hyojungss: (yunjin)
risa ([personal profile] hyojungss) wrote in [community profile] girlsfest2023-04-10 06:00 pm
Entry tags:

Round 2: Idolverse

Round 1

Prompts should be based around a scenario related to being an idol. But it doesn't have to be possible in real life!
  • Canon compliant (could have happened in real life)
  • Canon divergent (things started out the same but details will change)
  • Future fic (could happen in the future)
  • Alternate universe (idol/non-idol, different group entirely, etc)
Example:

Characters/Ship: SNSD Jessica/Taeyeon
Tags: future fic

Prompt: set after taeyeon’s retirement and they’ve both taken a step back from the public eye. taeyeon goes to san francisco for a solo holiday (sightseeing, to visit a good friend, or maybe something else draws her there) and bumps into jessica unexpectedly (bonus if it’s at a club or a bar lol)

Click here to view the fest rules.
RULES
  • You are not required to have a Dreamwidth account to participate. There are no signups necessary. You may post anonymously if you want.
  • There will be 4 rounds of this fest and 1 round will be opened each week of the fest. Rounds will be left open for fills and comments, so there is no deadline for participating.
  • Prompts do not have to be claimed before you write them, and they can be filled by more than one person.
  • There is no minimum or maximum word count for fills. In the spirit of the fest, we encourage you to write shorter works!
  • Users are allowed to crosspost their fic on any other site, such as AO3. However, we ask that when possible, writers post the text of their fills as a reply to the prompt and include a link to an AO3 post if they choose to do so, instead of just linking to an AO3 post in their comment. This helps keep discussion in our community!
  • Feel free to subscribe and join the comm to keep track of updates and view them on your reading page.

CONTENT

Prompts and fills have to center around K-pop girl group member(s). This includes:
  • All active and former girl group members
  • Female soloists
  • Female members in co-ed groups
  • Any female idol or trainee affiliated with K-pop (e.g. GP999 contestants, AKB48 members who featured in Produce48)
  • Slash, gen, het, and trans works are all accepted as long as they involve at least one girl group member



PROMPTING
To prompt, reply to a round post and copy the following template in.


It will look like this when empty:
Characters/Ship:
Tags:

Prompt:


Fill out the form with your prompt. You can also write in "Any" to give the writer freedom to choose their own. For example:

Characters/Ship: aespa, karina/any
Tags: canon compliant, no major character death

Prompt: Karina falls for another trainee as a coping mechanism. It's not supposed to last, so she doesn't treat the relationship like it will.


FILLING
To post a fill, post a comment reply to the prompt you wrote for and copy the following template in. Title your comment with [FILL] followed by the title of your ficlet.



It will look like this once filled out:

[FILL] still I fall

Characters/Ship: Aespa Winter/Karina
Tags: idolverse, predebut, shared trauma
Permission to Remix: Please ask
-

Content of fill here...

Please provide content warnings for Graphic Depictions of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, and Underage as well as NSFW/explicit content.


REMIXES
You are welcome to remix fics that the original author has approved for remixing. A remix is a work directly or indirectly inspired by another work.

To post a remix, post a comment reply to the comment you remixed and copy the following template in with your info. Title your comment with [REMIX] followed by the title of your remix.


pantomimes: (yunjin)

[personal profile] pantomimes 2023-04-11 12:16 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Any
Tags: can be a funny fic or a sad fic, anything is fine

Prompt: being happy that you’ve been chosen to be the mc of a major music show, only to find out that you’re going to do it with your ex girlfriend

[FILL] in this time apart

(Anonymous) 2023-04-25 03:00 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: IZ*ONE Kim Chaewon/Kim Minju
Tags: post-disbandment, unrequited requited love, past relationship
Permission to Remix: Yes
-

Kim Chaewon’s career has always been plagued by premature endings. So much so that her partner leaving the MC seat, a year early and barely two weeks after Chaewon's entrance into the coveted list of celebrities with a steady income, no longer fazes her.

What fazes her is this:

“They’re replacing Sullyoon with one of the previous MCs,” and Chaewon has to do a double take at the name that follows. “You and her aren’t close anymore, right? Anyway, you're gonna have to act like it.”

The irony that this is the same manager who warned her against any mention of her former band and its members – “especially Kim Minju, that came down straight from the CEO” – doesn’t go over their heads. She had been certain then that the instruction was given on the basis of Minju rejecting HYBE’s offer, but now, looking into the fraught eyes of her manager, Chaewon’s not so sure anymore.

