Glow Down

Your girlfriend Chaeyoung was stunning. Dating her was a daily lesson in humility. Whenever you went out in public, you could feel the collective “How?” radiating from every person you met. Everyone would look at her like she was royalty and you would look like you were the one who kidnapped her. 

You didn’t blame them. She looked like a runway model even while she slept. The messier she was, the more angelic she felt, and she only needed a little effort to look stunning. 

But for Chaeyoung, her face was also an insecurity. She was convinced that her incapability of looking cute (which wasn’t true) meant that your parents would never take her seriously. 

“They’ll think I’m a rascal,” she’d say, pacing around the apartment. “They will never accept me as your girlfriend. They’ll think I’m just some heartbreaker.”

The anxiety reached an all-time peak in the week leading up to the day she’d meet her parents. By saturday she was an unstable bomb waiting to explode. It was exhausting just watching her. Every time your phone buzzed, she’d rush out convinced it was your mother calling to cancel the day or worse, to interview her over the phone. You tried to soothe her but eventually the sound of her frantic rambling became white noise that lulled you into an accidental nap on her couch.

You had finally awakened from your nap a couple of hours later, thinking she had finally stopped. Stretching your stiff limbs to get rid of the pains of the couch, you got up and looked for some water. You dragged your feet to the kitchen and poured yourself a glass. As you drank, you could hear some rustling from the other side of the hallway. 

It sounded like clothes being thrown and beaten. You took a sip and started walking towards it. There was nobody else in the house but your girlfriend so surely it must have been her.

You stopped dead in front of the room and were left with your eyes wide open. There was a giant mountain of clothes on the ground—shirts, pants, dresses flung everywhere, dangling from the shelves and sliding off the edge of the bed. In fact, it was so full that there wasn’t any more space left on the floor, and some stray garments had found their way onto her head.

“Chaeyoung, what are you doing?” you asked, scanning the room to find stuff everywhere.

Your girlfriend blew a stray lock of hair out of her face and sighed. She slouched against the rolling chair, forgetting it was indeed a rolling chair that… rolls, so it just slid off, and she fell down on her back.

“Argh!” she exclaimed and kicked her legs at the pile of clothes out of pure frustration. “I don’t know what to wear!”

“You’re stressed about tomorrow?”

“Of course! Why would I not be?” she shot back.

“Don’t worry, Chae, just wear whatever,” you said, taking another casual sip of your water.

“Oh, it’s so easy to say for you!” she yelled and got back up. “I’ll see how you’ll act when it’s your time to meet my parents.”

“I will just wear a nice shirt,” you commented dryly, which seemed to upset her even more.

She crossed her arms up, her beautiful eyes narrowing at you. “Okay, I’ll try some stuff, and you tell me how it is. Be honest, alright?”

“Alright,” you agreed.

“Go out, let me change,” she said after getting up and pushing you out.

“It’s not like I can see you under that pile of clothes anyway—” you tried to reason before she closed the door.

You went back to the kitchen to put the glass away and came back to stand in front of the door, pacing around and staring at the wall, listening to the muffled sounds of zippers, frustrated groans and the occasional hanger flying into the wall.

As soon as you caught a glimpse of your girlfriend, air completely fled from your lungs. A floor-length, long-sleeved floral dress draped over her frame. The thin fabric had a pure white glow while the red roses painted it with vivid spots of love.

With her sharp, striking features, the simple dress didn’t look plain at all.

“Uhm,” you started, desperately trying to collect your thoughts. “What are you going for here?”

“Sweet girl next door? I look like I make my own butter, it’s perfect,” Chaeyoung said, brushing some strands of her hair behind her ears, an action that revealed itself to be more lethal than she thought.

“The next door must be heaven, because you look like an angel.” 

She shot you a mean, angry glare, smoothing her dress on her stomach. “It’s no time for jokes!”

She looked down at the white fabric. “Look at it. It’s basically a tent. It has no shape whatsoever.”

“Well, no, you don’t really look like a ‘sweet girl’, to be honest…”

“Wh-why not?” Chaeyoung said worriedly. To prove her point, she did a stiff, awkward twirl, turning her back to you. “It’s just a cylinder.”

As she turned, the supposedly shapeless fabric caught on the curve of her hips. The thin, silky material draped right over the butt, clinging just enough to perfectly accentuate the exact shape of it. She looked like the breathtaking, painfully pretty heroine of a historical drama—specifically designed to ruin men’s lives.

All the teasing died in your throat. You just stood there in the hallway, opening and closing your mouth like a dumb fish out of water.

“It looks conservative,” she continued, looking over her shoulder at you. “Your mom will definitely think I’m—”

Chaeyoung stopped and saw your still expression aimed at her lower half. Her eyes narrowed. She turned around and saw her reflection in the full-length mirror behind her.

“Oh, you must be kidding me,” she groaned. She reached back and desperately tried to puff out the fabric, but as soon as she let go, they settled right back onto her curves. “Why is it doing that?”

“I… uh…” you mumbled.

“Don’t even say it,” she said, raising her index at you.

“It’s not going to work. You’re still way too pretty.”

“Ugh! Okay, let’s do another one.”

She stomped back into the bedroom, slamming the door behind her, leaving you alone in the hallway to recover.

A few minutes later, she stepped out, and your brain entirely short-circuited. You could pretty much hear the cables in your brain frying, sizzling, popping, while smoke poured out of your ears.

She was in a suit. It was a whole look. She was wearing her black stockings that drew attention to the length of her legs, partially covered by a sharp pencil skirt, and ended with a crisp white button-down shirt and a loosely tied necktie.

At this point, you were drooling.

“So?” she asked, putting her hands on her hips and tilting her head.

“I would so fuck the shit out of you.”

“Oh my god!” She threw her hands in the air, causing the tight shirt to pull against her chest. “You can’t stay serious.” 

You were truly, in all honesty and with maximum effort, trying to stay serious. This was your way of remaining grounded and sane. Actually, you were lucky she didn’t put on any makeup because that would have been the end of you. Her face was totally bare, her hair messy from the outfit changes, if she had paired the suit with red lips? Yeah would be on the floor.

“Chae, there’s no way you actually tried with this one. Are you doing it on purpose? Is this a test?”

“What’s so bad?” she whined, stomping her foot, in a strangely cute manner, which only confused your brain more. “I’m trying to look like a banker. So your mom can take me seriously. Do I look serious?”

“You look… you do look serious.” You swallowed hard, your eyes darting down to her stockings and then right back up to her face. “Uhm. Like one of those serious, confident, sexy secretaries who blackmail the CEO.”