Work Text:
The autumn wind carried the scent of rust and fallen leaves, sharp against Nayeon's cheeks as she stood at the railing.
Below, Seoul sprawled in a tapestry of neon and shadow, the Han River cutting through it like a silver wound.
She was forty-two now.
Forty-two, and the city had changed so much she barely recognized it—but the tower remained. The locks still hung in their thousands, a constellation of promises made by hands younger and more foolish than hers.
She hadn't meant to come here.
The photoshoot had wrapped early—a solo concept, "timeless," her manager had called it, which was industry code for "you're aging gracefully, aren't you proud?"—and the car had been taking her back to her apartment in Hannam-dong when she'd seen the tower rising through the fog.
"Stop," she'd heard herself say, and her driver had obliged without question.
Now she stood with her coat pulled tight, watching couples pass hand in hand. Two women walked by, maybe twenty-five, fingers interlaced, one of them laughing at something on her phone.
Nobody stared. Nobody cared.
It was 2037, and Korea had finally learned what love meant—or at least, learned to stop pretending it didn't know.
Twenty years too late for us, Nayeon thought, and then immediately hated herself for thinking it.
The voice cut through the wind like a blade she hadn't known was still sharp.
"Unnie?"
Nayeon turned.
Momo stood ten feet away, bundled in an oversized cream sweater, her dark hair shorter now—shoulder-length, softer—and her face somehow exactly the same and entirely different.
The same full lips, the same sleepy eyes that had once made Nayeon's chest ache with a tenderness she refused to name. But there were fine lines at the corners of those eyes now. A stillness in her shoulders that thirty years in the industry had cemented into grace.
For a moment, neither of them breathed.
"Momo," Nayeon said. Just that. Just her name.
"What are you—" Momo stopped, shook her head, and something like a laugh escaped her. "Of course. I haven't bothered to come up here in ages, and the one time I come, there you are."
Nayeon's eyebrows rose. "What brought you back?"
Momo stepped closer, hands shoved in her pockets. "Dahyun-ie wanted to see the sunset from up here. Said she's feeling nostalgic. She's at the café—her feet were hurting." A pause. "Old age."
"You're not old."
"We're forty now."
"That's still not old."
Momo smiled then—that small, crooked smile that had always made Nayeon's heart stutter.
"Okay, unnie."
Unnie.
The word landed differently now than it had when they were twenty. Back then, it had been casual, easy, the currency of their shared language.
Now it sounded like an echo. Like something precious that had been dropped and cracked and glued back together, still recognizable but never quite whole.
Nayeon looked away, back at the city. "I was just leaving, actually. My shoot wrapped early, and I—"
"Don't."
The word stopped her cold.
"Don't what?"
Momo moved to stand beside her at the railing, close enough that Nayeon could smell her perfume—something soft and floral, different from the vanilla she'd worn in their twenties.
"Don't pretend you weren't standing here thinking about us. About everything."
Nayeon's throat tightened. "That's presumptuous."
"Is it?" Momo turned to face her fully, and there was something dangerous in her eyes—not anger, but an old, familiar grief. "I know you, unnie. I've always known you. That's the problem."
The wind howled between them, carrying the distant sound of tourist chatter and a street musician playing a guitar three stories down.
"You have no right," Nayeon whispered. "You have no right to show up here and talk to me like that. Not after—"
"After what?" Momo's voice was soft, devastatingly soft. "After we both made our choices?"
Nayeon flinched like she'd been struck.
***
They had come here once before. Just the two of them.
It was autumn then too, both of them still trainees with debut still a distant promise. Nayeon had been seventeen, Momo sixteen, and they'd snuck out after curfew because Momo had seen a drama where the leads went to Namsan and made a wish, and she'd said in her halting Korean, "I want to do that. With you, unnie."
Nayeon had laughed. Had said yes without hesitation.
They'd taken the cable car up, huddled together against the cold because Momo had forgotten her jacket—she always forgot things—and Nayeon had given her own without a second thought. At the top, they'd stood exactly where Nayeon stood now, looking out at a Seoul that had been smaller then, or maybe just younger.
"We should get a lock," Momo had said.
"For what?"
"I don't know. For luck. For debut."
