Chapter Text
Mina left. Nayeon took her to the airport and hadn’t seen her since. Not even over facetime. Mina called, sometimes. But an uncomfortable silence always settled quickly on the line between them—all the unspoken things between them holding their tongues, stopping the quiet comfort of familiarity—until Mina always found an excuse to hang up.
Nayeon didn’t blame her. She told her to go. She offered unwavering support. She told Mina she would let her do whatever she wanted to do without holding her back. When she had said that, she never expected it would mean Mina would decide distance meant the end of them. That ‘I’m going to New York in two months’ really meant ‘I’m leaving you behind’.
Still, she wasn’t bitter. She didn’t hold grudges. Mina had gone to pursue a dream she had held close to heart for her entire life. Nayeon would never keep her from that for anything in the world. If it was what Mina wanted, Nayeon would help her however she would let her.
For the time, that mostly meant very brief and uncomfortable phone calls every few months to catch up. It meant sending Mina money unprompted some days just so she could get herself a nice lunch or something—Mina had refused profusely to let Nayeon help her pay her rent or even for her travel expenses to get there. Nayeon had tried to protest, but she knew Mina would be stubborn about it.
The money didn’t mean much to Nayeon, not as much as Mina meant to her. She had more of it than she could ever possibly spend on herself. She had grown weary of counting the decimals in her bank balances. She had grown tired of counting in general.
She had always been good at it—numbers. Arranging them, breaking them down, rearranging them, then building them back up into a shape that made sense. From a young age, all the adults around her had used words like ‘genius’ and ‘gifted’. She had never really understood it though. She was no Sophie Germain, she was no Albert Einstein. She wasn’t very good at science, numbers were just easy. There was structure and repetition and even when uncertainties reared their ugly heads, she knew how to make them cooperate.
She liked to write too, but that didn’t make her as much money as all the businesses she ran like a family. It had started when her parents had divorced.
Her father was violent and angry and a drunk. He had tried to take everything from them, and had mostly succeeded. The day Nayeon had taken her mother and toddler sister away from him, she was only ten.
But she had taken up that care herself, like a shield. Like a vice.
She learned legalese and all the hidden words underneath what businessmen speak aloud. She had helped her mother arrange the divorce, had found her great attorney, had taken the financial burdens on her own shoulders as her mom recovered from such a fearful life.
She had stolen things. Magazines, toys, books, art—anything she knew she could get away with. It was easy to stay hidden, having been such a small child, she was good at hiding, good at running.
She would steal things and then sell them again. Usually to her classmates or to unsuspecting collectors.
It had taken her mom only six months to find a good position in a new company, after which she quickly worked her way up. After the divorce, it had become abundantly clear among the social elite that her father had always surrounded himself with that most of what he had built in his career was just her mothers work with his name on it. He had gone bankrupt after only a handful of years.
Even still, it wasn’t until Nayeon started high school that her mother finally started to make good money again. She had been twelve when her mother had asked her to be the financial leader of the family, trusting her to do everything from budgeting to handling tax season. Her mother was the opposite of her—fantastic at science, not the best at math.
Nayeon had done so willingly, having already mentally taken most of the load of caring for her mother and sister. She was happy to do it, seeing it more as a ritual than a task—a ritual that would keep them safe.
Nayeon had managed, in the years her mother was still struggling to find her feet again, to tediously make and save a significant amount of money by doing the taxes of nearly everyone in their small, run down apartment building. Even some of her mother’s colleagues came to her for help. She charged less than most accountants, but enough to make a decent profit.
It was only her first week of her first year of high school when she had been walking with Jeongyeon and seen it. The noodle shop. The tiny one on the corner with only a bar rail to sit at and stools that looked older than her. It was run by an older couple with no children. It was on a fast track to closing.
Nayeon had gone back the next day to try the noodles and ended up staying and chatting with the couple, the Baek’s. By the time she was leaving, she was already drafting a contract in her head. She came back a week later with a contract and backpack full of cash.
She had bought in partial ownership and helped turn the place around, making changes necessary to attract more students, more people her age. The school was nearby and there was a university only a few blocks away.
It worked. For the first time of many, Nayeon was a business owner. The paychecks were small at first, not that she had expected much. But she used that money to put back into the business, opening another location and two mobile food trucks by the end of the year.
