LISA

"I slept with my brother's wife," I say to Jisoo Kim. We are halfway through a bottle of fine wine—most of it drunk by me—in a swanky London hotel room, when I just blurt it out. Before she can react, I hold up my hand. "Worst of all, I think I may be in love with her."

"You're in love with your brother's wife." Jisoo's famous eyebrows are knotted together. "Am I hearing that right or was there too much applause after the premiere earlier and my eardrums have been affected?"

I joined Jisoo and the Like No One Else PR team in Europe two weeks ago because I was going mad at home with Jennie gone and Kai moping around and Mom not knowing what to do with herself, which is, quite possibly, most unsettling of all. As though she knows her family might implode any second.

"I don't know what to do."

"Have you tried falling out of love with her?" Jisoo says matter-of-factly. She seems rather unfazed by my confession. Maybe she thinks I'm just playing—just saying outrageous things to entertain her.

"When you fell in love with Chaeyoung and someone had suggested that, would you have been able to?"

"Me? Fall out of love with Chaeyoung? Are you crazy?"

"You met Jennie. I brought her to that party at your house."

"Oh." Jisoo nods approvingly. "I remember Jennie. Oh yes, I can see that."

"What does that mean?"

"She's not, um, not-hot." Jisoo grins.

"Oh, god," I groan.

"I say this respectfully, of course." She tilts her head. "Is this why your agent begged to have you join the Europe promo tour? You needed to get away from her?"

"That was to get away from my brother. He's staying with Mom and me and being around him is unbearable. Jennie went home to spend time with her family because she had to get away from me and Kai."

"Sounds like one big happy family."

"Doesn't it just?"

"How did this happen? You just took a shine to her one fine day?" Jisoo takes a small sip of her wine.

I respond by taking a much bigger sip from my own glass.

Then I give her the broad strokes about Kai and Jennie's unfruitful fertility journey and how it destabilized their marriage.

"I feel for them. A lot." She chews the inside of her cheek. "It sounds very similar to what Brian and I went through and, as you know, our marriage didn't survive. I know what that kind of thing can do to a relationship. It's really hard to just continue afterward and find a new path without the children you wanted so much. As though they were the only reason you were ever together in the first place."

"I didn't know that. I'm so sorry, Jisoo."

"Look at me now. I'm married to Chaeyoung Park and we have Leesa and Leroy, so… this is life and you never know what's going to happen. I had huge doubts about making A New Day. If I'd chickened out because it was too gay, I might never have gotten to know Chaeyoung better."

"If you put it like that."

"Chaeyoung wasn't married to my brother, though."

"Ouch."

"But, ever since Chaeyoung and I came out we've been bombarded with the message that love is love and maybe that applies to much more ways of loving each other than same-sex couples."

"That's a dangerous can of worms you're about to open there."

"Why? You're two consenting adults."

"I know what it feels like to be cheated on. My girlfriend left me for my best friend. They had an affair for months before I knew anything about it. I don't want to do that to my brother."

"That sounds awful. I'm so sorry you had to go through that. How long ago was this?"

"Three years."

"Well then, three years later, when you look back, what was the most painful: that they were sleeping together behind your back or that they fell in love?"

"Both."

"Are they still together?" Jisoo asks.

"They're getting married." The fact that I can say this without flinching is revealing to me.

"Are you okay with that?"

"It's not my thing to be or not be okay with anymore. It's just how it is. They're each other's soulmates or something like that."

"What if Jennie is your soulmate?"

"She can't be."

"Because of your brother?"

I nod.

"But your brother presumably loves you and wants you to be happy."

"Sure, but not with his wife."

"Well, not at first. That's too much to expect of even the most enlightened human, but given some time…"

"I haven't told you the best bit yet, Jisoo." I have to chuckle. In its own twisted way, it's kind of funny. "My mom walked in on us."

"Oh, no. This just keeps getting better and better. That's a movie right there, Lisa. We need to get Charlie on this as soon as possible."

"It's one hell of a soap opera." What else are we going to do but laugh? It's a lot more fun than crying over what I can't have. "The point is that my mother knows, and she begged us to not let it turn into anything for all of our sakes. For the family's sake."