Nayeon had looked at her—at the way the city lights reflected in her dark eyes, at the hopeful curve of her mouth—and had felt something lodge itself beneath her ribs. Something she wouldn't have a name for until years later.
"We'll come back," Nayeon had promised. "When we debut. When we're famous. When we've made it, we'll come back and get a lock then."
They never did.
The years had swallowed that promise whole—comebacks and tours and the relentless machinery of idol life. They *did* make it—but never back to that glimmering pillar overlooking the city.
Standing here now, Nayeon realized she'd never forgotten that night.
The way Momo had shivered in her jacket. The way she'd leaned her head on Nayeon's shoulder. The way she'd whispered, "I hope we're always together, unnie," and Nayeon had pretended not to hear because her heart was beating too loud.
***
The world had watched them, even when they didn't know it.
In the early years, after debut, fans had called them NaMo—a ship name that trended weekly, fueled by a thousand small moments. Nayeon and Momo spotted getting coffee in Hongdae on their one day off. Nayeon and Momo walking along the Han River at midnight, shoulders brushing. Nayeon and Momo out shopping, Momo carrying all of the older’s bags. Nayeon and Momo at the airport, Momo always reaching for Nayeon's sleeve when the crowds got too thick.
Dispatch had run a photo spread—not a dating scandal, just a feature on "Idols' Closest Friendships"—and the centerpiece had been a candid shot of them in Osaka, post-concert, eating takoyaki from a street stall, Momo wiping sauce from Nayeon's chin with her thumb.
TWICE's Nayeon and Momo share a bond that transcends language, the caption had read. Fans say they finish each other's sentences. We say they just look at each other like the rest of us don't exist.
Nayeon had laughed when she saw it. Had shown Momo, and Momo had shrugged and said, "They don't know anything," but her ears had turned pink.
What Dispatch never captured was the quieter intimacy. The way Momo would cook for her.
In the dorm, after long practice days, Momo would stand at the stove in her oversized shirt and fuzzy socks, making japchae or budae jjigae or hotpot rice or whatever Nayeon had mentioned craving earlier that week. She never asked what Nayeon wanted. She just watched. Listened. Remembered.
"Eat, unnie," Momo would say, pushing a bowl toward her on the couch. "You didn't have lunch."
"How do you know?"
"I always know."
And Nayeon would eat, and the food would be warm and perfect, and she'd think: this is what it feels like to be taken care of. This is what it feels like to be loved.
She had come to terms with it quicker than she realized. The exact moment was lost to a blur of practice rooms and van rides and late-night convenience store runs. There had been no dramatic confession to herself. Just a quiet, gradual settling—like water finding its level, like a song finding its key.
I love Momo.
It was that simple. That terrifying.
She had never seen love as something bound by gender. It simply existed, in any shape or form that it did. Waiting to be seen.
Love was the way Momo looked at her across a crowded room. Love was the way her own chest ached when Momo laughed. Love was the strawberry she placed on Momo's plate and the way Momo's eyes softened in response.
She knew the risks. Of course she knew. She watched the news like everyone else. She saw what happened to idols who were caught dating—the hate comments, the cancelled schedules, the way fans turned on them overnight.
And same-sex couples? There was no blueprint for that. No precedent. Just a cold, unspoken understanding that some loves had to stay in the dark.
I don't care, she had told herself, more than once, especially when alcohol buzzed warmly in her veins.
She had imagined it—the exposé, the backlash, the inevitable disbandment talks. She had imagined losing everything she had worked for since she was fifteen years old. And every time, she had concluded the same thing: It would be worth it.
Love would be worth it.
But then she would look at the other members.
At Jihyo, who had trained for ten years—ten years—and had never once complained, who had carried the weight of their debut on her small shoulders like it was nothing.
At Jeongyeon, who had given up so much to be here, whose quiet strength held them all together when things got hard.
At Sana, who had left her family in Japan with a smile on her face and cried herself to sleep for the first six months.
At Tzuyu, who had been only fifteen when she debuted, who had already weathered a political storm that should have broken someone twice her age.
At Mina, at Dahyun, at Chaeyoung, at all of them.
They had bled for this. Cried for this. Given up their childhoods, their privacy, their normal lives for the shared dream of standing on stage together, of being TWICE.
And if Nayeon pursued this—if she confessed to Momo, if they were discovered, if the scandal destroyed everything—
It wouldn't just be her dream that crumbled.
