak. While it would be so easy to just boil some water and make some, she still hasn’t gotten around to making Jimin a proper homemade meal.
And, Minjeong, for as much as she dogs on her silly decisions, is always a genius when it comes to food.
Not to say that she’s a rat, but she gets food the way Remy does—she gets the passion, the sense to combine the foods that taste right together, the satisfaction in cooking something delectable.
Maneuvering around Jimin’s kitchen, Minjeong has stayed over enough to know where everything is.
(Now that they’re getting closer, Minjeong is no longer shy about wanting to stay the night, wanting to extend their time together because she barely gets enough of Jimin through the weekdays.
Jimin’s a busy woman. Like, so busy Minjeong wants to send her Outlook meeting invites just to pencil out time with her.
Jesus, she feels ridiculous. She’s never wanted someone this much before.
Minjeong liked to think she was low maintenance, but she’s really understanding what withdrawals feel like when Jimin’s too busy to spend more than an hour or two with her. It’s new to her—the insatiable desire to be around someone, so damn needy that she’d rather ask for attention than be stuck vying for it.)
Preparing a cutting board and her mise en place, she gets into the natural rhythm of cooking with ease.
There’s something so peaceful about cooking—a system of operations to follow. And she gets a tasty meal out of it! It’s really the best reward.
She never imagined cooking for someone else to feel like a reward.
Cooking was usually the labor, not the reward.
But, maybe, doing things for someone like Jimin, for someone who doesn’t demand anything of her or ask for much, is a reward in itself.
(As Minjeong has spent more time with her, the more she recognized Jimin’s selflessness—her natural instinct to care and nurture and push herself for the altruistic sake of others.
It was always small things: Jimin yielding the last of the kimchi in stock at stores for the old halmoni, whittling out her break times to speak with interns who have a litany of questions for her, buying coffee and snacks for the company every month.
For someone who pays attention more to the world than to herself, it feels like a privilege to look out for Jimin—to be allowed the space, the invitation to care for her.
So, Minjeong finds a newfound peace and joy in cooking.
She always thought it was so fucking cheesy when her mom said that she cooks with love.
Minjeong doesn’t want to say she’s cooking with love.
It’s too early to be in love. Or, it feels like it is—it feels irresponsible to say she’s in love with Jimin after only knowing her for three months. Hell, she’s closer to thirty than she is to twenty. She isn’t a reckless young adult anymore, isn’t naive and immature with her heart. She pays rent, pays taxes, has a shopping list, follows her strict laundry days no matter how lazy she’s feeling. She’s an adult! She’s sensible!
She knows that she should love wisely but everything in her is telling her she doesn’t need wisdom to know she’s falling in love with Jimin. When she and Jimin have been as honest and intimate with each other as they have, blurring lines and boundaries under the disguise of faking it, Minjeong can’t even pinpoint when she stopped acting—when she started wanting Jimin more than she liked the idea of her.
So, whatever Minjeong’s cooking with, she put her heart in it.)
Jimin, locked in her office and fussing over proposals and cleaning up her pitch, is lured out of it when Minjeong is making her carbonara sauce, fatty, rich pork belly sautéing in a pan.
Even a successful COO bends to the alluring aroma of food.
Minjeong hears Jimin padding down the stairs of her penthouse.
Minjeong’s already remembered the sound of her walk, her pace and gait.
So, she isn’t surprised when arms wrap around her waist, Jimin’s chest pressed against her back, chin cozily resting into her neck.
“Smells good, Minjeongie,” Jimin mumbles by her ear.
If Minjeong’s mind goes blank when Jimin grazes her lips on her neck, that’s only for her to know.
Despite all of the clarity Minjeong has about what she feels, she’s frustratingly lost on what Jimin’s affection means.
She knows Jimin likes her.
She knows Jimin wants her.
Jimin has told her before that she doesn’t regret a single thing about their relationship.
And yet, when Jimin does anything definitively girlfriend-like, she’s being her fake wife—playing it up for other people.
Minjeong likes Jimin so much that it’s starting to not feel like it’s enough.
She doesn’t want pretenses or fake affection.
She wants something real, something real with Jimin, because the things she’s feeling are real—this attachment she’s becoming dependent on is real.
