𝔞𝔫𝔤𝔢𝔩

Despite Jay indicating this weekend would be a casual hangout, you feel woefully unprepared for whatever he has planned. 

Yunjin and Jiyu use the event as a celebration, debating the validity of sundresses and eyeshadow shades at an hour where you can only blink awake and sip your mug of coffee. They ease your tumbling thoughts by their familiar chatter, their wide smiles and giggly comments acting as if this is a dream in motion. Yunjin encourages you to choose between a floral pink top you don’t remember buying or a navy blue sundress you keep meaning to wear but hangs in your closet anyway. You choose the dress in hopes of not being underdressed, but end up wearing sandals you’ve owned since high school. Jiyu swipes glittery powder across your cheeks, a self-made mixture from blazing lights and lengthy dress rehearsals she swears “makes every audience stare.” You’re not too dense that you can’t see her hidden meaning.

Fleetingly, you wonder if Jay could ever be happy settling for staring at you the rest of his life. After Wonbin’s…everything, you’re not too excited to find out.

Still, you know that choosing his invitation is an answer itself, and you can’t help but imagine the start of a wild, wonderful, unattainable thing as Yunjin fusses over curling your hair and Jiyu compares lip tint shades to the shade of your outfit. 

(Just this once, you let yourself dream.)

After a quick muffin for breakfast, you’re driving to Jay’s place, playing all your favorites on the way to ease your trembling nerves. You have no idea what you are doing, and yet you’re out here, traveling through neighborhoods in a completely different tax bracket than yours, trying something that your friends have seen you cry and shake over attempting again. 

You can’t lie, you’re a little proud of yourself.

You half expect there to be a gated entryway in front of Jay’s home, like in all those secret agent movies—but fortunately, there isn’t, just a city street leading to a boxy, modern apartment. You park in the connected parking lot as Jay’s earlier text instructs you, quietly mentioning your connection to Jay to the security guard manning the entrance.

You climb out, lock your car, and glance at your phone to memorize the number he kept in his directions as you figure out what door to open. Fortunately the design isn’t too hard to figure out, and you quickly find the one leading you into the general foyer. Jay is already waiting for you in the wide, polished room, wearing a dark green shirt with sleeves reaching to his elbows, a leather belt, and faded jeans. 

“Welcome, Y/N. I’m so glad you could make it.” He raises his eyebrows in acknowledgement of your outfit. “You clean up well.”

“Thanks. Yunjin and Jiyu insisted.” You step beside him, trying to drum up courage you don’t feel. “How was Italy?”

“Oh, it was wonderful. I swear, it gets more beautiful every year,” he replies. “I’ll have to take you sometime.”

You pause, curious why he had jumped to that as an option. “Sure, I guess?”

Jay doesn’t seem to think the remark anything out of the ordinary. Maybe it’s the rich boy version of being polite. He leads you to an elevator past the front desk and then types in a few numbers inside.

For a building with a cold, corporate vibe, Jay’s personal foyer holds a more comfortable design, complete with warm, textured wood flooring and several family pictures hanging in the entryway. You wonder if he’s influential enough to make some of his own adjustments to the architecture. 

“Feel free to leave your shoes and things, you don’t have to carry them around,” he tells you. “Kitchen first? I think you mentioned wanting to try something with zucchini.”

“Oh, yes!” you exclaim, setting down your purse and slipping off your sandals. “I just found a new zucchini brownie recipe I’m excited to try.” 

“Good,” he says, quietly leading you in front. “Whatever we need to make it, I already have available. I even asked Sunghoon if he knew of any fresh zucchini providers. Who knew he was such a vegetable enthusiast?”

It’s only halfway to him leading you to the kitchen that you realize he avoided a grand tour so you wouldn’t feel more out of place. Clever man. 

“How has your week been?” he asks.

“Okay. Nothing interesting,” you say, avoiding the temptation to bring up…well, whatever Wonbin was doing to chip at your sanity. It had felt like such a big thing while getting ready in your room, but it seems wherever Jay goes nothing else feels important. “Are you jetlagged at all?”

“I’m feeling it a bit, yeah. Maybe…a little more than usual?” He raises a hand to rub at his neck with a short laugh. “But I’m feeling better now. Thanks for asking.”

“Yeah, of course,” you murmur.

You’re expecting Chef Park’s home kitchen to look smooth, steel-plated, and intimidating in its industrial nature. You aren’t expecting to see an ordinary stove and microwave nestled in between light wood countertops and a humble white backsplash. Cabinets and floating shelves are scattered throughout the kitchen with piled cooking utensils. Six large zucchinis rest on one side of the counter next to a steel mixing bowl, some worn oven mitts, a tiny phone tripod, and a black hand mixer. The rest of the kitchen is taken up by a central granite counter, with hanging basket lights and cushioned barstools. 

“I have a lot of kitchens I work in, but this is my favorite,” he says. “When I was first starting my career I missed home a lot, so I tried to combine all the things I liked about it here.”

“You designed this kitchen, then?” you ask.

“A little bit,” he chuckles. “I left most of it to the professionals who actually know what they’re doing, but yes. I wanted it to feel like…warm. Some place I could come back to and feel well rested in.”

You think about the detailed way he brought his world into the private room of his restaurant, and imagine him bringing that same level of interest and care here. “That makes sense. You deserve a safe place to come home to, I think.”

“Thank you.” Jay’s response is quiet, but he seems touched. “So, you said you wanted to film something?”

“Yeah, I thought it could be fun. No script, like usual for fake baking content.” You smile. “I love that you brought out a tripod, you really thought this all out.”

“I like to be prepared.”

“I can tell.”

“What do you usually use, then? If not anything to set up your camera.”

“I’m not a real influencer, so I don’t put much effort in it,” you shrug. “I film on my phone and do edits and captions later. Yujin lets me use the fancy light she bought for her self shoots sometimes.”

“I couldn’t tell the difference.”

You bark a laugh. “You flatter me, truly. Anyway, it isn’t too hard to bake with zucchini. Let me grab a claw clip and apron, then watch and learn.”

“I’m under your instruction,” he smirks, and wow, a polite reply should not sound that hot.

“Good!” you grin, and spend the next half hour showing him the ins and outs of the recipe you’d downloaded on your phone, your and Jay’s faces carefully obscured as you film different clips. (Every so often, Jay playfully brings his eyes close to the camera, or breaks out in a delighted chuckle at the way you demonstrate a step, and you think you’re going to have to make an exception to your simple vlogging to include those elements.) The recipe itself is easy to create, and even through his mischievous behavior you can see Jay focusing closely on the recipe. You try not to notice how his gaze follows you moving around his kitchen searching for the right ingredients and utensils. (You wonder what he’s thinking.)

Finally, the brownies are in the oven, and Jay offers to give you a tour of the apartment after you’ve both cleaned up. Every inch of the apartment is very him—precise, sentimental, and thoughtful in a way that makes your heart warm. He requests some time for him to grab some things, and so you find yourself flopping on his dark green couch, the scent of dark cocoa wafting through the air.

He returns holding a beautiful mahogany guitar and a tiny plastic bag with a floral-tipped, cursive word on it. Wait, is that logo in Italian? 

“Ah, forgive me, I’ve never done something like this before,” he says, carefully setting the guitar against the couch cushions and sitting next to you, so close your knees brush up against each other. “But we have a bit until the brownies finish, so I figured this was the right time.”

“What are you saying?” you whisper. This close, you can count every tiny dimple in his smile. 

“What I’m saying is I’m a little in love with you,” he murmurs. 

Your lips part on a silent gasp.

 “I think I’ve been gone ever since I walked into that cafe where we met,” he adds. “You looked lovely, sitting where the light caught your hair. I was so lucky to learn you were even lovelier to know.”

“Oh,” you breathe.

“I’d like to make my intentions clear, and I apologize if they haven’t been before,” he continues. “I want you, Y/N. I want you to be in my life as more a friend I give business advice to and laugh with over coffee and wine. I can’t pretend I know what I’m doing. My schedule would make anyone hesitate, and I’m a little bit known everywhere I go, and I’ve never really given thought about having someone in my life. But you make me want to try. You make me want everything, Y/N, before I had a chance to realize it myself.”

He pauses, ears red, offering the small shopping bag with one hand.

“I got you something, when I was in Italy,” he says. “I saw it and I thought of you. You…don’t have to read into it, or answer anything before you’re ready. I just want you to have it.” 

Your brain starts to slip into hauntingly familiar thoughts of danger, caution, and cynicism. They sound suspiciously like Wonbin’s voice echoing in your ears, bringing back hurt and heartbreak and a dizzying, cutting ache of not being good enough.

You suck in a breath and ignore your mind for once, gently taking the bag and placing it in your lap.

“I want you too,” you tell him. “I know it’s fast and I know it’s unexpected but…you are just so easy to fall for, Jay.”

“I do? I mean, I am?” he stammers, blush spreading to the rest of his honey skin. 

You let out a bright, unrestrained laugh. “You always have been to me. I don’t know how any of this will work either. But you’re worth trying for, however you’ll have me.”

You’re worth the risk of getting my heart broken again, you don’t add.

His flustered expression gives way to a gentle, sweet, and entirely besotted smile. “It’s okay, we’ve got each other now, mmm? We’ll figure out things together.”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” you tell him. 

“I’m going to be so, so good to you, Y/N,” he declares in a low voice that makes your heartbeat flutter, and for a moment, you are struck by the steadiness in his promise. You hope with all your heart that he means it.

“You already are,” you murmur, finding it hard to look away from him. He’s like a dream in front of you: stunning and flushed and surprisingly yours. Curiosity about the present in your lap eventually wins though, and you reach into the shopping bag to bring out a tiny light blue gift box. 

You open the box to reveal a delicate gold necklace. The oval pendant has a stamped sunburst design, with a twinkling drop of amber in the middle. It’s gorgeous. It’s exactly what you would’ve picked out for yourself.

“Jay, wow, thank you,” is all you can say. “Help me put it on?”

He responds with a soft hum, immediately scooting closer to you to help. His fingers are gentle as he sweeps stray hairs away from your neck and connects the clasp.

“Pretty,” he mumbles as he lets go of the necklace.

“You too,” you manage to blurt. His eyes turn a deliciously darker shade of brown, and for a second you think he might lean over and kiss you.

He doesn’t, which is sweet of him but devastating for your heart. Instead, he grabs the neck of the guitar and rests it on his lap.

“We still have some time before the oven beeps,” he says. “Might I have the pleasure of serenading my girlfriend without a screen?”

You smile and think you’ve never felt more adored.

“Yes please,” you whisper.

Downtown is abuzz, springtime bringing out lifeforms in their fullest, humans on a leisurely stroll and vampires in their element, nightfall cast to upheave the sluggishness of day, canines bared and timeless beauty arresting. On the way to your destination, a concrete jungle of scaffolding and pets on leashes, you stop at an intersection. Cars zoom, traffic lights ticking down until they turn green again. The road, a blur of cars would usually have your attention, if not for the huge billboard plastered above the pizzeria and jazz bar just ahead. 

Pearl Bite: A bloodless white, a perfect smile. 

Your own faux canines show, tongue run beneath their point as your eyes dazzle at the advert. Specifically, the creator and model for Pearl Bite ─ your one and only boyfriend. 

College sweethearts, Sunghoon describes your romance as a sneaky attack on your behalf, nothing but his passion on his mind, only to be derailed. The brilliance of your smile, the heartiness of your laugh, your endless glow he couldn't shy away from. The next century is meant to build upon his newly-found interest in dentistry, open his own practice with amassed generational wealth and give back to his community. His initial plan only accounts for vampires, at the mercy of many cycled conversations of blood-stained fangs and how there's no vampire-equivalent for teeth-whitening. Then he meets you, unknowingly opens himself up more to the human experience, recognizes how they can differ vastly from his own, yet share so many similarities. 

You're the most selfless person he knows, a long-line of people served before you're last in line. Amongst the juggle of others' needs and aspirations, yours kind of included somewhere, he learns you're a product of everything you've ever loved and suffered from too. In the months passing too quick for his liking - still toeing the line of friendship(ish) - you bare yourself to him in the late night diner you work at. 

The one he walks you home from, drinks the shitty coffee because you've brewed it. The things vampires do for love.

In a dim corner booth, your chin perches on your folded arms, fingers drumming against a table you're yet to clean and are honestly too tired to at this point. It's been non-stop shifts packed into a never-ending semester, and whilst your job's meant to supplement your means of living, it also serves another purpose. 

"I owe my mom everything," you start, the bat of your lashes turning Sunghoon into a statue, knowing what's to come yet unsure. Uncertain how to proceed. "No matter how little we had to our name, she always made sure I was taken care of. That if one of us was happy, it was always me,"

Your nose twitches, eyes glossy with a sigh coming from trembling lips. A vague crack sounds in his chest. 

He wishes his hand had the kind of warmth you'd lean into. 

"Losing her best friend, and in a way, losing me ─ has brought her to her knees," your fingers drum, pupils shaking as you will your tears to only exist before your waterline. "I'm doing as much as I can, but there's only so much to do from across the country. I can't check in on her and the house between lectures, I can't pay for anything medical other than some lousy insurance, I can't transfer that weight to myself,"

"Because at least then, it wouldn't be her burden to bear." 

The welled emotions in your chest demand you to straighten, more space for lungs to expand and when stray tears fall, you can only exhale, elbows propped to the table to wipe them away. Your hand falls to the surface in perfect timing, searing skin meeting a cool, steady palm. You're just as still as him, the thump of your heart felt in Sunghoon's fingertips, all the way through to his ears ringing with its race. Only empathy occupies him, remnants of a life before immortality tethering you two together by more than held hands, the quiet compassion he delivers sticking with you forever. 

Time has since passed, that corner booth a bittersweet memory. In spite of long-carried pain, you and your mom see brighter days ─ graduation, your first adult job, the return of her smile. Depression has a way of mystifying the future ahead of you, the present clouded in miserable, inescapable grey clouds. To push on takes all the more effort, so things start to give ─ sleep, appetite and the wither of everything else. While she's managed to pick herself up by the aid of you and others, your mom still holds a keepsake she'd rather do without. A dimmed smile you're doing your best to help restore. But in a household where annual doctor's trips are rare, the luxury doesn't come easy. And by the time you're examining what other expenses to cut back on, Sunghoon pitches his latest project. 

Pearl Bite, for humans and vampires alike. 

