#jongminkey

When Junghee wakes up, she’s confused. She feels Gwiboon’s hand holding on to her boob, per usual, but there’s a second hand resting at her waist as well and she’s wearing a nightgown she doesn’t remember buying. She does her best to turn around without waking up Gwiboon, to see if it helps to jog her memory. While there’s nothing about Gwiboon that seems odd, save the her own unfamiliar pajamas, everything is made clear when Junghee spots Minjung’s sleeping form on the far side of the bed. Excitement bubbles up and she finishes turning to face Gwiboon and Minjung. How she’d ended up on the far end of Minjung is a mystery to her, but she’s still more than happy to have woken up here. She moves hair out of Gwiboon’s face, strokes her cheek, then reaches and does the same for Minjung. They’d been drunk enough and tired enough that they’d all gone to bed after little more than a few kisses. Though she doesn’t want to rush things and she’s surprised that things have made it this far, she’s still a little sad that things didn’t go any further. Gwiboon starts huffing before opening one eye. She sees Junghee and looks vaguely perplexed by the arm on her waist. Junghee has to mouth ‘Minjung’ a few times before she catches on. Gwibbon moves and holds Minjung’s hand. Junghee half expects Minjung to start waking up too, but she remains deeply asleep. She leans to give Gwiboon a good morning kiss and the phone starts ringing. She gets out of bed and makes her way to the living room as quickly as she can.

“Hello?” she asks, hoping it’s not a personal call.

“This is Officer Joon. Is this Ms. Choi?”

“This is Ms. Choi’s line, but I’m Kim Junghee. Ms. Choi isn’t able to come to the phone at the moment.”

“That’s perfectly fine, I was calling to speak to you and the other Ms. Kim anyways. I regret to inform you that your agent, one Mr. Kwon, has been arrested.”

Junghee is struck with fear. “Arrested? On what charges?”

“Miss, I don’t want to upset you with the details, but they are particularly unsavory and involve some of the...younger girls of your agency.”

“Oh. Thank you for your call, Officer Joon.”

“Has there been any occurrences between yourself and Mr. Kwon or the other Ms. Kim and Mr. Kwon that you would like to report at this time?”

“No sir. We’re pretty new to the agency and seem to have been lucky.”

“That’s a relief, Miss. If I need to get ahold of you again, should I call this number again?”

“For the time being, yes. I’ll leave our other number with Ms. Choi if we leave this residency.”

“Thank you, Miss. I’m sorry that I had to tell you this.”

Junghee hangs up the phone and makes her way back to Minjung’s bedroom. When she gets back, Gwiboon is in the process of waking up Minjung.

“Jungie, what’s wrong, my dove?” she asks.

Junghee is almost in tears. “Remember how we said that it seemed that there were inappropriate dealings with those two teens in our company? Between them and Mr. Kwon? Apparently we weren’t wrong. He’s been arrested as of this morning.”

Gwiboon sits up, mouth and eyes wide in disbelief.

“Arrested?”

Junghee nods and sits on the edge of the bed. Minjung finally starts rubbing her eyes and manages to sit up by the time Junghee properly starts crying. Gwiboon seems too in shock to comfort her, so Minjung reaches out and takes Junghee’s hand. She says something about making a call and slips out of the room. Gwiboon finally comes to and wraps an arm around Junghee, pulling her back so that they’re laying face to face.

“Gwi, what are we going to do?” Junghee asks through tears.

“I don’t know, Jungie, but it’ll be okay, I know it will be.”

They’re almost asleep by the time that Minjung comes back. She sits at the edge of the bed between them.

“I called Jinki, my manager. He said that one of our other agents, Suho, who I know fairly well, has just had his two models retire and that the company has a pretty good knowledge of you two. I know this is really sudden, and I’m sorry if it feels like I’m meddling, but if you’re interested, they’ll sign you on so that you’re not out of work or anything. If you’re interested, they said to let them know and they’ll swing by for lunch to discuss it. They also said that for now, it might be easiest if you stay with me for a while while this whole thing is still going on. Though I don’t mind you continuing to borrow my things, they can also stop by your house and grab things for you if you’d like. I’m going to go make breakfast so you two can talk about it. Just come out whenever you’re ready and decided.”

Minjung stands and leaves, grabbing a robe off a hook on her way out. Once she shuts the door, Gwiboon and Junghee look at each other.

“She is, without a doubt, the sweetest and most thoughtful person I’ve ever met.” Junghee says, almost starting to cry again.