It would be all of theirs.
She thought about Jihyo's face on debut day—the tears streaming down her cheeks, the way she had whispered "We made it, we actually made it," over and over like a prayer.
She thought about Sana's mother crying during their first showcase, clutching a handkerchief and mouthing, "That's my daughter."
She thought about all the fans who had supported them through every comeback, who had made them the nation's girl group through sheer unwavering devotion.
It's not just my life. It's all of theirs.
For all her bravery, she just wasn't quite ready enough to lose everything in the face of changing history.
So she convinced herself that Momo didn't understand her. That Momo didn't know. That they weren't compatible.
Instead, she'd lean her head on Momo's shoulder, and Momo would let her, and they'd watch whatever drama was on, and neither of them would mention that Nayeon's hand had found Momo's under the blanket, fingers loosely intertwined.
Eventually, it worked. It simply became a fact: Im Nayeon and Hirai Momo, for all the time they spent with one another, didn’t understand one another.
***
Except…
Momo had known.
She had known from the moment Nayeon had placed that damn strawberry on her plate during their first anniversary fanmeeting, had looked at her with those big rabbit eyes and said *"Eat, Momo-ya, you barely touched your lunch,"* and Momo had felt her heart crack open like an egg.
It wasn't hard to feel her pulse race when she looked at Nayeon and saw the stars in her eyes and those adorable teeth peeking out from her rosy lips. But knowing and accepting were two separate things.
Because Momo knew herself. She knew that she was difficult—not mean, not cruel, but hard. Her brain worked in ways she couldn't explain, scattering itself into a thousand threads that ran a mile a minute, tangling so badly that sometimes it all just shut down entirely.
She forgot things: schedules, promises, the names of people she'd met twice. She needed space, needed quiet, needed to be alone in a way that made her feel guilty and broken and wrong.
She sometimes couldn't understand the world, and the world never bothered to stop and understand her.
Always the one who was one step behind in understanding. Always slow.
Contrary to what people believed, Momo wasn't blind. She saw it all—the way netizens and even some fans talked about her, had been talking about her since the day she was surprisingly added to TWICE's final lineup on SIXTEEN.
A second chance, they called it. A gift from Park Jinyoung himself.
Sometimes it felt like condemnation.
A slip-up on stage and she was trending for all the wrong reasons. There were hundreds of compilations of her mistakes—the encores where her voice cracked, the interviews where her Korean faltered, the moments she spaced out from exhaustion and the internet decided it was cute or pathetic depending on the day.
"Aww, Momo is so cute, there isn't a thought behind those eyes."
"She's lucky she can dance, that's why she made it, huh."
"Man, I like the song, but that one Japanese girl's voice is so annoying."
She saw the comments, read the threads, sat through the variety show edits that always seemed to highlight her confusion for laughs.
She smiled through it because that was her job—to be the cute, clumsy one who couldn't quite keep up, only good at dancing. But at night, alone, the words burrowed under her skin.
Second chance, the phrase haunted her. JYP had chosen her. The viewers hadn't.
She had been eliminated, and then plucked back at the last moment because one man saw something in her that millions watching at home hadn't. She had spent her entire career trying to prove that he wasn't wrong to believe in her.
But some days, she wasn't sure she believed in herself.
And Nayeon was… everything she wasn't. Nayeon was laughter and noise and the kind of warmth that filled every room she entered. The center—of the group (of the universe, if you had asked Momo). She deserved someone who could meet her there, in that brightness, without dragging her down into the dark.
Love should be easy, Momo thought to herself, curled in her bunk at 3 AM, scrolling through the photos she'd taken of Nayeon that week. It shouldn't be work. It shouldn't feel like a constant apology.
So she stayed quiet. She took her photos. She cooked her meals. She let Nayeon lean on her shoulder during dramas. She went anywhere Nayeon asked. And she never, ever stepped closer.
***
They had spent the better part of a decade orbiting around each other, unable to be apart but terrified of what would happen if they stepped closer.
Terrified of hurting the group. Terrified of hurting each other. Terrified of a society that wasn't ready for them.
But the world was funny. Maybe fate liked to play tricks, or maybe that was just the way of things. Maybe for people like them, this kind of love was always inevitable.