Endless trials, modifications, moulds that have bitten the dust and brave participants that bring his dream into fruition. Only now, his dream accounts for not only you, but your mother. Additional modules and clinicals to fit in the study of human teeth, revitalizing the last part of a past your mother is moving forward from. And when everything's said and done, your mother instinctively cowers from the mirror before she weeps, holding onto Sunghoon with a life force as gratitude soaks into his white coat. In the corner, his eyes find you, the water-lined tears in your eyes like then, now reflecting the kind of appreciation and love he knows is priceless. 

Pearl Bite takes off, his humble practice fighting to accommodate for the onslaught of patients he tries helping. People come from far and wide, all with a story that picks at their nails and prompts reluctance when it comes time for Sunghoon's inspection. Overbites, plaque, shaven-down fangs, blood stains ─ the list goes on. However, their reluctance is all but forgotten once he commits himself to their well-being, a sigh of relief filling his mask before he hands over what feels like a magic mirror, sorrow turning into happiness. One practice isn't enough, not for endless clients, or aspiring dentists with the same aspirations. Multiple dot themselves across the country, his time split between sights he flies to (your stomach still drops whenever both your feet leave the ground). He has a line of products, an alternative solution for those he cannot meet and to no surprise, it takes off. You climb your own career ladder, finding something just as meaningful and building your life together with the man who saved yours and your mother's smile. 

His practice bustles as it always does, a mixture of clients flipping through magazines or sharing stories in the waiting room. To his assistance, you wave, your presence always welcome when your schedules align. In the hall leading to his office, your head nods at more waiting patients, smile brimmed in manner with a glance at the clock. 

It's feeding time. 

A flutter in your chest disturbs the peace you've maintained for the day's majority, current sparked as your palm meets the door handle of his office, shallowly pulled to the side only to let yourself in. No one occupies the dental unit, spotlight tucked away with the space sterilised and clean, its sleek hues of white, grey and muted baby blue burrowing comfort in your chest. Attempts to slow the rabbit Sunghoon hears, a heartbeat so attuned to he forgoes his inventory count and goes to filter back into the main room, surprise alight in his eyes as he's urged back. 

"I didn't know you were coming," his voice carries the sentiment, the half-hearted draw of his inventory's door schemed behind you. 

Innocence brims in your smile nonetheless, arms strung around him as his hands fall to your waist, steady and firm. 

"You forgot your dinner."

"Dinner?" a lone eyebrow raises, the slope of his nose in full view as his head turns to the mini fridge metres away. "I should have enough blood bags for─" 

Your nails rake through his nape hairs once and for all, stepping back before you haul yourself on the counter space he'd been working so diligently on, showcasing the dinner he's seemingly left behind.

You. 

No one would bat an eyelash at the length of your skirt, a conservative length if not for an extra long stride ─ the cross of your legs ─ where skin reveals itself, blemishing with incessant teeth marks, beard burn and a mouth pulling into a disbelieving smile as you reveal yourself to him, making sure to crane your neck enough to hint at the location of his last feed. 

"So," mischief lives in the lines of your smirk, your own canines peeking through in an ask. "Will you finish what you started?" 

With centuries spent living amongst vampires and humans, you'd think Sunghoon would have some know-how. Predict the patterns humans have made of themselves, ingrained in wired DNA passed down from generation to generation. Yet, you always seem to surprise him. Bring the disbelieving and amused laughter out his huffing chest, his proximity drawn closer as his hands staple on either side of your thighs, skirt material bunched in your lap, goosebump-riddled from the arctic temperature of his office. 

His eyes burn with a dial of lust, iris colouring into a wine hue before his pupils swallows the field whole, gaze flickered between your eyes and lips. 

"This is risky," he notes, nosing along your jaw. The instinct to give your neck away wears him down more than you'll know. "Anyone could come in and see us. Hear us," 

He deserts the raised skin trail he's created from slight grazes alone, satisfaction on his lips as he creates space to marvel at the mess you're boiling down to. 

"But that's what gets you off, right?" his fangs show, his grin too amused and cocky to shield them, his head tilted to only emphasis his point. "Just can't keep your pretty moans to yourself." 

Air fills your lungs through a nasal inhale, chest slumping with a gulp audible to your own ears. You'd waltzed in here first, you can't lose control just yet. 

You bring yourself closer to the counter's edge, skirt riding up further to expose hints of lace, knowing it'll do nothing but torment him. Taunt him as his canine and lower teeth toy with an inner piece of his check, restraint tested.

"Come on, you haven't fed in days," he's standing straighter, hands off the counter. He's close enough though, the perfect distance for your leg to hook at his lower back and draw him in, your hand waiting before his length eventually throbs in your palm, your grin a work of sin as you peer up at him with dark magic eyes. "I know you're hungry." 

Control is commanded, and to some extent, Sunghoon submits. Lets you carry out your charade, allows the concept of power to exist in your frame of mind. However, deep down, you both know. Undeterred, Sunghoon lets you palm his growing erection, smirking like it doesn't turn him on. Like he doesn't give your hand one grind, starved for friction. 

His hand raises to outline the shell of your ear with his fingertip, pleased with the shiver erupting down your spine. 

"Funny how blood and sex are so intertwined," he leads, voice husky as his eyes fall to yours again, standing their ground. "For you, especially."

It's meant to be a call out. In some measure, you suffer from its consequences, prickly skin and heated cheeks. However, you've been with Sunghoon long enough to quit playing shy. You plan to spend eternity with him too, it's only natural you reward him with your honesty.

"It's another layer of intimacy," the sweetness of your words juxtapose your actions, palm firm against his shaft as your thumb glides over his tip in sweet, torturous motions, smile stretching at the waver of his breath. You cock your head, a call for attention. "Wouldn't you agree?"

He's close like this now, shuffled to you in a tighter circle of your hooked legs, the column of his throat licked. The grain of stubble against your tongue hums your pleasure into his skin, his own mirrored sound coming when your teeth nibble on the teased skin.

"Hmph," he groans, losing focus. Losing to you. "I do, but my mind can't help but wonder," 

Further words peaks your interest, Sunghoon's hand settling across your neck, face further away as he handles you for his viewing pleasure. His other set of knuckles push his glasses up his nose bridge, chin lifted as he looks at you through low eyes, the quiet but hard thump of your pulse meeting the pad of his thumb.

"If it's the euphoric high you're starved for," Sunghoon's thumb moves over the tender skin, thump gaining traction as you attempt withstanding his complete read of you. "Or maybe it's the slight pain," 

Through the time you've known Sunghoon, you've only ever known him to be humble. No matter what feat he reaches, trait or skill he posses and displays, he'll pretend as if it's not his own. Won't gloat, won't brag ─ except for times like these. 

When he's got you right where he wants, his fangs pinpoint on your skin between the fan of his thumb, your heartbeat the equivalent of being chased. 

You hear his smirk first before you see it, space created again as his eyes cannot be without your sight for too long. 

"Which one is it?"

The hand that'd been palming him arrests the counter's edge, knuckles burning white in an act of self-restraint. Control you're being frayed to abandon, a harsh run of your tongue on the back of your teeth as your other leg hooks behind him, nowhere to hide as your hip roll to meet his, a grind you see chipping away at him.

Pressure adds to the grasp on your neck ─ a test to you too. 

"Wouldn't you like to know." 

Again, that almost incredulous yet amused chuckle meets your ears, this time more mocking as Sunghoon's tongue pokes his inner cheek, his eyes bleeding over with an intensity you've only been anticipating.

"I'll find out either way," one corner of his lip lifts, small but all-knowing. "Spread your legs." 

The last thing you'll do is indulge him, even if your body aches for him in the worst way ─ bone deep, lust sinking in your body like an anchor. You're already pressed against him, the friction of few layers a blessing in disguise for someone as insatiable as you are. This, you can do with. The same can't be said for Sunghoon, who in the questioning look he gives you, your smile extends ─ a slice of heaven and a lot of hell. 

"What's with the attitude?" he chuckles, one last squeeze against the sides of your neck to make you squeak. The departures paves the way for his impatience, enough strength to pry your crossed ankles apart. "Didn't you want this all along? Treated the way you are in my office because you couldn't wait?"

You can't compete against an immortal, his strength bending your body to his will, thighs braced against the arctic counter top. Spread to his liking. 

"Ah, that's why," it's the second time in such little time you've heard him smirk, a more evil moon crescent shape to his eyes as he marvels between your legs. Specifically, the wetness that's soaked through the flimsy fabric. "It's okay, I want you just as much." 

A gentle kiss is pressed to your forehead, because your ego has its' moments, bruising like a peach. You could huff, turn away from the supposed affection he gives you, but he's quicker. A peck to the tip of your nose and happiness in the light chuckle he does afterwards. 

Then, when you're looking at him again, albeit reluctantly, he smiles regardless. Cups your cheeks, holding you as if porcelain and kisses you. Soft and pillowy, lingering to savour the simple press of flesh, a slow and sweet swirl back into desire. Melting in his cold grasp, you move in patterns known to each other, the audacity to start pulling away breathing a snicker between your lips, his smile against your lips after he's chased them, your own introduced moments later. 

He picks you apart in the most delicate way, undoing you with adoring kisses and assured hands, consuming you with every breath he steals, hands of desperation hinging themselves against his arms. Sunghoon kisses you as if it's your last, with deeper meaning coming from the lifetimes he's lived, your bottom lip between his teeth as he tugs gently. 

A move applicable to everyone. Doing its worst to you. 

While other teeth tease, his fangs threaten, a harsher skim against the flesh your breath hitches at, a swipe of his tongue meant to soothe, only to fuel the fire burning in you. 

While his hands no longer cradle your face, he kisses you without fault. Pouring affection into the tender overlap of lips, the only thing you manage to do is lift your hips as his hands tug your panties down your legs, tucked away in his back pocket as a souvenir. If you weren't so dazed, you'd make fun of him, like when you'd felt his cock kick when you'd started kissing, the venture of your tongue making him sigh a stuttered breath. 

Smacked lips and laboured breaths no longer only occupy the office/closet space, abundance of slick lapped up on the span of two fingers, the most piled on Sunghoon's fingertips as they tease your entrance, thumb doing slow circles against your clit. 

Fingers carding through his hair, your breath stutters in his mouth. Whines and huffed whimpers bleed into his kiss-stained lips as his fingers push in with no resistance, welcomed as your walls conform to their shape. He stretches you with the scissors of his fingers, the stretch simmering with a touch of discomfort, grinding down to blooming pleasure as you yield, his fingers 'curl pushed into the spot making you see stars. 

"Think I'll give your thighs a break," Sunghoon whispers, your tongue dipped into the curve of his lips. "All those hickeys and beard burn can't be good for you ─ too much friction," 

"N-not enough," you wail, running feverishly hot and without any care, bucking your hips helplessly. "Want ─ more." 

"I've made you such a greedy thing, haven't I?" he murmurs, humming at all the sounds you reward him with ─ vulnerable moans, sloppy kisses you try giving but it's no use. You're gone, in too deep to realise the moment you'd walked into his office, your fate had been sealed. 

Other points deserve attention, is Sunghoon's thought process as he leaves your lips with one last slow kiss, saliva strung between your quivering lips before he peppers his way down your chin, up the curve of your jaw and stops right below your earlobe. You know where he'll go next and it sends a buzz through your every cell, makes you tremble and shake. And before your brain can catch up to the signs, Sunghoon knows too.

Hears the chaos of your heart, the disarray of your pulse and plays along.

"Haven't even got to your neck and you're leaking all over my fingers," he muses, a peck smacked onto the dipped skin before his teeth catch onto the fleshy part, a fang punctured close to where your lone piercing is. An automatic response is relayed by your body. "Squeezing them for all their worth, huh?"

Lolled to the side, a partial part in purpose but the other because your head's swarmed in haziness, twice its weight from Sunghoon consuming you, his non-beating heart having the decency to not prolong your long-awaited ask. He descends, inches but makes his way with the tread of his teeth down your neck column. 

"What happened to that little attitude of yours, sweet girl?" he asks, the squelch and twitch of your body unearthing a rarity in condescending nature. "Did I fingerfuck it out of you, hm? You wanna be my good girl now?"

You nod hard enough to feel the jumble of your brain, cut up into pieces and free-floating in your zero-gravity headspace. 

"You know nods won't do," he's there. The exact spot he feeds from, and it's maddening. The release of adrenaline, the rabbit chase your heart does, nails scraping into marble. 

He noses along the mark, a momentary pause noting how gone he is for you too, intoxicated at the mere scent of your blood before everything crumbles, his willpower the only thing standing as he pries away, looking you in your eyes as he says, 

"Let me hear you say it, princess." 

"I'll─I'll be good," the words slosh in your mouth, lips pressed to muffle your desperate squeaks. "I just─just let me come please?" 

"I'm no animal," dark laughter licks up your spine, stuck in its slouch as Sunghoon's rhythm picks up, fingertips knocking deepest in you, your jaw pried open in silent surprise. "I couldn't deprive you if I tried." 

"Come on, sweet girl," he comes closer, fresh linen scent engulfing you as a kiss lays upon your temple. "The quicker you let go, the faster you get my cock." 

The quicker he'll feed. 

The mere thought is almost like magic, contracting your walls in an impossible squeeze as the coil in your stomach sizzles at the tips of your toes, shooting up to burst through every avenue ─ every pore ─ of your body. Detonating right in the palm of his hand, he kisses your wails away until they subside, fingers working you until you're twitchy and overly sensitive, glossy eyed yet itching to unbutton his slacks. 

"Impatience will get you hurt," is his later comment, letting you mess with the buckle of his belt, metallic clashes resonating through the room. Dripping more slick onto his office counter. "So rushed when you'll struggle taking me."

The last notch of his zipper sounds louder than the rest, your head snapped in his direction. "Now, that you can't mock me for," 

Your eyes drop down to the heavy bulge imprinting through his briefs and slacks, hoping his eyes follow along. 

"I take your literal monster cock like a champ, thank you." 

"Give or take." 

You kiss your teeth, knowing better but still cursing at him in your head.

"Whatever," your eyes roll, pushing enough of his waistband down to get your hand around his cock. Barely, but it's not of the essence. What is is the need his tip heats with, generous precome beaded in his slit your thumbs runs over. A hiss releases in spite of his efforts, met with the cockiness of your grin. "You're the one who needs me here," 

"Blood bags only taste so good," you drawl, pulling him out to get a better handle of his length. Head ducked to dribble spit on his skin as makeshift lube, enveloped by your palm in a mixture with precome as your hand comes up and twists up his veined shaft. Now it's his turn for braced hands on the counter's edge, his grip strong enough to snap the marble in two. The thought ignites lightning in your stomach. 

