Chapter Text
The first thing Minjeong smells is the scent of freshly printed papers.
She takes a deep breath before opening the door further and stepping inside her new office.
The blonde wouldn't be 10 minutes late to her first day of work, if her girlfriend Jimin had kept her hands to herself that morning.
She takes another deep breath and clenches her fists to stop them from trembling. It wasn't Minjeongs first or second time at a new job. She often had to switch jobs since she started working. But it was her first time being late. What would her boss think? What would her colleagues think?
Before Minjeong could get even more lost in her thoughts a woman with black straight hair approached her. She's a few inches smaller than Minjeong.
"Hey, are you the new one here?" The woman tilts her head a little to the side.
Minjeong nods. "Yes. Thats me. My name is Kim Minjeong."
The other woman takes Minjeongs hand and shakes it a little. "Nice to meet you Minjeong-ssi. My name is Ning Yizhou. Today must be your lucky day."
Minjeong furrows her eyebrows a little. Her lucky day? Eventhough she came late to work?
Yizhou seems to notice Minjeong's confused expression and chuckles. "I don't know why, but our CEO is currently talking with your new boss. They are taking a long time already."
Minjeong's eyes widen. Their CEO is here? Why is she here?
Before Minjeong could ask more questions, her new colleague is already signing her to follow her. So Minjeong follows Yizhou to her new desk.
"I don't think Taeyong-ssi will notice you being late due to his meeting. So you're really lucky today."
Just as Minjeong wanted to answer her new colleague, the door opens and their CEO and her new boss enter the room.
She bows down respectfully and holds back her smile as she sees her girlfriend.
Different circumstances led to Minjeong working at her girlfriends company, but of course nobody knows about their relationship and both would like to keep it that way for now.
Minjeong and Jimin meet eyes for a second before Jimin leaves the office.
Taeyong, Minjeongs new superior, looks at her. "You must be Kim Minjeong, right? My name is Lee Taeyong. Nice to meet you."
Minjeong nods and shakes his hand.
After a brief introduction to her tasks, Minjeong sits down at the free desk and starts working. Yizhou sits at the desk next to her and helps her get used to the new techniques. She also promised Minjeong a tour through the main parts of her new workplace later the day.
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After work, Minjeong sits on her couch and watches a movie on the TV as the front door opens and an exchausted Jimin enters their shared apartment.
Minjeong immediately stops the movie and walks up to her girlfriend. She waits until Jimin takes off her coat and shoes and wraps her arms around the taller woman. Jimin chuckles a little before returning the hug.
They stay like that for a few seconds before Minjeong pulls away and pecks the other woman's lips. "Welcome back, babe. I missed you."
Jimin chuckles. "I missed you too, love. How was your first day of work?"
At the mention of her first day, the blonde glares, or tries to glare, at her girlfriend. "I was late, because of you."
The older woman chuckles at her girlfriends expression. "I'm sorry, love. Was Taeyong mad?"
Minjeong shakes her head a little and sighs. "No, he didn't even realize thanks to you. What did you even talk with him about?"
Jimin just shrugs as a reply but can't help a little proud smile for herself. "Just something not important. I asked him about a project, so he doesn't realize you being late."
Minjeong feels her cheeks heating a little and pecks the raven's cheek. "You're awesome."
Jimin hums and closes her eyes. When she opens her eyes again, she cups her girlfriends cheek and leans down a little to kiss Minjeong properly.
After she pulled away, she took her girlfriends hand properly and pulls her further into their apartment. "Did you eat already, love?"
Minjeong shakes her head. "No, should I cook something while you take a shower?"
Jimin smiles and nods. "That would be awesome." She kisses Minjeong's forehead and leaves to take a shower while Minjeong prepares dinner.
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Later that night, they lay together in their bed. Jimin plays with the blonde strands of her girlfriend while Minjeong nuzzles her head in the raven's shoulder.
"I'll be late tomorrow. Aeri and I will have dinner with a new client."
Minjeong pulls back a little "Aeri?" She throws her girlfriend a questioning look.
Jimin smiles softly and nods. "Uchinaga Aeri. My secretary i told you about, remember?"
The blonde burries her face in her girlfriends shoulder. "Right, sorry. I forgot."
Jimin hears a muffled yawn before her girlfriend speaks up again.
"I'll probably be late too. My office throws a small welcoming party at some bar."
