It Just Happened That Way || JEONGIN from skz!

21

I look at Yeona's calm demeanor and feel the tension leave my shoulders. Nothing bad has happened. Just a little bit of bullying from a couple of overpaid lawyers. I sigh, and pull Yeona in for a hug.

She immediately reciprocates and I can tell that despite her calmness, she still felt fear and panic from the past 20 minutes. We stay like this for a minute, our breaths syncing with each other. I pull away and walk over to the kitchen counter with the folder.

"It's an NDA, isn't it," Yeona says, as she puts water on to boil. Tea always did make her feel calmer.

"Yeah, I'm guessing."

"I figured there was only so much time until your company got involved in us." She sighs, leaning on the counter top. "Well, open it."

I tear the seal off of the folder, and go to stand next to Yeona. We lean over the papers, reading together.

"Wait, I'm not done reading that page," Yeona says as I flipped to the next page. I laugh a little, remembering that Korean wasn't the most comfortable for her to read yet.

"Do you want me to translate it? There are a lot of legal terms here," I say, thumbing through the rest of the contract's pages. Yikes, I don't know if I even know the meanings of all of these words.

"...Yes please..."

After a good 20 minutes, and some google translating, we understood the gist of the NDA. It honestly wasn't terrible, as far as what she was not allowed to do. Essentially, whatever Yeona found out about us, our schedules, our personal information, and anything having to do with promotions, was to be kept secret. But that wasn't a big deal because that was basically a given with us.

"But the cost of a breach..." she says, sighing with a little bit of defeat. I furrowed my brows, because she wasn't wrong there. The cost of leaking confidential information would be over $20,000 USD.

"There could be an accident, and something might leak." She starts to speak faster. "What if it wasn't even my fault, and something got out? I don't want you to have to deal with that, and for you to have to worry about any potential situation!" Her hands grip the edge of the countertop.

Her body starts to shake a little. I didn't expect her to become so overwhelmed, or worried.

"Yeona, no! You don't have to worry about me!"

I grab both of her shoulders and try to get her to look at me, but she's beginning to tear up.

"I just don't know if this is worth all of the legal trouble! You are honestly better off without needing to deal with it," she whispers. 

"Yeona..." I lean my forehead on hers. "You're worth it."

Her breath hitches. She looks up at me, meeting my eyes. I wipe a tear that escapes her eye.

"Yeona, I — I think I like you too much to be able to let you go."