Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

~

The stage lights always nearly blind her, even after years.

She takes her bow after the formal applause and sits, tucking the soft, silky material of her dress under her thighs. There were no jitters, only the tranquil that settles before the conductor dips her hand for the metre. She places her fingers on the keys of the grand piano, prepares for the first note.

And she plays.

+

The stage lights always nearly blind her, even after years.

The audience screams for more, screams and screams it deafens her but she wouldn’t have it any other way. It only fills her with the adrenaline that she needs to finish this set. She positions her hand on the neck of her bass guitar, prepares for the first note.

And she plays.

~

“Nice set, everyone,” Dahyun applauds them, waving the waiter over to order a whole bucket of beer for everyone. “The crowd went wild when you played what you want as a lead single for your first EP!” 

There are collective high-fives among the group. Momo clinks her beer with Jihyo, who wraps an arm around her, sliding closer to the booth. The embrace is sticky, humid, and Momo can still feel both their post-performance jitters but Jihyo’s hugs are seriously one of the best things on earth.

“I’ve got good news and better news,” Dahyun grins. “Good news is that after that Lifestyle article about the indie scene at night, the views of your live performances on Youtube have been going up by five-k every day since last week. People have been asking about you more and I checked Twitter for some tweets--people have been sharing your videos to others, asking for your tracks to be on Spotify!” 

Momo’s and Jeongyeon’s jaws nearly fall to the floor. “Damn,” Momo exclaims, setting down her beer. “That’s great, Dahyun! We’re finally getting out there.”

Their manager-slash-producer holds up a hand. “Ah-ah, but that’s not all. And with how quick we’re working with our tracks right now, we can probably launch it in the middle of next month! You know, with an EP launch party and everything!”

They all cheer, giving Dahyun the praise and thanks she deserves and she nods, knowing exactly how good she is in her work. “I already have a lineup of the special performances for our EP launch,” Chaeyoung tells them excitedly. “We’ll definitely tap Mamamoo and RV to do them. Definitely.”

“Yeah, Hyejin has been texting me nonstop about our recordings because she wants to hear the studio version of Sixteen,” Jihyo says. “Seungwan has been dropping hints too about performing so I guess they’re really up for it.”

Chaeyoung laughs. “I feel like they’re more excited than we are.”

“They should be, and you too,” Dahyun tells them with chicken in her mouth. “You guys worked hard on this. Of course they’re excited; it’s gonna be really good. Then 2X is going to get the recognition you deserve.”

It was true. It’s been a long couple of months, considering that work has been extremely crazy as of late made even crazier by nights spent in Dahyun’s basement until the ass crack of dawn, writing and playing and recording, repeat.

Momo and the rest of 2X wouldn’t have it any other way, though. Even if they were fatigued with being awake for more than thirty six hours every other day, nothing in this world felt more right than with Jihyo on her keyboard, mic on her lips and Jeongyeon with her light-up drumsticks, banging to some awesome beat and Chaeyoung ripping some riffs on her guitar. Nothing in this world felt more right with her bass guitar in her hand. Nothing in this world more right than playing the songs they wrote together, half buzzed with alcohol and drunk on the audience’s enthusiasm.

“I gotta jet right now, kiddos,” Dahyun says, sliding out of the booth checking her watch. “I’ve got a hot date waiting for me.”

Jihyo raises an eyebrow. “Hot date? Since when?”

Flashing them her most dazzling shit eating grin, Dahyun laughs. “Since two days ago. You should ask this lady right here,” she ruffles Jeongyeon’s short hair before turning to leave. “Good job, today, 2X!”

After Dahyun makes her exit, they all turn to Jeongyeon.

“Who is our tiny dubu dating,” Jihyo narrows her at their drummer. It’s not directed at Momo, but she’s scared anyway. “Anyone we know?”

Jeongyeon’s throat visibly gulps, she throws her hands up in defense, hopefully to push Jihyo off when she’s being fiercely protective of all of them. “N-no, uh, I just set them up a few days ago. She’s, uh, one of the cute girls from my friends in the orchestra company.”

That tunes Momo’s ears in. Jeongyeon had been a percussionist for the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra for a couple of weeks now and Momo had met Tzuyu, a harpist, and was pretty great. Jeong totally has a crush on her, judging from the way Jeongyeon’s cheeks turn pink every time she talks about orchestra rehearsals.

Chaeyoung leans forward. “Well, out with it!”

“She’s one of the violinists. Her name’s Sana. Pretty cute. Blonde hair, nice smile. Always looks like she’s eternally grateful for your existence.”

Chaeyoung sinks into the couch, crossing her arms, looking everything like the petulant child she was once. She pouts at her older sister. “It’s not fair you set up Dubu with cute girls while I, your loving sister and flesh and blood, remains girlfriend-less.”

Tutting, Momo reaches across to squish Chaeyoung’s cheeks together. “Aww, but you’re our baby! You aren’t allowed to date yet!”

“I’m twenty years old,” Chaeyoung grumbles.

“And still our wittle baby,” Jihyo rebuts and Chaeyoung grumbles some more. Jeongyeon laughs and puts her arm around her neck, ruffling her red hair.

“Hey, if it’s any help at all, I’m single too.” Momo tells Chaeyoung with a grin and chews on a buffalo wing.

Chaeyoung isn’t the least bit consoled. “You sleep around with girls because you’re the Hirai Momo, girl-charmer, panty-dropper extraordinaire.”

“Which is exactly why she’s single, Chaeng.” 

Momo nods, because, well, it’s true. All relationships have ever been to her were burdens, amidst shifts being a cuisinaire at her uncle’s restaurant. Hook-ups had been nice--no strings attached, and getting great sex from pretty girls and not having to deal with said pretty girls getting annoyed about her being busy all of the time. “If you wanted to date someone, why not someone from our groupies? They’re all pretty nice.”

Jeongyeon laughs. “You sure you haven’t slept with all of them?”

“Yah! Don’t be rude.” That earns a punch to her arm, and even Jeongyeon’s thick sweater doesn’t dull the pain. Their drummer crumples to the table in misery. “And for the record, I haven’t.”

“We’ll give you the benefit of the doubt.” Jihyo says. Momo would have punched but, but she’s Jihyo. Even if she tried, her punch would probably bounce off because of some protective forcefield, probably the Holy Spirit. Or Satan.

“I hate you all.”

“You don’t.” Jeongyeon sing-songs, still clutching the arm that had met Momo’s knuckles. She turns to Chaeyoung. “Say, if you go to my first concert on Saturday, I’ll introduce you to the violin section leader. She’s super cute. Really nice and funny too. She’s a political science student and we hang out often even in school.”

“Here’s your chance, Chaengie!” Momo hooks her arm around Chaeyoung’s neck, ruffling her hair. “You just have to get through three hours of boring classical music to meet the girl of your dreams, but what’s a great romance without saving the princess from an eternal from a tower that plays Pachelbel 24/7?”

Jeongyeon punches her arm in retiliation. “Hey, don’t be an uncultured piece of crap. Classical music is pretty cool.”

“Says who.”

Jihyo pipes in. “Says the piece of pig’s feet waiting in the studio refrigerator.” Seeing how Momo’s ears perk up at the proposition, their lead singer continues. “Be a good legal guardian to our baby too, while you’re at it.”

Chaeyoung looks extremely affronted from her seat. “I’m legal, you old hags!”

They ignore her, watching Momo consider saying no, being jokbal-less and saying yes, enduring three hours of boring classical music for an entire wrapper of microwaveable pig’s feet.

Of course, the food wins. Always the food. “Yeah, sure. Can’t ever say no to food even if it costs my sanity. Please say you’re going too,” she pouts at Jihyo, who shakes her head.

“Can’t. Jeong asked me already and while I would have gone without any incentive,” Jihyo side eyes Momo, and Momo lets out a mock-offended gasp. “My parents are having their anniversary dinner that night. I’ll make it up to you, though, J.”

Momo pouts some more but turns to Chaeyoung. “I guess it’s just you and me and that cute girl Jeongyeon’s gonna set you up with.”

-

It’s the longest three hours of her life that by the end of the concert, she feels like a pile of cremated ashes in a tight dress.

Others would imagine classical music at the gates of heaven but Momo was 200% sure that it’s the music of the gates of hell.

Momo is on the brink of insanity, however the only things that tether her to her sanity is that it’s Jeongyeon performing, and that Chaeyoung face turns a hilarious shade of red when she meets Nayeon for the first time.

She laughs, pushes Chaeyoung towards the woman named Nayeon and she’s as cute as Jeong described and it seems like Chaeyoung is smitten with her already. She watches them shake hands and it’s incredibly awkward thanks to their guitarist, but it’s pretty darn cute. Momo gives Jeong a thumbs up over Nayeon’s shoulder and the drummer returns it just as enthusiastically, obviously pleased that she had successfully set up two of her friends.

“Jeongyeon, you left these in the dressing room,” a voice says and Momo hears it despite its timidness and the ambient noise of the audience leaving filled the theatre.

It comes from a pretty girl, just her height with copper hair and a lots of moles on her face. She’s wearing this white dress shirt and jeans and the way she holds herself… Momo doesn’t like it how her she hands the bag daintily to Jeongyeon as if she’s flirting with her—doesn’t like the way her chin tilts forward as if she’s better than everyone. Doesn’t like how her shoulders look like they can balance five glasses and none would break.

Momo doesn’t like her.

Jeongyeon glances at her empty hands. “My performance outfit!” Jeongyeon exclaims, taking the paper bag from Mina. “Ah, Mina, you lifesaver. This is my sister, Chaeyoung and my friend, Momo. They’re my bandmates too. Momo, Chaeyoung, this is Mina, section leader of the keyboardists; harpsichord extraordinaire and piano prodigy.”

Mina looks down at her shoes in what Momo thinks is humility but she’s not buying it. “You’re overselling me, Jeongyeon.”

They exchange pleasantries and it seems like Mina and Nayeon are quite close because Nayeon adheres to Mina and Mina’s perfectly fine with it but with the way her back is ramrod straight and her chin tilted upward proudly, Momo takes it that she’s not that into skinship.

“Momo is from Japan,” Jeongyeon informs Mina, and Momo nearly has an aneurysm when Mina turns to her, her mouth shaped into a little ‘o’.

Mina flashes her a small smile before speaking in rapid fire Japanese that is too quick for Momo to brain to comprehend and translate.

She replies in broken Japanese and damn, does she try real hard but a mix of Korean and English are mixing up in her head and—

“Sorry, my Japanese is kinda rusty already,” Momo laughs nervously, self-deprecating “You’re really good though.”

“Oh,” the other girl deflates. Momo thinks she sees a little judgment in her eyes and it unsettles her. “It’s fine. I’m sorry I kept talking. What instrument do you play?”

“The bass.”

“Oh.” Mina repeats and Momo really, really doesn’t like Mina and how she seems so disinterested, with her eyes blank and the curve of her lips set in a straight line. People have always responded nicely, usually along the lines of that’s so cool, Momo and you must get all the girls which she did, in truth. Mina’s indifference unsettles her, Mina’s blank face unsettles her.

Everything about Mina tells her that Mina thinks she’s an uncultured swine, a disappointment, from how Momo can’t speak her native language anymore to playing an instrument that she probably doesn’t care about—and while, yeah, she might actually be a piece of uncultured crap, something about Mina thinking she is one just annoys her deeply.

Momo doesn’t like her.

She wants to bail. Right now.

Before Momo can excuse herself, Jeonyeon interrupts her thoughts about possible escape routes because, damn, she really can’t stand Mina’s presence. “You guys should totally come to one of our gigs. It would be awesome if you met our leader and vocals-slash-keyboard.”

Mina perks up at the mention of a keyboard. Momo scoffs in her head, and if she had done it in real life, she wouldn’t really care if Mina had heard.

“When are you guys playing?” Nayeon asks, tucking her chin on Mina’s shoulder. “We should totally go, Minari.”

“It’s on Friday at the Music Barrel, 10 pm. Just down the streets of Gangnam.” It seems as if the cat had released Chaeyoung’s tongue already.

“Why not? That’s near our place. You know, the one beside H&M?” Mina says to Nayeon and Momo feels annoyance flare inside her again. Huh. Of course she’s rich. Of course she lives in Gangnam. Of-fucking-course.

“Ah, that one! Alright, save some seats for us then.” Nayeon smiles and Momo feels Chaeyoung whispering too cute, only loud enough for Momo to hear.

Momo groans internally. Great. Now she’s going to perform in front of this extremely pretty girl that probably thinks she is way better than Momo.

“I don’t like that Mina girl.” Momo says stubbornly, buckling up.

“What, why not? She’s pretty cool.” Jeongyeon spares her a side glance as she starts the car.

Chaeyoung leans her head towards the gap between the seats, looking like the child Momo had known nearly all her life. “Yeah, Momo. She’s just shy and quiet but she seems really nice.”

She shrugs, looks out the window to see they’re pulling out of the parking lot and onto the road. “I dunno. She just seems so… stuck up and bitchy to me? Like, let go of that stick up your ass, maybe.”

“Mina’s a trained ballerina and a piano prodigy, what more do you expect than that aura of hers and a back straighter than the most heterosexual person on this mortal plane?”

Momo shrugs again, settling deeper into the seat. “I’m pretty sure she thinks I’m uncultured swine.”

“But you are.” The sisters both say, at the same time, and my god, this is good enough proof that Chaeyoung and Jeongyeon are sisters.

She opens her mouth to say something, in her defense, though she flops down into the passenger’s seat and concedes. “Yeah. You’re right. But my point still stands. You don’t believe that she’s probably some music elitist that detests fun.”

“It’s because she wasn’t like that to m—otherfucker, fucking turn your left sign on, Christ!” Jeongyeon honks the horn of the car, turns left. Her road rage is such a common occurrence, Momo and Chaeyoung are longer thrown off by the loud yell and the possible swerving that happen each time. “—she wasn’t like that when we met. Nayeon asked me what my deal was, I said I was in a band and Mina said it was pretty cool.”

Momo huffs. Of course. She probably has a crush on Jeongyeon too. She could see it in the way she reached out the paper bag to Jeongyeon. Ugh.

“Hey,” Jeongyeon scolds her. She elongates the ‘e’, perfectly matching her chastising mom tone. “Be nice to her on Saturday. Nayeon’s going to be there too, and we wouldn’t want to ruin it for this li’l bean right here.”

She sinks deeper into the chair of Jeongyeon’s car. “Okay, whatever. Fine.”

“Don’t fuck it up,” Chaeyoung flicks her finger on the skin of Momo’s arm. “Don’t.”

Momo mock gasps in offense. “What, you actually think I’ll fuck your date up because of this petty thing?”

“Yes,” they both say, before Jeongyeon rolls her window down to speak into the drive through mic.

-

The soundcheck before the set is always one of Momo’s favorite parts of performing.

It’s the adrenaline before it completely surges out of them, song after song.

It’s the now larger crowd cheering to unfamiliar notes, still enjoying the instruments blending with each other while the technicians make sure the sound systems are a-ok.

It’s the way her hands move against the neck of her bass guitar. It’s the way Chaeyoung jumps and shakes herself as a warm up. It’s the way Jeongyeon checks the synths and her cymbals to the notes Jihyo’s playing on her keyboard.

The head technician gives them a thumbs up from the soundbooth.

Jeongyeon strikes her sticks as a cue.

And they play it like it’s their last set ever even though they know they’ll play a thousand more.

“You guys were amazing tonight; thanks for coming to see 2X!” Jihyo says, out of breath, but Momo can hear the smile in her voice.

“Yeah, couldn’t find a better audience than you,” Chaeyoung speaks, turns to Momo. “Hey, didn’t we have a surprise for them?”

A collective noise of ooh’s and ahh’s come from the audience.

“We do!” Momo speaks into the mic. She feels her sweat dripping down her face and into the black crop top she’s wearing. “It starts with a letter E, and ends with a letter P.”

The crowd goes wild—so wild, that it warms Momo’s heart. These people actually want to listen to them. These people love the music they make.

She’s emotional. She might cry, but she won’t. Momo faces the drums. ”Hey, J, why don’t you tell them what it is?”

Jeongyeon, however, is on the verge of tears. “Aww, daddy, don’t cry!” Jihyo laughs and the audience laughs too, amidst the cheering.

Their drummer wipes at her eyes with a hand holding a drumstick. She gives the audience a watery laugh. “We’re releasing our EP next month, here at the Music Barrel,” Jeongyeon says, smiles, sniffs. “And our music will be available on Spotify right after the release too. Our wonderful manager Kim Dahyun will be releasing the exact date, but you’ll be sure to hear about it. Thanks again for coming tonight!”

They exit the stage and the screaming of the audience still rings in their ears after.

“So that’s why you’ve been skipping rehearsals, huh. Maybe I’ll tell Sana where you’d run off to next time you disappear on rehearsals like that.” Nayeon says as a means of greeting, but she’s smiling and Jeongyeon doesn’t seem too worried either. “I’m proud though. Your music is great too. Maybe I’ll buy forty copies of your EP just because.”

They thank Nayeon, and of course, Chaeyoung is beet red. Especially when Nayeon asks her to sit beside her. The band settles around the booth, and it feels nicer to have another added to their little group; it’s comfortable, as if they’ve known Nayeon forever.

Wait, Momo thinks to herself, Nayeon was supposed to be with—

“Mina!” Jeongyeon stands, kisses both of Mina’s cheeks and Momo feels irritation flare inside her that it makes her momentarily dizzy.

“Hi, everyone.” Mina greets with a disarming smile, then sitting on Nayeon’s other side and right in front of Momo, which, in itself, is a tragedy.

Chaeyoung bounces up and down her seat. “Mina, Mina, Mina! Did you hear about—”

“Your EP? Of course I did,” Mina claps her hands in excitement. “I just took a call after your set but I heard everything. I really like your music. Reminds me so much of the Temper Trap. Has Nayeon mentioned we’re buying forty copies each?”

The chicken wings make its way to the table, how Jihyo manages to carry five bowls at the same time, Momo doesn’t know, but it’s pretty impressive. “Who’s buying forty copies of what?”

Mina’s eyes flash with recognition when she sees Jihyo under the light. “Park Jihyo?”

Their leader’s eyes are blown wide. “Myoui Mina?”

“Oh my goodness, it is you!” They stand and embrace tightly across the table. “It’s been too long and you look really good.”

“I’d say the same to you, girl. God. It’s been nine years. I can’t believe this.”

Jeongyeon looks dumbfounded. “You knew each other?”

“Yeah. Piano school when we were what, seven?” Jihyo ponders. “Then a few later she moved to Paris.”

 “We were the best of friends. I don’t know how or why we didn’t keep in touch but look at us now.”

Jihyo laughs. “You’re the pianist of the Seoul Philharmonic.”

“And you’re the leader of one of the rising indie bands in Korea!”

Momo watches this scene unfold before her, trying to ultimately forget that Mina had not acknowledged her existence even once for the past ten minutes, of Mina and Jihyo catching up while Jeongyeon are trying to get Nayeon, Chaeyoung and Dahyun shit-faced.

Well, Momo thinks, two can play that game.

She ignores Mina’s presence as well, talking animatedly at Jeongyeon or Nayeon or Jihyo, to anyone across her that wasn’t Mina. Hell, she’d even talk to a speck of dust if it meant she won’t look at Mina’s direction.

She’s doing fine, really. If Mina was going to hang out with them often because it seems like Jihyo and Mina want to become really close friends again, Nayeon and Chaeyoung are hitting it off pretty well—she can get used to ignoring Mina. Momo will do fine.

She’s doing fine, until Jeongyeon and Nayeon get tipsy while Chaeyoung is already passed out on the table with Dahyun.

“Ey, Momoring,” Jeongyeon slurs, her cocktail slushing forward, nearly spilling it on Mina’s precious cashmere shirt that must cost more than what Momo makes in the kitchen in two months. “Y’don’t like classical music right? Nayeonnie, Minari, look at her. A miserable piece of unrefined crap she is, do you not reckon.”

Chaeyoung mumbles something incoherent onto the table, and Momo recognize it as a, yeah, she is.  

Mina finally, finally looks at her for the first time that night and, well, the warmth in her stomach comes from the absolutely pure irritation she has for the girl, Momo reasons with herself.

“Hey, it’s fine that she doesn’t like classical music,” Mina tells the girls who are flanked at her sides. “At least she doesn’t listen to death metal.”

Momo glares at her. Remembers the CDs of Dying Fetus and Bloodthirst in her shelf. She doesn’t listen to it anymore, it was a phase at most, but this just proves the point that Mina is probably a music elitist.

There are many things Momo cannot stand: among those are people who throw away food and people who diss people’s preference.

(She might be a part of the latter, never the former but she’s not gonna tell anyone that.)

“You have problems with Screamo?”

Mina raises a perfectly shaped eyebrow. “A little. It’s screaming. You can barely hear anything. How is that even real music?”

Momo narrows her eyes. Jeongyeon and Nayeon flop to the table, identical to how Dahyun and Chaeyoung had. Jihyo was somewhere, probably hanging out by the pinball area.

Real music. Huh. Sounds like something a stuck-up, elitist pianist and ballerina would say.

Mina had a point, though. But she wasn’t going to give her the pleasure of knowing.

“You have problems with other genres of music, then?”

The girl in front of her inspects her nails. “Not much. Just screamo and country music.”

Okay, Momo hated country music too but she’s not about to disclose that information with Mina. Can’t have her thinking we have mutual ground.

She’s about to cut the conversation short, when: “I’d ask about what you dislike, but then you hate classical music and like screamo. I can imagine you’d dislike things that actually matter.”

Oh.

Did she just—

“Oh yeah,” irritation bubbles in Momo’s chest. “What exactly are these things that matter, huh? It seems as if you know a lot of things about things that matter.”

Mina brings up a dainty hand, her bangles clinking against each other. She takes a sip from Jeongyeon’s half-empty drink,  “Classics.”

“Classics who? Pachelbel? Strauss? Tchaikovsky? Is that what you mean? I told you, I don’t like classical music.”

The pianist huffs. “No, like Depeche Mode. Or New Order. Tears For Fears. Flight Of Seagulls.”

“New wave? All the bands you can think of are filed in alphabetical order in my dad’s garage. Even Seona Dancing.”

Mina’s eyebrows raise to her hairline. Momo smirks, thinking, yes, there’s an obscure band she doesn’t know until: “Ricky Gervais?”

“Yeah. Him.”

Mina grins at her, a silver tooth peeking out of her wide smile. “More To Lose was my first non-classical piano piece.”

“You win the 80s new wave round, princess.” Momo takes a drink to hide her frown.

“I didn’t know this was a competition.” Mina says flatly, though she’s smiling at Momo, like she’s enjoying seeing Momo ramble on semi-drunkenly.

“How else are we going to settle our differences once and for all?” Momo tells her, slams her now-empty glass of whiskey. “Okay, next round. 90s alternative. Name the first three bands that come into mind.”

Not a beat passes when Mina replies, “Dishwalla. Incubus. Goo Goo Dolls.”

“My childhood, those bands! I condemn you for not mentioning Radiohead.”

The humor in Mina’s eyes ebb away slightly and Momo takes this as her chance to expose Mina’s waterloo. “Radiohead is a nineties classic, and it lasts all through the early 00s. Exit Music For A Film? High And Dry? Reckoners? Classic.”

The pianist chews her lip and Momo takes this as victory even before: “I haven’t listened to Radiohead. Yet.”

Momo claps her hands, nearly toppling down empty glasses surrounding them. Chaeyoung, Nayeon, Dahyun and Jeongyeon are still fast asleep, but she’s glad they’re unconscious to witness this tiny ‘settlement of differences’ between them.

“You’re talking to the right person.” Momo takes out her phones and her earbuds, but as soon as she taps her music app, her phone tells her it’s two in the morning, and she has an early shift at the restaurant at eight. “Leave your number here. I’ll make a playlist on Spotify for you. To educate you about, you know, the classics.”

Mina narrows her eyes at Momo but a small smile tugs at her lips when she takes her phone, punches in her number, and slides Momo’s phone across the table.

“I gotta go. Jihyo’s here to bring these munchkins home, though keep an eye on them while she’s at the arcade.” Momo collects her car keys, phone and wallet, giving Mina a salute. “We’ll continue this soon, princess.”

Momo drives home, her head hurting, but she blasts the entire The Bends album, sorting the songs she’s put in Mina’s playlist when she gets home.

-

The wine is as good as Chaeyoung’s company. The red liquid is as cool as the way Chaeyoung speaks, her voice a nice contrast after a harrowing day at the kitchen.

Today Momo had almost strangled the busboy for nearly throwing out the sauce of the Coq au Vin she’d been working on. She prefers not to think about how she’d almost wrung his neck like a wet rag at the thought of Head Chef wringing her neck like a wet rag.

Momo’s still in her chef whites, rolled up to her sleeves, stained Dijon from earlier. She watches Chaeyoung eat the spare food heartily, and to Momo, she will always be Jeongyeon’s kid sister. Always.

The restaurant is quiet. Dim. No one else but them fills the vast space for the customers while some of the chefs have some wine at the kitchen, winding down from another hellish day.

“How’d Jihyo take you home yesterday?” Momo asks, her leg bouncing up and down. Her feet sore in her white training shoes.

“Drove us,” Chaeyoung says around a mouthful of salad. “She also tucked us in. Jeongyeon’s place was big enough for me, Dubu, Nayeon and her.”

“Ah. That’s good. You took the aspirins she leaves around the house, right?”

“Yup,” Chaeyoung nods. White sauce covers her mole but it’s extremely adorable that Momo doesn’t say anything. “I have to tell you something.”

Momo tilts her head. “What’s it, munchkin?”

Chaeyoung only rolls her eyes at that, though Momo knows she’s going to pay for that later. “I wasn’t exactly asleep when you and Mina were… having a polite conversation about music genres? Is that what it was?”

She laughs, remembering that night perfectly even if it’s fuzzy around the edges. “You caught that?”

“Yeah.” says Chaeyoung, taking another bite and wiping her mouth with the once expertly folded hankies on the table. “The tension was unreal.”

“We don’t really like each other, Chaeyoung.”

The guitarist raises a brow at her, a gesture that had made people tower in fear of little girl Chaeyoung, no longer a little girl but a little woman still, and most definitely a little girl in the eyes of her bandmates. “You sure about that?”

Momo frowns. “What are you implying…”

“I’m just saying, if you like her, you don’t have to pull her pigtails like this. Nayeon says she’s not exactly easy to woo, but you’ve gone for worse.”

Oh.

Oh.

“Chaeyoung. I. Don’t. Like. Her.” Momo enunciates each word because, okay, Mina is really pretty but she doesn’t exactly want to associate herself with her. She prides herself being a pretty easygoing person and it’s not hard for her to make friends, but Mina? Well, Mina had to act like a stuck-up, snooty lady from the start and Momo doesn’t see herself bridging gaps between them.

It’s just not going to happen.

“Sure.” The younger girl says, in the way that Momo knows she’s not buying whatever Momo’s saying right now.

“You little poop,” Momo flicks Chaeyoung’s forehead, making the girl flinch away in pain. “What made you even think that?”

“Nothing.”

“Out with it.”

“I said nothing.”

Momo narrows her eyes at her. “Nothing? Ah. Well, say goodbye to your Zelda games—”

That triggers Chaeyoung to stand up, the cloth on her lap falling to the floor. “No, don’t!"

“Tell me what’s up with me and Mina then. Or like, what’s up with me and Mina in your eyes,” Momo yanks Chaeyoung down to take a seat. Her yell had echoed in the empty restaurant. The lush leather seats squeaked with Chaeyoung’s weight. “Because I sure as hell don’t see anything.”

“The sexual tension, unnie. The sexual tension is unbelievable.”

Momo’s mind goes blank.

Sexual tension?

Where?

She must have spaced out longer than necessary because Chaeyoung snaps her fingers in front of her face. “Earth to unnie, earth to unnie. The sexual tension! Do not evade this conversation!”

Momo still hasn’t reeled herself from the accusation of sexual tension, with Mina. Ha! In what universe?

“There is no sexual tension,” Momo says slowly, hoping Chaeyoung would understand her if she speaks lethargically. “Chaeyoung. That was not sexual tension. That was tension. Period. End of story.”

“Whatever you say. You asked for my input and I gave my input. But you gotta admit, though. She’s really hot.”

Momo wills herself not to blush. “What? Really? I thought Nayeon was more your type.”

It's Chaeyoung that turns red at the mention of the violinist. “She is! But you know, I can still appreciate Mina too.”

“Whatever you say, kid.” Momo laughs. “Finish up so we can go roller skating tonight.”

The younger girl lights up, forgetting the previous topic at once, because Momo doesn’t really want to talk about Mina anymore.

She doesn’t tell Chaeyoung that she finds Mina extremely pretty and ‘really hot’ as Chaeyoung would put it.

She doesn’t reiterate that she and Mina don’t have the tension that Chaeyoung accuses them to have.

She also doesn’t tell Chaeyoung that she’s meeting up with Mina tomorrow to lend Mina the entire Radiohead discography.

Chaeyoung doesn’t need to know any of those.

The gravel crunches under her tires when she pulls over to Mina, who stands prettily on the curb holding a folder of what Momo assumes are her sheet notes. 

Momo rolls her window down. “Hey, Myoui. Hop on.”

“Sorry, I don’t take rides from strangers,” Mina teases, though she opens Momo’s door and slides into the passenger seat. “So,” she looks around Momo’s car, seeing that it’s empty save for some band clothes headed for laundry. “Where are the discographies?”

“Here.” Momo lifts her phone from its place in the cup holders. “I decided that I treasure my Radiohead CDs more than most things I own, so you’ll just have to do with Spotify and my bomb-ass car speakers.”

Mina raises an eyebrow at her. “So we’re just going to stay here in this car.”

“God, no. We’re going for a spin.” Momo exasperatedly explains, because, God, does she have to spell out everything? “Radiohead sounds better when you drive.”

Mina looks at her like she’s crazy, but she buckles up anyway and Momo smiles and starts driving. “Okay. Start your ‘educating’.”

“Alright.” She presses play. The drums of High and Dry surround them in the enclosed space of her car. “Let’s begin.”

-

“Alright, this is our last track from the album,” Chaeyoung strums her cream-colored stratocaster, adjusting the knobs on its board to get the specific filter for the song. Jeongyeon stretches her arms, Jihyo and Momo drink from their water bottles. “We’re so glad you guys are having a wonderful time tonight. And it seems like you’re enjoying our EP so far. I’m glad!”

The large crowd screams and Jeongyeon waits for them to settle before speaking again. “Thanks to our performances today: Mamamoo, RV, I.O.I.! You all rock. We look forward to your EPs too and we know you’re pouring your sweat and blood into it,”

‘And tears!’ screams Yoojung, in the front row. How such a small girl can bellow like that escapes Momo completely. 

Jeongyeon laughs, “and tears.”

“We’d like to thank Music Barrell for letting us play her tonight and for serving the greatest drinks ever.” Momo raises her water bottle, to which the crowd raises their beer bottles and mixed drinks.

“And of course, to our wonderful Miss Kim Dahyun; the best manager a band could ever have.” Jihyo raises her water bottle to their manager, who held a large WE LOVE YOU, 2X!!! <333 illustration board beside Mina, Nayeon and Tzuyu. “Who had helped produce our music, and had been kind enough to feed us when we all forget to eat. We wouldn’t be on this stage without you. Now, for our final song--it’s a remaster, actually, of the first song we released on Soundcloud.”

“This is Daytime / Nighttime and we are 2X. Thank you for listening!”

Momo plays the first few notes, remembers a hot summer day of her junior year and the exact moment they wrote this song, in Dahyun’s garage with Momo’s old bass guitar, Jeongyeon’s beatbox, Jihyo’s portable keyboard and Chaeyoung’s acoustic guitar.

Momo plays the first few notes, blinks away the tears that fall on her fretboard and thinks, yeah, they belong on this stage.

Dahyun stands from her seat the moment she sees them approaching their usual booth at the Music Barrel. She takes all of them into a crushing hug that punches the wind out of their lungs but they return it because Dahyun deserves the world, and if their hugs made her happy, then so be it. “I’m so proud of you guys!” She cries, holding all of them tighter. “You guys made it, finally!”

“Hey, like we said, we couldn’t have done it without you, Doobs.” Jeongyeon ruffles Dahyun’s hair.

“Yeah, you should know this,” Momo tells her. She noses Dahyun’s soft cheeks. “Come on. Do you think we know how to operate that big board full of buttons at the studio? You did all that.”

“Aww,” Dahyun lets out a watery laugh. “I love you guys.”

“We love you too,” Jihyo says, tightens the group hug and Momo likes this little family they have here. 

They sit down and the waiter asks if they’re having their usual, when Mina, Nayeon and Tzuyu set down two paper bags full of their EP cases. “You know, we weren’t joking when we said we’d buy 40 copies each,” Nayeon grins at them. “We decided to just give these to the people who came and won’t buy anything. For free.”

“Dahyun here said there were only limited copies so we can’t really buy the entire stock, so,” Mina explains, “Here.”

Jihyo turns to Jeongyeon. “Wow, you didn’t tell me your orchestra friends were promo geniuses.”

“From what I know, I didn’t know this would come in the package of befriending them. Hey, you guys should be our marketing team, we’ll pay you,” Jeongyeon tells the three girls from the orchestra.

Chaeyoung claps her hands excitedly. “Yeah! With you guys on our side, we might even get to Billboard’s Top 100!”

“Slow down there, sweetie,” Nayeon laughs. “We can only do so much. You’ll get there eventually. Your songs were great and I love the remasters! Congratulations, you asstwats. All that hard work finally paid off!”

“Aww, thank you, asstwat number one,” Jeongyeon twines her arms around Nayeon’s neck in a crushing hug. “I’m glad you guys enjoyed the EP.”

“The musicality was perfect,” Mina tells them, finding a seat next to Momo. “I love how you guys made the remasters simpler so you can vary from the live performance. Sort of like how Temper Trap does it. I’m impressed.”

“See!” exclaims Chaeyoung. “You guys wouldn’t believe me when I said we should make the CD tracks simpler so we can go all out during live performances.”

“Hey, wait a sec,” Momo turns to Mina and raises an eyebrow at her. “You said last time that we had the Yeah Yeah Yeahs feel.”

Mina doesn’t look fazed, only shrugs and takes a sip from her margarita. “I did. I just said your live performances are like the Temper Trap’s, with the cool intros and all.”

“Okay, but you said—” Momo starts when Mina turns her head towards Momo, her copper hair nearly hitting Momo’s face and she gets a whiff of watermelon, her train of thought and list of arguments dissolving at once. “Y-you said, that… that… you…” 

“Oh, here they are again discussing Mina’s ‘problematic taste in music’.” interjects Jihyo. “It really isn’t, Momo.”

Momo lets out a gasp. “Hey! It is pretty problematic. I thought you guys were on my side.”

“Momo, you didn’t even know who The Temper Trap were before (500) Days of Summer.”

It’s a good night, with good food and good time with their now larger circle of friends. There had been a couple of pictures with people in between, autograph signing, but everyone had been pleasant and it was a good night.

Things started to wind down when the event officially ended, people taking their leaves until it’s just 2X, Dahyun and the girls from the orchestra seated around a table with a bunch of other regulars of the Music Barrel.

They’ve all taken to their significant others, with Mina pairing up with Momo. As for Jihyo:

“Since you’re all couples here, I will take my leave and beat some ugly male ass in pinball over there at the arcade.” Jihyo stands and dusts her leather jacket. “If you need me, you can ask me later. Pinball is more important. I bid thee farewell.”