She chalks it up to a desperation to keep his job, and blinks first. And again when Minju comes to her waiting room before their first TV appearance together in seven years, looking like a deer caught in Chaewon’s scorching headlights, even though she had been the one to knock on her door and invite herself in.

They quickly soften, enough that Chaewon finds it in herself to look at her; the way she couldn’t all those years ago when Minju had hugged herself and cried, and the only words that fell from her own lips were choked apologies.

Minju’s hair still falls down far past her shoulders in waves. For a second, Chaewon sees in those tamed tresses a piece of Suyun, Eunbi, Garam – even Sullyoon. They stop just short of her elbows.

Chaewon had cut hers a week after her new group was formed. Shed the weight of it alongside the curious feeling of all-encompassing grief and heartache. That’s how the polaroid picture of them – taken while those same long locks fell along the sides of Chaewon’s own, Minju’s skull poking into her temple, cheeks raised and head tilted into her – ended up in an envelope in a box on the top shelf of Sakura’s cabinet, alongside other IZ*ONE memorabilia.

She did what she had to move on.

This time though, Minju speaks first.

“How have you been?”

Chaewon clears her throat. “Well enough.”

“You can’t say that when you haven’t even had your meal.” Always observant, this Minju, and always thoughtful – she hands Chaewon a piece of chocolate, remembering how she would lose her appetite before a stressful broadcast.

“Thank you,” feels so lame coming from her own mouth. She doesn’t know what else to say.

Chaewon resists asking about the tattoo, or the new drama, or why she took the MC gig again, feeling like she has somehow lost the right to ask about her life because she was the one who ended things. Because she chose the easy way out. Whether she did it willingly or not, that all seems trivial now. Because, despite being one of the industry’s most in-demand actresses, Minju still isn’t great at hiding her affections.

Of course, Chaewon also knows this only because Yena has never been one to care about boundaries or the sanctity that is one’s private thoughts. Minju is still as beautiful as she is patient, and as patient as she is foolish. Like a dog waiting for its owner to come home, Yena had said, a crass metaphor that earned her multiple punches to the arm.

“What about, um, you?”

Minju smiles, and Chaewon sees how time has added a crease or two by the corners of her lips and eyes.

“The same as I’ve always been,” she says. Before Chaewon can read too much into her words, Minju is pointing to the top of her head. It’s only then that Chaewon notices the halo she’d been wearing this whole time. “They want me to do the Kim Minju Angel gag again,” she adds a little redundantly, because Chaewon has seen the same script she has.

Her sheepish grin gives way into a short, heartfelt laugh. And – Minju is lying, because Chaewon can see how self-assured and confident she has become in their time apart. Braver, too, like she’s spent those years making up for Chaewon’s cowardice.

Maybe it’s being in the same space again, between those same walls where they shared the fondest memories from their youth. Maybe it’s the way Minju stands taller than her, shoulders broad and back straight. Chaewon can’t help the single half-step she takes forward to examine this new Minju, stronger and wiser than anyone gives her credit for, who still insists on wearing her heart on her sleeve. The Minju she has spent the last six years expertly skirting around birthday parties and reunion dinners to avoid; the Minju whose name she never could stop looking up during sleepless nights. The Minju who has been waiting for her; the Minju who still, after all of that, came to her first.

The Minju who now, and then too, deserved all of Chaewon’s honesty and bravery, and more.

(And, after all of those premature endings, didn’t she deserve a new beginning for a change?)

“I’ve really, really missed you, Minju-yah.”

And when Minju leans in, she does too.

Re: [FILL] in this time apart

(Anonymous) - 2023-04-25 13:32 (UTC) - Expand

Re: [FILL] in this time apart

[personal profile] flover - 2023-04-25 16:07 (UTC) - Expand

Re: [FILL] in this time apart

[personal profile] pantomimes - 2023-04-25 22:33 (UTC) - Expand
eelegy: (Default)

[personal profile] eelegy 2023-04-11 12:34 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Any
Tags: coworkers to lovers OR coworkers to fwbs, what-were-you-doing-at-the-devil's-sacrament-core

Prompt: Person A sneaks out to a gay bar in between comeback cycles and is surprised to run into her groupmate there.
Edited 2023-04-11 00:35 (UTC)

