Work Text:
Nayeon has never had a knack for routines. Or sticking to them.
Last night is a pretty good example.
She had been in bed— teeth brushed, face washed, pajamas on, her phone all cued up to play a ten-hour ‘best beach sounds’ video, a little melatonin in the palm of her hand when Sana texted her.
It was one of those heys with too many y’s. Which was supposed to mean something. Chaeyoung said it meant something, and whenever Nayeon pressed her the younger manager would just flick her sunglasses down her nose and that meant something too but Nayeon usually didn’t try to dwell on it between meetings and deadlines and all the dumb office minutiae that was a helpful distraction when it came to—
And then Sana had sent a long line of those doe-eyed emojis, which made Nayeon think of Sana’s actual eyes, which were much nicer than little black dots on a screen. But co-workers don’t exactly demand selfies. Or think about them. Or wish for them.
you should be sleeping….
Which was a responsible thing to say.
She turned the ocean sounds back on.
But of course Sana wasn’t done.
i’m dreaming right now:-)
Nayeon had pulled the covers up to her chin, closed her eyes. It was just a little past midnight, which wasn’t ideal, but maybe she could hit snooze a couple times and at least get five hours of sleep.
Jeongyeon sent her an article once about how, in the military, they teach people the best way to sleep is to focus on relaxing all the muscles in your face. So Nayeon does that, mentally checking off each box— the tension in her jaw, unclenching her teeth, imagining the waves washing over her forehead and cheeks, and—
(dreaming of you nayeonie)
So Nayeon doesn’t really sleep.
She has a few heart attacks until the sun rises.
By Nayeon’s estimation, she had maybe two hours of sleep.
When she wakes up, her first thought is to call Jihyo and fake a cough into the mic until she’s excused from work for the day, and maybe forever, because at her age some flirtatious, possibly not-sober text shouldn’t have consequences like this.
But it does.
Jihyo answers with her typical gusto.
“Hey.” Nayeon bends her voice with a calculated whimper. “I— well, I’m really sorry to do this, but—“ Some strategic hemming and hawing. “I’m feeling pretty under the—“
Here’s the cough.
Perfect.
Textbook.
“Weather,” Nayeon finishes with a whine.
“Unnie.” Jihyo is stern. Not a good sign. “Are you really?”
Typically, Nayeon would say ‘would I ever lie to you?’ But Sick Nayeon doesn’t have the charm. She’s purposefully pathetic. She’s too feverish for any wit. “Yeah,” Sick Nayeon sighs. “I took some cold medicine, but it hasn’t really—“
“You’re going to miss the meeting?”
Oh hell.
“I suppose Chaeyoung can do your presentation.”
It’s brilliant. This is why Jihyo is the boss— despite Nayeon’s mostly lax managerial style, there are certain things she cares about. Image is one. It takes a great deal of work to look like you care, but to spend most of the days just peeking around to Sana’s cubicle and jotting down new compliments for her cute little blouses and strategically ordering a little too much take-out so she can drift by Sana in the hallway and ask if maybe she’d like her leftovers.
But no one suspects anything. Nayeon’s sure of it.
Chaeyoung however, is a disaster. She’s so shameless in her blasé attitude that, at the last annual expense report fiasco, she stood up holding three binders full of account information, and simply said, “We fucked up.”
Then she just plopped back down in her chair and scattershot a daring smirk around the room.
Nayeon, even on two hours of sleep, can do better than that.
“Well,” Sick Nayeon says threadily, “I guess— maybe I can come in for a few hours.”
“Mhmm.” She knows Jihyo is smiling. “I’ll see you at 8.”
Jihyo and Nayeon have a sort of pact where, if Nayeon makes the mistake of attempting to use Sick Nayeon, they just don’t bring it up.
So when Nayeon gets dressed she doesn’t bother with bringing a mask or putting a little extra blush on her cheeks to simulate a fever or bringing a bag of cough drops to pop every time someone asks if she’s feeling okay.
She slips into slacks, a white shirt, her navy blazer, and dashes out the door.
Nayeon’s at her cubicle, drumming her fingers on the desk, scanning through the notes for the meeting. She prefers to memorize them, hates the visual of shuffling through papers while everyone’s just staring.
