The days leading up to the comeback were incredibly hectic for the girls. They spent most of their days and nights in the practice rooms, perfecting the vocals and choreography ready for their music show promotions, and they also had tapings of variety shows to attend in the coming weeks too.
For Lisa, despite the never-ending itinerary, she welcomed the distraction, as even if she rested for one minute, her mind would end up straying to Jungkook and their kiss.
Being the awkward girl that she was, she hadn't brought up the kiss again in any of their virtual conversations, and he hadn't mentioned it either. She found that she couldn't text him as much these days anyway, with their schedule being so packed.
She knew he had also been busy with touring and BTS had recently made huge waves in the US and globally. She had messaged him to congratulate him whenever she heard of their new achievements and promised him that they would celebrate when he was back in Seoul.
Their conversations hadn't gone much deeper than that, not like before, when they would text for hours past midnight, confiding their worries and dreams to each other. She missed that, but was sure they would get back to that when they were less busy.

-&-

On comeback day, Lisa gathered round a small laptop with their members in one of the YG training rooms, catching the MV as soon as it dropped. They watched the whole thing multiple times on repeat to catch everything and compliment each other's scenes. They had enjoyed making this music video a lot and reading some of the positive comments left on their video lifted their spirits and made them even more excited to perform it live.
"Ah I'm getting so many texts coming in now," Jennie said, scrolling through her phone as it buzzed every other second with new incoming messages.
"Me too, mostly my family though," Jisoo said with a large grin, also tapping away at replies.
Lisa herself had gotten many congratulatory texts, but none yet from the boy she really wanted to hear from.
"Why do you look so sad, Lisa?" Jennie said, shaking her arm.
Lisa shook her head and grinned widely. "No, I'm not, honestly! I'm so relieved it's finally out!"
"Let's do something to celebrate! Should we go eat steak?" Rosé suggested, her mouth already salivating at the thought of food.
"Yeah, let's go!" Lisa shouted enthusiastically. Then this way, maybe being with her members would prevent her from checking her phone too often and feeling disappointed.

-&-

Him 💜
22nd June 11:56PM

Lalisa
It's still comeback day right?
I messaged just in time
Congratulations on your comeback 🎊
I'm sorry I couldn't say it earlier
But I heard the song and watched the MV, it's really daebak!
Your rap part in English is amazing.
RM and Suga were impressed too.
Lisa?
Are you still awake?

-&-

She didn't catch his messages until the next morning but smiled when she read them. He had been touring for three nights straight in Japan but had still found time to congratulate her at the end of the day. She sent her gratitude back that morning and told him to rest well for his next set of concerts coming up.
The Blackpink girls were soon heading to the music shows, performing live and meeting their fans again. It felt so good to be on the stage again. They met other idols there too, promoting at the same time as them.
Jennie and Rosé even received Inkigayo sandwiches while they were promoting, although they both thought the concept was incredibly overused and unoriginal in the k-pop world that they threw the numbers out straight away.
Lisa suspected there may have been other reasons, judging from the way Jennie had been texting someone a lot recently and the way Rosé was such a bad liar when she denied that she was interested in anyone.

-&-

A week into their promotions for As If It's Your Last, they won their first win on a music show.
Lisa, Rosé and Jennie had burst out in tears on the Inkigayo stage, leaving their reliable oldest member and Inkigayo MC, Jisoo, to handle their thank you speech.
Even during their encore, just as she was about to stop crying, she would turn to see Jennie or Rosé tearing up again, which would set her off.
When they had returned back stage, the staff had lined the hallways and congratulated them with cheers and high-fives. Lisa had started crying again as she was doling out high-fives to her managers, her hair stylists, her make up artists, and everyone who was involved in Blackpink's success. 