Your mouth gets the chance for payback ─ hovering over the shell of his pointed one, a lapsed breath released in the anticipation of your words. The slow, tight jerk of your hand. "And none can get you off, so…" 

A huff of defeat ─ still humoured ─ sounds past your shoulder, Sunghoon's back muscles flexing through the white coat ruffling as he pushes off the table, hair slicked back back as his fingers run through dark strands, his pale features accented with a pretty rosy tint. 

Lips swollen with kisses. Skin glittering in the low light.

"You're annoying," his hands swats away yours, his focal point you as your figure reflects in the honey sweet hue of his eyes. "I love you." 

"Love you t─ah!"

Sunghoon had knocked your knees further apart, lined himself with your entrance and now, starts to slide his length in. Ever since your last orgasm, you'd hinged on his counter for the moment his cock would stretch you out, but even if your eyes blindly followed his shifts, you'd got lost in his confession. The sheer honesty and sincerity brimming in his eyes as he said so, his last words to you before you reconnect again as one. 

A frantic hand jumps to secure yourself on one plane of his shoulder, a sharp inhale sucking in all frigid air of his office into your shaken lungs, the bitten back moan he lets slip flooding the glide of his length, inches sparingly used. Yet the thought of being split open remains alive and well. 

"You're good, you can take it." 

It's one of his sentences that doesn't reek of condescension, the kind of sugary encouragement you can't help but want to do your best for, relying on your practiced methods of breathing and trying to relax. Except to accommodate to his size, you're gripping and adjusting, depleting his ability to be gentle with you. In the adjustments you make, one sentence lurks in the misty halls of his mind as he only gives as much as you can take, a hand and grazed-thumb on your hip to ground you. 

"What I'd do to stuff your hole full of me right now…"

Luckily, he doesn't have to do anything. Living up to your words, the inches continue to disappear, the sorest sight for his centuries-vision filled eyes, shoulders coming down in relief with a mouth ajar. Your hand's over the lower half of your stomach, not exposed by your shirt, but Sunghoon knows. 

You feel him there. 

"Remind me," he huffs, stalling for your adjustment, the stretch as delicious as it is a dance around torture. "You take what like a champ?"

Sunghoon gets a kick out of it, this you already know. Somehow, it still makes your jaw tick, the weight cramped in you, making friends with your lower stomach is colossal, enough for an eye twitch and a sharp head turn in his direction.

"Your cock," every word spoken has a letter with a centre part, the disapproving head shake you do continued as your hips shift, leaking tip grinding up into the spongy spot you keen at. "Now move, before I fuck you." 

Sunghoon's sorely mistaken. Painfully hard, yet he still continues ─ cat and mouse game too good to give up. 

"All bark, no bite," he muses, eyes in false moon crescent, hips pulling back to offload the fill of your entrance. "Leave that to the real vampire, huh?" 

Of course he'd leave you with that. Provide you some relief before he eases back into you again, grin shit-eating but eyes attentive, making sure this is pleasurable for you, to which it becomes. Accommodation is never easy, no matter how frequently you fuck, but he makes every grit of your teeth worth it. Falls into slow deep breaths you unknowingly follow and unwind with, moves his cock in and out at any pace you're comfortable with kisses you through it all, praises seared into the skin his lips meet.

A tempo builds, meek whimpers whispered into the hollow of his neck now barely contained moans. Your arms form a loose circle around his shoulders, the groans and whines he saves for your ears swirling a sickening pit of lust in your stomach.

"If only─hmph," you struggle, nails pressing into the fabric of his coat. "You put your mouth to better, fuck ─ use."

Past your ear, his laugh is bright. "You're bewitched,"

The smack of his pelvis against the back of your thighs teases your own teeth into his shoulder, whimpers releasing instead. 

"Are my fangs all I'm good for?"

Turns out, you have your own timing. Comedic timing, it seems, because when you pry from him, mourning the loss of his cool skin, your eyes peer down between your legs. At the cock he uses with you as priority, a simmered sensation you unwind to, wetness drenching his length as the faint bulge of his tip makes itself known. 

"You're good for other things too."

"Unbelievable," you hear your partner laugh, light and breathy because he's so fine-tuned to the human experience, large hands setting themselves up firm against your hips. "Now, if you will, let me do for what I'm good for."

Like you've always known him to be, he prides himself on his craft, making good of his word as he starts pistoning into you, the grind of his pelvis notching against your clit to make you squeal, his shoulders fastened to as the back of your thighs echo with your indecency. You're choking on moans, trying to keep noise to a minimal, but how can you when your vampire boyfriend knows you best? Knows what angle generates current in your body, what pace has you doubling over, holding him because the building pleasure is too immense for how contained your body feels? Knows when to flip the switch with you, the grounding presence you need or the kind that presses you into the ground. 

"My perfect girl," he murmurs, a soothing hand cascading down the back of your head. "I'll never get over how good you feel." 

He isn't the former for long, sheep's skin shed when your eyes start glossing over, legs hooked round his waist with your toes curled, tears of ecstasy saturating his coat's shoulder. How can he when you're basically offering yourself to him, enough distance created for your hands to support you from behind, neck craned for his taking. 

"Is this what you're into?" he asks, the outline of his body unfair under layers of clothing as his cock stuffs you full. "Do you fantasize about being feed on because you feed off the pleasure and pain?" 

You could consider his question, answer truthfully wherever it lies. However, you're a bit preoccupied. The one or two things he's good for working against you, reducing you to a worthless pile of mush, the same matter made of your brain, melted and spilling out your ears, hearing stifled. 

"Answer me." 

Your throat works, suddenly so dry with a swallow for saliva to quench some thirst, vision fuzzy as you fight off the impending doom. 

Not now, not yet. 

"Yes," you respond. "I'm into it because─" 

He notches himself with a particular force, one you do a withered whimper at, pupils shaking as they blow over your iris' ring. 

"Because it's with you," your hand's on his jaw, holding him firm as you add on. "I have a you fetish." 

"Fuck," there's a hitch in Sunghoon's thrusts, a slight hiccup when he disintegrates at your words, head hung only to come back up with the brightest smile on his face. The one you could spend eternity looking at. "You're such a tease." 

"A pretty, sloppy, needy─" emphasis in his stupidly seductive tone matches with the brute of his thrusts, concentrated and attuned to what'll make you break. "─tease." 

Against your forehead, his own falls, a kiss shared as his low body temperature attempts to dial back yours, the coil in your stomach too hot for you to function.

"Good thing you're close because I am too," he nods, one last kiss before he asks. "Do I have the honours?"

It's one of the easiest yes' you'll utter. 

"Always." 

What you could compare the initial seconds of Sunghoon feeding from you to is a piercing. The clamminess of your palms, an escalated heart rate even if you'd mentally prepared for the moment and eyes incapable of focusing. To gain it back, your only function boils down to managing your breaths as anticipation itches beneath your skin.

Then, it happens. 

A momentary flicker of pain, sharpened enamel piercing through skin and sinking, nestling where no vitals are endangered. It's minor, so minor it's forgotten the second after it's felt, the burst of euphoria incomprehensible. Words fail to explain the phenomenon, amounting to a standard you're on a constant chase for, bewitched as Sunghoon so lovingly puts it, him just the same ─ if not worse off ─ as he shamelessly moans at the taste, the vague waft of blood's metallic scent replaced with the blanket of his linen scent. 

Blood and sex are so intertwined, mentioned previously by Sunghoon. And while he'd said this in response to you, the words ring truest for him, a broken moan vibrating into your skin as his hips start rutting, erratic as he surges towards his orgasm. His priority forever and always, he wedges his hand between your bodies, your clit played with to bring you to a similar pace, something like come coating your walls as you squeeze his cock one last time, a cry from your lips before you come undone. 

Eventually, he relents, having had his fill with a pry he holds your body up for, still dazed from the aphrodisiac-like remedy in his venom to seal your skin together. When the world stops moving in separate circles, you catch sight of his fangs, coated in the rich crimson of your blood, only having the energy for a lazy smile before he sorts you two out. An eventual knock echoes at his door, Sunghoon spitting the last of Pearl Bite toothpaste out his mouth, fangs like brand new as you two feign normalcy. 

Like he hadn't fed from you, or how his vampire-equivalent to come isn't leaking between your crossed thighs. 

Just another day at Sunghoon's practice. 

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Jake's fork scraped against the plate, a grating sound that made Jay wince. It had been sitting there for the better part of three minutes, trapped between Jake's fingers and the congealing remains of his pasta. His hand was still. His eyes were open, but barely.

"Dude." Nothing. Jay kicked him under the table.

Jake jerked upright, blinking hard. The fork clattered onto the plate. "What?"

"You were asleep." Jay leaned forward, arms crossing over his chest. 

"I wasn't!" Jake rubbed his face with both hands, pressing his palms into his eyes hard enough that Jay could see the pressure whiten his knuckles. When he dropped them, his eyes were red-rimmed and unfocused. "I'm awake."

"You were holding a fork and drooling," Jay said. There was something almost gentle underneath the bluntness, the kind of concern that came out sideways because saying it straight felt too vulnerable.

"I wasn't drooling."

"You were definitely drooling." Sunghoon hadn't looked up from his phone. He was scrolling through something, thumb moving in lazy circles, but Jake knew he was paying attention. Sunghoon always paid attention, even when he pretended not to.

Jake looked down at his plate like he was trying to remember how it had gotten there. His pasta was half-eaten, pushed around more than consumed. The garlic bread sat untouched, cooling into something dense and unappetizing. He'd ordered it specifically because Jay told him to eat something with actual calories in it, and now it was just taking up space, another small failure in a series of them. The café around them hummed with the low murmur of conversation, the hiss of the espresso machine, the scrape of chairs against tile. It smelled like burnt coffee and something sweet that had been sitting under the heat lamp too long. The afternoon light slanted through the windows in pale, exhausted streaks, and Jake felt every bit as wrung out as the day looked.

Jay was still staring at him. "When's the last time you slept?"

"Last night."

"For how long?"

Jake didn't answer right away. He picked up his water glass instead, drank from it slowly, buying time. The ice had melted into pale slivers, and the water tasted faintly metallic. He could feel both of them watching him, waiting, and the weight of their attention made his shoulders want to curl inward.

"Jake."

"I don't know. A few hours."

"A few hours." Jay repeated it like he was testing the words, seeing if they sounded any less absurd the second time. He looked at Sunghoon, who finally glanced up from his phone, expression unreadable but pointed. "That's what we're calling it now?"

"It's fine," Jake said, and even he didn't believe it.

"You're falling asleep into your lunch. That's not fine." Jay's voice had gone quieter, which was somehow worse than if he'd yelled. Yelling, Jake could brush off. This careful, deliberate concern was harder to ignore.

Jake set the glass down too carefully, concentrating on not spilling it. His hands weren't shaking, but they weren't steady either. "I'm just tired."

"Yeah, no shit."

Sunghoon pocketed his phone, which was when Jake knew this had escalated past casual worry into something heavier. Sunghoon only put his phone away entirely when things were serious, when he needed both hands free or both eyes focused. He didn't say anything yet, just watched Jake with that patient, unblinking attention that made people confess things they hadn't meant to. It was the same look he'd had two years ago when Jake had finally admitted the night terrors had started, the same look he'd had last semester when Jake showed up at his door at three in the morning because he couldn't be alone in his apartment anymore.

Jake looked away first.  "You're both looking at me like I'm about to keel over."

"You literally just fell asleep holding a fork," Jay said. "We're a little worried."

"I'm fine." The words came out automatic, reflexive, the same thing he'd been saying for weeks now. Months, maybe. He'd lost track.

"You're not fine. You look like shit." Jay said it bluntly. 

Jake's mouth twitched, almost a smile. "Thanks."

"I'm serious." Jay leaned forward, elbows on the table, and his sandwich sat forgotten beside him, half-wrapped and leaking sauce onto the paper. "When's the last time you actually slept through the night?"

Jake looked toward the window, where a couple of students were walking past with their backpacks slung over one shoulder, laughing about something he couldn't hear. The world outside looked normal. He wondered what that felt like.

"I don't know," he said finally, because the truth was he genuinely couldn't remember. The nights had started blurring together sometime around midterms, a smear of dark hours and fragmented sleep and waking up with his heart trying to punch through his ribs.

"Weeks?" Sunghoon asked.

"Maybe." Jake picked up his fork again, stabbed a piece of pasta, and put it in his mouth without tasting it. Chewed. Swallowed. The motion was mechanical, something to fill the silence with other than the answer they wanted.

Then Jay sighed, the kind of exhale that said he'd made a decision. "We can stay over tonight."

"No." The word came out faster than Jake meant it to, sharp enough that the girl at the table next to them glanced over.

"You're not fine, and you know it. We can just crash on your couch. You don't even have to talk to us. We'll bring food, we'll stay out of your way, we'll just be there."

"I said no." Jake's grip on his fork tightened, knuckles going white. He could feel the panic starting to creep up the back of his throat, that familiar tightness that came whenever someone got too close to the truth of how bad it had gotten. They'd stayed over before, back when the night terrors first started, back when he still thought they might go away on their own. They'd seen him wake up gasping, seen him cry without knowing why, seen him stumble out of his bedroom at four in the morning looking like he'd been through a war. But that was years ago, and he'd gotten better at hiding it since then, better at managing it alone. Or he thought he had. Recently, though—

The sharpness in his own voice surprised him, and the table went quiet. Jay sat back, jaw tight, that muscle jumping near his ear the way it did when he was biting back something he wanted to say.

"We've done this before," Jay said, softer now, and there was something almost pleading in it. "It's not a big deal."

"It is to me," Jake said. His voice came out quieter than he meant, almost lost under the ambient noise of the café. 

"Why?"

Jake didn't answer. He couldn't. His throat had gone tight, and swallowing felt like work. He could tell them that the night terrors had changed, that they weren't just bad anymore but unbearable, that he'd started dreading sleep the way some people dreaded plane crashes or terminal diagnoses. He could tell them that last week he'd woken up on his bedroom floor with no memory of how he got there, that two nights ago he'd woken up screaming so loud his neighbor had knocked on the door to make sure he was okay. He could tell them he was afraid that if they stayed over and saw how bad it really was, they'd look at him differently, like he was broken in a way that couldn't be fixed.

Sunghoon spoke before Jay could push further. "We've seen each other at our lowest. You know that, right? I mean it. Jay cried for two hours when his dog died sophomore year. I had food poisoning so bad I couldn't get off the bathroom floor. You held my hair back while I puked into your toilet. None of us are keeping score."