[FILL] put your hands on me so everyone can see

(Anonymous) 2023-04-12 04:50 pm (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Sana/Jihyo (TWICE)
Tags: canon compliant, ambiguous/open ending
Permission to Remix: yea!
Content Warnings: nsfw/smut

-

sorry dreamfestgirls admins, the fic is way too long for me to paste it all here in good conscience. it really got away from me while i was writing it. my apologies TT (ao3 link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/46443706)
pantomimes: (yunjin)

[personal profile] pantomimes 2023-04-11 12:35 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Any
Tags: canon divergence, post-disbandment, future fic

Prompt: five years after the disbandment of a girlgroup that only got to release one song before their agency decided to drop them, two of the former members are casted as lovers in a kdrama
pantomimes: (yunjin)

[personal profile] pantomimes 2023-04-11 12:36 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: LE SSERAFIM
Chaewon/Yunjin
Tags: canon compliant

Prompt: yunjin developed a crush on chaewon during pd48 but forgot about it shortly after she got eliminated. then, when she finds out she’s going to be debuting with her, she has to deal with the return of her feelings for chaewon

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 12:52 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Aespa, any/any
Tags: quiet sex, fwb, sexual tension, fear/shame/guilt/internalized homophobia (not all, whatever inspires you!).

Prompt: They never kiss/fuck in their dorm, only in hotel rooms when they're overseas for a schedule.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 12:53 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Aespa, Karina/Winter
Tags: rivals to ??, pre-debut/debut period, canon-compliant or -divergent.

Prompt: JMJ said they had a bit of rivalry back when they were trainees. That's it, that's the prompt.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 12:55 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Fromis_9, Saerom/Jiwon
Tags: pining, unrequited love.

Prompt: Somewhere along the way, one of them falls in love with the other.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 12:58 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: WJSN, Exy/Luda
Tags: post-disbandment, pining, missed opportunities

Prompt: Exy and Luda reflect on their time together.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 01:01 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Any, leader/any OR gen
Tags: Angst, found family, finding comfort in each other (as friends or lovers)

Prompt: A member is falling behind in practice, and Leader steps in to protect her from scolding and/or punishment.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 01:03 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Any, f/f
Tags: canon-compliant

Prompt: Fucking against their better judgment.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 01:05 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Any, f/f or gen
Tags: canon-compliant or -divergent, snowed in, cuddles/huddling for warmth.

Prompt: Snowed in in the dorm.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 01:10 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Aespa, Karina/Giselle
Tags: sexual and/or romantic tension, secret relationship, other members protecting/covering for them.

Prompt: Karina helps Giselle with practice/trainee life, late night sessions lead them to develop feelings for each other.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 01:12 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Aespa, Karina/Ningning
Tags: sharing a bed, accidentally dating, cuddles

Prompt: Due to bad weather or something, Ningning's flight is cancelled, so she spends her break with Karina and her family.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 01:14 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Any, f/f
Tags: canon-divergent

Prompt: Ex-friends or ex-high school gfs meet again during a survival show or enter the same company in different times.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 01:30 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship:aespa karina/winter
Tags: canon compliant, friends to lovers, established but secret relationship

Prompt: karina and winter share a quiet moment together, ringing in karina's birthday

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 01:36 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: aespa karina/winter
Tags: survival show au, trainee/pre-debut au

Prompt: karina and winter are both survival show audition program contestants (similar to produce 101/girls planet 999) that consistently rank high and next to each other. both of them are evil edited for drama so they have to appear like bitter rivals in front of the camera but are actually very friendly and they get closer until they fall for each other
pantomimes: (yunjin)

[personal profile] pantomimes 2023-04-11 01:37 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: BLACKPINK Rosé/Bae Suzy
Tags: canon compliant? canon divergence? inspired by their iconic dating scandal, maybe inspired by gone by rosé?

Prompt: rumors about rosé’s and suzy’s secret relationship start spreading around the internet. the rumors are true, but they’re no longer together

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 01:45 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: SNSD's Taeyeon/Aespa's Winter
Tags: AU; idol!Taeyeon and non-idol!Winter. NSFW. D/s dynamics.

Prompt: Winter is a call girl, or TY's sugar baby. (No mommy kink, please.)

[fill] The scent I've left behind for something else

(Anonymous) 2023-04-14 04:35 pm (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Taeyeon/Winter
Tags: Call girl AU, idol!Taeyeon and non-idol!Winter, NSFW
Permission to Remix: Yes
-

Does her NDA cover this, Minjeong wonders. She isn't allowed to capture any recordings of Taeyeon, but if she's setting up the camera at Taeyeon's behest, does it still count?