The older woman nods and presses her nose to her girlfriends hair to take in her favorite scent. "Don't drink too much and call me if something happens, okay?"
Minjeong nods before her breathing evens and she drifts off sleep.
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The bar smells like beer and soju.
It's definitely not the place Minjeong spends a lot of time at. She's wearing a pair of jeans and a simple T-shirt because Taeyong told them to dress casually.
Minjeong sat next to Yizhou, who didn't seem to get the dress code. The black haired woman wore a short skirt with a crop top. Was this even appropriate to wear for a company dinner?
Minjeong shrugged since nobody else seemed to say something against it.
Her office team contained off 5 people. Yizhou, Kazuha, Jaehyun, Taeyong and her.
Kazuha and Jaehyun sat opposite from Minjeong and Yizhou in their office, while Taeyong had his separate desk to show his higher status.
Minjeong wasn't able to get to know the other much yet. Eventhough she wasn't much of a social person, Minjeong atleast wanted to be close to her colleagues.
Taeyong stood up and raised his glass for a toast to Minjeong. Latter only offered a small shy smile, while he made a small speech. He soon realized the blonde's shy smile and cut his speech short.
Minjeong listened to their conversation, expecting some work talk, but instead they seemed to share gossip about other workers at the company. Was this even normal?
"Eunchae said, she saw Minju getting scolded again by Aeri."
Minjeong nodded to herself a little. Jimin told her about it. Apparently Minju was helping Aeri on some task and messed up the documents. So Aeri and Jimin had to apologize to their client for their juniors mistake.
Yizhou gasped overdramatically. "Again? I really dont know, who has it worse. Minju, who's constantly getting scolded, or aeri, who constantly has to apologize to Jimin."
Taeyong shakes his head. "Definitely Aeri. I mean, have you seen Jimin being mad? I've seen her being annoyed at some meetings every now and then. It's really scary. And Aeri has to constantly apologize for her junior. If I was her, I would've left already."
Minjeong furrows her brows a little. Jimin being often mad at her secretary, for a mistake that wasnt hers? She's not someone like that. "She didn't seem like someone scary."
Yizhou looks at the blonde with wide eyes. "Didn't you already see her? She has that cold aura around her."
Minjeongs new colleagues nodded in agreement, but the blonde couldn't let somebody talk like that about her girlfriend in front of her. "But she still wouldn't scold anyone like that without reason to."
Minjeong wanted to proudly pat her own shoulder. That wasn't too obvious, was it?
She froze when she heard Yizhou snort. "Did you already develope a crush on our CEO, Minjeong-ssi."
Minjeong felt the heat in her cheeks rise and quickly shook her head, which made her new colleagues only laugh harder than before.
"By the way, Minjeong-ssi, how old are you?"
Minjeong looked at the black haired woman. "Oh, um. I'm 24. I was born in 2001."
Kazuha smiled, like the others. "Can I call you unnie than? Since you're older."
Yizhou also nodded. "Minjeong unnie. Only if you're comfortable of course. We are all pretty casual with eachother."
Minjeong smiled. "Of course. It's an honor."
The younger girls giggled.
Jaehyun put his hands on the table to get everyone's attention.
"Minjeong-ah, I hope you dont actually have a crush on Jimin."
Minjeong furrows her brows a little. "Why not?"
Taeyong chuckled a little. "Cause she's already taken."
Yizhou nods. "Yeah, it's pretty known around the company. She rarely works overtime and often buys flowers at the shop next to our company."
Minjeong hides her smile. "Really? What a shame. Do you know anything about her partner?"
Kazuha raises an eyebrow. "You don't seem so sad about the fact? But no, nobody knows anything. Not even Aeri, who's the closest to Jimin."
Yizhou lowers her voice a little. "I bet it's a girl." The black haired woman thinks for a second. "Somebody cute probably. So you'd fit perfectly, Minjeong-unnie"
Minjeong blushes a little and lowers her gaze to her glass.
Kazuha shakes her head. "No, no, no. Unnie, you should take someone nicer. Like Aeri, she's really charming from what I heard."
The blonde raises her head again to answer but gets cut off by Taeyong.
"Girls, let's stop assume anything about our superiors. If anyone heard you, I'd have to deal with it."
Kazuha and Yizhou giggled again but nodded and decided to drop the topic.
Jaehyun turned to Minjeong.
"Where did you work before, Minjeong-ah?"
