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The first time it happens, Sol is rushing for a meeting that she absolutely cannot be late for, rushing around for her lucky jacket.
“Have you seen my navy blue jacket?”
Across the room, Ji-wan looks mildly spooked, her eyes unblinking, her hand still in the onion rings bag. “Which one?” she asks, clearing her throat and promptly shoving more in her mouth.
Sol looks at her, warm and fond, her present worry immediately forgotten. So what if she doesn’t have her lucky jacket? She has luck by her side, a human-sized version of god in front of her, with chip dust on her face.
“It’s alright,” Sol says, walking towards her.
“But you want that jacket,” Ji-wan says, a sense of urgency in her voice that Sol can’t decipher – not right now.
“It’s alright,” Sol says again, and when she is within kissing distance, she swipes her thumb across Ji-wan’s cupid’s bow and chin, wiping the chip dust, and leaning in for a slow kiss. Ji-wan tastes like the onion rings and the wasabi chips she was having before the onion rings, the flavour of what Sol loathes. She has never loved Ji-wan more. Sol finds herself melting alongside Ji-wan as her arms enclose around Sol’s neck, considerate enough to not get her fingers near her hair and clothes.
Sometimes, Sol can’t believe that she gets to have this. It’s been a month since they’ve been dating, a month of getting used to Ji-wan’s kisses and her love and yet there are moments where all of this feels surreal, a setting straight from the fantasies she didn’t even dare explore in detail.
They pull apart mournfully. Sol sets Ji-wan’s bangs and her hair that managed to get ruffled. She kisses the top of Ji-wan’s head and then her nose.
Ji-wan pouts. “Do you have to go?”
“Unfortunately, yes,” Sol murmurs a soft apology, pecking her lips once again.
“You will leave your girlfriend all alone?” Ji-wan asks, her pout intensifying, her arms around Sol’s neck tightening.
Sol presses a kiss on Ji-wan’s jaw as a soft apology. “I will come home as soon as I can,” she promises, bringing Ji-wan’s hands to her mouth, pressing soft kisses on her fingertips.
“You’ll leave your girlfriend desperate for kisses and attention?” Ji-wan says, her gaze never once straying from where Sol keeps pressing the kisses. “How cruel can you be, Yoon Sol?”
“I’m sorry,” Sol says, “I’ll be back with more snacks, I promise.”
Ji-wan smiles, and plants a kiss on Sol’s head, her cheek and her lips, “for good luck,” she says. “My girlfriend is the best ever,” she cheers. “Go, Yoon Sol! I’ll be cheering for you from here!”
“Stay the night?”
Ji-wan blinks in surprise before her mouth curves into a warm smile. “Of course,” she says. “You know I never say no to spending more time with my favourite person!”
Stay forever, Sol wants to say. Ji-wan nuzzles into Sol’s neck and Sol reluctantly parts from Ji-wan, kissing the top of her head again. “I’ll bring fried chicken.”
Ji-wan grins. “I’ll be waiting. I love you."
"I love you," Sol replies, her heart full.
So, the first time it happens, Sol even forgets that she owns a lucky navy blue jacket, forgets that there was something missing in the first place. With Ji-wan by her side, she rarely feels like something is missing, rarely feels the need to think of things from a different point of reference. She forgets about her lucky jacket until another one of her jackets goes missing two weeks later.
***
The second time it happens, Sol is confused.
She specifically remembers putting the new yellow jacket on the pre-destined clothes chair in her room after her date with Ji-wan after they came to her apartment together and before they fell asleep together.
By the time she wakes up, Ji-wan is long gone. Morning classes, Ji-wan had said the night before, but Sol had merely shaken her head and said, stay the night anyway.
Sol wants Ji-wan to move in with her, but she also knows that it is too early in the relationship for Ji-wan, even though it doesn’t feel that way. Ji-wan has always been reluctant to stay the night, so Sol asks her every fourth time she feels the urge to do so.
By the time Sol makes breakfast for herself and bathes and is getting dressed up for lunch with Na-bi, she realises that the jacket is not where she'd kept it last night.
“A goblin is eating your jackets,” Na-bi tells her very seriously when Sol recounts the tale to her.
