Work Text:
// present.
Hyeju feels like a cracked egg sizzling under the record heat Seoul’s been under for the past two months. She grumbles as she feels the straps of the grocery bag slipping out of her grasp and makes sure to readjust her grip after wiping away a layer of sweat on her jeans.
The bag itself—a gift from Jiwoo, who had gone off about it being a new product under her line of fashionable and environmentally-conscious accessories—held a myriad of grocery items. The contents ranged from frozen rice cakes to mandarin oranges to the yogurt ice cream Chaewon pestered her for the past week to buy.
(Although nowadays there aren’t as many people interested in what flavors of ice cream Hyeju or any of the other 11 women like, nor are there cries of disbelief whenever a pint of mint chocolate chip ice cream appears in Hyeju’s shopping cart (not for herself, of course), she’s never stopped taking note of the things that make Chaewon’s eyes sparkle.
If 6,500 won imported artisanal yogurt ice cream or the atrocity that is mint chocolate chip Baskin-Robbins’ was what Chaewon wanted, then Hyeju would swipe her card in a heartbeat.)
She passes by a small stationary shop. Its door is open, the air conditioning blasting out onto the street, and Hyeju purposefully walks a little slower to enjoy the touch of artificial coolness upon her cheeks. From her current position she can hear the faint beat of a popular girl group song coming from somewhere deep in the store. She hums a couple of the notes from the chorus and bounces upon her toes, a kind of muscle memory that springs up whenever she thinks of idols and the stage.
As per usual, the last 300 meters to her apartment complex are the most draining. The straps of the bag have started digging into her skin (she’ll have to write a review on this issue and send it to Jiwoo) and she knows her palms will have stinging, raw marks on them when she gets home.
Hyeju finally reaches her apartment building after what seems to be an eternity and a half. She sets the bag down on the textured stone floor of the entrance and languidly presses the button linked to her apartment’s intercom.
“Open the door, unnie! I forgot to bring my keys!” As if answering back, the speaker spits out the sound of the twisting of a lock and the telltale squeak of Hyeju’s apartment door being pushed open.
“Uh,” the voice from the other side breathes out, “you’re not even outside the door…?”
Hyeju sighs. “The one downstairs! The entrance door, not the apartment door!”
She hears the girl on the other side of the intercom scoff before there’s the sound of an electronic lock sliding open.
“You should have specified,” a high-pitched voice calls out from the intercom speakers, but by that time Hyeju’s already in the lobby pressing fervently on the elevator’s “up” button. Thank god for elevators.
When she reaches her floor, she finds the door of her apartment already propped open with a pair of light grey slippers. She slots her right foot in the crack and uses her remaining energy to swing the door completely open. After placing the grocery bag on the floor in relief, Hyeju exchanges her trainers for her fluffy, light grey monstrosities. They’re a little creased in the center, no doubt victims of the rebounding momentum of their owner’s attempt to open the door, but they quickly mold into the contour of Hyeju’s feet.
She walks around the corner of the entrance and finds Chaewon, who’s wearing a cream-colored frilled dress, sprawled out on the sofa. According to the daily health-related articles her mother sends her way (Hyeju’s sure most were written by conspiracy theorists with nothing better to do than to spearhead inflation in the Korean red bean market by targeting middle aged women and their unfortunate children), more than 60% of the adult human is composed of water. Looking at the human equivalent of a puddle, however, Hyeju’s sure either scientists have underestimated or Chaewon’s not human.
The aforementioned girl peeks over the edge of her phone and gives the newcomer a small smile. Her eyebrows shoot up and her lips curl into a smirk but they’re brought back down into a mask of neutrality just as quickly.
“How was your day?” Chaewon, who’s hair is now black as night, averts her eyes back to the screen of the device in her hands as her soft voice fills the empty space within the apartment.
Hyeju walks to the table, grabs the AC unit controller, and quickly notches the temperature down a couple degrees. “It was okay, I guess. Heejin was pretty lenient about our schedule today so I was able to stop by the grocery store on my way back.” She slides down next to Chaewon’s form on the sofa and points lazily with her foot to where she left her Chuu-ree Bag. “I got you the ice cream you wanted. I’m not moving anymore, but you should go put it in the freezer before it melts completely.”
Faster than Hyeju can reach for the television controller haphazardly lodged in a nook between two cushions, Chaewon all but bounces onto her feet and flies to the apartment entrance. Hyeju watches as she digs through the bag and pulls out a frost-covered container.
(Hyejoo wonders if the team who came up with such an ingenious cooling design for the ice cream container can create a customized jacket for her so she can withstand the hell that is summer in Seoul.
Or maybe she’ll buy Chaewon more pints and piece the discarded containers into a DIY-coat. Not only will she save money by making it herself, she’ll be making Chaewon happy and saving the planet at the same time.)
