People who didn't know her, or probably knew her but not on the same level as Chaeyoung or the rest of the girls in Chaeyoung's bar, would automatically catalog her to be three things: goofy yet laid-back, mischievous and impulsive. The last one being being the strongest among the three.

Which were all true, if Lisa should be ask. But what those people didn't know was that she loved the sense of commitment. She would commit herself to something (or someone) and would dedicate all of her until she would get the result that she was aiming for and would only stop when she knew that she had finally reached the bar that she had set for herself or give up trying. The latter being unlikely to happen, ever, because Lisa's desire for fulfillment for anything and everything she would set her eyes into was insatiable.

Of course, except the piano lesson that she enrolled herself into to  accompany a shy Chaeyoung when they were kids and the culinary lessons and all the other adult-ish lessons her parents had ask her to partake. And after all the efforts she had exerted to at least fulfill something and pleased her parents, who by the way were never really obsessing about bestowing what they knew and what they'd hoped to instill in her. She then had turned her full attention to religiously attending her classes and accidentally stumbled and eventually immersed herself in photography.

It was pretty much non-special, the first time she held a camera and took interest in it. She had volunteered to help de-clutter their attic one boring day and saw a vintage camera inside a glass shelf. It was her grandfather's, she was told after she took it out and brought it downstairs and asked if she could bring it to a shop to see if it was still working. An old guy from the camera shop was over-enthusiastic to hold a 1960's Uniomat in his hand had worked his magic on it. Polished and clean it for Lisa. Suggested what film to use and how to use it in general. But it wasn't until she went to a gallery one day that she discovered her passion for photography.

And that was the dream that had been burning inside her since then. To open a gallery one day, someday, that would feature her own works for people to see. Not because she wanted to receive accolades or anything. She just wanted to show how the world looked through her lens. She wanted to tell a story. Of course, chasing her magnum opus was another thing. She'd get there someday. The gallery and the magnum opus.

Those were the thoughts dancing inside Lisa's head when she arrived in front of her studio. With a mixture of strawberry scents and expensive Chanel perfume and burnt pancakes. And kisses. Most definitely kisses and the sensation in her belly that she would feel everytime her mind would wander unto the intimacy that she and Jennie had shared the last time they were together.

She missed Jennie and her gummy smile. She missed being with Jennie. And seeing Jisoo today on Chaeng’s bar was an add-on to her long list of why she missed Jennie. It was frustrating on her part.

"Hey, Boss!" Bobby, her assistant greeted her as soon she pushed the door open and admit herself into the premise of her studio.

Lisa scowled. The way how Bobby prolonged the 's' like a hissing gaspipe would never failed to get under her skin.

"I think we had already settled not to call me that," she told Bobby and placed her tumbler of choco milk and the box that contained the photo paper she bought in front of Bobby so she could wiggle herself out from the jacket that she was wearing.

Bobby laughed at the sight of her and shrugged. Those big, barky laughs he would make like he just heard the funniest joke in his lifetime.

"L-i-s-a, then," he said and offered a flirty wink.

Lisa paused. The jacket was still halfway from peeling off her body and was wrapped awkwardly around her midsection. She took her time to roll her eyes in exaggeration towards the back of her skull, to emphasized how she was not impressed with Bobby's wink. And that loopsided, schoolboyish smile he was showering her.

"You bought a box of it?" Bobby asked. He meant the box of papers that Lisa had demanded from him.

"Can you please remind me again why I hired you?" Lisa asked, instead of answering Bobby's query.

"Because you find me irresistibly cute?" Bobby replied with a smirk.

Lisa laughed and winced. She liked Bobby. She found him nice and, okay, cute on first impression. But totally not in a special kind of way. If she had a brother, Lisa thought he would be a lot like Bobby on some aspects.

"No. Definitely not that," Lisa said good-naturedly, tilting her head a little to the right. "I think I hired you to be my assistant, Bobby. So, you better act like one. And speaking of which, I still definitely remember telling you to buy the papers last week," she told him, her eyebrows raised. She just could not let that go. Because Chaeyoung was right when she said how Lisa hates being disrupted when she would immersed herself inside her lab.