“Couple?” Mina and Momo turn their heads to the other at the mention of relationships and when their eyes meet, Momo sticks out her tongue at Mina, who only wrinkles her nose and rolls her eyes. “We’re not a couple,” Momo points out, though it’s pointless because everyone else is too busy with their significant others.

Mina laughs, taking a sip of her watermelon margarita. “I don’t understand where they get the notion we’re dating. Or fucking. Or both.”

“Me neither,” Momo says honestly. All she and Mina do are bicker and it’s not as if they sit on each other’s laps and are all over each other. She downs the last of her beer, takes a look around their friends who are deep into the presence of their girlfriends. Jeongyeon is busy staring at Tzuyu talking about some Chemistry shit, Sana is busy pressing kisses to Dahyun’s cheeks and Nayeon is laughing at something Chaeyoung’s saying. “I don’t think these whipped asstwats remember we exist. Wanna ditch this place and listen to music in my car?”

“Would I ever.”

“It’s 1974! Bohemian Rhapsody MV was released in 1974!” 

“No,” Mina replies adamantly. “It’s 1975. My dad always told me it was 1975. It was a pioneer video and I know it came out in 1975. Come on, didn’t you watch MTV classics segments?”

She did. It was one of her favorite things to do, especially on summer afternoons. Momo, Jeongyeon and Chaeyoung would wait for their favorite music videos on MTV in between Pokemon battles on their Gameboys. “Yah, I did! Want to prove it?”

“Are you seriously betting with me on this?” Mina raises a perfectly sculpted eyebrow. “I don’t understand what’s it with bets and you, Nayeon and Jeongyeon.”

“Come on. Scared of a little bet with me?”

Mina laughs. It sounds like soft chimes in the summer breeze. “I’m scared of what you’d do if you lose. Maybe you’d drive us off this cliff that overlooks the city.”

“It’s a nice way to die.”

“No it isn’t.”

“Come on,” Momo urges her, jumping up and down the driver’s seat a little. “Just a little bet.”

The pianist rolls her eyes. “Fine. What’s on the line? Nothing life-threatening, I hope.”

Momo turns to face her and, well, she isn’t going to deny she loses her train of thought, seeing Mina illuminated by the city lights of Seoul, her eyes immediately falling to Mina’s pink lips that curve downwards. She tries to say something, anything, anything at all—

“A ki…” Momo starts, her eyes finally pulled from the magnetic image of Mina’s pretty lips and she realizes what she’s about to say, and Mina realizes what she’s about to say, and oh god, oh god, no, oh god, Momo, think of something else, think of something else—“A Kinderjoy egg.”

Nice save, Momo thinks to herself, gives herself a mental high five. She wasn’t about to ask for a kiss from Myoui Mina, nope, nope, not at all.

Mina, on the other hand, appears relieved (and disappointed? Momo can’t tell under the dim light) though she does see a dusting of pink on Mina’s cheeks which she chooses to ignore.

“A Kinderjoy egg?” Mina says with a slight laugh. “What are you, twelve?”

“Maybe.”

“Alright. If I win, you have to buy me three.”

“Deal.” Momo whips out her phone and sets up a Google search for Bohemian Rhapsody and, well, her ego is bruised, she is questioning everything she knows and owes Mina three Kinderjoy eggs.

-

She feels a headache coming on, with the way the veins near her ears are throbbing hard enough to hear.

It’s an unfamiliar room, and Momo almost misses the sight of her clothes strewn haphazardly across the space. She looks at the girl, still sleeping with her back facing Momo and, shit, Momo can’t remember her name and can’t even remember the night - she only recalls a few shots, a pretty girl, then they’re on a cab to this place (wherever the fuck she is) to have a good time.

Momo can’t even remember if it was a good time.

“Shit,” she whispers to herself, stands to collect her clothes, slipping it on right before leaving to buy some food at the McDonald’s downstairs and Momo sets the brown paper bag by the bedside table. Sorry, have a shift at work soon, Momo writes, Thanks. I bought you some McMuffins for breakfast.

She checks her phone and it’s currently at 2%, full of texts from Jeongyeon (where are u ? are  u dead ? bitch if ur dead im not gonna be the one to tell ur mom. ANSWER ME HIRAI HOMO. omfg did u sleep with someone tonight jesus christ u hoe), her service provider and—a text from Mina, asking if she’d want to argue about Designated Dad music at eight pm today.

She shoots a quick ‘I’m alive’ text to Jeongyeon before replying to Mina, saying yes, she’s free tonight for discourse.

Momo smiles, feels something warm settling deep inside her chest, as she pockets her phone though it’s a brief moment of happiness when she realizes she has work in forty minutes and she hasn’t picked up her uniforms from the laundry shop.

-

Dahyun calls them for a band meeting back at her studio, and she’s on the phone when she they enter the soundproof room where they’ve spent hours and hours, taking turns sleeping and eating and probably doing some homework (Chaeyoung).

“Alright, thanks you very much! I’ll make sure to tell them. Yup, yes,” they take their seats on the leather couches while Dahyun wraps up the call, holding up a hand meaning wait. “Thank you, ma’am, I’ll get back to you as soon as possible.”

The moment Dahyun ends the call she grins at them with so much joy that Momo might have an idea as to why she’s overjoyed.

“So that was Monkey Business records, and, well,” Dahyun claps her hands excitedly, Chaeyoung, Jeongyeon and Jihyo woop and cheer even before Dahyun can finish her sentence.

“Well what?” Momo says, her head tilted because, what?

Jihyo hauls Momo up and into a group hug. “We have a record deal!”

A record deal, it sinks into Momo’s mind soon enough that, fuck, they have a record deal and this means they can have a full-fledged album with sponsors and all and—

“Oh my fuck,” they fall into another tight group hug because, well, they’ve worked so hard and they’re here, on the way into the bigger music industry, with tours and albums, and album signing with a bigger fanbase and they’re doing it together, as 2X and Momo’s crying pretty hard right now.

-

“Okay, now you’re just being rude and unfair.”

“Come on, Mina. My songs are awesome and you expect me to listen to this violin crap.”

Mina pauses the music and stares at Momo from the passenger’s seat. “Which only proves my point. I listen to your music but you refuse my educating you. You’re being unfair.”

She sighs, pressing play. Cavalleriana Rusticana. Momo is about to fall asleep. “I bet you don’t even listen to my playlists when you’re alone.”

Mina stares at her incredulously. “I do! Quite often, actually,” she admits, leans closer to Momo as she usually does when she’s trying to intimidate Momo.

Momo, of course, leans closer too, to match Mina’s stance. She grins, “Oh yeah?”

Closer.

“Yeah.”

Closer.

“Really?”

Closer.

“Really.” Mina tells her firmly, and there are probably a few inches of space between them before Momo realizes that they are so close, too close, and Mina is still staring her down.

It’s gotten really warm in her car, or maybe it’s just her, though Momo can’t find it in herself to look away because wow, Mina’s eyes are really pretty, and the mole on her nose is really pretty, and she smells like expensive perfume and—

They’re startled apart by a car honking loudly behind them, and Momo notices it’s a greenlight and wonders how long she’s been staring right at Mina’s face, getting lost in the tiniest details.

It’s awkward, no one speaks and acknowledges the closeness of their faces until Mina picks up the conversation. “You can ask Nayeon. And that’s completely beside the point. You’re unfair.” The other girl crosses her arm, her head turned to window, watching them move past restaurants with neon lights, casting colors on Mina’s face—her pretty face and, dammit, Momo.

It’s been happening quite often, these music sessions with Mina have been laden with a different kind of tension ever since Dahyun had pointed it out.

(“Hey, are you and Mina dating?”

Momo spat out her drink. “No! Jesus. What made you think so?”

Dahyun spun around in her boss chair. “Uh, nothing. You guys seem like it, though. Especially when you argue. Both of you have this… look.”

She frowned. “We don’t have a look.”

Dahyun only laughed, then whispered, “ifmomoisdatingminasaywhat,”

Momo tilted her head. She had not understood a single word that escaped Dahyun’s lips. “What?”

“Gotcha.”)

It’s not a different from Chaeyoung pointed it out, though back when Chaeyoung had asked her Momo had not spent a collective amount of 89 hours with Mina, in a car, listening to music while they drive around and probably get some food after.

Momo had not spent nights at the orchestra concerts, sitting at the front row with Jihyo and Chaeyoung, pretending to sleep soundly with her mouth hanging right in Mina’s line of vision just to piss her off.

(The applause is deafening; Momo cracks an eye open, sees Mina watching her when she stands and bows, and shoots her a thumbs up and a wink.)

Momo had not spent days trying to think of a proper response to Mina’s snark. She had not spent hours trying to move her eyes from Mina’s lips when she’s probably subtly insulting Momo’s taste in music. She had tried not to look directly at Mina’s face when she laughs and tells Momo her notes are three-fourths a beat late to Jeongyeon’s drums.

It’s been difficult to ignore the push between her ribs when she sees Mina lick her lips or show her tongue, or when she smiles and the glint of the silver tooth reminds Momo of the first time they’ve ever argued about music.

As much as she hates to admit it, Mina has been a constant fixture in her life for the past few months, from 2X gigs to the passenger’s seat of Momo’s car, where she is right now and it should trouble Momo that they’re spending too much time together, though she feels no alarms going off telling her to back off.

If this were any other girl, Momo would definitely be cutting herself off.

But this is Mina.

With her silver tooth, her music taste that’s nearly at par with Momo’s, and the fact that she listens to Momo’s playlists often. Momo doesn’t even have to ask Nayeon if Mina does so, because the older girl has already complained to her about it.

(“I resent you for giving Mina that damned playlist.”

“What? Why?”

“She listens to it every-fucking-day.”

Momo has to stop polishing her guitar at the sudden warmth that grows in her chest.)

Maybe she likes Mina as a friend now. Maybe she isn’t that stuck up bitch she’d met at the orchestra after Jeongyeon’s first concert.

Maybe Mina means more to Momo than she probably thinks.

Maybe—

“I like your playlist. It’s nice.”

“What?” Momo is snapped out of her thoughts, her heart racing, the realization that maybe Myoui Mina isn’t so bad doing weird things to her stomach.

“Never mind,” Mina mutters, obviously disheartened, though she doesn’t need to repeat what she’s said, Momo has heard perfectly.

“You said you like my playlist.”

“Yeah,” the other girl says quietly. “I listen to it almost every day.”

Momo doesn’t say I know or yeah, Nayeon told me, she opts for the oblivious route and says, “what? Why?”

Crossing her arms in front of her chest, Mina straightens her position, her cardigan brushing against the black leather of Momo’s car. “Personal reasons.”

“Don’t be a buzzkill,” Momo laughs, turning to Mina and folding her arm on the shoulder of the driver’s seat. “Come on. You started this conversation.”

There is a moment of deliberate hesitation, though in the end Mina shrugs. “It reminds me of my dad.”

She says it so solemnly, so very quietly, that Momo doesn’t offer any retort, only letting Mina speak, Bette Davis Eyes playing softly in the background. “He died when I was eight but we listened to a lot of the music you have on your playlist. So, uh, you remind me a lot about him.”

Momo furrows her brow, her shoulders slacking. “I’m sorry.” The mood of the car turned from playful to somber in an instant and she doesn’t like the way there is a sad kind of acceptance and nostalgia in Mina’s pretty facial features.

“It’s fine,” she offers her a smile and somehow the mood is lifted a tad bit. “You asked me why and I answered your question. It’s all good.”

A tense kind of silence envelops them, not the one that Momo is familiar with, the kind that they’re quiet because they’re listening to music and watching city lights.

"You do know I'm calling your taste in music dad music, right?" she snickers and Momo lets out a mock-offended gasp.

"Take. That. Back."

The glint in Mina's eyes is unmistakable when she grins at Momo and says, "Make me." 

The atmosphere is better in Momo's opinion, though now it's heavy with a different kind of tension that Momo refuses to think about right now, so Momo opts to tell Mina about the record label. “Hey,” she calls Mina’s attention while the other girl scrolls through her music library. Mina responds with a hmm, to which Momo replies with a, “We scored a record deal. We’ve got a full-fledged album in the works.”

Mina’s pretty lips form an ‘o’, her expressive eyebrows rising to her hairline and Momo feels a swell of pride in her chest that she’s made Mina this expressive. “Oh my God. That’s amazing!”

Momo inspects her short nails. "Yeah, it actually is." 

She makes a mental note to ask Nayeon about Mina’s dad because she sure as hell won’t ask Mina, solely for the reason that Momo doesn’t like the sadness that falls on Mina’s pretty face.

-

[4:30:31 PM] Hirai Momo: Got school 2day?

[4:40:10] Myoui Mina: Yes. Just a few classes though and then rehearsals for this saturday’s recital

[4:45:59] Myoui Mina: Want to grab some drive through after?

Momo smiles at her phone. It’s a quiet day at the restaurant after the busy weekend because it had been the designated food critique weekend that occurred every month, making the kitchen crazy as all hell, yelling here, yelling there with the staff working like a well-oiled machine.

She’s preparing one of the soup for this small party tonight with a few senators, and she’s got time in her hands, so she decides to text Mina while she’s inside the walk-in vegetable cooler.

[4:46:01] Hirai Momo: Wont u be too tired 4 that? Lol

[4:47:01] Myoui Mina: Not really :) see you then

She’s still grinning when the metal door opens, and it’s the head chef, looking very red and about to explode. At her.

Oops.

-

“Hey, wanna see a movie tonight?” Jeongyeon asks while they’re packing up their stuff at the studio, when they’d decided to call it a night. “They’re doing a free screening of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy at my uni. We can still catch the midnight screening it if we break the speed limit.”

Momo shakes her head, locks the case of her pedals. “Raincheck? I’ve got… prior engagements.”

The drummer’s head falls back in laughter. “Prior engagements? What could be more important than your best friend and her favorite movie ever?”

She considers lying, making up some cockameme excuse like, yeah, I’m just going to meet the head chef and discuss additions to the appetizer menu or I’ve got to meet my dentist at 11:30 in the evening. But this is Jeongyeon, and the last time they weren’t honest with each other, she can say it was a pretty bad time in her life.

“I’m seeing Mina.”

Jeongyeon’s face is passive, betraying nothing at first but after a few moments of Momo trying to keep her cool with continuous zipping and unzipping of her equipment, Jeong pulls at the lobe of her ear painfully.

“What the hell was that for, Yoo Jeongyeon?!”

“My god, Momo, you dirty slut,” Jeongyeon yells, but she’s smiling. “You’re fucking Myoui Mina behind my back, aren’t you?”

“Jesus no!” exclaims Momo, massaging the assaulted ear. “There is no fucking going on between us and Christ, why are you acting like this? Aren’t you with Tzuyu? Let me ask you, are you fucking—” She massages the bridge of her nose instead at the image of Mina and Jeongyeon sleeping with each other. “You know what, I don’t even want to know.”

“I’m not sleeping with Mina!” Jeongyeon denies, though knowing Jeongyeon, if she wasn’t with Tzuyu, she would have been sleeping with Mina by now. “Can you blame me, though? With how you’re acting with her, it seems like it.” Momo says nothing, but she can feel Jeongyeon’s suspicious eyes boring into the back of her head. “Ah, so that’s how we’re playing it. Okay. Don’t answer that. But why can’t I just ask what’s going on between two of my friends? Sheesh. ”

Everything is spick and span, Momo’s equipment arranged orderly. She throws her bass guitar over her shoulder and picks up her amplifier, turning to Jeongyeon. “It felt like an accusation to me,” Momo says, sticking her tongue out at Jeongyeon. “Smell ya later, pal. Take a shower before you make out with Tzuyu at that drive-in thing. Make good decisions.”

She makes her exit to load her stuff to her car when she feels a paper cup thrown to the back of her head, which she ignores save for the bird she flips at Jeongyeon. “Real mature.”

The door is closed but Momo hears her best friend’s voice carry out through the door, “Practice safe sex, kids!”

-

“You know what’s unfair? You’ve listened to classical music all your life and you expect me to win this dumb game.”

Mina flashes her a disarming grin and, well, Momo feels her heart flushing down the drain. “That’s the idea. I don’t expect you to win, though.”

She gulps, tries not to think how pretty Mina is with only remnants of the day’s makeup. “Giving up? Do you concede defeat?”

“No!” Momo says quickly. She racks her brain for every possible bit of information she knows of classical music. “No. I know this. This is a Mozart piece?”

“Mmm, no.”

“No, I know this. This is Mozart and you’re just shitting me.”

Mina huffs. “It’s really not. Just think of it this way, Mozart’s style is different from this artist as U2 is different from Flock of Seagulls. ”

“But this is Magic Flute. This is Magic Flute. My mom sang it all the time. I should recognize it.”

“No.”

They fall into a silent staring game where their faces are three point five inches away from each other, Momo trying to disassemble Mina’s eyes and trying to see if she’s shitting her because, fuck, she is 250% sure that’s Magic Flute.

Momo’s about to make a few more points on why she’s sure it’s Magic Flute when Mina interrupts her: “Bet on it?”

That’s unlike her, Momo thinks, so she raises a brow. Mina doesn’t seem the type to make bets but when she does, it’s probably not gonna be good. “Sure,” says Momo, cautiously. “What’s on the line?”

Mina grins at her, the silver tooth taunting Momo, making her gulp. “Kiss me if you're wrong."

Chapter Text

“Kiss me if you’re wrong.”

It takes a while for Mina’s words to sink into Momo, though Mina doesn’t take it back and she doesn’t seem to hesitate, with the way she’s still leaning across to look at Momo expectantly.

Momo recalls that night she almost asks for a kiss. Momo recalls the collective amount of five hours she’s probably spent looking at the slope of Mina’s lips. Momo recalls all the time their banter has left her heart threatening to beat out of her chest, her palms sweaty and her hands shaking—

She looks at Mina’s phone, sees it’s Bach, sees she’s wrong. 

Momo throws caution to the wind, leans in to do as the bet dictated and touches their lips together, tasting of popcorn and watermelon.

“Dude, you alright?” Chaeyoung asks quietly when she reaches her apartment, sparing Momo a side glance before returning to the latest Uncharted game she and Mina had lined up nine hours for. “You look a little blotchy and your smile is...unnerving.” 

Momo touches her own cheek, feels it’s warm and stretched from smiling too much aftrt Mina kisses her cheek before leaving the car.

“Uh, yeah,” she manages to say, before she notices that Nayeon is passed out on her bed, dead to the world, with her mouth hanging, drooling on Chaeyoung’s pillow. “What’s she doing here?”

Chaeyoung gives her that face, reserved especially when she thinks someone is an idiot and should stop speaking maybe, when she says, “she’s my girlfriend,” like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

“Your girlfriend?!” Momo whisper-yells, because she may be an asshole, but she isn’t an asshole that wakes people up when it’s one in the morning. “You have some explaining to do, young lady!”

-

[9:02:30 AM] Hirai Momo: I see ur listening to muse on spotify lol

[10:10:01 AM] Myoui Mina: I listen to rock too, you know.

[10:50:18] Hirai Momo: Are u free right now lets get drive thru and listen to muse in my car

[10:51:27 AM]: Let me finish my workout then let’s get some pad thai.

-

It goes on.

The bets don’t stop; only increase exponentially.

The kisses don’t stop either, only increase exponentially, too.

It roots from banter about music and branches out to the smallest things like the prices of coffee in different cafés, to useless movie trivia (Mina) to guessing what the other wants for dinner.

(“What are you up for?” Mina asks once she’s buckled up and Momo pulls out of the parking of the ballet studio.

“Guess.” she replies, giving the pianist her best shit-eating grin ever, knowing full well what this leads to.

Pursing her lips, Mina taps her chin, pretends to look thoughtful before answering, “Curry?”

Okay, Momo is in the mood for some coorg pandi curry, though she shakes her head and says no, pointing to her lips when Mina laughs, leaning in to press a brief kiss to Momo’s lips that makes Momo’s head spin.)

They’re dumb bets that Mina had said she downright hated, though Momo is still reeling with the realization that Mina had started these kissing bets in the first place.

Their bet-kisses don’t escalate beyond a simple liplock,  They’re dumb kisses, too, never escalating beyond a short press and a lip lock though as much as Momo enjoys Mina’s tiny watermelon-tasting kisses, she doesn’t want to be the first to up it a notch and Mina hasn’t made a move to do so. Momo’s not complaining, though, she likes this. It’s simple. Easy. Comfortable. They’re dumb bets and kisses that Momo enjoys while she completely ignores the erratic beating of her heart whenever Mina pulls at her bottom lip before moving away.

That minx. She’ll pay for that.

(And if Momo gets answers wrong on purpose for watermelon liplocking in between the driver’s and the passenger’s seat, the lights of Seoul casting lights that dance across Mina’s face, well, she can always deny it anyway.)

-

The scent of rain after a warm day fills her car momentarily when the door of the passenger’s seat opens, revealing Mina in her usual post-ballet get up, looking more upset than Momo has ever seen her. 

Before Momo can ask, tease her why the long face, Myoui, when Mina turns to her with creased brows and her already-downturned lips curving downwards even more. “Bet me,” says Mina.

(“Bet me.”

Mina raises an eyebrow before leaning closer. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

God, does she have to explain everything? “It means that I want a quick bet.”

She doesn’t disclose that she wants a quick bet because she wants a kiss from Mina, of course. Nope. Wouldn’t want that to get in Mina’s head.

“Why couldn’t it have been ‘bet on me’ instead?”

“I don’t exactly want to think of that musical number from High School Musical 2 in random moments of my life.”)

“Uh, Pizza Hut came from which country?”

Mina gives her this are you fucking kidding me look, as she always does when Momo asks dumb questions that only make her look bad when she gives wrong answers. “Italy?”

“Wrong. America.”

Then lean into each other almost mechanically, meeting in between the driver’s and the passenger’s seats. It’s quick, just a smack, and Momo thinks that maybe she’s just imagining the small dart of tongue before Mina pulls away completely, though regardless of whether it’s just her brain playing games with her, Momo feels her brain stutter, her stomach drop pleasantly, feels her fingers grow cold then warm.

Mina moves back to her seat, shutting the door. She doesn’t spare Momo a second glance, only facing forward, her eyes trained to the windshield. No one speaks for some given moments, the sound of the rain beating against the windows the only sound that fills her car and it’s tense, tense like the way Mina holds herself now, so tense that Momo turns her key and drives away from the parking of Mina’s ballet studio.

She puts on some music in hopes of releasing the unsettling silence from both of them, though she knows that Mina isn’t in any mood to be teased, so Momo plays the one thing she knows will cheer Mina up, if only a tad bit.

The familiar sax solo of Carly Rae Jepsen’s Run Away With Me blasts through the speakers, filling the silence at once, and Momo sings the intro at the top of her lungs, without the lyrics, just the damned legendary intro.

Momo spares the girl in the passenger’s seat, with her still-crossed arms, though Momo can see that a small, nearly nonexistent smile plays on her lips. It’s only right because Momo’s dignity is on the line, with her singing (read: yelling) Mina’s guilty pleasure song in the confines of her car, with the aforementioned upset pianist-ballerina.

“Jesus, stop,” Mina says before the bridge can begin, finally cracking a smile and Momo likes that better, more than the stormy, passive face that Mina had on before she had lost all semblances of being a sane individual (though she suspects the amount of time she spends with Mina had done that for her, long before this betting thing had happened). When Momo doesn’t stop yelling the oh, ooooooh before the final stanza at a stoplight, Mina shoves Momo roughly to get her to shut it.

“Goodness, I can’t believe you bastardized one of my favorite songs like that,” Mina says, though she’s laughing and Momo has always liked the sound of it, more so now. She likes this loud laugh as much as she likes the small, breathy one that Mina does when she’s being polite or shy. She likes Mina’s laughs. Period.

But she isn’t going to tell Mina that.

“You were ignoring me; what else was I supposed to do?” She turns the car round the corner. The rain had already stopped, though the soft drizzle made a gentle pitter patter against Momo’s car.

“Sorry,” Mina mutters, and Momo regrets it immediately, when she sees the storminess return to Mina’s pretty face. “Bad day at the studio.”

Here’s her chance. Momo snags it at once. “Wanna talk about it?”  

Mina shakes her head, though her shoulders aren’t as stiff as they were awhile ago.

“You sure?”

“Yeah.”

She wants to prod further, make Mina talk, though that isn’t Momo’s style and if Mina doesn’t want to say anything, Momo won’t make her.

There’s a small pang in her chest at the thought of Mina not trusting her, though she ignores it, thinking maybe it’s just from the way she nearly misses the yellow light.

“Alright,” Momo says, her eyes on the road though she spares Mina a side glance with a small smile. “If you need someone to be beaten up, just tell me.”

That earns her a hearty laugh from Mina and her eyes are soft when she grins at Momo. “You? Beating someone up?”

“Okay, so maybe I’d make Jeongyeon or Nayeon do it.”

Mina reaches to cover Momo’s hand over the gear stick, soft, warm, long fingers covering her own and it makes Momo’s hands clammy, clutching the gear stick even tighter when Mina touches her hand. “Thanks, I appreciate your offer.” says Mina softly and Momo has to keep her eyes on the road or else they’ll end up in the morning news tomorrow as two people (friends? More than friends?) in a horrible car crash.

She keeps her eyes on the road, so that they may live longer lives, and that Mina can keep holding her hand with utter gentleness that makes her heart flutter.

-

They don’t talk about it.

They talk about everything under the sun, everything under the night sky, with takeout on their laps, watching the entirety of Seoul, speculating about the lives being lived there, in the confines of Momo’s car, the doors open with the cool breeze washing over them softly.

What they don’t talk about is the bets, and the kisses, as if they don’t exist or coexist with one another. They don’t talk about the pecks, the lip locks, nope, not at all.

It’s just not a thing.

(There are boundaries set. Unspoken agreements between them that it won’t go beyond a simple press of lips, that they’re still Mina and Momo, but they kiss chastely, once in a while.)

Momo doesn’t want it to be a thing and it sure as hell feels like Mina doesn’t want it to be a thing, so Momo pretty satisfied with dumb bets and the taste of Mina’s warm breath and watermelon.

-

She feels like she’s on fire, thanks to a rather explosive set, more energetic than others and god, Momo’s adrenaline levels are probably at its peak, coursing through her veins and making her warm all over that Momo is sure she’s sweating through her shirt, her black leather jacket making it even hotter than it should be, though it only fans the fire that starts inside Momo when her the bass and drum solo of her favorite track starts, her fingers sliding across the fretboard easier than other days, like she and her bass guitar are a well-oiled machine, creating the sickest bass lick that Momo adores.

Everything is heightened: her breathing, the hearing, the way her hands are slightly shaking from the rush of energy that seems to have taken over the band today as they jump around the stage, the audience jumping with them, to the beat of Jeongyeon’s drums, Chaeyoung’s guitar set on crunch and drive creating the buildup, Jihyo’s synth adding melodies with her beautiful voice filling the large bar and Momo’s bass giving depth, a certain kind of sexiness to the sound and she feels like she’s on fire, she’s on fire and she never wants to be extinguished.

It’s burning hot and it’s fucking sticky and she’ll be spent in the morning but Momo would never have it any other way.

The bass still thrums throughout her body long after their set, when they’ve packed their things and Momo sits down beside Mina in their usual booth, the surge of adrenaline making her lungs burn for air still and she’s slightly heaving when she settles beside the pianist, her fingers shaking when she grips Mina’s hand under the table.

“Bet me,” Momo grins at her because she’s feeling extra playful and extra reckless and she wants to taste Mina’s pink lips right here, right now, in front of their friends who are kissing their respective partners (Jihyo is nowhere to be seen, probably kissing her own bottle of the most expensive scotch on the shelf), so Momo gives Mina her most dashing smile, the one that makes their fans swoon all the time, and hopes that Mina will swoon.

Spoiler alert: Mina doesn’t.

Much to Momo’s dismay, she only raises an eyebrow before rolling her eyes, and Momo sees a hint of the Mina she had met before, though instead of feeling the first semblances of irritation bubbling in her throat, she only scoots closer, her arm around Mina’s cardigan-clad shoulders.

She shouldn’t be this touchy, this isn’t how she is to Mina but she feels like it, and it feels right that Mina is close, it feels right that Mina’s presence is making her a pleasant brand of dizzy, and Momo knows it’s right when Mina wraps her arms around her back, settling at her waist, with her hand on Momo’s hip and my god, if Momo was dizzy then, she’s probably having vertigo from Mina’s proximity and Mina’s touch.

They watch the couples exist in their miniscule worlds and it’s nice, actually, seeing them like this; happy in their tiny little bubbles when they’re probably hyped up from the energy of tonight’s show that they don’t even pay any attention to the...questionable sitting positions of Momo and Mina. There are no teases that would have made both of them blush and look away and it’s nice, refreshing.

She’d be an idiot not to take this chance to be physically closer to Mina, because there had always been the gear shift between the driver’s seat and the passenger’s seat and Jihyo’s keyboard always seem to find its way between them, so Momo takes this chance to openly stare at Mina’s lips without the watchful gaze of their friends.

How she came from not wanting Mina in her line of sight to craving her warmth despite the humidity of the bar and her leather jacket escapes Momo completely, though she doesn’t question it, only accepts Mina in her arms as they finish their drinks and some of the potato spuds in the metal bowl set before them.

Momo likes being close to Mina, likes having Mina in her proximity and the way Mina snuggles up to her flank when it’s horribly humid in the bar tells Momo that yeah, maybe Mina feels the same way about this nearness thing as much as Momo does.

She feels more than sees Mina turning her head, and, well, Christ, because Mina is looking at her with eyes that are half closed, their faces are really close and Mina’s breath smells like her favorite margarita (she’s probably had a couple of drinks, Mina has an alcohol tolerance of a German man), panic rises within Momo and she prays to a god she conveniently believes in that it doesn’t show, that maybe the flush of her cheeks comes from the few shots of tequila she’s taken just a few minutes ago.

Mina looks at her, Momo panics, and when the pianist’s lips brush against her cheek, then to her ear, Momo panics even more, gripping the glass of water that it may or may not break if she increases the pressure of her fist.

“Hey,” Mina whispers in her ear and—Christ, Momo is so weak right now though she knows the glass she’s holding on to for dear life can only take so much psi before it explodes, and when Mina’s hot breath tickles the shell of her ear, Momo has to cross her legs in her jeans, preparing for whatever the fuck Mina has to say and—

“Want to go to that 24-hour diner that sells great mango shakes?”

Momo lets out a shaky breath of relief. It’s just fruit shakes at the diner they frequent.

Momo lets out a shaky breath of sexual frustration. It’s just fruit shakes at the diner they frequent and it baffles her how Mina makes it sound so sexy with her sexy voice and her sexy mouth that tastes like watermelon and oh, Christ on a stick, is that Mina’s sexy pianist fingers on her thigh—

“Y-yeah, let’s,” fuck - Momo bites her tongue before she can say it, and if she moves away from Mina and into her car as fast as humanly possible.

Get it together, Hirai, she chastises herself, hands gripping the steering wheel until her rings dig uncomfortably into her flesh. “She’s sexy and she’s really fuckable but you’re starting to be friends,” mutters Momo, “she’s sexy but you have self control, she’s sexy but you have self control—”

The car door opens and it turns out Mina is wearing this pretty ensemble of casual wear that also looks like office wear, something from Zara or Lacoste, with a tight black pants that wraps around her thighs and Christ, there goes every bit of rational thinking; out the window of the car where she and Mina had spent hours sharing small kisses that she secretly looked forward to.

Mina is still flushed from what was probably her fifth glass of her watermelon margarita, though she still walks straight where Momo would already be throwing up the contents of her stomach into the bar toilet. So it’s funny when Mina buckles up and asks, “Can you drive?” when Momo has had only a couple of beers (“Did you know beer is equivalent to seven loaves of bread? That’s gross,” Jihyo says incredulously, not looking up from her mindless scrolling through Facebook.), and she’s more drunk on adrenaline and Mina than anything else, really.

“Y-yeah,” Momo curses herself for stuttering, for ignoring Mina’s piercing eyes, for missing placing in her fucking car keys because Mina is seriously being distracting right now, how she’s just there, sitting in Momo’s passenger seat like the countless times Mina had done before. “M’not drunk. I can drive.”

Mina laughs, a pretty sound and Momo blames the adrenaline that lingers in her system for the way her knees buckle when she steps on the gas and pulls out of the parking space of the Music Barrel.

“Why am I not surprised you like musicals?”

Mina uses her straw to scoop up some whipped cream on top of her strawberry milkshake and Momo crosses her legs when Mina’s lips extremely attractive lips wrap around the end of it. “My stepfather took me to New York for business trips when I didn’t have school, and we’d watch broadway musicals after he works.”

Of course Mina has been to New York, Momo thinks, rolling her eyes to herself. Of course she has.

“Have you seen Phantom of the Opera at least?” Momo asks, because, well, it’s the only musical she knows and she almost regrets asking because she knows this will lead to more discourse, though she doesn’t regret it because discourse leads to bets and bets lead to—

The pianist inspects her perfectly manicured short nails. “I’ve seen the 25th anniversary. With Ramin Karimloo and Sierra Boggess.”

That had been the first Phantom of the Opera Momo had seen, when she had let Chaeyoung convince her to at least see one musical and Momo genuinely likes it, nearly as much as she hates to admit that she does.

Jealousy tinges her mood and the smug look on Mina’s face makes her want to punch her. Softly. With her lips. “Is that supposed to be a big deal for me?” Momo plays it cool, though she can she’s really fucking envious that Mina had the chance to see Sierra Boggess, the object of her and Chaeyoung’s affections for the entirety of 2013.

“I don’t know,” shrugs Mina, sipping from her milkshake while Momo’s mango one had long been consumed. “It was amazing. Maybe if they have another international tour, we can watch with Chaeyoung.”

Momo pouts. She had waited for Asian leg of the Phantom tour to announce Korea but she was only met with crushing disappointment, that’s why when Mina laughs and covers Momo’s hands with her own saying that if that doesn’t happen, they can always watch the one with Emmy Rossum and Gerard Butler instead, Momo tosses a used napkin aimed at Mina’s head, earning her a scandalized “hey!” before tossing it back to her in weak retaliation.

“Have you seen Love Never Dies live?” Momo asks once they’re done tossing crumpled tissue at each other.

Mina huffs, rolling her eyes and Momo knows this is going to be the start of their usual discourse. “It was horrible. I mean, the theatricality was amazing, but the story was just—what’s the word you use?—a clusterfuck of bad storytelling.”

“Hey! It wasn’t that bad.”

“Really? Name your favorite songs from Phantom.”

Momo doesn’t know where this is going, so she does what Mina says and enumerates nearly half of the songs on there. “Think of Me, Angel of Music, the main theme, of course, Music of the Night, All I Ask of You, Masquera—”

“Now list all your favorite songs from LND.”

Momo opens her mouth before she thinks of a song until she realizes she has nothing to say, because she doesn’t recall any from Love Never Dies.

“See?” Mina laughs, wiping off the milk mustache from sipping from the tall cup. “Nothing.”

“But—”

“Nothing!”

“It’s an Andrew Lloyd Webber work, though,” rebuts Momo. “You’re not always there for the songs.”

The pianist raises an eyebrow, a gesture that Momo is very familiar with. “So you’re saying the story is more important?”

Momo snaps her fingers together. “Bingo.”

“And that the Phantom and Christine have a child together.”

“It could have happened.”

“And you’re also saying that Meg falling in love with the Phantom makes perfect sense.”