The paychecks got a lot better. So, Nayeon didn’t stop.
By the time she graduated, she had partial or sole ownership of four restaurants, two clothing retail storefronts, half a dozen cosmetic stores, one fashion brand, and a few dozen food trucks and street stalls, and one coffee shop.
The pay only got better with each passing day. By that time, the number of zero’s in her bank account had felt like a made up number to her. She was making more than her mother, the CEO of a prolific and respected national Bio-Medical Lab Facility. It all felt like a dream to her.
She didn’t spend more than was necessary on anything, putting most of her profit back into the businesses and into opening new ones. She had long since hired a personal assistant to help her balance all her responsibilities and had started hiring young, freshly graduated business majors to help run certain aspects of different businesses.
She took a year off of school to travel to Japan, where she lived in Osaka for just over eight months in order to open a high-end diner downtown. It had a lot of classic recipes and traditional food, but was—like all her other ventures—geared to a target audience of young people, teens and university students. She was great at it but adjusting to the differences in youth culture between Seoul and Osaka was a small challenge.
It was a hit and by the time she was packing to leave, they were already in talks to open a second location in Tokyo.
She started university that autumn. She had decided to go to a performing arts school. Her mother had called her crazy but Nayeon knew she was already well beyond needing a business degree to find success. She had already done it. She was already wildly successful. She had chosen the school and the program for fun. Because in the spaces between numbers, she always found a song.
Jeongyeon had also taken a year off to volunteer in animal rescue programs overseas. Her freshman year had quickly turned into a blur of parties, girls, and fighting hangovers in morning classes.
Nayeon would have never called herself a womanizer, she treated everyone she took home with immense respect. It wasn’t about taking what she wanted, it was always about her desperately searching for the one thing all her money could never buy her. She still tried though.
She spent copious amounts of money on girls she never saw more than a couple times at most. She bought a flashy car and fancy clothes and went to the spa weekly. All the while, she heard the whispers.
That she was a player. That she slept around. That she left a trail of broken hearts everywhere she went.
There was a little bit of truth to all of it, regretfully. Nayeon never wanted to be seen as a manipulator or heartless. It was quite the opposite. She was too desperate to find somewhere to pour all the love she had trapped inside of her by years of stiff handshakes and tense boardrooms.
She thought if she just kept trying she would eventually find a place safe enough to lay her head and rest at long last.
But like the universe liked to do—ever a cosmic comedian—it didn’t work.
Instead, the universe brought Mina to her.
Like a slowly rising tide. Like pieces falling into place.
It had been her second year, Mina’s first. Freshman orientation. Nayeon and Jeongyeon had volunteered to help as the tops of their classes, as well as knowing it would be Jihyo’s orientation.
Nayeon had given a short introduction before breaking off into small groups for team bonding—or whatever. She was standing by the refreshment table with Jeongyeon, chatting about a party they were meant to attend that night, when another of the volunteers approached them, Miyawaki Sakura, with three freshmen in tow.
“I just want to introduce you guys to my friends,” She had said, tilting her head towards the other three.
On the left was a girl with short, chopped hair and a scowl that could freeze lava, glancing around the room like it was a trap. In the middle was a girl with round, excited eyes, a faint blush on her cheeks and wide grin splitting her unblemished face. The one on the right–
Nayeon had stopped breathing for a moment, sure her heart had stopped too. She was gorgeous. Smooth and pretty as porcelain, a spattering of moles across her soft features. Her eyes were like pools of honey to Nayeon. Her gaze drifted slowly over the smooth curve of her brow that dipped into the delicate slope of her nose. Her lips were pink and shining with gloss. Her lashes were long and fluttered distractingly.
Her hair was shoulder length and fell into her face in a way that looked like a defense mechanism. She kept her eyes low, her gaze not staying anywhere too long—clearly nervous.
“Did you hear me, Nayeon?” Sakura nudged her. Nayeon turned to her like it hurt to look at anything else other than the angel that had just appeared in front of her. “I asked if you’ve met Mina yet–She’s in your program.” Sakura explained, gesturing to the girl on the right—the one that had appeared like an oasis in the desert of Nayeon’s life.
“Mina.” Nayeon echoed, like she hadn’t heard a single other word, turning her eyes back to the girl.
