Work Text:
There's absolutely no reason for Minjeong to search the crevices of her piggy bank for an extra quarter until she reaches twenty dollars to pay a good friend of hers.
Unless a certain Yu Jimin is involved and there's going to be a party tonight.
“What the fuck else are you doing? We’re going to be late.” Aeri's voice makes her sound irritated but she looks nowhere near it. Or maybe Minjeong's just downplaying her hand-on-hip stance in the doorway.
The tip of Minjeong's tongue is peeking out of the corner of her mouth as her two fingers squirm around in the opaque plastic pink pig, blindly feeling for that one stupid coin.
Aeri starts tapping her foot. “You’ve already wasted thirty minutes trying on outfits. You can't be wasting another ten on change.” The pink haired girl bristles, realizing another thing. “You don't even need money for a party, Minjeong.”
“Yeah. I don't,” Minjeong grins in triumph when she finally fishes out a rusty old quarter. “But it's not for me, it's for you.”
She doesn't think her best friend has ever looked so befuddled and tired at the same time, ever. “I don't need that.”
Minjeong hops to her feet and skips over to Aeri, proceeds to grab her hand and dump a ten-dollar bill, a five-dollar bill, three one-dollar bills, and eight quarters on Aeri’s palm. “Rig the game.”
“What game?”
“Seven minutes in heaven.”
“We are not playing.”
Minjeong scoffs, “We totally are. Because Jimin's going to be playing. And that means I'm playing, which also means you are playing.”
Aeri stares her down, so does Minjeong. There's that look on Aeri's face, the one that appears when she's thinking on something, which makes Minjeong's lips curl up into a knowing smile because that means Aeri's actually considering her demand.
Then Aeri opens her mouth. “No.”
“Oh, come on. I want this. You’ve been telling me I need to get laid and you're not helping me?” Minjeong argues and makes a show of taking back the money. “Fine, then. See how you'll like it when I get shoved into that closet with your crush, who just happens to be my crush's close friend, who most likely will also play tonight since her best friend is playing.”
Aeri grunts, closing her fist to ward off Minjeong's nimble fingers. “Oh my, fuck. Fine.”
Okay. She might be regretting this. Just a tiny bit.
Whoever the fuck it was that forced her onto the floor next to this stinky man needs a fist to the face. But trust that it won't be Minjeong doing the punching because she's got a pretty girl to kiss and she can't let this get in her way.
It's been a little over twenty minutes into the game, and an hour since Aeri and Minjeong arrived at the party. They had been dragged into conversations here and there, people they knew littered the entire house and they had no way of avoiding them. After a mind-bogglingly lengthy talk with one of the cheerleaders—Not that Minjeong's complaining. She actually likes the girl for her bubbly attitude. But the fact that she had a jock hanging off of her who would cut in every ten seconds was just pissing the shit out of her—Minjeong had signalled to Aeri with a tug on her sleeve that they'd better go, five minutes into the conversation.
Aeri is sitting not totally across from her in the circle, more towards her right, but she can still make eye contact with the pink haired girl and mouth ‘You fucker’ whenever she catches Aeri staring at Ning Yizhuo on the far opposite end of the circle—just because Aeri does it to her when she stares at Jimin.
And right now, right after her time without Mr Stink Fest ends because he had been inside the closet with a girl who now looks so, so out of it—bless her poor soul—Minjeong locks eyes with Aeri, squints, and Aeri unwillingly understands it all too well.
Minjeong reaches for the bottle in the middle of the circle since, ugh, it's her turn now. God forbid the bottle lands on anyone but Yu Jimin. It spins fast, the bottom of the bottle and the mouth of the bottle unable to be determined due to its pace. When the bottle loses its momentum, slowing and slowing until it's spinning about one-eighth of its speed initially, Minjeong can already see it.
Fuck. It's not Jimin. Fuck, fuck. Shit. No. Please. Just this once— A clump of pink mops over the bottle, followed by a body falling limpless unceremoniously on the ground right in the center of the circle.
The bottle's no longer spinning, rolling off of its course, the neck of it bumping into the toe of someone's black converse. Minjeong blinks at it.