“Okay, so maybe—”

“He doesn’t even consider Love Never Dies as a sequel of Phantom of the Opera,” says Mina with a small smile at seeing Momo ruffled by this. “Love Never Dies but guess what? Love died—”

She reaches across to place her hand over Mina’s mouth to make her stop speaking because Momo’s had enough; her arguments are slowly being demolished by Mina’s rebuttals and, well, maybe Mina is right about LNB being shit, though while her already fragile ego is on the line once more, she enjoys this; enjoys their playful exchanges (and occasional fits of being a sore loser from the both of them) about everything they know about music. “Stop, I get it,” she says, Mina’s eyes still blown wide with surprise at Momo’s outburst and probably Momo’s hand, currently placed on her face.

It hits her that she does have her hand over Mina’s mouth when she feels Mina’s hot breath on her palm and well, she may or may not be having dreams of the two of them in bed with Momo’s hands touching the warmth that Mina’s mouth offers—

“Christ, y-you’re a mouth breather,” she stutters (this has been happening around Mina more often than she likes) when Momo’s hand returns to her side, still slightly damp with Mina’s milkshake and breathing and shit, the tightness in her abdomen is starting to get annoying.

“I am not!” Mina denies though Momo can see that she’s red under the ugly fluorescent lights of the diner, her cheeks growing pink and Momo tries to ignore this piece of information for the fries that the waitress served a few moments ago. “Your finger was covering my nose, how else was I was going to breathe?” 

Momo shrugs, because it’s all she can do—her bravado is wavering and her tunnel vision focusing on Mina’s pretty lips, which take a darker shade of pink thanks to her second milkshake, is getting worse by the minute and all she wants to do is to make bets and probably give Mina lots of tiny kisses until the sun rises.

Leaning her back against the diner booth across Mina, Momo smirks at Mina, hoping that she didn’t seem as nervous as she truly is at this moment.

Mina recovers perfectly, as if the pink had drained from her cheeks in a matter of milliseconds. She leans closer, her hand under her chin, gives Momo a small grin. “You know, at this rate, with your atrocious take on the only musical series you know, I’m terrified to ask about your opinion on Sound of Music.”

Momo stirs her second mango shake. “Haven’t seen it.”

The pianist’s eyes widen almost at once, her mouth gasping in pure offense at Momo’s words.

Well, this is how Momo dies.

RIP Hirai Momo. A loving daughter, musician. ‘Sound of Music’ killed me, her epitaph would read.

“You heathen!” Mina exclaims as much as she can with her naturally soft voice. She grabs the menu and stars hitting Momo’s head with it with every syllable of her chastising Momo for not having seen Sound of Music. “You,” a strike to her arm, “are,” a strike to her head, “a musician!”, and strike to her shoulder.

“Ow! Quit that! I’m sorry I never got around to watch it,” her hand massages the assaulted parts of her body. “It’s just that I’ve always wanted to watch it and then I never got to.”

“You should, Momo, you really should. Where the hell did you think Do Re Mi came from if you haven’t watched it?”

Momo tosses a french fry in her direction, one of which Mina manages to avoid perfectly. “Hey! I know it came from there, alright? I just don’t know other songs.”

Mina checks her watch before turning to her side to retrieve her laptop from her Michael Kors bag. “Well, it’s only one in the morning; let’s order another round of milkshakes and watch it.”

She rolls her eyes. Of course Mina would have musicals in her hard drive. Bringing her plate of fries and second mango shake, Momo scoots closer to Mina, wrapping an arm around her when she’s close enough to do so.

They’re huddled closely against one another that Mina is practically sitting on Momo, the top of her head under Momo’s chin and well, if Momo is in a mental institution by tomorrow, driven insane by the way Mina’s hands are caressing her thigh, you know who’s to blame.

Momo should be used to this. Skinship with other people comes easy for her but with Mina, it only makes her nervous—she doesn’t know where exactly to place her hands or doesn’t know if maybe she can nose behind Mina’s ear in a conpletely platonic manner.

They’ve sat closely, exactly like this in the past. It shouldn’t be a big deal. Momo should be used to this.

But she isn’t.

It’s not that she doesn’t like Mina’s proximity—god, having Mina close is really, really nice—but it’s a matter of what Mina’s closeness does to her.

Sound of Music would have been more enjoyable if it weren’t for the hand that has been climbing from one point (Momo’s knee) to another (Momo’s upper thigh area) and it rises higher and higher until Momo is sure she’s flushed and trembling and extremely turned on that she can barely see what’s going on; something about a emotionally detached military leader with seven fuckin’ kids, that falls in love with a bubbly novice but that doesn’t really matter because Mina is breathing into her skin and, well, Momo is about to combust.

The end credits roll and the fire under Momo’s skin a few hours ago pales in comparison to the way she feels now, as if her skin is about to turn into ashes because Mina’s hand is still on her thigh, caressing it through Momo’s ripped black jeans.

“How’d you like it?” Mina says quietly, not moving from her seat; her breath trailing under Momo’s jaw and Christ, she is in so much pain right now.

“I-it was fine,” she manages to angle her jaw away from Mina’s lips. “The Captain and Maria’s chemistry though… Questionable.”

This is when Mina moves away, but only slightly, with her hand on her chest, looking as offended as Mina’s oftenly neutral face can. “Excuse you, their chemistry is amazing.”

“Their kiss was bland."

“What do you know about kissing?”

Momo doesn’t expect it to steer to this conversation and she’s also sort of in a mild panic state, though she can see Mina is blushing, looking away as if she had regret saying it in the first place so Momo takes this chance to fluster the pianist even more. She leans, makes sure their faces are level when she stares at Mina dead in the eye, watching Mina’s eyes flicker to her own lips. “Oh, princess, I’m sure you’d know that I know a thing or two about kissing.”

It’s the first time they openly mention the kissing, and well, it’s as awkward as Momo had imagined it to be—maybe this is why they refused to acknowledge it.

Well, it’s out in the open now.

Momo’s not backing down, though. Mina had been the one to bring it up in the first place.

“Are you sure about that?” Mina challenges, leaning closer. There are approximately two point thirty five inches between their faces.

“Very.” Momo says, moving forward so their lips are touching at this point and, Christ, she craves Mina so much it’s ridiculous.

A stare-off isn’t anything new between them; if anything, Momo is used to it, to her face being in close proximity to Mina as means to intimidate her when proving a point.

“Prove it.”

Momo likes a challenge.

They push forward to finally, finally press their lips together in a kiss that tastes like mango and strawberries, Momo loses it at once. She’s been craving it since their shared moment at the bar, with Mina snuggled to her side. She’s been craving it as soon as she had gone down the stage. She’s been craving it every damn day for as long as this bet-kisses had started.

The Captain and Maria’s kiss may be bland, but Myoui Mina? She gives the best kisses on this mortal plane, with her snarky mouth and her watermelon lip balm and the way she holds Momo’s face like she never wants Momo to move away.

It starts off as shy, quiet kisses similar to the ones they’ve shared before but longer now, each press of lips melting to another and another and Momo feels it reach through her, twisting her stomach in the best way possible.

Momo allows herself to cup a hand under Mina’s jaw, stroking the skin there with gentleness and she also allows herself to sigh into the kiss when Mina traces her bottom lip with her tongue, and Christ on a stick—

Mina pulls away abruptly—so very abruptly that Momo’s face trails after hers, involuntarily searching for the warmth that Mina had to offer and she ends up kissing the dirty red leather of the diner booth. It takes her a moment to get herself out of the haze Mina induces in her. Momo’s eyes flutter open to see Mina grinning, shoving her laptop into her bag before standing to walk away from Momo, her hips swaying in a manner that had further delayed Momo’s recovery.

Her brain catches up, maybe a few moments later, when she realizes she’s running after Mina, pushing through the double doors of the diner where Mina has slowed down her fast pace so Momo walks faster, fast enough to be able to take Mina’s hand to halt her completely.

“Yes?” Mina giggles, turning to Momo, with her kiss-red lips and Momo can’t speak, can’t talk; can only haul Mina towards her body, the other girl slamming into her with a surprised laugh that grows quiet when Momo presses her lips to Mina with a kiss that’s hotter and wetter and harder than the one they've shared minutes ago.

Momo wraps her arms around Mina’s waist when she feels the crooks of Mina’s elbows around her ears, and it feels like a The Cure song when Momo leans forward to dip Mina slightly, embracing her closer when she kisses her with all she’s got, their tongues finding their ways into each other’s fruit-tasting mouths, under the streetlight of the parking of this small diner, at three in the morning.

When Mina moans, Momo’s knees buckle and she knows that she’s fucked—absolutely fucked, in both the literal and figurative sense.

Air is a necessity but it doesn’t mean that Momo resents it less, when they pull away with heaving chests, breathing heavily against each other’s lips and Momo feels the world spiral around them—half from the kisses they’ve exchanged for what felt like hours and the other half from the taste of Myoui Mina herself.

She’s never been so worked up about a simple (a debatable term) make out, but this is Mina, whose hands sear through her loose cotton tank; her hands, her magical hands, that plays Bach and Pachelbel and Tchaikovsky so very perfectly are driving Momo to the edge that she’s sure she’s soaked through her tight jeans.

They’re staring into each other’s eyes, unmoving, as if they’re balancing on eggshells but it’s also exactly like balancing on eggshells, when their next move determines their relationship and Momo thinks, fuck it, fuck it all to hell—

“That was…” Mina begins, licks her lips and Momo follows the sight.

“Yeah,” is all she can reply, something that isn’t: fuck me into the next day.

“Can we—”

“Yeah,” is all she can reply, something that also means: fuck me into the next day.

It has come to this. 

Momo knew it would end like this.

It would end with her pulling Mina inside the diner again as they run to the bathroom situated at the other end of the small restaurant, the waitresses running the graveyard shift paying them no mind, too engrossed in their phone games. They can watch paint dry, for all Momo cares, because Mina slams the door of the bathroom, pushing Momo against it while reaching to twist its lock, her sinful mouth that has made Momo so wet and so turned on finding her again in the dim incandescent light of the room.

It would end with her hands on Mina’s hips, under her soft, floral-scented navy blue sweater, her gold bracelets cold against the skin of Momo’s back.

She’d be lying if she said she didn’t anticipate this, because the way they’ve been interacting was laden with so much tension, with so much eye contact and Mina was attractive as Mina was intelligent and Momo just can’t resist a girl that doesn’t fall easily to her charms.

Mina kisses her with precision, accuracy, with control even if earlier today she looked like she was about to lose her mind if she didn’t jump Momo’s bones that instant. Mina kisses her like clockwork and Momo makes it a personal mission to make Mina lose all semblances of control.

“Are you sure about this,” Momo breathes into Mina’s lips, presses her further into the wall of the dim washroom, the only light coming from the once-dark skies beginning to lighten. Their clothes were driving her insane, too. She wants Mina stripped off all her clothes, wants to feel all of Mina, wants to drive her to the edge again and again for all the times their petty arguments have left her hot and bothered.

Mina bites Momo’s lower lip and the sensation tethers between pleasure and pain and Momo groans into her mouth, rakes her nails into Mina’s tight stomach—and, oh dear God in the holy heavens above, are those abs—“Shut up and fuck me,” Mina mutters into Momo’s mouth. “Right now. Hard.”

Momo grins. That, she can do. “Yes, ma’am.”

It’s hurried, rushed, and it she’s drunk and exhausted that it takes nearly half a minute trying to unbutton Mina’s tight jeans with a collective effort from both of them and when it finally opens, Momo latches her mouth onto Mina’s neck, sucking, biting, licking and the moans Mina is making bounces through the walls get even louder when Momo jams her hands inside Mina’s underwear to where she had wanted it to be for some time.

Momo finds Mina smooth—she’s honestly not surprised, Mina seems the type to go through all the hassle of waxing and such though Momo isn’t complaining, especially when her fingers are coated with Mina’s wetness.

She feels Mina’s jaw hitting her head when she touches her for the first time and, good god, she’s so drenched that Momo’s fingers slip right in. She’s never fucked anyone who was this ready for her and the sound Mina makes when she brushes once, twice, past her clit then Mina’s perfectly manicured, short fingernails digging crescents into her flesh.

Momo had enjoyed teasing Mina—she blushes prettily, looks away when she doesn’t have a snarky reply. Momo enjoys teasing her just as much now, with the way her moans sound so desperate, like she’s been wanting this for some time and if she had, Momo doesn’t doubt it. She’s the look in Mina’s eyes. She knew what it meant.

“Inside,” Mina breathes. “Now.”

“Yes, ma’am,” she repeats, bites the tight cord of Mina’s neck and slips her finger through her slit and, fuck, Mina is so tight and wet that Momo lets out a groan that echoes Mina’s loud, sinful yell.

Momo loves it.

Momo wants to hear it more.

Momo wants to play Mina like her bass guitar, wants to get those low licks and those high licks, vibrating through her entire body. She wants to play Mina like her bass guitar, smooth and sexy and just the right amount of treble.

“You feel so good. You feel so damn good, princess.”

“Yeah?” Mina gives a breathless laugh that’s punctuated by another groan when Momo adds another finger, her thumb circling Mina’s bundle of nerves and, Christ, she feels so good.

“Yeah,” Momo lifts Mina up to the sink.

“Fuck,” Mina hisses when her thighs meet the cold tiles of the sink counter, landing with a thud and her sweat-slick thighs adhering to it. “Fuck, Momo,” her fingers find purchase on the skin of Momo’s arms.

“Can we make a bet?”

“What—” Mina breathes through grit teeth, clutching Momo’s arms tighter. “Now? Shit—do you think—”

“How many times can I make you come in this dingy restroom before you start screaming?”

“I can say, maybe—oh god that feels really, really good—three times?”

Momo smirks, angles her fingers more upright and she finds it so hot, so fucking hot, that she’s knuckle deep inside her. “Kiss me if I’m wrong?”

The girl currently pressed against her body hits her hip with the back of her hand before dragging it through the skin, making Momo hiss, the pain turning into pleasure nearly at once. She expects a snarky reply, though Mina only uses her other hand to press an open-mouthed kiss on Momo’s lips.

Mina comes four times. Momo comes three.

None of them scream out loud, though Mina’s final orgasm has her biting into Momo’s shoulder that Momo has to swear off tank tops for the next two weeks.

They’re coming down from their high after going at it like rabbits, the early lights of dawn washing over their bodies, tired and spent as they kiss lazily, because, well, Momo did prove Mina wrong.

She drops Mina off at her house, the other girl’s hair all mussed up and it’s very attractive that Momo can’t help but ask for another kiss, a long one that doesn’t end until she realized she has a shift at the kitchen at eight in the morning when it’s already five in the morning.

Momo drives home and is thankful the roads are empty at this hour because she’s seriously having a mini panic attack because, well, she just fucked Myoui Mina.

While she’s been sleeping with other girls, it’s never with a friend and it’s usually with girls she’s sure she will never, ever see again. 

But Mina? She sees Mina nearly everyday. She picks up Mina and they have dinner when they have the time. She attends Mina’s concerts and recitals every month and Mina does so, too.

Christ, christ, you just have to fuck everything up, do you, Momo—

[4:40:31 AM] Myoui Mina: I had fun tonight. :) I owe you one.

Owe her one?

She pulls over to try and mull over what the hell Mina’s talking about when—

Oh.

She only came three times earlier.

Oh.

Momo grins when she drives home, all the way to her apartment before texting Mina once she’s parked in her designated parking place.

[4:40:38 AM] Hirai Momo: Sure thing :P see you real soon princess

She’s walking into the kitchen, rolling up her whites to her mid forearm before snagging her designated checkered apron beside the clock-in machine when Jinyoung wraps his arm around her neck, successfully putting her in his trademark headlock.

“What’s gotten you grinning like that, Hirai?” He rubs her head and if his mission was to annoy her early in the morning by messing her hair, well, he had successfully done so.

Palming his face away from hers, Momo nearly sends him crashing into the counter of spices. “None of your biz, Junior.” 

Jinyoung pretends to think, cocking his hip and placing his hand under his chin. “I think I know that look well, Momo. That’s the you-got-laid face!”

Oh. She got laid, alright.

“You’re not hitting me in the face! It’s true!” Jinyoung exclaims, clapping his hands together, noticeably pleased with his discovery. “You’re glowing so much I feel like you’ll ascend into heaven any moment.”

Momo tosses a wet rag aimed at his face, landing squarely over his eyes as he yells in surprise. He deserved it. And Momo doesn’t stop smiling the entire day at the kitchen.

-

It becomes a cycle. 

They fuck in marble bathrooms after Mina’s concerts and recitals; suddenly she’s awake after two long hours of imagining Mina pressing her against the marble columns of the luxurious washrooms.

(“Aren’t people gonna come in here?” Momo laughs, watching Mina frantically unzip Momo’s green bomber jacket,

“I locked the entrance of the hall that leads here,” Mina says in between searing, hurried kisses. Then she pulls away completely, holding Momo’s head between her hands before licking across Momo’s lips and grinning, whispering, “the only person that will come in here is you.”)

They fuck in dingy bathrooms of bars after 2X’s set and as much as she loves performing for their audience and fans, an encore is just too much a chore when she’d rather be kissing a sinful trail from the back of Mina’s ear to her shoulder and hear Mina’s familiar, chime-like moan that sends Momo’s brain into a frenzy every single time that it should be embarrassing how she is so fucking crazy for Mina’s breathy groans, telling her to keep going, to get in deeper.

(“I’m needed for the next set,” Momo informs her, already taking her ends of her tee before pulling it over her head, tossing it onto the couch. Mina’s doing the same after locking the bathroom door of the bar’s green room. “Can we do this in less than five minutes?”

“Sounds like a challenge.” Mina grins before brisk-walking towards Momo’s direction then she throws her arms around Momo once she gets close, her lips finding Momo’s immediately. Mina’s momentum almost topples them them over and into the small couch.

Their kisses are tinged with laughter and tiny giggles but once Momo stuffs her hand under Mina’s seamless underwear, it’s all businesslike and quick and Momo likes it like this.)

They fuck in Momo’s car, too. At the backseat, in the secluded cliff area overlooking Seoul, with Momo’s leg on the shoulder of the passenger’s seat while Mina fucks her senseless, with her nimble and long pianist fingers, coaxing orgasm upon orgasm from Momo.

(“Turn off the engine,” Mina’s throat vibrates when she speaks while Momo traces the moles with her tongue.

“Hmm?”

“Engine,” Mina moans and, christ, the word ‘engine’ had never been uttered this sexily before. Momo shifts her hips, her leg finding Mina’s crotch.“Bad—bad… for the… environment...”)

It happens so often. A quick wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am kind of thing and Momo’s pretty content with it. Mina’s a pleasant person and Momo likes the way Mina makes her feel and she likes the way she makes Mina feel.

At the end of the day, they’re still Momo and Mina, who tease each other endlessly about their music endeavors. They’re still Momo and Mina, who share milk-less shakes at three in the morning. They’re still Momo and Mina, who watch Seoul from their usual spot, in Momo’s car, listening to Carly Rae Jepsen and Momo’s playlists and maybe Mina’s too.

It’s fun. Momo’s having fun. Mina’s having fun. That’s what matters.

-

“So that’s how Tzuyu plans to murder Nayeon,” Jeongyeon looks very amused and very afraid after finishing telling the intricate plans of Tzuyu’s genius mind. Firing laser gunshots pass through their apartment door tells them Chaeyoung’s home, playing video games.

Momo fishes for own keys because the drummer holds a large paper bag of their groceries in her arms. “That’s really scary and genius,” Momo admits and wonders if Tzuyu is capable of homicide. She probably is.

The sounds of planes and blasters only get louder when they enter the apartment coming from Chaeyoung’s Star Wars: Battlefront game. Chaeyoung is lounging on one of their beanbags, pressing on her controller and beside her, in an identical position, is Mina.

“Both of you better leave if you don’t have my damn croissants,” Chaeyoung yells over the havoc of droids being destroyed.

Jeongyeon yells back. “I have your damn croissants!”

“Thanks, you ugly boob,” Chaeyoung yells once more. “Leave it over there!”

Momo crosses to the living room where they are and she doesn’t really understand what’s going on in the screen but they’re supposed to shoot at that giant metal thing with four legs. “Hey,” she greets Mina who barely spares her a glance.

The urge to press a kiss to Mina’s cheek is so strong, too strong, that she actually leans in—but she remembers, hey, that’s not them—so she only blows into Mina’s ear which earns her the adorable sight of Mina yipping, flinching away clutching her right ear.

“Momo-yah,” she whines when she sees that the other team had just annihilated her. “You made me lose. Now I have to start again.”

“I just wanted to say hi,” Momo pouts, and it’s obvious Mina can’t handle a Pouting Momo situation, only grimacing before reluctantly returning to her videogames.

Mina refuses to acknowledge her presence even though a small smile plays on her lips when Momo nuzzles her neck and clings to her. “Mina-yah, Mina-yah, Mina-yah,” she repeats, over and over, slightly shaking Mina while she delivers headshots to different online players.

“Oh my god, Momo, shut up,” Chaeyoung groans, the buttons of her controller are noisy when she presses at it angrily. “If I die, say goodbye to the cute flower soap you have in my bathroom.”

She wraps an arm around Mina like she always does when they’re beside each other, resting the side of her head on Mina’s legging-clad thighs. Momo mock-gasps. “You wouldn’t.”

“I totally would—damn it!”

-

She’s tired and spent and soggy, considering that it’s been a harrowing day at the kitchen and Mina had turned up at the gig, so of course Momo can’t resist her when she’s wearing that tight black shirt beneath her bleached jean jumper.

Mina is sitting up from the leather couch of the green room, slipping on her underwear with her back to Momo and Momo can see her spine through the skin. It takes all her willpower to not run her fingers through the skin with protruding bones, because that wasn’t part of this… arrangement that they have.

Momo turns to her side, her skin uncomfortably adhering to the couch material though she gets a full view of Mina’s glorious back, dusted with freckles and moles.

“You know, I thought you liked Jeongyeon at first.” Her voice is scratchy and can barely be heard over the loud EDM music above them, though Mina turns to look back at Momo while she snaps her (very flattering) skin-tone bra on.

Mina makes a face, tying her copper shoulder length hair. “Really?” she buttons her blouse with expert precision that Momo can’t believe those were the fingers that had scrambled for her hair when she came just a few minutes ago. “I don’t like Jeongyeon that way. What made you think that?”

She tucks her fist under her chin, keeping her eyes on Mina despite her turning away to smooth her hands down her top. “I don’t know,” she says honestly, recalling the night she first met Mina, with her lingering touches on Jeongyeon’s hands, coming all the way from the dressing room just to give her performance outfit. “You’re so… touchy with her, I guess?”

Mina laughs though Momo sees more than hears it, with the way Mina covers her smile with the back of her hand. “Aww. Are you jealous?”

Sitting up abruptly, her grey cotton shirt falls off Momo’s naked chest when she protests with a “huh? No!”. The pianist spares her a shit-eating grin, pushes at Momo’s shoulder until she’s on her back again.

“No need to be so defensive,” Mina chuckles. The very pretty golden bangles clank against each other when Mina slips them on. “She just reminds me of my brother in Japan. I miss him, that’s all.

“Oh, okay,” is all Momo can say because Mina stands and smacks a kiss to Momo’s lips, quick but with tongue peeking out, teasing her and Momo watches Mina walk away.

Not for the first time, Momo finds Mina gorgeous, especially when she looks well-fucked by Momo; as if moments ago she had been scrambling for semblances of sanity when Momo bent her legs to find a better angle.

She’s gorgeous and she’s smart and she’s Mina, so when the girl that’s been occupying Momo’s time lately turns back to give her a small wink, Momo can’t help but feel a tiny tug at her heart.

They’re at a toy store when the thought of maybe coming clean to Jeongyeon about this whole sleeping-with-Mina thing hits her square in the face. It hits her when Momo catches sight of the newest video game that Mina wants but has no time to buy, much less play. 

(“Oh god.”

Momo sits up from the reclined driver’s seat. “What’s up?”

The girl looks up from her phone with a pained expression. “A game I’ve been waiting for was released yesterday but I don’t have the time to play it.”

Always the drama queen, she thinks, reclining back into her seat with the crook of her elbow over her eyes.)

Jeongyeon is her best friend. She deserves to know that she was right—that Momo would be screwing Myoui Mina, quite often at that.

The drummer is sifting through the Star Wars spacecraft Lego boxes when Momo finds the courage to speak, two hours upon entrance into the toy store.

The truth is lodged in her throat and Momo scolds herself for even finding it difficult to say she’s fucking Myoui Mina. She isn’t a kiss-and-tell kind of girl—no, never—but there are things her best friend should know, and one of said things should be if she’s sleeping with one of their friends their small circle of musicians.

If this were any other girl it would have been easy, so. Why. Was. It. Difficult. To. Say. She’s. Fucking. Mina.

Damn it, Momo, she chastises herself, get yourself together.

It’s on the tip of her tongue when Jeongyeon finally selects the Millennium Falcon, words don’t fail Momo when she her mouth forms the words: “Hey, can I tell you something?”

“Hmm?” Jeongyeon hums, leaning closer albeit her attention is to the Lego in front of them.

She takes a deep breath. Just pull off the damn band-aid now. “I’m fucking—”

“Um, hi, sorry to interrupt,” a small voice calls out from the side and Momo sees a girl probably in her early teenage years clutching a copy of their EP close to her chest. “You guys are from 2X, right?”

Momo exhales with relief (oh, thank fuck, Momo thinks, this must be what divine intervention is for religious people) through her nose before nodding, Jeongyeon saying yes for the both of them.

Better luck next time.

The girl tucks a strand of her hair behind her cheek when she asks for their autograph, that it would mean to her even if she only got to meet half of them.

Momo snickers as the girl noticeably blushes a deep shade of red when Jeongyeon grins at her after the two of them sign, bowing at them before leaving to group of friends who start squealing when she returns to them.

Jeongyeon only shakes her head with a slight laugh. “I wonder if she always brings our EP with her wherever she goes. What were you saying?”

Momo’s stomach drops at the question, all the courage she had mustered up to tell Jeongyeon the truth had evaporated faster than Chaeyoung drops people when she realizes that she has feelings for them.

“Nothing.”

“What? You said something, like, ‘I was fucking—’”

“I’m fucking serious when I say Mina has a crush on you,” Momo lies through her teeth and while it hurts to not tell Jeongyeon the truth, it also physically pains her to admit that yes, they’ve been right all along, that eventually she’d be sleeping with Mina.

Her best friend only raises a brow. “You sure? She said I reminded of her brother in Japan.”

“I’m sure.”

“Really?”

“No. I meant to say I’m fucking hungry and would like to have the dumplings you owe me right now.”

“Now that’s more believable,” Jeongyeon takes the Millennium Falcon, tucking it under her arm. “I thought you were gonna say you were fucking Mina, or something like that.”

Momo nearly trips on a skateboard left lying around by some kid.

-

It seems as if being the most favored pianist in the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra has its perks. 

Mina has her own dressing room, unlike the other musicians.

With a mini-bar, a bathtub and a very luxurious plush divan where Momo is currently lying on with Mina collapsed on top of her after a few rounds of really good sex.

Momo doesn’t know how Mina can have adrenaline from sitting with her back straight, with only her hands and fingers moving expertly above keyboards, but hey, Momo is far from complaining. She enjoys being the object of Mina releasing excess performance adrenaline.

Mina’s breathing evens out, their skin sticking to one another, and Momo is suddenly compelled to start the pillow talk.

“So what does it feel like to be a bitch in the eyes of everyone who’s just met you?”

Mina raises her head from Momo’s naked chest. “What?” Her eyes are drooping but one can’t mistake the look in her eyes as pure confusion. “What makes you say that?”

“I don’t know,” Momo shrugs, and it’s nice that her body isn’t sticking uncomfortably to the leather of her car or that couch in bar green rooms. “We met in this place. I just remembered that I didn’t exactly like you.”

The pianist giggles, an adorable sound, but Momo isn’t swooning, no sir. “Oh, so you like me now?”

“No, I don’t,” she denies, pouting, trying to turn but Mina’s weight on her is stopping her from doing so. “What made you think that?”

“Nothing. I mean, definitely not how we’re naked and on top of each other after really good sex.”

Momo laughs. “Yeah, definitely not that.”

There are beats of comfortable silence, only the sound of the air conditioning unit and the coffee maker brewing them a nice cup filling Mina’s dressing room when Mina decides to break the tranquil silence with a gentle yet teasing voice.

“You have the weirdest pillow talks ever.”

Momo sifts her hands through Mina’s soft, copper colored hair. “Is it pillow talk when we don’t have a bed? Just this couch? That’s a thing to ponder on. Hmm.”

“Here is a pillow,” Mina tugs at the throw pillow under Momo’s head. “We just had sex and we are now currently engaged in conversation. I think that constitutes to pillow talk.”

“Whatever you say, Myoui.”

-

“Uh, Chef Momo,” Jinyoung calls from the door, halting Momo from cleaning up her work station. “They want to speak with the chef." 

If she were a rookie still, Momo would be scared shitless though, she isn’t one anymore and when it comes to the kitchen, she learned not to garner fear towards anything. “Who is it?”

“The group that ordered the plum lamb chops and the salted king crab.”

“Okay. I’ll be out in a minute,” Momo wipes her hands with a small towel before tossing it onto the spice counter. She takes a moment to fix herself before pushing through the heavy mahogany double doors to table that had requested her.

She spots familiar faces from the large group in formal outfits, an ensemble of crisp black and white that manage to stand out against the plush velvet seats.

Mina, Nayeon, Tzuyu and Sana sit side by side, casually sipping at their wine glass to hide their smirks when they witness Momo is surprised to see them.

“Ah, is this the chef?” An old man looks back at her, to whom she gives a 90 degree bow.

“Hirai Momo at your service, sir.” She says once she’s upright, giving the man, whom she recognizes as the conductor, a shy grin.

“Your lamb chops were exquisite,” he informs her, the group nodding and murmuring their agreement. “Simply amazing. We wanted to thank you for this wonderful meal tonight.”

Sana and Tzuyu giggle at Momo’s seemingly uncharacteristic bashfulness while Mina covers her mouth with the back of her hand when Nayeon whispers something to her ear and Momo is 200% sure that it’s about her. “It’s no problem at all, sir. We’re very happy you enjoyed your meal.”

He dismisses her politely, and she bows out, prepares to make her exit and to text the four musicians to maybe fuck off—

“Where’s the washroom?” Mina says, standing up and good god, she looks so beautiful in that sleek black bustier dress, making her skin glow more than it usually does.

“Right there, ma’am,” Momo points with an open palm; she gulps and is beyond glad she doesn’t stutter because damn, that would have been embarrassing.

She’s too busy staring at the gorgeous image that is Mina that she nearly misses the quick wink she gives Momo, and the quick, discreet sweep to the left, to where Momo had pointed.

Momo thanks the group once again, watching Mina walk to the washroom and she returns to the kitchen, gathers herself and follows Mina to the customer washroom through a passageway so to be hidden from plain sight of a small part of the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra.

“Mina?” She calls out once she’s there in the empty customer bathroom. “Mina-yah, where are you?”

There are hands over her eyes before she knows it, panic rising in her throat when she recognizes that perfume, the softness of Mina’s palm but the roughness of her fingers that matches Momo’s.

She groans, prying Mina’s hands away, opens her eyes to see a grinning Mina, pleased with herself that she had given Momo a partial heart attack.

Not moving her hands away from Momo’s face, Mina brings their faces together for a laughing kiss that is mostly giggles and chaste lip locking, very unlike the kisses they’ve been sharing as of late.

Momo’s feet are tired, fatigue from the day at the kitchen settling deep within her bones, but her knees are weak for an entirely different reason (namely: the girl giving her soft kisses that tug at her heart).

This goes on for a few minutes; it’s a short encounter, and Momo doesn’t really feel like having sex right now even if the customer bathroom is very pretty and well-lit. “Has anyone ever told you that you look extremely adorable in your chef whites?” Mina quietly asks once she pulls away. Her arms are still around Momo’s neck, her fingers linked at the back of it.

“Mmm, maybe a couple of people,” Momo matches her tone, realizes they’re moving from side to side. “You don’t need to know who.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“Were they your parents and Nayeon?”

Momo sighs. That’s enough of to tell Mina the answer to her question.

“Poor you. It’s okay, I find you adorable anyway.” Mina pats at her cheek, then moves away completely. “Don’t want to keep your kitchen waiting. I’ll see you tomorrow?” She leans in for a quick kiss that leaves Momo lightheaded anyway.

“Takeout? Vietnamese, please. We had sushi last week.”

“Fine.” Another kiss, before Mina sends Momo away with a harmless shove and an extremely pretty smile that might be the cause of her death if she’s exposed to it for a long period of time.

Momo finds her way to the kitchen but not without making sure she isn’t smiling like the smitten idiot she’s totally not and when she finds herself succeeding, she pushes the door open to Jinyoung and Chef Yeeun pouring wine into three separate glasses. “Join us for this nightcap,” Yeeun says, placing the cork back into the wine that probably costs three times more than Momo’s monthly salary. Momo nods, takes the wine glass but before she can drink, Jinyoung puts a hand to stop her from tilting the glass to her lips.

“Uh, Momo, you have a little… red on your lips.”

Red?—oh.

Damn it, Mina. Damn you and your lipstick.

She hastily wipes it off but the damage has been done; Yeeun and Jinyoung snicker behind their hands. “Do. Not. Say. Anything.”

“We won’t,” he laughs, sipping from his wine. Chef Yeeun is still chuckling to herself and Momo feels her face heat from the embarrassment, though Jinyoung and Chef Yeeun are pretty cool people and they won’t say really say anything, but that doesn’t stop Jinyoung from making gross kissy noises, not until Momo tosses another conveniently placed wet rag at his face.

-

Four pairs of eyes turn to her when she enters Dahyun’s studio, apparently thirty minutes late to the first official band meeting for the full-length album.

“Why are you late?” Jihyo asks, but Momo knows that inner-Jihyo is probably frothing at the mouth with rage.

“Uh, traffic,” she says when she shuts the door, unzipping her ankle boots.

Jeongyeon dangles the keys to Momo’s car. “We borrowed your car, remember?”

Damn it. “I called a cab.”

Momo takes a seat beside Chaeyoung, though they’re all still watching her warily that it’s almost uncomfortable. “What?”

Dahyun puts on her best game show host voice. “Welcome to Jeopardy. Choose a category.” Oh no. Not this again.

Chaeyoung presses her pen as a makeshift buzzer. “I’ll take Momo’s Whereabouts for $500.”

“This is the name of the girl Momo has been spending an excessive amount of time with that the band is growing extremely suspicious of them,” Dahyun mock-reads from a blank piece of paper. Jeongyeon takes another pen and clicks it. “Jeongyeon?”

“What is Myoui Mina.”

“That is correct,” Dahyun says, “$500 for Jeongyeon.” A small round of applause fills the room and Momo wants to bury her head in her hands because her friends (simultaneously her band) are a bunch of dorks.

“Well?” Jihyo prompts and Momo can’t help but feel like she’s sitting on a hot seat.

Well—she is sitting on a hot seat.

“I wasn’t with Mina.” A lie.

“Really?”

“Yeah. I wasn’t.” Another lie.

“Were you at her house?”

Okay, that is not true. She hasn’t been to Mina’s apartment and while they’ve been sleeping together for a good month, they haven’t slept in her apartment or Mina’s house. “No.”

Their vocalist softens a tad bit, “Well you sure reek like you were.”

Okay, that’s the last straw. “Hey! I showered after, alright?”

Chaeyoung giggles. “Showered after what?”

Oh.

Damn it.