Hyeju switches on the TV and one of Jiwoo’s commercials plays out on the TV screen. The chirpy brunette has the same smile she had back then when they were just naïve children wanting to make themselves known in the industry, but even through a screen the hint of maturity in her gleaming eyes is unmistakable. The company jingle, a song Jungeun had written on a free songwriting app on her phone in the five minutes she spent waiting for her abomination of a Gongcha order, plays in the background.
“Now that’s what you call a Chuu-riple threat! A Chuu-riple threat! ” Chaewon’s ice cream-coated voice carries into the living room. Hyeju mentally curses and grabs the remote to turn the volume down. No ill feelings towards Jungeun, but fuck catchy jingle tunes.
“But really—this flavor is so good. Are you sure you don’t want any, Hyeju?” From across the room, Hyeju sees a slightly blurry Chaewon dip a spoon into the container before bringing a light-colored spoonful into her mouth.
She hears the girl relishing the harmony of sour and sweet upon her palate with a pop! which, to Hyeju’s chagrin, seems to be the sound of the spoon leaving Chaewon’s mouth. She sinks deeper into the cool embrace of her leather sofa and leaves the question unanswered.
Not hearing a response, Chaewon glances back at the girl in the living room. Hyeju’s eyes are closed and, after getting a little closer, Chaewon can make out the soft rise and fall of her chest.
The shorter girl quietly treads back to where she left the pint of yogurt ice cream and quickly fits the lid back on the container. One by one, she takes out the items from Hyeju’s grocery bag and places them in their designated spots within the refrigerator. The bags of snacks are, likewise, piled into a bowl sitting at the edge of the dining room table.
She pulls out one of the chairs at the dining table—slowly so she doesn’t scrape the floor—and settles in. In terms of comfort it’s a far cry from the sofa, but it’ll have to do if she doesn’t want to disturb Hyeju.
Chaewon, too, feels the veil of sleep cloak over her. She creates a makeshift pillow with her arms by crossing them on the table surface in front of her and sets her head down. Her phone and the variety show she was watching on it before Hyeju arrived are subsequently abandoned. Soon, the slumber takes her over.
When she wakes up, hours later, there’s a light pink blanket draped over her shoulders and Hyeju, now settled in the seat across from Chaewon’s with her phone horizontally in her hands, has her eyebrows furrowed and her nostrils flared. She notices the sound of rustling clothes and sets her phone down to look at the groggy girl before her. Quickly standing up, Hyeju makes her way to the kitchen counter where there’s already a bowl of batter and a medium-sized plate of precut fruit.
“You’re awake, unnie? Go freshen up—I’ll get started on dinner. I hope you don’t mind waffles eating waffles tonight. There’s also some chicken I fried an hour ago that I can crisp up in the oven.”
Chaewon nods, a layer of sleep still coating her mind. When she comes back half an hour later with damp hair and clothed in a pair of baby blue cotton pajamas—a gift from Yerim—there’s already a plate stacked with honey-dripped waffles and an abundance of bite-sized fruit. There’s also a huge dollop of hand-whipped cream sitting precariously on the edge of the plate. She takes note of the cute little wolf Hyeju’s drawn using chocolate syrup.
It’s just the way she likes it. Hyeju always remembers, after all.
Chaewon looks up in an attempt to thank the younger girl but is greeted with the sight of Hyeju shoving a thick cut of waffles into her awaiting mouth. She watches in silence as the taller girl follows up with a piece of fried chicken coated in a thin sheen of honey-soy glaze. She doesn’t even look up once, and Chaewon’s not even sure the other girl has time to breathe with everything she’s shoving into her mouth.
Chaewon goes back to cutting her own waffle into manageable pieces. She’ll thank Hyeju later, but for now she just wants to finish her waffles before they get soggy.
They finish dinner with light conversation and shared chuckles. Hyeju talks about how Heejin had specifically called her to the back room to ask if Hyeju could dye her hair cocoa-colored again, just so she looks a little softer. Apparently she was scaring some of the customers at the bakery with her sharp gazes and chic black hair. Chaewon shares how she and Jinsol had gone filming for her newest vlog episode and gotten lost around Seorae Village. Both of them blamed the time they had been away from Seoul, but Hyeju’s fairly certain it’s because they both had a terrible sense of direction.
(Years ago—maybe five?—Hyeju had blindly followed Jinsol backstage after the older girl had told her there was an interesting vending machine in one of the hallways. They got lost, mainly because Jinsol was a terrible guide who kept walking around in circles, and they were found by their manager in another artist's break room more than twenty minutes later.
Five minutes later, Hyeju found the aforementioned vending machine in the hallway next to the one they started at.)