“She’s Mina,” The one in the middle pointed to her, pulling Nayeon’s attention. “She’s Momo,” She pointed to the left, “I’m Minatozaki Sana. We’re from Japan. Nice to meet you.” She spoke in overly formal honorifics with a thick accent. She extended a hand.
Nayeon accepted it and they shook lightly. “Osaka?” Nayeon asked.
Sana gasped, “How did you know?”
“I spent most of my gap year in the city.” Nayeon answered simply.
“I’m Jeongyeon.” she spoke beside Nayeon suddenly, leaning across her to offer her own hand to Sana. “That’s Nayeon.”
“Sakura already said that.” Sana giggled and released Nayeon’s hand to take Jeongyeon’s.
“Right,” Jeongyeon smiled bashfully. “I knew that.”
Sana giggled again as their hands lingered locked in the middle of the small circle they had formed. Nayeon glanced between them with a raised brow.
“You’re in my program?” Nayeon stepped around Jeongyeon to stand closer to Mina, speaking quietly. Like she was a deer that Nayeon could startle away if she spoke too loud.
“I am.” Mina answered, looking directly at Nayeon for what she was sure was the first time. “The music program?” She spoke the words like she wasn’t sure she got them right. “Sorry, we are still learning Korean.”
“Don’t apologize.” Nayeon said quickly. “You sound fluent.” She smiled and swore she could see Mina’s cheeks tint just a shade darker.
“Thank you,” She bowed her head respectfully. “I don’t feel fluent.”
“Your Korean is better than my Japanese.” Nayeon shrugged, her warm smile shifting to a playful grin. “Maybe we can help each other out? Most of the Japanese I know are numbers.”
“Having a tutor isn’t a bad idea. We could really use the help.” Mina returned a smile and Nayeon’s dropped just slightly before returning even wider, slightly forced.
“Right, I meant all three of you…” She trailed off, perturbed, trying to find something else to say to get Mina to see her real motive.
“Hey, wait,” Momo cut in, interrupting the conversation between Jeongyeon, Sana, and Sakura as well. “Aren’t you that woman that owns that restaurant with the massive mermaid tank in Osaka?” Her eyes narrowed at Nayeon.
“Yeah, how did you know?” Nayeon frowned.
“Your picture was in the article about it opening.” Momo answered. “I went there once with my sister. It was crazy expensive.”
Nayeon shrugged with a sheepish smile. “It’s fine dining.”
“Yeah, the food was great.” Momo mused as if remembering the flavors vividly. “Don’t you own, like, a ridiculous number of places, though? What are you doing at an arts uni?”
Nayeon shrugged again. “To have a good time.”
This made Sana and Sakura laugh.
“Yeah, because collegiate arithmetic is fun.” Sakura teased.
“I’m good at math.” Nayeon shot back playfully. “That’s not a problem.”
“You’re very confident.” Sana commented with admiration.
“She’s arrogant.” Jeongyoen rolled her eyes.
“I think, if you’re as successful as I am at our age, you kind of earn the right to a little arrogance.” Nayeon joked.
“So humble, so wise.” Sakura sighed and began corralling the others away. “Okay, time for a boring lecture.”
And that had been it. It was over for Nayeon from then on. She had tried hopelessly to subtly flirt with Mina, worried she might come on too strong and ruin any chances she might have.
It didn’t take long though for her to convince herself it was pointless.
Mina was too good for her. Too gentle, too calm, too soft at the edges. She was certain Mina must have heard about all the things people whispered about her around campus—all the things true and untrue. There was no way she hadn’t. And how could she accept Nayeon after knowing how everyone saw her, after knowing who she was?
Mina knowing her and Mina loving her at the same time sounded to Nayeon all too much like an impossibility.
So, she had shifted back into the safety of her reputation. She tried to date a classmate, Bae Joohyun. Though, everyone called her Irene. It didn’t go well. They fought a lot, then broke things off after only a few weeks. They ended on good terms though, both understanding they just weren’t compatible in that way.
Nayeon continued to sleep around, continued to find a new bed to sleep in every weekend. Though now, she never stayed the night. She never lingered too long, never let her guard down enough to relax around anyone. And every new face just disappointed her by not being Mina’s. Every voice felt grating and invasive. Every look felt pointed and predatory. But there was a certain protection in it.