“A-after my shift at the kitchen, dummies,” Momo tries, “you know, so I wouldn’t be sticky when I get—damn it.” It’s a lost cause, because Jeongyeon’s smile spreads menacingly so and Jihyo, Chaeyoung and Dahyun bury their heads in their hands, meaning only one thing. “You assholes bet if Mina and were sleeping together, didn’t you.”

God. She had idiot friends. Idiot friends that do her dirty.

As payback for putting her on the goddamn hot seat, Momo finally comes clean, leaning back and trying to scramble for a sense of bravado, at least, that she is unfazed about her friends finding out when she’d been meaning to tell them soon but not now. “Yeah, Mina and I are sleeping together. So what.”

She looks to Jeongyeon, and while she loves her friends dearly, it’s Jeongyeon she’s worried about in the first place though it seems as if Jeongyeon doesn’t mind that Momo had kept this from her even if they promised no secrets a few years ago; judging from the triumphant look on her face, Jeongyeon doesn’t mind at all, since she won the bet, announcing it with a: “Pay the fuck up, assholes. Tzuyu and Sana too. Nabongs and I told you.”

Momo watches as her friends hesitantly bring out their wallets, fishing out fifteen thousand KRW each before depositing it on the table.

“Looks like we’re thirty seven thousand five hundred KRW rich, Jeongyeon,” Nayeon laughs, giving the drummer a high five. “Thanks for sleeping with my best friend, Momo. You’re the best.” 

Momo feels her cheeks flush through the eye roll she has especially reserved for Nayeon and Jeongyeon. “Yeah, anytime, Bongki.”

“What’d I miss?” Mina returns with a tray of an assortment of sashimi and a kani salad (for herself) and a plate of fried rice and bacon-wrapped asparagus skewers and beef cubes (for Momo).

“Nothing much,” Nayeon says, counting the money. “Just collecting payment.”

“For what?”

“A bet. About you and Momo sleeping together.”

Momo pinches the bridge of her nose and refuses to look in Mina’s direction. Well, she fucked it up. This is great. Thanks, Nayeon.

“Oh,” Mina says calmly, oddly enough, that Momo risks a peek to see Mina completely unruffled by the information relayed by Nayeon. “We are sleeping together.”

“Glad that you confirmed it,” Nayeon tells her, giving Mina a small kiss on the cheek. “Thanks.”

“No problem,” Mina and Momo say in unison, turning to each other. Momo expects at least a slightly livid Mina though she sees none of it, only a confused expression on Mina’s lovely features.

I’ll explain later, Momo mouths at her from across the table.

Okay, Mina replies. What’s up with the bets, though?

Momo can only shrug.

(“Speaking of getting rich from bets,” Nayeon says, “Hey, Momo. Have you seen Sound of Music before Mina showed it to you?”

She flushes, remembering true nature as to why she doesn’t remember much from the movie. “No; I’ve only seen it when she showed me.”

Nayeon opens her palm in front of a dejected-looking Jeongyeon, who takes five hundred KRW from her pile of money from their other friends.

“Do Re Mi Fuck off,” Jeongyeon mumbles quietly.)

-

[11:46:31 PM] Hirai Momo: Sorry they found out lol it was an honest mistake and a slip of the tongue (pun intended) :p

[11:46:40 PM] Myoui Mina: Funny. :P It’s fine, really. They’ve been pressing me about it anyway.

[11:46:45 PM] Hirai Momo: Yeah me too thats why i told them just so it would end

[11:46:49 PM] Myoui Mina: Same. It’s fine. I’ll see you in the morning?

[11:46:51 PM] Hirai Momo: yep. gnight

[11:46:54 PM] Myoui Mina: Goodnight. :)

Momo changed Mina's nickname to Princess Myoui

Mina changed Momo's name to Uncultured Swine

-

They’d be lying if they said they didn’t anticipate the seemingly endless teasing that both their bandmates put them through.

2X and the girls from the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra just enjoy them squirming or turning red at them openly mentioning what happens behind closed doors to almost every goddamn situation. It’s always like:

“Hey, Myoui,” Jeongyeon says with her hands on Momo’s shoulders. “Don’t overdo it. We need her voice for the gig tonight.”

Or:

“Oi, Momo,” Nayeon says, wiggling her eyebrows. “Mina surely has prodigy fingers, doesn’t she?”

They’re the brunt of the bad teasing but hey, it’s fine. Mina is pretty cute when she’s embarrassed and she tends to look at things that make Mina cute with a positive light.

(The way Mina meets her eyes when the jokes subside is worth it, too.)

-

It’s all a matter of breaking when it comes to Mina; and this dawns upon Momo in the middle of cracking an egg open to separate the egg whites. 

Her resolve breaks the first time she kisses Mina in her car, when she had not given it second thought, leaning forward and just taking it as the bet had made her do.

Her self control breaks when Mina rubs her hand on Momo’s thigh, the warm searing through the material of her jeans.

Momo’s sanity breaks when she fucks Mina in that dim bathroom at the diner, a few minutes before the sun rises, washing over them like a gradient.

Momo’s sanity breaks even more, when they’re kissing in her car before she drops Mina off in front of her house when Mina pulls away slightly, Momo kissing past her cheeks and under her chin where she knows Mina is weak, when Mina asks, “Come inside?” so quietly that Momo’s not even sure she’s said it because while they’ve fucked countless times already, it’s never at their houses—as if there’s a boundary set that yeah, there’s no fucking that’s going to happen here.

“What?”

It seems as if Mina regrets asking in the first place but she offered to break the unspoken boundaries and they’re here now; everything else has led to this moment and there’s no point in delaying it any longer. Before she can deny it, though, Momo holds the back of Mina’s neck and pulls her in again for a kiss, rougher and hotter than the one before that.

“I’d love to.”

They break a small vase when they stumble into Mina’s house, taking off their sneakers while divesting the other of their clothes in a lustful haze, and it’s taking every bit of Momo’s decency to not take Mina right here, on the luxurious rug that lies on the floor of the main hall. “Don’t mind that,” Mina whispers into her lips without breath, as if she’d just run a marathon and Momo nearly asks what, until she remembers the shards of porcelain on the floor near them.

Mina leads them to her room, it’s a beautiful house but she can only look at Mina, gorgeous in her fit jeans and her black bra, her shirt scattered somewhere but Momo couldn’t care less, because the large windows of Mina’s living room casts a beautiful moonlight, bouncing off the curves of her back, illuminating her as if she is an ethereal creature that’s not of this mortal plane.

There’s a door (Momo’s back against it, with Mina sucking a necklace of marks at her collarbones); then Mina’s neat, large bed.

A bed shouldn’t scare Momo, but this is Mina’s bed and while they’ve fucked on couches, on divans, in bathrooms with their backs to marble columns or standard bathroom tiles, they’ve never fucked on a bed—it feels a whole lot heavier than it should be, because that’s just a goddamn bed, but it’s Mina’s bed, and this—this this between Momo and Mina—suddenly means something more than how they make it.

“Something wrong?” Mina says from behind her, hands crawling up Momo’s bare stomach, and Momo realizes that she may or may not have been staring at Mina’s bed with mild panic. Her chest hurts but now it’s not from panic, but from the unadulterated want she has for the girl pressed against her back, pressing open-mouthed kisses to the back of her neck (dear God, is Mina trying to undo her bra clasp with her mouth).

Momo wants to say, nothing, though how can she when fucking Mina in her own bed means they’re not playing around anymore that even if this wasn’t serious, it was still serious in a sense and—

Fuck that.

She reaches behind to carry Mina in her arms and tosses her onto the bed from a bridal hold, but not without Mina giggling, kicking her legs without causing harm. Momo crawls on top of Mina, slowly but surely, making sure to not leave any part of her stomach unkissed when she reaches the top of Mina’s breasts, tonguing her nipples through her bra. Mina arches into her, her back a perfect semi-circle and Momo takes that chance to wrap an arm around her back, Mina’s weight settling back when Momo finds her mouth, pressing kisses upon kisses to her mouth because she just can’t get enough of Myoui Mina.

She’s so wet from all this kissing that when Mina’s hands find her center after she unbuttons her shorts, carefully tugging it with her underwear down Momo’s legs, Mina groans from the contact, her eyes stormy with pure lust and something Momo can’t name. “Sit up,” Mina says, slightly pushing at Momo’s shoulders to put space between them. Momo doesn’t really know what’s going on until Mina adjusts her legs by the crook of her knees, sliding under her and—

Momo holds on to Mina’s head to stop her. “God, Mina,” she pants, because while she’s not exactly opposed to this, her senses are full of Mina and Mina only that it’s making her so dizzy. “I’m—I’m not gonna sit on your—”

“Please,” Mina asks with a small, shy smile, as if she hadn’t asked to eat Momo out from underneath her. “Would you let me?”

Momo hasn’t had anyone eat her out like this, for one she’d been conscious and she usually likes to be the one doing all the eating, but this is Mina, who has a smart mouth that tastes like watermelon and she’s been finding it to deny Mina the things she wants. “O-okay,” she agrees then lets herself be pulled toward’s Mina’s mouth, and goddamn, she isn’t prepared for the moment Mina takes her by the ass and drags her down to work her mouth like that and—oh god—

Turns out that Mina’s prodigy fingers aren’t only her best assets.

She’s gripping the headboard of Mina’s bed like a madwoman, yelling a mixture of god, Mina, god, god, Mina until she forgoes the god and screams, Mina, Mina, Mina, Mina, like a litany of lust and love and everything that’s in between that. Mina with her heavenly tongue, Mina with her god-given mouth, Mina with the majesty of her fingers—

Her brain runs a continuous loop of Mina, Mina, Mina and good, good, good until Momo feels like she’s being thrown into the oblivion when she meets Mina’s eyes across the plane of her own stomach, looking as if she’s the only thing that exists in this bubble of Mina and Momo; she’s thrown into an oblivion where she can only feel like her nerves are on fire, where she can only feel the slick of Mina’s skin, where she can only smell the scent of Mina and the scent of Mina alone.

It seems like Mina isn’t done; she keeps licking and mouthing and good god, she can’t take any more of this so she moves Mina’s head away with weak arms because damn, she feels like gelatin right now; Momo hasn’t come that hard in a long time. She moves away from Mina, slumps on the bed facing the ceiling and there’s a mirror—goddamn it, we were fucking and she was watching this the entire time—

“You taste really good,” Mina pants and before she can wipe Momo’s wetness on her mouth, Momo holds it and gives her tongued yet tired kiss, the taste of watermelon and Mina and her own taste mingling in beautiful harmony that she wants this, wants this taste bottled and mass-produced—Momo sure as hell won’t ever grow tired of it.

Momo scrambles for something to say but nothing comes out, nothing that isn’t saying the she’s falling for Mina (but she isn’t, is she?), hard and fast like their previous encounters. So Momo does what she does best and kisses Mina, kisses her and kisses her because she can always repay Mina for what constitutes as the best orgasm of her life tomorrow, and the next day, and the day after that. She kisses Mina until she falls asleep, nestled to Mina’s arm with Mina’s hand stroking her hair in such a comforting gesture that the last thing on Momo’s mind is the small doubt that things won’t change between them because, damn, it sure as hell feels like things will.

Her body seems to know when that she’s sleeping in another girl’s bed because she wakes up at the break of dawn, orange lights peeking through Mina’s blinds, creating the faintest of orange and deep blue rays that paints over Mina’s back like watercolor. Momo feels her chest expand when the color orange washes over Mina’s peaceful and sleeping face, and that’s when she feels fully awake—tracing what she can see of Mina’s face since it’s partially buried into a pillow. Every mole, her long lashes and the lips that had driven Momo crazy (that still drives Momo crazy).

It’s usually at this hour she collects her clothes and drives away from nameless girls and their generic houses but she can’t find it in herself to stand and leave—no, not when Mina sleeps like one of Michelangelo’s sculptures, her back carved by the hand of all of the deities combined. Mina embraces her pillow with her belly on the mattress and christ, Mina is the epitome of the goddamn golden ratio.

It feels like a dam breaking; all these things she feels are magnified by the fact that she’s afraid, and this isn’t part of the agreement so Momo pushes it away to the farthest part of her mind, wishing that it’ll dissolve soon enough if she doesn’t pay any attention to it.

Momo stays the night for the first time in years and wishes to see Mina lying beside her but Mina isn’t there, only a note attached to the pillow. Momo ignores the stab of pain that shoots through her, because oh, how the tables have turned. She was the one that had always left notes; she was the one that always leaves before her and it really throws her off, that it takes her a collective amount of eight minutes to read the note, written in Mina’s adorable cursive.

Sorry for leaving so early.

The conductor wanted rehearsals

scheduled at an earlier hour. :(

Would have stayed but I don’t want

him to murder me in my sleep.

Brunch later? My treat.

Big things—big realizations used to break Momo, but now? Now, it’s the things that shouldn’t have mattered before that break Momo. (i.e. these notes, Mina’s hands in her coat when they’re taking a walk, the way Mina laughs at everything Momo says). 

It used to be a wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am thing but Momo isn’t sure anymore.

When it comes to Myoui Mina, boundaries are set only to be crossed and things are meant to be broken and Momo is goddamn sure that Myoui Mina is going to break her heart.

(“Why is Momo staring at egg yolk like she’s about to cry?” Jinyoung whispers to Jackson. 

“I… don’t know.” Jackson watches Momo watching at the yellow liquid inside the pyrex measuring cup. “Maybe she wants to incubate the egg just by staring at it? It must be a Japanese thing.”

“Oh,” Jinyoung nods, “that makes sense.”)

-

“So, tell me,” Jihyo starts, with a half-masticated cow rolling around in her mouth. “How’s the sex? Is it great?”

Momo almost coughs up her soda. “The what?”

“The sex,” the keyboardist blanches.

She wipes at her mouth and feels Fanta dripping through her sinuses. “Ah. It’s—it’s alright, I guess.”

Jihyo laughs. “Alright? Momo, my god, do you really think I can’t see through the heavy makeup your neck has right now? I was the one who taught you how to hide your hickeys.”

Damn it. She should know better than to hide things from Jihyo. And Jeongyeon.

“Okay, it’s pretty great, alright?” Momo says, biting into her burger, hoping that it covers how red her neck is turning right now and—fuck, Mina’s slight scratches sting a little.

Jihyo laughs again, obviously finding joy in Momo being very uncomfortable. “There we go. Was it so hard to say it?”

“Nope.” She doesn’t lie because she does enjoy sleeping with Mina, even if it causes her a lot of emotional distress when it comes to pushing feelings away.

Which reminds her that she should probably tell 2X about this pressing issue though she thinks that maybe it can wait since songwriting and composition for the full-length album start pretty soon, and Momo thinks that they can’t afford to panic about the aforementioned pressing issue altogether.

-

Momo’s been too busy to sleep with anyone else. Mina is sexy. Mina is actually pretty easy to be with. Mina makes her laugh. Momo is having lots of fun with her.

(Jeongyeon points at a pretty girl. “You think you can score that?”

Momo looks over to the girl in question, though she only shakes her head. The girl fails to catch her interest.)

It’s only normal for her to text Mina if she wants to fuck because she’s hyped up from her recent set, a really great audience, but it turns sour once twenty minutes have passed with no reply and Mina isn’t where she’s usually sat beside Nayeon when Momo sits with them in new clothes.

She doesn’t want to ask first; no, sir. She’s not gonna ask first. Momo, don’t ask first—

“Where’s Mina?” her mouth moves before she can stop herself and Momo mentally palms her face in embarrassment.

The look Nayeon gives her isn’t something to be proud of either. Like she knows exactly what’s going on between them. Hey, Momo likes Nayeon, don’t get her wrong. But she couldn’t even care less about what Nayeon thinks about she and Mina sleeping together.

“At home. Puking her guts out.” Nayeon blanches, taking a sip from her margarita before Tzuyu slaps her arm, hard enough to make some splash onto the table. “Hey!”

“She has low-grade fever and nausea. I think it’s just a bug,” Tzuyu says, her eyes still on Nayeon. “But it was bad when we passed by earlier this morning.”

Momo’s heart sinks. It’s not a pleasant image to see Mina all alone, doing exactly as what Nayeon had said. She chews on her bottom lip, stares at the oak wood under her hands. Should she…? 

“Here are the keys to her house, hotshot,” Nayeon tosses the ring of keys and Momo nearly misses. “Do what you must.”

She’s a fuckbuddy. She’s just someone who gets Mina off. She enjoys getting Mina off.

But Momo doesn’t know exactly why she stands up without second thought. She doesn’t know exactly why she rushes to her car. Doesn’t know exactly why she breaks the speed limit to get to the grocery, doesn’t know why she snags all the ingredients of her mom’s ginseng soup that she knows at the top of her head and drives off to Mina’s house, breaking the speed limit again and maybe the sound barrier too.

She’s a fuckbuddy, yeah, but she’ll be a good one. The best fuckbuddy ever.

Thus:

[9:10:31 PM] Uncultured Swine: im here @ ur doorstep with soon to be food dont worry

i have keys nayeon gave it to me dont kill her i asked for it

Momo deposits the paper bags onto the counter of Mina’s luxurious kitchen that she almost never uses except to maybe burn some eggs and toast.

 (“You should really use your kitchen. It’s such a nice one and all it does is gather dust.”

Mina laughs. “Yeah, I should. You know, if I wanted to burn this my parents' old house to ashes.”

“You’re not that bad I think,” Momo tells Mina, adjusting her arm so that Mina’s head rests comfortably on her shoulder. “The kitchen busboy managed to fuck up an egg when it was just supposed to be boiled. Remember that.”)

Momo sets up the pans, the ingredients with the same precision as she does when she’s at Je Suis Pi. kitchen She’s mixing the ginseng and the chicken flakes in broth when soft footsteps pad behind her.

“Aren’t you supposed to be at a gig right now?” Mina says as greeting, clutching her robe closer to herself and Momo doesn’t really understand how she looks really pretty if Nayeon’s telling the truth that she has been puking her guts out the entire day.

“It finished early and Nayeon told me you were sick,” Momo turns back to stirring because looking at Mina like this makes her weak, even weaker when she sees Mina wearing nothing at all. She also can’t stand that amused face Mina’s making, because this is obviously a chip on her bad-girl, asshole-with-a-band image.

“So you came to see me? Aww. I’m touched.” The smirk in her voice makes Momo want to—

“Yeah, well that’s not the only thing of yours I’ve touched.” Momo grumbles under her breath and Mina laughs out loud then suddenly her body molds into Momo’s back, arms around her stomach, fingers lightly touching the exposed skin of Momo’s hip.

“Always the snarky one between us, aren’t we,” Mina chuckles.

She smells like menthol and illness and it still makes Momo’s heart constrict just as it does when she smells like the bottom note of her favorite Burberry perfume. A soft kiss is pressed to her cheek—Momo nearly chops her nail off—and it stays there, for a few passing moments before Mina tiredly murmurs, “Thank you, Momo. You’re very sweet.”

The pot nearly burns when Momo realizes she had abandoned all semblances of movement, after Mina’s lips linger on her skin.

Stupid Mina with her stupid sickness and her stupid menthol-scented kisses.

Momo only hums noncommittally, because it’s the only thing she can do without screaming her lungs out to get rid of the tightness in her chest. Mina doesn’t detach from her, not until Momo has to move to another station. She maintains her distance, thank fuck, but now Momo misses Mina’s closeness but she’s not going to tell Mina that.

“You could’ve just bought soup, you know.” Mina informs her with her back to the counter across the stove, and Momo feels her eyes on her back while she’s chopping the ginger.

Momo tosses her a look over her shoulder, wiping off some sweat while she’s at it. “It’s different if I cook it, okay. My mom swears by this.” She turns back to her chopping before she can slice off her finger when Momo feels Mina’s chin digging lightly into her shoulders. “It’s bad for you to be all up when you have a slight fever and nausea. Rest. I’ll clean up.”

They end up watching High Society in bed while Mina eats the soup with as much gusto a sensitive stomach will allow, and they fall asleep halfway when Momo wakes to realize that she should get back to her own apartment soon, though Mina’s head is situated comfortably on her shoulder, sleeping peacefully through her sick and sleepy warmth and Momo smiles, decides she isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.

(Maybe Mina doesn’t want her to go anywhere, too. Momo checks her bag, sees the keys to Mina’s house, attached to the zipper of her backpack.)

Chapter Text

It was bound to happen.

Mina sits on the keys of her Yamaha grand piano, thighs taking up two octaves on its board, meshing the keys together, creating a myriad of noises as Momo fucks Mina against it, two fingers in and out, a thumb rubbing small, hard circles against the bundle of nerves in the middle that make Mina carve crescent shaped dents into Momo’s back.

(“Aren’t you going to listen to me play the complex arrangement of Chopsticks?” Mina says, though it’s punctuated with a tiny sigh that Momo will never get tired of hearing. “It was my very first recital piece when I was five.”

“Mmm,” Momo hums against the back of her neck, unable to help herself from touching Mina. “But you’re very attractive when you’re in pianist mode.”)

Momo isn’t that familiar with the piano though she is sure as hell that piano keys aren’t meant to be sat on—more less fucked on.

Though right now, with the way Mina cries out loud for her, voice echoing through the small yet luxurious piano room, Momo could care less what should or should not be good for a piano.

Momo is a musician, so even through Mina’s distracting crying (which drives Momo into a frenzy that borderlines into insanity, mind you) as she fucks her on her piano, Momo hears mismatched chords coming from the piano as the heels of Mina’s hand press on it for support and she knows, as much as can know in a lustful haze with Mina assaulting all her senses because when she fucks Mina, it’s as if they’re the only people in this world—damn the rest—she knows that Mina’s voice harmonizes with the notes when she cries out after Momo hits that sweet, sweet spot.

Scratch that.

She is sure Mina’s moans are far more beautiful than anything this damn piano has ever played.

She is also sure that she had just come in her pants from the way Mina’s leg had ground up into her crotch.

Mina’s breathing is labored; she’s still coming down from her high, her muscles relaxing immensely after being clenched the entire time Momo was coaxing orgasm upon orgasm from her. She reaches to unbutton Momo’s shorts but Momo stops her—she’s spent, too, like Mina. Seeing Mina come undone is already enough.

“You sure?” Mina tilts her head in concern, though when Momo smiles at her assuringly, the crease between her brows ironing out almost at once as she returns it with an even brighter beam.

They grin at each other, breathing heavily, and it dawns upon Momo that they’ve been grinning at each other like morons quite often.

“Wanna order in?” Momo asks, helping Mina off the piano, steadying her when she wobbles and nearly topples over. “I feel like having some chimichangas and churros.”

“Yeah,” Mina laughs, pecking Momo on the lips once, twice, three times before smoothing down her skirt to move away. “Order while I shower?”

Momo pouts, genuinely disheartened by the fact that Mina would want to shower without her. “Without me?”

“You sound like a horny teenage boy,” Mina rolls her eyes before kissing Momo and Momo realizes that Mina can’t get enough of her and she can’t get enough of Mina. “Remember what happened when we ordered in and we were both ‘showering’?”

She remembers full well the incident, where she had nearly cracked her skull open when Momo runs out of the bathroom for the delivery money.

“Don’t remind me,” Momo tells her, wiping her still damp fingers on her shirt. “Fine. Shower. Vegetable taco for you, yeah?”

“Yup!” Mina is already halfway out of the piano room, stripping out of her clothes and Momo can only roll her eyes at the terrible tease Mina truly is. She takes out her phone and orders under Mina’s name, then follows to the bedroom to take a short nap before the delivery arrives.

They eat in silence, but it’s the nice kind of silence—always the nice kind, with Mina—with Mina’s new monthly playlist playing Modern English’s I Melt With You filling in the large room perfectly.

(“Every musician—or anyone who likes music will hate that question, Momo. Not just me.”

Momo laughs. “I know. So what is it? What’s your favorite-favorite song. Like the one on top of that list.”

“Hmm,” Mina ponders for a moment, before turning to Momo to smile. “Modern English’s Melt With You. You know, the one from Sky High. Only the original, though the remake isn’t bad.”)

She loves this song, she loves the food, she likes the girl in front of her, dressed in her silk pyjamas while Momo’s still in her university sweater.

It’s perfect—every single bit of this moment is perfect that she wishes Chaeyoung were here to take a photo, but a photo would never do this moment justice and the sheer content that washes over her can never be captured by an image.

-

“Dating and fucking are two different things,” Momo tells Chaeyoung for the third time. “We’re fucking. Not dating. Those aren’t mutually exclusive terms.” 

“Sure it is,” Chaeyoung drawls, her eyes trained on her laptop, typing away furiously. It’s probably another essay that Chaeyoung makes for other people where she gets generously paid for it. “Hmm,” she hums, then mumbles the sentence (something about poststructuralism? What the heck is that?) she has written to herself before pressing the backspace button for a few seconds. “You know the concept of the blur?”

“The what?” Momo asks, bounces a stress ba off the wall from where she’s seated in the bean bag to Chaeyoung’s right, where Mina often sits when she comes over to beat Chaeyoung’s puny ass in Battlefront. 

“The blur,” she explains without sparing Momo a single glance. “Where the reality of the author and the persona of a poem blend together that the reader fails to distinguish the difference between who is the true storyteller. You are the author. You are the persona. You are also the reader. You write that you want to date Mina. Your persona is a front that denies it. You as the reader have no idea as to what you truly want though you can identify that the blur between you as the author and you as the persona.”

Momo takes a while to understand it. After five minutes of deliberation, she decides she doesn’t have a slightest idea of what Chaeyoung had said. “I don’t understand how this is supposed to help me.”

“Me too. But you get my point. You want to date Mina, but you also don’t, now you’re confused.”

She scratches her head, obviously frustrated at Chaeyoung, whose attention is not fully Momo’s. “I… really don’t get your point,” she says, though she knows it’s a lost cause to try and make sense of Chaeyoung when she’s too busy writing about higher philosophy.

She also ignores the fact that Chaeyoung is right about the entire dating-not-dating thing  and she doesn’t need this mild moment of panic so Momo stands, straightens her chef whites and collects her bag before pressing a kiss to Chaeyoung’s hair. “But thanks for that moment of enlightenment, Machiavelli.”

“Wrong philosopher. And that wasn’t a philosophical concept. It’s a lesson in collegiate literature.”

“Do I look like I care?”

“No, no you don’t.” Chaeyoung laughs around a mouthful of chips. “Hey, you could use this useless bit of information to impress Mina, though.”

That makes Momo halt in her ball-throwing. “Tell me more.”

-

Momo climbs into the bed, Mina already waiting as she reads the nightly news or something just as boring.

An odd sight it is, Mina in her bed. They’ve slept and had sex on Momo’s bed countless times before, but Mina always seems to be a fixture that sticks out like a sore thumb, though it’s the comforting kind, not the kind of sticking out that clearly screams I don’t belong here.

Mina, in all her expensive silk night dress, belongs there, bundled up in Momo’s old cotton sheets and old cotton pillows, doing absolutely nothing on her phone.

A work of art Mina is, nonetheless.

“It’s about time you finished your nightly routines in the bathroom,” Mina yawns, locking her phone, setting it on Momo’s bedside table. “I didn’t peg you to be more vain than Nayeon, and she has, like, six different creams on her face every night.”

“I had zits when I was a kid, okay,” Momo explains, checking her phone for messages and finds none, so she sets it aside as well.

Bette Davis Eyes plays softly in the background, as she huddles closer to Mina, under the coccoon of sheets and feels an overwhelming amount of content.

Momo reaches across the bed to turn off the lights and they’re in the darkness, fatigue from the day’s work and the day’s work alone. She’d been too tired to offer sex to Mina, and Mina seemed tired too, from the way her shoulders slump a slight angle when she always has her back straight. It’s nothing new that they sleep together in the literal (and most innocent) sense, when they’re too tired for anything else.

Sleep almost washes over her from the sheer calm that her pillows and the warm of Mina’s body offer as she clings to Mina tightly, but Momo hears Mina speak, her attention tuning into her almost at once.

“Why do you have glow in the dark stars on your ceiling?” Mina asks softly, even more softly than her normal talking tone though Momo had grown accustomed to both. “I’m not complaining; it’s pretty cute. I’ve wanted to ask for some time.”

“I was scared of the dark when I was a kid, so my dad put up those things in my room back home,” answers Momo through a yawn. “It’s comforting, especially when I moved out of the house and came here for college.”

Mina doesn’t say anything, only tightens her arm around Momo. She isn’t sure if she feels a fleeting kiss pressed to her hair, though Momo is sure that whatever it is, it’s pleasant and it tugs at her heartstrings.

The last thing Momo sees before falling asleep is Mina, after a quick glance, seeing her with her eyes open, an arm crooked above her head, as she stares intently at her ceiling, looking so entranced by simple cream-colored stars and a half-moon.

Momo smiles and snuggles closer.

She dreams in black and white; dreams of gentle bass and slow steps with Mina, in a gorgeous black dress.

-

“The most wonderful thing happened today,” Mina says upon entry to Momo’s apartment.

“Hmm?” Momo hums, her mouth occupied with brushing her teeth as she follows Mina into the kitchen when the pianist deposits her bag there, with the biggest smile on her face as if it’s about to split in half. She spits into the sink and rinses her mouth, turning to Mina.

Mina is completely unfazed by Momo’s state of undress, in a torn old shirt and just her underwear, and she’s still beaming at Momo and goddamn, it’s really pretty that Momo is going to go blind in maybe a few seconds if she stares directly at Mina’s face. “Remember that project my conductor wanted me to try? The youth charity orchestra thing?”

“Yeah?”

“I got it. I’m going to be a conductor!” Mina is shaking at this point, her happiness coming off in vibes.

She’d been going on about it for the past few weeks, complaining about another girl probably taking the spot, so when Mina squeals in sheer joy, Momo can’t help but feel it with her. She’s proud of Mina, so very proud of her. “Holy shit, that’s great!”

Mina lets out high-pitched giggles when Momo takes her into her arms and spins her around as much as she can in her small apartment, Mina’s weight barely making itself known and it’s great, she’s ecstatic and she’s proud and Mina deserves this project more than anyone else. 

Her heart thumps madly in her chest when she finally lets Mina down, the other girl’s arm around her neck and they stand there, in the middle of Momo’s small kitchen, exchanging elated kisses and grinning like idiots.

“Hi,” Momo smiles at her, eyes alternating between Mina’s eyes that are more alight now than ever. “You’re really great. Did you know that, princess.”

“Hi,” Mina smiles back, grinning and breathing heavily just as much. “I’m not sure, though you’re not so bad yourself, Hirai Momo.”

“Hmm. I don’t know a lot of things, but I do know that I want to cook your favorite dishes for you to celebrate,” says Momo, swaying their connected bodies side to side. “What do you say to that, Miss Youth Orchestra Conductor?”

“I say that I’m looking forward to it and also the celebratory sex, yes?”

Momo grins at her, hand already finding its way under Mina’s sweater. “Thought you’d never ask.”

-

“Really nice work today, guys,” Dahyun says, typing away furiously on her laptop with her headphones only on one side. “We’re almost done with our demos even if we don’t have a title song yet.”

Momo pouts. They never anticipated that writing the title song would be a slight challenge, considering that their EP title song had only been a remaster of an audience favorite. She’s been working on possible chord progressions with her Jihyo, but they just couldn’t get that chord progression, if you knew what she meant.

They pack their stuff up, grab some dinner, when Momo’s phone pings when she’s halfway through her burger.

[10:04:35 PM] Princess Myoui: How’s recording?

[10:42:01 PM] Uncultured Swine: Washed up at the tender age of 23 lmao

[10:45:10 PM] Princess Myoui: Aww, don’t worry, baby.

You’ll find inspiration. :) Come over after dinner?

[10:45:25 PM] Princess Myoui: Nayeon finally left and stopped pestering me

because Chaeyoung finally replied after your recording session.

Momo grins at her phone, a piece of lettuce falling from her mouth, a sight that Chaeyoung witnesses, sending the youngest girl into a fit of laughter even after Momo flips her the bird.

[10:45:30 PM] Uncultured Swine: Yep haha she doesnt reply when shes busy with her ~art.

Let me finish my food and ill find my way there

“No texting on the table,” Jihyo chastises her, swatting her hand, nearly sending her phone into the metal bowl of the diner, with grease and sauce and Momo can’t fight back because, well, it’s Jihyo. Momo finishes the rest of her food in less than four bites and it feels like maybe she’s going to choke on a piece of meat, but she’s seeing Mina, so she bids her friends goodbye, leaves with her bass guitar strapped to her body, and drives to Mina’s house.

Momo had always thought Mina’s house was beautiful. Rustic, with high ceilings and polished wood, remnants of her parents placed neatly about. She doesn’t understand why Mina prefers her apartment over this.

(Though the way her shoes echo across the vast rooms and halls is a telling sign that maybe Mina doesn’t like the emptiness, despite it being full of items of her parents.)

“Mina-yah?” Momo calls out once she makes her way to Mina’s room. “Where are you?”

“In the bathroom,” Mina replies, through the small opening of the door at the end of her room. “Come in.”

A sight for sore eyes, Myoui Mina is as she sits in the bath tub, the bubbles covering nearly everything as the water only reaches the top of her breasts, her pinks of her knees peeking out of the water. A sight of sore eyes she is, with her hair knotted in a messy bun, turning to Momo when she enters the room that smells of lavender.

Momo is rendered speechless by the attractive sight—she can’t speak, not even when Mina grins at her and says, “Hi, baby.”

If anything else, that makes her brain short circuit even more. Mina had never called her that, like ever, except maybe in bed when she praises Momo for being a good girl and—

“I b-brought some shakes from the, uh,” she manages to say with difficulty, trying to shake off the image of Mina and her in bed at an inappropriate time even if Mina is naked and in a bath and so very pretty and she gives Momo kisses that taste like mint.

“Want to join me in this fine bubble bath?” Mina asks once they pull away from each other, her hand still gripping the front of Momo’s shirt with damp hands. “There’s enough space for two. Come, relax.”

Momo only grins, a pleasant heat in her chest expands immensely, and leans in for some more short and sweet minty kisses before stripping off her jacket to join in the bubble bath.

(“See? We fit perfectly in this tub,” Mina tells her, when Momo lowers herself into the water, creating tiny splashes until she finds a comfortable position between Mina’s bare legs in warm, lavender scented water.

“You’ve had other people here, haven’t you,” Momo grumbles, hates the idea of thinking Mina enjoying a nice bubble bath with another girl. Or boy.

“No, no,” Mina laughs, hands finding the tense muscles of Momo’s back, rubbing in circles to release some tightness from the day and Momo moans. “Just you.”)

-

“And then Jihyo—”

“I’m sorry to interrupt,” a male voice cuts off Momo’s story of the legendary time when Jihyo paraglided into a restaurant balcony, crashing into a table. Mina laughter dies down when she turns to the new presence, her smiling eyes shifting into surprise all at once.

“Mark?” Mina says, standing up from their table to embrace the guy in an expensive-looking tuxedo. “Goodness, it’s been so long!”

“Mina,” Mark laughs, whoever the fuck he is, with his good looking face and his tailored suit and the way he has his arm low on Mina’s back when they hug. “My god. You look amazing.”

“So do you,” Mina beams, then looks at Momo at the corner of her eye. “This is, uh, my… friend, Momo. Momo, this is my ex boyfriend, Mark.”

“How do you do,” he says, offering his hand and while Momo wants to ignore it completely for being an extremely attractive and polite ex boyfriend that Mina has never mentioned before, though she doesn’t, only takes it and gives a firm handshake that may or may not be tighter than necessary.