“A goblin.”
“You lost your navy blue and yellow jacket. Within the span of 2 weeks. That is strange, Sol! A goblin’s doing, I’m telling you.”
It is strange. Sol may not be the tidiest person out there, but she is someone who keeps her clothes in place, folded and sorted according to the colours and types.
It is stranger when Sol opens her wardrobe and sees her lucky navy blue jacket thrown haphazardly in the t-shirts section.
Sol thinks of the appearance of her navy blue jacket and the disappearance of her yellow jacket in succession and wonders.
***
The third time it happens, her yellow jacket doesn’t make an appearance but her t-shirt does disappear.
It is her olive green jacket that goes away the fourth time it happens.
The fifth time, it is her shirt, not her jacket.
The sixth time, it is her t-shirt.
The seventh time, her other shirt disappears and her first shirt makes a reappearance in approximately the same place it was. The way it is folded is entirely unlike the way Sol prefers.
All a few days apart.
Sol thinks about the day those clothes disappear aligning with the days she meets Ji-wan and wonders.
***
“I’m sorry,” Sol says again, her heart breaking when she hears Ji-wan’s tone.
“You’ve no reason to apologise!” Ji-wan says brightly from the other side of it, although Sol knows that she is disappointed and trying not to make Sol feel bad. “Honestly, Sol, this was just a stupid movie! Your interview is more important! We can get the tickets again and—”
“You wanted to see the premiere with me,” Sol says. “It isn’t a stupid movie. You were looking forward to watching it with me and now we can’t. I’m sorry for cancelling our plans.”
“Yoon Sol,” Ji-wan softly says, the fake cheer stripped away from it. “These things aren’t under our control. Don’t feel too guilty about it, please. I am not angry at you about this. You know that, right?”
“I do,” Sol says, “doesn’t mean that you can’t be disappointed that our plans got cancelled.”
“Nothing compared to how excited I am for you! Aye Yoon Sol, I hope you get this job. I am rooting for you! Are you wearing your lucky jacket? Wish I could give you good luck kisses!”
“I don't need my lucky jacket when I have you,” Sol says softly. “Come over? I don’t know when I’ll be done, but let yourself in and stay the night? I will make it up to you.”
“Oh? How, exactly, will you make it up to me?”
“Why don’t I tell you when I see you?”
Ji-wan laughs, breathy and soft, this time it is genuine, Sol can tell. She breathes out in relief. “I’ll let myself in,” Ji-wan promises.
"I love you," Sol says, shivering at the thrill the words give her, even now.
"I love you," Ji-wan says, a smile evident from the tone of her voice.
The interview goes longer than she’d hoped and even though it went well, Sol feels the kind of ache in her bones that she feels when it’s been a while without seeing Ji-wan. Reason number 4087 why you should move in with me, Sol thinks. By the time she gets home, it is 8 already, an hour and a half past the end of the movie premiere that Ji-wan ended up watching with Na-bi and an hour past the message signalling Ji-wan’s arrival at her home.
Sol smiles when she sees Ji-wan’s shoes at the entrance, right where they should be.
When she finally finds Ji-wan, she is sleeping in the middle of Sol’s bed, clutching Sol’s pillow hard, surrounded by… Sol’s clothes.
Sol throws a cursory glance at her wardrobe, sees the door open, and mutters a small ah.
She toes her socks off and climbs on her bed, kissing the top of Ji-wan’s head and bringing her closer. Ji-wan, even in her sleep, immediately curves around Sol as though the space beside her was always Sol’s.
Just five minutes, Sol thinks as her eyes fall shut. Just five minutes and I’ll wake her up so we can have dinner.
***
Sol wakes up when she feels the warmth around her disappear and feels feather-light kisses on top of her eyelids.
She blearily wrenches her eyes open, finding Ji-wan’s hand and pulling her closer. “You’re warm,” she mumbles. “Don’t go.”
She hears Ji-wan chuckle but she relents anyway, curling around Sol, her fingers drawing circles on her forehead. “We’ve to eat. I bought your favourite pork and potato soup to celebrate. You’ve to tell me everything about your interview!”