It’s a shared document between her, Chaeyoung, and Sana. She can tell which lines are Chaeyoung’s, because they’re often finished off with an endless line of question marks. Sana’s usually are accompanied with either hearts for minor accomplishments, or sad faces for blistering failures.
“Chaengie,” she barks. “Why isn’t September in here?”
The other manager swivels her chair around, popping an earbud out. “Uh.”
“September.” Nayeon points at the blank space in the document.
“Shouldn’t you know?”
Typical.
“Sana,” Nayeon calls. And it’s like, not purposeful, but her voice is a little softer. A little higher.
Which is actually a calculated thing, because higher pitches move at faster frequencies.
That sounds true.
“Sana!”
“She isn’t here yet,” Chaeyoung sighs, slinking away.
Also typical.
Sana is not exactly a perfect co-worker, though she is a perfect person.
She is terminally tardy and hopelessly clumsy. She laughs a little too loud and a little too long. She’s easy to distract, often spending half the afternoon ping-ponging between Jeongyeon and Momo’s desks, pulling at their ears, and Nayeon wonders what exactly is wrong with her ears because of course she doesn’t want Sana to pull them but doesn’t she have nice ears too? And—
Sana is skipping down the hallway.
Nayeon desperately wants to go home.
“Nayeonie,” she calls, coming to a bouncing stop just a tad too close for comfort. Her perfume tickles at Nayeon’s nose.
“You’re late.” Nayeon crosses her arms for effect. She’s not exactly the boss, but she is officially the Sana-Chaeyoung wrangler.
Sana pouts. “I couldn’t sleep last night.”
Well-played.
“That’s no excuse,” Nayeon huffs.
Sana licks her lips, eyes searching, like she wants— what? An apology? It’s ten past eight. It’s highly unprofessional. They’re just coworkers.
“Do you want some?” The other manager holds out her half-empty iced coffee. There’s a lipstick ring around the straw.
“Uh—“
And Nayeon hasn’t had coffee.
She has had two hours of sleep.
It is highly unprofessional.
They’re just coworkers.
She takes a sip.
Sana’s fingers flutter over the keyboard while Nayeon looms behind her, watching as September’s reports bloom against the screen.
“Do you want me to double-check the rest,” Sana asks, cracking her wrists.
“Um. No. I can do that.”
They’ve spent the last three hours bickering, until Sana finally snatched the mouse and said she’d just do it. Nayeon feels a little guilty. Not terribly. Not enough that she’d offer—
“Can I buy you lunch?”
Sana’s eyebrows raise and her lips part and her eyes go all mushy. “Really?”
Nayeon would never go on a date to the company cafeteria.
First, the food is a little overrated. Organic doesn’t exactly mean good.
Second, literally everyone she knows is here.
Just like a high school lunchroom, there’s the quiet table— Mina, Tzuyu, Dahyun and Momo by the window, muttering to each other, probably discussing like. Podcasts? Nayeon isn’t sure what exactly goes on there, because typically she’s at the loud table, which only consists of Jeongyeon and Jihyo but has approximately the same decibel level as an airfield.
Third, she would not go on a date with Sana.
“Here?”
The other woman hovers uncertainly over an empty table.
“Sure,” Nayeon says, plopping her tray down and sitting.
So the salad actually is pretty good. It’s the first thing she’s eaten all day, and it settles the meeting-related nervousness still roiling in her stomach.
“So,” Sana starts, stirring her soup. “About last night.”
Brilliant.
“Did something happen?” Nayeon asks through a mouthful.
“Well. I texted you.”
“Oh. Yeah.”
Sana leans back in her chair. She has one of those blouses with the cute little bows on the front, and it’s hard not to think about what the silk feels like, like maybe if Nayeon ran her fingers through it and it came undone, but that’s—
“I’m a little embarrassed.”
Nayeon pops a tomato in her mouth. Chews. Swallows.
Sana waits dutifully.
“Why?”
“I’m just,” Sana smiles half-heartedly. “A little confused. About what you feel.”
“Feel?”
So usually Nayeon has complete control over her vocal inflections. But this time, something happens between her throat and her mouth and it comes out as mocking.
Nayeon knows it’s wrong before Sana even has time to stiffen, her fingers clenching around the spoon, her cheeks a dangerous red like she’s just been slapped.