“What the fuck, man! Why’d you do that?!” Aeri’s screaming at a poor unsuspecting—and most certainly innocent—boy standing close enough to the circle, wide-eyed and surprised and raising his hands in surrender.
“Hey, I didn't do anything!” He yelps, jumping back when Aeri sits up.
Aeri throws her arms up. “Whatever, man. Just get the fuck away from me.”
The boy scurries away in disbelief, probably running off to tell his friends about how he was framed wrongfully over nothing. And Aeri turns around to face the people in the circle again, huffing, apologizing bluntly.
“Wait, so who did the bottle land on?” A small voice in the group chirps up when everyone's too silent and too spooked over whatever it was that just went down.
Minjeong, sweating from her palms, clears her throat. “I’m.. not sure.”
“Let’s just have you spin again, then.” Another voice says.
Aeri waves a dismissive hand. “Just pick the person it touched. You,” She points at the victim: Yu Jimin, in all her glory, the bottle still at her black converse. “Go.”
Minjeong would jump up and thank Aeri profusely if it weren't for the audience, or the way Jimin quickly and very calmly agrees to it. And Jimin's already standing up, anyway, so she can't do anything else other than follow her like a lost puppy.
Clearly, Minjeong didn't think this shit through. Which is funny because she's pretty sure she spent about five months thinking of this one thing and she should have everything under control by now. But she doesn't and now she doesn't know what to do with herself.
Jimin is quiet as the door is closed, standing there with the usual nonchalance she carried all around campus and her hands in her pockets. She looks bored. And that's a bad sign because what the fuck is Minjeong supposed to do, and how does she get from here to kissing?
“So.. We’re not going to,” a pause. “Do anything?” Minjeong wonders if she can strangle herself right here and now with her bare hands. Why did she have to sound so hopeful? In a feeble attempt to save face when Jimin turns to look at her, Minjeong clears her throat, keeping her eyes on the closet door.
The taller girl stifles a laugh; Minjeong nearly melts into a hopeless puddle of a fool. “We don’t have to if you don't want to,” Jimin says. Respectful, thoughtful, careful. All of the things Minjeong likes. God, Jimin is so perfect for her. Jimin just doesn't know it yet!
Her throat bobs as she weighs out the pros and cons of this situation. On one hand, if she shoots her shot now and succeeds, she not only gets to kiss Jimin but also spend even more time with the girl since she trusts Aeri will do her job outside. On the other hand, if she doesn't, they'll just have to stand here in silence for the entirety of this round and that's just boring now, isn't it?
Fuck it. Here goes nothing. Minjeong swallows her pride, and social anxiety. “The rules are the rules.” She mutters slowly, mouth barely moving to enunciate the words.
Jimin's silent, unmoving, nonverbal. Minjeong has to look over to make sure the taller girl isn't judging the hell out of her. But all she sees is Jimin's adorable, doe eyes staring right back at her, carrying some sort of curiosity.
“Jimin...?” She trails off unevenly. Crap. My voice. Can you be any more embarrassing, Kim Minjeong?
A shadow towers over her. The lightbulb that she once could see above her head is now replaced with the face of Aphrodite herself. Jimin is standing one breadth of a hair away—that’s a lie because there's a gap between their bodies where Minjeong can technically fit Aeri in but a girl can dream—and she's staring. Like, really staring.
Minjeong becomes tongue-tied. She's never been this close with Jimin, ever. Though it's not like she's ever been closer than one meter with Jimin, anyway. But Jimin looks all the more ethereal from this distance. Her smooth forehead, her evenly drawn eyebrows, her big brown eyes, her tall and pointy nose, her soft cheeks, her lips. The pair of lips Minjeong has been dreaming of kissing, the lips of the girl Minjeong has been unhealthily thinking about 24/7 for seven fucking months.
Jimin smiles down at her. “Push me away if it gets too much, okay?” And Minjeong thinks to herself: Oh, we’re actually going to kiss now.
Jimin comes closer.
Oh my god.
And closer.
It's happening.
And even closer, until Minjeong can feel the ghostly breath on her philtrum.
Fuuuuuuuuccckkkk..
Jimin's breath smells good. Minty, cool. It tastes minty for some reason, which is weird because Minjeong is pretty sure she saw Jimin gulp down two cans of beer earlier but she chalks it down to the older girl having probably eaten a mint beforehand. Oh my gosh. Did she eat mint to kiss me?