Mark winces a bit when Momo lets go after Mina kicks her under the table, mouthing a small behave. While Momo had not crushed his large hand that may or may not have touched Mina in appropriate places, it was a painful grip from self defense classes provided by her dad, so she smirks when Mark holds his other hand tenderly as he engages in conversation, seemingly uninterested (or afraid) of Momo, who plays with the stringbeans on her plate.

Momo hates herself, hates herself so much for feeling jealous clawing at her innards, especially when Mark is extra touchy with Mina while she keeps a safe distance between them.

It’s stupid and irrational because Momo’s just a fuckbuddy, a friend that gets Mina off, and the dumb feelings she continues to push to the back of her mind is getting in the way of all the fun they’re having when with other girls she’s never had a problem of sleeping with no feelings.

This isn’t part of their arrangement—this irrational jealousy—though it doesn’t stop her from feeling and acting like a kicked puppy, even after Mark bids them goodbye; even after Momo foots the bill, even after they’re at Momo’s car and it’s Mina’s turn to drive.

Stupid ex boyfriend that’s an idiot to break up with Mina for whichever reason.

Stupid Mina that spent seven minutes and thirty six seconds talking to stupid ex boyfriend.

Stupid ex boyfriend that’s an adonis of some sort. Stupid Mina who is too good for stupid ex boyfriend.

“So I’m not sure up to when you’re going to keep up this kicked puppy thing,” Mina asks while they’re at a stoplight and goddamn, she has to stop looking extremely attractive while she drives. “But I’m taking that meeting my ex boyfriend has a lot to do with this kicked puppy thing.”

It has everything  to do with this kicked puppy thing, though Momo isn’t about to let Mina know that.

She only crosses her arms even tighter, the seat belt digging into her arm uncomfortably.

“Ah, so you’re not gonna talk, are you,” Mina says, though she it’s done with an amused tone, as if Mina is enjoying seeing Momo with this kicked puppy thing.

“Nope,” Momo replies. It’s the first thing she’s said in over an hour.

“You talked right now.”

She mimics zipping her lips. “Mmhmmp.”

“Okay,” laughs Mina, stepping on the clutch and adjusting the gear, the car moving forward and damn it, no one should look this attractive while driving, not when Mina drives like a mom or a total road square. “So I gusss you aren’t going to answer me if I ask you if you’re jealous—”

“No!” Momo yells instantly, blood rushing to her cheeks. Her seatbelt burns against her neck at the sudden movement. “Jesus, no!”

Mina, the minx and the attractive devil she is, only laughs louder at Momo’s discomfort. “Sure,” she says, as if she thinks that Momo’s lying when she truly is, though Mina would be thick-faced to think that.

Sort of.

Whatever.

Fuck what Mina thinks, right?

She isn’t jealous of anything, nope. Not when Mina has an attractive ex boyfriend that probably lives in a really big house and probably works at the stock exchange and—

“He’s gay, Momo,” Mina tells her. “He was my childhood friend and I agreed to be his beard just to keep his family off his back, but I knew he was gay from the start.”

“Oh.” Momo says, because, well, her gaydar worked better than this. “Okay.” Momo says, because it’s all she can say.

“It’s poor comfort, I know,” Mina laughs, “so if you were j—”

“I wasn’t jealous.”

“—ealous, you shouldn’t be.”

Momo waits for the you shouldn’t be jealous because we’re not together, or the you shouldn’t be jealous because you don’t have the right, though it never comes.

“There’s nothing going on between Mark and I; not now, not ever. Not even before!”

Oh.

She finds herself speechless, though it’s not a new sensation, because there had been serious moments like this that make Momo warm all over, as if she had taken a seat in front of a campfire: warm, content.

“Okay,” Momo says.

Mina smiles, and that’s the end of that thread of conversation.

(She sort of regrets taking it further, but Momo isn’t the least bit ready for that.)

-

Momo might be hallucinating, her wishful thinking getting the best of her when she sees that things change between them after that incident with Mark at the restaurant and that may be the indirect go signal that it’s fine for Momo to be jealous.

She may or may not be seeing things, but she is 98.5491% sure that it wasn’t a fever dream when they finally admit to one another that they’re not having sex with anyone else.

(“You still have the weirdest pillow talks ever.”

Momo laughs, and says, “got a lot to compare me to, princess?” before she can even stop herself. She mentally flicks herself in the forehead, very much like how Jihyo does when she’s being an idiot.

Well. Ripping off the band-aid has never caused Momo anything but regret.

But: “No, I actually don’t,” Mina replies and Momo can’t see her face, but the other girl’s voice is so solemn serious that the playful atmosphere evaporates at once.

When Mina turns to smile at Momo, the mood lightens a tad bit, though the push between Momo’s ribs remains unmoving.

Momo catches an unspoken question, sees it in Mina’s eyes that shift slightly when she doesn’t reply, and she says, “Yeah, me too,” she says and it feels like the weight on her naked chest has been lifted. “Not anymore, anyway.”

Mina smiles, softly, the fear in her eyes disappearing completely before she leans in to press a kiss to Momo’s forehead, gentle and tender that Momo thinks, hey, maybe she wants to be with me too.)

Things are more playful between them before they started sleeping with each other, though now there’s a certain kind of sweetness there that didn’t exist before. It’s in between their giggly kisses, borderline-painful footsie, and verbal banter with a single goal: to annoy the living daylights out of each other and that had always been one of Momo’s favorite things about this friendship or not-friendship.

(The night is colder than anyone had anticipated and since the sun is gone, the breeze turns into ice that as soon as Mina and Momo walk out of the restaurant, Mina shivers as she’s forgotten her coat inside the car.

Momo sheds her coat immediately, despite Mina’s protests, hanging it on her shoulders. “I don’t want your pretentious shoulders to freeze to death,” she rubs Mina’s shoulders as the pianist has done to her on multiple occasions. Her fingers are magical. Momo can only mimic it without any of Mina’s magic. “Don’t want you to catch a pretentious cold either.”

Mina only rolls her eyes and allows Momo to warm her, watching her with an unreadable expression when Momo sandwiches her hands between Mina’s bending down to blow warmth into them.

Later that night, Mina leaves a sleeping mask for her next recital, with a purple sticky note attached to it that says: for my next recital. Don’t want you to catch some pretentious germs from the culture there.

Momo appreciates it, though she finds no use to use the damn thing. She’d rather see Mina perform.)

Mina often visits her before the after-hours of the restaurant, when all the chefs are already winding down with some wine and cheese, and they eat together after Momo whips up easy meals with the best spices available. 

“You know, when we go out for dinner it means that I’m too tired to cook, right?” Momo tells her, the candlelight casting dancing orange lights on Mina’s face.

Mina only laughs and takes a bite off some pulled pork plums Momo had made; it escapes Momo how Mina manages to eat so attractively, but she’s not complaining, nope. Not at all.

Mina kisses her goodbye on the door steps of the restaurant when Momo walks her out—a sweet, long one that makes her toes curl because this is Mina and she’s loved Mina’s kisses even before Momo got tangled in this mess of emotions.

“Bye,” Mina mumbles, her hand over Momo’s heart. She’s wearing the bracelet Momo had won for her from the carnival after three attempts at shooting plastic ducks when Mina had won her a stuffed fox with just one try.

“Bye,” Momo says back, knocking their foreheads together and she likes this, loves this—that they kiss each other in public and hold hands like couples even if it drives her crazy that they’re not supposed to do this and that she’s not supposed to feel this way.

Jackson calls her attention with a wolfwhistle as he cleans the metal bowls by the sink. “Moguri. Was that girl your girlfriend?” He does an OK-sign with his soapy fingers and nods in approval. “Nice, nice.”

“No!” She yells, loud enough for it to echo through the empty kitchen. “No, nope. Just sleeping together.”

“Even nice-r!”

Momo throws a wet rag at him like she does with Jinyoung with a laugh though her chest is aching at the thought of Mina as her girlfriend. “Shut the fuck up, Wang.”

Maybe she should get checked by a shrink.

She doesn’t know who she is anymore, especially when she finds herself listening to Rachmaninoff before she goes to sleep.

Ah, Christ, Momo thinks to herself, switches the song to a Haim song because she doesn’t need to think about Mina more than she already does.

-

“Just Dance 2015? Really?” Mina raises an eyebrow, but she rolls up her sleeves nonetheless, swiping their arcade card to start the game.

“It has some pretty sick songs, don’t start,” Momo says, finishing the knot of her shoes. The other girls have found their ways within the empty arcade, to the horror shooting games and the karaoke booths and as dancers, Just Dance appeals to them as much as Guitar Hero does. “Let’s make this a little competition, yes?”

She loves bets; she loves bets with Mina. It reminds her of how they first became friends when their difference had brought them together. It reminds her of their millisecond-pressing of lips, of their fast and hard first time and the thousands of soft and gentle kisses they share now.

Momo leans closer to whisper, “first person who gets five stars for this song gets chocolate syrup off the loser’s body.”

The pianist blushes, though she grins at Momo, a competitive glint shining in her eyes and Momo knows that challenging Mina to a game, much more a dancing game, isn’t going to end well for her.

“Which song?”

Momo extends her hand to scroll to the right, moving it around to select the song.

Bad Romance by Lady Gaga. The extreme version.

Everything goes downhill from there the moment Mina starts moving from the start position, mimicking the dance perfectly and Momo can’t catch up because Mina is one star ahead of her.

“What the hell!” Momo exclaims breathlessly, sitting up and moving her arms up and down while shuffling. “You memorized the fucking dance!”

Mina barely breaks a sweat with the difficult footing and the extravagant hand movements, eyes barely watching the screen. “I used to—” they dip their heads, extending their arms to move their hips, “work out through Just Dance when I’m too—” a half spin, and another, “lazy to go to the gym.”

The choreo is too difficult to keep up with even if Momo loves dancing, and as a first-timer, catching the dance the first time is difficult and she’s always a beat late, thus the GOOD she receives where Mina’s score say PERFECT and now Mina is two stars away from five and Momo has to think quick—she needs a way to sabotage Mina and an idea pops into her head when—

The pre-chorus is always Momo’s favorite part; the you know that I want you, and you know that I need you, for both the song and the choreo from the music video, because from the kneeling position before it, Momo takes Mina’s shoulder and pushes her lightly, enough to get her on her ass before she straddles Mina and gives her a lapdance, just like in the MV where Gaga straddles the guy and does exactly as Momo’s doing right now.

“Wha—” Mina’s eyes blow wide when Momo sits on her lap and starts grinding on her, rendering Mina speechless, her jaw hanging as she watches Momo with a mix of absolute horror and unmistakable arousal as Momo dances in her lap for the pre chorus. Momo only smirks at her when she sees that Mina is flushed red, even through the blue neon lights casted over their faces the moment she moves away to continue her dance and sees that Mina’s score halts at three stars, giving Momo ample time to catch up and resume like nothing had happened while Mina sits still, stares at absolutely nothing with her mouth open, clearly in shock about Momo giving her a lapdance in public.

It’s too late when Mina regains any semblance of movement and Momo can only laugh at how she’s always a beat late now, her scoreboard displaying OK in magenta letters, the dazed look in Mina’s eyes never dissipating.

The song ends with Mina being a star behind Momo, Momo taking five stars.

“You’re a cheater,” Mina tells her, slightly out of breath. “You—that wasn’t—”

“Part of the rules?” She steps closer to the pianist, sees that she’s flushed to her neck with beads of sweat shining on her forehead. “Princess, there are no rules. You really want to eat chocolate off my tummy that much, huh?”

Mina opens her mouth to argue but finds nothing to say, only to concede defeat with eyes narrowing at Momo before they select easier dances winning five stars from all.

(Just to tease Mina, Momo plays Bad Romance later, at Momo’s place, as she licks a stripe of chocolate up the plane of Mina’s abs.

They don’t get far, though; Mina can’t stop laughing because it tickles her and the mood is thoroughly ruined so they take the strawberry ice cream from the fridge and use the chocolate syrup on those instead as they eat from a shared bowl, on Momo’s bed, in just their underwear.)

-

Let it be said that Momo is the queen of ignoring pressing matters.

She’s managed to ignore Chaeyoung for an entire week when Chaeyoung broke her favorite non-stick pan. She’s managed to ignore Jihyo’s death-glares whenever she’s too much of a little shit that flirts with their groupies and fans. It was a challenge to ignore her feelings for Mina for the entire time they’ve kept at this arrangement of theirs, whatever arrangement it is, with only fucking and no feelings but Momo managed, even if her feelings for Mina struggles to claw its way to freedom.

Momo, however, is having some difficulty ignoring the subtle (is it, really?) shift in her relationship with Mina.

She tries to ignore the way it drives her crazy, especially when Mina kisses her like it means something, when Mina touches her like it means something, when Mina looks at Momo like she means something to her, more than a friend and more than someone who gets her off on a more than regular basis.

Many would call it cowardice; Many would call Momo someone who is afraid of confrontation, and she really, truly was afraid of confrontation though no one can blame her for that, can they? Not when she doesn’t want this thing with Mina to end, when she realizes that maybe admitting to these feelings that shouldn’t be there would mean that they’d have to stop spending time with each other and as much as Momo might never ever tell Mina, she doesn’t want this to end and Momo would like to prolong this as long as she can.

Chances are, this ends prematurely because Mina finds out she has said feelings that shouldn’t be there and that she doesn’t want to be anything more than fuck buddies with Momo.

There are telling signs that maybe, just maybe Mina doesn’t want to be fuck buddies forever. Momo can’t be sure—Momo doesn’t ever want to be sure because she isn’t at all ready for the crushing heartbreak that comes with a rejection from one drop-dead gorgeous, magnanimously kind and freakishly talented Myoui Mina.

-

She doesn’t know why, but Mina seems to really like Momo’s apartment more than her own home.

Like she’d said before, Mina stuck out in the best way. As if she’s some expensive fixture in Momo’s humble home but it belongs there. As if Mina’s the puzzle piece that completed this home, making it an even more comfortable living space for Momo.

It’s a simple apartment. Nothing much. Jeongyeon and Chaeyoung own almost all the appliances.

It’s a simple apartment but Momo makes it a point their kitchen is as high-end an apartment kitchen can be. A complete spice rack. The latest equipment. Pyrex plates and pots. The best La Germania stove one can avail of that fits this small space.

Mina fits in every space of this house except the kitchen. Momo, with her back to the edge of the dining table, watches amusedly as Mina aimlessly putters about the kitchen. She had offered the pianist some help, but Mina insists in making breakfast for the both of them.

Momo can’t complain. Mina’s immaculate legs that go on for days are in full view, and she looks magnificent in Momo’s Led Zeppelin muscle shirt as she walks around in only that and the underwear she has stashed in a drawer that Momo had emptied for her.

She seems to have given up, though, when Mina can’t break the egg properly, getting pieces of egg shells into the pan. Momo laughs at when Mina hides her face in embarrassment, padding over to fit her body into Mina’s back.

“Don’t worry, princess; I got you.” Momo says, arms moving past Mina’s body to position her hands at a safe distance from the pan. She watches the pan over Mina’s shoulder, Momo’s chin digging into the soft flesh as she nimbly picks out the debris of egg shells in the pan. “Cracking an egg perfectly is sort of like how you have to press the keys of the lowest octave of the piano,” Momo explains, laughing when Mina giggles at the tickling sensation that Momo’s chin on her tendons induces. “You have to press it hard enough, but you still have to do it quick or else you’ll miss a beat or a note, buy a half-second.” She cracks the egg at the edge of the pan with the expertise that comes with working at one of the fanciest restaurants in Seoul, the pan sizzling when the liquid settles onto the middle in a perfect circle.

Mina leans her head back on Momo’s shoulder, kissing just below her ear and it feels so horribly domestic that Momo can’t help but push down the thick emotion mixed with sheer content and happiness that comes with it. “Tell me more,” she tells Momo, her voice rough and used and sleepy, her hair tickling Momo’s ears as they bathe in the sunlight that comes through the windows by Momo’s kitchen.

They (Momo, mostly) cook a simple egg with Momo guiding Mina’s hands with her own; Mina pretends to be her puppet, laughing when Momo blows raspberries into the back of her neck once in awhile.

(“You’re like that cat from those funny videos back in 2010.” Momo tells her once they season the egg with salt and pepper. “The one they play after a fail video.”

“The keyboard cat?”

“Yep! It’s appropriate too! My favorite was the treadmill one.”)

They make Momo’s bed and sit, cuddled up beside each other as Mina reads through some book that’s going to be a movie this summer as Momo flips through the latest Gourmet Korea magazine when Mina suddenly stands up and grabs some of Momo’s clothes from her closet, the warmth of Mina beside her dissolves completely and a whine finds its way out of her mouth before she can even stop myself. “Where are you goooing,” she says, clinging to Mina’s arm. “It’s a Sunday today with no rehearsals for Seoul Phil and for that youth orchestra.”

Mina refuses to answer, thus resulting in a tiny tug of war on a lazy Sunday morning until Mina finally sits back on the bed with Momo still adhered to her arm, Momo’s cheek squished on Mina’s elbow. “I’m going to the wax parlor,” explains Mina, subtly pulling away her arm from Momo’s grip.

“Wax parlor? For what?” She pulls at Mina’s arm to check her underarm to find it still smooth as a baby’s bum.

“Not there,” Mina seems embarrassed, most especially when she looks away and says, “you know. There.”

“There where?”

Mina looks down and the gears of Momo’s brain start working. Oh. There. “Why?”

The pianist shrugs, moving a tad bit away from Momo but she doesn’t let Mina anymore farther than she is right now. “So it’s not messy when we—”

“I don’t mind,” Momo butts in. “Uh, I really, really don’t. So uh, if you’re doing it for me, you don’t have to.”

She doesn’t expect that the first time she ever feels awkward around Mina is when they talk about hairless habits when they’ve fucked for more than half a year.

“Really?” Mina laughs, though it’s shy and awkward and very, very endearing that it tugs at Momo’s heartstrings quite well.

“Yeah. I mean,” Momo clears her throat. “I’m not hairless and you don’t mind, right?”

Mina shakes her head, watching Momo with amusement that Mina only reserves for her and her alone. “No, not at all.”

“See?” She hauls Mina back into the bed and Mina follows, doesn’t resist until she’s on top of Momo, already clutching her copy of The Girl On The Train.

It’s horribly domestic and horribly confusing because this definitely wasn’t part of the unspoken arrangement when they decided to fuck on a regular basis without feelings involved.

Well, Momo is definitely feeling right now.

Damn it.

-

[1:40:11 AM] Princess Myoui: Done with recording yet? It’s 10 in the evening. Get some rest.

Momo zips up her bag, but she stops to reply.

[1:45:38 AM] Uncultured Swine: Yeah just finished. Ur place or mine?

[1:45:48 AM] Princess Myoui: Yours. I’ll bring pad thai. :)

They eat with takeout boxes on their crossed legs on Momo’s bed in a silence that makes Momo feel relax as they passively watch classic Scooby Doo on the channel that plays old cartoons.

Momo finds that it’s always like this, recently. The day ending with her and Mina eating some takeout or something Momo had cooked, as they’re seated side by side.

She doesn’t know exactly when sleeping together resulted with them literally sleeping with each other—and Momo realizes that she can’t sleep without Mina to cling to at night; she can’t sleep without her nose buried into Mina’s watermelon-scented hair as she spoons her from behind, their bodies fit together as perfectly as any puzzle ever created.

She wonders if this is what love felt like—the completeness Momo feels when Mina is around, as if Mina were a missing piece she never knew she was missing because Mina fits every pocket of her life perfectly. Momo pushes the thought of them working out away, because merely the thought of being in love with Mina and hoping that feels the same about her is only going to get her in trouble.

She wonders if this is what love felt like, when Momo’s alarm rouses her from the sleep she doesn’t even know she fell into but she sees she’s in her underwear and Chaeyoung’s paint-shirt, with Mina’s sleeping form half on top if her.

She wonders if this is what love felt like, when Mina raises her head to look at Momo with half lidded eyes and a pretty, sleepy beam that drives Momo insane in the best way; when Mina snuggles closer, speaks with tiredness clinging to her throat as she whispers a solemn “good morning,” to Momo. She wonders if this what love felt like, when Momo can’t find anything to say because she is lost in everything that is Mina—her pliant, sleep warm body in just her underwear and Momo’s Pink Floyd shirt. She wonders if this is what love felt like, when Mina straddles her, pinning her wrists to the bed, her giggles a symphony of violins playing in the most beautiful cathedral in Europe. She’s illuminated by the light that seeps through Momo’s blinds, outlining her with gold as her copper hair glows, the stars on her ceiling no match for Mina’s luminosity.

Momo wonders if this is what love feels like. Momo remembers Dahyun saying, we need a title song and lyrics about the things that matters the most to you.

When Mina saunters off to brush her teeth, Momo takes a piece of paper and writes.

-

Momo’s bed is big enough for the five of them to sit cross legged (and almost sort of on top of each other) when they decide to have a Netflix sleepover after being busy with their lives at school, and the kitchen for Momo.

Jihyo provides the popcorn; Dahyun, the laptop; Jeongyeon and Chaeyoung the soda drinks and Momo the large bed—it feels terribly like their high school days, though it’s nostalgic and Momo’s heart hurts at how they’re all getting older, venturing out into the adult world, but at least they’re getting older and venturing into the adult world together.

To say they’re surprised to see Momo’s room spick and span is the understatement of the century. There is a lot of gasping, a lot of questions and a ton of, “dear god, am I in your room right now?” from her bandmates.

Everything is in order—her once dirty clothes now have a hamper, her cooking magazines arranged in alphabetical order by the shelf. Plastic bottles gone, emptying the flat surfaces of her room and yeah, Momo is pretty proud of that even if she takes slight offense in her friends’ words. “Did you have a cleaning lady do it?” Jihyo asks, kicking the door closed and inspecting Momo’s clean floor. “It’s the first time I’ve stepped on the floor. Amazing. Nothing remotely dangerous to step on.”

She recalls the broken glass she had lying around. Jihyo had almost stepped on it and Momo had never felt the fear of God as she had in that moment alone.

“Not the cleaning lady, I feel,” Jeongyeon taps her chin, already lying down on Momo’s bed. “Momo never lets other people clean her stuff because she’s a lowkey hoarder.”

“Did Mina do it for you?” Jihyo asks and the band makes sound of agreement.

“You guys underestimate Momo too much,” Dahyun tells them. “Did you clean this up, Momo?” Their producer-slash-manager asks in such an elderly tone that makes Momo forget that Dahyun is two years her junior.

“Yeah, I did,” she says honestly, around a mouthful of popcorn. “It wasn’t easy but Mina hates it when I’m messy and I wouldn’t let her do it, so...uh, violá?”

A moment of silence takes them as they gape at Momo in disbelief and just as it’s about to become borderline uncomfortable, Jeongyeon takes her left arm and inspects her hand, her joints twisting painfully. “What the hell do you—ow—think you’re doing, Yoo Jeongyeon?!”

Her best friend doesn’t answer her; neither of her other friends do so, too. “What do you—” she begins to demand once more.

“We’re just checking if you’re not married to Mina yet,” Chaeyoung blanches, inspecting the her ring finger. “Hmm. No ring tattoos. They could have gotten married in court. But we’re in Korea. So I guess not.”

“Married?!” Momo yells, taking her hand away from them. “She’s not even my girlfriend!”

“Ah,” Jihyo nods. “But you want her to be.”

Momo raises her voice, clutching her pillow tighter because Jihyo isn’t lying (or is she?), “Oh yeah? Well—”

“Well what, Momo?” Jeongyeon stuffs her mouth with popcorn. “Your puppy eyes for each other tell us that that’s exactly what you want.”

Puppy dog eyes? Momo doesn’t recall any of those as she stares at them in horror when Jihyo says, “If you want her to be your girlfriend, quit being a wuss and ask her.”

“G-girl, girlf-friend?” She stammers, the terrifying thought removing all her semblances of speech. “I don’t…want her to be my girlfriend.”

Chaeyoung throws her head back in laughter. “You’re gonna have to talk about it one day.”

“No, we don’t.”

“Yes, you do.”

“No—”

Jihyo takes her by the shoulders and shakes her lightly. “Just think about it this way: if you don’t ask now, she might find someone else that has the guts to ask her for things to be official.”

The thought of Mina being someone else makes Momo sad and angry and feeling all the feelings that friends with benefits shouldn’t feel, and it physically pains her to experience all these things and knowing you have no right—it physically pains her to know that she doesn’t know where she stands with Mina.

“That wasn’t part of the arrangement,” Momo admits sadly, truthfully and instead of feeling relief of finally speaking about this pressing matter that she’d been pushing away, her heart aches even more now that it’s staring at her right in the face and she has no choice but to stare right back. “I don’t know. Maybe she doesn’t want that.”

Jeongyeon jumps on the bed and squishes Momo’s face in her hands. “Open your eyes, Hirai Momo! She wants you!”

“As her booty call,” Momo says dejectedly, trying to move away from her best friend and she doesn’t exactly understand the look of consternation plastered on her friends’ faces. “We’re not ready to be anything more than this with each other. I’m not ready.”

That catches the attention of her friends; They might have made sure she faced this uncomfortable situation instead of running away and pretending everything is alright like Momo always does, though they know that the main reason Momo hasn’t been in long-term relationships in the past is because all of her past ones had fallen apart at the seams.

2X were Momo’s friends first before her bandmates, and it always, always be that way—she will die trying to always make it be that way. They know her more than anyone else; have been there through all the rough patches of her life and they know better than to rush Momo when she’s not ready when that’s gotten her in more trouble than she’d like to remember.

“Okay,” Jihyo relents. “You have a point.” Momo hears the unsaid we don’t want you to get hurt, but not feeling any hurt? With Myoui Mina? Impossible.

The funny thing about that is that Mina would never intentionally hurt her; too kind, too good, too caring. Mina would never.

It’s all on Momo, for wanting more than what’s given to her. It’s all on Momo, for being too afraid.

Momo doesn’t understand the movie they’re watching. She only curls in herself, her chin on her knees, mulling over plausible plan of actions and finds that she has none.

-

“And that’s a wrap—the title song is amazing,” Dahyun spins to them, pressing pause as a prototype of their album plays another loop. “Your songwriting has gotten really good. My god. I don’t wanna ask who or what inspired you but keep doing it.”

Jeongyeon snickers. “Yeah, she’ll keep doing it, alright.”

The knuckle-shaped bruise on her best friend’s arm is well-deserved, if anything.

-

She finds Mina in all the pockets of her life.

A book of hers on Momo’s bedside table. Pairs of underwear stacked in a spare cabinet drawer—bras hanging on the rack behind Momo’s bathroom door. Mina’s eyebrow pencils neatly placed in a Mickey Mouse she provides herself, sitting on Momo’s dresser.

It doesn’t dawn upon Momo how engrossed Mina is in her life until one night, she returns her toothbrush into its cup when Momo notices the purple toothbrush her own knocks into, matching her own mint green one.

Momo recalls the cereal that Mina prefers over her own chocolate flakes one, stored neatly in her cupboard. Mina’s bangles right beside her canvas and leather bracelets. Mina’s loafers beside Momo’s own pair of sneakers.

Her heart swells to the point of pain, at the thought of Mina being too in her life that having her away is going to hurt her more than staying like this, because this is just fine. She’s still having fun. Mina’s company is more than perfect and there is no need to always impress the other.

This is fine, Momo says, snapping a toothbrush cover on Mina’s brush, to match her own.

-

Turns out Jeongyeon is right again and she hates it.

Momo curses her best friend under her breath as she clutches her clothes to her chest, squished inside one of Mina’s large closets with her laundry-scented clothes in only her underwear, trying not to make a sound as she listens to Mina and Mina’s mother speaking to each other in their native dialect. Momo catches bits and pieces of their conversation, though its speed and also the wooden door between them makes it difficult to fully understand.

It had started when Momo bit the muscles of Mina’s stomach lightly, enough to leave a small mark but not enough to bruise and things escalated from there, just slow, lazy making out that moved to slow, lazy foreplay until several knocks on the large doors of the master’s bedroom echo throughout the room, making the two of them jump away from each other like two hormonal teenagers caught jumping each other’s bones when they thought their parents were away.

That’s exactly what it is, only they’re two consenting adults and that she’s not about to meet Mina’s mom for the first time while she’s in just her panties, with Mina’s hand jammed inside it.

(“Fuck. That’s my mom,” Mina whispers as they stare at each other with wide eyes, the incessant knocking growing more impatient each second. “I forgot—shit!” She pushes Momo off and scrambles for her bathrobe.

“Your mom was coming over and you forgot?” Momo hisses, doing the same and collecting her bra, shirt and jeans while scoping for a place to hide.

“Mina,” Mina’s mom calls through the heavy doors followed by more knocks. “Are you awake?”

“Hide in that closet over there,” Mina instructs her, pointing to small walk-in closet reserved for Mina’s shoes and jeans. “Be right there, Mama!”)

Jesus. Who the hell forgets about her mom visiting for the weekend?

Mina, apparently. Damn it, Mina.

She moves her shoulders but finds no space to adjust. This is the first time Momo has spent more than ten minutes inside a closet, in both the literal and figurative sense.

Jeongyeon had predicted this, and she was just as right as all those other times in college where she told Momo this and that and Momo doesn’t listen, only does what she wants and when it bites her in the ass, Jeongyeon only laughs at her and says I told you so.

The times Momo hates Jeongyeon for being right comes to her in brief flashes of irritation.

Like that time in college, where Jeongyeon had said Momo will forget the keys to her own apartment and soon enough she did. Another instance was that time Jeongyeon was sure that Chaeyoung was drinking from her stash of liquor and Momo had insisted Jihyo was the culprit.

Maybe she should have listened to Jeongyeon when she said that she thinks Mina’s mom is visiting within the week to watch Seoul Phil’s concert. “If her mom’s coming then there’s a slight chance you’ll meet her,” Jeongyeon had said, and Momo winces when she overhears the conversation that’s currently taking place, as she only comprehends some familiar words from Mina’s dialect.

“Hi, Mama,” Momo hears Mina greet, with two loud kisses to the cheek and she doesn’t catch the rest of the conversation until Mrs. Myoui switches dialect, asking if Mina’s seeing anyone.

“No,” Mina tells her. “Too busy, you know, with the youth orchestra and the Philarmonic.”

“Then whose guitar is that?” Mrs. Myoui asks, and Momo remembers that her acoustic bass leans on the wall beside Mina’s bed. Her subconscious tells her she is an idiot.

“My… friend’s.”

There’s a beat of tense, disbelieving silence that Momo can hear Mina’s thoughts reverbating to her own wavelength of thinking, full of cuss words for being too transparent.

“Uh-huh,” Mrs. Myoui speaks in English, and Momo doesn’t understand what Mrs. Myoui says next, though some keywords like ‘meet your friend’ and ‘dinner’, tells her enough that she’s fucked into the next dimension and probably more—she groans internally, because Mina doesn’t say anything, only tells her that her friend will be cooking for them, and Mina says it in Korean as it’s also an indirect message to her.

Momo doesn’t come out until Mina’s mom leaves and Mina locks the door.

They sit side by side at the edge of the bed, hips together, looking at everything except each other, Mina still in her silk robe and Momo in her underwear.

“So I guess I’m making dinner for your mom. Who is one of the best cooks you know.”

“Yep.” 

“I’m going to have to dress up nicely and I shouldn’t use that Kiss The Cook apron.”

“Yep.”

“Do you always speak to your mom in like, four different languages?”

“Yep.”

“The first half of the dinner, I felt like I was in Masterchef and your mom was Chef Ramsey.” Momo tells her as she wipes the last plate before neatly placing it in its rack and takes the wine she had brought earlier today, pulling out the cork. “I have never met any of my ex-girlfriend’s parents but I know it’s not supposed to feel that way.” 

Mina laughs, leans on the counter and sips the leftover wine that she and Momo split, from a glass as Momo forgoes glasses completely. “It sort of is like Masterchef, in a sense. Like, you have to present something, make sure they like it. Or something like that.”

Momo grumbles unintelligible words under her breath before Mina pads to her quietly, settling her glass on the counter, both arms on Momo’s sides, trapping her against it. “Hey. You did well. To quote my mother, exceptional food, Momo.”

Mina kisses the pout on her face away and Momo can’t help the smile that graces her lips when they do, kissing tenderly in Mina’s barely-used kitchen.

“She knows we’re fucking, by the way.”

“She knows what?!”

Mina laughs and steps away with her wine glass, settling beside Momo, their arms linked. “Don’t worry, Mom’s fine with it.”

Oh. She exhales a sigh of sheer relief. “I’m more concerned on how or why she knows that we’re…”

Momo feels rather than sees Mina shrug. “I don’t really know. She might be an X-men and can see if two people are sleeping together.”

“That’s… wild.” Momo grimaces. “Must be hard for you growing up.”

Mina sighs, tightens the link of their arms and snuggles closer to Momo. “No, not really. I wasn’t exactly promiscuous and I didn’t bring anyone for her to meet, except for Mark whom she knew was gay from the start.” She laughs when Momo downs the rest of the bottle in one go. “She likes you, though, I’ll give you that. As my… friend. Or something.”

A lull falls between them and it feels like an open wound without protection and Momo can feel that Mina backpedals to that phrase, dissecting it—her silence after a risky statement (which had been popping up here and there, quite often) usually means that.

This is her chance to ask. This is her chance to bring up whatever this is and wherever this is going. This is Momo’s chance and it’s at the tip of her tongue, willing to escape so she can finally get this off her back even if it’s going to bite her in the ass

She means to ask: what are we, Mina? Or: am I your girlfriend, Mina? Maybe: Can I be yours to keep?

However: “so the condescending resting bitch face is genetic, huh.”

Mina laughs, a small one, fitting for this intimate moment that Momo had maybe thoroughly ruined. “Yes, I guess so. But you like this condescending resting bitch face.”

It takes a moment for her to realize that yeah, she loves that condescending resting bitch face and so much more, although if you asked her, Momo likes the way Mina smiled when Momo had bonded with Mrs. Myoui about the woes of spices earlier—bright, can light up the entire city, the silver tooth Momo had despised before now an endearing sight that grips Momo’s heart with emotion.

-

The girls from the orchestra arrive earlier than expected, catching 2X rehearsing some new songs for their album release right before Girlfriends, Not-Girlfriends and Designated Single Friend horror movie night, much to Nayeon and Momo’s reluctance.

Mina, Nayeon, Tzuyu and Sana have begged to hear samples of the song but they had resisted their cute pouting but not without difficulty. Chaeyoung nearly broke, because Nayeon is too damn cute for any of them, really but they’re still standing and not letting any of them near any of the raw files of the album.

The movie watching goes pretty uneventful—save for the times Nayeon weeps when things get too scary. The film was good enough to catch their attention because none of the couples disappear to make out with each other like the hormonal teenagers they used to be.

It’s nice, being with 2X and the orchestra girls like this. It’s when Momo feels that she’s grateful all her friends and their girlfriends get along with each other even if dating within the same circle of friends might fuck everything up but everyone is doing well; everyone is happy though if it does happen, they’ll cross that bridge when they get there, together.

They retire to their rooms, Momo and Mina left on the couch with Mina’s legs over Momo’s lap as they talk and laugh quietly.

“What were you playing earlier when we got here?”

Yikes. “Uh,” Momo says, and decides to play it safe by partially telling the truth. “The intro of one of our new songs. If you’re gonna ask more, these lips are sealed.” She mimics zipping her mouth to make a point.

Mina toes at her lap. “I’m not asking that, stupid. Can you play it again?” When she sees Momo’s reluctance, she pouts her lips in an adorable attempt of cuteness that Momo has a hard time resisting. “Pleeease? For me?”