But this isn't the worst thing. Nayeon has another, not-represented-on-a-resume talent, which is apologizing. She has a lot of practice, and the perfect apology will take a few seconds to load in her head but when it does she’ll be able to fix everything, get Sana to laugh too loud and too long, and then she’ll say ‘I didn’t sleep at all last night either’ and ‘I love that blouse’ and ‘let’s go on a real date’ and everything will be—
Chaeyoung plops down in the chair next to Sana. “Hey.”
Sana smiles instantly, wrapping her arms around the other manager.
“Where’s your tray?”
Chaeyoung shrugs.
“You can have some of mine, Chaengie,” Sana coos.
“Actually.” Nayeon slides her tray across the table. “I’ve lost my appetite.”
The meeting goes smoothly. Nayeon doesn’t make any big mistakes, Jihyo shoots her a thumbs up when she sits down, the building doesn’t explode.
She leaves at five, on the dot.
She scarfs down a microwaved dinner, then settles into bed.
Sleep comes easy.
Nayeon wakes at an incredibly impressive 6:30am.
It’s perfect for a morning routine that she usually doesn’t have time for— brewing a cup of coffee, laying out her clothes on the bed, reading through the headlines.
Boredom sets in just as her phone rings.
Her stomach flips when she sees it’s Jihyo. Usually she only calls if something is really wrong—
“Hey Nayeon.”
Full-stop.
Usually Jihyo is a bit of a motor-mouth, getting everything out before Nayeon can hang up because if you don’t know there’s a problem, you don’t have to deal with it.
“Uh, what’s up?”
“Just wanted to check-in.”
“Okay. Well. I’m awake. I actually might come in early today, so—“
“Oh, that’s great. The more prepared you are for the meeting, the better.”
“The meeting?”
“Don’t tell me you forgot.” Jihyo’s voice is a tad darker.
Nayeon mentally runs through the last few weeks. Was there something else? It was weird no one had mentioned it, but then again Sana and Chaeyoung weren’t exactly calendar junkies and—
“Of course not,” Nayeon soothes into the phone. “Just a little joke.”
“Don’t. Not this early.”
With that, Jihyo hangs up.
“Chaeyoung,” Nayeon hisses, peeking out of her cubicle.
The other manager swivels in her chair, untucking an earbud. “Yeah?”
“What meeting are we having today?”
“Ummmm.” Chaeyoung bites her tongue. “I sent you the document with the notes.”
“No you didn’t,” Nayeon whispers. She doesn’t want a lurking Jeongyeon to hear this— it would amount to at least six months of mockery. “You only sent me the one for yesterday.”
Chaeyoung’s eyebrows scrunch up. “What meeting?”
“That’s what I’m saying.”
Ten minutes and a few bumping elbows later, Chaeyoung has commandeered Nayeon’s computer, downloading the PDF and scrolling through it to demonstrate that, yes, she sent the email. So fine. It’s not like she deserves a raise.
“Where’s September?”
Chaeyoung squints at the screen. “Oh. I guess Sana didn’t finish.”
“And where is Sana?”
“She isn’t here yet,” Chaeyoung sighs.
“Typical,” Nayeon huffs.
She makes a beeline out to the lobby, then to the long hallway with the elevators, and Sana is there, skipping across the tiles, an iced coffee bouncing in her hand.
“Tardy two days in a row.”
“More than that, probably,” Sana grins, coming to a wavering stop just in front of Nayeon. “Want a sip?”
“I’ve had enough caffeine today,” she dismisses, pivoting on her heel to get back to the cubicles. Sana follows obediently. “We’re missing September in the document, so you need to get on that.”
“Yes ma’am,” Sana purrs.
“Eek. That makes me feel old.”
“Do you like Nayeonie better?”
It takes all the power in Nayeon’s body to not come to a sudden halt in the middle of the office. She feels a little dizzy, like maybe she needs the world to just stop for a damn second so she can realign to hearing that word out loud, with that specific lilt in Sana’s voice.
“Yes,” she says instead, just cranky enough that maybe Sana won’t take it seriously.
Sana finishes up the meeting notes document after a couple hours, cross referencing with a library of Excel documents, and Nayeon breathes a sigh of relief. She really should get a Christmas bonus for all this on-the-fly meeting preparation, but Jihyo doesn’t respect procrastination as a skill.