But of course, Bobby would argue. Like he always would.

"No, you did not. Because you definitely told me to cancel everything that day because you said there was a VIP that you need to attend to," he told her.

And it hit Lisa. The memory of a red-cladded Jennie inside her car, parked outside the studio, waiting for her and flashing her that gummy smile she adored. Yes, that definitely was last week. Same day that she had asked Bobby to buy the supplies for another week's worth and told him to cancel everything because there was Jennie and her three reasons. And the third one, it seemed, was already lost in translation.

"Now you remember," Bobby gloated when Lisa just bit the lower lid of her lips in an attempt to neither refute nor insist that Bobby was right and she was wrong.

Lisa looked at him with narrowed eyes. "You know, when all these will be over? Remind me again to fire you, okay?" she told her assistant with a taunting smile.

Bobby paused from stacking and cataloging photos and considered Lisa for a moment before he flashed his schoolboyish smile and shrugged dramatically.

"Nah, you won't," he said confidentially that caused Lisa to roll her eyes once again.

Of course, it was an empty threat. And Bobby knew it well. She had been issuing threats to Bobby about termination and riddance ever since he joined Lisa's studio. Not because she really was in haste to get rid of him after she hired him barely two weeks ago. But because it was the kind of banter they had started and it was nonetheless fun.

Bobby was competent, behind the flirtatious look on his face everytime he sees Lisa. Or women, in general. He was showing eagerness to learn and adapt, which was a plus point for him to land in the position. And, okay, Bobby was cute and good-looking. And definitely had his way with women. Or girls. And people, in general. He was a talker and so Lisa decided to hire him. Because she couldn't deal with the talking and dealing with potential clients while she was off somewhere chasing her magnum opus and collecting stills and stories to fill her would-be gallery. She needed someone to man the studio. And of course, do errands for her.

"I'll be in the lab and I cannot be disturbed," Lisa said as she picked up the box of photo papers and her choco milk drink from the countertop.

"Define 'disturbed', please?" Bobby asked.

"You, barging in there for unimportant and unnecessary reasons," Lisa replied without so much as looking up. She was fiddling on her phone for some music that she could use for the amount of time that she would spend inside the dark room.

"And if I do have important and necessary reasons?" Bobby insisted.

Lisa pressed her lips together and consider Bobby's words for a moment. And then she said, "Call me. I'll have my phone with me." Shaking the device on her hand to emphasize her point.

Bobby snorted. "That's really funny because you don't actually take any of my calls, Lisa."

Lisa laughed and said, "Touche!" before leaving Bobby in the threshold of the studio.

"Lisa—,"

"Call me, Bobby! And nobody gets through my door!" Lisa said loudly, waving her phone on her hand in the space above her head as she proceeded to the farthest end of the hallway. Where the dark room was situated.

"Is there any exception?" Bobby asked loudly, because his boss was almost out of earshot, that he even had to lean forward and twist his upper body to have a better look at Lisa's figure as she hovered at the front of the door of her most favorite room on Earth. Probably working on with the key and the doorknob.

"Not a single soul, Bobby!" Lisa yelled back before she twisted the knob and finally admitted herself inside.

Once inside, her fingers automatically searched for the light switch on her left. And when she found it, she pushed it upward and red light had bathed the dark room. She loved to call it her lab. Because that's where she could create something that would conver a story to tell the world. A story that she had seen and captured through her lens. Because that was what photography is to Lisa. An unspoken story that could tell a thousand different perspectives of interpretations through different eyes that would look at it once they're laid out to the world.

Lisa sat her drink above the shelf next to the switch, where she stored boxes full of film rolls, cataloged by dates and places, written in bold, messy letters, using a permanent marker. Most, she took. Some were left by avid film photography enthusiasts for her to scan or develop. It was a tedious job, which would need a period of time to finish. One roll would take at least a week to scan for digitalization. Developing it was another story. But Lisa loved the challenge it was asking from her.

On the shelf also were stacks of film papers, a basket full of empty film roll cartridges that she just couldn't let go for recycling purposes, among many other things. It wasn't fully organized but Lisa would know where to find what she would be looking for even with the ample amount of light the red bulb could provide her. It was her domain. She belonged there.

