Exposure

Epilogue

Jennie stepped into the elevator and hit the button for the ground floor. She's not exactly sure how it happened, but life was kind of incredible. After the exhibition, she had been offered space at the gallery to show and sell her work on a regular basis, as well as a job with a national magazine who's home office happened to be just a few miles from the gallery. She was a now a field photographer, occasionally traveling for assignments for the magazine as well as making actual money selling her own work.

Plus, she was finishing up her final semester at YG and had been going practically non stop. It had been a long 3 months getting used to it all but it was finally feeling normal. Good, even.

The elevator slowly shut and her eyes fell to her reflection on the cold silver doors. She couldn't stop the small smile that grew on her lips. Mere months ago and the way she saw herself was completely different. It wouldn't have made her smile. But things were different now.

She had been through hell to get here. Dealing with her own demons, as well as literal monsters trying to hold her back and push her down. Her mother had been furious when she shifted her classes and found a way to graduate early so she could really focus on photography. So much so, that she threatened to cut Jennie off.

Jennie had simply smiled at the threat and left the Deans mansion for what would probably be the last time. Whatever hold Chaerin had on her, be it out fear or just years of telling her she wasn't good enough, had vanished.

Jennie realized she had already been living without her mothers help- actually, she had been making it despite her mothers efforts to hinder her dreams. Getting "cut off", so to speak, was probably one of the greatest things to ever happen to her.

She let out a content sigh, she had never thought things would end up the way they had. But here she was.

"What the--?" Jennie glanced at the lit up numbers as the elevator slowed to a stop on the 4th floor.

She should have been the only one left in the building. After getting lost in her work in the dark room provided by the magazine, she had lost track of time and when she had finished her work, it was well after everyone else had gone home for the day.

The doors slowly opened, Jennie's reflection on the heavy doors rippling away as they opened to reveal someone standing in the 4th floor office, files and notebooks clutched against her chest and a tired look on her face.

Jennie's eyebrows lifted in slight surprise at the sight. The other girl was looking at the floor, clearly exhausted and not paying much attention.

"Going down?" Jennie asked, her voice low, a slight smirk on her lips. Her hands rested on the railing that wrapped around the elevator as she leaned her back against the wall behind her.

Warm brown eyes lifted immediately at the sound of her voice and Jisoo felt herself smiling at the all too familiar smirk. She quickly cleared her throat and replaced her smile with a straight face and stepped into the elevator without saying anything.

Jisoo stopped just barely inside the elevator and turned her back to Jennie, tightening her grip on the stack of papers in her arms.

It took a week after Jennie started her job with the magazine before they realized it was in the same building as Jisoo's newspaper internship. They had found out in almost this exact way. Jennie had lost track of time, Jisoo had stayed late, and the unlikely meeting in the elevator after hours had happened.

"Long night?" Jennie asked, not moving from her place against the back of the elevator.

Jisoo stared at the office in front of her, the elevator doors apparently offering her one last chance to leave before they shut and trapped the girls together for the slow ride to the ground floor.