“Do you want to review it,” Sana asks, looking up at Nayeon from her chair. It’s weird how, like, sometimes it’s nice to be literally looked up to. It makes Nayeon feel like maybe they aren’t in an office, but somewhere that maybe this would be halfway appropriate, to feel so—
“No.” Nayeon straightens. “Lunch?”
“That salad yesterday was pretty good,” Nayeon says in the awkwardness of the elevator. Sana’s perfume is just a tad too strong— delightful otherwise, when it drifts between their cubicles, but here it’s a little stifling.
The other manager rocks on her heels.
Nayeon waits for the scolding. For Sana to say something about how weird she was acting yesterday, and that they didn’t really finish that very bad conversation, but Sana is merciful.
“You should get it again,” she smiles instead.
So Nayeon does, and she then follows Sana to a table. Jihyo and Jeongyeon are making a ruckus at the other end of the cafeteria, and—
Actually it’s all so typical Nayeon doesn’t really bother cataloguing anything but the cute little black bow on the front of Sana’s blouse.
“I like your shirt,” she says, popping a tomato in her mouth.
“Thank you.” Sana makes a little show of leaning back, smoothing the fabric down over her torso. “Why didn’t you text me back last night?”
Oh hell.
“You texted me last night?”
Sana nods, a little smile playing at her lips.
Nayeon pulls out her phone to prove the manager wrong, flipping through to find— okay, yeah, just past midnight Sana had sent a hey with too many y’s.
Was this going to be the pattern? Every night?
“I didn’t see it,” Nayeon says, because that’s at least honest. “I went to bed pretty early.”
“I couldn’t sleep,” Sana pouts.
“Do you have trouble with it?”
“Mhmm.”
“If you focus on relaxing each muscle in your face, it helps a lot.”
Sana nods dutifully. “I’ll try it.”
A chair screeches behind them as Chayoung pulls it out to sit.
“Hey.”
Sana smiles instantly, wrapping her arms around the other manager.
So something is off.
Nayeon already has the meeting notes memorized. She does one read through, and it’s all familiar enough that when it comes time to stand in front of the board members it just flows out of her with all the rote drama of a Hamlet soliloquy.
Jihyo shoots her a thumbs up.
It doesn’t register as the usual little serotonin bump she gets from her boss’ approval.
On the subway ride home, Nayeon pulls out her phone and sifts through news articles and unread emails and her notification-less text app.
Sana is still at the top of the list of recent messages.
heyyyyyyyy
And above it, nothing.
No i’m dreaming right now:-). Certainly no (dreaming of you nayeonie).
When she gets back into her apartment, sets her dinner in the microwave, she calls Momo.
Momo is the only conspiracy theorist she trusts, and also the only person she knows won’t make fun of her for this.
If she remembers it, Nayeon thinks, with a sick twist in her stomach.
“Hello,” Momo sighs.
“Momo, yeah. Glad I got you. Um.” Nayeon takes a deep breath. “This is gonna sound a little weird, but. Did anything feel, like, off today?”
A long silence. One of Momo’s frustrating charms is she always thinks before she speaks. “Sana was a little sad.”
“Uh— about what?”
“Best friend stuff.”
“Right. Yes. I totally respect that. But I actually meant more in terms of like, inter-dimensional off-ness.”
“No, it seemed pretty chill today.”
Nayeon drums her fingers on the countertop. “Momo, if I tell you something and I want you to keep it a secret, even from Sana, can you do that?”
Another silence.
“If it doesn’t directly effect her.”
“Perfect. Great. Okay. So.” This is so stupid. This is so fretfully stupid. “I think yesterday and today are the same day.”
“Oh. So just, like, a temporal loop?”
“Um. I think so?”
“That’s pretty standard,” Momo yawns into the phone. “I get those all the time.”
Nayeon fishes a pen out of her junk drawer, ripping off a paper towel. “So what do I— what do you do?”
“Well, usually a temporal loop happens because you’ve made a huge cosmic mistake.”
Nayeon hurriedly scrawls cosmic mistake.
“And,” Momo continues, “all you have to do is figure out what you did to offend the universe, and then just fix it.”
“That sounds deceptively simple.”
“There’s always the chance that you fixed it today.”
“I doubt it.”
Nayeon spends the rest of the night making a chart of every interaction she had over the past twenty-four hours.
