I blink and swipe at my eyes, making sure I’m reading Celeste’s message correctly.

Yeah, I reply. You?

A few seconds later, Celeste says, Yeah.

I bite my lip, wondering what’ll happen the next time we’ll work together.

17: Celeste

On Monday night, Celeste gets an email from Gemma letting her know that their next round of interviews will be on Thursday. And for the rest of the week, Celeste can’t stop thinking of her ex. It’s gotten to the point that, almost every night, after the daytime rush of shoots and admin work, she has to touch herself to fall asleep.

Celeste and Gemma barely did anything, just made out, really, but somehow the sheer memory of kissing Gemma again—and how it felt to have her hands on her breasts—is more arousing than anything she’s experienced in the last eight years.

Celeste told herself she wasn’t going to do anything with Gemma, and yet, the first moment they were alone, she couldn’t stop herself from crossing the point of no return. Impulse control had never been one of Celeste’s strong points. It’s one of the main things that got her into trouble when she was growing up in Seoul, since she’d often kiss other girls—with their full, breathless consent, of course—even when she knew she wasn’t supposed to.

Most of the time, they managed to keep things a secret, but on the couple occasions they got caught, Celeste’s parents would have to move her to another school because the other parents complained, saying that she’d “turned their daughters gay.” As if that were a real thing.

Unfortunately, in the highly traditional and homophobic social circles she grew up in, people believed that shit. Which is why, by the time she was a second year in high school, she made it her life goal to go to college in another country, self-studying English as much as she could so she wouldn’t be limited to schools close to home.

Sure, it meant she had to study more than her peers, but, in retrospect, everything worked out in Celeste’s favor. She learned enough English to get into a college in Los Angeles, where she could freely be herself. And where she met Gemma, for better or for worse.

The night before she’s supposed to see Gemma again, Celeste is up late, trying to distract herself from thoughts of her ex. But even that miserably fails when she finishes watching her friends’ Instagram Stories and opens Facebook.