A soft, warm hand on her cheek and Minjeong almost melts into a puddle of a fool. Jimin's looking down at her lips and Minjeong reciprocates in kind. And Jimin's about to kiss her, quite literally just a centimeter away, when Minjeong takes a leap into another one of her “Fuck it. We ball.” moments, leaning forward and pressing her mouth to Jimin's before the latter can do so herself.
As expected (and occasionally day-dreamed), Jimin's lips are just as soft as her voice. They are well taken care of, as depicted by the amount of times Minjeong's noticed Jimin smearing lip balm on her lips in between classes—not that she's observed Jimin that closely. They're warm and just overall really, really nice. And they, for whatever reason, taste sweet?
Jimin sighs into the kiss. Minjeong drinks up all of that hot, minty breath. And Minjeong presses herself even closer to Jimin, to which the elder welcomes by slipping her arm around her body and up her back. A not-so-classy noise gargles in her throat and Minjeong barely registers it, too busy and too caught up to notice.
Desperate hands claw and grab at the front of Jimin's shirt. Minjeong wants more, wants to feel more. So she ends up pulling forth the cotton and sticking her hands up under it, impatiently feeling up Jimin's soft stomach.
“Minjeong,” Jimin husks, clipped, against her mouth. “Slow down.” She sounds flustered, and Minjeong finds herself liking the fact that she is the one who has Jimin sounding this way. It only encourages her to kiss Jimin harder, more desperately—or try.
Jimin catches up, peeling Minjeong off of herself and nudging her backwards against the wall of the closet. Minjeong's pupils are blown when she comes face-to-face with Jimin who's just a couple inches away, blissfully out of breath. “Huh…?” She pants softly, blinking aimlessly.
Minjeong knows Jimin's upset. Yet with eyes as pretty as those, the taller girl has no choice but to turn into a harmless cupcake when she does it. Subconsciously, Minjeong smiles at the thought.
“I understand we only have a few minutes,” Jimin breathes out almost exasperatedly. Her hands are warm on Minjeong's hips and they are very attention-seeking in Minjeong's opinion. “But you need to calm down a bit. Okay?”
“But we have more than that.”
Jimin blinks. “What?”
Shit. Blew my cover. Screw Minjeong's loose mouth and overflowing lust that's been bubbling for months for the woman before her at the moment. And since she's already fucked herself over with the supposed-to-be discreet plan, Minjeong just winds up telling Jimin about it, anyway.
Her eyes are closed as she spews out the first words that come to mind. “My friend outside is stalling for us. For me, actually. I really like you and I mean this in the nicest, most polite way possible: I want you so bad. Have been, is wanting. Please kiss me again.”
Jimin is frozen. So-called Queen Elsa of Arendelle loses to Jimin by ten points just because Minjeong has the hots for her. The devil has finally come to take Minjeong away, it seems. Because Jimin is staring at her like she's grown two more heads; like she's finally figuring out that the pink haired doofus outside had launched herself to the ground for the sake of putting her inside the closet with Minjeong and made it look accidental; like she's finally realizing that the pink haired doofus is actually Minjeong's friend.
“Oh…” The frail exclamation leaves Jimin's lips like a broken record. Minjeong winces internally, heart already chipping away at the simple thought of having chucked away her only chance of getting with her crush.
Praise the lord. And Uchinaga Aeri.
Soft, warm lips on her neck, sturdy hands on her back and hip, solid heat in the form of Jimin's broader build pressing against her; Minjeong is on cloud nine.
This is—if she's allowed to have a wider spectrum of dreams—just a quarter of what she wanted to experience tonight. Jimin’s a good kisser, no doubt, and, the kissing is nice and sweet and all that, but Minjeong imagined herself getting into a taxi with Jimin heading to Jimin's place so they could move to Level 5 by now.
But you know what? She'll take what she can get. And if that meant making out in a humid closet while strangers awaited them just outside, then so be it. Weird reminder, but it's whatever because Minjeong can't exactly focus on that right now when she's being enveloped by her long-lasting crush.