“Normally I’d be upset that you didn’t say after me but I can’t even be mad because it’s true.”

“What do you think we should do, Gwi?”

“I mean, it wouldn’t hurt to at least look at the terms they’re offering. If they’re familiar with us and still willing to sign us that must mean that they are at least interested in us.”

“That’s what I was thinking.”

“I know this is off topic and we’re having an important discussion but this is the most comfortable bed I’ve ever slept on and I would not mind sleeping in it for the rest of my life.”

Junghee giggles. “I was thinking that this morning.”

“Should we go out?”

Junghee nods and they both sit up. They grab two other robes off the hook and make their way into the kitchen. Minjung’s in the kitchen ladling pancake batter into a pan.

“I hope you don’t mind pancakes,” she says when she notices them. “I usually make eggs in the morning but I thought you two could probably use a little pick-me-up instead.”

“I can’t remember the last time I had pancakes, I’m so excited.” Junghee says, creeping up behind Minjung.

She wraps an arm around Minjung’s waist and again, Gwiboon is more than content with the view. She sits at the table and watches the other two with a faint smile. When everything’s cooked, Minjung hands the plate of pancakes to Junghee to carry as she brings out cups and orange juice. Once everyone’s seated pancakes are distributed.

“So, what did you two decide?” Minjung asks shyly after a few bites.

“As long as the terms are good, I think we’re both more than willing to sign with your agency.” Junghee explains, trying her best to sound sure of herself.

Gwiboon reaches out and takes Minjung’s empty hand. “Thank you for setting this up. It really means a lot, especially with how little you know us.”

Minjung smiles. “You’re welcome, don’t worry about it. I’ve known more than a few girls that this kind of thing has happened to and I’d feel awful if I didn’t try to help.”

Once breakfast is finished, they all get dressed and then call to the agency is made. Soon enough, Jinki and Suho arrive. Most of the afternoon is spent going through the new contracts; they’re much more fair than their former ones and they’re almost glad that this happened. As part of the contract, they agree to move in with Minjung, at least temporarily, until everything is sorted. It’s well passed dinnertime by the time they leave and Gwiboon and Junghee are more than exhausted. Minjung makes more sandwiches for dinner and she lets them take a bath while she sits in bed and reads. Once they’re done, she takes one herself. Soon enough they’re all ready for bed. Junghee lays in the middle of them this time, with Gwiboon to her right and Minjung to her left. Idle chatter soon turns to talk of past romance. Gwiboon and Junghee talk at length about their former pursuits while Minjung stays mostly quiet.

“Minjung, if you don’t mind me prying,” Junghee starts unsurely, “have you ever had a proper girlfriend? Like I know you said you had one, but was she just a friend or more?”

Minjung sighs a little and Gwiboon can tell she’s poked something that probably ought to have been left alone.

“She was...something in between.” she says quietly.

“Is it the girl in the picture at the beach?” Gwiboon asks before she can stop herself.

“Yes. Her name is Taeyeon. We grew up together. I’ve always known that I liked girls, and when we were around 14 I confessed that I had feelings for her. When we were 16, she decided that she had feelings for me too. Her parents are very religious, she comes from a Catholic family. So her feelings were very on-off. Some days, I really could believe that she loved me and wanted me. She’d kiss me and hold my hand and say that we’d always be together. Other days, she’d be almost cold. Even if I was just touching her arm to get her attention, she’d act like I was trying to do something indecent. She eventually went to school at a university near here, so her parents were fine with her coming to live with me, since they didn’t know. When she dropped out, she moved back home and I tried to be understanding. A few weeks later, she called me to tell me not to come around anymore. That she’d found a good Christian man at school that she’d been seeing for a few months behind my back and as of that day they were engaged. I was heartbroken. Six years I had done my best to respect her and love her as she wanted and I was thrown out like leftovers just like that. That was almost two years ago. She has a son now.”

She’s understandably close to tears, and next to her, softhearted Junghee is also close to crying. She kisses Minjung’s cheek.

“That’s so cruel! I can’t believe anyone would do that, least of all to you!”

Minjung laughs bitterly. “I guess you better start believing.”

Gwiboon reaches across Junghee and takes Minjung’s hand. “Though I’m sorry you’ve been hurting over this and think it’s awful that she did that, I’m thankful for her evil ways. If you were still with her, then we wouldn’t get to be the luckiest girls ever and be in your bed. I know eight years is a long time to grow accustomed to loving someone, but I’ve only really know you for eight days and I’m already ready to declare my undying love for you. As long as you don’t mind sharing and being shared with Junghee, that is.”

