Tease

During

Jisoo didn't know how it began, the teasing.

It had suddenly became a routine for Rosie to close in on her and flirt with her, taunting her with words and looks and touches.

Rosie would be leaning on her shoulder as the two of them watched a random movie during their usual Friday movie marathon, when all of a sudden the former would lift her head a little and lean in to brush her nose against the back of Jisoo's ear. A sharp tingle would course through Jisoo as she felt Rosie whisper "You smell really good, Soo," with that incredibly alluring voice of hers. Her response would usually be a sharp lift of her shoulder to detach Rosie from her, or a mean retort like "Well you stink, so back off, Chaeng."

At times, she would catch Rosie staring at her lips far too long for her comfort. Jisoo would retaliate with a well-aimed pillow to the face. "Stop staring at my lips, you byun," she would say with annoyance. All she got in response was a loud laugh and a teasing "You better stop making them look so kissable then."

Jisoo knew Rosie was just teasing her, wanting to get a rise out of her. After more than a decade of friendship, teasing and pranks were pretty much a mundane occurrence for the two of them. She still hadn't forgiven Rosie for loosening the heels of one of the shoes she had worn to an important meeting, causing her to twist and sprain her ankle in front of the entire staff present. She may have gotten even though, when she got a large dose of loud hysterical screaming and crying from the blonde as she stepped into the bedroom Jisoo had decorated with real and fake bugs.

What Jisoo didn't expect was the sudden shift of her thoughts and reactions regarding Rosie's teasing. What once made her groan in disgust and annoyance now made odd and unexpected shivers crawl down her spine. She could barely stop a whimper from leaving her mouth when Rosie would softly rake her nails against Jisoo's nape while they were leaning against each other during bus rides when they were both too lazy to drive around the city. Every time Rosie would compliment her lips, Jisoo wanted to tell her how hers looked kissable too. And soft. And how she bet that they would feel amazing against her own.

Jisoo wasn't dumb. She knew the way she began to respond to Rosie's teasing went beyond platonic. Her frustrated screams were muffled against the pillow as she began to overthink the whole situation, keeping her up most nights. Aggravation regarding the inappropriate thoughts she began to have about her best friend made her want to burst through the latter's room across the hall and yell at her. Blame her for putting the lusty ideas in her head. And then slam her mouth against hers.

It was wrong. So, so wrong. Rosie was her best friend. Her completely platonic soulmate.

She knew Rosie didn't feel the same way. Didn't really think about Jisoo in that way, she only wanted to tease her. Possibly avenge herself for the bugs terror Jisoo had unleashed upon her.

Jisoo didn't want their ten years of friendship to be ruined by one practical joke. And so she pretended that the shivers that went through her were shivers of disgust rather than pleasure, that she found the warmth of Rosie's breath annoying rather than arousing, and that the sound of Rosie's voice against her ear was bothersome rather than breath-taking. But as she faked her reactions, time and time again, she wondered how long she would be able to keep setting her real feelings aside.

-/-/-/-

Rosie knew how it began, the teasing.

It was an accident.

Well, not really an accident, per se. Endless nights thinking about it made her realize that the first time was a sudden conscious burst of her subconscious feelings towards her best friend.

Jisoo was ranting to her about the kissing catastrophe she experienced with the girl she just had a third date with. It technically was her best friend's fault for going into detail like that, talking about how dry and rough the girl's lips felt against hers, how she felt like she was kissing a loofah.

Jisoo's rant made Rosie laugh, but it also made her think. It made her think about the softness and texture of Jisoo's lips. Obviously they would be very soft, since Jisoo was able to feel such roughness from the other girl's lips. She also wouldn't be able to insult the girl like that if her lips were rough and dry too. That would've made her a hypocrite, and Rosie knew her best friend was anything but that. In fact, Jisoo could be so brutally honest at times, just like her. That was probably only one of the very few things they had in common.

Her thoughts about her best friend's lips inadvertently brought her gaze to them. They were so pink, and naturally so, since she knew that Jisoo rarely wore lipstick, she preferred lip gloss or those fruit-scented lip balms that Rosie always seemed to catch a whiff of when she was within proximity.

Her lips were also a little moist, because Jisoo had this habit of licking her lips. That was also why she rarely used lipstick, since there would barely be any left after only a few hours, and the lazy dork didn't want to keep reapplying it.

As the words soft, pink, and wet filtered through Rosie's mind repeatedly, it was no surprise to herself that she had suddenly blurted out "Your lips won't be wasted on me," cutting off Jisoo, who was in mid-rant.

She didn't realize that she had moved her face closer to Jisoo's, mere inches separating them. She broke her gaze from the brunette's lips to look up and find very surprised brown eyes blinking back at her. Rosie instantly flushed, realizing what she had just said, and the two of them scrambled back to safer distances.

That incident didn't really put a strain on their friendship, and come to think of it, neither did the succeeding ones.

It almost became a game to Rosie. Okay, scratch that, it was a game. She loved seeing Jisoo blush and stutter after she let loose teasing remarks she barely even thought twice of saying. Saying those words was almost like a reflex, like she was acting on pure instinct. She also found that Jisoo was easily more affected by the rawer statements she said, the ones that she really didn't filter out, so she began to use those more often.

She realized too late that the words she had spoken were basically unadulterated musings about her dorky brunette friend. Her once subconscious feelings and thoughts spewed out in the open and spilled over the line between friendship and something more. But Jisoo didn't know that of course; she still thought that Rosie was just messing with her, which she loves to do. Jisoo didn't know that the flirty whispers the blonde brushed against her ear were actually screaming out fervent wishes and unmasked desires.

Jisoo didn't know that every time she would push the brunette away when the latter closed the distance between them, Rosie's smirking mouth would falter and drop once the brunette had turned her back on her. Jisoo didn't know that every time she would scoff or roll her eyes at the seductive teasing, Rosie's eyes would clear up and express the hurt she felt, before she blinked them away.

It began as a game for her, to see how far she could push and tease Jisoo, but in the end, Rosie was the one who lost, because the game made her realize how Jisoo looked even more beautiful up close, how her eyes looked like they could show her and give her the world, how Rosie wouldn't mind spending an eternity counting her long lashes, and how she wouldn't mind feeling those lashes brush against her cheeks as she finally got a taste of those soft pink lips that had been haunting her day and night.

These realizations scared her because she knew they were simply one-sided. If they weren't, wouldn't Jisoo have already responded positively? The fact that she didn't caused Rosie to become afraid of pushing her further. If it were one-sided, then she didn't want her feelings to develop even more, lest it destroy the friendship between them. And so Rosie waved the white flag, deciding that if she couldn't bring back the conscious feelings to the subconscious, then she would at least stop herself from verbalizing them.

-/-/-/-

What Rosie failed to notice was the barely-there shudder that racked Jisoo's body when the former's lips lightly grazed her skin. She failed to see the quick dart of Jisoo's eyes to the brunette's pink, soft-looking lips. She didn't catch the quick look of want that filled Jisoo's eyes as she wondered what sounds Rosie would make if she tugged at the full bottom lip inches away from her own pair. How she wondered if the sounds would be different if she used her tongue. She missed how Jisoo's heart frantically thumped against her chest as she felt her breath mix with hers.