From everything she’s reviewed, she can’t find a glaring, horrific, war-crime of an interaction. She’d been a little rude to Chaeyoung, maybe, but she had done a fantastic job at the meeting, and the surreal forces of life probably cared the most about marketing projections for the next quarter anyways, not interpersonal quabbles, so.
Nayeon falls face first against the mattress. Her brain is tired, but her body still buzzes around with frenetic electricity, a growing discomfort, a dread. What if the rest of her life is just that day over and over? What if she has to give a presentation every single afternoon, and Chaeyoung always interrupts lunch, and September is always missing, and Sana always has that half-empty coffee and that cute little bow that just makes her—
Her phone trills on the table beside the bed.
heyyyyyyyy
It’s just past midnight.
hey Nayeon types. But— no. She taps back, then tries again. heyyyy
She pulls the covers over herself, fluffing her pillows.
you’re still up!, Sana sends.
yeah…kinda have a lot on my mind
do u wanna talk about it?
Nayeon bites her lip. Sana won’t remember any of it. Sana is probably laying in her own bed, all hopeful, not yet disappointed, and Nayeon is—
i’ll tell u tomorrow:-)
okie, Sana sends instantly. sweet dreams nayeonie
Her eyelids are heavy as her thumb smears across the keyboard. i like it when you call me that
Nayeon didn’t sleep particularly well, or have especially sweet dreams even though Sana had ordered it, but when her alarm goes off at 6:30 it’s easy to wrest herself from the bed.
She gets dressed, waters the plants, gives herself a quick pep talk in the mirror and is already on the subway when Jihyo calls.
“Just wanted to check-in,” her boss starts, “about the—“
“Yep, the meeting. I’ve got my notes memorized, so it should be smooth-sailing.”
Jihyo doesn’t have the tact to camouflage her surprise. “Oh. Wow. Okay. Perfect. I guess this was— unnecessary?”
“Yes, but I forgive you.”
The office is a little weird early in the morning. Only half the lights are on over the cubicles and it’s dead silent, the perfect sort of quietness for Nayeon to open up the document Chaeyoung emailed her and type out all the September notes that are still stuck in her head.
Over the next hour, her coworkers filter in.
“Solitaire, huh?” Jeongyeon leans at the corner of her desk, jutting a thumb out at Nayeon’s screen. “Slacking again.”
Nayeon slaps her knee lightly. “I came in early.”
“Gross.”
Chaeyoung settles into her own chair, earbuds in. Occasionally she peeks past the cubicle, eyebrows scrunched in confusion.
“Something wrong, Chaengie?”
“Uh.” The younger manager frowns. “No.”
“Good.” Nayeon reaches over to ruffle her hair. “I’m going to go greet Sana.”
“You’re not gonna chew her out?”
“Not today!”
So maybe Nayeon hadn’t appreciated before the sun-splitting glory of Sana clicking down the hallway. Yes, it’s late. Yes, it’s unprofessional. But sometimes things are beautiful and you just have to appreciate them, even if it’s just a woman with a coffee skipping toward you and perking her eyebrows up when she says, “Nayeonie?”
“Hey.”
Oh fuck. Maybe the universe wanted her to say—
“I’m sorry I’m late,” Sana sighs, though she smiling as she tilts the straw between her lips. “I couldn’t sleep.”
“That’s okay,” Nayeon says. “This isn’t really important.”
“Uh— the meeting?”
“Anything.”
“Oh. I mean— are you feeling okay?”
“Can I have a sip?”
Sana’s eyes bulge. “Of this?”
“Mhmm.”
She offers it instantly, and Nayeon leans down to take a long sip. She hopes some of Sana’s lipstick rubs off on her lips, or maybe—
The cup jerks, the straw slipping from Nayeon’s mouth.
“I just remembered,” Sana squeaks, “I think I forgot some things in that document—“
“I edited it already.” Nayeon hopes her smile is kind. “It’s no biggie.”
“Biggie,” Sana whispers.
“Let’s go.” She tugs Sana’s wrist, and then through some miraculous gymnast routine of elbows and hands they link arms, and walk into the office.
Nayeon busies herself with solitaire for the next few hours, occasionally spying to see Sana snoozing on her desk.