It started small.
The silly eldest and the reliable one, bickering like sisters, supporting each other through every hardship. Somewhere along the line, the line between friendship and something more had blurred. Jeongyeon was safe. Jeongyeon didn't look at her with fear in her eyes. Jeongyeon said what she meant, meant what she said, and never made Nayeon feel like she was asking for too much.
Easy, Nayeon had thought, the first time Jeongyeon kissed her. This was easy.
And Momo—Momo had found Dahyun.
Dahyun, who laughed at all of Momo's jokes, even the ones that didn't make sense. Dahyun, who sat patiently beside Momo during her quiet days, never demanding conversation, never making her feel broken for needing space. Dahyun, who looked at Momo like she was the most fascinating person in the world, not in spite of her strangeness but because of it.
Easy, Momo had thought, the first time she held Dahyun’s hand. This was what it felt like.
Neither of them had planned it. Neither of them had looked at the other members and thought I'll fall in love with them instead. It had just… happened. Like water finding its level. Like roots growing toward the soil that could hold them.
And wasn't that the cruelest joke of all? That they had both been so afraid of being too much for each other that they had found solace in people who required less. Jeongyeon, who had always been steady. Dahyun, who had always been patient.
The easy option, Nayeon thought, sometimes, late at night when sleep wouldn't come. We both chose the easy option.
And they both knew it.
But that was the thing about them, all of them. The thing that fans had always sensed, the thing that had kept them together through scandals and slumps and the relentless passage of time.
They loved one another. Too much. Inevitably. Irresistibly.
Not just Nayeon and Momo.
All of them.
Jihyo and Sana, who had somehow made it work despite their explosive personalities. Mina and Chaeyoung, quiet and artistic and perfectly matched. Tzuyu, who had sworn she would never date within the group and then promptly fallen into the quiet comfort of the beautiful Japanese and shorter artist.
The love had always been there. Beneath the the late night practices, beneath the variety show appearances, beneath the pressure and the scrutiny and the weight of being the Nation's Girl Group. It had seeped through the cracks like water through stone, patient and unstoppable.
Inevitable, Nayeon thought now, looking back. It was always inevitable.
Because when they’ve spent their formative years with one another—when they’ve bleed together, cried together, succeeded together, failed together—something permanent takes root. Something that doesn't care about gender or society or the opinions of strangers on the internet.
They simply loved. They couldn’t help it. It flowed over rocks, around obstacles, through barriers that should have been insurmountable. It found a way.
***
The announcement had come in the spring.
Not from Nayeon and Jeongyeon—they would wait another three years, would guard their privacy with the ferocity of people who had learned that the world wasn't kind to girls who loved girls.
No, it was Momo and Dahyun who came out first, in a quiet Instagram post that broke the internet and then healed it.
A photo of their hands intertwined, two rings glinting in the sunlight. A caption that said simply: "Love is love. Thank you for growing with us."
The support had been overwhelming. Fans who had shipped them for years erupted with joy. Articles were written. Debates were had. And slowly, tentatively, other idols began to follow.
By late 2030, it was almost unremarkable. Two members of the same group, in love. What a concept.
Nayeon had been the first to heart the post, Jeongyeon's arm around her shoulders. She had smiled. Had genuinely, truly smiled, because Momo deserved happiness, and Dahyun was good—so good, so patient, so willing to sit in the quiet with Momo and never demand more than she could give.
"Are you okay?" Jeongyeon had asked, and Nayeon had nodded.
"I'm happy for her."
"You are."
"I am."
Jeongyeon had kissed her temple. Hadn't asked the question Nayeon saw in her eyes. Are you happy?
***
"You knew," Nayeon said now, her voice cracking on the words. "All those years, you knew how I felt, and you just—you let me think—"
"I knew," Momo agreed. She wasn't crying. That was the worst part. Her eyes were glassy, yes, but she held herself with a stillness that spoke of decades of practice. "I knew, and I loved you back, unnie. I loved you so much it scared me."
Nayeon made a sound—something between a laugh and a sob. "Then why? Why didn't you—"
"Because I would have been wrong for you."
The words hung in the air, absurd and devastating.
"That doesn't—that's not—" Nayeon shook her head, her carefully styled hair coming loose from its pins. "You don't get to decide that, Momo. You don't get to decide what's right for me."