She knew exactly what they all wanted from her and she was willing to deliver. She knew all the steps to the song and dance. It was easier to hide behind whispers than raise her own voice above the din of it all.
Then, in her third year, she got partnered with Mina for a performance showcase and something within her once again shifted in a direction that felt like running headfirst into a storm. But that time, she let the wind and the rain carry her away, out to sea. Out into the unknown.
She was persistent and consistent. She offered to carry Mina’s things and walked her to any classes she could. She looked for her everywhere. She memorized all the instances they would coincidentally end up passing each other, or unknowingly ended up in the same places, and logged each one away in her mind neatly to reference later. She would show up with more intention to all those places and wait for another chance to see her.
She heard from Sana before that they had all been working at a local coffee shop near campus and started going there. The coffee was good; the atmosphere was cozy. But Nayeon didn’t care about any of that.
Even if she happened to show up when Mina wasn’t working, she always enjoyed chatting with Sana or making small talk with Momo. But when she was there, Nayeon would ask anything she could think of to stay at the counter longer.
Asking for recommendations, just to find out what kind of tea was Mina’s favorite and how she liked her coffee. She would purchase far too many pastries. She would buy four drinks under the guise of bringing them to her friends, not even knowing if they were still in class or not.
She started going just to study things that she already knew well, just to sit in the corner and steal glances at Mina while she worked. Like collecting secrets about how she moved when she thought nobody was paying attention.
She kept a mental catalogue of all things Mina. Her favorite foods and her favorite movies. That she liked video games—which ones were her favorites. That she liked to crotchet. That she moved with a quiet, calm elegance that could only ever come to a person by nature. The way she blinked when Nayeon complimented her, like it was a surprise. The way she would tuck her hair behind her ear when she was concentrating hard on something. The way her tongue would peak out between her lips when she was writing something down.
The way she smiled when Nayeon would find her, most often simply crossing campus, just for a chance to walk with her for a few minutes. The way she would laugh when Nayeon said something dumb but would indulge her imagination anyway. The way she often wouldn’t respond to things if she didn’t feel it necessary, but Nayeon could always tell she was listening intently.
The way she would say Nayeon’s name differently for different reasons—the soft lilt of it when she just wanted to draw her attention, the firm, but still quiet, hum of her voice when Nayeon was being too arrogant. The drawl of it when Nayeon would tease her too much. There was fondness in it each time, no matter the context, that made Nayeon’s head spin.
When she had worked up the courage to kiss her for the first time it was the same day she had first officially asked her out.
They had both been dancing around their attraction delicately for about a month, reserved to soft, slow looks and knuckles that brushed as they walked together, only interrupted by Nayeon's teasing. Nayeon had always been blunt, flirting shamelessly.
She had realized quickly that Mina took those advances as playful, friendly teasing.
Nayeon couldn’t have that.
Mina had taken her to the dining hall to meet some of her friends and once everyone else had left, she spilled her guts. She told Mina she meant every word and that she wanted to take her out.
She walked Mina home after that. They were both silent but Nayeon was grinning ear to ear and Mina wore a more subtle, but equally giddy smile paired with a soft pink blush. They didn’t speak, but they didn’t need to.
The calm that Mina carried with her was changing Nayeon. The first time she had ever been alone with Mina, walking her from one class to the other after they got paired up, she had felt it. That peace.
They didn’t talk then either but Nayeon could feel it. Mina’s passive, quietness that she carried everywhere had settled into the thrum of Nayeon’s heartbeat. She realized just how little time she had taken to just watch the world around her.
They would be walking, and Nayeon would notice more—the people, the buildings, the breeze in her hair. She had been moving too fast for too long to see any of it before. Mina had been the wildcard that brought a quiet into Nayeon’s life that she had never known possible.
Once they got to the sidewalk leading to Mina’s front door, she had turned to Nayeon wordlessly and reached for her bag, but Nayeon didn’t let go. She hesitated as Mina gave her a questioning look. Nayeon tugged the strap of the bag just enough for Mina’s own grip on it to pull her stumbling forward into Nayeon, who caught her easily with one arm and dropped both their bags to the ground to hold her properly.
“What are you doing?” Mina had whispered, the warmth of her voice drifting over Nayeon’s cheek due to their proximity.