The two girls spend the rest of the night binge watching one of Sooyoung’s latest dramas. No one had expected it back then, especially since Sooyoung herself had never expressed any avid interest in acting and she—like the rest of yyxy—had never gotten the opportunity to try their hand in that field. In hindsight, Sooyoung had always possessed a knack for expressing herself freely and was finely in tune with her own emotions. She truly was born to be a performer, both on stage and on the screen.
Sometime during the 7th episode—Sooyoung’s character had just gotten taken in by the police for questioning after the brutal yet mysterious death of her husband—Hyeju’s vision dims out. Chaewon shifts closer to her on the sofa and finds a pillow to cushion beneath Hyeju’s neck. She takes the thin blanket she had grabbed from Hyeju’s room as a precaution (of course, she was right about doing so given the current situation) and lightly places it around Hyeju’s midsection. It was enough to guarantee the other woman wouldn’t catch a cold, but it wasn’t heavy enough for Hyeju to run a sweat in the middle of the night.
"Goodnight, Hyeju." Only light breaths answer her.
When Hyeju wakes up hours later, the sun’s already up in the sky. Seoul’s veins are again filled with the traffic of 9-to-5 workers bumbling to their jobs, and the muffled noise of a busy city makes it way to Hyeju’s ears.
She looks around. The kitchen sink is free of yesterday night’s plates and the pajamas Chaewon wore last night are folded properly on one of the countertops inside the bathroom. Chaewon even managed to take out the trash before she left, how courteous of her.
Hyeju shuffles her way to the bathroom to prepare for another day of work. Chaewon had been here last night, and that was that. What more did she hope for?
(Frankly, Hyeju’s a little bitter. She can’t help it—they’ve fallen into this routine for years now, but it never gets any less hurtful.
She wonders if Chaewon would ever consider not leaving. Is it even worth all the effort to continue waiting for someone who never stops running?)
—
// past.
The way Hyeju recalled it, their friendship was rekindled with a singular KakaoTalk PUBG invitation.
One night, two years after they had all gone their separate ways, Hyeju was abruptly woken up by a notification sound from her phone. She usually set it to silent before bedtime, but that night she’d been so tired from being the verbal punching bag of her superior in the daytime that she'd fallen asleep on the sofa the moment she stepped through her apartment door.
She checked her phone to see what the distraction was—after all, it was around 3 AM and Hyeju no longer had the ability to stay awake until this hour. Usually the only ones awake at this time were people that she no longer contacted regularly.
Park Chaewon: Hyeju are you up?
Hyeju had to make sure she was reading everything correctly. After all, their conversations had waned over the past couple of years and they usually only text each other to exchange pleasantries around holidays.
Son Hyeju: Why are you still awake,,,? =^=
She waited for a couple minutes before she got a reply.
Park Chaewon: I’m in the airport shuttle now, just got off my flight to Switzerland~~
The “…” behind Chaewon’s name appeared and disappeared. Hyeju continued waiting.
Park Chaewon: So do you want to play PUBG now? I know it’s late but ^^
Her fingers drummed on the surface of the short table in front of her sofa. It was late and she still had work the next morning, but she wanted to grab every chance she got with Chaewon.
(She realizes, much later, that the time they spent lounging on waiting room couches, sweating onstage with ten cameras ready to capture their every move, and squeezed in the back seats of black minivans had been the things she lost to time itself. Maybe the time afterwards was spent desperately trying to get any piece of that back.)
Son Hyeju: Yeah just wait for me, I’ll be right there
Two hours, a can of Red Bull, and ten games of PUBG later, Hyeju and Chaewon were laughing together like old friends, their laughter carrying across the thousands of kilometers and hundreds of days that had separated them.
(So why had they waited so long?)
—
Seven years of idoldom came to a spectacular end accentuated by fireworks, flying drones, and a farewell concert in Jamsil Olympic Stadium.
After their contracts with BlockBerry Creative expired, none of the members had chosen to renew. They dispersed like scattered remains of a beautiful firework—the show was over, and it was time to prepare for the next.
Jiwoo went back to school to study environmental science and the basics of starting a business. It wasn’t necessarily a formal 4-year degree, but she emerged two years later with the budding idea for an environmentally-conscious fashion brand and Jungeun in tow as her business partner.
The Hanlim duo began building their brand from the ground up. With Jiwoo as the brand ambassador (she was, after all, the one with the most public recognition even after all these years) and Vivi—who ultimately decided to continue her career in Korea—as the official product model, their products began selling like hotcakes. Jungeun, who always ran group practices with an iron grip back when they were still twelve girls in a half-renovated practice room, was appointed CEO. Along with Vivi, she always showed up to reunions wearing luxury brands with price tags Hyeju’s not sure she’d want to see.