She grumbles when she takes her acoustic bass guitar from the wall, playing it for Mina, who watches her fingers move across fretboards. “Try adding a Cmaj7 before that Bminor.”

It sounds really good and fits the rest of the chord progression, and Momo nods in satisfaction. “Good, yes?”

Momo nods before muttering show off goodnaturedly, and Mina laughs before standing to go to the kitchen for a glass of the soy milk Momo keeps for her; jumping when Momo squeezes her ass through her gorgeous cycling shorts as Mina’s legs go on for days, accentuated by her long shirt that Momo had been looking for for months—

“Hey, that’s my shirt, Mina-yah!”

-

Jeongyeon is 24 today, though no one is really surprised when she rents out the entirety of the largest children’s playground in South Korea; with large slides, a giant ball pit and trampolines for all her friends, like the eleven year old child she really, truly is. 

“Do I look okay?” Mina asks once she nears where Momo stands, with her back to the car.

She had sworn off coming inside to pick Mina and Jeongyeon, thanks to last week’s incident taking the cake as one of the most awkward moments in Momo’s lifetime.

(“Oh, Sunmi-unnie, this is Momo, my… friend.” Mina says, like every single time she had introduced Momo to someone new. “Momo, this is Sunmi, she’s the leader of the cello section. She’s a bassist too!”

Sunmi’s eyes flash with recognition. “Aren’t you Jeongyeon’s best friend? And also that girl that sleeps in the front row every concert you’ve attended?”

Momo scratches the back of her neck and nods. “Yeah, that’s me. Uh, I don’t really sleep,” she explains, “I just do it to annoy the living daylights out of her.”

“Aww, that’s cute,” Sunmi coos, also eyeing Mina’s gym bag, its strap slung over Momo’s shoulder. She turns to Mina with a small smirk. “You didn’t say you had a girlfriend, Minari.”

Momo’s stomach drops, her sweaty palms gripping the flowers tighter and she’s sure how mortified she looks right now must be comical, especially when she shakes her head violently. “We’re not girlfriends,” she denies and Mina happens to say the same thing, too, simultaneously which leaves Sunmi stunned, though the amused smirk never leaves her face, not even for a moment.

“Oh, sorry,” she says though the look on her pretty face says she’s not sorry at all, obviously pleased to see Mina and Momo tense, their cheeks flushed at the sudden drop of the dreaded girlfriend word.

God. Momo can’t even say it.

Mark her words, she’s never, ever picking Mina and Jeongyeon stepping foot into the orchestra again.

So that’s a lie, by a long shot, but you know what Momo means.)

“Hey,” Mina calls Momo’s attention again. “Do I look okay?”

Momo snaps out of it and gives Mina a once over and, well, she looks amazing as per usual, in just her dance sweatpants, sneakers and a loose top.

A beauty in casual wear. Momo swoons silently.

She means to say, you look great or you’re really fucking beautiful but nothing comes out, except for: “You look awesomesauce.”

Mina bursts out in laughter. “Awesomesauce? Really? I think you watch too much Parks and Rec.”

She can’t stop staring at Mina, won’t ever get used to looking at her, so Momo doesn’t notice how Mina moves close enough to peck Momo on the lips. “Thanks,” she says against Momo’s mouth. “You look awesomesauce, too.”

Momo can’t stop smiling for the rest of the car ride to Jeongyeon’s birthday party.

It’s as fun as Jeongyeon promised, with people in their twenties running around the vast, airconditioned play place. They’re banned from certain areas made especially for toddlers, though the owner of the play place is Jeongyeon’s aunt, and she told her that they can get as crazy as a bunch of responsible adults can be in an environment made for kids.

On Momo’s part, there’s a lot of sliding from the large slide that extends from the second level of the play place, as they move down fast, with Mina between her legs, their hands in the air, yelling like a pair of eight year olds.

2X and the girls from the orchestra are enjoying it just as much, as they’re hip-deep into the ball pit, Jihyo, Chaeyoung and Nayeon engaged in ball warfare with Tzuyu, Jeongyeon, Sana and Dahyun.

Jeongyeon’s other friends find the jungle gym while Mina and Momo make their way to the ball pit, hand in hand, as their friends jump around, screaming aggressively that someone (Nayeon) may get hurt.

They jump into the ball pit together, their legs sinking into the pool of plastic balls and that’s the exact moment she feels Mina’s fingers digging into the tickle spot on either side of her waist and Momo jerks away from her, falling face-first into the multi-colored plastic balls, Mina’s laugh ringing in her ears.

“Mina-yah, you’re mean,” Momo pouts, covers all the spots Mina knows is her weakness.

“Who, me?” Mina asks innocently, flopping onto her belly and on top of the ball pit as she sinks lower, her hair falling out of her neat low ponytail. “Is… this mean?” She says with a grin before pulling up Momo’s shirt at the belly and tickling her even more until Momo cries from laughter, now neck deep in the ballpit with Mina’s legs attached to her waist.

Momo might suffocate if Mina doesn’t relent but she’s glad she does, when Mina only cuddles closer to Momo as much as she can with plastic balls between them.

That moment shrinks into just the two of them, as if their friends are jumping around miles away, and Mina and Momo are unmoving, submerged amidst colorful plastic balls as they stare at the other with goofy grins on their faces.

(Momo notices she’s always felt like this—felt like she creates her own world when she’s close to Mina or alone with Mina where only the two of them exist on that universal plane.)

It’s at the tip of her tongue, it’s always there; the words climbing up from her heart, through her throat and it wants out, wants to find its way to Mina’s ears.

Mina. I’m falling for you.

She wants to say it, just so Mina would know that Momo doesn’t want to be just this anymore—but asking for more terrifies Momo to the point that the words never fall from her lips and she pushes it to the back her mind once more as she kisses Mina, in the middle of a ballpit with Young Blood by the Naked and Famous playing all throughout the entire playground (it’s Chaeyoung’s playlist, Momo knows it) and feels young and reckless and in love—everything that she is right now, especially when with she’s with Mina.

Their lips almost touch and they’re so close Momo can feel Mina’s smile, until—

“Ow!” A ball hits the side of her head rather painfully, making her turn to the side with the small force, Mina’s lips landing on her cheek instead. She stands, searches for the culprit with a hand massaging the tiny throbbing pain on her temple. “Who did that?”

None of their friends speak up, only run away from the two of them so Mina and Momo take handfuls of plastic balls in their hands to throw it at all of them, now involved in this small-scale war between couples (sans Mina and Momo).

It’s fun and exhilarating, a night full of laughter and childishness among a bunch of twenty year olds, the girl of Momo’s dreams included.

Momo is young and in love, and so are her friends—the universe wants them this way. Young and in love and as right as rain.

-

Princess Myoui changed Uncultured Swine's nickname to Food&Sex Machine

Food&Sex Machine changed their nickname to Uncultured Swine

[4:55:42 PM] Uncultured Swine: OMG STOP MY FAMILY IS HERE

Princess Myoui changed Uncultured Swine's nickname to Baby Girl

[4:57:22 PM] Princess Myoui: Much better?

[4:57:25 PM] Baby Girl: Much better

[4:57:25 PM] Baby Girl: not changing urs cos youll always be my princess

-

Momo finds herself texting Mina as soon as she steps foot out of plane from her weekend back home.

[10:37:21 PM] Baby Girl: Landed as smooth as a baby’s bum

[10:45:33 PM] Princess Myoui: Welcome back. :)

[10:45:34 PM] Princess Myoui: Rewatching Sorcerer's Stone. Come over?

[10:45:38 PM] Baby Girl: Thats so nerdy :P be there in 30

Mina’s room is pitch black when Momo walks in, nearly tripping on Mina’s shoes by the door. The only source of light comes from Mina’s laptop as it shines on her face while Mina elegantly chews on popcorn.

“Hey,” Momo greets quietly, shrugging off her jacket and placing it neatly on Mina’s chair, like Mina had programmed her to do.

“Hi,” Mina grins, pulling Momo in for a quick kiss that melts into a succession of delicate kisses, Momo’s hands finding Mina’s jaw when she takes a seat at the edge of the bed, strands of Mina’s hair that falls from her messy bun brushing against her knuckles, soft as their lips press against one another. “I missed you.”

“I’ve only been gone a few days.”

“That’s three days without quality food and foot massages after rehearsals at the Youth Orchestra.”

Momo flicks her finger on Mina’s arm without really causing any harm. “Yeah. I missed you too, princess.”

They sit in silence, in each other’s embrace, because she had missed Mina’s presence and she had craved Mina’s warmth for the three days she was gone, with only selfies and voice messages but they were never enough.

“Oh and before I forget,” Mina says, her arm moving slightly away from Momo’s hug. “Look up.”

Momo’s confused since she knows a mirror hangs above their head, but her mouth drops in awe to see glow in the dark stars stuck on the canopy of Mina’s bed, green and yellow and white glowing amongst each other with tiny dots of what she thinks is glow in the dark paint.

Her chest warms pleasantly, at the thought of Mina recreating the glow in the dark stars she has in her own room, done with more effort of course and it feels like she and Mina are the only living things that exist, in this world very much like how Momo feels whenever they go for a night drive and park at their favorite cliff, watching the night sky and looking into the past.

“I arranged it in our star signs,” Mina whispers. “That’s Scorpio over there and that’s Aries here.”

“Wow, Mina, this is… wow,” Momo can’t find anything to say—she’s too busy looking up the literal embodiment of a canopy of stars above them.

“You like it?” The pianist inquires, soft, hopeful, with her hands curled into Momo’s shirt.

What Momo says is: “I love it.”

What Momo doesn’t say is: I love you.

-

Her own birthday arrives in a flurry of hectic shifts at the kitchen and finalizing things for their full-length album and suddenly Momo finds herself in Mina’s apartment with lots of food, brand new kitchenware, Nerf guns and some music equipment from all her friends.

It’s fun, and it’s so full of love, when her friends surround her, singing with large smiles with a cake Sana baked herself that she finds tears prickling her eyes because, yeah, her friends are idiots but they’re her idiots.

“Make a wish, baby,” Mina tells her, looking absolutely adorable in a Dora the Explorer party hat.

She smiles at Mina, then looks at the twelve dozen candles on her cake and wishes that she should be truthful to herself more often.

Momo admits two things to herself.

First is that she wishes that these people stay in her life forever because you don’t find people who work together, sewn together so easily upon meeting. She doesn’t mind spending the rest of her life with these eight girls in front of her.

Second is that she is hopelessly, helplessly, carelessly and wholeheartedly head over heels for one Myoui Mina.

“Inglourious Basterd’s OST was mediocre,” Mina says, a matter-of-factly. “Kill Bill vol 1 & 2 had the best Tarantino OST, but since it’s your birthday, I’ll let it slide.”

“Let what slide?” Momo cries indignantly, reaching across the space between the seats of her car to pinch Mina’s thigh, one of which Mina avoids narrowly. “It’s my opinion so there’s nothing to let slide.”

The girl in the passenger’s seat laughs at that. “Alright. But you better agree with me when I say that Mulan has the best OST besides Frozen.”

“Okay that I can ride with.”

Mina sips from Momo’s cup. “I want to know your opinion on Wes Anderson OSTs.”

“Uh, The Grand Budapest’s is my favorite. I haven’t seen Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou and The Royal Tenenbaums is a close second.” Momo says, turning to Mina in the driver’s seat, folding her knees and curling into the backrest. “Alexandre Desplat is one of my favorite composers.”

The pianist raises a perfectly shaped eyebrow at her. “Alexandre Desplat didn’t score The Royal Tenenbaums.”

“He did.” Momo crosses her arms. “He scored Fantastic Mr. Fox, too, I think.”

“He did not.”

“Are you sure?” Momo smirks. “Wanna bet?”

Those words hold more meaning now than it ever has before;they’ve gone a long way from their hesitant friendship that got off the wrong foot and now Momo has finally acknowledged her feelings for Mina, despite knowing full well that this isn’t going to end well, especially if she doesn’t reciprocate.

It had started with bets about music and then about everything and anything under the sun, now she’s here—in the cliff area overlooking Seoul where they’d shared hundred of kisses—in love with Myoui Mina, doing the exact same thing.

Mina seems to understand it, gives her a small smile but her eyes shine with recognition at the very familiar pair of words that had taken them here, in the first place. “Alright. What’s on the line?”

Racking her brain for anything—anything at all—and coming with none, Momo shrugs. “I can’t think of anything.”

“I can imagine a few things,” Mina inspects her nails. “Like that new TRIO pedal I bought you, sitting behind the driver’s seat.”

Momo shoots up in her seat. “Wait. You what.”

“Like that new TRIO pedal—”

She cups a hand over Mina’s lips. “I heard what you said.”

Mina pries Momo’s hand off her mouth, revealing an apologetic yet excited beam, her silver tooth peeking out, taunting Momo. “Surprise?” Reaching past Momo to retrieve a paper bag, she then presents it to Momo with the brightest smile on her face. “Happy birthday, Hirai Momo.”

“Are you serious? This is so—Mina, you can’t—” Momo can only gape at Mina, who only laughs at her state of overwhelming surprise.

“You said your pedal broke, and your birthday was coming so I thought I’d ask my brother to buy it for me while he was in Tokyo.” Mina tells her, her shrug barely completed when Momo moves past the paper bag and pulls Mina into a crushing bear hug that knocks the wind out of her lungs.

“Thankyouthankyouthankyou,” rushes past her lips, clinging to Mina tightly, still. “You’re the best person ever, you know that?”

Mina strokes her hair and giggles. “I’d say the same to you.”

-

“Yeeun’s having her baby shower on Saturday,” Momo says loudly, over the music and the running water that echoes within the bathroom. “Wanna come and be my plus one?”

“You have friends in straight relationships?”

Momo huffs at that, applying some ointment on the pan burn from last week. “To quote Chaeyoung, ‘the spectrum of my friendship is not limited to the homosexual sphere,’ she winces when the cold lotion touches the burn. “I mean, most of my friends are queer, but not all of them. Sadly. But Yeeun is bi, I think.”

Mina exits the shower area, dripping wet, with Momo’s towel wrapped around her body. “Oh. Ah, well, you’re still bi even if you’re in a straight relationship.”

“So are you busy?” She follows up, leaves her ointment to dry by resting her hand on the counter by her sink. “I can ask Jihyo if you want.”

“No charity orchestra rehearsals on the weekend, so I can,” the girl dries off her hair, eyes the burn on Momo’s hand right after. “Still hurts?”

“Like a bitch, yeah.”

“Aww, poor baby. Here,” Mina gently takes Momo’s hand before pressing a kiss to the small distance around the burn, providing even better relief than the ointment her mom swears by.

She finds herself staring intently at Mina as she applies the ointment on Momo with careful and nurse-like precision. It’s endearing, really, the way Mina concentrates, with her tongue poking out once in awhile, before licking her lips fully (one of which is a distracting feat if Momo was honest).

Turns out Mina doesn’t know how to hold a baby, and it’s the funniest thing on earth until Yeeun asks Momo to hold her baby and it’s actually a horrifying thing, but Mina’s laugh rings in her ear as she watches her with an unreadable expression that Momo’s wishful thinking names love and admiration.

-

[8:17:23 PM] Baby Girl: I have a surprise for you

[8:18:31 PM] Princess Myoui: Oh? What is it?

[8:18:55 PM] Baby Girl: Youre going to the album launch ryt?

[8:18:59 PM] Princess Myoui: Wouldn’t miss it. :)

[8:19:10 PM] Baby Girl: Awesome. See you there princess

-

“Liking our album so far?” Chaeyoung asks, strumming her guitar, adjusting the knobs on its board.

“It’s made with love, especially for you. Chaeyoung, Dahyun and I produced it except for our next song, the much awaited title song of our first album.” Jihyo says after downing half of her water bottle, drenched in sweat like the rest of them. “Before we begin, though, I want the composer to introduce it. Momo?”

The screams and chants of their audience overwhelms her, tears stinging in her eyes but Momo keeps it at bay. “Yeah, uh, I wrote this for a… someone who keeps me sane and drives me insane, all the time. They’re one of the best people I’ve ever met and, uh… yeah,” she sees Mina at the front row, cheeks tinged with pink, smiling at her so widely and so brightly, Momo’s knees grow weak. “This is for you. This was the surprise I was talking about and this is why we didn’t want you to listen to our songs before anyone else. So I hope you guys enjoy our title track. This next song is called I Think I’m Yours.”

They play the intro, one of which Mina had helped in creating, Jihyo’s synth ringing in her ears as she plays the first few notes, her eyes on Mina for the entirety of the song and Mina watches her just as intensely, the large grin never falling from her pretty face.

“A toast to 2X, for the successful first album and for more albums to follow,” Jihyo says. “And a toast to the orchestra girls, and that their next concert will rock the socks off our feet!”

They splash different types of alcohol on their hands when the nine of them clink their glasses together, but it doesn’t matter because they’re laughing and together and Momo couldn’t have asked for a better set of friends.

Momo would be lying if she said she hadn’t anticipated this when she had noticed the way Mina had been eyeing her all night and the way Mina’s hand never leaves her lap, the heat of it passing through Momo’s ripped jeans. She’d be lying if she said she didn’t anticipate it when Mina tells her to come inside, words mumbled into Momo’s lips solemnly, quietly, like a prayer only she wants Momo to hear.

Momo had known it would come to this, with them in bed together but she didn’t anticipate it to be this gentle, to be this tender and it feels a whole lot like making love.

(It is far from their first time but Momo thinks, in different circumstances, their first time could have felt like this.

She had slept with countless women but this time, with Mina, it feels as right as everything should be. Everything slots into place. Momo is home.)

Maybe it is making love—says the glow in the dark stars on the canopy of Mina’s bed; says the clothes Momo has hanging inside Mina’s closet; says the way Mina clings to her when she comes, again and again, Momo’s name whispered into her ear on a continuous loop that Momo would never grow tired of.

Mina touches her too, her ministrations so caring and so loving that there are tears forming in Momo’s eyes when she feels warm and then cold—every nerve on her body tuning in to the entirety of Myoui Mina, whose body fits on top of her own.

It’s on the tip of her tongue, the three words that had been bothering her for quite some time. Three words that Momo is sure will change everything, for better and for worse. It’s at the tip of her tongue, when she sees how beautiful Mina looks when she chases her orgasm; Momo knuckle-deep inside her. “Look at me,” Momo tells her. Mina’s eyes flutter open, her eyes hazy with lust and love that Momo is sure she sees.

“I—I’m close,” Mina pants, and Momo kisses her forehead.

“I got you.” She whispers, realizes she has never spoken truer words. “Don’t worry. I got you.”

It’s the closest to I love you Momo has ever gotten, because she can’t say it, not now. Not ever, maybe. Momo says I got you because it’s one of the truest things that she has ever said her entire life.

She catches Mina’s body when the girl on top of her collapses. She catches Mina’s tiny kiss to her collarbone. She catches Mina’s fall and dulls it, and Momo?

Momo is more than happy to absorb the damage that comes with falling for Myoui Mina.

-

“I’m just gonna go and buy us some more drinks, yeah?” Jeongyeon says, standing with a slight wobble. “Stay put. Mina’s coming to join us.”

Momo giggles at the thought of Mina joining them because she’s seriously been the lone entity running through Momo’s alcohol-induced brain.

She gives Jeongyeon a thumbs up before returning to devour the rest of the nachos on the table when someone slides into her seat.

“Hey, hotshot,” the girl says and Momo recognizes her as—ah, well. She’s one of the girls Momo had slept with in the past, right before Mina. She can’t even remember the girl’s name though Momo remembers it wasn’t a good night spent with the girl, who was pretty but wasn’t Mina, so she was beyond useless to Momo right now.

“Hi,” Momo says, out of politeness, wishes Jeongyeon to be there to ward the girl off, because Momo is too polite to do so.

“Remember me?”

“Sadly,” Momo mutters under her breath before giving the girl a small smile that doesn’t reach any other part of her face. “Yeah.”

“You never called back. You said you were.”

“Yeah, well,” shrugs Momo, shifting her body away from the girl despite being well on her way to becoming shitfaced. Her body rejects the girl’s presence as if she’s physically repulsed by it and Momo really doesn’t want to be here right now. “I lost your number. Sorry.”

“You don’t even remember my name.”

“No, I don’t. Sorry.”

The girl moves closer until Momo has nowhere else to go, because all their belongings are on the table and Jeongyeon should return soon enough. Please, Jeongyeon—“Make it up to me then,” the girl tells her, coming closer to whisper in her ear and Momo flinches away.

“No—uh, I’m sorry. I can’t,” Momo holds up her hand. “I’m… preoccupied right now.”

Nameless girl scoots even closer, her cheek against her fist. “Ah, so you have a girlfriend?” She smirks. “I don’t mind.”

Girlfriend.

Mina isn’t her girlfriend.

Mina is her not-girlfriend. Her somewhat-girlfriend. Her maybe-girlfriend.

Momo shakes her head, finally turning to look at the girl because she doesn’t want to. Not anymore. “No, but I lo—”

The lips are unfamiliar even if she’s tasted it before, as if Mina’s sweet kisses had wiped out past memories of kisses before. There’s tongue, but it’s too rough. There’s taste, but it’s not Mina’s mouth. There’s a lip balm, but it’s green apple, not watermelon.

It’s like a puzzle piece that’s not for this puzzle, forced into the board when the perfect piece is already there.

She’s too shocked to move away, too paralyzed at how she hates this kiss and loves Mina’s; too shocked to move away and she can’t find out because she’s trapped against the chair and—

Momo’s wide eyes meets Mina’s as the girl stands a short distance away from the table, stormy and angry and hurt with her jaw clenched.

That’s the moment she gains back the semblance to push the nameless girl away but Mina is already walking away from them faster than Momo can catch up.

No, Momo. No, no, no, no!

“Mina,” Momo calls out, trying to catch Mina’s arm but she never slows down. “Mina! Stop walking and listen to me!”

She pushes out of the bar door and into the parking lot and nearly gets hit in the face, but Mina doesn’t slow her pace down; keeps walking fast that Momo runs to pull at her hand, momentum making their bodies crash together.

It feels like that night at the diner, but Mina doesn’t wrap her arms around Momo’s neck to kiss her—now, Mina tries to shove Momo away by the chest.

Where Mina had stared into Momo’s eyes then is replaced by Mina refusing to even spare Momo a glance.

“Let me go,” Mina demands dangerously, struggling. “Let me go, Hirai Momo or—”

Momo does as she says, right even before she finishes asking the second time. “It wasn’t what you think—”

“Really?” Mina laughs putting some distance between them. “Really. It wasn’t what I think it is. Do you know that girl?”

Lying isn’t the best option right now. “I slept with her. Before.”

“Of course,” Mina sighs. “Of course you did.”

An unexpected anger flares inside Momo. “What do you mean of course I did? Mina. I slept with her months before we started… this. Didn’t you see that I didn’t kiss her back?” she exclaims, “I didn’t want anything to do with her!”

Mina crosses her arms, says nothing.

“She kissed me, Mina. She kissed me. I didn't kiss her back.”

Then it washes over Momo; a bucket of ice to the head. “Are you jealous?”

The silence extends, only the muted noises from the bar filling the tense quiet. “Mina, we need to talk; stop this silent treatment,” Momo says though it comes out like she’s begging and she blames it on how her heart aches painfully, how hard her heart beats against her chest. “Are you jealous?”

Mina finally looks at her, jaw clenching, relaxing, only to clench again. “What if I was?”

“We aren’t supposed to,” Momo replies though she says it without any conviction at all, only defeat.

“That’s rich,” The pianist laughs bitterly. “You can get jealous and I can’t. Right. That’s just the way this works. You’re being unfair, Momo.”

They haven’t argued like this. They’ve never had arguments like this; nothing beyond petty ones about where to eat or playful teasing. Not like this. Never like this.

Her fist clenches, nails digging into the flesh of her palm. All the questions Momo had reserved for Mina comes rushing out like a dam breaking.

“Are fuckbuddies are supposed to feel like this, huh?”

 It comes off as an accusation when she had meant it as a question to clear things out. Momo doesn’t intend it to be one but it’s too late, the can of worms open and Momo can’t stop herself because she’s pushed every feeling she had felt for Mina to the back of her mind only to grow exponentially.

“We were just supposed to sleep together, Mina. I don’t know where we’re going,” Momo says honestly, and okay, wow, the push between her ribs borders on insanely painful, as if she’s run a marathon and her lungs burn. She can’t stop herself, not even when Mina flinches as Momo talks, the questions Momo has had leaving her mouth in a never ending thread.

Momo offers a laugh but it’s sad and she’s crying, too. “No strings attached but it feels like I’m tied up to you.”

This is her chance. This is her chance to tell Mina. She’d been truthful to herself and admitting that she’s in love with Myoui Mina was difficult and she just has to say it—just those three damn words that had been lodged at her throat when Mina would do wondrous things that Momo falls deeper for. It’s always lodged at her throat when Mina walks around the room in just Momo’s shirt. It chokes Momo when lights dance across Mina’s beautiful face. It makes sure to grip at her heart whenever Mina would kiss her like Momo’s important, like she held all the secrets to the universe.

She wants to tell Mina. Momo wants to tell Mina this part of herself that she’d been hiding from Mina.

Mina. I love you.

Momo opens her mouth to say it, but Mina speaks before any word is spoken into the chilly night air. “Maybe we shouldn’t do this anymore.”

Oh.

Momo blinks, her face hopefully betraying nothing but she feels her insides crumble. She hates that it had taken this long; that it had taken an argument when Momo finally asks: “stop this and be more than without strings? Or stop this completely.”

Oh.

“Completely.” Mina’s voice breaks in between and Momo feels her heart do the same and more. “Yeah, we should.”

Momo had been right and she didn’t listen to herself. She knew that this would never end well, with the crushing rejection she anticipated and the sadness that she didn’t expect, packaged with this thing between them coming to a halt.

It had kept her up at night, the very plausible end of this thing with Mina.

Momo thought maybe she’d find someone else to fuck or maybe Mina would find someone to treat her better than Momo. Countless scenarios run through her mind but she never really was sure of anything except maybe the end of this, and not even being in love with Mina can make her optimistic about it.

There’s no use in prolonging things any further. It was a ticking time bomb that had exploded. Today, on the thirtieth day of November 2016, is the expiry date of Mina and Momo.

Maybe we shouldn’t do this anymore.

“Okay.” Momo says simply.

Okay, because she’s hopelessly in love with Myoui Mina and if this is what Mina wants, she’ll give it to her.

Okay, because Mina is beautiful and kind and talented and she deserves better than some asshole with a band, who sleeps with a nightlight and glow in the dark stars on her ceiling.

Okay, because Momo wants the best for Mina, even if she isn’t part of that list.

‘Okay’ is all Momo can say. Then she walks away.

Chapter Text

 To say that it had been a rough couple of days is a severe understatement. 

Hell, she’s probably gone through the stages of grief in a matter of days, or so Chaeyoung says, in one of those times she attempts to drag Momo out of bed to have a good night out.

(“It’s futile,” she hears Chaeyoung tell Jeongyeon, exasperation clinging to her voice. “She’s not going to join us. Stages of grief and whatnot.”

Jeongyeon tuts. “Let her sulk. She needs this.”

“Don’t you think she’s overreacting?”

“No, not at all.”)

With her face against the pillow, Momo shuts her eyes and exhales—her bones as heavy as the weight in her chest and it dawns upon her that Chaeyoung’s right.

It goes like this:

DENIAL

“No, Mina and I aren’t over,” Momo says as she paces around the studio. “She didn’t say anything. Did she?”

The night had been a blur of sadness and vodka that she barely remembers her conversation with Mina. Or Momo remembers it completely but it’s all a lucid fever dream that always comes with a night of hard liquor.

“She did, Momo,” the keyboardist tells her, dropping the rag she’s been using to wipe the keys of her board. “When Jeongyeon called me to pick the two of you up, she told me everything while you were crying, stone cold sober.”

It floods back to her—the real memory of Mina telling her that maybe they should end things and the very real memory of Momo saying okay.

“No,” Momo mutters, fingers threading into her hair and she wants to pull all her fucking hair out in frustration. “No! Fuck. No.”

“That’s what happened,” replies Jihyo, with a sad and pitiful and motherly smile on her face that makes Momo’s heart burn. “Maybe when the time is right you can ask her what really happened, to help you clear your head.”

The heels of her hand dig into her eyes, Momo feels a headache between her eyelids that matches the tightness in her chest.

“I don’t want to, Jihyo,” she mumbles. “I don’t want to talk. Not yet.”

So they don’t.

They don’t talk and it hurts and the hardest part of an empty passenger’s seat, an empty bed, an empty inbox is that Mina had always filled those parts of her life so easily—fitting like a glove.

Momo could text Mina. It would be easy to ask her if she meant it, now that they’re considerably less angry and overwhelmed with emotion. It would be easy to call her, ask to meet up.

Though whenever she picks up her phone to do exactly that, irrational fear grips her until she decides to ignore her phone for the rest of the day, with Mina and only Mina on her mind, paired with sadness and anger that yeah, Momo managed to royally fuck this up with a girl that means so much to her—a girl that she loves thoroughly, a girl that she is so fucking crazy about.

Maybe it would be easy to ask Mina what she thinks.

The answer is what scares the living daylights out of Momo.

Jeongyeon announces her arrival with a: “I could feel your sadness radiating from your room,” she shuts the door quietly and sits by the bed, on the third day of Momo spending the third day in her room, flopped on her belly and her phone in hand.

Momo tosses the ball she’s playing with at Jeongyeon. “Sod off.”

The drummer avoids it quite well. Perhaps if she had wanted to inflict pain on Jeongyeon, someone who had been playing softball all her life,, throwing a ball wasn't the best idea. “No, but seriously.”

Momo only groans into the pillow in response.

“Quit sulking.” Jeongyeon tells her, hands on Momo’s back to shake her slightly. “Just talk to her.”

“No.”

“Why not.”

Momo raises her head to stick her tongue out at her best friend. “Why should I.”

“Because not talking about things got you in this mess in the first place.”

Jeongyeon’s her best friend and more often than Momo would like to admit, she’s right about many things in Momo’s life.

Momo refuses to say anything, only groans miserably, because, well, fuck.

“You don’t have to right now, not while you’re like this because god, you smell like Satan’s asshole right now,” her best friend crinkles her nose, a laugh bubbles up Momo’s throat. “But in the near future. The very near future. When you’re ready…” She pauses and Momo’s heart, too; she knows what Jeongyeon’s about to say. “When you’re ready to hear things you don’t want to hear.”

It lies unsaid, but Momo latches onto the meaning almost instantly.

It lies unsaid, how both of them know that there is a chance Mina might reiterate that night in the bar was very real—and the end of Mina and Momo was very real, too.

“What if I’m not—what if I don’t ever want to hear what Mina has to say?” Momo’s voice breaks in the middle, her voice thicker with tears that she doesn’t noice. “What if I don—Jeongyeon, I don’t want to. I don’t want this to end yet.”

Her best friend rolls her onto her back, holds on to her shoulders and shakes. “Momo. Just because you don’t want to doesn’t mean you shouldn’t. If you don’t, it’s gonna bite you in the ass when you look back at this. Not knowing sucks, dude, believe me, it does.”

It’s hard not to believe Jeongyeon. For one, she is her best friend and another reason is that her break up with Bona years ago had fucked Jeongyeon up in so many ways, driving Jeongyeon up against a wall because she didn’t know why exactly things ended—self blame and pure hatred for Bona only bloomed, not until they’ve settled things for good recently.

“Yeah, I know,” Momo grumbles and Jeongyeon wipes away the unbidden tears that escape the corner of her eyes. “I know it does.”

Jeongyeon embraces her tightly, one of which Momo returns even tighter, burying her face into her best friend’s shoulder. “I love you, Moguri,” she says earnestly, ruffling Momo’s hair. “I love you so much. You’ll get through this, I promise.”

“Love you too,” mumbles Momo into Jeongyeon’s shirt, the girl hauling her up with difficulty right after.

“Okay, up now, Jihyo’s outside with some gifts from fans and also some albums to sign,” she laughs when Momo groans but her body feels noticeably lighter after that talk. “She also brought some new McCormick spices to fill up your kitchen rack.”

That particular phrase gets Momo on her feet.

What sucks the most about this whole not speaking to Mina and not physically seeing Mina anywhere thing is that Momo feels like something’s missing, all of the time. That restless sensation as if she’s forgetting something like when Momo is about to lock the door to the apartment only to find her keys are inside.

They don’t talk and it hurts because while Mina hadn’t been the most talktative person when they first met, that had changed—Mina filled in the silence quite well, with her gentle voice that can increase in volume in different circumstances. She filled in the silence with her voice so very well, that dealing with the absence of it is difficult.

This silence and this absense takes its toll on Momo when she finds herself getting ready—dressing up to head to Mina’s house and maybe iron things out; it horribly feels like dressing for her own funeral, when she knows she’ll be marching up there without a clue of what she wants to say only that she wants to see Mina—Momo wants Mina and Momo loves Mina and that maybe they should try this again.

(“Think you’ll be alright?” Chaeyoung asks from the doorway, genuine concern in her voice. While the youngest girl avoids emotions like the plague, she cares for Momo and Momo knows.

Her fingers halt at buttoning her shorts. “I… really don’t know, Chaeng.”

The guitarist wraps her arms around Momo’s middle in a comforting embrace. “Call if you need a ride home.”)

Momo breathes a sigh of relief when the keys to Mina’s house slide into its barrel and turn. She hates herself for being relieved, when it’s only been a matter of days since the incident, but Momo wouldn’t be sure if Mina would change the locks by then.

She walks into the vast entrance, shrugging off her jacket, the drop of her shoes echoing through the hall.

On Thursdays, Mina doesn’t have any rehearsals, so Momo is taken by disappointment and panic when she finds that Mina is not in any of the rooms until a sticky note on Mina’s fridge captures her attention.

Jing, I’ll be away for some time.

Please keep the house warm

while I’m gone. Thank you. :)

-Mitang

Mina left?

Momo knows nothing of Mina leaving for anywhere, so she finds herself calling Nayeon; the violinist picking up after five rings with a very disgruntled, “hello?”

“Nayeon,” she says. Her fingers shake slightly. “Where’s Mina?”

The line goes silent and Momo knows that Nayeon knows, so she isn’t surprised that after a few moments of deliberation, Nayeon finally spills. “She’s… She’s on her way to Paris. Right now.”

“Paris?!”

If it were possible for her heart to be even more crushed since that night, the bits of her heart might be pulverized into powder, right now.

“Please don’t tell her I said anything,” pleads the older girl. “She will kill me if she finds out I told you.”

Momo frowns. “I don’t think she can kill you.”

“Nuh-uh. We were at the archery range when she told me she’ll be leaving for Paris and she told me that if I tell you I’m dead, then she pointed an arrow to me.” Nayeon shudders and Momo feels it on the other end of the line. “Please don’t.”

“But why?” She doesn’t mean to whine, but she misses the pianist and that she gathered up all her courage and suffered five anxiety attacks on her way to the house for nothing.

“Uh, she made some cockamame excuse about her stepdad and seeing him for whichever reason but,” Nayeon sighs, “I’m sure she’s just there to… to sort herself out. After, you know.”

“Yeah,” the memory freshly imprinted in her brain. “Yeah, I know.”

“I’m supposed to be angry at you, actually. But you were both idiots, so I’m angry at both of you, equally.” Nayeon says and Momo can see her inspecting her nails haughtily.

Momo palms her forehead. “That’s what Jeongyeon said.”

