paste you to the pages of my heart

Chapter Seven

The reason behind Mina's decision to not talk about their past haunts Nayeon for the following days.

Mina looked as if she wanted to explain but something was holding her back and it was just so confusing for Nayeon. What's a reason so important that it overrides Mina's own desire to give Nayeon an explanation?

Nayeon can now admit—at least to herself—that yes, she still has feelings for Mina and yes, it's why she's so curious but no, she isn't certain what feelings she has exactly and how she feels about them.

"Ah, fuck it." Nayeon carelessly throws the documents in her hands to the table and instead leans back against her chair.

She's not going to get much work done at this rate and she needs to do something else before her concentration can come back.

She sees an excuse in the form of the (now washed) blouse that Joohyun lent her a few weeks back. Guess she can spare some time to go to legal, return her unnie's blouse, and catch up with the latest legal gossip.

Not that there's much, anyway.

Their legal department only consists of Joohyun and two interns after all.

On her way out of her office, Nayeon comes across Ryujin who seemingly just got back from her afternoon break.

"Oh, sunbae-nim, where are you off to?"

The smile that crosses Nayeon's lips is automatic, as any other smile that she gives Ryujin. She's been Nayeon's assistant for less than a year but she's already Nayeon's all-time favorite ever since she easily agreed to simply call her sunbae instead of daepyonim.

"Just think of me as an older, more experienced colleague. Daepyonim makes me feel old."

"Uh, okay... sunbae-nim."

Nayeon can still remember the flush that crept up on Ryujin's face when Jennie turned to her when she heard her call Nayeon sunbae for the first time.

Ah, good times.

"Sunbae?"

Nayeon blinks. "Oh. Uh, I'm going to legal." She raises her hand holding the paper bag with Joohyun's blouse in it. "Gotta return this to Joohyun-unnie."

"I can do that."

"No need. I want to talk to her, anyway. Thanks, Ryujin-ah."

"Okay."

"Call me if anything urgent comes up."

"You got it, sunbae."

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With Joohyun being used to Nayeon barging into her office without even knocking—she's learned to not do anything scandalous after that one time Nayeon walked in on her and Seulgi—Nayeon comes into Joohyun's office with an "unnie!"—

—and stops dead in her tracks when she comes face to face with Myoui Mina.

They have got to stop randomly bumping into each other like this.

Mina freezes on her spot as well and Nayeon catches how the papers in Mina's hand crumple with how tight she's holding them.

"Nay?" It's Joohyun, but Nayeon can't tear her gaze away from Mina's wide eyes.

What is she doing here?

Nayeon blurts out the first thing that pops into her mind. "Are you stalking me?"