Maybe it’s why Minjeong feels like she’s on high alert, heartbeat pulsing in her ears, when Jimin’s wrapped around her like this, when her lips are so close to her.
If Jimin’s lips feel like a wildfire, being in her arms feels like falling into her bed after a long and tiring day, feels like a place where she can rest and let everything go—where she can forget about the world and her every issue.
Minjeong thinks it’ll devastate her if Jimin’s been faking everything.
But, Drunk Minjeongie pulled her weight.
She pulled her weight like she could take the weight of the sky with ease.
Because Minjeong knows Jimin likes her back.
It’s, honestly, really clear that Jimin does. It’s a real pleasure to be with someone who doesn’t make her guess.
(It almost makes Minjeong feel guilty because she knows she’s made the mistake of being so painfully ambiguous about her feelings in the past. If it felt this good to be so sure about someone, it could only feel like hell to be doubtful.)
But she hasn’t done a damn thing about it.
It’s frustrating.
Minjeong doesn’t like pining. There’s no reason to pine when they’re both pining for each other. But, she also doesn’t like being the first to bear her heart.
She can’t help that she’s reserved. She isn’t like Jimin, can’t share what she’s feeling so easily. Even if she’s so sure about it, aches for something to happen, she will be the last to ask for it.
So, she’s doing what comes easily to her.
Minjeong is being Yu Minjeongie who’s falling in love with Yu Jimin. Which means she’s making a meal so fucking bussing Jimin has no choice but to girlfriend her up.
“I’m making carbonara. Listening to you talk about it made me crave it.”
Jimin hums, observes how Minjeong ladles pasta water into her pan. “I didn’t even know I had the ingredients for this.”
(She didn’t.
Minjeong had to quickly leave and pick up the meat and pecorino for this. But Jimin doesn’t need to know that—doesn’t need to know that Minjeong has put in the effort to fuss over her and dote.)
“I’m, like, so many months late, but I remember you told me you didn’t have the time to make homemade meals. And you’ve been so busy lately that I doubt you’ve been cooking for yourself.”
Jimin’s silence, while heavy, isn’t as heavy as the laden gaze she has on her.
Minjeong can feel it, can feel something like adoration shining in her eyes.
God.
Jimin isn’t making it any easier for her.
“You remembered?”
Smiling, uneven and crooked with one corner of her lip in an upturn, “Yeah, of course, I do. I wasn’t doing anything. I wanted to eat and you haven’t had anything to eat either. Seemed like a good decision.”
When Jimin speaks, there’s nothing but honesty in her voice, nothing but saturated affection prettily coloring her words. Even if she lilts with a lighthearted drawl, Minjeong doesn’t need to guess if Jimin’s being serious with her.
“Minjeong-ah, I’m already your wife. You don’t need to butter me up like this.”
Jimin’s deflecting.
Typical.
Jimin deflects when she can’t accept any efforts made to make her life easier.
This, Minjeong has recently discovered, is Jimin’s one fatal flaw.
She’s too damn selfless that she can’t accept kindness when it’s given to her.
Minjeong’s going to change that—she’s going to make Jimin see she’s deserving of kindness, of effort that requires inconvenience. That’s…that’s what love is. Love is understanding inconvenience and accepting it anyway, because love isn’t about ignoring inconvenience. It’s about making life convenient and easy for the other person, no matter the cost.
Love is about being a simp. Truthfully, it really is. The people that are special have special privileges. Jimin, to no surprise, has the privilege of a Minjeong who’d jump at her request, who’d find a way to make the world turn on her own if Jimin wanted it.
“I don’t need to be your wife to cook for you, Jimin.”
Minjeong feels Jimin nodding, she doesn’t say anything.
(She’d love to be her girlfriend and cook for her though.
Minjeong would fucking love to have that spot in Jimin’s heart. She’d love to tell her parents about Jimin, about the wonderful person she is, about how beautiful life has become now that Jimin is in it. She’d love to be able to talk about her to strangers, to her friends, her coworkers. She’d love to see what her fingers create when Jimin’s her muse, what art comes from loving someone like her—when it comes from a place of love and making something with the intent to love.
She wants everyone to know Jimin is her girlfriend. Not Yu Jimin, the competent and successful heir to Yu Industries, but Yu Jimin, dumb of ass and heart of gold.