Minjung moves their hands up so that she can place soft kisses to Gwiboon’s palm. “Eight years is a long time to love someone, but eight days can be good enough to start loving someone new. Taeyeon always said I was too clingy and greedy with her time. Maybe being shared would be nice, if it meant always being wanted.”

It had been an easy day on the island. Everyone had gathered together for a very important project. Not storm making or adventuring or any of the normal sort. It was more of a cleaning mission. Somehow, Minho had sent all of his fruit bearing plants into overdrive and now he and Jonghyun had more than they could possibly eat to deal with. So of course they invited Taemin, Jinki, and Kibum over for a picnic of sorts. Jonghyun and Minho had made reed baskets for everything, pulling it all out on the beach. It was quite a bounty, even for five people with seemingly endless appetites. They had already started peeling tangerines by the time the others finally came around. They sat in a circle at first, each person picking one type of fruit: Jinki had apples; Jonghyun, strawberries; Kibum, persimmons; Taemin, bananas; and Minho kept the tangerines. Beside them lay more baskets which were less full, but had other fruits like peaches, lemons, and grapes. They’d peel and clean it off, then either eat it themselves or feed someone else. 

When the sun finally started to set, they decided that they’d had enough to eat. Minho, Kibum, and Jonghyun decided to nap while Taemin and Jinki started playing around with the remaining fruit down in the surf. Jinki would pull up a tiny bit of water and use it to dramatically slice up an apple while juggling tangerines. Taemin, on the other hand, was trying to figure out how to use lightning to cut fruit. After 10 attempts, all he had was fruit mash. It wasn’t often that the two of them just played for the sake of it.

When they woke up, Jonghyun, Minho, and Kibum watched Taemin and Jinki for a while. Since Jinki seemed to have a pretty good hold on Taemin’s attention, they figured they had at least a little while to be more affectionate before the Mr. kissing police started sending miniature storm clouds and other annoyances their way. They had figured out a system to make sure that none of them got left out when it was affection time. Minho, who was both the top donor and top recipient of affection, would sit in the middle. When Jonghyun or Kibum wanted his attention, they’d simply tap his shoulder or cheek and he’d oblige. Minho prided himself on trying to be as fair and equal as he could be. Today, Minho was on the receiving end of both Jonghyun and Kibum’s affections. At first, it went smoothly. Tap, tap. A kiss from Kibum. Tap, tap. A kiss from Jonghyun. Back and forth. Then, equal time became obviously not enough time.

“You know, I should be able to get two kisses for each one you get,” Kibum started, poking at Jonghyun. “You live with him so you have 24/7 access while I only get a few hours a week.”

“If you want more kisses then come visit more. It’s not like there’s a chance we won’t be here,” Jonghyun sneered.

“If you’re always here that just proves my point that you get more kisses overall so I should get more now!”

“If you want time to get more kisses than other people then maybe you should just set time aside to visit just Minho! But since this is the three of us time, you get one for each I get!”

Still sandwiched between the two of them, Minho sighed. They’d argued about this before at great length. It always made him laugh that the two would waste more than half their  affection time arguing about who should get kisses. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Jinki gesturing that Taemin was losing interest in his games and that they were almost out of time. Tired of not getting the affection he wanted, Minho put an arm around each of them.

“I know you two like arguing about who deserves more kisses but I’m not quite feeling it today. I don’t know if you noticed, but I have two cheeks. Which is convenient since there’s two of you. Two cheeks, two of you, twice the kisses.” he explained, jokingly.

Jonghyun and Kibum looked at each other and laughed before shifting closer so they could each reach their respective cheek. Jinki was surprised at the sudden peace and dropped his tangerines. As he reached to pick them up, he heard Taemin mutter under his breath.

“What if neither of you kissed him and you guys just took another nap.”

Jinki started laughing and dropped his remaining tangerines. He tried to suppress it so the three could finish having their moment, but it was too much.

“Taemin, what did you say? Are you trying to rekill Jinki or something?” Kibum called, his face somewhere between concerned and amused.

Jonghyun, who had heard the comment, yelled “I mean the third option is we keep kissing and you take a nap.”

Taemin’s face turned red, though it was obvious he was pleased that he’d made Jinki laugh so hard. The sun finally set and it grew dark on the beach. Begrudgingly, Jinki, Taemin, and Kibum got up to leave. Jinki set off first after quick hugs for everyone. Taemin also said goodbye quickly but lingered, waiting for Kibum.