“Jeongyeon’s just as much of an idiot, but she’s right.” chuckles Nayeon, though her tone sombers after. “Mina will come back, Momo. Don’t worry.”

The cavity in her chest echoes with a slight twinge. “This isn’t the first time she’s done this, is it?”

“Yeah,” confirms Nayeon. “It’s… It’s a Mina thing. Leaving the country to think things through.”

Momo would have laughed if she didn’t already want to cry—she would tease Mina for being a snooty rich girl that she is by heart, but Mina isn’t here and she misses being able to tease Mina so much.

“It happened often when she finally became legal to fly to places alone to deal with stuff.”

She nibbles on her already-short nails. “How long do you think she’ll stay?”

“I don’t know, Momo,” answers Nayeon. “The last time she did this, she was gone for ten months.”

Ten months. That’s just a few months short of the entire time they’ve been sleeping with each other.

“Jesus Christ,” Momo sighs, irritation bubbling in her chest at the thought of Mina running away all the fucking time.

“You know how Mina is,” Nayeon says with a hint of exhasperation directed at the both of them.

And the funny thing is, Momo does. She should have seen this coming, really. She should have seen the way Mina’s eyes cloud with hesitation mixed with fear whenever they near the conversation about them and whatever they had—have, damn it, stop thinking like that, Momo—between them.

She pinches the bridge of her nose and exhales a shaky breath. “I’m sorry, Momo,” Nayeon says, and while she had never been one to apologize, she sounds very sorry for Momo. Tears prick at Momo’s eyes before she knows it.

“Yeah, thanks for this. I’ll—I’ll see you soon, Bongki.” her voice is thick and shaky, so she decides to end the call right before Momo lets out a sob.

Momo sits in one of the stools in Mina’s kitchen—where she had spent many days cooking a hearty meal for her; where she had spent many days trying to teach Mina how to cook, pressing kisses to the back of Mina’s neck—holds her head in her hand and cries, frustration and irritation blooming within her chest.

Damn you, Myoui Mina, Momo thinks, before she dumps the keys to Mina’s front door on the counter, metal clanking noisily against tiles, locks the door and leaves.

ANGER

Momo hadn’t meant to yell at Bambam for burning the sauce meant for her dish, but Bambam’s face already looks like something worth yelling at on a good day—and it’s a bad day (week, really) and she just doesn’t have enough patience to deal with his incompetence today.

So Momo yells at him.

(Not really yell, more like raise her voice slightly and pretend like nothing had happened as Bambam stands there, stunned.)

“God, Momo, what’s gotten into you,” Jackson grumbles when Momo ignores his attempts at making her laugh, which involves dry humping Jinyoung. “Are you on your p—”

“On my what?” she says, her tone quiet, but menacing.

“On her what?” Yeeun calls out from the freezer, blocks of cheese in her hands and she looks read to toss it square at Jackson’s head.

“Her… her… pmmfff… mmm…” The saucier trails off, withering under her and Yeeun’s gazes.

“That’s what we thought,” they say together, returning to their work, Momo starting the sauce Bambam burnt from scratch.

A myriad of emotions stirs within Momo when she thinks about that night outside the bar but she finds herself angry more than any other emotion that she could possibly feel. 

Irritation mixed with sadness bubbles in her chest when she sees Mina’s things scattered around Momo’s room—the apartment, actually (with her stupid cereal and her stupid mug and her stupid shampoo). She can’t even open the cupboard without feeling irritable at the sight of Mina’s favorite cereal.

She’s angry that she didn’t push the girl away at once. She’s angry that she just walked away. She’s angry Mina didn’t stop her. She’s angry they’re not talking. She’s angry Mina is somewhere else, running away from whatever this is.

Momo is just… really angry.

So angry that a pack of cigarettes lies in her bag when Mina had successfully coaxed her out of the habit months before with a vape unit, one of which Momo had stopped using for the moment because it does nothing to lift her mood.

The only time the anger dissolves fleetingly is when Momo is drunk with hard liquor, when she feels more pathetic than mad. So one night, she drinks and drinks and drinks until she doesn’t even know she’s taking out her phone to drunkenly dial Mina’s number (one she memorized by heart, imprinted on her brain).

BARGAINING

“Mina,” Momo slurs into her phone. She can’t say it—doesn’t want to say it, doesn’t want to beg Mina to come home or tell her everything through Facetime audio, much less leaving it on voicemail when Mina doesn’t pick up. “Mina. Mina. Mina.”

Momo says Mina’s name, hoping that it would be enough to tell Mina how she feels but even her drunken subconscious tells her no, it’s not enough, but liquid courage does nothing to tell Mina she misses her and she wants Mina to come back and she’s in love with Mina.

“Mina,” her voice is thick and heavy, tongue scrambling on each syllable. “Mina—Mina, I lost a flipflop.”

She doesn’t know if Mina picks up her phone because the next time it rings, it doesn’t redirect her to Mina’s adorable voice saying ‘Hi, this is Mina. I’m probably busy right now but leave a message and I’ll get back to you!’.

A laugh bubbles up her throat because she knows that’s one of Mina’s favorite scenes from Sense8, on those days they had done nothing but watch on Netflix. “Mina, I lost a flipflop.”

Nothing but silence greets her on the other end of the phone but her dulled senses pick up soft inhales; with the Mina on the other side of the world, with a 7 hour time difference and a thousand miles between them.

Momo misses Mina—she misses Mina so fucking much and she can’t even find it in herself to tell her.

She wants to say so many things, she wants to ask right now if things were really over. Maybe Momo just wants to know where she stands. Maybe Momo just wants this over with but she doesn’t—because she knows if Mina says yeah, we’re over again she doesn’t know what she’ll do but she does know it will crush her.

It’s on the tip of her tongue and the alcohol coursing through veins tell her to say it, just fucking say it. “Mina, I lo—Mina,” she breathes, and curses herself because she can’t say it, not now and maybe not ever. “Mina, I lost my flipflop.”

Before she can embarrass herself further, Jihyo bursts into her room looking for something when she sees Momo huddled around a bottle of Smirnoff, holding a phone to her ear. “Jesus Christ, Moguri,” she hisses, taking the phone and Momo’s too dull and sad and angry to grip harder. She tuts, shaking her head before ending the call. “Let’s get some water in you before you die of alcohol poisoning. Come on.”

DEPRESSION

Thinking about that night doesn’t do her good; it does Momo sadness, painful sadness that keeps her in bed when she doesn’t have work and compels her to smoke two packs a day.

She’s stupid. Stupid for saying okay so easily and she blames herself for it every fucking day that the Mina-shaped cavity in her chest aches around the edges. Stupid for not fighting hard enough for Mina.

(But maybe that’s exactly why Mina deserves better. She deserves better than someone who won’t fight for her, Momo thinks bitterly.)

(But Mina asked. She wanted to end things. Momo is nothing if she could say no to anything Mina asks of her.)

She checks her phone periodically but she doesn’t call Mina anymore, but Momo reads text messages exchanged between them even if it hurts like a bitch. She can’t find it in herself to delete anything that reminds her to Mina just as she is physically incapable of returning any of Mina’s things.

Her clothes hang inside Momo’s closet. Her cosmetic items are still on Momo’s desk. The book she’d been reading last sits on Momo’s bedside table, untouched. Her toothbrush clinks against the metal cup Momo has on her sink. She can’t give these back, not yet. Not in the near future.

Momo refuses to let it go and lives with a familiar yet never any less painful ache that reverberates within her when she is constantly reminded of Mina’s presence wherever she goes.

Her friends are handling things pretty well. They’re not falling apart like many friend groups just because two people dated and broke up within the circle. Maybe it’s different because Mina isn’t here, so things aren’t so bad.

Maybe they think it’s because they know there’s still a chance to patch things up. Maybe it’s because they saw this coming—because they knew Mina and Momo would end like this.

(Momo chooses not to think of the latter.)

Performing I Think I’m Yours had been Momo’s favorite part of every gig, mainly for the reason that she meets Mina’s eyes from where she’s stood; her from the stage and Mina in the audience.

It was Momo’s favorite, though she’s not sure anymore because every time she does, a piercing-like pain lances through her heart when she doesn’t see Mina in the audience, when she doesn’t have any messages from Mina after the gig, when she doesn’t get any after-performance kisses.

It’s painful and it’s killing Momo—each goddamn note and each goddamn lyric in that goddamn song, remembering the sunlight through the blinds that casted a halo around Mina’s head like she was a saint.

The tips of her fingers bleed and Momo bandages it with shaking hands, wishes Mina were there to press kisses to the pads of her nicotine-scented digits.

Gravel crunches under her tires when Momo parks, but she sends her car forward while she’s reversing when the radio plays goddamn Melt With You comes on and everything hurts suddenly, the sadness closing in on her at Mina’s favorite song and the way she and Mina would sing this at the top of their lungs, regardless if they were in public or if they were in the comfort of Momo’s apartment or Mina’s house.

She takes her phone, calls Jeongyeon, and weeps pathetically with Mina’s favorite song in the background.

ACCEPTANCE

(Momo never gets to this part.)

It’s a cycle, just as everything with Mina. Momo finds herself back in square one, in denial, as if every part of her body refuses to be without Mina. As if her every fibre of her being refuses to accept things are over. Every fibre of her being refuses to accept and now Momo is back in denial. Again.

Even Momo’s body rejects being without Mina because sleeping lately has been so very difficult, like there was always something she’s forgetting to do.

She misses Mina sleep talking. She misses the warmth of Mina’s body as they’re pressed together from head to toe.

“Hey, would you guys mind if I slept here,” Momo says, knocking on Jeongyeon and Chaeyoung’s shared room. Jeongyeon looks up from her phone and Chaeyoung stops painting the next album’s cover. She can’t bear to be in a room that horribly feels like there is a missing part—she can’t sleep on the bed and look up at her ceiling when Mina isn’t nestled in her arms. They let her, because they’re Jeongyeon and Chaeyoung. They let her sleep and Momo gets maybe a few hours of sleep more than when she’s alone and sad.

On those rare days she feels anger bubbling up in her chest she takes Mina’s toothbrush and moves to toss it into the trash bin but her hand stops when she’s suddenly attacked by the image of her and Mina brushing their teeth, side by side, their hips and elbows bumping against one another.

Momo sighs and places it back in its cup.

-

It takes a month.

A miserable month it was but Momo likes to think she’s getting better even if Mina’s stuff never leave her apartment.

It takes a month and she can think about that night without wanting to cry though that doesn’t stop her from hating herself for letting Mina off the hook so easily.

It takes a month but all her progress trying to get back on her feet when her heart has been pulverized into ashes crumbles to the ground when Jeongyeon raps the knuckles on the door to the green room after one set. “Hey, uh, Moguri,” she says, her eyes hopeful and also worried. “She—Mina’s back.”

It breaks, like everything about Momo when it comes to Mina.

It awfully feels like being thrown at the deep end of the pool when she doesn’t know how to swim, like the ocean swallowed her whole, when Momo halts the careful ministrations of her hands packing up their handheld equipment.

“She’s seated at our table, right now. And, uh, her hair is dark brown now,” Jeongyeon offers with a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes. “Just… wanted to give you a heads up. We can leave right now, if you want.”

Momo resists the urge to run, to listen to her flight senses and decides to harden up and say, “No,” she shakes her head stubbornly and wills her entire body to stop trembling. “I’ll sit with you guys for dinner.”

Her decision to stay isn’t the brightest because she barely looks in Mina’s direction the entire time and Momo is thankful her friends had dissolved the awkward air before she can even speak.

She can’t hold a spoon without trembling because Mina is right there, at the end of the table and Momo wants to look at her, so much—so fucking much—but she feels that if she looks at Mina she might explode with every single feeling in her body right now.

Momo doesn’t know why she’s putting herself through so much pain when she can leave but maybe she wants to let Mina know that she didn’t break Momo even if she did, in tiny little pieces until she’s unrecognizable. She wants to let Mina know she’s stronger even if she is about to pass out because Mina is right there—and she’s been craving for Mina for a month like a fucking cigarette.

Her body is attuned to Mina that when they say goodbye she knows Mina is behind her long before Momo can even dare to look back. Momo knows the softness of Mina’s hand on the skin of her arm. Momo knows Mina that a month is barely enough time to forget about it when she thinks that everything about Mina will remain forever in her mind.

Momo flinches away from the touch she is craving for because it’s too much; it breaks her too much and she’s not supposed to cry right now.

Their friends are nowhere in sight, no scapegoat because she suddenly wants to run away when she’s been trying to catch up with Mina and Mina’s touch physically pains her, echoing throughout her entire body like electric currents—Momo pulls away, much stronger this time, because if Mina touches her again she might pass out.

She hasn’t looked at Mina and she’s not about to look over her shoulder, not when she’s scared this’ll be something out of a Greek tragedy, where if she looks back Mina will turn into a pillar of salt.

The tables have turned, Momo thinks bitterly and wills herself not to cry. She’s not about to look back, nope, but then—

“Momo, please,” pleads Mina, “can we just—”

“Can we just what, Mina?” Momo snaps like a twig, and it just comes pouring out of her after a month of being wrung like a wet rag. “Can we just what.”

Tonight is full of bad decisions, realizes Momo, when she takes in dark brown hair and the tearful eyes shining with wetness dark circles situated underneath them.

Her knees grow weak and her heart thumps maddeningly in her chest because Mina is here, Mina is finally fucking here and she loves Myoui Mina still, after every-fucking-thing that has happened and every-fucking-thing that Momo has told herself just so she would stop feeling things over Mina.

“Hi,” Mina says thickly, giving her a small smile as if tears aren’t rolling down her cheeks.

Momo can’t say anything, can only look away but this time, she doesn’t pull her hand from the grip Mina has on her wrist.

“What do you want, Mina?” she replies, defeated. “I thought—”

“Can we talk?” The pianist asks, wide-eyed and vulnerable, a little bit desperate. “Outside. Please.”

Momo can’t find it in herself to say no, so she nods, walks and doesn’t look at Mina and Mina doesn’t ask her to.

“Talk.” Momo says once they’re outside. She grips her elbows from the cold, hopes that it’s also enough to hold herself together.

Mina’s gaze remains on her, though she doesn’t speak, her eyes boring into the side of Momo’s head.

She spares her a glance because if she looks too long, it’s going to make everything difficult for them. As much as Momo wants to shove Mina against a wall and kiss her senseless to make up for lost time, they need to talk.

This is what got you two in this mess in the first place.

“If you’re not gonna say anything, stop wasting my time,” she tells Mina, tapping her foot on the concrete. It feels wrong, being this hostile to Mina; Mina hasn’t really been the best talker ever, and she must be struggling to say the right words but Momo needs this, needs Mina to know she’s hurt and upset, among other things.

“I—I just want to give you some answers.” Mina cuts herself off, before starting again and Momo braces for an apology but, “I spent some time thinking about that night.”

“Yeah, well, you’re not the only one.”

The younger girl looks away, guilt in her eyes. “I didn’t say we should end things because you were kissing that girl,” says Mina, shrinking into her beige coat and it’s an endearing sight if Momo isn’t about to have her heart broken the second time by the same damn girl that she is completely in love with. “I said… I said that because I was scared.”

“Of course you were,” scoffs Momo but she looks up to keep the tears at bay.

Mina raises her voice, a line forming a crease on her forehead from frustration. “Weren’t you scared, Momo? Don’t even dare say I was the only one who was terrified because if you weren’t, we could have been more than what we were before.”

She matches Mina’s tone. “That’s exactly why I was scared! Because you didn’t say anything about wanting more so I didn’t too,” exclaims Momo. “Mina, getting your heart broken sucks ass, in case you didn’t know.”

“You think I didn’t know that? Momo, Jesus, I didn’t want to ask for more because I thought—” her voice breaks and so does Momo’s heart, “I thought I could handle being friends who sleep with each other. I thought I could but I was wrong and I thought that asking things from your fuck buddy was against the rule book. Or something.” Mina wipes at her tears, her breath condensing in the night air. “It hurt a lot. It hurt me so much when I realized how much you could hurt me in return when I saw some girl kissing you and that maybe you’ve been sleeping around all this time while I—while we make love. I couldn’t sleep with anyone else, Momo. It hurt me that I couldn’t sleep with anyone else but you can. It hurt me that I couldn’t feel jealous but you can. It hurt me that you didn’t even put up a fight when I said we should end things.”

Momo is crying now, because all this time this part of Mina remained untouched because they both refused to speak about it and now the band aid is ripped off and the cut hurts like a bitch. She opens her mouth to rebut every worry Mina has about her—she hadn’t been sleeping with anyone, she made love to Mina and only Mina and that she loves Mina so fucking much that she’s not the only one hurting right now.

“And you know what else hurt?” Mina asks, hiccupping with tiny sobs. “You gave up so easily.”

Momo moves forward, closer to Mina in her defence. “I gave you what you wanted! You can’t talk about me leaving like that when you leave so easily too!”

“But I came back,” Mina replies quietly, looking at Momo, eyes filled with sadness. “I’m sorry for running away like that but I’m here now.”

Momo’s voice breaks when she speaks, the push between her ribs noticeably increasing in pressure. “If you didn’t leave then you didn’t have to come back.”

Looking away, Mina bites her lip and Momo remembers what they taste like, though it’s a hazy memory now, like a lucid dream that she has had, over and over again.

“I know,” Mina nods. “I know.”

Momo leans on a post, fingers itching for a cigarette but she can’t, not in front of Mina because she’s asthmatic. “Why didn’t you tell me you left? I went to your house—” to apologize, Momo omits, “but it was empty.”

“We weren’t exactly talking, Momo. I didn’t know if I had the right to tell you where I was.”

She had a point and Momo can see it perfectly. The anger that had risen has now subsided into a tired, mellow state of just sadness, their sobs turning into mere sniffles but the heartache very much present, still.

“I wanted to tell you everything,” Mina sits on one of the benches situated by the window, her hands tucked between her legs. “But I couldn’t. I was scared and I left.”

Momo looks down, touches the box of cigarettes in her coat pocket. “I know. You needed to think things through. Clear your head.”

Mina nods. “If I hadn’t, well, I would have made things worse.” Mina bites her lip, then looks at Momo, the rims of her eyes red. “I—I wanted to be with you, Momo. It scared the hell out of me to ask for more but I really did.”

Her heart catches on to the use of tense faster than her brain does. “Wanted to?” Momo clarifies and she knows she’s heard right, and hearing it again will probably kill her more than it already has the first time. “Not anymore?”

The silence tells her enough but Momo has had enough of the two of them being vague about pressing matters. “Being quiet isn’t an answer, Mina,” she says softly, her breath a small cloud and her throat dry, tears stinging to her eyes once more.

“I… I don’t know anymore, Momo,” she shakes her head, tears falling into her lap which Momo sees a few feet away, a distance that might as well be the distance they had when Mina was in Paris. “I don’t know what I want anymore.”

Tonight, she had been wrong about so many decisions made but she wasn’t wrong about having her heart broken the second damn time by the same damn girl whom she is very, very in love with still.

“Me too,” lies Momo.

She wants Mina. Nothing more, nothing less. Just Myoui Mina with her smart mouth and her silver tooth and the softness of her palm fitting perfectly in Momo’s hand.

“What do we do now, Mina?” Momo laughs miserably. “Come on, you’re the smart one.”

Mina gives her a small laugh at the jibe, one that echoes within Momo and she realized that she has missed this girl beyond words. “Do you think we can be friends? For the group and… for my sanity, too.” The sad smile Mina offers her tugs at her heart.

This is Mina, the girl Momo that drives Momo crazy. This is Mina, This is Mina, whose requests Momo can never say no to. This is Mina, the girl she is hopelessly in love with.

Let’s be friends, Mina had said.

Mina was her friend first, before this mess of emotions. Would it be easy to be friends when she’s seen every part of Mina, when she’s seen the sun paint colors on Mina’s immaculate face, and kissed every mole on her face, every inch of her body until Mina trembles?

No, it probably wouldn’t.

Better than nothing, Momo thinks. So she nods, her heart on her throat telling her she’ll regret this but there is no other choice because Mina is kind enough to leave if Momo asked her to, and says, “okay.”

-

They hang out like nothing had happened, but there is a wall in the form of Jeongyeon and Nayeon, who try to get them away from each other, per Momo’s request because she can’t be near Mina, not when she wants Mina still that it’s driving her nuts.

Mina and Momo are loose ends, never tied up properly now they’re both falling apart.

(“You know, if it’s killing you to go, please don’t,” Jeongyeon tells her as they’re getting ready to meet 2X and the orchestra girls. “We all appreciate you trying to keep it together for the sake of the group but if it’s at the cost of your sanity, don’t. We’re all fine.”

Momo thinks back to her birthday, her friends surrounding her and realizes that putting on a brave face for them is better than all of them falling apart just because of this. “No, I want to, okay? Don’t go soft on me, J. I can do this.”)

She’s still getting used to this whole just friends thing when she looks at Mina and sees her like the first few peeks of sunshine through dark clouds of dawn, beautiful and tantalizing and just warmth when there is anything but warmth between them right now.

Mina’s laugh ebbs at her resolve, but when Chaeyoung and Jihyo shoot her concerned looks across the table, she gives them a small smile to tell them she’s a-OK.

-

Hwang Eunbi had been one of the girls Momo slept with more than once, and she was a great booty call, if Momo were honest. Snarky, eager and just enough feisty that would have turned her on a year ago.

They’d met at Jeongyeon’s eldest sister’s birthday party. Jessica Jung, one of Seungyeon’s friends, brought her sister and then they’d hit it off (at the venue’s bathroom). They’re still drinking buddies, though, even when Momo didn’t sleep with other girls after Mina. Eunbi can still drink her under the table and it’s pretty embarrassing.

Everything feels off right now, though, with the way Eunbi is kissing down her neck, her elbows pressing painfully into Momo’s ribs and the rest of her long limbs never slotting perfectly into each crevice of Momo’s body like Mina’s. Eunbi’s kiss never matches the kind of tenderness that Mina offers and she pushes Eunbi off of her with a small shove, the girl moving from Momo’s lap and back on the couch.

They’re breathing heavily, Momo’s mouth slick with spit, her heart thumping maddeningly because everything about this feels wrong, like she’s forcing the wrong piece into a space in a puzzle board. It feels wrong, awfully wrong; and she’s thinking about Mina while kissing another girl.

Only the sound of the air conditioning fill the space and Momo is too busy living in her own thoughts that her skin jumps when Eunbi sits beside her again, a bottle of soju in her hand. “So, is it too late to ask what’s wrong or am I just gonna let you stare at my sister’s sculpture until it melts?”

Momo’s hands find her face as she leans forward, her elbows on her knees. “Sorry,” she apologizes softly. “Uh, I can’t do this.”

Eunbi laughs, a boisterous one that rings throughout her and Jessica’s living room. “Yeah, I can see that. I was about to have my brains screwed the fuck out but I’m seated here, my brains not screwed the fuck out.” She downs half of the bottle in one go. “Dare I come to know what troubles you.”

That earns a laugh from Momo. “It’s a long story.”

“Well, since we’re not fucking until the sun appears, I guess we better make use of this time to talk like the adults we’re supposed to be.”

Momo leans back on the couch, one that probably costs more than her salary for two years. She takes a deep breath before saying: “so there’s this girl.”

“Ooh, I like this already.” Eunbi giggles, tucking her leg underneath her. “Tell me all the juiciest details. Spare no raunchy event.” She’d rather not tell Eunbi about those things, though Momo does give her the condensed version of the story, ending up with Eunbi laughing at her face. “You fell in love with the girl you were just supposed to fuck? Hah!”

Momo pinches the bridge of her nose. “Yeah. I did.”

Once Eunbi calms down, she pats Momo’s back in comfort. “Hey, champ, it’s not all that bad. You’re friends. I mean, that really sucks but at least she isn’t anywhere else? I get if it kills you but it would kill you more that she isn’t there. Lesser of two evils, and all that.”

“That’s what I told myself,” Momo groans into her hands. This is already as embarrassing as telling her ex-fuck buddy that she fell in love with someone, who had been her fuck buddy too.

“Hey, if it’s anything, it means she still thinks of you more than just a fuck buddy. Like, she values you still, enough not to lose you and to keep you around.” says Eunbi. “She said ‘stay for the group’ but she did say it’s for her sanity, too. Isn’t that enough to tell you she wants you around?”

“I don’t know,” Momo sighs and Eunbi slaps the back of her head. “Ow, Jesus, Eunbi! The hell was that for?”

“She still needs you, you dimwit,” exclaims the younger girl. “If you stopped your pathetic moping for just one second then you’d see she needs you, still.”

She hadn’t thought of it that way, as if her brain had completely omitted the part where Mina asked for them to stay friends for her sanity. It had a different effect on Momo, though. Being around Mina and not being able to do what she wants drives Momo insane even more than having Mina away but at least Mina is here; Mina is here and that’s what matters. Eunbi is right.

Eunbi stands to take another bottle of soju from their fridge. “Well since we’re not going to have sex any time soon and I sexiled my sister for nothing, I miss Jeongyeon and Chaeyoung. Make them come over so we can play drunk Clue.”

She and Momo may not be compatible as lovers (probably too much yelling from Eunbi and too much passive aggressive side comments from Momo), but Eunbi is a good friend above everything else, so Momo slaps her ass as thanks and as appreciation.

-

It dawns upon her that Mina has been around for the past two weeks but she hasn’t collected all the stuff scattered about Momo’s room when she pulls the wrong underwear drawer and sees Mina’s neatly folded underwear, untouched for the past month and more.

Momo thinks it’s because Mina has more and is rich enough to buy more expensive underwear for herself that the ones she’s left in Momo’s house. She refuses to think that it’s because Mina does the same as Momo, where she still clings to a tiny thread of hope that things aren’t over between them.

(It terrifies Momo that every time she sees Mina would be an opportunity for the pianist to ask for her things back, in a big brown box that Momo will have to drive to her house. It terrifies her but that moment only exists in her anxious consciousness because Mina never asks for Momo to return her items.)

She doesn’t put them in any box and packs them away. Momo has learned to live with remnants of Mina around her.

There are more awkward moments now than there has ever been before, between her and Mina.

“It’s because you don’t know how to act around each other,” Chaeyoung had explained to her one night as they lie on Momo’s bed, Vance Joy playing softly in the speakers. It’s comforting and also very worrisome to know that Chaeyoung can psychoanalyze everyone else’s relationships correctly except her own. “From what I see, she doesn’t act like you’re friends in the first place. It’s because she can’t stay friends despite her saying you should maintain the friendship.”

Pure, unadulterated awkwardness that comes from acting like they had been before that night at the bar, before this entire mess. There had been unbidden cheek kisses and occassional hand rubs that they don’t catch themselves doing. Mina accidentally orders food for Momo, knowing exactly what she’d like and Momo, well, stares at Mina while she isn’t looking.

It drives Momo nuts because she doesn’t know how to act around Mina just as the other girl doesn’t, either. A blurry boundary has been set and she doesn’t know where it is, exactly, and she doesn’t know if she’s overstepping or is too far from it.

She meets Mina’s eyes across the table (their friends are sensitive enough to not make things uncomfortable for either of them) and Mina gives her a smile so soft and so kind then Momo remembers exactly why she hasn’t given up the tiny sliver of hope that comes with being very in love with Myoui Mina.

-

Her hands shake from the cold when Momo reaches for the cigarettes in her pocket. Momo has been craving for one even before the youth orchestra performance began but Jeongyeon had slapped her hand, scolding her for even thinking about sitting beside her, smelling like nicotine.

It’s stressing her out; she knew Mina’s going to look extremely great and that she has front row seats, right in the middle, Mina’s ass in plain sight.

God. Two hours. That was fucking stressful. Momo lights a cigarette, inhales and puffs out the smoke, taking a seat on one of the cold marble steps of the grand theatre.

The performance was great. Mina did so well, and caught up to the changes her substitute made while she was away. It warmed Momo’s heart to see the kids run up to her after, engulfing her in a large embrace from over twenty-five children. She recognized some of the pieces played; she and Mina used to listen to them in her car.

Her heart hurts. She misses those moments the most, before all this happened, when life was simpler and they only thing they had argued about was each other’s music tastes.

Momo takes another long drag to get rid of the pang in her heart but it fails to do so.

There are quiet clicks of heels and Momo knows person to whom those footsteps belong to. 

“I thought you quit,” says Mina, though there is no hostility in her voice. “Like, for good.”

Momo laughs, doesn’t look at Mina because she knows how beautiful Mina looks in a black dress, with gorgeous pearls around her neck and her hair done so simply but she looks like a Greek monument to Aphrodite. “I thought so, too.” She tosses the cigarette away, stepping on it with her heeled shoes before waving away the smoke so Mina doesn’t inhale any.

They sit side by side, an inch between them. Momo’s body tunes in to Mina, her senses bombarded with her perfume and her warmth and everything that Momo misses about Mina’s physical presence. Silence envelopes them, only the sound of the crickets fills it but it’s heavy, in a way that a silence has never been heavy between them. Heavy, with things unsaid and things they’re afraid to say.

Momo’s brain scrambles for anything, anything at all, when—

“Are you cold?” inquires Mina, when she notices that Momo still shakes slightly in one coat that is no match for the mid-December cold. Before Momo can answer, Mina unbuttons her own beige coat and Momo knows it’s large enough for the both of them, but Mina keeps her distance and places it over Momo’s shoulders with a chuckle that condenses in the cold air. “Here, to protect your uncultured shoulders so you don’t catch an uncultured cold.”

A laugh bubbles up Momo’s smoke-dry throat. “Thanks. Why are you out? Your kids must be looking for you inside.”

“My kids?” Mina giggles, clutching her second coat layer tighter around herself, elbows bumping with Momo’s. “I love them but… not my kids. Hi.”

“Hey.” She returns the small smile Mina gives her before turning back to watching the moon casts light on the frozen lake.

It horribly feels like how they were before, with the soft jibes and the soft tones and if she ever thought she wasn’t in love with Mina, she’s definitely in love now. It’s impossible not to, not after everything. Not after seeing Mina in a gorgeous dress, her skin illuminated by the footlights on the side of the stairs and Momo can only stare, not touch, as if Mina was a work of art and she, only an observer.

They exchange small talk, to fill the quiet, as if they were new friends when they’re not, not when Momo knows exactly how Mina’s lips taste like.

She’s tired of this small talk, she’s tired of pretending everything is okay, and Mina notices how tired she is of this façade they’re both keeping up.

(Mina had always been one to pick up her moods quickly. She picks it up faster than Jeongyeon and she’s known Jeongyeon all her life.)

“I’m sorry, this is weird, I know,” Mina looks away, genuinely saddened by Momo’s reflexive facial expressions.

Momo is quick to apologize, feeling guilty for being a tad bit rude to Mina when she’s just trying to make things better between them. She shakes her head, waving her hands. “No, I’m just tired. Uh, I guess I’m the one that’s supposed to say sorry.”

Silence blankets over them; guilt tears at Momo’s innards. She can feel Mina’s discouragement coming off in waves as much as she can feel Mina shivering where she is, so Momo unbuttons Mina’s coat, huddling closer so Mina can fit inside.

Mina jumps out of her skin when their bodies make contact, though she masks it off as a shiver even though she knows Momo saw her body’s reaction to Momo’s nearness.

She shouldn’t do this. Momo knows she shouldn’t. Especially when her heart thumps painfully against her chest it might pop out; so loud that Mina can probably hear it from their closeness but this is her body reacting to Mina’s closeness after months of being so far away from her—after months of craving for everything that makes up Myoui Mina.

Mina smells of watermelon, still. Like all her clothes in Momo’s room that Momo refuses to give back. Like the pillow on the left side of Momo’s bed where Mina used to sleep. Memories bombard her, painfully so, and she tries to push them out because she’s just trying to be friends with Mina, because Mina wants to be friends and Momo does, too, regardless of her sanity slipping away from her every time she remembers how she was with Mina and how they both fucked up and now they exist in a limbo where no one knew where to go, as they aimlessly wandering and dancing around each other.

“I have an idea.” Mina’s voice pulls her out of her thoughts.

“Okay,” replies Momo, a beat late because Mina’s warmth isn’t doing her any good. Momo is drunk. Momo is drowning. Momo is too caught up in the way she remembers what exactly Mina’s closeness can do to her.

“Maybe things… maybe things won’t be weird between us if we start over. Like a blank slate. If we can.”

She furrows her brow in confusion. “I don’t—”

Mina sighs, looks less confident about her idea when Momo doesn’t agree to it at once. “Maybe we should try again. From the start.”

A blank slate, Momo thinks. From the start.

Does that mean throwing everything away from the moment they had met? From the first bet? From their first millisecond-kiss? From the first time they sleep together in the room? From the first time Momo realizes she’s fucking crazy for Mina?

It feels an awful lot like throwing it away.

But a fresh start is something that sounds appealing to Momo, if that were even possible. Maybe this way they have another shot at this, whatever this is. Maybe they can move past this and be something more. 

Mina moves, the coat slipping off her back when she holds up a hand for Momo to shake, in the way that they hadn’t when they were first introduced inside the theatre after rehearsals. “Hello, I’m Mina. I like classical music, eighties alternative rock and indietronica.”

This is just a formality of some sort, just Mina’s way of saying let’s leave things behind us. Like a promise that Momo knows she can’t fulfil. But Mina is looking at her with so much hope and admiration and something else Momo can’t name. She is lovely and beautiful and everything Momo had fallen in love with—and she falls even more in love now, with the childlike glint in her eyes that match her mature features perfectly; her eyes that let Momo venture into every crevice of Mina’s being.

She can’t find it in herself to say no. Not when Mina looks at her like that, staring at her dead in the eye, asking if they could give their friendship another shot.

Thus:

“Hi, I’m Momo and I like ska alternative, soft rock and eighties pop.” 

(Later, Jihyo, Chaeyoung, Jeongyeon and Dahyun nearly lose their hair trying to explain to Momo that this is Mina extending an olive branch; that this is her sign that she doesn’t want to be just friends just as much as Momo. That she wants Momo, still. That she loves Momo, too.

They only manage to convince twenty percent of Momo, but that’s something.)

-

Excruciatingly slow and painful is the only way to describe what it feels like, after that night by the staircase. She’s thrown into a whirlpool of confusion and emotion when their dynamic shifts; softer, shyer. Like they’re walking on eggshells.

Mina had always been the more graceful one between them. She tiptoes, dances around Momo and she doesn’t even know it and Momo is left to be a stuttering, bashful mess that stiffens up like a board every single time Mina does something that tugs at her heart strings.

Surprise hugs. Cheek kisses. The occasional linking of fingers. It’s terrifying, really. Momo feels her soul leave her body multiple times.

Just friends, Momo scolds herself. This is what friends do.

Their dynamic shifts. Shyer, softer. Like a reset button had been pressed but not quite, because this is still Mina, with her gummy smile and her shy mannerisms. This is still Mina, with her soft hands with equally as soft eyes, always kind and just the right color of brown that Momo has learned to associate with sweet chocolate and waking up next to the girl she loves.

There can’t be a reset button. Not for Mina. Momo can’t forget everything she knows about Mina even if she wanted to.

It’s stressing Momo out. Mina is stressing Momo out.

So she doesn’t what exactly compels her to text Mina if she could pick her up for some dinner at this new sushi bar near her place, but she does and Mina says yeah, sure and now they’re laughing at dumb cat vines at one in the morning, at this small coffee shop.

It feels strangely nostalgic and also new, because Mina’s here and everything’s fine but Momo is still crazy in love with her, Mina is still Mina and Momo is still Momo—just two people trying to ignore everything that has happened between them for the better.