Jay nodded, picking up the thread. "We're not going to judge you for having a bad night. Or a bad week. Or however long this has been going on. We've been there before, remember? You've let us stay over when it got bad. This isn't new."

"It's different now," Jake said, the words coming out before he could stop them.

"Different how?"

Jake set the fork down. His hands disappeared under the table, into his lap, where they could curl into fists without anyone seeing. "I don't want you there when it happens."

Jay frowned, leaning forward slightly. "When what happens?"

"The—" Jake stopped. His jaw clenched hard enough that it ached. "You know."

"The night terrors," Sunghoon said, not a question, just a statement of fact.

Jake flinched. He nodded once, a sharp, reluctant jerk of his head, and hated how small it made him feel.

"We've dealt with those before too," Jay said. There was something almost desperate in the reassurance, like if he just said the right thing, Jake would let them help.

"Not like this." Jake's voice was flat, drained of inflection.

"What do you mean, not like this?" Jay asked, and he sounded genuinely confused, like he couldn't fathom what could be worse than what they'd already seen.

Jake shook his head slowly. "It's worse. It's been worse.” He stopped again, exhaled hard through his nose, the breath shaking slightly on the way out. "I don't want you to see it." 

Jay wanted to push. Jake could feel it, the way you could feel a storm building on the horizon. But instead, Jay just exhaled slowly and said, "Okay."

Jake's head snapped up. "What?"

"Okay. We'll drop it." Jay picked up his sandwich, unwrapped it the rest of the way with deliberate, careful movements.

Jake blinked, caught off guard. They never dropped it. Jay especially never dropped it. "Really?"

"Yeah." Jay took a bite, chewed, swallowed, all while maintaining eye contact. "But you're still texting us when you get home."

"Fine," Jake muttered, because arguing would take more energy than he had, and besides, he could always just... not text them. They'd be annoyed, maybe, but they wouldn't actually show up. Probably.

"Good," Jay said, and some of the tension bled out of his shoulders. He took another bite of his sandwich, and the conversation shifted, drifted toward safer territory. Sunghoon mentioned an assignment he was procrastinating on, something about a group project where half the group wasn't pulling their weight. Jay started complaining about a show he'd been watching, talking too fast the way he always did when he got excited about something, gesturing with his half-eaten sandwich in a way that made the guy at the next table lean slightly away.

Jake contributed when prompted, but his answers were short, distracted. His eyes kept losing focus, drifting toward the window or the middle distance, pulled somewhere else entirely. The exhaustion sat behind his eyes like a physical weight, dragging at him, making his thoughts feel slow and thick. He picked at his pasta without eating it, moved the garlic bread from one side of his plate to the other, drank his water in small, measured sips. The conversation washed over him like white noise, familiar and distant at the same time.

By the time Jay flagged down their server and paid the check, Jake looked worse than when they'd arrived. The brief nap, if you could even call it that, hadn't helped. If anything, it had made him look more wrung out, like his body had tasted rest and resented being denied it. His eyes were heavier now, lids drooping despite his best efforts to keep them open. His face had that grayish tint that came from too many sleepless nights strung together, the kind of exhaustion that went bone-deep.

Outside, the late afternoon air was cool, almost cold, carrying the first real bite of autumn. Jake shoved his hands into his jacket pockets and hunched his shoulders against the wind, which cut through the fabric like it wasn't there. The sun was already starting to sink, casting long shadows across the pavement, and Jake felt a familiar dread settle in his stomach. Another few hours until he'd have to decide whether to sleep or keep himself awake, whether to face what waited for him in his dreams or suffer through another night of forced consciousness.

He didn't say goodbye, just nodded once in their general direction and started walking in the direction of his apartment, his stride a little uneven, his gait slower than usual. He could feel their eyes on his back, the weight of their concern following him down the block, but he didn't turn around.

────୨ৎ────

The file lands in your assignment queue at 11:47 PM, which is typical. They always send the hard cases at night, like the timing will soften the blow.

You open it. Male, early twenties, severe night terrors since adolescence, chronic insomnia, three previous guardians rotated off due to lack of progress. Of course. You scroll down. History of sleep avoidance, documented panic attacks during REM cycles, persistent nightmares characterized by looping scenarios and high-intensity fear response. The notes from the previous guardians are clinical, but you can read between the lines.

You close the file and stare at the ceiling of the archive room.

Jungwon is sitting across from you, already reading through his own assignment with that focused, unbothered expression he always has. He's been a guardian longer than you have, but somehow he still manages to look peaceful about it, like this work hasn't worn him down to raw nerves and resentment yet. You don't know how he does it. 

"What did you get?" you ask, even though you already know the answer won't make you feel better.

He glances up, blinking like he's surfacing from deep water. "Eight-year-old. Scared his teeth are falling out. The adult ones are coming in, and he keeps dreaming they all come loose at once."

You stare at him. "That's it?"

"Well, there's some anxiety around the dentist, and his parents recently divorced, so there's probably some underlying fear of instability manifesting as—"

"And mine," you interrupt, because if you let him finish that sentence you're going to scream, "is a twenty-something with severe night terrors, chronic insomnia, and a history of three failed guardian rotations."

"That does sound difficult," he says, and he means it, which somehow makes it worse.

"Difficult." You laugh, sharp and humorless. "That's one word for it."

"What would you prefer?"

"Impossible. A waste of my time." You open the file again, skim the details you've already read twice. The previous guardians left notes. Dreamer exhibits extreme resistance to standard interventions. Nightmares intensify with direct contact. Recommend specialized assignment, which is code for we couldn't handle this, so we're passing it to someone who can.

That someone is always you.

"Have you asked for reassignment?" Jungwon asks, and his voice is careful, gentle, like he's trying not to spook you.

"To what?" You don't look at him. You're still reading, even though you've memorized every word by now. "Another hard case? They'll just give me something equally bad. Or worse."

"You could request a break."

"When's the last time you saw anyone get a break?" You close the file again, rubbing your eyes with the heels of your hands hard enough that spots bloom behind your eyelids. "I'll manage."

"I know you will," Jungwon says, and he sounds so certain, so completely convinced of your competence, that you want to tell him to stop. 

You just nod, pick up the file, and stand. The archive room shifts around you, responding to your intention to leave, the walls thinning and curving until there's a doorway where there wasn't one before.

"Good luck," Jungwon says behind you.

You don't respond. Luck has nothing to do with it.

The dreamer's name is Jake. You learn this from the file, along with a dozen other details that paint a picture of someone who has been suffering for years and will likely continue suffering for years more. The night terrors started when he was sixteen, seventeen, somewhere in that range. 

You've handled cases like this before. The protocol is straightforward: observe, stabilize, regulate the dream cycles, minimize harm. Do not intervene beyond what is necessary. Do not get involved. Do not stay longer than three months unless there are extenuating circumstances.

The first night, you don't do anything. You just observe.

Jake falls asleep at 2:17 AM, which tells you everything you need to know about his sleep schedule. He's been awake for hours, fighting it, and his body finally gave out. The dreams start almost immediately, bypassing the usual descent into deeper sleep. His subconscious is a mess, fragmented and volatile. 

You stand at the edge of it and catalog what you see. The dream has no coherent setting, just a series of overlapping spaces that bleed into each other without logic or transition. A hallway that becomes a staircase that becomes a room with no doors. The lighting is wrong, too harsh and too dim at the same time, casting shadows that don't match the objects creating them. Everything feels precarious, like it's barely holding together.

And then the nightmare starts.

You've seen worse, but not by much. It's a classic looping scenario, the kind that traps a dreamer in repetition until they wake from sheer exhaustion or panic. He's looking for something, searching through the nonsensical architecture of his own mind, and every time he gets close, the dream resets. The walls shift. The doors disappear.

The nightmare cycles three more times before his body forces him awake. He sits up in bed gasping, and you can feel the echo of his panic even though you're not fully inside the dream anymore. His heart rate is erratic. His hands are shaking. He reaches for the lamp on his bedside table and turns it on, flooding the room with light. He just sits there, breathing hard, waiting for his body to believe that he's safe.

He's not going to fall asleep again. You can tell from the way he's already reaching for his phone, the way he's pushing the blankets off like the bed is contaminated. He'll stay awake until morning, running on fumes and adrenaline, and tomorrow night will be the same.

You pull back, disconnecting from his dream space, and return to the archive room, where Jungwon is probably already asleep and dreaming pleasant, uncomplicated dreams about children who are afraid of dentists.

────୨ৎ────

You try again the next night.

Jake's dreamscape is there, technically, but it's barely holding form. You've seen this before in dreamers with severe insomnia, the way their subconscious becomes hostile territory when they've been awake too long. The space rejects you before you can even fully enter, pushing back like a hand against your chest. The edges are serrated, sharp with exhaustion and anxiety, and the few images that do surface are fragmented beyond recognition. A door handle. The corner of a ceiling. Someone's voice, distorted and layered over itself until it's just noise.

He's not asleep. Not really. His body might be horizontal, his eyes might be closed, but his mind is still running, still fighting, caught in that terrible in-between state where rest is impossible and waking is unbearable.

You pull back. There's nothing you can do here. The protocol is clear: you can't stabilize a dreamer who isn't dreaming.

The second night is worse.

You enter the edges of his dreamscape and immediately feel the wrongness of it. The space is collapsing in on itself, folding and refolding like paper in a fist. His subconscious is eating itself, turning inward with nowhere else to go.

You try to anchor yourself somewhere stable enough to work, but the dreamscape lurches and spits you out. The rejection is almost physical, a shove that sends you back to the archive room with your equilibrium spinning.

Jungwon glances up from his own work. "Are you alright?"

"Fine," you say, even though you're not. Your hands are trembling slightly, residual feedback from the ejection. It doesn't usually hit you this hard, but Jake's dreamscape is particularly volatile. Two nights of forced wakefulness have turned his subconscious into a minefield.

The third night, you don't even bother trying to enter. You can feel the dreamscape from a distance, and you know it's pointless. He's still awake, still fighting, still running himself into the ground. The file didn't mention this level of avoidance, but maybe the previous guardians never pushed hard enough to see it. Maybe they rotated off before it got to this point.

You're in the archive room, not really reading through Jake's file so much as staring at it, when the dreamscape snaps into sudden, sharp existence.

It's not gradual, the way sleep usually is. One moment there's nothing, and the next moment the dreamscape is there, fully formed and pulling at you with desperate urgency.

He's crashed.

You enter without thinking, without the usual careful approach, because the dreamscape is already destabilizing and if you don't act now it's going to collapse into a full night terror before he's even fully unconscious.

The space is dark. You can feel Jake's presence somewhere in it, his consciousness flickering like a candle in a wind tunnel. He's not aware, not really. His mind is too exhausted to form coherent thoughts, too wrung out to do anything but freefall into the void his body has forced him into.

The darkness ripples. You can feel the nightmare building underneath it, gathering mass and momentum, fed by days of accumulated fear and exhaustion. It's going to be bad. This is the kind of night terror that leaves psychological scars, the kind that traumatizes a dreamer badly enough that they'll avoid sleep for weeks afterward, which will only make the next crash worse, which will make the next nightmare worse, spiraling down and down until something breaks permanently.

You step forward into the darkness and begin to work.

The nightmare doesn't want to be dismantled. It fights you, surging up like a wave, trying to solidify before you can break it apart. You can feel its shape, all teeth and drowning and the terrible certainty that something is coming and there's nowhere to run. It's pulling from Jake's worst fears, from years of accumulated dread, and it has momentum on its side.

But you're faster. You've done this before, too many times to count, and your hands know the movements before your mind has fully processed them. You reach into the fabric of the dream and pull, unraveling the nightmare thread by thread. You soften the darkness, diluting it with gray, with the suggestion of light. You take the weight out of the air, the pressure that makes it feel like drowning. You find the thing that's chasing him, the shapeless terror that his mind has conjured, and you erase it.

It's not easy. The nightmare keeps trying to rebuild itself, keeps reaching for the worst possibilities, but you're patient and precise. Eventually it gives up. The dreamscape settles into something calm. 

Jake's consciousness is still flickering, barely aware, but you can feel the moment his body registers the shift. His mind, finally, mercifully, stops fighting.

You stand in the dreamscape and watch as it begins to shape itself into something gentler. A room, plain and unremarkable. Four walls, a window, soft light that doesn't come from any particular source. He'll sleep through the night, maybe longer, considering how badly he needed this.

Jake enters the dreamscape slowly, like someone wading into water they don't trust.

He looks around, his movements careful and deliberate despite the dream logic that should make everything feel fluid and easy. His shoulders are tense. His hands are loose at his sides, but there's a readiness to them, like he's prepared to fight or run at the first sign of wrongness. He's looking for the trap. 

Of course he is. His subconscious doesn't believe in peace anymore. It's just waiting for the other shoe to drop.

He takes a step forward, and the dream holds. The floor doesn't dissolve. The walls don't shift. 

"This isn't real," he says, and his voice is rough, scraped raw from exhaustion. He's not talking to anyone, just stating a fact, trying to orient himself in a space that feels wrong because it feels too right.

You stay silent. You're not supposed to interact with dreamers directly unless absolutely necessary, and you've already broken enough protocol tonight just by intervening this much. Talking to him would cross another line, one you're not ready to cross yet.

He walks to the window and looks out at the nothing beyond it. His reflection is faint in the glass, and you can see the toll the last few days have taken. Even in a dream, he looks exhausted. 

"What are you?" he asks the reflection, or the room, or maybe himself. His hand comes up to touch the glass, fingers spreading against the surface. "You're different."

He turns away from the window and walks to the center of the room. He sits down on the floor, cross-legged, like he's claiming the space. His eyes are moving constantly, tracking things you haven't placed, looking for patterns that aren't there.

"I know you're not going to last," he says, and there's something almost conversational about it, like he's talking to the dream itself. "Nothing does. So you might as well just get it over with."

He's waiting for the nightmare to start. He doesn't believe this is real, doesn't believe it will hold, and some part of you feels something uncomfortably close to pity.

Not sympathy. You're not supposed to feel sympathy for dreamers. That's how guardians get compromised, how they start making decisions based on emotion instead of protocol. But pity is different. Pity is just the clinical recognition that someone is suffering and that the suffering is, objectively, unfortunate.

You can feel pity without it meaning anything.