Yerim ventured into hosting variety shows for children and—to Hyeju’s horror—acquired a legion of preschool-aged superfans. Hyeju was used to the swarm of fans whenever they stepped out of airport customs and the blinding light of shaking lightsticks in the audience section of concerts, but children were on another level . One time after shopping with Yerim they passed by a daycare center—not by choice, but because Yerim’s apartment was in that direction. What had initially been a one-minute walk around the fence of the building swiftly became a 40-minute meet-and-greet session with what seemed to be more than 60 children under the age of 7.
Afterwards, Hyeju always brought a face mask for Yerim as a precaution whenever they went out.
Sooyoung, like Yerim, chose to stay in the entertainment industry. She initially signed on as a soloist, but a lead actress role as a CEO in one of the most popular dramas of 2026 caused her fame to skyrocket and her singing career was soon left on the backburner. She continued posting song covers and dance videos to Instagram and YouTube (Hyejoo would know—she followed Sooyoung’s feed religiously, mainly to find content she can make fun of her for) but her agency had decided to shift her into being a full-time actress. Even if Hyeju missed Sooyoung’s voice singing R&B songs from her room at ungodly hours, she was still happy that Sooyoung’s talents were being recognized in a different form.
Jinsol, arguably one of the members who felt the greatest pull from the music world, became an apprentice of a well-known producer in the industry after disbandment. She started off giving suggestions for melodic progressions and, after a couple years, was granted the opportunity to produce for a couple up-and-coming rookie girl groups. The songs did fairly well on the charts (Hyeju hears them all the time when she goes to the 7-Eleven close to the bakery) and she opened her own studio not long after under the pseudonym Soul.
Nowadays she spends most of her time in Boston in pursuit of a master’s degree in music education. Whenever she comes back, usually coinciding with holidays, Hyeju makes sure to take her to the best joints in the local food scene and spends her nights listening to Jinsol share everything about the life she’s created for herself.
As for the youngest of the members, Yeojin single handedly carried on the legacy of the group’s dance expertise. The members all had some money saved up from their years as idols, but the amount saved was a far cry from the down payment needed for a well-maintained apartment in the heart of Seoul. Yeojin struggled to find a suitable place to live in the months that followed disbandment and her parents lived too far for her to be able to commute daily to Seoul. Haseul, owning up to her title as the sister figure Yeojin had craved for even before they met in the audition rooms of BlockBerry Creative, offered the younger woman a place to stay temporarily. What initially began as a two-month favor stretched into two long years.
Hyeju sometimes sees Yeojin when she passes by the dance academy the shorter woman started three years ago (under the generous funding of a certain Miss Jo Haseul). She still looks younger than her actual age—if Hyeju doesn’t pay attention, she might mistakenly take Yeojin to be a high schooler—but she wears the experience of someone who's spent more than a decade seeing the splendor and the pain behind every dance move.
Haseul got married in the summer of 2027 with the blessings of the 11 girls she had spent a large portion of her youth with, and Yeojin moved out of their shared apartment not long afterwards. Before she left she had made a scrapbook of all the memories she made with Haseul and left it on the table where the older woman stored all her opera trophies and awards. Every time Hyeju goes to visit Haseul, she sees its dust-free cover resting regally on the stand Haseul had custom-built for the scrapbook. Even as the trophies are gradually replaced with family pictures over the years, Yeojin’s scrapbook never leaves its position.
It’s a remnant of their youth, a toast to the blissful memories they would never live through again.
(Sometimes Hyeju stays up at night cradling an empty bottle of soju, wondering to herself where all the time has gone. She’s been doing this for the past four years, and she still gets no answers.)
Chaewon, true to her nature, had spent the months following disbandment holed up in her family home. Out of pure boredom, she started filming a series of disastrous cooking videos. These videos were turned into memes and spread widely on social media, leading to her quick rise in popularity. She branched out into becoming a food vlogger and began traveling to different countries to try their local cuisine (and try her hand at making them, which usually ended terribly ). Soon, the games Hyeju and Chaewon had enjoyed together always had a player offline. Hyeju was forced to pair up with random players when Yerim was too busy hosting one of her programs, and soon she deleted the games on her phone altogether. In the end, Chaewon had gotten too busy and Hyeju had gotten tired of waiting a week for a response to her messages. Hyeju could only watch as Chaewon drifted further and further away in her lifeboat as she, abandoned, clung on desperately to the side of a sinking ship.
(Back when they were still idols, Hyeju and Chaewon were always taken as a package deal. Whether it be in front of fans or in the dorms, they always stayed in each other’s orbit. The initial awkwardness of being placed into the same group as two strangers thawed and left connected red strings in its wake. To top it off, the two girls had similar personalities so they were able to coexist in one space without wanting to rip out each other’s hair.
(It’s safe to say that there were fights in the dorms, and many extensions and hair rollers—Hyeju had lost count sometime in year four—had been lost in the crossfire.)