It was the closest Nayeon had ever gotten and she felt a swelling in her chest not too dissimilar to the feeling of watching one of her ventures find easy success.
“I want to kiss you.” She had responded quietly, “May I?”
Mina hadn’t responded, just nodded with wide eyes.
It wasn’t electric. There were no fireworks or sudden life changing realizations. It wasn’t a movie.
It was real.
Mina was real. She was soft, and she was smart, and she was gentle, and she was quiet, and she was stubborn but kind. She was real and in Nayeon’s arms and kissing her back.
Nayeon knew then that Mina really was it for her—this was what she had so desperately been searching for in the series of faces that had long since blurred together into something Nayeon couldn’t see clearly anymore.
None of it mattered anymore. Only Mina.
The beginning of their relationship was a learning experience that they both tried to take in stride. By the end of the academic year, they moved together through their lives like two parts of the same something.
For her final year, and Mina’s third, they found a little apartment close to campus and moved in together. Nayeon had spent most of the summer there alone, preparing it while Mina visited home in Japan. She had gone too, for a few weeks right in the middle of the break, to meet Mina’s parents—and to see their shop, the one Nayeon had helped save from bankruptcy and turn it around, like she had done countless times before.
They stayed in that apartment until Mina graduated a year after her, then moved to a bigger one deeper in the city. Jihyo and Momo moved a few blocks away not long after them and Jeongyeon lived a few floors above them, occasionally hosting Sana when she would return from working—she traveled the world frequently, having found quick success in the world of modeling.
Chaeyoung and Tzuyu moved to the United States for a little over a year for Chaeyoung to work with a new record label there to release her first English album. She also easily found success. Dahyun went with them after Chaeyoung insisted via ultimatum that Dahyun would be her producer, or she would never sign anything with the label.
When they moved back, they got apartments next to each other on the north end of the city, close to the studio they worked in.
Nayeon went back to working at her businesses, setting up a central office solely for managing everything with a small, highly skilled team of professionals she knew she could trust and who had been working under her for years. She hired a new assistant and set her mind on expanding her already very impressive CV.
Mina didn’t work. She decided, at first, with Nayeon’s demanding schedule, she would take a bit of time off to look after their home. She seemed content, spending most days playing her favorite games and building her Legos, going to lunch with Momo and Sana or to the theater with Dahyun, or to concerts with Chaeyoung and Tzuyu.
She did whatever she wanted every day without ever having to worry about security in finances. She never had to worry about losing her home, or anything else. And she spent each day showered in affection from Nayeon.
About three years after she had graduated, Nayeon started to notice the changes. The way Mina’s silence had turned slightly more sour. How her patience started to wear thin. How she seemed restless and frustrated with something Nayeon couldn’t place.
She tried, she really did, to figure it out. To find the problem and come up with a solution but Mina insisted for a long time that everything was fine. Nayeon knew it was the first lie Mina had ever told her.
The first hit came at Sana and Jeongyeon’s engagement party. Mina had been bitter all night, shooting Nayeon cold looks from across the room every time another woman stood a little too close as they spoke to her or when they made her laugh.
Nayeon had gone over towards the end of the night to find out what was bothering her so much, it was a rare thing for Mina to feel real jealousy. It had ended in a nasty argument in Jeongyeon’s room with a closed door and clenched fists.
That had been the catalyst that had sent their lives flying off the tracks. They had both been drunk and things were said that could never be taken back.
They didn’t talk about it the next day. They didn’t talk about it for a year. They just pretended it hadn’t happened. Though, that night had sunk its claws into the peace of their life together and refused to let go. They could both feel the sharpness of it digging into all their softest parts, slowly tearing them apart.
Mina found a job, working on a crew at a local stage theater. She had demanding hours. So did Nayeon. They saw each other less and less. Often, Nayeon would already be sleeping by the time Mina made it home, and she would already be gone by the time Mina woke up. They rarely ate together, let alone did much at all together beyond lazing on the couch on the weekends.
Mina ended up taking a long vacation to New York City one summer with her mother and when she came back, things were ten times worse. The uncomfortable stand still they had found themselves in had morphed into a quietly festering resentment.
Mina would start arguments over simple things that never seemed to matter before. She would give Nayeon the cold shoulder if she stayed out a little too late with Jeongyeona and Jihyo, or when she would work later than she said she would be. Her silence had turned into a weapon that Nayeon had no idea how to defend against, but her anger was even harder to navigate.