“You’re the best,” Sol whispers, kissing the arch of Ji-wan’s cheek. “How was the movie?”
By the time Ji-wan has finished talking about the movie in vivid detail, and Sol has talked about her interview, they’re cosily settled on the dining table, warm food between them.
“So,” Sol starts, “you were sleeping curled around my clothes.”
A look of alarm flickers on Ji-wan’s face but she covers it up with a burst of high-pitched laughter. “Sol!” she says. “They smelled like you, and you smell like home, and I missed you so much, so I— gosh, that’s so weird, isn’t it? I’m sorry. I should’ve asked.”
Sol leans forward, covering Ji-wan’s hand with hers. She presses it gently and says, very seriously, “It’s not weird. I don’t mind. I too, like having things that remind me of you with me. It is always so comforting.”
The next morning, Sol’s orange t-shirt disappears.
***
Three days after that, Sol’s olive green jacket makes a reappearance.
***
Two days after that, her purple shirt disappears.
***
Thing is.
Thing is, Sol knows. She doesn’t understand why Ji-wan isn’t forthright with her, doesn’t just ask for the clothes herself.
Sol doesn’t mind giving them, far from it, in actuality.
The next time they go out together Sol offers her lucky navy blue jacket, just to reiterate that fact.
“Are you cold?”
It is 29℃.
“Yes, thank you!” Ji-wan chirps, eagerly wrapping the jacket around her.
But Sol won’t tell her that she knows, not until Ji-wan feels comfortable enough to tell her.
Meanwhile, she truly does not mind her clothes disappearing and reappearing, seemingly out of the blue. Her lucky jacket stays with her lucky woman forevermore.
***
Sol gets the call when she gets off of work on the last day of her first week.
It’s been a long, long week, with work cutting the already limited hours of her meeting Ji-wan. Sol wants nothing more than to see Ji-wan and spend the weekend burrowed in her house.
She is a little surprised when she sees Na-bi’s name flash across her screen.
“What’s going on?” she asks.
“Your girlfriend is being stubborn,” says Na-bi. From behind her, she heard a choked off wail, sounding distinctly like Ji-wan.
“Are you with Ji-wan?”
“She’s ill,” Na-bi says, just when Ji-wan lets out another long, nooooo and I am not even that sick, Na-bi! Aye Yoon Sol, if you're listening, don' come! “Come take care of her, please?”
When she gets to Ji-wan’s home, she finds Na-bi, holding out a very familiar yellow jacket. “You’d lost this, hadn’t you?”
Sol sighs, and then nods. “How is she?”
“Sleeping. Her fever was very mild, and but she's taken paracetamol, so no need to worry.”
Sol sighs. “Thank you for telling me,” she says, bidding her farewell.
As Ji-wan sleeps, Sol pours the seaweed soup she bought in a vessel, so she can heat it up when Ji-wan wakes up. She starts cleaning around the house, ultimately feeling guilty for having overlooked the heaviness in Ji-wan's voice when they talked yesterday, her scattered replies today. She should’ve known that something was wrong.
Reason number 6703 why you should move in with me, thinks Sol.
When she starts cleaning Ji-wan’s room, she finds her flushed but ultimately asleep in the middle of the bed, with very familiar shirts and jackets around her. Sol collects them all and puts them in a pile beside the bed.
Ji-wan’s room is too small for Sol to be sitting, so she sits in the living room, with her laptop as she waits for Ji-wan to be awake.
Sol is too carried by the flow of her readings to notice the patter of footsteps behind her two hours later, but not so carried by it that she doesn’t notice Ji-wan standing in front of her. Greeting on the tip of her tongue, she watches amusedly when Ji-wan pushes the laptop away and climbs onto Sol’s lap, her face buried in the nape of Sol’s neck.
Immediately, Sol wraps her arms around Ji-wan’s waist, rubbing circles on her back. “How are you feeling?”
“You know,” Ji-wan says, pitifully.
“I know?”
“You know,” Ji-wan says, burrowing her head deeper. "About your clothes."
“Ah,” Sol says, holding Ji-wan tighter. “I do.”
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I know it’s weird.”