Time and space between had turned that comfort into complacency. Like a pot of water kept at a consistent 99 degrees Celsius, they were destined to never reach their boiling point.)
She heard through the grapevine that Hyunjin, who was always the most unpredictable out of all her comembers, had applied for a pilot training program right after their contract ended. They never texted that often even when they were in the same team, so naturally she only heard the news from Heejin during a breakfast run to Heejin’s bakery. It was three years after disbandment and approximately 28 months into Hyeju’s tenure as an official corporate wage slave. She took one look at the odd souvenirs and quirky trinkets lining the counters of the shop and figured out that Heejin plane tickets must’ve been free ones from Hyunjin. There was no way she had visited more than 30 countries in three years otherwise.
When Hyeju asked for Heejin’s favorite destination out of all the pins on the map, Heejin smiled and said she’d visit Tokyo again if given the chance. “Preferably after Hyunjin has enough time in her schedule so we’re able to visit all the places we shot our music videos at before,” she had specifically voiced out to Hyeju.
A couple months later, the number of souvenir items—which had been steadily growing ever since the first time Hyeju stepped into the bakery—stopped increasing, and Hyunjin’s name ceased to come out of Heejin’s mouth.
(Sometimes she catches Heejin grazing over the items with her fingertips with a distant smile on her face.
Maybe, like Hyeju herself, Heejin had accumulated a treasure cove of memories she didn’t want to keep.)
Hyeju quit her job a month later (she managed to write a three-page complaint regarding her coworkers and sent it directly to both her superiors and the HR department just to spite them) and took up a managerial position at Heejin’s bakery.
The pay was similar to her corporate job, but at least she didn’t feel like strangling her coworkers every day. She wondered why she waited this long to switch careers anyways.
(She doesn’t tell anyone but another reason she quit was due to Heejin’s increasing irritability. Given the older woman’s personality, self destruction was imminent and inevitable.
Hyeju wanted to be there when it happens so she can give back some of the comfort Heejin’s always offered her.)
—
// present.
It’s already nearing midday when Hyeju arrives at the bakery. Heejin peers out of the kitchen in the back and sends her a glare, which Hyeju promptly returns.
The customer picking up an order from the counter hurriedly grabs their tray of freshly baked red bean buns and iced Americano and scampers away to a seat by the window. Hyeju sees Heejin raise up a fist in mock anger for unintentionally scaring away the customer but looks away in feigned ignorance.
(In technical terms Heejin was her boss, but Hyeju’s the one who gives out salaries, so she wasn’t that threatened by the shorter woman.)
She makes her way to the small office they set up for her in the back. It’s a little cramped with all the documents stacked upon the table, but it’s soundproofed and fairly close to the restroom so Hyeju doesn’t have many complaints. She decorated the room with black satin wallpaper and replaced the old plastic swivel seat with a plush, leather executive seat. A humidifier—a “work-warming” gift from Sooyoung—sits on the corner of her desk. In the corner next to the door, a potted plant rests on a tall table Yeojin found at a second-hand store.
(The potted plant had, like the Chuu-ree Bag, been a gift from Jiwoo as part of her Starter Kit in Protecting the Earth for Baby Environmentalists. Hyeju had protested against her efforts to add more green to her apartment, and Jiwoo’s retaliation came in the form of truckloads of plants for Hyeju to choose from (they were on a delivery run, so it wasn’t specifically for Hyeju per se). They decided to reach a compromise with the addition of a low-maintenance Chinese evergreen in Hyeju’s office after Jiwoo’s neighbor called security to report them for being a public disturbance.)
She pretends she doesn’t know, but whenever she passes by the rest area she hears the part-timers whispering about the mysteriousness surrounding her “lair.” She doesn’t have the heart to tell them all-black is just an aesthetic she picked up after finding herself unable to relax in rooms that are too brightly lit. In fact, she enjoys the narrative the employees have conjured up.
The tip of the ballpoint pen in her hand runs against the smooth surface of the inventory papers laying in beautiful disarray across her desk. She checks that they have enough ingredients left for the rest of the week and goes through the timetable to see if anyone put in a request to switch shifts. None—perfect.
After organizing everything into near-toppling towers and paying the necessary bills, Hyeju opens the door to find Heejin. The brightness of their newly installed LED lights nearly scorches her corneas as she emerges from the relative darkness of her office.
She walks out to the dining area and scans around for the other woman. Weaving through the path created by the sparsely placed tables, Hyeju spots Heejin sitting at a table seemingly conversing with a woman whose face is covered by a curtain of black hair. The woman across Heejin seems familiar, but Hyeju’s too far to be certain.
Jeon Heejin, that’s a pay deduction for slacking on the job!
She walks closer to the two and—is Heejin crying? A grimace makes its way onto her face and she moves forward to tap the shoulder of the woman opposite Heejin.