Lisa docked her phone on the box speaker she had set up inside her lab. Contrary to her old piano teacher who told her she that she didn't have aptitude for music, she couldn't live without it. Probably due to the fact that she had been friends with Chaeyoung who had been breathing and spewing music even before she could utter a single word and the Chipmunk used to give her mixtapes guised as gifts.

Her hips started to sway and her head was bobbing when Joan Jett and The Blackhearts’ I Love Rock n’ Roll had started to blare on the speakers, filling her ears with the all-too familiar beat of drums and guitar rhythm while she gathered her long blond hair on her hands, raised it just a little above her nape and tied it to a clumsy bun. She then proceeded to the table where a tray of film rolls—Kodak, Ilford, Dubble, to name a few—that she had placed prior to her going out to buy the papers that she would be needing. She picked the tenth cartridge on the second row because that was where she stopped before she went out.

And I can tell that it wouldn't be long
Till he was with me

“Yeah, with me!” Lisa muttered, singing in a tune she knew was far-fetched from the original, providing the second voice as she proceeded to her working station.

And I can tell that it won't be long
Till he was with me

“Yeah, with me! I'm singin’—,”

I love rock n’ roll
So put another dime in the jujebox, baby

With her spectacles and hand gloves on, Lisa rolled her sleeves up to her elbows and resumed the pace of her work. She knew it was going to be a long day and she was fine with it. She preferred getting lost in time inside her lab, surrounded by heaps of film canisters and cartridges, already-developed photos hanging on the line above her head to dry and inhaling mixed scents of her choco milk and chemicals for photo development on the trays on the next table, than be anywhere else right now.

…..

"Oh god! Please, leave me alone," Jennie groaned to herself exasperatedly when her phone had rung, yet again, for the umpteenth time eversince she hurriedly left the building.

She picked up her device from the vacant seat next to her without taking her eyes off the road. It was her assistant, she found out after taking a glance on the screen.

Jennie released an exasperated sigh through her nose before she pushed the button on the built-in stereo of her car.

"Yes?" she asked before the woman on the other end of the line could open her mouth to speak.

"I'm sorry to bother you, President Kim, but yo—,"

"Jennie," Jennie said. "I told you to call me by my name, Seulgi. I'm getting sick of people calling me President or Chairwoman all week. Please, don't join their wagon. Not today. Not ever. It's Saturday!" she groaned and pouted, eventhough her assistant couldn't see it. "I'm sorry. I'm just really—,” she sighed. “What were you saying again?"

"Madam Kim called to ask whether you'll be joining her for dinner later or you have to attend yet again another meeting? Her words, not mine," said her bubbly assistant.

Jennie rolled her eyes.

"Now she wants to make me feel like the bad daughter because I can't join her for dinner. What else does she wants from me? Honestly!" She heard Seulgi stifled a chuckled from the other line.

"So, what should I tell her? Because she's been busting the telephone lines non-stop for the last thirty minutes, Jennie, and I'm seriously bordering to freaking out already,” her assistant said.

"Tell her I already left the building. I'm off somewhere and I won't be home until later. She'll probably know where I'm heading, anyway. So, you don't have to worry about her demanding about my whereabouts," Jennie told Seulgi.

"Is that also what I'm supposed to tell everyone who will look for you?"

"They won't leave me alone, will they?” she asked and heard Seukgi muttered a faint ‘no’ on the other line.” No. Please tell them I already called it a day. Bad headache. And you should, too, Seulgi. You've been working hard twice as I do. Go home already."

"Thanks, Jennie. But call me if you need anything, okay?" Seulgi said.

"Alright,” Jennie said and was about to hang up when she remembered something. “Hey, Seulgi? Have you heard from Jisoo yet?"

She had instructed Seulgi to contact Jisoo since this morning. She had not seen nor talk to Jisoo for a week now and she missed her bestfriend. It was weird not seeing Jisoo that often. Everything just happened in a blur that Jennie felt like she was walking on a different shoe in a world not her own.