He sits there for a long time, waiting for something terrible to happen. The dreamscape holds because you're holding it, maintaining the stability with the same steady pressure you'd use to keep a wound from bleeding. It's work, more work than it should be, because his subconscious keeps trying to assert itself, keeps reaching for the familiar patterns of fear and panic.

Eventually, slowly, his shoulders start to lower. The tension doesn't leave entirely, but it eases, just enough that you can tell his body is overriding his mind's insistence that this is dangerous. He's so tired.

His eyes start to close. He fights it for a moment, head jerking back up, but his body has made the decision for him. He tips sideways, slow and ungraceful, until he's lying on the floor of the dream with one arm pillowed under his head.

"Fuck," he mumbles, and his eyes close fully. "Fine."

The dreamscape shifts around him, responding to his surrender. The room softens further, the floor beneath him becoming something closer to a bed, though you're careful to keep it subtle enough that he won't notice the change and wake himself up with suspicion. The light dims, just enough to signal that it's safe to sleep.

You stay at the edge of the dreamscape and watch his breathing even out, watch the frantic energy finally drain out of him. His face smooths, losing some of that hunted look. 

────୨ৎ────

The next night, there's nothing.

You reach for Jake's dreamscape at the usual time and find the same hostile, fragmented static from before. He's awake again, or something close to it, his mind grinding itself down to nothing while his body screams for rest he refuses to give it.

You pull back and wait. When you check again an hour later, there’s still nothing. Two hours after that, the dreamscape is even worse, jagged and bleeding at the edges like a wound that won't close.

He's doing this on purpose.

The realization settles over you with a particular kind of frustration you've felt before, with other difficult cases, other dreamers who self-sabotage in ways that make your job impossible. He finally got a night of real sleep, the first in days, and instead of taking it as relief, he's treating it like a threat.

Of course he'd interpret one peaceful night as an anomaly instead of a turning point. Of course he'd go right back to running himself into the ground rather than risk hoping for something better.

You close your connection to his dreamscape and return to the archive room, where Jungwon is humming quietly to himself while he works. He's probably weaving together a dream about playground equipment or favorite stuffed animals, something gentle and easy that will make his eight-year-old dreamer smile in his sleep.

You don't say anything. There's nothing to say. Jake isn't sleeping, which means you can't work, which means you're just sitting here waiting for him to crash again.

The day passes. You check on Jake periodically, more out of routine than hope. His dreamscape remains inaccessible, a churning mess of exhaustion and anxiety that won't coalesce into anything workable. You can feel him deteriorating from a distance, the way his consciousness is starting to fray at the edges from lack of proper rest.

Jungwon finishes his shift and leaves with a quiet goodnight. You stay. There's no point in leaving when you're just going to have to come back and check again in a few hours.

By the second day, Jake's dreamscape has degraded to something almost unrecognizable. You've never seen a dreamer push themselves this hard for this long. A month of near-constant wakefulness, broken only by that one night you forced stability on him, and now he's right back to it. His subconscious is fragmenting in real time, splintering into pieces that don't fit together anymore.

If he keeps this up, he's going to cause permanent damage. 

It's mid-afternoon, earlier than you'd normally check, but something pulls your attention toward his dreamscape. It's still there, still barely functional, but there's a change in the quality of it. You reach for it carefully, ready to be rejected again, but this time the dreamscape doesn't push back. 

Jake's consciousness is flickering in and out, caught in that terrible half-asleep state where the body has started shutting down but the mind is still trying to fight it. You can feel him slipping, his awareness dimming and flaring and dimming again as he loses the battle against his own exhaustion.

He's not in bed. The dreamscape tells you that much. He's somewhere else, somewhere his body decided it couldn't stay upright anymore. A couch, maybe. Somewhere he sat down for just a moment and couldn't get back up.

The dreamscape is starting to form, pulling itself together out of the wreckage of his consciousness, but it's unstable. He's too wound up to dream peacefully. This is going to go bad fast if you don't intervene.

You don't hesitate this time. Protocol be damned. You find the center of it, the place where the nightmare is trying to anchor itself, and you sever the connection. The darkness writhes, tries to rebuild around a different fear, but you're already there, already cutting it off. You work quickly, methodically, the way you've learned to after years of doing this, finding each thread of terror before it can weave itself into something solid. The nightmare collapses under your hands, dissolving back into the shapeless anxiety it came from, and you smooth even that away until there's nothing left but empty space.

The dreamscape shudders and settles into something neutral. Jake's consciousness is barely present, a flicker of awareness that doesn't even register where he is or what's happening. He's too far gone for that, too exhausted to be anything other than a passenger in his own mind.

Good. That makes this easier.

You shape the dreamscape carefully, gently, building something that won't trigger his suspicion when he surfaces enough to notice. A bed this time, simple and unremarkable. Soft light. No windows, no doors, nothing that suggests an exit or a trap. 

His consciousness settles into it like a stone dropping into water, sinking down and down until there's nothing left but the slow, even rhythm of actual sleep. 

Hours pass. The dreamscape holds. Jake sleeps.

The dreamscape remains stable without much effort on your part now. You've done the hard work already, dismantled the nightmare before it could take root, shaped the space into something that won't trigger his hypervigilance. Now it's just maintenance, small adjustments when the edges start to fray, gentle corrections when his anxiety tries to bubble up. Easy work. The kind you could do in your sleep, if guardians slept.

You should leave. He's stable enough that another guardian could monitor him, or you could just let the dreamscape run its course and check back in a few hours. You've already spent more time on this than you should have, more energy than a single intervention warrants.

But there's something almost peaceful about watching him rest. Not peaceful for you, exactly. You're not sentimental enough to pretend this is enjoyable. There's a satisfaction in it, the same satisfaction you'd get from solving a difficult problem or finishing a task that everyone else said was impossible. He's sleeping. After days of watching him tear himself apart and feeling his dreamscape reject you over and over, he's finally resting.

It won't last. You know that. One good sleep doesn't undo weeks of damage, doesn't fix whatever is broken in him that makes the nightmares so severe in the first place. Tomorrow night he'll probably go right back to avoiding sleep, and you'll be back to square one.

But for now, for these few hours, you've done your job. You've given him what he needed, even if he doesn't know you exist.

That should be enough.

You're starting to pull back, preparing to disconnect and return to the archive room, when something shifts.

Someone is waking him up.

You feel it before it happens, the way the dreamscape starts to destabilize in response to stimuli from the waking world. Sound, first. A voice, muffled and distant but insistent. Then touch. A hand on his shoulder, shaking gently.

The dreamscape flickers. Jake's consciousness rises toward wakefulness like a bubble rising through water, slow and inevitable.

No. Not yet. He's barely been asleep for three hours, maybe four. His body needs more than that. He needs more than that.

You try to hold the dreamscape together, to keep him under for just a little longer, but you can't fight the physical world. Someone is actively trying to wake him, and there's nothing you can do to stop it. The dreamscape is already dissolving around the edges, losing coherence as his awareness surfaces.

The voice comes again, clearer now. "Jake. Hey. Wake up."

Sunghoon. You don't know how you know that, but you do. Maybe it's something in the tone, something Jake's subconscious recognizes even as it's being dragged back to consciousness. 

"Come on, man. Library's closing. We have to go."

The dreamscape fractures. Jake's consciousness pulls away from sleep like a riptide in reverse, and you're left standing in the ruins of the peaceful space you built for him, watching it collapse into nothing as he wakes.

You disconnect fully and return to the archive room. All that careful intervention, all those hours of monitoring and maintaining and making sure he got the rest he so desperately needed. And for what? Three hours, maybe four. Barely enough to take the edge off his exhaustion, nowhere near enough to actually help.

You pull up his file and add another note. Dreamer achieved stable sleep for approximately 3-4 hours before external interruption. Will continue monitoring. The words are clipped, professional, but you can feel the irritation bleeding through them anyway.

────୨ৎ────

You shouldn't do this.

The thought occurs to you as you're already reaching back into Jake's consciousness, toward the memories that sit just below the surface. 

You're looking for Sunghoon and Jay specifically,  the two names that keep appearing in Jake's dreams, always associated with a complicated tangle of trust and shame and guilt.

It takes almost no effort to find what you're looking for. The memories are right there, worn smooth from repeated examination, the way Jake turns them over in his mind when he can't sleep. You pull one forward and let it unspool.

Jake's apartment. Nighttime. The layout is slightly wrong, the way memories always are, details filled in incorrectly or left vague because they weren't important at the time. The emotional content is clear. Jake is sitting on his bed, exhausted and afraid. Sunghoon on the floor with his back against the wall, controller in hand, playing something on muted volume. Jay sprawled in the desk chair, scrolling through his phone but glancing up every few minutes to check on Jake.

"You should try to sleep," Jay says, and there's worry underneath the casualness.

"I'm fine," Jake says, automatic.

"You're not fine. You look like death."

"Thanks."

They go back and forth like this for a while, the same circular argument you've heard variations of in Jake's other memories. Jay pushing, Jake deflecting, Sunghoon watching quietly and occasionally interjecting with something that cuts through the tension. Eventually Jake lies down, and Jay and Sunghoon stay, and the memory ends with Jake staring at the ceiling while his friends pretend to be absorbed in their respective distractions.

You pull another memory. Similar scene, different night. This time it's worse. Jake wakes up mid-nightmare, and Sunghoon is there immediately, hand on his shoulder, voice low and steady. "You're awake. You're okay. It was just a dream." Jay appears in the doorway, hesitant, unsure what to do. Jake is shaking, can't seem to catch his breath, and Sunghoon just stays there, grounding presence, until the panic passes.

Another memory. Jay bringing him food because Jake keeps forgetting to eat. "You need to take care of yourself, man." Said with frustration, with helplessness, because Jay is the kind of person who needs to fix things and this is something he can't fix.

Another. Sunghoon staying up with him through an entire night, not saying much, just being there. 

You watch memory after memory unspool, and a picture forms. Two people who care deeply, who have tried everything they can think of, who have watched their friend suffer for years and never figured out how to make it stop. They've done research, suggested doctors, offered medication, stayed over countless times. They've seen him at his worst and never left.

And none of it has worked.

They can't touch the dreams themselves. They can't reach into his subconscious and dismantle the nightmares before they form. They can't do what you do.

You're pulling back from the memories, vaguely annoyed at yourself for the detour, when you feel Jake's consciousness starting to sink again, pulled down by exhaustion that three hours of sleep did nothing to satisfy.

He's falling asleep.

You shouldn't enter yet. He's still too close to wakefulness, still aware enough that the dreamscape will be unstable and potentially dangerous. Standard protocol is to wait until he's fully under, until his consciousness has settled into proper REM sleep.

But you're already moving, already reaching for the dreamscape as it starts to form, because if you wait he might fight it, might pull himself back to wakefulness out of habit or fear, and you're not letting that happen.

The dreamscape materializes around you, half-formed and flickering. You can feel the waking world bleeding through, sounds and sensations that shouldn't be present in a dream. Voices. Movement.

You push deeper into the forming dreamscape and the shapes resolve into something more concrete. Jake's bedroom. The details are sharper than they should be, more accurate, because he's still aware enough to be pulling from recent memory rather than letting his subconscious improvise.

He's in bed. Or his dream-self is in bed, which amounts to the same thing. There are two other figures in the room.

Sunghoon and Jay.

They're trying to help him sleep. You can see it in the way the dream has shaped them, turned them into gentle, supportive presences. Sunghoon is adjusting the blanket, making sure it's covering him properly. Jay is messing with something on the desk, probably the white noise machine that you can hear humming in the background.

"Better?" Sunghoon asks, and his voice is soft, careful.

Jake makes a noncommittal sound. He's tense, you can see it in the line of his shoulders, the way his hands are fisted in the blanket. His eyes are closed but he's not relaxed. 

"Try to sleep," Jay says from across the room. "We'll be right here."

"I know," Jake says, and there's guilt in his voice, thick and obvious. Guilt that they have to do this, that they're spending their night watching over him instead of doing literally anything else.

They mean well. You can see that clearly. The dream has rendered them with affection, with trust. These are people Jake loves, people he feels safe with.

But they're not helping.

Sunghoon sits down on the floor next to the bed, settling in like he's planning to stay there all night. Jay turns off the overhead light, leaves the desk lamp on. They're making him physically comfortable. All the external factors are right. 

None of it matters, because the problem isn't external.

You can feel Jake's anxiety from here, radiating through the dreamscape like heat. He's afraid to fall asleep. Having Sunghoon and Jay there helps in the waking world, gives him people to ground him when he wakes up screaming, but it does nothing to prevent the nightmares from happening in the first place.

The dreamscape flickers, unstable because Jake is still too aware, still caught between sleeping and waking. You've already broken protocol twice with him. What's one more time?

You reach into the dreamscape and start making adjustments. Small ones, subtle enough that he won't consciously register them. You dim the anxiety first, not erasing it but muting it, turning down the volume on the fear response that's keeping him wired. The tension in his shoulders eases slightly. 

Then you adjust the dream-versions of Sunghoon and Jay. They're already helpful, already supportive, but you sharpen that, make their presence feel more solid, more grounding. The white noise machine is too loud. You soften it. The lamp is too bright. You dim it further. The blanket is the wrong weight. You adjust the dream-logic until it feels exactly right, heavy enough to be comforting without being restrictive.

Jake's breathing starts to even out.

You work carefully, precisely, making change after change so small that Jake's conscious mind doesn't flag any of them as wrong. This is the kind of intervention that takes skill, that requires you to understand not just what the dreamer needs but how to give it to them without triggering their defenses.

This is what you're good at. This is what the elders keep you around for.

The dreamscape stabilizes. Jake's consciousness finally, finally lets go, sinking down into proper sleep. The dream-versions of Sunghoon and Jay fade into the background, becoming less distinct as Jake's awareness of the waking world dims. They'll disappear entirely in a few minutes, replaced by whatever his subconscious decides to populate the dream with.

You'll make sure it's nothing that hurts him.

────୨ৎ────

Three weeks in, and Jake is sleeping almost normally.

You’re not a miracle worker, and his subconscious is still a minefield of anxiety and trauma that will take months to fully stabilize, if it ever does. But he’s sleeping through most nights now, going to bed at reasonable hours instead of fighting consciousness until his body gives out. The night terrors still happen, but you’ve learned to catch them early, to dismantle them before they can take root and traumatize him badly enough to send him back into avoidance.

You’ve also started giving him actual dreams instead of just neutral space, just small scenes that feel normal enough to be forgettable. The kind of dreams regular people have, the kind that don’t mean anything and don’t leave any residue when you wake up.

Tonight he’s eating ice cream.

