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i can see you from my room's window, my heart is beating
your bright smile, you and i are sweet sweet sweet
can you see me with your black eyes? my heart is beating
my smile can make you smile too, you and i are bright bright bright
01.
You wake up to the smell of espresso, maybe a splash or two of caramel syrup and the sound of whipped cream swirled right on top of a cup of coffee.
You used to have such a difficult time pulling yourself away from the blankets, screwing your eyes shut to block out the growing morning sunshine, groaning as you hit the snooze button on your alarm clock. When you finally stir and pull yourself out of bed, you're drowsily getting ready for the day, can't seem to find any energy in yourself to talk to anyone so early in the day. You were never good with mornings.
These days, you're ready to get out of bed as soon as you smell coffee and buttered toast. Once you're in slippers and you've had a chance to stretch your arms out, you're off to the kitchen. A warm smile, a pair of kind eyes, and a gentle voice greets you as you enter.
"Breakfast is ready."
You're a morning person if you're with Jaehee.
02.
If you have to compare your relationship to something, it's like swimming: you have to start slow, wading around in the water before you feel like you're ready to start diving head first into the deep end.
Both of you are in bed just whispering back and forth, not quite asleep but not very awake at this point. You're looking up at the ceiling where you stuck glow in the dark stars.
Jaehee tried to make constellations, a whole solar system. You were silly enough to make tiny hearts out of stars that are hidden inside her galaxy.
"I've never had time for it, I guess—for romance. I was too busy with my job."
As you turn onto your side to face her, you realize that she's been looking at you this whole time.
"But now I have all the time in the world for it," she pauses here, then decides to say instead, "For you."
03.
Jaehee is surprisingly clumsy when she's in love.
It's been a long week of planning the coffee shop's interior design. You find Jaehee sitting in the middle of the floor with papers all around her. She's sitting so tensely, so you walk over and kneel behind her. Massaging her shoulders a bit, feeling her body relax under your finger tips, you lean in to kiss the back of her neck. Her hair is at her shoulders now.
"Go home early today," you tell her, "I'll take care of the rest here. I'll see you for dinner, okay?"
You hope that when she goes home, she'll relax with a nice bath and maybe a nap.
Instead, there's a smoky smell wafting into the entrance as you come through the door. You're wondering if she's okay, because it almost smells like something caught on fire. When the panic dawns on you, you're hastily making your way to the kitchen.
"Is everything okay?"
"—oh, you're home!" Jaehee is in the middle of a messy kitchen, the fan overhead the stove is turned on the highest setting and there's something black on the skillet. Has it been burned...?
She's sheepishly rubbing her hands together. "I wanted to do something for you. We've been working on the shop for some time, and you've done so much for me—you even let me go home early when this was my project to start with. For goodness sake, it's my project, I should be letting you leave early." Her eyes aren't looking at yours, but you're seeking for her gaze. You want her to look at you.
"Anyway. I've never been great at cooking," she admits, a little embarrassed, "No one taught me how to, and following recipes is hard. All I ever ate was convenience store food when I was working for Mr. Han and—" Jaehee is still trying to explain the situation.
Damn, isn't it cute when she's in love?
“Just leave the food to me, darling.”
04.
You're amazed at how much time passes from the beginning to where you are now. It's not a clock you're looking at, or a planner you're writing your schedule in; it's sitting shoulder to shoulder in the park with a picnic laid out in front of you, and you're noticing how Jaehee brushes some of her hair behind her ear. It reaches the middle of her shoulder blades.
“Is your hair getting in the way, Jaehee?” you ask her. Unfolding your legs you position yourself so that Jaehee is sitting in between your limbs. “It's gotten long.”
She starts playing with her hair, fussing with the way her bangs sit on her forehead or how the fringes are slightly out of place. She's twirling a bit of it around her finger, too.
“I suppose it has,” she decides on saying, “I'm still not used to it quite yet. My hair grew fast, didn't it?”
“It really did! How long's it been now, six months? Here, just relax for a little bit, alright?”
Jaehee hums, wonders what you're up to back there behind her. You section off her hair into three sections, take two of the sections and weave them together. She must have not realized what you're doing right away until you've managed two or three braids into her hair.
She tilts her head back. Now she's looking at you upside down.
“Thank you.”
And you lean down to kiss her to say she's welcomed.
05.
“I think we're finished. What do you think?”
“We're good to go. Are you nervous?”
“A bit. This is the first time in my life I've ever put so much passion into what I was doing. What if it fails?"
“Don't think like that. It's because of all that passion that this will be a success.”
“If you think so... I'll believe you.”
“And if it fails, just remember that I'll be right here next to you.”
“Should we go ahead and get started then?”
You flip the sign on the door from closed to open. The first set of customers are your fellow RFA members, eager to try the coffee Jaehee has put her love into making and your assortment of baked goods.
They're greeted with smiles: and you have never seen Jaehee smile any brighter than she is now.
“Welcome to our coffee shop!”
sweetly play with me so that my smile won't go away
this feeling that this happiness will last forever, you and I are the same heart
always, i'm thinking of your smile