"Stop thinking so much and come to bed."

Minjeong knows that tone. Time's up. With a tap of her finger, the recording begins.

-

She's so much smaller in person. Knowing Kim Taeyeon's height in numbers hadn't diminished Minjeong's impression of her on stage - captivating and resplendent. Standing before her now, she seems even tinier than when Minjeong had first seen her from the third floor of Olympic Hall.

"How should I address you?"

After Taeyeon speaks first, Minjeong knows to reciprocate distance in crisp and correct enunciation, the name she gives clients rolling off her tongue without hesitation. Something about it seems to give Taeyeon pause (Is that a tiny snort or are Minjeong's ears deceiving her? She can't see Taeyeon's face) but her composure quickly recovers.

She's like that in bed too with her hands all over Minjeong's most intimate places but batting Minjeong away when she tries to reciprocate. Taeyeon fucks Minjeong hard enough to rival her most voracious male clients and takes her pleasure only at the very end, riding Minjeong's fingers in near-silence until she comes.

Minjeong doesn't try to cuddle. Taeyeon allows Minjeong to use her shower before she leaves, seeing her off at the door with a nod, no wave.

When Minjeong gets the email calling her back the next weekend she has to read it twice just be sure she's reading it right.

***

Minjeong stops seeing other clients after her fifth visit. All it takes is Taeyeon putting a hand on her thigh, stopping Minjeong in her motions as she's getting dressed, and saying, "I don't like sharing."

Minjeong stares stupidly at Taeyeon for long enough that the demand in Taeyeon's eyes softens. She goes so far as to withdraw her hand- it's that that jolts Minjeong into grabbing her wrist and nodding her unthinking agreement.

"Yes." She doesn't need to know the clear parameters of what she's agreeing to. Not this time. "Yes, unnie."

On her eighth visit, she's allowed to stay the night.

***

"Unnie. Please."

They're at a hotel restaurant for Taeyeon's birthday, the kind that's so high-class people pretend not to notice celebrities when they see them. Every adornment on Minjeong tonight is a gift from Taeyeon. Her designer dress. Her necklace and earring set. The vibrator between her legs. Minjeong's so wet, it wouldn't surprise her if the next table halfway across the room can smell her arousal.

"Taeyeon-unnie," Minjeong begs again, as prettily as she can and as loudly as she dares.

Good girl. Taeyeon's smile is hard and possessive.

Good girls get rewards. Minjeong gets to come with Taeyeon's fingers inside her on the long elevator ride down.

***

(Jimin no longer offers to pay for Minjeong's meals. She still doesn't manage to hide the tiny crease between her brows when Minjeong shows up to class with a new bag- the latest branded item of the season.

"Would it help if I promise I'm happy?"

Minjeong waits, but Jimin won't meet her eyes before walking away.)

***

"Minjeongie?"

She rolls onto her side to face Taeyeon but her eyelids are too heavy to force open. Though Taeyeon's fingers are gentle as they play with her hair, Minjeong wouldn't mind if she were rougher. It's good to be wanted even in the quiet moments.

The sounds of Taeyeon picking up her phone filter hazily into Minjeong's consciousness. She's never asked about the photos of her that Taeyeon captures in her unguarded moments. She has no need.

"You can sleep in tomorrow. I'll drive you to class after breakfast."

Minjeong feels Taeyeon's lips soft on her forehead just before she falls asleep.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 01:53 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Dreamcatcher, Jiu/any
Tags: AU, ex-fellow trainees/friends (Jiu debuted, ?? didn't), repression.

Prompt: After years of idolhood and repressing her identity, Jiu thinks about coming out. Coincidentally, she meets ??, who quit idolhood and came out all those years ago.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 01:55 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: WJSN, any f/f
Tags: Future fic.

Prompt: At their group's anniversary party/dinner, they finally get together.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 02:03 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Any, f/f
Tags: canon-compliant, self-discovery(?), feelings realization.

Prompt: A jokingly gives B a lap dance.

sorry for stealing this, mods, but it's an A+ prompt

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 02:05 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: aespa, karina/any
Tags: canon compliant, no major character death

Prompt: Karina falls for another trainee as a coping mechanism. It's not supposed to last, so she doesn't treat the relationship like it will.