It’s a simple dream, almost aggressively mundane. He’s sitting on a bench in a park you’ve constructed from generic elements, with trees, grass, and a path winding into the distance. The ice cream is vanilla, melting slightly in the sun that you’ve calibrated to be warm but not uncomfortable.

His dream-self seems content with this. He takes another bite, watches a bird hop across the path in front of him, tilts his face toward the sun. There’s no tension in his shoulders, no hypervigilance in the way he scans his surroundings. 

You’ve been maintaining dreams with small, peaceful moments like this for over a week now. Jake having coffee with Jay and Sunghoon at their usual café. Jake walking through campus between classes. Jake reading in his apartment with rain pattering against the window. Nothing exciting, nothing memorable, just the texture of a normal life rendered in dream-logic.

Last night you gave him something a little more dynamic. He was at the café with his friends, and Sunghoon knocked over his coffee. Jay laughed so hard he choked on his sandwich, and Jake just sat there grinning while Sunghoon tried to mop up the mess with a handful of napkins that kept disintegrating. It was light, silly, the kind of thing that happens in regular dreams. The kind of thing that would make someone wake up and think huh, weird, before forgetting about it entirely.

You’ve been careful to include small anxieties too, the normal kind that don’t spiral into terror. Dreams where he’s late to class, or can’t find his keys, or accidentally wore mismatched shoes. Yesterday he dreamed he overslept and missed an exam, woke up in a panic, checked his phone, and realized it was Saturday. The fear was real but proportional, manageable, the kind of stress that didn’t require your intervention.

It’s important that the dreams don’t seem too good. Dreamers notice when everything is too pleasant, when nothing ever goes wrong. Their subconscious rebels against it and tries to assert the anxiety that’s being suppressed. You learned that early in your training. The best dreams are the ones that feel real, complete with minor frustrations and small embarrassments and moments of awkwardness.

Tonight’s ice cream dream is going well. You’re monitoring it with half your attention, which is all it requires at this point, when something shifts.

Jake stops eating.

You focus fully on the dreamscape, scanning for problems. Did something slip through? A nightmare trying to assert itself, a spike of anxiety you missed?

Jake is looking directly at you. His dream-self has turned on the bench, ice cream forgotten in his hand, and he’s staring at the exact spot where you’re standing at the edge of the dreamscape.

Your presence isn’t visible. It shouldn’t be visible. You’re not part of the dream, you’re separate from it, existing in a space adjacent to his consciousness but not inside it. Dreamers can’t perceive you unless you choose to manifest, and you have never, not once, chosen to do that with him.

But he’s looking right at you.

You don’t move. You’re not even sure you could. The dreamscape continues around him, the sun still shining, the bird still hopping along the path, but Jake is completely still, ice cream starting to drip down his hand, eyes fixed on a point in space that should be empty.

Maybe it’s coincidence. Maybe he’s just looking in that general direction, staring at nothing the way people sometimes do in dreams.

“Hello?” he says.

The word drops into the dreamscape like a stone into still water. You feel the ripples of it, the way his consciousness sharpens slightly, awareness increasing in a way that’s dangerous for someone who’s supposed to be dreaming.

Jake’s eyes narrow slightly. He’s still looking at the same spot, and his expression has shifted from curious to something more intent.

“I know you’re there,” he says, and his voice is quieter now, more certain. “I can feel it.”

No. No, he can’t. That’s not how this works. Dreamers don’t feel guardians. They don’t perceive the maintenance happening around them. You’re as invisible to them as the mechanics of their own heartbeat.

Except he’s still staring at you, and the dreamscape is starting to shift in response to his focus, the edges sharpening as his awareness increases. He’s getting too lucid. If he keeps this up, he’s going to wake himself up, or worse, he’s going to destabilize the dream enough that the nightmares can slip back in.

You need to do something to redirect his attention.

You reach into the dreamscape and manifest a dog. It’s medium-sized, friendly-looking, the kind that people smile at automatically. It trots up to Jake’s bench, tail wagging, and pushes its nose against his free hand.

Jake doesn’t react.

“You’ve been here before,” he continues. “Every time I sleep now, you’re here. Aren’t you?”

The ice cream slips from his hand and falls to the ground. He doesn’t notice. The dog sniffs at it and then looks up at you, like it’s waiting for instructions, because of course it is. You created it, it’s just an extension of your will.

You pull the dog back, dissolve it before Jake can notice that it’s not behaving like a real dog would. The dreamscape flickers. His awareness is spiking, consciousness rising toward wakefulness, and you’re losing your grip on the stability you’ve worked so hard to maintain.

You need to leave. Now.

You disconnect, pulling back so fast it’s almost violent, severing the connection and returning to the archive room with your equilibrium spinning. Your hands are shaking slightly, residual feedback from the abrupt exit, and there’s a cold feeling in your chest that you don’t want to name.

He saw you.

No. He didn’t. He couldn’t have. Dreamers can’t perceive guardians. It’s impossible.

You pull up his file with hands that are still unsteady, scrolling through the notes from previous guardians, looking for any mention of awareness.

There’s nothing about lucid dreaming.

You wait longer than usual before entering Jake’s dreamscape the next night. You enter more cautiously than you have in weeks. The dreamscape is already formed when you arrive, which is normal. Jake’s subconscious has gotten better at constructing stable environments on its own, now that it’s not constantly bracing for nightmares.

He’s in the café this time, the one he frequents with Jay and Sunghoon. You settle at the edge of the dreamscape and watch. Everything seems normal. His awareness is at the usual level for this stage of sleep, present enough to engage with the dream, but not so present that he’s analyzing it. He takes a sip of coffee. 

You start to relax. Last night was nothing. He happened to look in your direction at the same time he was surfacing toward lucidity, and his mind tried to make sense of the vague awareness by addressing it directly. It doesn’t mean he actually saw you.

Then Jake’s gaze slides toward your position, and your chest goes cold.

He’s looking at you again.

His eyes are clearer than they should be. This is lucidity, or something close to it, and it’s spreading through the dreamscape like ice across water. You can feel it in the way the details sharpen, the way the café becomes more solid. The dream is stabilizing around his awareness instead of existing independently of it.

This is bad. This is very bad.

Lucid dreamers are difficult to work with under the best circumstances. They fight intervention, try to control the dream themselves, destabilize carefully constructed environments. If Jake takes control of the dream right now, if he pushes too hard, the whole thing could collapse into the kind of nightmare you’ve spent weeks protecting him from.

“You’re here again,” Jake says, and his voice is quiet but certain. He sets his coffee down, leans forward slightly. “I thought maybe I imagined it last night."

You pull back immediately, preparing to sever the connection, but the dreamscape resists. It’s too stable now, too anchored by his lucidity. Disconnecting abruptly could shock him awake, could trigger exactly the kind of panic response you’ve been trying to avoid.

His awareness is sharpening further. The café around him is gaining details you didn’t place. His subconscious is filling in the gaps, making this more real, and the more real it becomes, the harder it is for you to manipulate.

“I know you can hear me,” he says, still looking at you, and there’s something in his voice that makes your throat tight. “I don’t know what you are, but you’ve been helping me, haven’t you? The dreams are different now because of you.

You reach into the dreamscape and manifest a figure behind Jake. Sunghoon. You pull the image from Jake’s memories, render him as accurately as possible, and place him in the chair across from Jake like he’s been there the whole time.

“Jake?” Sunghoon says, because you need him to say something to redirect Jake’s attention before this gets any worse.

Jake doesn’t turn around.

“I’m not crazy,” he says, still looking at your position. “I know something is—”

“Jake,” Sunghoon says again, louder this time, and you push urgency into his voice, making it impossible to ignore.

Jake’s head turns, finally, breaking eye contact with the space where you’re standing. He blinks at Sunghoon like he’s surprised to see him there. He looks around the café, then back at Sunghoon. “Have you been here the whole time?”

“Yeah?” Sunghoon says, and you’re controlling him directly now, puppeting him through the conversation because you need this to work. “You good? You zoned out for a second there.”

Jake stares at him. You can see the confusion working across his face, the dream-logic trying to assert itself against his lucidity. He was talking to someone. Something. But Sunghoon is here now, has apparently been here, and dreams don’t always make sense. Maybe he was talking to Sunghoon the whole time. Maybe his mind invented the presence he thought he felt.

“I’m fine,” Jake says slowly. “Just tired, I guess.”

“You want to get out of here?” Sunghoon asks, because you need to move the dream somewhere else, somewhere that doesn’t have Jake staring at the spot where you’re standing.

“Yeah. Sure.”

They stand up, and you guide the dream into transition, shifting the café into a sidewalk, the sidewalk into campus, giving Jake’s mind something to follow so he stops trying to analyze what just happened. Sunghoon walks beside him, asking about classes, about an assignment due next week, normal conversation that sounds like something they’d actually talk about because you’re pulling it directly from Jake’s memories of similar conversations.

Jake responds, but he’s distracted. His eyes keep moving, scanning the dream like he’s looking for something.

You stay as far back as you can, maintaining the dream from a distance, keeping Sunghoon’s presence solid and distracting. The lucidity is fading slowly, his awareness dimming back to normal dream-consciousness. He’s accepting the dream again instead of questioning it.

But every few minutes, his gaze drifts toward empty spaces. 

────୨ৎ────

You enter Jake's dreamscape at the usual time, prepared to avoid anything that might trigger his awareness again.

The nightmare is already waiting. It’s fully constructed, massive and hungry. This isn't the usual gradual onset of a night terror that you can catch and dismantle before it takes hold. This is something that materialized the moment he fell asleep, something his subconscious has been building in the background while you've been giving him peaceful dreams.

The dreamscape is dark and cavernous, all wrong angles and oppressive weight. Jake is somewhere in the center of it. You can feel his terror from here, sharp and overwhelming. The nightmare has him caught in something, you can't see what yet, but it's bad. 

You don't hesitate. You throw yourself into the dreamscape and start trying to dismantle it, reaching for the threads of fear and yanking them apart. The nightmare fights back harder than anything you've encountered with him before. It's dense, layered, pulling from years of accumulated terror. Every time you break one piece apart, two more surge up to take its place.

The darkness ripples and reforms into a hallway that stretches endlessly in both directions. Jake is running. 

You reach for the thing that's chasing him, try to erase it, but your hands pass through it like smoke. It's too deeply rooted in his fear, too fundamental to the nightmare's structure. You try a different approach and lighten the darkness, shortening the hallway to give him an exit. The dreamscape resists. It's pulling from Jake's consciousness, feeding on his terror, and he's giving it so much fuel that you can barely make a dent.

The hallway splinters into multiple paths, each one worse than the last. The nightmare is fracturing, multiplying, becoming too many things for you to fight at once.

You're losing.

The realization hits you with a force that makes you stumble. You've never lost to a nightmare before. You've always been able to dismantle them, always been fast enough and skilled enough to break them apart before they could do real damage. But this one is too big, too entrenched, and Jake's fear is making it stronger with every passing second.

You try again, pulling at the fabric of the dream with everything you have. The hallway shortens slightly. The thing chasing him slows. You can feel his consciousness fragmenting, trying to escape by waking but unable to because the terror has him locked in place.

You need to do something drastic.

You reach for the core of the nightmare, the central fear that's powering everything else, and you wrench it sideways. The dreamscape shudders violently. Jake's terror spikes, but you don't stop. You tear at the nightmare's foundation until it starts to collapse.

The hallway dissolves. The thing chasing him dissipates into smoke. The darkness fragments into gray, into light, into nothing.

The dreamscape goes completely still.

You're shaking. You can feel it in your chest, residual feedback from how hard you just had to fight. That shouldn't have been that difficult. You're good at this. You've handled worse cases, more severe night terrors. Something about Jake's nightmare was different, like it had been gathering mass for weeks while you kept him safe.

Jake's consciousness is still there, flickering in the wreckage of the dream. You can feel his terror still overwhelming even though the nightmare is gone. He's not calming down the way he should, not settling back into peaceful sleep now that the threat is gone.

You should leave now, while the dreamscape is still unstable and formless, before he can latch onto anything. You're too shaken, too wrung out from the fight, and you hesitate for just a moment too long.

"Please," Jake says, and his voice cracks through the empty dreamscape like thunder. "Please don't leave."

He can't see you. You haven't manifested. You're just a presence, just the vague sense of something other that his consciousness has learned to associate with safety.

You can feel it, the way his consciousness is groping through the formless dreamscape, searching desperately for the thing that's been protecting him. 

"I know you're there," he says, and he sounds so young, so afraid. "I can feel you. Please, I just—I need—"

His consciousness finds you.

It's desperate, clinging, the way a drowning person grabs onto anything that might keep them afloat. His awareness wraps around your presence with crushing intensity, pulling you closer, refusing to let go. You can feel the shape of his terror, the depths of how afraid he just was, how afraid he still is. And underneath that, the bone-deep relief at finding you, at knowing he's not alone.

He's associated you with safety, as if the only thing that's protected him from the worst parts of his own mind. Now he's holding on like you're the only thing keeping him from drowning.

You try to pull back, to extract yourself from his grip, but his consciousness tightens further. He doesn't know what he's doing, doesn't understand the mechanics of the dreamscape or how guardians exist within it. He just knows that you're here and you're safe and he can't let you go.

The pressure increases. You can feel it compressing around you, forcing you into a shape you don't want to take. If he keeps this up, if he doesn't let go, he's going to pull you fully into the dreamscape. He's going to force you to manifest.

You need to break free. You wrench against his grip, trying to sever the connection, but his fear is too strong. His need is too strong. He's holding on with everything he has. You're not strong enough to fight both him and the residual nightmare and your own exhaustion all at once.

The dreamscape solidifies around you.

It's excruciating, like being turned inside out, pulled from the abstract into the concrete. The dreamscape renders you in three dimensions, gives you weight and substance and presence.

You manifest.

The gray nothingness of the post-nightmare dreamscape sharpens into something more defined. A room, plain and empty, with soft light coming from nowhere. In the center of it, Jake is on his knees, looking directly at you.

His eyes are wide, red-rimmed and wet. He's breathing hard, body shaking. He looks destroyed.

"You're real," he says, and his voice breaks on the last word.

Before you can move, before you can even think about disconnecting, Jake lunges forward and grabs you.

His arms wrap around you with desperate strength, his face pressing into your shoulder, and he's holding on like you're the only solid thing in the universe. You can feel him shaking against you, the raggedness of his breathing, and the way his hands are fisted in the fabric of whatever your manifestation is wearing.