"I know." Momo's voice dropped lower, softer. "I know that now. I didn't know it then. But back then… All I knew was that I was hard to love. I am hard to love. I still forget things, Nayeon unnie. I still disappear into my own head for days. Dahyun-ie has learned to read the signs, but she still struggles sometimes, and she's the most patient person I've ever met."
A pause. "You were never patient. You were passionate and loud and you wanted everything from the people you loved. And I wanted to give it to you. God, I wanted to. But I was terrified that I'd run out. That one day you'd look at me and realize I wasn't worth the effort."
"YOU DON'T GET TO—" Nayeon's voice rose, cracked, and she covered her mouth with her hand.
People were staring now— two women in their forties, one of them shaking, the other standing perfectly still. She didn't care. "You don't get to tell me what I would have thought. You don't get to protect me from a choice I never got to make."
"I know," Momo said again. "I know that too. I've had twenty years to learn it."
"Twenty—" Nayeon's breath hitched. "You've been with Dahyun for seventeen years. You're happy."
Momo was quiet for a long moment. The wind tugged at her sweater, and somewhere below, the guitarist had started playing something melancholy—an old ballad Nayeon hadn't heard in years.
"I am happy," Momo finally said. "Dahyun makes me happy. She makes me feel seen, even when I can't explain what I'm seeing. She's never made me feel broken."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only answer I have."
Nayeon turned away, gripping the railing so hard her knuckles went white. The city blurred through her tears—all those lights, all those lives being lived, all those couples who hadn't waited until it was too late.
"Do you remember," Nayeon whispered, "when we came here the first time?"
Momo went very still.
"You forgot your jacket. I gave you mine. You said you wanted to get a lock for luck, for debut." Nayeon's voice trembled. "I said we'd come back. We never did."
"I remember," Momo said quietly. "Of course I remember."
"Then why—" Nayeon's breath hitched. "Why didn't you say something that night?"
"Because I was scared," Momo said. Her voice cracked. "Because you were everything, and I was just me. Because I thought if I said it out loud, it would become real, and then I'd have to face the fact that I wasn't good enough for you, unnie."
"I thought you didn't understand," Nayeon said, her voice breaking. "I thought you just—that you didn't get it. That my love was invisible to you. And all along, you were just—"
"Too young, and too afraid," Momo finished.
They stood in silence. The guitarist played on. The wind carried the scent of autumn and bittersweet endings.
"I kept the photos," Nayeon said quietly. "The ones you took of me. I had them in a box under my bed, and then I put them in an album, and then I put the album in a drawer, and then I took it out again whenever I needed to remember."
Momo's breath caught. "You kept them?"
"Of course I kept them." Nayeon laughed softly, without bitterness. "You made me look like I was the sun and the moon and the stars. Every single photo. And I never said thank you for that."
They stared at each other, and for one impossible moment, Nayeon was twenty-two again, standing in a practice room with sweat in her eyes and Momo's hand on her waist, correcting her posture, and the world had felt so full of possibility.
Eventually had come and gone. But somehow, standing here, that didn't feel like a tragedy anymore.
"Jeongyeon is good to you," Momo said. It wasn't a question.
"She is." Nayeon nodded. "She's steady. She's kind. She loves me in a way that doesn't hurt."
"That's good."
"It is."
Another pause, softer this time.
"Dahyun is waiting for you," Nayeon said.
"She is."
"You should go."
Momo nodded slowly. But she didn't move.
Instead, she reached into her pocket and pulled out something small. A lock. Baby-blue, heart-shaped and gleaming, the kind tourists bought at the gift shop downstairs.
"I bought this earlier," she said, turning it over in her fingers. "Dahyun thought it was silly. She said we didn't need to lock our love to a fence to prove it was real. She was right, of course. She's always right."
Nayeon watched the lock in Momo's hands, her heart pounding despite herself.
"I was going to leave it blank," Momo continued. "Just throw it somewhere, let it rust. But now—" She looked up, met Nayeon's eyes. "Now I think I want to write something on it."
"Don't," Nayeon breathed. "Momo, don't."
But Momo had already produced a marker from her other pocket—because of course she had, because she'd always been prepared, because some things never changed. She wrote slowly, deliberately, pressing the marker against the cool metal. Then she held it out.