(Anonymous) 2023-04-11 03:41 am (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: Red Velvet's Irene/aespa's Karina
Tags: Can be romantic/smutty/wistful, I'm open to anything

Prompt: Irene is too tired to be jealous of the beautiful, young leader of SM's newest girl group. She does, however, feel it's her duty to warn her about what it means to be a leader.
spasi: (Default)

[FILL] i see the light (no need to turn a blind eye)

[personal profile] spasi 2023-04-15 01:23 pm (UTC)(link)
Characters/Ship: red velvet irene/aespa karina
Tags: leaderism, canon compliant, op i hope i didnt butcher your prompt too much
Permission to Remix: Yes
-


Joohyun does not play to lose.

It started out harmless as it is: a game for fun, for enjoyment. She figured people wouldn’t exactly be enthralled to watch a game where the players are indifferent about winning or losing, so Joohyun runs along.

A small reality show game for a free meal or the fastest one to memorize the new choreography for an early leave.

It was never the meal nor the early pass; Joohyun can get it herself, she can wait—never had any problem with being the last one to leave the room. She was never intrigued by something she could get and choose herself when given by someone in a set of rules. In the end she will share that meal with Seulgi, Seungwan, Sooyoung, and Yerim, and will go practice with them again tomorrow.

What is it but a game, one Joohyun found a gratifying aftermath from the win itself.

The one she found joy in seeing Yerim laughter pitched, Seulgi and Seungwan watching with accustomed gaze, and Sooyoung all with a defeated smile on her lips, a win that is by far Joohyun’s favorite kind: how is it you always win, unnie, I’ll get you the next time!, the words crawl under her skin as she laughs, keen to draw out that same smile again.

This is the first insight, clear enough for Joohyun to take into her hands and unfold easily around them. These are the small times that linger only enough to make her feel more like Bae Joohyun and less like Irene, the leader of Red Velvet.

This is Bae Joohyun taking a step back to sneak behind you.



However, this.

This is something she doesn’t really want a part in.

Joohyun knows people will talk—is already talking: oh, they’re both leaders, they’re both the oldest, they’re both visual, they share the same sign. Then, Irene disappears and starts becoming ‘too’: Karina sings and raps, too; Karina dances very well, too, oh, she did a cover of Naughty as well; Karina likes using fabric softener, too; Karina takes care of her members, too.

It’s not nice, of course, to hear yourself being compared. Joohyun has heard things, many kinds—she thinks she shouldn’t feel too bad about this, but it still feels discomforting to somehow see yourself in a sentence very much meant for someone else.

Karina bows politely in front of her, definitely taller and leaner, there’s a shy smile on her face.

I think she’s a fan of you, unnie, fans said her profile picture used to be you, Seungwan said the other day.

Suddenly, Joohyun feels a little too old for this. She still remembers her trainee days, the early days of her making. Before Red Velvet and before Irene. There must be a before for Karina, too, she wonders what it's like. What is it she left or hid behind to reach this point, what kind of words she had to listen to up to this point.

Joohyun holds her hair back as she bows, mouth lifting into a small smile.



Joohyun takes pride in taking care of others and considers herself good at it. It makes her feel valuable, in a sick kind of way, to see the people she loves eat the food she prepared or wear the clothes she carefully ironed or listen tentatively in what she has to say, or even something as childish as pulling a prank on her.

She’s needed, after all.

And then, like a formidable foe she cannot avoid, there’s also their heartfelt gathering or something.

Joohyun finds it easy to listen to other’s burdens, but she’s never been one to blatantly confess hers. Though she figures a pretty face with a stone cold expression and a sense of duty above all else doesn’t leave much for question. Perhaps it’s because she’s used to people viewing her as above or untouchable, efficient and cold blooded.

These girls don't look at her like that, Joohyun knows that well enough. But it doesn’t help making this less frail, as if this all wouldn’t shatter if she ever let herself walk on it—be seen more than what she lets on.

“Unnie, don’t you have anything to say?”

The fact remains that Irene manages only to stay afloat with Joohyun pretending she's nearly as strong as everyone around her thinks her to be. I’m fine, she tells herself. It’s true as long as she lets it be.

“No,” Joohyun answers. “Not really.”



End of the year comes around, and somehow she’s in a practice room again.

They’re going through a new choreography, it’s light in comparison to whatever Red Velvet is usually given. But she finds it a little distracting now, to keep track of the vastly different ways a practice room can sound when there are her, her group, and another group in it.