(Midnight shots of plum wine.)
She turns.
(A night in the snow, throwing snowballs into the sky and the chill of ice against her tongue.)
A face Hyeju hasn’t seen in four years.
(Awkward glances and downturned lips.)
Of course. Who else could it be? Heejin has only ever cried because of one person, whether it be in the past or the present.
“Oh—Hyeju? What are you doing here?” Hyunjin, dressed in a pristine collared shirt, looks genuinely confused to see Hyeju, especially after so long.
“I’m the manager of this bakery,” Hyeju deadpans. She nods towards Heejin, who’s still wiping away the remnants of tear tracks on her cheeks, and turns her gaze to Hyunjin. “Did you say something you weren’t supposed to? Why is she crying?”
Hyunjin doesn’t answer, but she’s not given the opportunity either way. Heejin quickly pulls herself up out of the chair and drags Hyeju away by the wrist. When they’re far away enough, Heejin drops her hand and returns to the kitchen. She emerges fifteen minutes later with a platter of s'more cookies in hand, looking as if nothing had transpired.
(One of the aspects of being an idol Hyeju hated the most is learning how to conceal one’s emotions.
She especially hated how Heejin was always the best at this skill.)
Hyeju walks Heejin back to her apartment that night and helps remove the makeup off Heejin’s face when she falls asleep to a puppy grooming video. She leaves the kimchi fried rice she makes in a covered bowl on the kitchen table and makes sure to plug in the night light. Before she leaves, she takes out the envelope Hyunjin had stuffed into her hands when Heejin was busy in the kitchen and leaves it on the countertop beneath Heejin’s keys.
(Hyunjin had begged, and Hyeju was softer than she thought.)
The next morning, Heejin finds an envelope holding a one-way plane ticket with her name on it sitting on the counter. There’s no sender marked on the envelope, and the ticket itself doesn’t even have a date on it. It just has her name—printed in English—and the destination: Tokyo, Japan.
(There’s a single line on the backside of the ticket she sees later, after the tissue box runs empty and she finishes reheating the meal Hyeju left for her. It’s written in Hyunjin’s handwriting that Heejin would recognize from anywhere.
Heejin sets it down and turns on “Around You.” The song starts, and she sings along to Hyunjin’s youthful voice.
You’ll come again today, without fail
What happens if I see you?
I’m carefully waiting
But I’m not expecting anything.
Heejin cries, her tears turning the words on the ticket into ink flowers, it’s petals growing and growing and growing until it can grow no more.)
—
The next time Chaewon shows up at Hyeju’s apartment, it’s in the middle of October.
Hyeju’s plans for a leisurely night in is scrapped for an impromptu recreation outing with her coworkers. Heejin had sprinted away after closing to go take care of a family emergency, so that left Hyeju the next in line to be the designated supervisor. For their first stop the group of eight go to a karaoke lounge and sing until their throats turn raw. They refuse to stop even after their session is over, still high on the music coursing through their bloodstream.
(Hyeju’s seen this scene before, and she’s pretty sure she likes the ending.
The ending in question is Sooyoung—drunk out of her mind—making snow angels on the pavement and an equally drunk Jungeun singing Eclipse while clinging on to a sober, but suspiciously happy, Yerim.
Hyeju filmed it all, and Sooyoung blocked her number for the remainder of the month.)
Since a couple of the employees are still students, Hyeju offers to take them home earlier and leaves the rest of the group at a bustling tent bar. She trusts that they could take care of themselves, but she still instructs them to dial her number if they run into any problems. She is, after all, supposed to make sure they remain safe.
She picks up a pack of beer—Hite, because she wasn’t that particular about her alcohol—and two bags of chips on her way home and makes sure to give a big smile to the employee ringing up her purchases.
(She thinks of the late nights they spent caking on layers and layers of makeup and shudders in horror. There was nothing she hated more than being forced to wake up at 2 AM to go to the makeup shop and struggling to stay awake. Honestly, her distaste is warranted—after all, the makeup artist almost shaved half her eyebrow off after Hyeju fell asleep in the makeup chair.)
The temperature outside is getting colder so she makes sure to wrap her scarf a little tighter around her neck. The air smells of broken promises, pumpkin spice, and autumn’s damp embrace.
Hyeju slips into the elevator and presses the button to go up at exactly 12:00 AM. The doors open with a sharp ring at the 12th floor and Hyeju makes her way down the hallways to her apartment. She presses the pads of the electronic lock one by one and watches as her fingerprints show up against the black plastic surface.
One. One. One.
The door swings open right as she’s about to enter in the last digit. A crooked smile, rounded eyes, and the faint smell of light floral and beer greet her.
“Hyeju, you’re back! Want to go to Incheon with me?” Chaewon, her small frame engulfed by an oversized coat, looks up at Hyeju and gives her a watery smile. Her eyes are glazed over, the unmistakable inebriation seeping through her unfocused gaze.