Minjeong put her hands in her lap and straightened her back a little. "Just some small company. You probably haven't heard of it before. I did similar things to now, just not about medicaments like now."
Taeyong seemed to be interested aswell.
"Why did you start at our company, if I may ask of course"
Minjeong forces a smile.
"Just some personal reasons. And the salary is better now."
Her fingers started to clench the fabric of her jeans under the table.
Yizhou seemed to notice how Minjeong tensed at the topic and quickly switched it to something work related like the latest project or something.
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That night, Minjeong couldn't sleep well. Her mind kept wandering to what happened at her previous job.
Luckily for Minjeong, Jimin didn't seem to notice her inner turmoil. The blonde didn't like to worry her girlfriend.
She burried her face in Jimins shoulder and swallowed hard to not start crying. Her girlfriend was fast asleep. Everytime Minjeong closed her eyes, she had the same situation back in her head and couldn't seem to fall asleep. The same guy. The exact words. She could even feel the pain of the grip.
So she carefully pulled away from Jimin to not wake her up and went to their kitchen to take a sleeping pill. Maybe that will make her help fall asleep and forget.
When she reached for a glass of water to swallow the pill, she felt arms around her waist from behind.
Minjeong immediately tensed but relaxed after hearing her girlfriend sleepily murmur something incoherent.
Minjeong quickly takes the sleeping pill and lets herself be pulled back to bed. The sleep wasn't the best Minjeong had, but atleast she didn't cry herself to sleep like many other times.
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Time flew by and Minjeong grew closer with Yizhou. The girl had a way to draw people in and she was easy to talk to.
Christmas was over soon and it was time for Minjeong to celebrate her birthday
Her new friend found out and basically invited herself, so Minjeong had to promise her girlfriend to celebrate separately.
Usually, Minjeong had no problems with showing off her girlfriend to her friends. But Yizhou started shipping Minjeong and Jimin and the blonde was scared to have an akward atmosphere if Yizhou saw their CEO. Minjeong was also scared that Yizhou would act differently towards her, if she found out.
So Minjeong celebrated her birthday at her favorite restaurant with her close friends Yunjin and Chaewon. And Yizhou, of course.
Her friends talked comfortably with eachother. Yizhou told Minjeongs best friends embarrassing stories from work, like how Minjeong once accidently spilled coffee on Taeyong. Yunjin and Chaewon talked about their highschool times together in exchange.
After saying something utterly embarrassing about Minjeong (She tried to stop it but Yizhou still heard every word), Yunjin had to wipe a tear of laughing.
"Can you believe she still has a hot girlfriend?"
That made both Minjeong and Yizhou freeze. Minjeong desperately tried to shake her head towards Yunjin and Chaewon.
Yizhou gasped dramatically. "SHE HAS A GIRLFRIEND? UNNIE WHY DIDNT YOU TELL ME???"
Now Chaewon and Yunjin also looked confused at Minjeong.
Minjeong wanted to explain but stopped when Yizhou started again.
"Wait, so you dont actually have a crush on Jimin. Minjeong, are you-"
Minjeongs eyes widen
"Are you in a relationship with Aeri???"
Minjeong's brows furrow
"Wait, what?"
"Omg, everything makes sense now. Thats why you defended her that last time."
Minjeong now desperately shakes her head while Yunjin and Chaewon couldn't stop laughing.
"No, Yizhou, that's not-"
But she gets cut off by Yizhou again, who looked at little hurt. Her voice was more smaller than before as she stood up.
"It's okay, unnie. You didn't have to tell me. I'll go to the bathroom quickly."
Minjeongs eyes widen. "Wait, Yizhou i really-"
But Yizhou was quickly away and Minjeong could only stare. Yunjin and Chaewon also stopped laughing. It was quiet for a few seconds. Did Minjeong say something wrong? Was Yizhou hurt that Minjeong didn't tell her about a relationship? Minjeong shook her head a little. That reaction was way too intense for something like that. But Yizhou always reacted a little over dramatic.
Chaewon broke the silence. "I think you're friend likes that Aeri girl."
Minjeong turns to her friends. "You guys think so?"
Chaewon and Yunjin nod. "Also, why doesn't she know about Jimin? Did we miss something? Did you to break up?"
Minjeong's eyes widen. "Oh god, no. I just… I can't really tell her."
"Why not?"
"Because I just… can't."