Minjeong wants Jimin. Just Jimin. Jimin and her bad jokes, her low laughter, scrunchy-nose smiles, her satisfaction in being a smug brat.
Minjeong’s ninety-five percent certain she’s in love with her.
She’s in love with Jimin and she can’t accept it until Jimin knows that the things she does for her are out of love—that Minjeong isn’t trying to be a good wife.
Minjeong just wants to be good to her.
Plain and simple.
In all of her drunkenness and complete lack of memory of what happened, Minjeong doesn’t need to remember what she felt that night to know just how consuming it is—doesn’t need to wonder anymore what it was about Jimin that got her to marry her.
Minjeong wants to show her that she can fall, that she doesn’t need to worry about being too much for her to handle.
Minjeong’s confident in this.
She can do anything for Jimin—she’d do anything for her.
Making her a meal is nothing.)
“Making food for me is a Wife Duty, Minjeongie,” Jimin teases, the shape of a smile pressed into her neck.
Unwilling to proceed because Minjeong’s not going to have this conversation while stressing about making a good sauce, she takes her pan off the heat.
“Could be a Girlfriend Duty if you wanted it to be…”
Jimin freezes. Like, Minjeong feels her entire body still so stiffly that she can feel her entire sternum pulse with every racing heartbeat.
“I said I’d show you you could fall for me.” Staring at the glossy pan of pork belly, Minjeong thinks there’s no part of her brain that’s driving the courageousness of her confession. “I know I’m not super credible because I don’t even remember saying it to you, but drunken words are sober thoughts, right?” Subconsciously smiling to herself, Minjeong anchors herself to Jimin when she places her hand atop hers, her fingers lacing with Jimin’s. “So, I’m…gonna prove it to you. I’m gonna keep my promise to you.”
Okay, so Minjeong doesn’t ask Jimin to be her girlfriend. Not really. She doesn’t have the audacity for that. But she has all of the desire and ability to show she wants it. She’s going to do what she wants to do—and that means cooking for her wife/woman she’s in love with.
“Minjeong, are you being serious?”
The brave smile Minjeong has trembles.
She’s never been so serious about wanting someone.
“I know I proposed to you blackout drunk with a stupid Fat Tuesday, but I meant what I said. I married you for a reason, Jimin.”
Jimin’s embrace tightens, buries her face into her neck.
That’s a massive ass smile Minjeong feels.
(Oh, Yu Minjeong, you lucky son of a bitch. What’s it like to have the woman of your dreams want you back?)
Muffled because she’s still nuzzling into her, Jimin sounds so fucking elated it makes Minjeong’s stomach flip, “We’re doing this all backwards.”
Leaning her head on Jimin’s, any remnant of stress and worry melts away, “Nothing about this is conventional. But I don’t regret anything. I don’t care about doing things backwards or right as long as I’m doing it with you.”
Lowly, Jimin’s soft reprimand does nothing to scold her, “You can’t say stuff like that to me.”
“Why not?”
Jimin pouts. Minjeong hears it in her voice.
“...No reason.”
Uh huh.
Very believable, Yu Jimin.
“Tell the truth, Jiminie~”
Minjeong feels Jimin deflating, feels her attempt to be firm bend to her will.
Jimin’s given her too much power.
“No. You can’t make me.”
Oh, but she can. Minjeong knows she can.
Minjeong knows Jimin well enough to know that Jimin’s a sucker for her—she married her! Of course, Jimin would do anything under the sun for her.
“I guess…I guess I’ll stop cooking for you.”
Popping her head up to glare a frown at her, “Why?!”
Shrugging, Minjeong tells her stupid smile to fuck off because Jimin isn’t meant to be cute to her right now. She’s meant to act like she’s being cool! “It’s a Girlfriend Duty, Yu Jimin.”
“Wha- didn’t I- we-”
“Why can’t I tell you what I feel?”
The air stills.
Any humor or easy lightheartedness they were bantering with shifts into something serious, something that kneels to the eve of a conversation they’ve been due for.
Speaking softly, Jimin stops holding her so that she can turn to face her. “You…you can. I want you to.”
