so, do we like each other or not? // JENLISA

Chapter 25

The day of the party was one filled with firsts. It was the first time Lisa had ever woken up before Jennie. It was the first time Jennie had staggered downstairs to find Lisa half naked in the kitchen and already yelling into her cell phone. It was the first time Jennie had been the one to gently coerce Lisa into eating something before she passed out, and it was definitely the first time Lisa had ever shrieked in Jennie's face, "I don't need to calm down, I'm perfectly calm already."

Jennie had curled Lisa's hair for her while she'd been bellowing at the caterers down the phone because they had somehow managed to deliver half the food to the wrong address and then refused to go and get it. After sending Sidney on an hour-long trip around town the situation had eventually been fixed, but by 4pm there was a tell-tale pounding behind Lisa's eyes and all she really wanted to do was curl up in a ball on Jennie's bed and forget this was happening.

An hour later, Lisa had moved on from moping and instead was storming around the apartment in a skin-tight leather dress and the highest heels she owned. It was her armour of choice, because she needed all the help she could get that night.

"Lisa," Jennie said, watching as Lisa did lap after lap of her bedroom with her phone clenched so tightly in her hand that the plastic was close to shattering. "I need you to slow down."

"DJ Dave is going to be the fucking death of me," was Lisa's response. She finally stopped walking, but it was only so she could type out an angry email to the guy that Chaeyoung was still convinced she was going to marry. "He's now asking if it's okay for him to do his playlist of only songs that have the word 'art' in the title for the first two hours."

Jennie was sitting on the edge of the bed, dressed only in a bathrobe but wearing eye make-up so dark and dramatic that Lisa would have mounted her on sight if it had been any other evening. Her hair was curly and slightly wild, and if Lisa had taken a second to stop pacing, she would have told her that she was gorgeous. Breathtaking. The most beautiful woman she'd ever seen.

But she didn't have the mental capacity for that. Instead, she just collapsed onto the stool in front of Jennie's vanity and rested her pounding head on her arms.

"Lisa," Jennie sighed, walking up behind her and sliding her arms around her shoulders. Lisa was forced upright, groaning uncomfortably as Jennie hugged her against her. "Come on. You know this is going to be great."

"Do I?" Lisa asked, looking up at her. "More to the point, do you?"

She'd taken Jennie to see the venue three days earlier. She'd been forced to watch as her upper lip had slowly, painfully curled upwards as she stared around at the exposed brickwork, the distressed paint, the ropes of lights that Lisa had strung up across every railing and surface in the building. Lisa had seen the doubt written across Jennie's face like it was splashed there in black paint.

To her credit, she hadn't said a word – she'd just nodded and let her carry on. While that had been kind of her, it also meant the pressure had doubled since.

"I do," Jennie said, resting her chin on top of Lisa's head. "Take a breath."

Lisa did as she was told, focusing on Jennie's surprisingly composed reflection. Her horrified expression from Wednesday had somehow subsided into a mere glimmer of doubt, and Lisa willed that same serenity to enter her too.

"Why do you look so calm?" she asked.

"Because I know how hard you've worked, and I know it's going to be perfect," Jennie said, bending forward and kissing her cheek. "It's not what I would have done, but that's the beauty of it."