Hyeju pauses, her grip on the door handle tightening.
She knew Chaewon was born and raised in Yeongjongdo and had spent her years up until high school there. Sometimes the food vlogger mentions the island’s amazing kalguksu in her videos, but Hyeju knows she hasn’t gone back after her family moved to Seoul years ago. Plus, the other woman was slightly swaying now and Hyeju didn't feel like carrying an alcohol-soaked Chaewon all the way to Incheon in the dead of night. Sue me, I don’t even get paid for taking care of her whenever she shows up.
“What are you talking about? And why are you here?” The words leave her mouth before she can think them over. She sees Chaewon’s eyebrows push together and the corner of her lips drop.
“I just wanted— wanted to.”
“Wanted to do what?” Hyeju sighs, exasperated. This is going to be a long night—why couldn’t Chaewon be the type to sleep the alcohol off?
“I just wanted to go to the ocean!” A small fist hurls at Hyeju’s chest.
She brings her hand up to her temples and presses away an emerging headache. Are there even buses in operation at these hours? And would they think she’s kidnapping a drunk woman? There were too many complications, too many logistics to work through, but—
“Okay, fine. You win. Go back in and drink some water while I look for a way to get us there.” She slides into her apartment through the gap between Chaewon and the frame of her doorway. She shakes away the cold seeping into her bones and watches as the older woman starts giggling to nothing in particular. God, this is going to be a really, really long night.
Curling a single digit into the back of the other woman’s collar, Hyeju manages to pull her into the living room and onto the sofa. She pours out a glass of water—even adds ice cubes in hopes that Chaewon would sober up faster and, perhaps, realize the stupidity of her request—and brings it to the dazed girl.
“Here.” She sets it on the table in front of the sofa and nudges Chaewon to take the glass.
“You give it to me,” Chaewon slurs out, a disoriented smile on her face. She puckers out her lips and turns her head like a spoiled toddler. Hyeju sighs for the tenth time that night and grabs the cup. She helps Chaewon tilt her head back and makes sure the other woman doesn’t choke on the water.
When Chaewon finishes the glass, she looks up at Hyeju and gives her a lopsided smile. “Thanks, Hyeju. You’re the best, did you know that?”
(She knew.)
Hyeju just scoffs in response and takes out her phone from her bag. Now, let me see how to get to Yeongjongdo at this ungodly hour with a drunk part-time toddler constantly on my ass.
—
They get to Yeongjongdo around 4 AM after an expensive taxi ride that Hyeju knows she’ll regret paying for later. Chaewon’s a little more sober now and squatted down in the sand to run her fingers against incoming waves the moment they reached the beach. Hyeju settles down on the edge of the shore, toes resting on wet sand.
It’s cold, both the air around them and the sea. Hyeju’s never felt more awake than in this moment.
“Hyeju,” a shrill voice calls out, “watch this!” Hyeju turns to the other girl’s bumbling form, expecting to see an interesting seashell or a magnificent sand castle. Instead, she’s met with the bitter saltiness of seawater in her mouth.
“Park Chaewon! You’re so dead—you just wait!” She launches herself off the sand and barrels towards a giggling Chaewon. Soon, she has the older woman in a headlock.
“Apologize for that! I got seawater in my mouth, you know.” Chaewon’s black hair tangles through the air, the wind bringing the scent of her perfume to Hyeju’s nose. She lets the other woman go and watches Chaewon catching her breath one big mouthful at a time. Soon, they’re standing side by side on the beach, the sound of the waves filling their ears.
Hyeju feels time slip away and sees the sliver of orange sunlight making its way out of the horizon. She catches the woman next to her staring at her, and she stares back.
The older woman breaks the silence with a sudden giggle. Chaewon feels Hyeju slip her fingers through her’s one digit at a time, and she pulls.
They’re both terrible runners, even more so now that they’re barefoot against the soft sand. Nonetheless, neither stop. They run and run and run, their hair streaking through the salty air like tails behind a flaming meteorite that’s using the last of its energy to produce the greatest sight mankind has ever seen.
“Hyeju, don’t you feel like you’re flying?” Chaewon looks behind her to give the taller woman a vibrant smile. Hyeju feels the blood rushing to her head, the sound of her heart a damp, continuous thump in her ears.
(It’s been more than 10 years since everything began, but not much has changed.)
She can say with utmost certainty that this doesn’t feel like flying; in fact, she feels her legs grow wobbly and a cramp starting to build in her lower abdomen. If this is flying, Hyeju would rather become an Icarus who brought a Bic lighter to burn her own wings down before she could fly too high.
With a heavy pull, she brings Chaewon towards her. They tumble to the ground, Hyeju underneath and Chaewon on top. They struggle to catch their breath, and the shorter woman rolls away from Hyeju and onto her back.