"What about your and Jennie's sake?"

"There's no such thing. It's just too impossible. Too painful. Too difficult."

"How does Jennie feel about you?"

I shrug. "Last I heard, she has feelings for me, but that was three weeks ago and a lot can change in three weeks. We haven't been in touch. By design."

"It's complicated all right, but ever since I fell in love with Chaeyoung, I will always try to make a case for love. No matter what. Because sometimes the price of not pursuing it is higher than what you think you'd give up for it in the first place."

I've had a little too much wine to get that without letting it sink in for a second. Then my phone beeps. What time is it back home? Mid-afternoon, probably.

"Speak of the devil, that's probably my mother."

"I can't even think about that, Lisa. Your mother walked in on you." Jisoo obviously thinks this is a massive hoot. It would be funny if it wasn't so mortifying. Out of guilt more than anything, I grab my phone so I can text Mom back that I'm doing okay, which, in her mind, is probably code for me swiftly forgetting all about Jennie.

"Oh," I say when I see who the message is from. So much for not being in touch. But maybe Jennie has come to the end of her exile. She's bored in the Des Moines suburbs and she's just notifying me of her impending return to LA.

I know we agreed not to contact each other but damn it, Lisa, I can't stop thinking about you.

"Oh, Jesus," I mutter under my breath.

"What is it?" Jisoo asks.

"It's from Jennie."

"What does she say?" Maybe her impromptu little speech earlier made Jisoo invested in this more than she ought to be.

"That she can't stop thinking about me." I gaze at my phone screen. "You know this is all your fault, right?" Making more jokes is the only way I can deal with this right now.

"Me? What did I do?" Jisoo's eyes go wide.

"Jennie and I have this running joke that she's 'gay for Jisoo'. That's you."

"Flattered as I am, I still don't see what that has to do with me." She flutters her eyelashes.

"You made her gay, Jisoo." I burst out laughing. "She saw us kiss in the movie and it… did something to her."

"Millions of people have seen our characters kiss in that movie and I'm fairly certain that for most of them nothing much has changed."

"It started out as a joke. Until it spiraled out of control."

"If you need someone to blame all this on, go ahead, blame me, but the real question is: what are you going to reply? Does Jennie know you're in my hotel room knocking back all my expensive wine?"

"She'd probably go nuts if I told her that."

"Maybe that's exactly what you need. Some levity," Jisoo offers.

"I can't reply with a joke right now. God knows what she's going through out there in the sticks? With no one to talk to and all that spare time to mull things over. Miles away from her life—and me."

"It's pretty obvious you can't stop thinking about her either."

I let my head fall back. "How long does it take to get over someone? Weeks? Months?"

"Depends on the intensity of your feelings for them."

"I'd just hoped distance would speed up the process, do what time can't. Make it go faster. Make it so I can just get on with my life without considering ruining my brother's. Because, just hypothetically, say that, yes, love is love, and Jennie and I are entitled to love each other. We choose each other. Then what? My brother stops talking to me. Mom will kick me out of the house. She'd be so angry and, worst of all, disappointed in me. I'll lose my family and I don't want that."

"But you'd gain Jennie."

"Our potential happiness is not worth all that pain."

"But what if it is? You'll never know if you don't try."

I shake my head. "I won't do that to my family. I just won't."

"That may be so, Lisa, but hearing you talk about Jennie, it sounds to me as though part of you already has."

"That's not true." I hold up one finger. "We chose each other fully sober exactly once. We had one night of weakness, that's it. That's still excusable. We ended it right after, when we came back to our senses. Now we just have to wait until our feelings go away."

"Good luck with that." Jisoo points at my phone. "You're not going to reply to her at all?"

"What can I possibly say?"

Jisoo scrunches up her lips as though she's seriously considering my mostly rhetorical question.

"If you think she's not worth it, then say nothing. Then you shut it down. Send the only message you can. That it's over."

The wine I drank over the past hour threatens to make its way back up, that's how devastating Jisoo's statement sounds. Cold. Heartless. Ruthless, even. All the opposite emotions to those that run through me when I think of Jennie.