Nayeon didn't want to read it. She read it anyway.
N & M – we'll always be us.
"I loved you then, Nayeon unnie," Momo said softly. "And I love you now. Maybe not in the way we dreamed of. But the memory of loving you? That's never going away. And I wanted you to know that somewhere, on this stupid tower, there's a lock that proves it."
"You promised me one," Nayeon whispered, her voice cracking. "You said we'd get one together. And now you're giving it to me like this? After everything?"
"I know." Momo's voice broke. "I'm sorry it took me this long."
The dam broke. Nayeon was crying in earnest now, ugly sobs that shook her whole body. The grief of two decades came pouring out—for every meal Momo had cooked, every photo she'd taken, every night they'd sat shoulder to shoulder with their hands intertwined under a blanket, neither of them brave enough to say the words.
"This is the cruelest thing anyone has ever done to me," Nayeon choked out.
Momo stepped forward, and this time she didn't hesitate—she pulled Nayeon into a hug, fierce and brief, her cheek pressed against Nayeon's hair. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, unnie."
"What good does sorry do?" Nayeon's voice was muffled against Momo's shoulder.
"None," Momo admitted, pulling back. Her own eyes were wet now, and something about that—seeing Momo cry, seeing the regret written plainly across her face—made Nayeon's anger begin to soften, just slightly. "But I needed to say it anyway. I needed you to know that you weren't alone in it. That I felt it too. That I feel it too."
Nayeon wiped her face with the back of her hand, trying to steady her breathing. "Why now? Why not five years ago? Ten? Why not that night, the first time we came here?"
Momo was quiet for a long moment. When she spoke, her voice was raw.
"Because I've spent twenty years carrying this, and I'm tired. I'm so tired of pretending it didn't matter. That you didn't matter."
Nayeon stared at her. The wind tugged at Momo's hair, and in the fading light, she looked both impossibly young and impossibly old.
"I'm not saying this to change anything," Momo continued, her voice trembling. "This doesn’t change anything. I love Dahyun-ie. I chose her. I choose her every single day. But I also loved you.”
She tentatively reached a hand out to brush a tear from Nayeon’s cheek. “I loved you first, in a way that I never got to express, and carrying that alone for for all these years has been its own kind of grief."
Nayeon's tears had slowed, but she could still feel them clinging to her lashes. She looked down at the lock still in Momo's hand, at the words written in Momo's familiar handwriting.
We'll always be us.
"What are we supposed to do with this?" Nayeon asked, gesturing between them. "What am I supposed to do with this?"
Momo shook her head slowly. "I don't know. I don't have an answer for that. I just know that I couldn't stand the thought of leaving this earth one day without you ever knowing the truth. That's all this is, unnie. The truth. A confession, if you want to think of it that way."
Nayeon let out a shaky breath. She thought about Jeongyeon waiting at home, about the quiet steadiness of their life together. She thought about the photos in her drawer, the ones Momo had taken years ago, the ones she'd never been able to throw away. She thought about the seventeen-year-old girl who had given Momo her jacket on a cold night and made a promise she didn't know how to keep.
"I wanted you to be the one," Nayeon admitted, her voice barely above a whisper. "For so long, I wanted you to be the one. And when you weren't—when you never said anything—I convinced myself I had imagined it. That you didn't feel the same. It was easier than accepting that you did and still chose silence."
Momo flinched. "I'm sorry."
"You keep saying that."
"Because I keep meaning it."
They stood there, the wind whipping around them, neither willing to be the first to move.
And then, slowly, something shifted in Nayeon's chest. The anger didn't disappear—it just… settled. Found a place to rest that wasn't quite so sharp.
She looked at Momo—really looked at her—and saw the same exhaustion she felt. The same grief. The same quiet acceptance that they had both done the best they could with the tools they had at the time.
"We were kids," Nayeon said finally. "Terrified kids with the weight of eight other people's dreams on our shoulders. We did what we thought we had to do to protect everyone."
"We did," Momo agreed.
"Does that make it okay?"
Momo considered the question. "No. But it makes it understandable. Liveable"
Nayeon nodded slowly. She reached out and took the lock from Momo's hand, turning it over in her own fingers. The metal was cool and smooth against her skin.