Resting her arms on Jimin’s shoulder and lacing her fingers together, Minjeong doesn’t know what it is that gives her the strength to look Jimin in her eyes. Usually, she can’t even bear a staring contest with her, even her fiery competitiveness douses out when Jimin’s giving her every ounce of her attention. But there’s something about the way Jimin’s looking at her right now that breaking away from her feels impossible.
“I want you to do that with me, too. I want you to be able to speak freely with me. I want you to rely on me. I want…I want everything you’re willing to give me.”
Minjeong thinks she sees Jimin’s chest stutter, thinks she feels how her breath gets caught in her throat.
When Jimin’s eyes linger on her lips, Minjeong knows exactly why Jimin’s suddenly feeling so shy.
For someone with Casanova’s rizz, Jimin looks awfully timid.
It doesn’t stop her from doing what Minjeong’s asked of her.
Minjeong almost feels lightheaded from the adrenaline rushing through her veins.
God, she better not pass out.
She’s about to get kissed.
She’s about to get something she has been wanting for months—since they hung out and she got winetipsy.
She’s getting Yu Jimin, her Yu Jimin that she has wanted ever since she saw her.
When Jimin rests her forehead on hers, Minjeong’s heart sounds like thunder crashing, feels electricity surging through her.
“I want…” Jimin, breathy and quiet, almost sounds like she’s about to beg, “I wanna kiss you.”
Minjeong’s breath hiccups, uses all her restraint to not hold Jimin’s chin in her hand and kiss her. Despite her valiant attempt, her lips, a featherlight graze on Jimin’s, makes Jimin hold her waist tighter—like she’s the one thing keeping her tethered to the earth.
Mumbling, she feels how Jimin shudders in her arms, “I won’t stop you if you do.”
“Minjeong,” a plea, “Minjeong, I want you. I have always wanted you.”
Minjeong thinks Jimin loves her back.
She’s pretty sure that Jimin loves her back because no one’s been so silly desperate just to fucking kiss her.
Whoever said that power is about dividing and conquering has never had a woman like Jimin want them the way she wants her.
This isn’t “conquering” her. No, this is Jimin wanting her so much she’s willing to give everything to her.
It’s empowering to know she’s not the only one.
“Then, kiss me, Jimin. Be mine, be my girlfriend.”
This isn’t asking, Minjeong knows.
She doesn’t need to ask when she knows Jimin wants her.
When Jimin kisses her, Minjeong thinks she’s won a great war—she’s won against yearning, against stupid decisions, against the stars, against the universe. When Jimin kisses her, passionate and languid, Minjeong feels like she’s done everything right.
When Jimin kisses her, Minjeong feels like she’s hers.
That Jimin is hers, that she is Jimin’s.
This kiss, Minjeong knows, is for them.
Only for them.
Screw the world, screw everything else.
Minjeong is in love.
She is in love and she’s the luckiest girl in the world because her girlfriend is such a good girlkisser she never wants to be kissed by anyone else.
Being Jimin’s girlfriend is bliss. It’s like being her fake wife, except all the time. Jimin doesn’t work as much, says that going on dates with the love of her life is much more riveting than staring at numbers and Excel sheets. Minjeong spends more nights at Jimin’s, Minjeong has an extra toothbrush in her bathroom. It’s like they’ve (mostly) skipped the initial awkward dating phase and went straight to an old married couple.
One of the best things about being Jimin’s girlfriend, other than…being her girlfriend, is Jimin’s uncanny necessity to always be attached to her. She’s even bought them ridiculous socks that hold hands.
“What…is this?”
Jimin, holding two pairs of socks in her hands, gloats, “Couple socks! Because we’re a couple!”
“Baby, no one even sees our socks. It’s winter! I’m wearing pants! I know it doesn’t get super cold here, but my ankles get cold!”
Jimin’s smirk is smug. Never a good sign for Minjeong.
“That’s what the socks are for! My hands keep your pink jelly fingers and iceblock hands warm, my socks hold your socks’ hand! It’s true to real life!”
Minjeong frowns at her, judging.
“I can’t believe people are scared of you.”
“Hey!”
“I hate to break it to you, baby,” Minjeong fakes a wince, “but you’re a loser.”
When Jimin whines, it only serves to prove Minjeong right, “I’m not a loser!”
“Jimin. Do you see these socks?”
