touch, taste & tremble

- 9

Jimin ignores her calls and her texts, she avoids sleeping at home, only letting Jeno know that she's painting as an explanation for why she's not there. He never replies. She doesn't care. Despite that, she still checks her phone every ten minutes, putting it down in disappointment every time. In all honesty, she's not sure what she's hoping for, but she is also trying to ignore that the only thing she can think of is Minjeong. So maybe she is waiting for a call or a text from her, maybe she is hoping that nothing changed, but deep down she knows that's not true.

She saw it in her eyes when she left. The unspoken questions, the uncertainty. She can't blame Minjeong. She can't blame her for anything. Jimin knows she was the one who broke her own rules.

Every goddamn one of them.

And before last Friday she could still pretend she had control, she could still pretend this wasn't something more than just an arrangement for sex. But now it's Monday and all she can think of is Minjeong. And her lips, and how they felt so soft and tasted so sweet, so inexplicably like her.

There's no more pretending.

It's Wednesday. It's nearly twelve o'clock. She has ignored Aeri and Yizhuo too. And she is very well aware of the degree in which she is ignoring them, because there are dozens of texts from them individually and even more in their group chat. She sees them every time she checks her phone hoping to see Minjeong's name.

It's Wednesday, exactly twelve o'clock and Aeri is pretty much breaking down her door. Jimin takes one look at herself: outfit obviously haphazardly thrown together, hair a mess because she hasn't showered since Monday morning, eyes red and puffy. She opens the door looking exactly like that.

"What the fuck?" Aeri looks obviously surprised and Yizhuo is so shocked she can't even voice it.

Jimin walks back into her tiny living room, door still open and her best friends gaping at her. They enter cautiously, as if approaching a dangerous animal and both perch on the coffee table in front of the recliner where Jimin is currently, and has been for days, curled up in.

"What happened?" Yizhuo asks.

"Yeah," Aeri agrees. "We were kind of expecting that we had to drag you away from your mystery lady." She tries to lighten the mood but Jimin seems to sink even further in her chair.

"What happened?" Yizhou asks again.

Jimin looks at them, her lip quivering, her eyes trying to hide a sadness that runs so deep it's a losing battle. "I fucked it up." She admits finally.

"I had rules, you know? Five rules that I told her before we started so that we couldn't fuck this up. So that I could just enjoy this one thing until fucking Jeno got his fucking shit together." Aeri and Yizhuo nod, their silence urging Jimin on. "How hard can it be to keep five rules, huh? Well, fucking hard is how hard."

"What were the rules?" Yizhuo asks tentatively, immediately feeling Aeri's glare boring in the side of her face.

"No kissing on the mouth. No staying after sex or sleeping over. No communication outside of the occasional text to confirm details. No naming each other to friends and/or family. No feelings." She lists. And then, softer than her entire previous rant. "And I broke all of them."

Understanding comes over Aeri and Yizhuo within seconds and they rummage around the small apartment quickly and resolutely, coming back to Jimin with two bottles of wine and two glasses. They fill the glasses for themselves and then hand the bottle to Jimin, who takes a long gulp.