By 2021, Y/N wasn't just another manager orbiting the group.
Somewhere along the way, she'd become Jennie's constant. The one who always had water in her hand before she asked. The one who knew that when Jennie went quiet, it wasn't aloofness but the weight pressing on her chest. The one who could read her, sometimes better than Jennie read herself.
It looked like friendship. To everyone else, that's all it was.
But to Y/N, it felt different in ways she couldn't name without shattering something. It was in the way Jennie leaned close during rehearsals, brushing her shoulder as she asked about something, voice pitched lower than necessary. In the way Y/N's hand sometimes lingered when passing her a mic or notes, not long, just long enough to feel the warmth. In the way laughter between them sometimes lasted a beat too long, both of them looking away too quickly afterward.
It was small things. Quiet things.
Like the time during the practices, hair damp against her temples, face flushed. Jennie dropped onto the bench beside Y/N, stretching out her legs with a sigh. Y/N wordlessly slid a bottle of water into her hand. Their fingers brushed, warm skin against warm skin, and Jennie's lips curved, soft and private, like the smile wasn't meant for anyone else. Or the van rides, when the others were loud or sleeping, and Jennie's head drifted against Y/N's shoulder as if it belonged there. Y/N never moved. Never breathed too loud. Just let her stay.
They never talked about it.
To the world, they were friends. To themselves, maybe they were too. But underneath it all, something buzzed, low and steady, waiting for the moment when pretending would no longer be enough.
And that moment came sooner than expected.
Seoul blurred past the car windows in streaks of neon and rain, every light bleeding into the next. The wipers dragged across the windshield in a steady rhythm, but inside the car the silence pressed thick, almost unbearable.
Jennie sat curled in the passenger seat, hoodie sleeves bunched in her fists, knees drawn up, forehead tilted just shy of the glass. Her jaw was set so tight it looked painful, and every so often her foot tapped, restless, like she couldn't keep still even when she was exhausted.
Y/N kept her eyes pinned to the road, fingers clamped white around the steering wheel. She could feel the weight of Jennie's mood without even looking, the way it filled the air, prickling her skin, sinking into her chest.
It had been weeks of this. Rehearsals that stretched until dawn. Lights in the practice room still burning when Y/N passed at midnight. Meals skipped, water bottles left untouched. Staff whispered about Jennie's short temper, her sharp words when exhaustion finally snapped through the cracks. But Y/N had seen the other side of it too, Jennie running the choreography until her body trembled, singing the same line until her throat was raw, eyes burning with a desperation that scared her.
And tonight, Y/N finally broke.
Jennie's voice sliced into the quiet, low and ragged.
"You don't get it, Y/N." Her fingers dug into the fabric of her sleeves, knuckles sharp against the cotton. "If I'm not perfect, if I'm even one second off, they'll tear me apart again." She laughed then, a bitter, hollow sound. "Lazy. Deadweight. Maybe they're right. Maybe I am."
The words punched the air from Y/N's lungs. Her stomach twisted, heat burning up her chest so fast she almost missed the turn. She gripped the wheel tighter, voice steady only because she forced it through clenched teeth.
"They're not right."
Jennie barked a laugh, sharp and humorless, still staring out at the blur of lights. "You don't know that. You don't know what it's like to be hated for breathing wrong. To have people waiting for you to fail so they can prove they were right all along."
Y/N bit back the thousand things she wanted to say. That she knew Jennie, that no one worked harder, that every performance left her in awe. That none of the noise online mattered compared to the truth of who she was. But Jennie's profile in the glow of the streetlights was hard, closed, carved in shadow.
Instead Y/N forced the words out, quiet but firm. "Let's just get you home."
Jennie didn't move. Didn't look at her. She pressed her forehead against the glass, rain streaking down the other side like tears she refused to let fall. Her breath fogged the window, and she whispered so faintly Y/N almost thought she imagined it.
I can't fail. Not again."
The words hit like a confession, like a wound.
Y/N's grip tightened on the wheel until her hands ached. She wanted to pull over, to make Jennie look at her, to tell her she was more than perfect, more than enough. But the road stretched on, and all she could do was drive, chest heavy, throat raw.
The rest of the ride was silent. Suffocating. Every heartbeat counting down to the moment when silence would shatter, one way or another.
The dorm was hushed when they stepped inside, only the hum of the fridge and the faint tick of the wall clock breaking the silence. Shoes lined neatly by the door. Jackets hung with care. A home, but tonight it felt like a fragile shell. Jennie dropped her bag with a dull thud, the sound too loud in the quiet, and stalked down the hall without a word. Her shoulders were tight, her jaw rigid, her whole frame vibrating with the tension she refused to let go.
Y/N should've left. She should've let her go to her room, shut the door. That would've been the professional thing, the safe thing. But she couldn't. Not when Jennie's words from the car still echoed in her skull.
Her feet moved before her mind caught up.
"Jennie—"
"Don't," Jennie snapped, whirling on her. Her eyes were rimmed red, lashes clumped with unshed tears. Her voice frayed like a rope ready to snap. "You don't understand. Slowing down means failure. And if I fail, everyone's right about me."
Y/N's chest burned. She shook her head, stepping closer. "You're going to hurt yourself. Do you get that? You can't keep running like this—"
"I have to!" Jennie's voice cracked, too loud in the sleeping dorm. She shoved her hair back with shaking hands. "If I'm not flawless, I'm useless. If I'm not perfect, I'm nothing."
The word sliced through Y/N like a blade.
Useless. Nothing.
Words she'd seen hurled at Jennie online, words spat from strangers who knew nothing about her, and now Jennie was saying them about herself.
Her pulse surged. She closed the gap between them, fire in her throat.
"Stop."