"You've worked hard, Lisa-ya," her manager said, patting her shoulder consolingly.
She could only nod her head and bow back to him in silent thanks.
Their manager drove them back to the YG building, where they were inundated with flowers and gifts of support for their recent comeback. They had all been placed in one of the training rooms, after they had flooded the reception and left barely any floor space to even walk.
Rosé and Lisa had gone around the room and read through each congratulatory card and each note that had come through with the bouquets.
"Blinks are so sweet!" Rosé cooed. "Wow, there's a lot from big companies too." 
"Teddy oppa sent us a card to congratulate our first win," Lisa said, skimming through the note and immediately bursting out laughing. She turned to show Teddy's awkward attempt at congratulating the girls.
"How sweet!" Rosé said with a giggle. "Hey, who's JK? Jimmy Kimmel?" she guessed, bursting into chuckles afterwards at the ridiculous thought that an American talk-show host would reach out to them.
Lisa perked up and held out her hand to ask Rosé to pass the card to her. It read:

Congratulations on a successful comeback!
Yours,
JK🐰

She smiled and knew instantly exactly who had sent them. 
The bouquet that had accompanied the note was full of bright yellow sunflowers amongst some decorative leaves and baby's breath. She picked them up and decided to take them back to the dorms with her, put them in some water and place them beside her bed.

-&-

Later when she got home that evening, she admired the flowers sent to her again. The other girls had suspicious, raised eyebrows about why she had decided on only those to take back with her to the dorms, but they had to admit that sunflowers and the instant joy they emitted were very on brand for Lisa.
She picked up her phone, about to text Jungkook to thank him when she scrolled through some of their older messages in the last few weeks.
A worrying revelation became obvious to her as she started noticing a pattern among their conversations. Jungkook had been messaging her a lot but she had been so busy and distracted by their comeback that she had barely replied, or replied with the bare minimum effort. He had texted her good mornings everyday when he woke up in whatever part of the world he was in, and tell her something meaningful about what he was up to that day. He would sometimes ask her a question, to which she would oftentimes fail to reply until several hours later and then she would apologise late in the evening and vow to respond properly in the morning... 
She had even left the last text message he had sent which had been that morning on read before their Inkigayo performance.
Before she typed out anything though, her phone buzzed in her hand and Jungkook had messaged her again.

-&-

Him 💜
2nd July 10:54 PM

Congratulations on your Inkigayo win 🎊🙂

Jungkook-ah...
Thank you
I mean it - thank you so much
Your support means a lot

You sound weird....
Is everything okay?

Everything is okay I think
I'm just really really really sorry for neglecting our friendship
😭
I've been a bad friend while I've been promoting

Oh I'm glad it's not more serious 😅
Don't be silly
I know you've been busy.
I saw the Inkigayo clip...
It was so surprising seeing you and your members bursting into tears so suddenly.
I can see this comeback meant a lot to you.
So don't feel guilty for having to focus on that.

Eugh, you're going to make me cry again

No don't!

I meant from happiness!
You're always so good to me...
And that also reminds me, thank you for the flowers 💛

I'm glad you like them.
Hope they helped brighten your day.

I'm going to make it up to you.
All the kindness you've shown me and for being so patient...
When are you returning to Seoul?

Oh?
We have a break from touring next week.

Perfect, I'm going to organise something.
Please look forward to it 😉

-&-

Jungkook let out a huge sigh of relief as he put his phone down after texting Lisa.
It had been a tense few weeks for him emotionally, not to even mention the physical and mental strains that touring put him through.
He had been messaging Lisa whenever he got a chance and tried to keep up the same frequency of communication that they had gotten used to, but after that unplanned kiss at Lisa's dorm, she had been quieter than usual and not her normal teasing self.
Jungkook had tortured himself into thinking at times that she had regretted the kiss, or even worse, that she hadn't wanted it to begin with. He was afraid to bring it up and ask her, scared that she would break off all ties with him, and she didn't mention it either.
Although they still hadn't addressed the kiss, he was at least reassured that she didn't want to end their friendship.
He ran a hand through his untamed hair - he could now go through the rest of his tour days with a lighter heart, looking forward to spending another day with Lisa again.