"Maybe she's laying her cards on the table. Maybe that's the wisdom distance has brought her. That she wants to be with you." Jisoo's not letting it go just yet. She must have spotted the devastated look on my face just now.

"But it's imposs—"

"Stop saying it's impossible, Lisa. Talk to your family. Tell them how you feel. Be honest and take it from there."

"Have you met my mom?"

"I don't think it's your mother you should be worrying about the most."

Poor Kai. All the guy's ever done is look out for me. And now I have to tell him that I'm in love with his wife? How's that for sisterly love?

"Are you serious about all the things you just said?" I examine Jisoo's face. "You're a mother. Imagine if something like this happened in your family."

"My kids are far too young for this kind of drama. Thank goodness." Jisoo's face practically melts when she mentions her children. "I'm an outsider. I'm not part of your family and I don't know the dynamics of it. But from what you've told me, which is only one side of the story, but it's all I've got to go on, your brother's marriage isn't doing well, and you and Jennie are in love. Either you hurt him now and he will suffer for a while, be angry with you, cut you out of his life for a bit. Those are all real possibilities. Until he comes around, because he's your brother. He's your family." Jisoo pins her gaze on me. "Or you and Jennie hurt yourselves and miss out on something possibly amazing."

"If we hurt Kai, we hurt ourselves as well. Either way, we hurt ourselves. It's an easy enough equation. If Jennie and I are going to get hurt anyway, we might as well keep Kai out of it."

"Oh, sure. If only love were that easy. If only you could choose who you fall for. If only you could not fall in love with your brother's wife. Press the delete button on the hard drive of your heart." She exhales deeply. "Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way."

"Maybe we just need a little more time away from each other."

"Maybe." Jisoo refills my glass, emptying the bottle. "Maybe not."

Back in my room, Jisoo's words echo in my head. So do my own. But I've had enough of thinking this through, of turning it over again and again, trying to find another outcome that doesn't exist. Most of all, I just want to hear Jennie's voice.

She picks up after the first ring.

"Hey." All it takes is for her to say one word, for me to hear her voice for a split second, and all the things I've been trying to push away engulf me again.

"Hi," I say.

"It's so good to hear your voice," Jennie says. "How are you?"

"You're never going to believe who I was hanging out with when you texted me earlier."

"It would help if I knew where you were."

"I'm in London. With Jisoo."

"J-jisoo Kim?" I wish I could see Jennie's face. I should have video called her, but it seemed like too much.

"The one and only. I owe you a huge apology, by the way, because I told her exactly how gay you are for her."

"What?"

"I also told her about us," I say on a sigh.

"Oh, my god. What are you doing in London?"

"Working. European promotion tour for Like No One Else. I had to get out of LA. I was going mad… without you."

"You were?" Her voice wavers.

"Yeah. They even put me up in the same swanky hotel as Jisoo. She's just next door. She poured me a glass of wine too many and you know what I'm like when I've had a few. All boundaries out of the window."

"Lisa." Jennie's voice is suddenly sharp. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. Just surprised to get that text from you. How are things with your family?"

"I told my mom about us. I had to tell her. I couldn't keep it to myself any longer. She was quite understanding about it."

"She was?" My turn to be surprised. Jennie telling her mother is much more profound than me telling Jisoo.

"At first she thought you had brazenly seduced me, but I made sure she knew that's not how it went." She pauses. "Although you did take off your top in the hot tub that night."

"I didn't do that to—" She's playing, trying to ease the tension, I do know that.

"Oh, Lisa, it doesn't matter. I—" I only hear her the inhale and exhale of her breath for a few seconds. "What I texted you is true. I can't stop thinking about you. I should be thinking about a million other things, like how to save my marriage, but I can only think of you. It's like instead of making it easier, the distance has made it harder. Because I don't want to be away from you."

"I don't want to be away from you either," I blurt out. "When are you coming home?"

"I don't know. I'm dying to get back to LA, but only if you're there. When are you back?"

"Next week."

"Would you mind if I came back next week as well?"

"I would love that, but, um, Jennie…" I can't believe I'm about to say this. "Maybe it's time we told Kai."