“Not weird,” Sol assures, kissing the side of Ji-wan’s head. “We’ve established this, haven’t we? Not weird at all.”
“Aren’t you disgusted? Or like angry?”
“Why would I be?”
“I kept stealing your clothes!”
“What’s mine is yours,” Sol says. “I just don’t understand why you didn’t tell me, but I don’t mind. Not at all.”
Ji-wan finally extracts herself from Sol’s neck, grabbing her face in her warm palms. “Yoon Sol! How are you like this!”
“Like what?”
“I don’t understand why you aren’t angry.”
“I had suspicions,” Sol admits, eliciting a groan from Ji-wan. "As I said, I didn't mind. I would not, even if you continue doing that."
“Oh, this is embarrassing,” she mutters. “This is so embarrassing.”
“Honestly, Ji-wan. This is the least of my concerns. I just want to know how you’re feeling and why you didn’t tell me that you were sick!”
“I am better now. No fever, see?” Ji-wan grabs Sol’s hand and puts it on her forehead and her neck. She doesn’t seem feverish right now and Sol breathes out a sigh of relief.
“You really worried me, you know?” Sol leans in to kiss Ji-wan’s forehead.
“You’re my lucky person,” says Ji-wan. “I wasn’t feeling good since yesterday and you came over just once and look! I am feeling a hundred times better!”
“Should’ve told me before,” Sol says. “Why didn’t you? I care for you far more than anything.”
Ji-wan huffs. “I care for you more than anything as well. But, would you tell me that you’re sick if I got a new job and was exhausted because I was working my ass off in the very first week that I was there?”
It’s Sol’s turn to huff now. She extracts Ji-wan’s fingers and locks their pinky fingers together. “Can we promise each other that we will tell each other when we're sick? Clearly, we’re both silly when it comes to this.”
Ji-wan’s face softens. “Okay,” she says. “I promise.”
Sol kisses their locked fingers. “I promise, too.”
“Now,” says Sol, tightening her hold on Ji-wan's waist with one arm. “Can we talk about the clothes? We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.”
Ji-wan lets out a loud whine. “We're going to have to talk about this," she says, unsteadily. "If what I say is weird can we pretend that it was my fever talking and not me?”
"You don't have fever anymore," Sol points, but at the little glare Ji-wan sends her, she mutters in a small voice, "of course, we can."
Immediately, Ji-wan burrows her face in Sol’s neck.
Sol holds her snugly against her chest, rubbing her back in what she hopes is a comforting manner.
"Every time that we part," she says, her voice muffled, "I miss you a lot more than I ever thought I would. It's not that I get lonely, but I just... I just want to be with you all the time, like I never want to be away from you or the things that remind me of us. Your clothes smell like you and I like having a piece of home with me. God, I hate how needy I sound. But that's the essence of it. You smell like home and I want to always be home."
Sol pulls Ji-wan closer to her and kisses her. Kisses her to tell her, not needy, not needy at all, and you're my home, too.
"Not needy," Sol says after they've pulled apart. "Not needy at all. I want to be home all the time too. Why do you think I keep asking you to stay over so much? You're my home and my house feels so cold without you. Stay over more often, please." Move in with me, please. Your lease is up in another month, anyway.
Ji-wan laughs, her eyes shining. "Yoon Sol," she calls. "If I stay over so much, I am afraid I may never leave," she says, and Sol's heart leaps out of her chest. "And then," she continues, oblivious to how desperately Sol wants this, "you'll be stuck with me forever. No getting rid of me."
"I want us to be stuck to each other forever," Sol says. "Don't ever leave, stay with me forever."
"Sol, do you mean this?"
"I have around 6800 reasons why we should be living together, since even before we started dating," Sol says, pressing a kiss on her jaw, revelling in the little gasp Ji-wan gives out. "I love you. If you want to, we should move in together and never be parted for more than a few hours. Do you want that?"
Ji-wan heartily chuckles, throwing her head back, before regarding Sol with unbridled love. She tucks the strands of hair on Sol's face behind her ear and leans in to kiss her.
"Sol," Ji-wan says after they've pulled away, their chests heaving, "let's go home."