“Yeah! They’re cute!”
“Loserish things can be cute! Look at you!”
When Jimin angrily turns away from her, inciting the relinquishment of cuddling time as punishment for her crimes, Minjeong doesn’t believe her for a second.
Jimin? Not cuddle her to sleep? That’s preposterous.
“Jiminie,” she goads, “look at me.”
“No!”
What a big baby.
(When Minjeong says baby, she means it like aegi.)
“Baby, if you won’t look at me, I’ll get sad.”
Her girlfriend harrumphs, stubborn about her faux anger, “Be sad then.”
(That’s even harder to believe. Jimin would probably be dead before she intentionally does anything to make her sad.)
Getting out of bed, Minjeong notices how Jimin tries to discreetly watch her.
“Gimme your feet.”
“Huh,” Jimin questions, “why,” placing her feet in her lap.
As Minjeong works on slipping Jimin’s pair on, she catches the pout on her girlfriend’s lips turn into a fond smile.
(God.
There is down bad and then there is Minjeong.
There is no such thing as a backbone if Jimin’s involved. Minjeong’s all gooey for her. It's even worse because no one’s going to believe her when she pretends she hates it. She does not and everyone freaking knows it.)
Getting back into bed and molding herself into Jimin’s back, tangling their feet together, Minjeong makes sure the socks’ magnetic hands connect.
(Minjeong just had to fall in love with the president of Loserville. And now, she’s doing cheesy shit like wearing couple socks that hold hands. Even worse, she’s enjoying it!)
It’s almost embarrassing to be so obedient to Jimin’s every request. She’d almost hate herself for it if Jimin weren’t Jimin.
But alas, as wrapped around Jimin’s finger as she is, Jimin’s wrapped around her. Her hands, her legs, their arms, her hair in Minjeong’s face.
Jimin’s hand in hers, goofy socks linked together, Minjeong sighs to herself.
Being Jimin’s is easily one of the best things she has ever been.
When Jimin’s her girlfriend, she’s much more shy. Throughout the months as her wife, Jimin has surprised her with a plethora of gifts—bouquets and boxes of chocolate, lunch that she prepped the night before, cute notes and paper hearts. As her wife, she has given her these things boldly, popping in like the Princess Charming she is, leaving with a kiss goodbye.
But, as her girlfriend, she is so devastatingly adorable it hurts. The first time Jimin got her flowers, she gave them to her with pink, blushing cheeks, arms fully extended with her eyes squeezed shut.
(What was she expecting? For Minjeong to refuse them?
As if she could ever refuse Jimin.
She could give her a tiny wildflower or a small trinket of no value and Minjeong would cherish it like it was the greatest thing she has ever seen.
Unable to let this pass, Minjeong made sure to be more verbal about her appreciation—making a show of smelling the flowers and asking for a vase to be brought to her office. While Jimin was there, she took it upon herself to arrange it, cutting off extra parts of stems and taking off damaged petals or leaves. She made sure Jimin saw how much she cared for it, the effort she’d be willing to make to take care of something given to her by her.
Jimin’s made a green thumb out of her. While the bouquets are harder to keep, Minjeong tries to keep them alive for as long as possible. The variegated monstera Jimin gave her six months ago has impressively grown and is thriving—Minjeong hasn’t let it die. In fact, she takes such good care of it that she knows exactly which leaves are new, which ones need tending to, could even snip a stem off and confidently go to a plant trading convention and barter with other plant-obsessed people.)
Jimin touches her for no reason at all. She holds her hand, walks around with her arm around her waist. She kisses her hello, kisses her goodbye. She kisses her because she wants to, when she needs to. Jimin’s more vocal about missing her, texting her late at night and asking if she’ll Facetime her even if Jimin’s stuck looking at her ceiling.
“But I’m barefaced. I’m already ready for bed…”
“That’s fine, baby. I just wanted to hear your voice. Tell me about your day.”
“You’re not gonna tell me I don’t look ugly?”
“Why would I tell you that,” Jimin deadpans.
“Jimin!”
“What?! Why would I tell you that when I can just say that everything beautiful starts and ends with you.”
Minjeong rolls her eyes, knows that teasing, saccharine voice too well.
“Okay. That’s too much.” She gags, “Yuck, baby.”
