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dahyun gets glasses, and momo can’t cope.
it had been with a heavy heart and an elongated sigh that dahyun had shown momo the prescription from the doctor the day she came back from her checkup.
“i guess jeongyeon unnie was right,” dahyun sighs. “i really am fucking blind.”
momo makes a sympathetic sound and pats dahyun’s head reassuringly, but she’s mostly concentrating on editing her project for her post production class. it’s really kicking her ass, and although momo loves video and editing and production and all of the things that she’d signed up to do with this four year degree, she also can’t help but hate how university manages to turn her passion into something she dreads.
anyway.
dahyun got her prescription, and she went with chaeyoung and tzuyu to the opticians to pick out a frame for her glasses. momo would have offered to come but, you know. project, deadlines, senior year. she couldn’t spare the time.
“i can snapchat you pictures so you can help me choose too, unnie,” dahyun had said, slipping her feet into her trainers.
“mmm, i don’t think i’ll be on my phone to reply on time. surprise me.”
and surprise her she did.
it wasn’t really the frames, in particular. they were cute, yes, and fashionable in a way that could only have been the influence of the trend-savvy chaeyoung, but… it was just something about the general vision of dahyun in glasses that made momo’s stomach swoop. maybe it was because she looked older with them on, more mature. maybe it was just that it was cute the way that dahyun kept gently touching the edge of the frames with the tip of her fingers to push them back up when they slid down her nose. maybe it was just the change, making all of the thoughts that momo had suppressed as best as she could come back to light, bounding out of her chest in bright bright colours, as if to say, we were here all along! did you think you could get rid of us?
“what?” dahyun says, looking up at momo from where she’s perched on her bed. it’s summer and their studio apartment’s ventilation leaves a lot to be desired, so dahyun is sat there in a black bra and cargo shorts. momo swallows, realising she’d been staring.
“nothing,” momo says, and when dahyun squints at her skeptically, she sighs. “you just look good in your glasses, that’s all.” as if glasses are the only thing momo, a Known Bisexual, would be staring at on dahyun.
“you’ve been acting different recently,” dahyun says with concern lacing her voice, closing the textbook she was reading with a pen in the middle to keep her page. “should i be worried?”
momo shakes her head and feels her cheeks start to turn pink.
dahyun swallows audibly. “is it… is it the lease? do you want to move out?”
hold on, hold up, what?
“dahyun, what? what are you talking about?”
“i just - we got the letter about the lease from the landlord last week and i saw it on your desk under some stuff so i thought you were hiding it from me because you’re sick of me and want to move out and now you’re not making - making proper, proper eye contact with me and acting weird and i’m sorry, i’m sorry if -”
“dahyun, stop,” momo says, walking the three steps over to dahyun’s bed. “stop. please. it’s nothing like that, i promise.”
dahyun takes a shaky breath. “then what is it?”
momo looks at dahyun. sweet dahyun who tries to dance along with her when momo’s practising and distracts her by making her laugh, who owns five million pairs of plaid pants.
liking dahyun came easily to momo. the feelings fell right into place in her chest, settled in amongst her heart and lungs like they were supposed to be there, even when logic, experience, society - so many things dictated that it wasn't a good idea. your best friend, your roommate - there are so many things that could go wrong, and so many ugly consequences that could come after.
and yet -
there was nothing that momo knew with greater certainty than the fact that she liked dahyun. the fact that she could be in love dahyun. the fact that maybe - her traitorous mind whispered this to her, hushed with fear - maybe she already is in love with dahyun.
"unnie?" dahyun says, fearful frown on her face.
"dahyun-ah," momo says softly. "i've been acting weird because - because i like you. romantically. and i didn't know what to do with the feeling, so i kind of just - i was fine, i was dealing with it before, but then i just ... couldn't anymore. so i started acting weird."
dahyun exhales slowly. momo watches, afraid.
"right."
"right?" momo repeats tentatively.
"that is... the reason. that you have been acting strange."
momo feels like a coiled spring, energy stuck in her body and nowhere for it to go. her heart is running at five hundred miles an hour.
"i see." dahyun says. all she's saying are these - these nothing words. they don't give momo any indication either way of what she feels, what she thinks. momo waits, though. patient.
it takes dahyun a moment, but she swallows and pushes her glasses up, faces momo head on. "i like you too, unnie. i ... i always have. ever since freshman year."