Imperfectly Perfect [Chaelisa]

forty

“Oh my god, Rosie.”

“Put that away!” Chaeyoung runs over to Lisa and her mom and rips the photo album out of her mother’s hands. “Don’t show her my baby pictures.”

“But Chaeyoung,” Lisa pouts and takes the photo album back. “Look how cute you were. You can’t deny me that.”

Chaeyoung frowns. “But I don’t want you to look at my baby pictures.”

“Let her look, Chaeyoung,” Rosalie laughs and flicks over the page, pointing to a picture in the top left. “This was her first day of school. She made me go on the school bus with her because she was frightened of the other kids.”

“Oh my god,” Lisa repeats, staring down at the picture with wide eyes, “Rosie, you were adorable. I just want to squish your little cheeks. In fact, I’m going to go and build a time machine so I can go back and harass baby you with my cuddles.”

Chaeyoung sighs in defeat, because she knows that her mom isn’t putting the photo album away any time soon. So, she sits down on the couch next to Lisa and shrugs. “I wouldn’t let you cuddle me, though. I didn’t like touch even more back then.”

“But- look at you!” Lisa exclaims. “You were so cute! And you’re such a cuddly dork now. You’re always asking for snuggles.”

Chaeyoung shrugs again and cuddles up to Lisa, because now she kind of wants snuggles and Lisa had told her that she can hug her whenever she wants. “Yes, but I didn’t like it then. I would never let people touch me, except- um, I would cuddle with my mom on a Saturday morning when we watched The Lion King.”

Rosalie laughs. “You say that like you don’t ask to watch it Saturday you’re not at Lisa’s.”

Chaeyoung blushes, but Lisa doesn’t look all that surprised at Rosalie’s words. “Trust me, the days she’s at my house and I suggest watching a movie, it’s always straight to ‘can we watch The Lion King?’ I don’t get how you’re not sick of it by now, Rosie.”

“It’s one of my special interests,” Chaeyoung shrugs. “I love it, and there’s more than one movie so I can choose which one I want to watch.”

Lisa doesn’t reply, because she lets out a loud aw that makes Chaeyoung jump. “Okay, this picture is my favourite by far. Look at you, you were so tiny! I bet you were having so much fun at the playpark. Look, you seem so happy to be on the slide.”

Chaeyoung looks down at the picture with a frown. “I’m not- um… I never went down the slides. I just sat on it. Because I could.”

Rosalie looks between them with a smile. “The slides scared her. Chaeyoung’s afraid of heights.”

“Mom,” Chaeyoung sends her mother her best glare. “Stop it. You’re embarrassing me.”

Rosalie laughs. “I’m your mother. I’m supposed to embarrass you in front of your girlfriend.”

“Well… stop it,” Chaeyoung repeats, tapping on her leg but cracking a smile when Lisa wraps her arms around her waist and rests her head on her shoulder. “And- um, Lili, stop encouraging her.”

Lisa shakes her head. “Nope. I’ll encourage her as much as I like. I want to see all of your cute baby pictures and hear about all of the embarrassing stories from your childhood. But I didn’t know you’re afraid of heights. You didn’t seem to be when you were dragging me all of the rollercoasters at Disney.”

“I mean things like- uh, tall buildings. One time I went up the Eiffel Tower when we went on vacation and- um,” Chaeyoung turns bright red, and her last words come out all muttered, “I cried.”