Jimin’s playful retort is smug. Minjeong bets she’s smirking, “You know who you married. Get used to it if you’re gonna be my girlfriend.”
“We’re breaking up.”
Jimin doesn’t laugh. It’s unsettlingly quiet on her end of the line.
Oh shit, has Minjeong gone too far and made her angry?
“I’m joking.”
“Joke like that again and we’re divorcing.”
Jimin is such a little shit.
“Jimin!” Minjeong whines. “I thought you actually got mad at me!”
When her girlfriend simpers, Minjeong feels like she should brag, grinning to herself. She loves making Jimin laugh, loves seeing this playful side of her.
Even if it’s at the cost of her dignity and pride, she’d happily take the mantle of being a reason for Jimin’s joy.
“You started it!”
But she wasn’t just going to sit there and take it. She had to try and fight back. At least a little.
“I’m upset at you.”
“No, you aren’t. I can hear your smile, baby.”
(You know what? Fuck Yu Jimin lives. This is enough. Minjeong can only take so much in a conversation. She can only take so many losses at once. She could be happily asleep! She could be dreaming about good things like Jimin not annoying her and taking her out on a nice date, kissing her and spending time with her, dreaming about not missing her anymore. Or, on the other hand, she could be dreaming about meeting Picasso or Dali, having dinner with some of her most revered artists. She could dream about having a massive puppy to terrorize Los Angeles like Godzilla but cute.
She doesn’t have to deal with this. She doesn’t have to deal with Jimin being the biggest little piece of shit she has ever had the pleasure of loving.)
Minjeong hangs up.
Jimin calls her back immediately.
“Don’t hang up on me~ I missed you!”
Jimin’s lucky she’s cute. She’s lucky Minjeong can’t say no to her—has never been able to say no to her annoying, lovable ass. Who cares if she isn’t wearing makeup? She wants to see her girlfriend!
“Come over if you missed me.”
Hearing a door closing shut and an engine starting, Jimin excitedly replies, “I’m on my way with my pajamas. Wanna tell me about your day? Anyone piss you off?”
“No, just you.”
“Hey!”
Minjeong loves being Jimin’s girlfriend.
She loves being her girlfriend so much she hates her parents to the fucking bone.
She loves Seoul, she loves that home away from home isn’t a billion hours away like it is when she’s in the United States.
She does not love that she’s in Seoul getting her self-worth booted into the stratosphere just because her girlfriend has the worst parents she has ever seen.
Weren’t they supposed to be refined and professional? Aren’t they supposed to be, like, pros at maintaining facades?
Minjeong knows they are.
People don’t build empires without learning how to fake it.
Which means they’re just being assholes on purpose, disrespecting her, her family, and her choices—to her face—because they want to.
It only gets worse.
Minjeong knew her parents weren’t going to be like Jimin. She knew they weren’t going to be easy or kind or polite. They’re everything Jimin isn’t. And when Jimin is the best person on the planet, that makes her parents the worst fuckers to walk the earth.
Maybe Minjeong’s being dramatic, maybe she’s exaggerating.
But she isn’t exaggerating the anger she feels.
She’s never considered herself particularly protective—there has been nothing that garnered such a visceral reaction from her. Yet, hearing the two people Jimin loves disrespect her will do it. In the past hour alone, Minjeong has not heard a single genuine compliment. It has been nothing but backhanded insults and superficial praise. She’s heard, “I hear the company is doing well in the US,” has heard them say, “you look like you lost weight.” From there, it only went downhill like a fucking rockslide steamrolled them because they opened their ugly mouths and said, “you need to lose more.”
(All Jimin needs to lose are the designer bags under her eyes—she deserves some rest after working as hard as she does.)
It’s funny how Minjeong can withstand a lot of push, can take insults about her or her life. But when it concerned Jimin, she’d rather keel over and die than let it go.
But Minjeong can’t just fight her girlfriend’s parents. Not when Jimin still respects them, still wants their love and praise.
It’s not pity she feels for her, but empathy. It hurts her to see how small Jimin looks in their presence. She doesn’t like her dimmed eyes or her hunched posture. She doesn’t like how Jimin doesn’t fight for herself, doesn’t like to see the woman she’s in love with have to deal with the insecurity and doubt of feeling undeserving and unloved.
