Until Next Summer

Eunbi woke to the smell of coffee and the sound of humming.

It took her a moment to place where she was. The ceiling above her was unfamiliar — wooden beams, a skylight she didn't recognize, pale morning light filtering through gauzy curtains. The bed was larger than hers, the sheets softer, and there was a warmth on either side of her that her own bed back at the Airbnb definitely didn't have.

Then the memories of the night before filtered back — slowly, like sunlight through water. Hana's mouth. Leo's hands. The three of them tangled on the carpet, then in this bed, then somewhere in between. The sounds Hana had made. The way Leo had looked at both of them afterward, like he couldn't quite believe any of it was real.

She turned her head. Leo was still asleep on her right, his face half-buried in the pillow, his breathing slow and even. He looked younger in sleep — the perpetual tension in his jaw finally released, his brow smooth. One of his arms was stretched across the space where Hana had been.

Hana, it seemed, was the source of the humming.

Eunbi slipped out of bed carefully, not wanting to wake Leo. Her clothes from last night were still scattered somewhere in the living room — the watercolor camisole, the mesh skirt, the lace panties that had ended up who-knew-where. She found one of Leo's t-shirts draped over a chair and pulled it on. It was too big, falling to her mid-thigh, the fabric soft and worn and smelling faintly of him.

She padded barefoot into the kitchen.

Hana was at the stove, still in her sleep shorts and a thin tank top, her hair pulled back in a messy bun. She was making pancakes — actual pancakes, from scratch, the batter sizzling on a griddle while she hummed some song Eunbi didn't recognize. The morning sun caught the side of her face, illuminating the fine, soft hairs along her jaw, the curve of her cheek, the small smile playing at the corner of her mouth.

She looked happy. Genuinely, uncomplicatedly happy.

Eunbi leaned against the doorframe and watched her for a moment, and something shifted in her chest. Something that felt a lot like guilt.

She doesn't know who you really are, a voice whispered. She made love to a woman named Sumin, not Kwon Eunbi. She trusted a stranger. When she finds out the truth—

Hana turned and spotted her. Her face broke into that brilliant, sunrise smile.

"Good morning! I was trying to let you sleep, but I'm not very good at being quiet. Leo says I'm physically incapable of it. How do you like your pancakes? I have blueberries, or chocolate chips, or just plain with butter—"

"Hana." Eunbi's voice came out more serious than she intended. Hana's smile flickered, confused.

"What's wrong? Are you okay? Was last night— did I do something—"

"No. No, last night was perfect. You were perfect." Eunbi crossed the kitchen and took Hana's hands in hers. The spatula dangled forgotten from Hana's fingers. "But there's something I need to tell you. About me. About who I really am."

Hana's brow furrowed. "What do you mean?"

Eunbi took a breath. This was the part she'd been dreading. The part where the fantasy cracked and reality seeped in.

"My name isn't Sumin."

They sat at the small kitchen table, the pancakes forgotten on the counter. Hana had turned off the griddle without being asked, her instinct telling her that whatever was coming was more important than breakfast.

Eunbi had both of Hana's hands in hers across the table, and she was trying to find the right words. There was no script for this. No choreography to follow.

"My real name is Kwon Eunbi," she said. "I'm... I'm an idol. A singer. A soloist, based in Seoul. I've been in the industry for years. I was in a group before — maybe you've heard of IZ*ONE? — and now I perform on my own."

She paused, watching Hana's face. Waiting for the hurt. The betrayal. The how could you lie to me.

Instead, Hana's eyes went wide. Her mouth fell open.

"Wait." She pulled her hands free — not in anger, but to grab Eunbi's shoulders, holding her at arm's length like she was examining a painting. "Wait, wait, wait. Kwon Eunbi? The Kwon Eunbi? Leader of IZ*ONE?" She stopped herself, but a grin was starting to spread across her face.

"You're not... upset? That I lied about my name?"

"Upset?" Hana stared at her like she'd grown a second head. "Sumin— Eunbi— whatever I'm supposed to call you now — you're literally famous. Like, actually famous. And you've been living next door to us for two weeks, eating our tacos and playing board games and—" She broke off, her cheeks flushing as the memory of last night clearly replayed in her head. "And we— I mean, we all— oh my god, I had sex with a K-pop idol."

"A soloist," Eunbi corrected, but she was starting to smile now. "Technically."

"I don't care about the technicalities!" Hana's voice had gone slightly shrill with excitement. "I need to see. Show me. Show me everything. Your videos, your performances — wait." She gasped. "The fancam. The one that went viral. The white top, the—" She gestured vaguely at Eunbi's chest. "That's you. That's actually you. And I—" She looked down at her own hands, the hands that had touched Eunbi's breasts the night before, and her eyes went impossibly wider. "Oh my god."

Eunbi laughed — a real laugh, surprised and relieved and genuinely delighted. This was not the reaction she'd expected. This was so much better.

"You're really not upset?"

"Upset? I'm thrilled. Do you know how boring my life was before you showed up? I was literally just... making pancakes and reading books and trying to get Leo to talk more than three words at a time. And then you appeared, and you were beautiful and mysterious and interesting, and now it turns out you're famous on top of everything else?" Hana shook her head, her messy bun wobbling. "This is the best summer of my life."

"I used a fake name because I wanted to be normal," Eunbi said, the words tumbling out now, the relief making her honest. "Just for a month. Just to be a person instead of a product. I didn't think I'd meet anyone. I didn't think I'd—" She stopped, swallowed. "I didn't think I'd care about anyone."

Hana's expression softened. The manic excitement dimmed into something gentler. Something real.

"You care about us?"

"I do." Eunbi squeezed her hands. "Both of you. More than I expected to. More than I probably should."

"Good." Hana leaned across the table and kissed her — soft, quick, tasting faintly of pancake batter. "Because we care about you too. Sumin, Eunbi, whoever you want to be. It doesn't matter. You're still you."

A throat cleared from the doorway.

They both turned. Leo stood there in his boxers, hair rumpled, eyes still heavy with sleep. He was looking at them — at Eunbi in his t-shirt, at Hana's hands still holding hers — and his expression was unreadable.

"Did I miss something?"

"Leo!" Hana jumped up, practically vibrating. "Sumin isn't Sumin! She's Kwon Eunbi! The K-pop star!"

Leo's eyes met Eunbi's. A flicker of something — acknowledgment, shared secret — passed between them.

"I know," he said.

Hana's head whipped around. "You knew? Since when?"

"Since..." He glanced at Eunbi, a question in his eyes. "A couple of days ago. I found her videos by accident. I didn't say anything because... it wasn't my secret to tell."

Hana looked between them, and Eunbi could see the pieces clicking together in her head — Leo's weird behavior, the morning he'd disappeared to "fix Eunbi's pipe," the way he'd been even quieter than usual for the past two days.

"Wait," Hana said slowly. "When you went over to fix her kitchen pipe..."

"That really happened," Leo said, and managed to keep a straight face for approximately two seconds before Hana smacked his arm.

"You're both terrible liars! You—" She pointed at Leo. "You slept with her first, didn't you? Before last night?"

Another shared glance. Another silent conversation.