"Please don't leave," he says into your shoulder, the words muffled and broken. "Please, I can't—I can't do that again, I can't—"

"Jake,” Your voice sounds strange to your own ears, foreign. You haven't spoken aloud in years. Guardians don't talk. There's never been a reason to.

"I know you're the one who's been helping me," he says, and he's talking fast now, words tumbling over each other. "I know it's you. The dreams, they're different now, they're better, and tonight when that thing was chasing me I could feel you fighting it." His grip tightens. "Please don't go. Whatever you are, wherever you came from, please just stay."

This is wrong. This is so fundamentally wrong that you don't even know where to begin cataloging the violations. Dreamers aren't supposed to see you. They're not supposed to know you exist. And they are absolutely, under no circumstances, supposed to be able to touch you.

The nightmare is gone but the fear hasn't faded. He's terrified that you're going to disappear, that he's going to be alone again with nothing between him and the worst parts of his own mind.

"You need to let go," you say, and you try to make your voice firm, authoritative, but it comes out too gentle.

"No." His arms tighten. "No, please, I'll do whatever you want, I'll stop trying to find you, just don't leave yet. Not yet.” His breath hitches. "I'm still so scared."

He's clinging to the only thing that makes him feel safe.

You.

He's clinging to you.

Some terrible, treacherous part of you doesn't want to let go.

"Please," he whispers. "Just a little longer. Just until I'm not so afraid."

Your arms come up slowly, carefully, and you hold him back.

"Okay," you hear yourself say. "Okay. Just for a little while."

Jake's breath shudders out of him, relief and residual fear tangled together. His grip on you doesn't loosen, but the desperation in it eases slightly.

You stand there and let him hold on, and you tell yourself this is just damage control. It doesn't mean anything.

You're already very good at lying to yourself.

────୨ৎ────

Jake's hands are shaking.

It's subtle, barely noticeable, but the coffee in his cup is rippling slightly, tiny waves lapping at the sides. He's staring at it, watching the surface tremble, and he doesn't realize Jay is saying something until a hand reaches across the table and plucks the cup from his grip.

"Hey!"

"You were about to spill it all over yourself," Jay says, setting the coffee down on the far side of the table, well out of Jake's reach. "When's the last time you slept?"

Jake blinks. "Last night."

"For how long?"

"I don't know. A few hours."

Jay and Sunghoon exchange a look. Jake catches it, that wordless communication they've perfected over years of friendship, and he knows what they're thinking. He was doing better. He was sleeping normally, going to bed at reasonable hours, waking up looking less like a reanimated corpse. And now he's back to this, jittery and distracted in a way that makes him miss entire chunks of conversation.

"What happened?" Sunghoon asks. His voice is even, careful, the way it always is when he's worried but trying not to show it.

Jake doesn't know how to answer that. What is he supposed to say? That he had the worst nightmare in weeks, maybe months? That would explain the exhaustion, the relapse into caffeine dependency, but it wouldn't explain the other thing he can't stop thinking about.

"I had a bad night," he says, which is true but insufficient.

"Night terror?" Jay asks.

"Yeah."

Jay hesitates. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"No." Jake reaches for his coffee automatically, forgetting Jay moved it. His hand closes on empty air. He pulls it back, shoves both hands under the table so they can't see the tremor. "It's fine. I'm fine."

"You're not fine," Jay says flatly. "You look like you're about to vibrate out of your skin."

"I just need more sleep."

"So sleep."

"I will."

"Tonight?"

Jake doesn't answer. He's looking out the window now, at the quad where students are sprawled on the grass between classes, talking and laughing and living normal lives where sleep is just something you do, not something you have to brace yourself for. The sunlight is too bright. Everything is too bright. He didn't sleep enough to process light properly, and his eyes keep losing focus.

"Jake." Sunghoon's voice cuts through the fog. "What's going on?"

Maybe it's the exhaustion, or maybe it's the fact that he's been carrying this alone for too long, but Jake hears himself say, "I met someone."

Both of them go still. Jay's eyebrows climb toward his hairline. "You... met someone?"

"Yeah."

"Like, a person? A real person?"

"Yes, Jay, a real person." Jake's mouth twitches, almost a smile. "What other kind is there?"

"I don't know, you've been acting so weird I wasn't sure." Jay leans forward, and there's something eager in his expression now, excited. "Okay. Tell us about her."

"How do you know it's a her?"

"Is it?"

"Yeah."

"Called it," Jay says to Sunghoon, who rolls his eyes. "Okay, so. Who is she? How'd you meet?"

Jake opens his mouth. The explanation that made sense in his head at three in the morning sounds insane now, in the middle of the day, sitting in the café with his friends looking at him expectantly. "She... helped me. With the nightmares."

"What, like a therapist?" Sunghoon asks.

"No. Not a therapist."

"Then what?"

Jake's fingers are tapping against his thigh under the table, restless, anxious. "I don't know exactly. She’s just been there when I sleep. She makes it better."

Jay and Sunghoon exchange another look, this one more concerned than before.

"Makes it better how?" Jay asks slowly.

"The dreams. They're different when she's there. Peaceful. The nightmares can't touch me when she's around." Jake knows he's not explaining this right, knows it sounds wrong, but he doesn't know how else to say it. "Last night, when I had that terror, she fought it off. I could feel her doing it. And then after, when I was still scared, she stayed."

"Okay," Jay says, drawing the word out. "So... she's in your class or something? And you've been hanging out?"

Jake runs a hand through his hair, frustrated. "It's not like that."

"Then what is it like?"

"She's..." How does he explain this? How does he put into words something that doesn't make sense even to him? "She's the reason I've been sleeping better. These past few weeks, when everything was good, that was her. She's been helping me."

"That's great," Jay says, and he sounds genuinely pleased, like this is normal, like Jake is describing a regular person who exists in the regular world. "You should ask her out."

"What?"

"Ask her out. If she's been helping you this much, if you're this into her, just go for it."

"I can't—it's not—" Jake's hands are back on the table now, fingers drumming arhythmically against the wood. "You don't understand."

"So help us understand," Sunghoon says. "What are we missing?"

Everything. They're missing everything. Jake looks at both of them, at their patient, concerned faces, and tries to find words that won't make them think he's lost his mind. "She's my savior."

The word lands heavy and strange. Jay blinks. "Your what?"

"She saved me from the nightmares." Jake's voice is getting more intense, more urgent, and he can hear it but he can't stop it. "You don't understand what it was like, every night, just waiting for it to get bad, knowing it was going to get bad, and then she fixed it. She made it stop. I can sleep now because of her."

"Okay," Jay says carefully. "That's... that's good, Jake. I'm glad you found someone who helps."

"She's not just someone." The words are coming faster now, tripping over each other. "She's the girl of my dreams. Literally.”

"Wait." Sunghoon holds up a hand. "Literally?"

Jake realizes his mistake too late. "I just mean—"

"You said literally." Sunghoon's eyes have sharpened, focused. "The girl of your dreams. You mean she's in your dreams."

"That's not—I didn't mean—"

"Jake." Jay's voice has lost its encouraging tone. Now he just sounds worried. "Is this girl real?"

"Yes." The answer is immediate, defensive. "She's real. I've seen her. I've talked to her. I've held her." The memory of it crashes over him again, the weight of her, the solid reality of her presence. The way she'd put her arms around him and told him it was okay, he was safe and she wasn't going anywhere.

"In your dreams," Sunghoon says. 

"No, listen." Jake leans forward, desperate to make them understand. "She's real. She exists. She's been protecting me this whole time. Every night when I sleep, she's there, and she keeps the bad things away." He's gesturing now, hands moving frantically. "She's the only reason I've been okay. Without her, I'd be back where I was before, terrified of my own mind.”

"What's her name?" Jay interrupts.

Jake stops. "What?"

"Her name. What's her name?"

The question sits between them like a trap. 

"You don't know her name," Jay says flatly.

"I haven't—we haven't—" Jake's hands are shaking again, worse now. "It's not about that. Names don't matter. "

"Jake." Sunghoon's voice is gentle, which somehow makes it worse. "I think you need to hear how this sounds."

"How what sounds?"

"You're talking about a girl you've never met outside of your dreams. A girl whose name you don't know, but you're calling your savior."

"Because she is." Jake can hear the desperation in his own voice. "You're not listening. She's real. What she does for me is real.”

"Do you hear yourself right now?" Jay asks, and there's something almost pleading in his voice.

"I sound crazy. I know." Jake slumps back in his chair, suddenly exhausted. The adrenaline that's been keeping him upright drains away all at once, leaving nothing but bone-deep weariness. "But I'm not. I'm not crazy. She's real."

"Maybe you should talk to someone," Sunghoon says. "A professional, just about the nightmares.”

"I don't need a therapist."

"Jake.”

"I need her." The words come out more raw than he intended. "I need her, and I know that sounds insane, but it's true. Without her, I'm—" He can't finish the sentence. Without her, he's drowning. Without her, he's back in the dark with nothing but his own fear for company. "I can't lose her."

"You can't lose someone you don't actually have," Jay says, and his voice is so gentle it feels like a knife.

They think he's breaking. They think the sleep deprivation has finally pushed him over some edge, made him lose his grip on reality.

"Forget it," he says quietly. He reaches for his coffee, remembers again that Jay moved it, and stands up instead. "I should go."

"Jake."

"I'm fine." He's backing away from the table, hands shoved in his pockets to hide the shaking. "I'll see you guys later."

Outside, the sunlight is still too bright. Jake squints against it and starts walking. His mind is racing, thoughts tumbling over each other in an exhausted tangle.

She's real. He knows she's real.

But he's never seen her outside of his dreams. When he tries to describe her, to explain what she looks like or anything concrete about her, the details slip away like smoke.

────୨ৎ────

You've been maintaining distance for three days now.

The elders didn't yell. They simply summoned you to their chamber and stated, with calm, inflectionless voices, that your recent reports showed concerning patterns of extended intervention and that you needed to recalibrate your approach to align with established protocol. 

You enter Jake's dreamscape only when absolutely necessary, dismantle nightmares from a distance, and leave before his consciousness can latch onto your presence.

It's destroying him.

You can see it in the way his dreamscape has started to fray again, anxiety creeping back into the edges like mold. His sleep is deteriorating, not as badly as before, but trending in that direction. He's fighting rest again. When he does sleep, his consciousness is agitated.

Tonight his dreamscape forms into something unstable, flickering between locations like he can't decide where he wants to be. The café. His apartment. Campus. Back to the café. Nothing settles.  His subconscious is too restless, too focused on something other than the dream itself.

You stay at the very edge of the dreamscape, monitoring from a distance. A nightmare starts to form, and you reach in just far enough to dismantle it. The nightmare dissolves before it can take hold.

Jake's consciousness sharpens immediately.

You pull back, making yourself as small and unnoticeable as possible. You can feel his awareness sweeping through the dreamscape, searching for the thing that just intervened. 

"I know you're here," he says to the empty café around him. His dream-self is standing in the middle of the room, turning slowly, scanning every corner. "I can feel it when you stop the bad things."

You don't respond. 

"Please," he says, and there's something desperate in his voice that makes your chest tight. "I just want to talk to you. That's all."

The dreamscape wavers. His emotions are destabilizing it, making it harder to maintain from a distance. You consider leaving entirely, letting it collapse naturally, but that would probably wake him, and he needs the sleep. So you stay, silent and still, and wait for him to give up.

The café dissolves, and the dreamscape reforms into the bookstore you've seen in his dreams before, the peaceful place he kept returning to in those early weeks. He's recreating it himself now, pulling it from memory, and the details are almost perfect. 

He's trying to lure you out with something familiar. 

It's clever. It almost works. Some part of you wants to step into that space, to see what he's built and acknowledge the effort.

 You stay where you are.

Jake sits down in the window seat and waits, like he thinks if he's quiet enough, you'll appear on your own.

Minutes pass. The dreamscape holds steady. He doesn't move.

"I'm not going to stop," he says finally. "I know you can hear me. I know you're there. And I'm not going to stop looking until you talk to me."

You watch him wait, and you tell yourself this will pass. He'll get tired of waiting. He'll move on.

The next night, he tries something different.

The dreamscape forms into a nightmare immediately, but it's wrong. You can tell within seconds that he's doing this on purpose, forcing his own subconscious into a fear response to make you intervene. 

You almost admire the strategy.

The nightmare isn't severe enough to warrant intervention. It's uncomfortable, probably unpleasant for him, but not dangerous. You leave it alone, let him suffer through it as a lesson about manipulation.

Then it starts intensifying. He's pushing it further, feeding it more fear, and it's starting to spiral beyond his control. What started as a calculated risk is turning into something real.

You reach in and dismantle it before it can fully form.

"There you are," Jake says immediately, and his dream-self is smiling, triumphant. "I knew that would work."

You pull back to your observation point and wait for him to realize you're not going to engage.

His smile fades. "Come on. I know you're there. Just show yourself. Please."

The dreamscape shifts, and you can feel his frustration building. He's trying to force another nightmare, trying to recreate the conditions that made you manifest last time, but he doesn't understand the mechanics well enough to do it right. He's just destabilizing his own sleep, making the dreamscape chaotic and hard to manage.

You spend the next twenty minutes cleaning up the mess he's making, smoothing out the disruptions, keeping everything stable while he essentially throws a tantrum trying to get your attention.

It would be annoying if it wasn't so concerning.

By the third night, you're expecting more of the same manufactured nightmares and attempts to force your hand.

What you're not expecting is for him to hurt himself.

The dreamscape forms normally at first. Jake is in his apartment, sitting on his bed, and everything seems calm. You're monitoring from a distance, alert for whatever strategy he's going to try tonight.

He stands up and walks toward the window.

It's a dream-window, looking out onto a dream-version of the street below. Jake opens it and looks down at the ground several stories below.

"I wonder what happens if I jump," he says conversationally, like he's musing about the weather.

Your attention sharpens into something close to panic. He wouldn't. He doesn't understand how dream-death works, how trauma in the dreamscape can bleed into waking consciousness, how dying in a nightmare can leave psychological scars that don't heal.

"I bet you'd stop me," he continues, still looking down. "If I actually did it. I bet you'd have to show yourself then. I'm going to count to ten, and if you don't show yourself by the time I reach one, I'm going to find out what happens."

He's bluffing. He has to be bluffing.

"Ten."

You don't move.

"Nine."

This is a test. He's trying to see if you'll break, if you care enough to intervene.

"Eight."

You should call his bluff. Manipulation won't work, you're not going to compromise your position just because he's threatening self-harm in a dream.