Minjeong's phone tickles her thigh with vibrations and she already knows it's a text from Aeri. Probably telling her to hurry the fuck up, or that she's going to have to hitch a ride with someone else because Aeri’s leaving. Fingers crossed Aeri doesn't leave. Minjeong is too much of a coward to trust anybody else behind the wheel that isn't Aeri, especially not with the widely known fact that possibly only Aeri will walk out of this party sober. Hell to the no, she is not taking any chances with that.
Anyway, back to the situation at hand, Jimin kisses like she's a little kitten. Timid, snippy, and a lot of licking. Minjeong is so sure she'll leave this closet with a neck full of slobber and hickeys. But hey, better than nothing. She'll take saliva over uncomfortable embarrassment any day.
Dainty, slender fingers creep up the back of Jimin's neck, some slithering up her shirt and wriggling past her waistband. Maybe Minjeong's moving too fast; she couldn't care less though. And Jimin doesn't seem to mind it all that much either. Encouraged, Minjeong pushes her two fingers further past the restricting jeans, the two digits wedged between hot skin and rough fabric.
And although she is horny, Minjeong has a bit of brain left unaffected to think about modesty; both hers and Jimin's. Hence, she halts her wandering hand, leaving it two knuckles away from a revolutionary movement. “I think, not here.” Whatever the fuck that was, at least it got her point across because Jimin's busting the door open in the next second, pulling her along as they worm their way through the back door.
Aeri's definitely mad at her. But she should've known that Minjeong was going to shoot her shot if she was given a target. And come on, Aeri was paid to help her get with Jimin. She shouldn't have her panties in a twist.
“Yes. I get it, mom.” Minjeong hobbles around on one foot, phone wedged between her ear and shoulder, doing her best to put on her jeans from yesterday that feel tighter now for whatever reason. Jimin's not anywhere in the room, possibly out in the kitchen, if Minjeong's taking into consideration the noises that sound awfully like someone getting burned on a stove and clanging pans.
Aeri's nagging again, says something about how she doesn't trust Jimin all that much. Minjeong opens the bedroom door, not listening, and steps out into the living room. And Jimin is indeed burning herself on the stove in the kitchen. Minjeong mumbles out an amused ‘wow’ when Jimin manages to send a half cooked pancake flying over her head and into the sink. She hangs up when Aeri is mid sentence.
“I’m surprised you’re still alive when you're this disastrous in the kitchen.” She says once she's close enough to see the sad lump of a pancake in the sink. In her head, she tells herself how she's surprised also because this is the cool, hot senior she's crushing on? That's… blasphemous.
Jimin has flour on her cheek that probably even she doesn't know is there. Streaks of her dark hair drizzled in yellow from batter. Minjeong's body moves before she tells it to, pinching the battered pieces of hair between her thumb and index, wiping them clean. “You’re a mess,” Minjeong chuckles.
“Sorry… I'm just trying to get breakfast going before you have to leave.” Jimin apologizes with big kitten eyes that Minjeong can't resist falling deeper into.
Minjeong purses her lips, smiling almost pitifully. “Jimin, I'm so sorry. I need to go now. My roommate is going to shave my head if I don't come home in the next hour.”
Jimin's brows arch. “Oh..”
The elder looks genuinely bummed out and Minjeong has to force herself to stay put and not jump Jimin for being so stinking adorable or she'll have to stay the night again and face another round of Aeri’s wrath. So, in the end, she settles with placating Jimin by combing her fingers through her hair.
She decides to shoot the apple because why not? They're already here, and Jimin looks like a sad, wet cat in the rain that's lost its way home. “How about we go on a date tomorrow?” Minjeong asks, voice as soft as a feather.
In an instant, a smile is slowly blooming on Jimin's face, brightening up the entire room. “Yeah. I'd like that.”
There's this shiny glint in Jimin's eyes. Something of mirth and mischief that Minjeong can't ignore. Blunt nails gently scratch at Jimin's scalp as they leave her head of hair. Jimin blinks slowly like a cat in comfortable silence, trusting and unsuspecting. Minjeong tiptoes to press a kiss to Jimin's cheek, bidding farewell and good luck on cooking the rest of breakfast.
She's pretty sure Jimin fails to flip another pancake when she hears a thump as soon as she closes the door. But Jimin's cheering, and Minjeong walks away giggling.