Outline of You | Jensoo

Ch14.

In hindsight, Jisoo knows, deep down, it is her fault - she shouldn't have thrown such a childish fit when Jennie really hasn't done anything wrong. She shouldn't have drunk and played games and got angry and stormed out on poor confused Jennie like that. She really should have controlled herself and suppressed the fumes.

Why was she so worked up anyway?

She sighs, then abruptly realises her cheeks are wet and roughly wipes them with the back of her hand. She breathes deeply, steadies herself, and calls in sick for the meeting scheduled for later.

---------

"You have got to be kidding me, Kim Jisoo," Lisa has a brow raised, her eyes wide with one larger than the other, and she is shaking her head incredulously at Jisoo.

"I wish I could be," Jisoo mumbles as she runs her hands meticulously along the marble wall, inspecting the finishing coat for any signs of defect. She leans in to position her cheek mere centimetres from the wall and closes an eye to examine the evenness. Unlike her, it is perfect.

"I don't get it. I thought the plan you've been on for weeks was to stay friends, not kill friends?" Chaeyoung marks their inspection progress on the floor plan that is sprawled across the newly minted pool table.

"That's a harsh word. I didn't kill anyone."

"You might as well have!" Lisa bellows, clanking Jisoo's butt with her metal tape measure, "Because what you said to Jennie was wayyyy harsher. I'm surprised she didn't just slap the shit out of you."

"I wish she did, come to think about it," Jisoo pushes herself off the wall and proceeds to climb up the ladder to check the lighting.

"As much as we disapprove of you insisting to draw that clear friendzone line ever since dinner at the mansion, you probably should have found a nicer way to tell her to mind her own business, so yeah, I agree with Lisa." Chaeyoung softens a little at the 2v1 situation, and adds, "But then again, you were too drunk to think humanly, I suppose."

"Thank you, kind of, for seeing it from my point of view," Jisoo sits on the top of the ladder, closes an eye and squints at the spotlights, adjusting their angles against the ceiling. "I mean, I had to say something, right? She wouldn't back off."

"Technically, you could have chosen from a ton of other things besides 'no, so get over it'. You could have said 'yes, we are friends, I will tell you all my secrets' or like, 'no, we are not friends, because I like you so much more than that' or even 'I don't know, I am confused about how I feel about you'. See?"

Jisoo snorts, finding it oddly amusing, "Lisa, you do realise those options are all equivalent to confessing, right?"

From where Lisa is squatting and rummaging through the toolbox, she looks up and crosses her arms like a defiant kid, "No, I don't think so."

Pretending to throw one of the bulbs down, Jisoo ignores Lisa's weird logic, "And you do know that any form of my confession will undoubtedly lead to her rejection, right?"

"No, I don't know that. And neither do you."

"She has a point," Chaeyoung points her pen at Lisa, who beams from the ground.

"Oh god, please don't tell me, after all these weeks, you both still refuse to believe that she actually, definitively, clearly stated over drinks that night that she still loves Nayeon." The overwhelming sense of déjà vu is threatening a headache in Jisoo.

Eyes brightening in epiphany, Chaeyoung snaps her fingers, "No, think about it, Jisoo. Whether she loves someone else or not, if you don't confess, your chances equal to zero. You confess, your chances become more than or equal to zero."