"I'm sorry, Jennie, but Miss Jisoo still won't pick up. Do you want me to call her office?" Seulgi replied.

Jennie sighed and shook her head. Jisoo might probably be outside the country for all she knew. They hadn't spoken since she took over the company. What with all the meetings that she needed to attend to everyday, left and right, consuming most of her time. And also the never-ending people coming in and out of her office, bringing with them thick stacks of papers and books that she needed to review and sign. It was almost impossible for her to even sip a tea or just breath. Her schedule was so tight and hectic that she wasn't given the time to at least drop a call to Jisoo and Lisa. Especially Lisa.

"No, never mind. I'll just try to call her later. Thanks, Seulgi. You've worked hard today. See you on Monday,” Jennie said before she ended the call.

Her heart ached when she remembered how abrupt she was taken away from Lisa's place the last time they were together. And how she left Lisa with another set of unanswered questions. She knew Lisa would be curious. She missed her Lili. And the warm and comfort that only Lisa could possibly give her.

Jennie’s heart was pounding a little too loudly when she saw the Impala parked beside Lisa's studio slash apartment. She maneuvered her car towards the space next to Lisa's car to park beside it. And when she stepped out of her Porsche, Jennie couldn't stop herself from smiling. She walked like there were balls attached at the soles of her feet and started to climb the stairs with a heart as light as a feather. She missed this place.

But after she hit the doorbell for a handful of times and returned unanswered, Jennie decided to descend down the stairs with a pout and creased brows, wondering where Lisa could be and if Leo and Luca were left all by themselves again inside the apartment.

She pushed the door of Lisa's studio and was slightly taken aback when she heard an unfamiliar voice, welcoming her into the threshold.

"Good afte—,” Bobby started but his jaws dropped shamelessly when he saw Jennie. Sure, there had been girls and women streaming in and out of the studio, but he had never seen such gorgeousness in an expensive-looking suit standing in front of him until now. “Oh! Hello there! Can I help you?"

The voice of the guy standing behind the counter changed from customary to flirty in a matter of second, that it made Jennie’s eyebrows twitch. Her mind was asking what possibly made Lisa to take the guy in and work for her.

"Hi! I'm looking for Lisa. Is she here?" she asked Bobby, who was smiling at her from ear to ear.

"She's—,"

"She's not upstairs. I've checked. But her car's parked outside. Is she inside the studio?" Jennie inquired, pointing the door of the studio with her thumb.

The tone of her voice made Bobby's grin falter. Gone was the flirty look that he had been casting on the petite beauty in front of him. She wasn't impressed with his flirting, he realized.

“No. I'm really sorry but Lisa can't be disturbed right now,” he said in a business-like tone, matching Jennie’s.

"Why? Where is she?" Jennie demanded, her fingers were tapping impatiently on the countertop. That was something that she had learned in a span of a week working at the company. She had to demand in order to be heard accurately.

"In the dark room. She probably won't be out until forever,” Bobby replied.

"Excuse me?"

"Well, Lisa's been spending most of her time inside her lab lately and only steps out when she's hungry or she needs to feed her cats upstairs,” Bobby said. “Do you want to leave a message? I'm Bobby, by the way. Her assistant.” He offered his free hand for a handshake.

But Jennie ignored it. "Thanks, but no. I think I'll deliver it, myself,” she said, stepping away from Bobby's station.

Bobby dropped his hand and shrugged. "Oka—hey!” he said when he saw Jennie walking towards where Lisa's lab was. “Hey, hey, hey! Please, no. Don't. Do not go there. Lisa will kill me!" he desperately begged.

Jennie paused and looked at Bobby incredulously. "No, she won't. Don't worry about it,” she said and resumed her steps.

Bobby grabbed her arm impulsively and said, "She definitely will. You don't know Lisa."

They were now standing in front of the dark room’s door.

"Yes, I do. Now, please let go of my arm," Jennie told Bobby while looking at his hand around the bend of her elbow, while her hand had found its way on the door knob.

Bobby had unlatched his hold on Jennie’s arm like it was singed and muttered a meek ‘sorry’, the same second as when Jennie’s hand had turned the knob and