This honestly feels like a waste of time.
She’s supposed to be meeting Jimin’s parents and showing them that their daughter made the right choice with her.
Both as a wife and girlfriend.
She’s supposed to show them that she’s proud to love her—because she is.
She wants to be grateful to them for giving Jimin a chance to be hers, to share her beautiful and loving self with the world.
All she’s grateful for is the materials they’ve given her to succeed; they are, decidedly, incapable of receiving anything more from her.
But now, blatantly clear, she sees it’s Jimin’s parents meeting her. It’s them she’s criticizing, them that Minjeong disapproves of.
Maybe she doesn’t have a right to feel this protective. Maybe she’s overstepping.
But Minjeong knows one thing for sure.
If there is one thing Jimin deserves, it’s to be loved—wholly, selflessly, intentionally.
Whatever history Jimin has with her family isn’t her business but Minjeong knows they don’t love her. They love what she does, they love that she works and dedicates herself to their legacy. But they do not love Yu Jimin. As confusing as it is to her, her parents do not love their daughter like a daughter, even if she’s the easiest person to love.
(If Minjeong were to strip away all of the things about Jimin and leave her as her bare self, she’d still have a library of notes and anecdotes and descriptions about the beautiful things Yu Jimin does—her heart, her soul, her faith in humanity.
There’s the Library of Alexandria and then there’s the Library of Jimin. Minjeong won’t let her parents burn her down—not without her fighting for her.)
Minjeong will be the first to say it, will die on that hill. She married her in a night. Even if she was so drunk she couldn’t tell her right from her left, it only took a night for Minjeong to put her faith in Jimin’s hands, to know that she was worthy of her effort and love. To prove her point, she fell in love with her all over again, became her girlfriend despite already being her wife.
Minjeong kind of specializes in falling in love with Jimin, it’s become something like a skill.
It has been six months with her, 197 days since they met—not like she’s counting or anything—and Minjeong loves Jimin every day. She loves her when she wakes up, she loves her when she sleeps. Minjeong loves her like she breathes.
In lesser words, Kim Minjeong loves Yu Jimin period.
She loves her, she loves her.
She loves her like she has never loved anything else before—loves her like she amassed all of the things she adores into one person.
If everything about their relationship fell away and Minjeong is left with a blank slate, it’s this wretched heaviness in her chest that says enough. This is when Minjeong knows she really loves Jimin.
To say it bluntly, Jimin’s parents are absolute trash. How they made someone like Jimin is a mystery. Jimin is everything they’re not. Jimin is everything Minjeong loves.
Her family?
She knows they’re her in-laws and she’s supposed to respect her elders and what not, but, holy fuck, they’re worse than dogshit. No amount of money can compensate for their archaic life perspectives and screwed up greed. Minjeong’s mother taught her to respect elders. She did not teach her how to respect people incapable of deserving respect so Minjeong’s kind of just left with all of this irritation sinking into her bones and stomach.
(Truthfully, they piss her off. In a deeper dive, Minjeong is pissed because Jimin deserves better than them. She deserves to be loved, praised, and welcomed. When Jimin is so good at doing those things for others, she deserves it back from the people she loves.
Minjeong’s never felt sick from anger before, but there’s a first for everything. She hasn’t felt so infuriated in a while. There hasn’t been a reason to tug such a strong emotion out of her.
If there is a fury that burns so hot within her, it is born out of something ardently protective—something reverential.)
Minjeong doesn’t even remember everything about dinner. She doesn’t want to. Seeing Jimin’s pain was enough, seeing her shrink and flinch and bear their abuse was enough.
Even if the food was scrumdiddlyumptious—compliments to the chef—it was the worst meal of her life. Easily. In the history of awful dinners, this one is taking the world record.
And yet, despite her anger and sadness, Minjeong would willingly sit through a lifetime of shitty dinners if it meant being there for Jimin. If she could be there to show her parents, and Jimin more importantly, that there’s someone out there who cares for her as a person rather than an insignificant money bag, she would. Without being asked, she would do it every time.
If she has to get this angry every time, she will. She would do it all if it meant Jimin doesn’t have to go through this alone. If Minjeong’s choosing to suffer beside her, to protect her and comfort her, to see her through her pain and frustration, there can only be one outcome for the feelings she’s having.