With no Chaewon on top of her, Hyeju now sees the scattered stars against the dark blue velvet of the night sky. She’s never seen them in Seoul before; the city was always too loud, too bright, too suffocating.
Am I dead? I must be fucking dead and in heaven. Hyeju breathes deeply and the cool thickness of the sea breeze feels like salt crystallizing in her lungs. The sand shifts beneath her, fine particles finding homes in tiny crevices in her clothes.
“You know, you could’ve just told me.” Chaewon’s voice, dampened by the breeze, sounds both familiar and foreign.
“Tell you what?” Maybe Chaewon was still drunk, because Hyeju has no idea what she’s talking about. This was, frankly speaking, becoming a trend tonight.
The shorter woman sighs sweetly into the cold air. “I went back to go sort through some business a month ago. I found the letter you tucked behind the frame. The one you gave me when we moved out of the dorms.”
A pause. Oh.
Hyeju thought Chaewon found that letter years ago and just didn’t feel like saying anything. The other woman had always kept to herself anyways, so Hyeju had accepted that she’d never know much besides what Chaewon wanted to show.
(If Heejin was the best at concealing her emotions then Chaewon was in second place, tied with the ever-elusive Kim Hyunjin.)
Hyeju shrugs even though she’s not sure Chaewon can see her past the haze of the morning light. It didn’t matter anyways—Chaewon didn’t seem to be looking for an response. The silence between them stretches out like ribbon and loops around the night. It twists and turns, wrapping tightly around wounds that have long scarred over, but neither Hyeju nor Chaewon pay heed to it.
It feels right to be here, against the sand and senses overwhelmed with the rolling sea. They’re close enough to the edge of the water that Hyeju can feel the light sprays of saltwater upon her skin, yet she knows they’re just far enough inland that no wave can bring them into the sea. She clenches her fist and feels Chaewon squeeze back. Somehow, Chaewon’s hand had made its way into Hyeju’s some time after falling. It’s that, or they never let go in the first place.
“Can I kiss you?” It’s a siren’s call, a seduction of love that spellbinds both women. They reach for it, fingertips brushing upon a sweet temptation. Hyeju’s not sure if the voice belongs to Chaewon or herself, but does it really matter?
(Afterwards Chaewon will say that it was Hyeju, but Hyeju swears it was Chaewon.
Yerim just smiles knowingly at both of them and offers up another apple slice to the bickering couple.)
Maybe they’re years too late, maybe it was all a spell that would shatter like pieces of glass. But with their lips on each other’s and the soft morning light upon their skin, they felt like they’re right where they’re supposed to be.
—
A notification from KakaoTalk pops up on Hyunjin’s phone when she’s out looking for a sack of freshly baked milk bread. It’s been a while since she’s spent more than a day or two in Tokyo, and even those days were wasted away in hotel beds as an in-between for red-eye flight schedules.
She reaches into her pocket and pulls out her phone after feeling the slight vibration. Her fingers, a little stiff due to the cold, are a little slow when clicking on the text notification on her lock screen. With a little effort she manages to open directly into the application.
There’s a single, red “1” next to a chat that hasn’t been touched in more than a year.
Heejin: Where are you right now?
A nearby shop begins playing a Japanese pop song. Hyunjin can’t tell if it’s an idol group singing or if the song’s part of an anime soundtrack. She’s a little ashamed to admit, but she never had a knack for these things. Back when she still had her hair set in a permanent mid-part and the halls of Polaris were filled with the voices of girls she left behind more than a decade ago, Heejin would turn on mainstream J-pop songs and force Hyunjin to dance with her. The taller girl never knew what she was doing or what to expect, but Heejin had always laughed hard enough for Hyunjin to not care. She spent endless nights snoring next to Heejin while her same-age friend watched the same five episodes of Naruto and cheered on the characters like she was watching a soccer match, but whenever the other girl felt down she’d stay up until it was time for school just listening to Heejin ramble on and on about which character from the show had the best design.
Hyunjin thinks if she could go back in time, she’d choose to go back to those moments. Not for the fanfare, not for the heartbreak, but for the moments in between. That was her youth, the pieces of herself she had left behind when she had started looking up instead of behind. But now, looking at the message on her phone, she thinks that maybe they were still there.
The skies of Tokyo are splashed with a beautiful palette of pinks and oranges, and the light atop Tokyo Tower gleams like a guiding star. Hyunjin thinks of Heejin running a paintbrush of dreams against the night and painting in the curve of the moon, feels the nostalgia crawl into her veins like a sweet drug she’ll fall into over and over again.
She’s descending from the stars, a fallen angel, just waiting for the right moment to land in the arms of the one she loves.
After all, did angels even need salvation when their Heaven was on the ground all along?