It’s important, she’s sure, to not disrupt the delicate balance of this. The universe is watching with it’s big stupid eye. The clock is ticking. But Sana should sleep, and Nayeon knows she shouldn’t just fill these silences with useless noise.
Eventually, Chaeyoung scoots over in her rollie chair. “You going to lunch?”
“Um. When Sana wakes up.”
“You’re going together?”
Nayeon shifts in her seat. “Yeah. It’s kind of, like.” She tries to hold down the wince. “A date.”
“Oh.” Chaeyoung bobs her head. “Cool.”
“And so,” Nayeon lowers her voice. “If you see me and Sana sitting in the cafeteria together, what do you do?”
“Um…”
“Because it’s a date, you don’t…?”
Chaeyoung fiddles with her earbuds. “Come over?”
Nayeon nods voraciously. “Exactly.”
Nayeon gets her salad.
Sana gets her soup.
They sit at the table.
Their table.
“I like your blouse,” Nayeon starts. She makes an effort not to pop a tomato in her mouth. No distractions. No vegetables. This has to go right.
“Thank you,” Sana smiles. She leans back, smoothing the fabric, quirking the little black bow at the top with a melodic giggle. “Are you feeling better?”
“Yeah, I just was stressed out last night. But I think everything is about to get easier.”
Sana knits her hands together in her lap, looking down. “You know, you can talk to me. About anything.”
“I want to.” Nayeon’s fingers begin to drum nervously on the table. “Maybe tomorrow.”
“Are you always going to say that?”
“No, no, I promise.” Nayeon sticks her pinky out. “See?”
Sana’s lips quirk up into a smile. She curls her own pinky around Nayeon’s, and is it the first time they’ve—
“This is the first time I’ve touched you,” Sana murmurs, soft, like it’s a secret that just has to be said aloud.
“Is it really? I feel like we must’ve—“
“No.” Sana still hasn’t moved her hand. “I’ve always been careful.”
Chaeyoung walks past, making a bee-line for the quiet table.
“Why,” Nayeon whispers. “You don’t have to be scared of me.”
“I am.” Sana rearticulates her hand so that now it’s cupping Nayeon’s palm, her thumb stroking over her knuckles. “I have nightmares about you.”
Dizziness swells in Nayeon’s skull, an electric hum going from her skin to her spine to every dumb, alive organ. “I dream about you.”
Sana’s whole face is red, flushing down her neck to her collarbones and then down further, to where the blouse is fluttering as she breathes fast. “Can we kiss in the copyroom?”
Announcing a kiss isn’t exactly Nayeon’s style.
Usually she likes the secret look, the agreed-upon and hopeless lean forward into someone else’s warmth.
However, she is a professional.
However, she is a person highly concerned with ethics.
However, she is backed up against the unlocked door of the copyroom, Sana’s hips pressed to her’s, the manager’s hands cradling her jaw as Sana’s lips glide over her ears, her cheeks, even tapping a quick kiss to her nose.
Maybe she whimpers, but it’s justified. Sana is everywhere except where Nayeon wants her most right now, and she puckers her lips in hope again as Sana just laughs against her neck.
“Sana.”
“I’m nervous,” Sana whispers.
“Why?”
“Because.”
Nayeon huffs. Her hands are around Sana’s waist, and carefully, like this is precious, because this is precious, she glides her thumbs up the blouse, past that bow, and tilts Sana’s chin up.
It’s warm and soft.
No, Sana is warm and soft. Her breath has the faint bitterness of coffee, her eyelashes flutter, she leans her full weight against Nayeon and Nayeon melts and melts and melts until she’s silly with happiness, with victory, with the feeling of the world setting itself right in a copyroom.
So Nayeon fucked up.
She spent the remainder of the day sitting on the floor of the copy room, hand tight around Sana’s, listing off all the things she likes about her while Sana countered with everything she liked about Nayeon until their voices were rough.
She missed the meeting, and Chaeyoung did a subpar job, and Jihyo is probably going to send a long mean e-mail.
She makes a microwave dinner. She sends Sana a goodnight text. She gets into bed but she doesn’t really want to sleep. She wants to think about every place Sana kissed her, and as she does, each muscle in her face— in her neck, in her shoulders, in her hands— slackens.
The next morning, Jihyo calls about the meeting yesterday.
Sana shows up late with two cups of coffee.