She will simply have to love Jimin until Jimin’s decided she has had enough of her.
Good for Minjeong, Jimin’s in love with her too—far too obsessed with her that Jimin whines about not having enough of her while being wrapped all around her.
It doesn’t matter who fell first or who loves the hardest.
(Minjeong fell first, Jimin loves her the hardest—that much Minjeong is willing to admit. But, that’s baffling because Minjeong already loves Jimin like she’s got eight lives and she’s looking for her in her ninth.)
What matters is that they both fell twice, as wives and as girlfriends.
Backwards or not, Minjeong loves Jimin towards infinity.
-
A year flies by quickly.
Within the year, they’ve flown to Busan twice.
Minjeong’s parents love Jimin—to no surprise.
Jimin is very quickly stealing her Favorite Child spot and they don’t even know she’s their in-law. If they knew, they’d probably put the picture of them Jimin printed on their-
Oh wait.
“What do you think,” her mother asks, honey-gaze and sweetness in her voice.
Jimin hasn’t even said anything yet but Minjeong knows she loves it. She’s seen love in her eyes enough to know what it looks like.
Staring at the fridge, in her eyes, Minjeong sees a flicker of disappointment and grief before it turns into the brightness of awe and thankfulness.
Her girlfriend’s voice is soft with wonder, asking like she’s looking for confirmation, “You’re putting us on your fridge?”
Her mother, blessed with mother’s intuition, gets a read on the subtle despondency in Jimin’s eyes.
(There’s always that part of Minjeong that’ll hurt for her.
She will always want this for Jimin with her own parents. Even if Minjeong hates their guts. If she could wish upon a star, she’d wish that they’d open their eyes and hearts to a girl that has wanted nothing but their affection and love.
If Minjeong could make paper stars to represent the times she has wished for Jimin’s happiness, she could fill jars and jars.)
“In all of the time Minjeongie has been away, she has never brought anyone home.” Jimin smiles at that, that familiar wash of fondness in her eyes. “She has never called us right after a date, excited to talk about it. She has never talked about anyone the way she talks about you.” Her mother’s voice is a lighthouse of comfort, helping Jimin find her way back. No longer looking at the picture, it’s Minjeong she turns her adoration to. “You’re special to her, Jimin. We put special things up so that we’re reminded there are people in this world who make us feel like life is worth living no matter how insignificant we are in the long run.”
What a pretty way to say they’re all meaningless specks of dust. Wistfully existential but poetic.
And yet, if they are all specks of dust, Jimin is her favorite. To Minjeong, in Jimin, there is a universe, planets and stars and moons and suns, magnificence and beauty.
Maybe one day she’ll tell her parents about how she and Jimin actually met.
They might kill her.
But, maybe they’ll love Jimin enough to keep her alive—Minjeong’s positive there’s no one beating her in the Loving Yu Jimin race even if it was her against the world.
Falling for Jimin has felt like flying.
Now, falling feels like getting caught.
-
“That ring is gorgeous, Minjeong-ah! Where’d you get it?”
The jewelry around her finger isn’t as flashy as the first ring Jimin bought her. This one is a simpler silver band, encrusted with four small diamonds.
Like a dedicated wife, she hasn’t taken off her ring. Or she forgot to. Either or. She doesn’t like to take it off. She bets if she does, there’s going to be a tan around her finger.
(Jimin has two rings, too. One that she bought herself to tell a convincing lie, the other Minjeong was adamant about buying herself. With her own paychecks, her own money that she has earned, she splurged on her wife before she indulged for herself. The one Jimin wears is the one Minjeong has given her—she has never seen her without it unless she was washing her face or cooking. Chosen by Minjeong, similar to hers, Jimin’s is also a simple silver band—a singular garnet stone that’s cut into an oval and surrounded by smaller diamonds.)
Speaking at the same time, Minjeong and Jimin panic and stutter, their eyes flittering between each other and her mom.
“Uh…I uh-”
“We- uh-”
Delighted, her mother claps her hands together, moved, “Aww! You’ve already gotten each other rings! Minjeong, you better propose to her someday!”
Oh, if she only knew.
She’s already one step ahead.