It all came to a head on one unsuspecting night when Mina had, for once, managed to make it home before Nayeon was asleep.
The truth came out—Mina was leaving.
She had been offered a role in ballet production and would be living there for a year while the production ran. She would be going alone. She was ending things with Nayeon.
They kept living together, kept sharing a bed and silent mornings over coffee. They continued to fall asleep on the couch together when they watched movies too long on the weekends. They still went to events with their friends and presented for all the world as a happy couple.
Nayeon helped Mina pack and prepare to leave. She offered financial help that was adamantly refused. She gave Mina her verbal support and kept all of her protestations to herself.
This was Mina’s dream. It’s what she wanted. It would make her happy.
Nayeon was never so selfish as to hold her back.
She drove Mina to the airport the day she left, after helping her put the things she wouldn’t be taking into a small storage unit. She carried Mina’s suitcase to the check in kiosk and paid for it despite Mina’s protests.
She walked with her to the security gate and intended for only a hug goodbye.
Mina was the one who went for the kiss.
Then, she was gone.
She was gone.
Nayeon went back to work.
Nayeon went back to the now half empty apartment they had once shared.
Nayeon fell back into the bittersweet embrace of numbers—a life she had never asked for. Never wanted. But a life that had demanded her participation either way.
Nayeon stopped going out and stopped sleeping through the night.
She started ending the day with a glass of wine that, over time, turned into a bottle.
She didn’t talk to anyone much, spending most of her time in her office.
She got rid of the apartment and got a new one across the city, away from everything familiar. Away from all the people and places that reminded her of Mina.
She kept to herself and kept her head down. She did math and interpreted charts until the sight of an unsolved equation made her nauseous.
A year passed and Mina called for the first time in months. Nayeon hoped it was to tell her when she would be flying back. All she said is that she had been offered a more permanent position with the theater and would be staying. Indefinitely.
Nayeon had seen it coming but had hoped she was only making it up.
Another few months passed, then six. Then, another year had gone by. Then, another.
Then, one day, Nayeon stopped counting.
She gave her assistant a policy that she was to be given no paperwork with any math to still be solved—hired an intern just to do the job for her. She hired an accountant to handle her personal expenses and taxes and stopped checking her bank accounts, stopped checking prices, stopped counting the days.
She never wanted to see another number again, especially ones that got a little bigger every day.
A new kind of silence settled itself deep into her bones and lived there. The kind of quiet that demanded to be felt, the kind that's dull but constant throb only dissipated with a drink.
Jeongyeon came around sometimes to bring her takeout and catch up. She was married with a kid on the way. Jihyo would come around occasionally too to nag Nayeon about cleaning her apartment and insist she drink more water. She was a newlywed entering a new era in her career as a performer. Sana came by sometimes, to bring Nayeon candy and gossip about their friends. Chaeyoung showed her face sometimes too just to check in on her or just to tell Nayeon she loved her. Her career in music was growing naturally into an acting one as well, especially thanks to her connection to Tzuyu, who was growing in popularity in the acting world with each passing month.
The world was moving on, her friends were moving forward. They were hitting new goals and milestones every day. Starting families, starting careers, starting brands, starting to really begin their adult lives.
Nayeon stayed stuck.
In her mind, she was still on the rooftop the night Mina had found her and told her she was leaving her behind.
She stayed there like it would keep her safe.
She refused to date, turning down anyone brave enough to make an advance, turning down all her friends' offers to set her up on a date. She knew they weren’t together anymore, but indulging anyone else's attention felt like some kind of betrayal to Mina. Like she would find out she went on a date and that would only tell her that Nayeon had never loved her enough for it to mean anything.
It meant everything to her, even with all the miles and years continuing to stretch between them.
Nayeon could no longer picture a future for herself. The waters of certainty had been muddied by deep loss—the grief of overflowing love with nowhere to put it.
She stayed as she was. She stayed quiet, she stayed alone. She stayed at her desk. She stayed with a bottle in her hand. Avoided sleeping in a bed by herself at all costs, usually falling asleep in her office or on her couch.
She was no longer Im Nayeon. She was simply the wayward ghost of the woman she had once had the potential to become.