"We'll always be us," she read aloud. "What does that even mean?"
Momo smiled—small, sad, but genuine. "It means that no matter who we end up with, no matter how much time passes, whatever happens in the future, there will always be a version of us that exists here. On this tower. In that dorm. In every photo I ever took of you. That love was real, unnie. And it still is. Just… different now."
Nayeon turned the lock over in her hands one more time. Then she handed it back to Momo.
"Put it somewhere we can find it. If we ever come back here again."
Momo's eyes widened slightly. "You want to come back?"
"Maybe." Nayeon shrugged, a genuine smile tugging at the corner of her lips. "Not like that. Not in a what-if way. But… we made a promise, didn't we? It took us this long, but we're here now. Let's keep it."
Momo nodded, her eyes glistening. She took the lock and walked toward the railing, searching until she found a spot—somewhere among the thousands of other promises, other heartbreaks, other hopes. She attached the lock with a decisive click.
For a moment, she stood there, her hand resting on the metal. Then she turned back to face Nayeon.
"Nayeon-ah," Momo said quietly.
The name hit differently now—not like a blow, but like a key turning in a lock that had been rusted shut for years. It was intimate. Equal. A door opening onto something that didn't need to be walked through to be appreciated.
"I should have said it that night," Momo continued, her voice trembling. "The first time we came here. I should have turned to you on the cable car and told you that I loved you. But I was a coward. I've been a coward for twenty-five years." She paused, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. "You deserved to hear it then, and I'm sorry you're only hearing it now."
Nayeon was quiet for a long moment. She thought about the girl who had given Momo her jacket on a cold night. She thought about the woman standing in front of her now, older and softer and braver.
"Thank you," Nayeon said finally. Not bitter. Not angry. Just grateful. "For telling me. For being brave enough to say it now, even if it took you this long."
Momo blinked, surprised. "You're not angry anymore?"
Nayeon shook her head. "I was. For a minute there, I was so angry I could barely see straight. But then I realized… I wasn't just angry at you. I was angry at myself. At both of us. At the timing, at the world, at everything that made it so hard to just say how we felt."
She exhaled slowly. "But standing here now… I don't want to be angry anymore. I don't want to spend the rest of my life mourning something that never got to be. I want to be grateful that I got to love you at all. Even if it was quiet. Even if it never had a name."
Momo's tears spilled over. "That's very generous of you."
"No." Nayeon stepped forward and took Momo's hands in hers. "It's not generosity. I've been carrying this weight for twenty-five years, too. Wondering if I imagined it. Wondering if you ever felt the same. And now I know. Now I can finally put it down."
Momo squeezed her fingers. "Does it feel lighter?"
Nayeon considered. "Lighter? No. But it feels… finished. Like a book I finally finished reading after putting it off for years. It wasn't the ending I wanted. But at least I know how it ends now."
They stood there for a long moment, neither speaking, simply letting the silence hold them. The wind had softened. The guitarist below had switched to something brighter.
Then Momo hesitated. She looked at Nayeon—really looked—and something flickered across her face. A question. A hope. A last, gentle what-if.
"Nayeon-ah," she said softly. "Can I… would it be okay if I…"
She didn't finish the sentence. She didn't need to. Nayeon understood.
For a moment, the world held its breath. Nayeon thought about Jeongyeon. About the life she had built, the love she had chosen, the steady warmth of her wife waiting at home. She thought about all the reasons she should say no.
Then she thought about the seventeen-year-old girl on this same tower, shivering in a borrowed jacket, too scared to reach for the girl beside her. She thought about the twenty-two-year-old on the couch, fingers intertwined under a blanket, both of them pretending not to feel what they felt. She thought about all the versions of herself and Momo who had never gotten a single moment of honesty.
She nodded. Just once. A small, almost imperceptible movement.
"Okay," she whispered. "For them."
Momo's eyes widened, then softened with understanding. She stepped closer, her hands coming up to rest gently on Nayeon's shoulders. Nayeon closed her eyes.
Momo leaned in and pressed her lips to Nayeon's forehead—soft, warm, achingly tender. It lasted only a second, but it felt like a lifetime condensed into a single point of contact. A goodbye and a hello all at once.
When Momo pulled back, Nayeon opened her eyes. Momo's cheeks were wet, but she was smiling—a real smile, not the sad, crooked one she'd been wearing all evening.
