again.
birthdays are fun; fights with your girl, not so much.
jihyo’s halfway through picking out an outfit for the rest of the day when she checks her phone for what must be the nth time this morning; to her disappointment ( is it disappointment, though ? at this point she isn’t sure anymore ) there’s no new notification from the one person who matters most. jihyo tries not to let it faze her, despite the quick dip in her features once she realizes yuqi hasn’t even sent her a half assed happy birthday — call it pathetic and middle school-y, but she feels like a girl whose crush has got snuffed right in her face.
to be fair — it’s not even her fault the stupid fight had happened ! but when hours had passed without contact on her end guilt began its slow crawl up her spine, and what used to be a mere mix of frustration and anger has morphed into something resembling regret, too. but jihyo’ll be damned if her stubbornness doesn’t get the best of her, and so social media wise she remains stoically uncommunicative towards the younger girl — despite the slight pangs in her chest whenever her phone screen lights up, and it isn’t her.
a sudden, rapt knock at the door snaps jihyo out of her thoughts, and in the middle of singing out “coming !” she slides a top on with ease, fitting into it comfortably as she bounces to the door with a bright smile — which seems to freeze, coming face to face with the very person she was just thinking about. and she doesn’t seem to be alone, either; jihyo’s eyes fall to yuqi’s companion, the bouquet of bloom that entice her and leave her heart running a mile a minute. yet she does her best to remain passive still, gaze drifting up back to yuqi with eyebrows arched. “no one saw you come up ?” is her first question.
but she steps aside in an attempt to let the other in anyway — which is, in turn, an attempt at calming down the rush of her own heart.
for a moment, yuqi stands frozen, a million thoughts racing through her mind. her gaze meets jihyo’s, her lips forming a subtle smile that makes her relief all too obvious. she almost wants to fall into the older girl’s arms, apologizing for the thousandth time about just how difficult it can be to date her. she refrains, however, wanting to enjoy the moment for what it is, now that she sees that jihyo isn’t opposed to seeing her. it’s the first step towards progress, but, mostly, yuqi’s just grateful to see the person that she cares for the most on her special day.
before yuqi’s able to speak, jihyo interrupts the silence with a question of her own, and yuqi’d be lying to say that it didn’t catch her off guard. she blinks, hesitating for a moment as her heartbeat continues to quicken in her chest. “i —” she pauses, gaze momentarily falling to the bouquet in her hands before returning to meet jihyo’s. “i don’t care even if they did see me come up. this is more important to me right now, okay?”
she enters her girlfriend’s apartment, not wanting to linger outside any longer than she has to (despite her attempt at seeming brave, the fear still plagues her). there’s so much that she wants to say, so much that she planned to say — yet, now that she’s here and the moment is real, she finds herself at a total loss for words. what even is there to say? how many different ways to say sorry is she expected to find?
yuqi sucks in a deep breath, biting down on her lower lip before finally speaking up. “i know that this is probably the last thing you want to hear right now, but... i really am sorry for how the other night went. and i... i think it’s safe to say that i’ve spent about half my time since then thinking about just how guilty and shitty i’ve felt? so, yeah, i obviously still have a lot of things that i need to work on, but...” she pauses, hesitating for the nth time that day. “i want to work on them, because you really are worth that much to me, okay? like... i don’t know, jihyo, you’re just... really fucking special. i don’t know if you feel the same way after what happened, but... i had to at least tell you that, you know?” a short moment passes before she’s handing the bouquet of flower’s in jihyo’s direction, her smile growing slightly in intensity. “happy birthday, babe.” please take them.