Blank slate my ass, Momo thinks as Mina’s chime-like laugh plucks at her heartstrings, very much how Momo plucks the thick strings of her bass guitar.

-

They’re en route to the bowling alley after the orchestra girls’ rehearsals, Momo taking the role of the driver because Jeongyeon is conked out in first row of seats. Mina takes the seat beside Momo, because, well, she can, meaning that she’s responsible for the aux cord and that all the girls trust her with it.

Momo’s heart drops to the pit of her stomach when Melt With You plays, earning a tiny gasp from her because the last time this played in a car she wept for a good ten minutes with Jeongyeon on the other end of the phone.

From her peripheral she sees Mina scramble to change the song but Momo extends her arm, eyes on the road still, a hand halting the panicked ministrations of Mina’s hands.

“Don’t,” Momo tells her quietly, but she’s sure Mina hears her even through the cacophony of the girls behind them. “It’s okay. I like this song.”

She spares Mina a smile, one of which Mina returns, though the glint in her eyes is wistful if anything. “It’s one of my favorites,” Mina tells her even if the two of them know each and every one of the other’s favorite songs.

Momo laughs, feigns ignorance. “Really? Didn’t peg you for a Modern English fan.”

The girl beside her feebly punches her arm, barely making any damage even though Momo knows that Mina can throw a mean punch if she wanted to.

They reach their destination; Momo is about to park the car—then it dawns upon her that she had never let go of Mina’s hand and neither did Mina let go of hers .

-

“Okay, so you know this next song probably just as much as we do.” Chaeyoung laughs into the mic. The crowd cheers and Momo smiles, loves that the crowd adores I Think I’m Yours, as if they understood just how beautiful Mina looked when she composed the lyrics and the tune of the chorus.

“This is one of my favorite tracks too,” Momo says suddenly, earning shocked faces from the three other band members as she hasn’t spoken for this song for some time because it had killed her just playing it, what more talking about the damn song? “I wrote it… for someone really special. And, uh, it means so much to me that you guys love it as much as I do.”

The crowd coos with collective awww’s, and then Momo meets Mina’s eyes from where she’s standing in the front row, eyes focused only at Momo. It’s electric; it fuels her even more than show adrenaline. Mina’s eyes has enough heat to power up multiple city grids.

Momo never drops her gaze from Mina’s and plays I Think I’m Yours, her eyes locked on Mina’s the entire time.

-

Mamamoo’s album release after party is just as fun as the girls themselves, so Momo doesn’t expect anything less than a pool party inside a large greenhouse (“So we can have a pool party in December!” Byulyi exclaims, an incredulous look in her eyes as if Jeongyeon had asked if she’s ever seen pigs fly.), an abundance of warm water and free-flowing alcohol.

2X played a few songs to start the night up and it’s been great; Wheein and Hyejin nearly fall off the bar counter as Momo and the band perform, acting silly as per usual. It’s all fun and games, soaked in waist-deep inflatable pools until she lays her eyes on a very wet Myoui Mina, soaked to the bones, her light blue blouse clinging to her body. The water makes the cloth transparent and, Christ, that’s Mina’s black bra, one of which Momo has seen countless times.

She doesn’t even know she’s staring until Mina moves closer and hooks her thumb under Momo’s chin to push it up. “Eyes up front, soldier.”

Momo can only swallow and wish that she doesn’t die at any point of the night.

She does, however, nearly pass out three times. An instance being a bucket of water dumped on Mina’s head, her Ralph Lauren blouse fall off her shoulder, revealing a very attractive bra and a very attractive shoulder blade and Momo is about to pass out.

The alcohol is already dulling her senses, making everything seem like it’s floating as her head thumps pleasantly. She’s warm all over, her blood right under her skin and her brain feels like liquid that Momo doesn’t even catch herself blatantly staring at Mina. Thankfully the pianist remains oblivious to her ogling, too caught up in a water fight with Jihyo and Jeongyeon.

“You okay? You look a little…” Chaeyoung comments, pulls her out of her own thoughts. She settles beside Nayeon, currently passed out and leaning into Chaeyoung’s small frame. .

“Frustrated?”

The youngest girl’s eyebrows raise to her hairline. “I was about to say ‘red’ but I guess that answers my question.”

“Kill me, Son Chaeyoung,” mumbles Momo before submerging into the water to blow some bubbles with her eyes above water level, just to relieve some tension but it’s not working.

Chaeyoung only laughs at her misery. “If you’re so sexually frustrated right now, why don’t you just go and choose a random girl and screw with her?”

“Those days are over, Chaeng,” she’s too drunk to stop herself from being too melodramatic about this. Momo hides her eyes behind her forearm and frowns. “I’ve left that part of my life behind.”

“Really? You’re a changed woman, Momo. I’m proud.”

Momo tilts the tall glass of gin, downs it, the world spinning when she sets it on a small table but it doesn’t stop her from standing on her two feet and walking to the inflatable pool where Mina is seated, nursing a bottle of apple-flavored beer.

They talk, comfortably, until a lull in the conversation stops. Momo realizes that Mina is so close to her—not on top, but very near that her wet and warmth is driving Momo crazy.

“I’m sorry,” apologizes Momo, shifting away from Mina. “I don’t—I’m drunk and I—I’m sorry. For everything.”

For being afraid. For not saying anything. For assuming what’s best for Mina and giving up so easily.

Her mouth is moving on its own accord, the alcohol dissolving her filter with things she’s not ready to say but the logical part of Momo thinks, if not now, when?

“I’m sorry for everything. R-really sorry.” She says, leaning closer to Mina because her eyes are starting to cloud, either from the alcohol, the water, hopefully not tears.

Mina doesn’t say that she doesn’t need to apologize for anything because she does, Momo really, really does. They both do.

They’re seated side by side; Mina’s legs folded to her chest, the water stilling around them and Momo just wants to be dry right now.

“I’m sorry, too,” the pianist says quietly or so Momo thinks, because her hearing has been dulled by her state of drunkenness. “I—I lied. About a lot of things.”

Momo furrows her brow, tilts her head to the side. “Huh? Like what?”

She feels Mina’s shoulders rise and fall and even her alcohol-addled mind knows that this isn’t going to be easy for the two of them, not the very least.

“I… I lied to you, that night when I came back from Paris.” The pianist says, her hands creating small waves in the pool. “You remember how we were talking about what could have happened if we weren’t scared? And I said that I don’t know what I wanted? I did.”

Her brain has been jogged with the memory but Momo isn’t connecting the lines, her eyes drooping.

Mina notices Momo’s confusion, and shakes her head with a “you’re drunk, Momo,” moving to stand but Momo stops her, pulls her right back into the water.

“What’d you lie about?” Momo asks honestly, eagerly, because she needs to know after living in the dark. 

A visible sigh shakes Mina’s shoulders, before staring at Momo, dead in the eye. “I lied when I said I didn’t know what I wanted, because you’re the one I wanted.” She looks away, embarrassed at the admittance of such. “You’re still the one I want.”

Momo may be drunk but she understands Mina’s words, probably even more so now than when she’s sober.

It boils down to this. A confession but not quite; in still waters while they’re on the alcohol high.

“I thought you didn’t want me,” Momo admits quietly.

“I thought you didn’t want me. God, we really need to start talking about these things.” Mina laughs and sniffles slightly. “I’m telling the truth now, in case you were wondering. I’m… I’m done stopping myself from wanting you when I really, really do that it hurts the both of us. I’m sorry, Momo. I was scared but I could have said something, but fear took the best of me. You deserve better treatment than that.”

Mina looks at her, so open and so honest and Momo falls over the dark oblivion of Mina’s eyes.

She does the first thing that comes in mind.

Momo kisses Mina, because it seems right, as if fate wanted her to, right here, right now, with the same girl that had broken her heart but is reaching out, volunteering to fix it.

‘Just friends’ goes out the window, as easily as that.

She tastes the same, only now their mouths taste like mixed drinks but Momo chases the taste of Mina because it had been months of being deprived of this—and she hates herself for being so eager, so desperate for Mina’s kisses and Mina’s touch and Mina’s everything.

Their lips slide across one another, meeting kiss per kiss and God, she’s wanted this, wanted this so much and now that’s it’s here, sharing wet and hot kisses that had so much suppressed emotions from denying themselves each other and well, it had driven Momo up a wall so many days.

Mina is pliant against her, taking as much as she receives, pulling Momo closer by the nape of her neck.

It has boiled down to this, when she feels the desperation growing and the need to touch Mina after months spills out of her slowly then all at once, consuming Momo completely, drunk and lustful and also in love with Myoui Mina, who grips at her arms that match her own desperation.

“Do you want to…” Mina says, pulling away an inch and Momo follows her face for more kisses, refusing to be separated from her.

“I just want you, Mina.” Momo says honestly, staring Mina dead in the eye, never speaking truer words than what had left her lips just now.

In the past, she could fuck Mina into walls and not look at her face, but now she can't even think of looking anywhere else, not when Mina’s face is of pure lust and love that Momo is hopeful enough to see, as she leans in to press another kiss to Momo’s lips, thumb swiping her cheek with so much tenderness that her chest hurts.

No one notices they leave, in new clothes; no one notices their hands are linked as they make their way to Momo’s car, Mina taking the driver’s seat because Momo is obviously too drunk to drive, but never too drunk to press Mina into the door of her apartment, hands already finding their way past the waistband of Mina’s shorts.

They find themselves kissing into walls, all the pent up frustration and longing into searing kisses that make Momo feel so very lightheaded. She’s so caught up in everything that is Mina, overwhelmed with being able to do this again, touch her and kiss her, that Momo doesn’t even notice that they’re en route to her room, the other girl pushing into the door to dump Momo onto the bed.

Momo watches her with half-lidded eyes, her body aching just as much as the middle of her legs and also her chest, when Mina strips off her clothes. “You’re beautiful,” says Momo quietly and despite her soft-spoken words Mina catches it and blushes a pretty shade of red, highlighted by the moonlight, seeping through Momo’s blinds.

“You’re beautiful, too,” Mina replies, leaning close to crawl on top of Momo, their lips finding each other instantly, Momo’s hands roaming Mina’s body because she’s terrified that this is a cruel wet dream where she wakes in the morning, hot and bothered and missing Mina terribly but the girl is here, touching her and making her feel as good as they had before.

Before.

It feels like before and it also doesn’t, not in the delicate way Mina holds her eyes and the way she touches Momo with their foreheads together,

“I mis—missed this,” Mina whispers, their mouths touching as Momo’s lungs burn for air, because Mina is making her feel so much, feel too much, her smart fingers knowing exactly where to rub, knowing exactly how touch Momo’s chest. “I missed you so much, Momo.”

Momo responds by coming, her body arching like a bow into Mina’s.

It goes on for the night, rounds of making love that Momo doesn’t know where the energy comes from though she does know that she likes seeing the look on Mina’s face when she comes, as if universes open in her head and it’s the most majestic things Momo has had the pleasure of seeing.

She missed Mina, missed having Mina like this, missed having Mina in her arms in like this that when Mina sleeps and Momo is on the verge of it, she finds herself touching Mina’s face, so gently and so tenderly because Momo is afraid that if she presses too hard, Mina might dissipate like bubbles, and now that she’s had the taste of Mina again, Momo doesn’t know what she would do without her, the past few months a complete mystery to her, how she can live without the sweetness that Myoui Mina brings into her life.

Momo doesn’t know what’s about to happen now that they’re here, but they are, and she doesn’t know what the next step should be because she’s still in love with Mina, and she doesn’t want things to be the way it was before.

The worry, however, wipes away when Mina turns in her sleep, snuggling closer to Momo’s chest. The thought of returning to the way things were before terrifies her but she’s pledged to make things better, and the small, content smile on Mina’s face as she presses a sleepy kiss into Momo’s shoulder tells Momo they’re in this together, this time.

Momo wakes up to an empty bed and feels a familiar heartbreak ache at her chest, painful and there because she had thought things would be now that they’re relatively more honest with each other.

It takes her awhile to get out of bed, obviously disheartened after a good night, about to break down in front of whoever is in the kitchen right now when the sight of Chaeyoung pouring hot water into mugs for Mina and Nayeon, giggling at something Chaeyoung had said. They turn to her once she enters the room, with not-so-surprised look at Momo oversleeping on a Saturday morning.

“Morning hotshot,” Chaeyoung greets, setting the kettle back on the stove, padding over to Nayeon and placing her hands on her girlfriend’s shoulder. Nayeon only grins slyly, in the way that Momo has come to know that she knows something Momo doesn’t.

“Good morning,” Mina says brightly, walking over to press a kiss to Momo’s cheek. “Had a nice sleep?”

Momo can’t speak, because Mina stayed the night and Mina is here, pressing kisses to her cheek that all she manages is a grunt when Mina presses another kiss to her cheek, then pulling  away to retrieve something inside Momo’s room but not without a tap to Momo’s underwear-clad ass.

Mina stayed.

Her heart warms at the thought. Mina stayed and is still here, pressing kisses into her cheek like before, but more doting and gentle, if that were even possible. She grins and sits at the table, clutching her cheek like a schoolgirl, happier than she has been in months.

(The mood is thoroughly ruined when Chaeyoung and Nayeon give her slow nods of approval and thumbs up while Mina’s back is turned and it takes every bit of Momo’s hungover self-control not to chuck plates at the two of them.)

-

Her eyes are itchy from allergies, and she’s about to call out for Chaeyoung to ask where she’d kept the antihistamines this time, Jeongyeon and Jihyo yell and run to her, enveloping her in tight embrace, knocking the wind right out of her lungs.

Before she can struggle to ask what’s wrong, they scream, “Momo is fucking Mina! Again!” over and over again she’s sure they’re going to wake up the entire complex.

-

“You’re looking good today,” Jackson remarks, giving her a thumbs up. Looks like he isn’t going to dry hump Jinyoung or Bambam anytime soon. “Got laid again?”

“Fuck off,” replies Momo, flipping him the bird, but she’s laughing. “2X’s about to have another album, that’s why.”

“That’s great!” He claps her back painfully. Seriously. What is it with people wanting her to cough up her innards. “Please. No more yelling at Bambam. He’s sensitive.”

No more yelling, she thinks, her phone pinging with a message from Mina, most likely a response to her good morning message.

Being with Mina now doesn’t feel like a reset button being forcefully pressed to forcefully forget everything that had happened between them. Ignoring the suppressed and ridiculous pining had been torture but now there is no more reason to pine, because Mina is here; Mina is back to fill the empty crevices that Momo didn’t even notice she filled before.

The satisfying feeling of finishing a puzzle washes over her when Momo looks to her side to find Mina always there.

Mina in the passenger’s seat. Mina in the restaurant booth. Mina lying on the left side of the bed.

(“I missed your car,” Mina says

She laughs, baffled by Mina’s sentiment. “But you’ve been here after…” Momo trails off, unsure of how to refer to The Incident as The Incident.

The pianist shrugs. “It feels different now.”

She would have countered this with a oh it must be the new seat covers or you like the new air freshener, though this is Mina, who blushes from the small revelation. This is Mina, and Momo has learned her lesson from not telling Mina what she wants to say.

She gives Mina a small, fond smile and relieved: “I’m glad it does.”)

It had stung to not have her there but now that she is, Momo feels everything falling into place from the chaos that had taken over her life when Mina was in Paris, when Mina asked to be just friends, when Mina asked to have a reset button.

There is no more reset button.

This is them finishing where they left off, only this time they’re not afraid and they’re more careful and loving and gentle, everything Momo had not imagined she would look for until Mina happened to her.

(“Moguriii,” whines Mina with a small laugh, trying to pull her hand away from Momo as she attacks the back of her hand with kisses. “I’m trying to study a piece. We can fool around later.”

Momo blows a very large raspberry into Mina’s skin in response.)

Nothing changes but also everything changes. Momo is still in love with Mina but it feels like Mina isn’t stopping herself from being in love with Momo. Not anymore.

-

Momo isn’t sure where she stands with Mina, not yet, but things aren’t as hazy as it had been before.

It’s as if the fog had cleared up but not completely.

Sometimes panic settles over her because Momo isn’t willing to go through that again, no, not again, but then Mina slides her hand into Momo’s when they’re en route to the beach with the girls. Momo turns to her that Mina is facing the window, watching the road roll out.

The panic that rises subsides, and Momo can breathe again, when Mina’s thumb absently rubs on her skin.

-

She wakes up with her nose buried in Mina’s dark hair, their limbs tangled with one another and the light peeking through the blinds. The skin from the underside of her arm is smooth against the soft skin of Mina’s waist, and she feels an overwhelming amount of love and content that her heart might explode from warmth.

Except that Momo really needs to pee. Right now.

She reluctantly untangles herself from Mina, earning a small groan of protest that successfully tugs at her heart but not enough for her bladder nagging her to walk to the washroom, no matter how warm Mina and the bed is.

Momo spots the cigarettes while she’s washing her hands. It’s been weeks since her last, ever since things got better between her and Mina and while she craves it sometimes, it’s better that she stops again because performing is harder when you’ve got smoker lungs, as Jihyo would say.

“Thinking of smoking?” Mina’s raspy voice pulls her out of her own thoughts and Momo doesn’t know how long she’s been washing her hands and contemplating throwing her cigarettes away. “Let me use the washroom and you can do your thing.”

“Nah,” says Momo, dumping it into the trash bin before facing Mina, who is a sight for sore eyes in yesterday’s night shirt, her makeup only half removed. “Just forgot to get rid of them but they’ve been sitting around unused for weeks.”

Mina grins and Momo feels her knees grow weak. “Really? I’m glad.”

“I mean, I guess the habit’s pretty attractive to other girls. You know. Band, smoking, et cetera,” she pads closer and twines her arms around Mina’s body, the girl leaning into her touch like a sunflower to the sun. “There’s only one girl I want to impress.”

The pianist rolls her eyes but pink tinges her cheeks, her arms locking around Momo’s neck tighter. “Is it your mom?”

Momo laughs. “Her, too. But mostly this amazing girl. Let’s just call her… hmm. Mina? Yeah. Mina.”

A half-hearted swat from the back of Mina’s hand lands on Momo’s arm and she’s definitely blushing now, adorably shy; Momo can’t look anywhere else but at the girl in front of her. “Flattery will get you nowhere, Hirai Momo.”

“Ah, damn it, I thought it might get me in your pants—ow!” Mina flicks her forehead before walking away, her hips swaying tantalizingly.

Momo laughs before tackling Mina to her bed, in a fit of loud laughs and tickles and a bath of sunshine.

-

[9:24:11 PM] Princess Myoui: Are you doing anything right now?

[9:35:12 PM] Baby Girl: just ended my shift y?

[9:35:17 PM] Princess Myoui: Drop by the orchestra please. :)

[9:35:33 PM] Baby Girl: was about to pick u up before u could even think abt it princess :)

-

The orchids wrapped in brown paper rustle in her hands, loud enough to echo in the empty orchestra though not soundly enough to upstage the music that greets her when she pushes through the heavy doors of the theatre.

The entirety of the stage is illuminated but only the piano creates the music that fills every pocket of the theatre, soothing notes played by Mina’s fingers and Momo doesn’t need to be up close to know how they dance across the keys of the grand piano like ripples of water. Delicate, graceful, and if this is what heaven is like, then she’d like to go to heaven right now.

Momo lets her fingers trail through the velvet chairs as she walks closer to the stage, completely mesmerized by how the yellow stage light bounces off Mina and it’s nothing new that Mina is the most beautiful girl she has ever laid her eyes on—and she realizes that Mina is equally as beautiful as she is now when she walks around in a tattered shirt, trying to whip something up for Momo (and failing).

She wonders when she had become the person to know that the piece Mina is playing is a Chopin piece, but Momo doesn’t really mind. Andante spianato et Grande polonaise brillante, op.22, exactly. It’s on one of her go-to-sleep playlists when sleep evades her.

After the last note, Momo claps and whisper-screams and claps some more, pretending to be an entire crowd that should be there to appreciate everything that Mina plays. The pianist notices Momo’s presence, and laughs heartily; standing to curtsy with a large smile plastered on her face.

“Brava, brava!” calls out Momo, coming on the stage with the orchids hidden behind her back. Mina greets her with kiss that makes her toes curl in her sneakers.

Mina’s kisses are what the great composers have written their masterpieces about, Momo thinks. Chopin, Beethoven, Mozart, Bach—all of them have composed the masterful pieces of the greatest music ever created all in Mina’s honor.

“Hi,” says Mina.

“Hi,” says Momo. She presents the orchids to the pianist, who takes it with a grin that stays even with the quick kiss she gives Momo.

“What are these for, baby?” Mina lowers her face to the flowers, the light illuminating the pink pigment her cheeks have taken to.

“Nothing. I just felt like it.” She shrugs. It had been an impulse to buy Mina flowers, as if the night should end with Momo giving Mina flowers.

Mina’s eyes never leave hers, adoration and absolute fondness in them and Momo can’t look away. Not now. Not ever.

“You’re so sweet,” Mina tells her softly, then looks at Momo with a brightness in her eyes that Momo has had the pleasure of seeing often. She bites her lip, her white teeth peeking out. “If you’re like this now, I can’t imagine you as a girlfriend.”

Her heart drops but it’s not unpleasant at all, not until it picks up its pace when it sinks in that Mina had just dropped a hint (or maybe not? Just an observation?), and when Momo has managed to convince herself that what Mina had said was just a mere remark, she looks up to Mina with a certain look on her face, expecting and worried and Jesus Christ, Momo, say something!

Old habits die hard, because she should really ask Mina what she means. Momo refuses for things to be like they were, when no one knew what was going on the other’s mind. She doesn’t want that to happen again. Momo mentally thumps the back of her head “Why don’t you find out?” comes out of her mouth instead of something similarly less snarky and more romantic.

Old habits die hard, because Momo is shaking so much right now because she’s wanted this for so long, and she might have royally fucked this up, but then Mina, beautiful Mina, graceful Mina, Mina with the silver tooth and the snarky mouth and the ever expressive eyes that pulls you in and pushes you out if she wants to, says:

“Okay,” it’s done with a laughing tone, light and soft, like a chime in the summer breeze. Then nothing can ever prepare Momo for this, nothing on this earth, nothing on this mortal plane—“Be my girlfriend then, Hirai Momo.”

Nothing can ever prepare Momo for it, and she might be about to pass out but then she realizes she hasn’t said anything yet and she wants to say something, she really does, but words have failed because Myoui fucking Mina had just asked Momo to be her girlfriend. After everything that had gone down, after all complications they could have avoided if they just talked things out—they’re here, they’re here—

Momo opts to not say anything because words fail her now more than ever, no word in Korean or Japanese can ever tell her how relieved she is now that they’re here, on the same page, finally knowing that they’ve both wanted this, both wanted each other so damn much so Momo surges forward, kisses Mina with all she’s got, hoping, praying it’s enough to tell her, yes, yes, yes she’ll be Mina’s girlfriend through and through.

Mina meets her kiss per kiss, never relenting, the smile of her mouth tells Momo that yeah, she knows exactly what Momo can’t find the words to say.

They’re standing in the middle of the stage, Mina’s arms locked around her neck and her hands on the expanse of Mina’s back and it feels like the first time they’ve ever truly kissed, under the streetlamp, outside a diner, at three in the morning only now it’s softer, tender, filled with everything Momo had wanted to tell Mina (but maybe Mina knows, all this time), washed in the golden yellow of the stage lights, musical instruments surrounding them.

No symphony the Philharmonic Orchestra can play that will match Mina’s laugh which echoes throughout the entire theatre when Momo pulls away, heaving like she’s just run a 4k marathon, and say “about damn time” into Mina’s lips.

Turns out Mina invited her for a picnic on stage, with a checkered mat, basket of cheese and bread and wine.

Momo had taken her for a picnic by the park one time, before. They fed ducks at the pond that day, the little birds pecking at their toes as thanks.

Now, instead of grass and ducks and ponds surrounding them it’s musical instruments. Brass, gold, wood. Momo enjoys it just as much, especially when Mina teaches her how to play most of the instruments that Momo nearly broke Tzuyu’s harp.

(“Oh God, I’m glad we didn’t break it,” sighs Momo. “I don’t want to be eligible for someone in her hit list.”

Mina doesn’t even deny that her friend has a hit list.)

Some point during the surprise date, which happens to be their first date as official girlfriends, Momo’s back hits the plaid mat, Mina sucking kisses into her neck when she realizes that maybe they’re not alone in the theatre.

(Momo would be up for that, some other time; but she isn’t about to have sex with Mina in public as their first time as official girlfriends.)

“Can—can we go home,” asks Momo, wincing when Mina sucks at the part behind her ears, her resolve to not break public decency rules ebbing away.

Mina hums in response before speaking, her voice vibrating across her skin and Momo is about to go crazy. “Right now?”

It takes her a few more seconds to gather enough strength to hold Mina by the shoulders, detaching the other girl from her neck.

Mina is adorable, with her blushing cheeks and her cloudy eyes and her red lips.

Mina is sexy, with her tongue peeking out to lick her bottom lip and her labored breathing.

God. She’s going to be the death of Momo, one of these days. Not that Momo is complaining or anything.

She situates her mouth above Mina’s ear and whispers, in the sweetest tone she can manage, and says, “I really, really, really want to make sweet love to you, Myoui Mina. On a bed,” she punctuates with a sight and a, “please.”

Mina is off her, packing up the basket faster than Momo can blink.

-

[1:01:20 AM] momomomoring: good news mina is my girlfriend now

[1:01:24] fake daddy yoo: bithicH HD HWAHT HTHE UFKCK

[1:01:26] fake daddy yoo: DRII V E HOMW E RIGH T NOW AND TELL ME DETAILS

[1:01:29] fake daddy yoo: HTANK GOD NO ONE IS OGING TO SAD-EAT MY fROZEN PIZZAS

-

She’s shaking when she bends insert the key into its barrel, the metal gate of the warehouse. Momo doesn’t know why she’s nervous since this isn’t the first date they’ve ever been on, as girlfriends or otherwise, but she trembles when she pulls the warehouse door above their heads.

The paint buckets she had set up the night before is exactly where she and Chaeyoung had left it, the canvas spread out in the warehouse and Mina’s mouth forms a surprised little ‘o’ at the sight.

“Chaeyoung had a friend with a warehouse where we could mess around with non-toxic paint,” Momo bends to retrieve the full body suits and goggles on the chair, situated on the side of the nearly empty room. “I wanted to do something fun with you.” Momo hands Mina the suit and the goggles before grinning, shyness already taking over her. “Shall we?”

They kiss amidst splattered colours, orange smeared on Mina’s suit, yellow on her face while Momo is bathed in electric blue.

They’re lying on their messy masterpiece, creating snow angels in the myriad of colors, spent and exhausted, laughing as the sun dances over different hues they have rolled in.

“Have I out-dated you?” Momo asks when they’ve spent probably minutes staring at each other in their paint-clad suits.

The remaining part of Mina’s forehead that’s unpainted creases in confusion. “Outdated?”

“I’m the more creative lover, and I out-dated you.”

Mina laughs. “I don’t think that’s what outdated means, but alright.”

Creating a smudge of paint across the canvas, Momo rolls over to kiss Mina, their bodies slipping from one another in their suits. She removes Mina’s goggles, flesh among the yellow pigment that had dried on Mina’s face and it would be a hilarious sight to anyone else but Momo thinks Mina is still the most beautiful girl she’s ever laid her eyes on, even like this.

She wipes Mina’s face with her thumb, blue on orange, and puts up her goggles. “Mina,” says Momo, solemnly. “Mina. I’m crazy about you.”

She’s about to say it, the words that had been lodged into her throat for the longest time. Momo had wanted to tell Mina she loves her, loves her so fucking much, even more than rain on a cold Monday morning and the sweetness of chocolate bars from her childhood—

“I love you, too, Momo,” Mina replies simply, as if she had heard Momo’s thoughts now or at any point of them being together. “I love you, too. So much.”

Momo feels her heart expand into the wideness of the universe except without the darkness, only light and only pure love for the girl under her, covered in her favorite hues. She expands, and expands, because she loves Mina and Mina loves her and everything feels so right in the world.

Later that night, they say it over and over again, each touch a star shining brighter behind their eyelids.

They say it over and over again, making up for all the times they didn’t say it. Because they’re late, but they’re here now and it’s better late than never.

-

“So now… she’s my girlfriend.” Momo ends lamely, because a blush is creeping up her neck at the thought of the entire thing once more.

Eunbi shrugs. “So what? Water is wet. Tell me something new.” When she sees Momo deflate at her lack of enthusiasm, she sidles up to Momo, wrapping an arm around her shoulders to squeeze it forcefully. “I’m kidding! I knew you could do it, champ!” Eunbi slaps Momo’s back, the beer in Momo’s cup sloshing forward, following her momentum. “Looks like you have a whole new glow to you.”

“You make it seem like we just got married and you’re my over-the-top best man,” grumbles Momo into her drink. “Just so you know, Jeongyeon would be my bridesmaid, not you.”

Eunbi fakes an offended gasp. “I didn’t know that Jeongyeon was your best friend in the entire world! And to be honest, I think it’s too early to think about marriage.”

It really is, Momo has no doubt about it. Eunbi is just such a stereotypical wingman that it reminds her of those cheesy wedding movies. “But hey, since you rekindled this friendship in the first place, why don’t you and Mina have lunch with me, my treat.”

So she finds herself doing exactly that, on a Saturday afternoon, Mina watching Eunbi cautiously as she laughs boisterously at the Hang Glider Incident. Cautious is stinkeye in Momo’s Mina Vocubulary, so Momo sorta, kinda regrets inviting Eunbi over until she slaps Momo’s back once more that Momo feels her fucking internal organs shift inside her body and sees the concerned yet amused smile playing on her lips before interacting with Eunbi more.

She still sort of regrets inviting Eunbi but Mina is so amused by the girl, despite knowing she had been an ex-fuck buddy of Momo’s. Turns out they know some football stuff, too; Mina knowing only stuff from FIFA games.

(“She’s Jessica and Krystal Jung’s youngest sister.” Momo tells her, spinning her keys on her index finger.

Mina halts in her steps, her jaw hanging open.)

-

After recording, Jihyo buys them pizza, feasting on it after hours and hours of recording demos to be submitted to the record company.

(“It’s because you and Mina finally decided to stop being lovesick fools with pride larger than the Empire State building,” Jihyo leans down to pinch Momo’s cheek when she pouts.

Ah, well, it’s free pizza, even at the cost of her embarrassment.)

“Hey, didn’t you have some idea to pitch last week?” Jeongyeon prompts Momo, her mouth full of bread and cheese.

Momo had nearly forgotten about that, in the haze of the rhum cola she’d taken in that night. “Oh, I just wanted to ask if you guys think a collab between the orchestra girls and us would be a good idea.”

Dahyun stops spinning in her seat. “Holy shit. That’s genius. Shit. That’s genius!”

Jihyo swallows with a grin on her face that remains when she uses a napkin to wipe the grease off her face. “Well, what are you waiting for? Get your girlfriends’ asses over here, quick!”

They reward Momo with another box of pizza for it, Chaeyoung fondly scratching under her chin as she always does.

-

“I think I gained ten stone from the meals your parents served me,” Mina informs her from the bathroom with a hearty burp, followed by a small “excuse me.”

Momo laughs as she tinkers with the toy robots she had kept in her childhood bedside table. “Well, that means they like you and they don’t care if you get fat.”

Mina’s head pokes out of the door. “Will you still like me when I get fat?”

“Only if you like me when I get fat.”

Her girlfriend shrugs, resumes her nightly routines, then finds her way to Momo’s childhood bed. It’s cold, but they manage; snuggling close under the duvets, Momo stretching to switch off the bedside lamp, the stars illuminating once it’s dark and it’s a beautiful kind of contentment washing over her; having Mina here, in the room of her youth, watching the glow in the dark stars with awe and childlike wonder that not many people see often.

“So, your parents like me, huh?” whispers Mina, turning in Momo’s arms so they’re face to face.

Sleep weigh down her eyelids. “Mmhmm.”

“Just like you like me?”

Her eyes are closed but Momo grins at Mina’s silly questions, and she knows Mina’s just messing with her. “Mmm. Maybe I like you more.”

“Good.”

Silence washes over them save for Dave Matthews Band’s Crash Into Me playing at a low volume, the warmth of Mina under the duvets help sleep ebb at Momo’s consciousness until:

“Into your heart, I’ll beat again, sweet you rock and sweet you roll, lost for you, I’m so lost for you,,” sings Mina softly, into the chilly air. Her voice is cracked, tired, but carries the melody of the song perfectly. “Merry Christmas, Momo. I love you.”

Momo smiles, sings back in a volume and softness that matches the sleepy girl in her arms. “Touch your lips just so I know, in your eyes, love, it glows so I’m bareboned and crazy for you,” she presses a kiss to Mina’s forehead. “Merry Christmas, Mina,” Momo says softly. “I love you, too.”

-

The girls decide to be together for New Year’s eve, having their annual exchange gift with new friends.

She’s content to see their friends monkeying around, half drunk, as she’s sidled up next to Mina in front of the pianist’s fireplace, holding Mina’s present in one hand and her other slotted in Mina’s own, their palms touching in the most comforting manner that has always made Momo a ridiculous kind of happy.

Mina gifts her a GC to the local music store and buy a brand new Gibson Memphis Les Paul bass guitar, and Mina hugs

She didn’t know anything about jewelry, so Momo had to consult Yeeun for the best kind of jewelry a girl can receive and Momo settles for a necklace with Mina’s name engraved on it, followed by the first few notes of O Mio Babbino, Mina’s favorite classical piece that happened to be Momo’s too.

The misspelling on Momo’s card, however, seems to have made Mina happier. “Marry Christmas,” Mina laughs, cuddling a sulking Momo. “Aww. It’s okay. It’s cute. We all make spelling mistakes. I love your gift still.”

Mina wears it, the gold shining against her collarbone and it’s absolutely beautiful that Momo can’t look away.

(“Marry Christmas,” chuckles Mina again. She prepares herself to sulk once more until the pianist speaks in a hushed tone, so quiet Momo almost misses it, “Hmm. Maybe when we’re older.”)

The countdown starts.

4. Their friends snuggle up to their significant others, waving their sparkle sticks in the night air.

3. Momo looks at Mina’s staring at the sky as the fireworks find its peak and explode, coloring the night sky.

2. Mina turns to her and grins, the light dancing on her face, silver tooth glinting.

1. She leans in and presses a kiss to Mina’s lips, feels like a new person because of this girl in her arms.

“Happy new year, baby,” says Mina, grinning into their kiss, fireworks in her chest and above their heads.

“Happy new year,” Momo replies, and she could never imagine welcoming a new year with anyone else except the girl of her dreams, reached through millisecond kisses, quick rendezvous, breakfast that had been burned and the sunlight casting different shades of yellow on their faces.

~

“Open it, open it!” Mina squeals, clapping her hands eagerly as she vibrates with excitement.

“Alright, alright,” laughs Momo, unpacks the second album from its cardboard box. “Jeez, calm down.”

“Don’t tell me you’re not as excited as me for this, too,” her girlfriend shoves her lightly, teasingly.

Girlfriend.

Momo grins. She’ll never get tired of calling Mina that.

“Check the booklet, quick!”

Momo flips the pages of the album booklet, ending up directly on the page of their title track - art by Son Chaeyoung, produced by Park Jihyo and Kim Dahyun, demo by Yoo Jeongyeon. Backing instruments by Minatozaki Sana, Im Nayeon, Chou Tzuyu.

Kiss Me, I’m Right - written and composed by Hirai Momo and Myoui Mina.