Joohyun catches Karina in the mirror, and it goes without saying that she is very pretty and definitely dances very well. Joohyun likes to think she can handle pretty faces, at least enough to know that all these unknown feelings she has have to do with something else.

“Okay, we’re done for today! Let’s see it again tomorrow.”

Everyone sits down, gathers their stuff and shares small talks as they go. Joohyun drinks her water, watching everyone. From the mirror, she sees Karina cleaning up the sound control bench. She looks like she could use some help, maybe from Joohyun. Or not—it doesn’t matter, she’s already walking.

“Loud, aren’t they?” Joohyun begins, helping her tidy the equipment.

“Yes, extremely,” Karina replies with half a laugh, quickly getting all the wires before Joohyun could get it. “I didn’t know Wendy unnie and Joy unnie would click so well with our Ning and Winter, it’s very fun to watch.”

Joohyun doesn’t miss the title put after their names. “They get crazier the more tired they are.”

“Ah, I know that,” Karina says, and the smile on her face is one Joohyun could see herself in for the first time. It feels uncanny, almost. “Our Ning-ie does that, too, it’s like a virus when she starts laughing.”

There’s a time and place to let someone else speak for you, this is one of those times she doesn’t feel too bad about it. Perhaps, in the end, this is all Joohyun has ever wanted to picture.

They chatter away again, idle conversation while Joohyun gets her bag and stands there between the light switch and Karina, it’s as though she’s certain of what lies ahead: Karina will walk out and Joohyun will do her usual part.

“Oh, you can get going, sunbae,” Karina says suddenly, her hand gesturing to the light switch. “I’ll get the lights.”

And it’s so weird. Joohyun just nods, fumbling her bag as she walks out the door and watches whilst Karina takes out more leftover trash and turns the light off. The light illuminates her face slowly as she gets closer to the door.



“You don’t have to…” The words die on her tongue when Joohyun holds out the cup holder for her to take.

“It’s just coffee.” Joohyun replies, she sounds like she’s trying to be stern, but it comes out much too soft for that. It’s courtesy, right? She used to receive small appreciation like this, too.

“Then we’ll drink this well.” Karina takes the holder carefully, proceeds to smile at it like she’s never seen anything quite so fascinating before. It’s just coffee. “Thank you sunbae-nim.”

“Unnie is fine.”

“Really?” Joohyun nods. What she doesn’t say: you were fine calling Seungwan and Sooyoung with unnie, what difference is there with me?

“Then, Jimin is fine, too,” she says, and perhaps she heard how elated herself was and backtracks, “if it’s not too much, of course—!”

There’s no time to second guess this.

“Then, Jimin.”



“There is so much work, huh.”

The sun was half down when they entered the dorm, but now it’s already purpling with nightfall when she returns from her shower. Joohyun is sitting on the edge of the sofa when Seungwan sits next to her, lighting a candle on the table.

“It’s nearing year end, after all.”

“Right, somehow I can never get used to this,” Seungwan sighs, her head resting on the cushion. “Felt like something might sneak behind us.”

Something—someone already is, Joohyun thinks.

“I can hear your mind ticking,” Seungwan states, “You will say you need my help or something.”

“Stop.” You’re getting too good at reading us, is left unsaid. “Give me your brownie recipe.”

“For who?”

“For me.”

“No, who are you making it for?”

“...The hoobaes,” Seungwan looks delighted by her find, and far be it for Joohyun to enjoy any teasing she’s about to get. She tries her best now not to look ridiculous at least. “Maybe one for you, too, if you could just give me the list.”



“Irene unnie!” Joohyun lifts her head and there it is, Karina with the rest of Aespa just there next to her. She knows how this goes. “Thank you, unnie, the brownies were delicious.”

The last part of the music video they had to film was the pajama party. Karina is there in a twintail and a jacket far too big on her.

She really is pretty, Joohyun thinks.

“Was it really?”

All of them reply in a mixture of a nod, thumbs up, yeah, yes, it’s the best ever.

This is how Bae Joohyun loses: “I can make you another one.”

“No, it’s okay!” Ningning joins in. “It must be too much work for you.”

“Hardly,” Joohyun brushes it off, not missing the way Yerim laughs loudly at something Seungwan was telling her in the corner. “I’ll make you a different one next time.”

“Then we’ll get unnie something nice, too, next time.”

Jimin is looking at her with a bright smile and the timing is just right for one of the LED lights to hit her face, making her shriek. Joohyun laughs.

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