"Thank you," Momo said, her voice barely audible. "For letting me do that. For letting us have that."
Nayeon nodded slowly. Something loosened in her chest—not the love itself, but the weight of carrying it alone. The kiss hadn't changed anything between them, not really. It hadn't rewritten history or reopened old wounds. But it had given something back to the girls they used to be. A moment they never got to have.
Then Momo took a small step back, creating a gentle distance between them—not a retreat, but a transition. A return to the present.
"Dahyun's probably wondering where I am," Momo said, glancing toward the stairs. A soft, fond smile touched her lips. "She said she'd wait at the café, but she's terrible at sitting still. I wouldn't be surprised if she's already talked the staff into letting her behind the counter."
Nayeon laughed quietly. "That sounds like her."
"It is." Momo's smile deepened, warm and real. "She keeps me grounded. Reminds me to come back to myself when I get lost in my own head." She paused, then added, almost sheepishly, "I should probably get back before she sends out a search party."
"She already texted you three times, didn't she?"
Momo pulled out her phone and glanced at the screen. Her expression softened into something tender. "Four times, actually. And a photo of a cat she saw outside the café."
Nayeon felt a small, unexpected warmth in her chest—not jealousy, but something like relief. Momo was loved. She was taken care of. The girl who had once been too scared to reach for Nayeon had found someone who made it easy to stay.
They smiled at each other, and for a moment, they were simply two old friends sharing a quiet understanding.
"We have a dinner next week," Momo said, her voice steadier now. "All of us. Jihyo already sent the group chat. You're coming, right?"
Nayeon nodded. "As if I could miss it."
"Good." Momo smiled—that same crooked smile from twenty-five years ago, but softer now. Gentler. No sadness in it, just warmth. "Then I'll see you there, unnie. I'll make japchae. Just like I used to."
She turned and walked toward the stairs. This time, she did look back. Just once.
"Tell Jeongyeon I said hi," Momo called out.
"I will."
"And tell her she's lucky."
Nayeon laughed. "She knows."
Momo smiled one last time, then disappeared down the stairs, her footsteps fading into the ambient noise of the tower.
Nayeon stayed at the railing for a long time, looking out at the city. The lights of Seoul glittered below her, indifferent and beautiful.
She touched her forehead again, where the ghost of Momo's kiss still lingered. It didn't ache the way she'd expected. It just felt… warm. Like a bookmark placed in a story that had long since ended—a reminder of where she'd been, not where she was going.
There were no regrets. Not really. Just the shape of a life that could have been different, but not better. Just different. Just hers.
She touched the railing one last time, then turned and walked toward the stairs.
Behind her, nestled among thousands of other promises and heartbreaks, a brass lock gleamed in the fading light.
***
A maintenance worker found the lock the next day, nestled between a faded promise from 2029 and a wish from 2026.
N & M – we'll always be us.
He almost removed it—the tower had rules about too many locks weighing down the rails.
But something made him pause. The handwriting, maybe. Or the way the newness of the lock gleamed in the morning light.
He left it there.
Some things, he'd learned in his thirty years on the tower, weren't meant to be removed.
Some loves just had to rust on their own, quietly and gently.
***
The dinner was loud, chaotic, and perfect.
Nine women crammed around a table designed for six, elbows knocking and chopsticks flying. It was as if they were twenty back at the dorm again. Momo had made japchae, just as she'd promised, and she'd set the bowl directly in front of Nayeon without a word.
Their eyes met for a moment—just a moment—and then Momo looked away, laughing at something Sana was saying.
Nayeon ate the japchae.
It was warm, perfect, made with the same care as it had been all those years ago.
Across the table, Jeongyeon caught her eye and raised an eyebrow. Nayeon smiled and reached under the table to squeeze her hand.
Beside Momo, Dahyun was telling a story about their dog, and Momo was listening with that soft, focused attention she gave only to people she truly loved.
Nayeon caught Momo watching her from across the table, and this time, neither of them looked away.
No longing. No what-ifs. Just two people who had loved each other once, still loved each other now, and had found a way to carry that love into something that didn't hurt anymore.
Nayeon raised her glass—just slightly, just enough for Momo to see.
Momo raised hers back.
They drank.
And the night went on.