"Seven."

But if he's not bluffing—

"Six."

—if he actually jumps—

"Five."

—the psychological damage could be severe enough to set him back months, could trigger a cascade of actual night terrors worse than anything you've seen from him.

"Four."

You can't let that happen.

"Three."

But if you manifest now, you're rewarding this behavior, teaching him that threatening himself is an effective way to get what he wants.

"Two."

He puts one foot on the windowsill.

"One."

You manifest in front of the window, blocking his path, your form solidifying so fast it's almost violent. "Stop."

Jake's face breaks into a smile, relief and triumph mixed together. "I knew you'd—"

"Are you out of your mind?" The words come out sharper than you intended, anger bleeding through the careful neutrality you're supposed to maintain. "Do you have any idea what you almost did?"

"I wasn't actually going to jump," he says, but there's something uncertain in his voice now, like he's realizing he might have miscalculated.

"You don't know that." You step closer, and you're furious in a way you haven't been in years, maybe ever. "You don't understand how any of this works. Dream-death isn't real death, but the trauma is real. The fear is real. You could have damaged yourself in ways I can't fix."

"But I didn't," he says. "Because you stopped me."

"I shouldn't have had to stop you. You shouldn't have—" You cut yourself off, trying to regain control. This is exactly what he wanted. He wanted you to engage, and you fell for it. "This was manipulation."

"This was the only way you'd talk to me." His voice is rising now, frustration spilling over. "You've been avoiding me for days. I can feel it. You're still here, you're still protecting me, but you won't let me see you or talk to you. What was I supposed to do?"

"Let it go," you say. "Forget this happened."

"I can't forget you." He says it like it's obvious. "You're the only thing that's kept me sane for weeks. The only thing standing between me and everything terrible. How am I supposed to just forget that?"

"That's not how this works."

"Then explain to me how it works." He moves closer, and you don't step back even though you should. "Tell me the rules. Tell me what I'm not supposed to do. Tell me anything, just stop disappearing every time I get close."

You can see exactly what will happen if you leave. He'll spiral and get worse. The nightmares will come back with a vengeance, and the next guardian won't know how to handle him.

You're trapped, and you put yourself here.

"You can't do this again," you say finally. " No more threats.” 

His voice has gone soft, almost pleading. "You've been in my head for weeks. You know everything about me. Every fear, every weakness, every terrible thing I've ever dreamed. I don't even know your name."

The word sits between you like a trap. Your name. Such a small thing, such a basic piece of information.

"No," you say.

"Why not?"

"Because this is already too far. You're not supposed to know I exist, and I'm certainly not supposed to—" You cut yourself off before you can finish that sentence.

"Supposed to what?" he asks, and there's something searching in his expression. "Care? Is that what you were going to say?"

"You do care," he says, and he sounds almost amazed by it. "That's why you keep protecting me. You care what happens to me."

"I care about all my assignments," you say, but it sounds hollow even to you.

"I don't believe you."

"That's not my problem."

"Isn't it?" He's still looking at you with that unbearable intensity. "If I'm this attached to you, if I'm willing to stand in a window and threaten to jump just to see you again, doesn't that mean you've already broken whatever rules you're trying to protect?"

He's right, and you hate that he's right.

"This can't continue," you say. “I've seen inside your mind, Jake. I know how this works. You're not attached to me. You're attached to not being afraid."

"You're wrong," he says flatly.

"I'm not."

"Then prove it." He crosses his arms. "Stop protecting me. Let me have the nightmares, let me deal with it on my own, and we'll see if I forget about you."

It's a challenge, and you both know it. He knows you won't do it. 

"That's what I thought," he says when you don't respond. "You're just as trapped as I am."

The words hit harder than they should. You want to argue that you're just doing your job, his attachment is one-sided and problematic and not at all reciprocated.

You're not sure any of that is true anymore.

"I need to go," you say quietly.

"Don’t," He reaches for you, and you step back before he can make contact. The rejection flashes across his face. "Five more minutes. Please."

"No."

"Then tomorrow night. Just talk to me tomorrow night. You don't have to manifest if you don't want to. Just let me hear your voice."

"Maybe," you hear yourself say.

His face brightens immediately. "Really?"

"Maybe," you repeat, firmer this time. "And only if you sleep normally tonight.”

"I can do that."

You disconnect before he can ask anything else, returning to the archive room with your manifestation dissolving like mist. You sit down heavily, exhaustion washing over you in a wave.

────୨ৎ────

Jake only feels in extremities.

You've noticed this over the past week, watching him in his dreams and cataloging the way his consciousness operates. There's no middle ground for him. The night terrors were extreme, debilitating and relentless in a way most people never experience in their entire lives. And now his attachment to you is equally extreme, all-consuming in a way that should disturb you more than it does.

Tonight he's dreaming about a garden. You didn't construct this, he did, pulling it together from fragments of memories and imagination. It's peaceful, almost aggressively so, all soft sunlight and flowering plants and the distant sound of water. He's sitting on a bench, and the moment you manifest, his entire face lights up.

"You came," he says, and he sounds so genuinely delighted that something in your chest does an uncomfortable twist.

"I said maybe."

He pats the bench beside him. "Sit with me?"

You sit down.

"I've been sleeping better," he says, and he's angled toward you, knee almost touching yours. "Every night this week. Did you notice?"

"Yes." Of course you noticed. You've been monitoring his sleep cycles obsessively, tracking every change, every improvement. He's going to bed at reasonable hours now, sleeping through most of the night and waking up rested. It's the kind of progress that should let you rotate off his case.

"I think it's because I know you'll be here," he continues. "It makes it easier to sleep." There's something almost shy in his expression now. "Knowing you'll be waiting."

He shifts closer. Not much, just a few inches, but enough that his shoulder brushes yours. The contact is light, barely there, but he's testing to see if you'll pull away.

You don't.

"Can I ask you something?" he says.

"You're going to regardless of what I say."

He grins at that, quick and bright. "Probably. But I'm trying to be polite."

"Since when?"

"Since you threatened to leave permanently if I wasn't." His hand moves, fingers brushing against yours where they're resting on the bench between you. "I'm trying very hard to behave."

"I've noticed. What were you going to ask?" you say when he doesn't continue.

"Oh. Right." His fingers are still against yours, warm and solid in a way that shouldn't be possible in a dream. "Do you have a name?"

You've been expecting this question. "You know I can't tell you that."

"Can't, or won't?"

"Both."

"I could just make one up," he continues, thoughtful. "Give you a name myself. Would that bother you?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because I already have a name. You just don't get to know it."

His fingers curl slightly against yours. "That seems unfair. You know everything about me."

"It's my job to know things about you. It's not your job to know things about me."

"You've said that before. I still don't believe you." He's smiling now, soft and knowing. "I think I'm special."

The arrogance of it should annoy you. Instead it's almost charming in its directness, the way he's stating what he wants without pretense or game-playing.

"You're a difficult case," you say. "That's not the same as special."

"I'll take it." He shifts even closer, and now his shoulder is pressed fully against yours, his hand warm around yours, his presence taking up space in a way that should feel invasive but doesn't. "I've been thinking about you all day. Every day, actually. I go through my classes and eat lunch with Jay and Sunghoon and do my homework, and the whole time I'm just waiting for nighttime.”

"I know I'm not supposed to feel this way. I know this whole thing is probably breaking a dozen rules. But I can't help it." His fingers tighten around yours. "You're the best part of my day. The only part I actually look forward to. And I know that probably sounds pathetic, being this attached to someone I only see in my dreams. "

"It's not pathetic," you interrupt, and you mean it. 

He leans his head against your shoulder, a gesture so casual and affectionate it makes your breath catch. "Pathetic would be harder."

He shifts slightly, getting more comfortable against your shoulder. "What if I just talk then? You don't have to tell me anything. Just let me talk to you."

This is safer territory. Letting him talk means you can maintain some semblance of professional distance while still keeping him engaged.

"Fine," you say.

He talks about his classes, about a paper he's working on, about how Jay is dating someone new and won't shut up about it. About how Sunghoon keeps asking if he's okay because apparently he's been acting weird lately, distracted during the day and eager to go home at night.

"I told him I met someone," Jake says, and you feel yourself tense. "He asked if it was the same person from before. The one I tried to tell them about."

"What did you say?"

"I said yes." His hand tightens around yours. "I didn't tell him the details. Just that I'm still... that we're still..." He trails off. "I don't know what we are, actually. What should I tell him?"

"Nothing. Tell him nothing."

"That's not helpful."

"It's the truth. We're not anything. This is temporary."

"You keep saying that." He tilts his head to look up at you, and he's close enough that you can see the details of his face. The exhaustion’s finally fading from around his eyes. "But you keep coming back."

Your silence is apparently answer enough. He settles back against your shoulder, satisfied.

"Jay thinks I'm in love," he says conversationally.

Your heart does something complicated. "You're not."

"How do you know?"

"Because love requires knowing someone. You don't know me."

"I know some things." His fingers lace through yours properly now, holding instead of just touching. "I know you're patient. I know you're careful. I know you care more than you want to admit. I know you're scared of this, whatever this is, but you keep showing up anyway."

"Those are observations, not knowledge. You can't love someone you don’t know anything about.”

"I'm not saying I'm in love with you. Not yet, anyway." He says it so casually, like it's not a devastating thing to admit. "But I could be, if you let me.” 

The words hang between you, heavy and unavoidable. He's not wrong. You do feel something, something you don't have a name for and don't want to examine. Something that's going to end badly for both of you.

"We should talk about something else," you say finally. “This conversation is going nowhere productive."

"I disagree. I think it's very productive." But he doesn't push, just settles more comfortably against you. "Fine. Different subject. Did you make this garden?"

"No. You did. You've been getting better at constructing stable dreamscapes.” 

"Is that because of you?"

"Partially. Your subconscious is learning what stable feels like. It's starting to default to peace instead of panic."

He's quiet for a moment, and you can feel him thinking. Then: "Does that mean you'll leave soon? If I'm getting better?"

There it is. The question you've been avoiding.

"Eventually," you say carefully. "When you're stable enough to maintain on your own."

"And when will that be?"

"I don't know."

"Just tell me." His hand tightens around yours, and there's something almost pleading in his voice now. "How much time do we have?"

"A few more weeks, maybe. If your progress continues. You need to prepare yourself for me to leave."

He stops, laughs slightly. "I don't even know what I want. Just more time with you. More of this. Whatever this is."

"This is me helping you sleep."

"This is more than that and you know it." But he's smiling now, soft and knowing. "But fine. We'll call it helping me sleep. If that makes you feel better."

It doesn't make you feel better. It makes you feel like a coward.

But you nod anyway, and he settles back against your shoulder, hand still in yours, and you sit together in the garden he created while the dream continues around you, peaceful and stable and completely unsustainable.

He falls into deeper sleep eventually, his consciousness dimming as his body gets what it actually needs. You stay until the dream naturally dissolves, until his sleep cycle shifts and your presence is no longer necessary.

────୨ৎ────

Jake is sleeping fourteen hours a day.

You noticed the shift a week ago, right after you told him your time together was limited. At first it seemed like a normal adjustment, his body finally able to catch up on months of sleep debt without fear. Then he kept sleeping and sleeping. 

He's missing classes. You know this because his dreams have started incorporating anxiety about assignments he's forgetting, emails he's not answering, texts from Jay and Sunghoon that he's ignoring. Somehow, the anxiety isn't enough to wake him up. Nothing is enough to wake him up, because waking up means leaving you.

Tonight he fell asleep at six in the evening.

The dreamscape forms into something familiar now, a room that's become your default space, comfortable and neutral with soft lighting and a bed that he insists on even though dream-logic doesn't require furniture. He's there the moment you manifest, already reaching for you with that desperate eagerness that's become standard.

"You're here," he says, like there was any doubt.

"I'm always here." You let him pull you down onto the bed, let him arrange you the way he wants: on your back with him curled against your side, head on your chest, arm around your waist. He's gotten bolder about touching you over the past two weeks, and you've let it happen because it keeps him sleeping peacefully.

Except he's sleeping too much now, and you're running out of ways to justify it.

"Jake," you say carefully. "What time did you go to sleep?"

"I don't know. Six? Seven?"

"It's six-thirty."

"Then six." He presses closer, fingers curling in the fabric of whatever your manifestation is wearing tonight. "Why?"

"You slept twelve hours last night, and ten the night before that."

"So?"

"So that's too much. You're oversleeping."

"There's no such thing as too much sleep." His voice is muffled against your chest. "I'm just making up for lost time."

"You've made up for lost time. Now you're actively avoiding being awake."

"Can you blame me?" He tilts his head to look up at you. "Being awake means being away from you. Why would I choose that?"

This is exactly what you were afraid of. The attachment going too far, tipping from therapeutic to pathological. He's preferring sleep to waking life, choosing dreams over reality because you're in the dreams.

"You have a life outside of sleep," you say, and you start running your hand down his back in slow, soothing strokes. It's something you've learned calms him, grounds him when he's getting agitated. 

"I have you here." He catches your other hand, brings it to his chest and holds it there. "That's better than anything out there. I'm not wasting a single hour of being awake when I could be here with you."

"You're going to make yourself sick," you try. "Sleeping this much isn't good for you."

"I feel fine."

"It’s not sustainable.”

"My body needs rest. That's what you kept telling me for weeks, remember? How I needed to sleep more, how I was destroying myself by staying awake?" There's something almost sharp in his voice now. "Well, I'm sleeping. Isn't this what you wanted?"

"Not like this."

"Then how?" He shifts, propping himself up on one elbow so he can look at you properly. "How am I supposed to sleep a normal amount when I know every hour I'm awake is an hour I'm not with you?"

Your hand is still on his back, still moving in those slow, calming strokes. You can feel the tension in his muscles, the way he's holding himself too tight. "You need to find balance. Sleep at night, be awake during the day. Live your life."

"I don't want to live my life. I want to be here."

"That's not an option."

"Why not?" And now there's real frustration in his voice, breaking through the usual gentleness. 

"Because I'm not going to be here forever." You make your voice firm, trying to cut through the attachment that's wrapped around him like a strangling vine. "Jake, listen to me. You need to start pulling back. Start spending more time awake.” 

"No. I'm not preparing for you to leave." He's sitting up fully now, and your hand falls away from his back. "I don't care what the rules are. I'm not just going to wean myself off of you like you're some kind of addiction I need to quit."

"That's exactly what this is becoming."

"Good." His jaw sets in that stubborn way you've seen before, the one that means he's not going to be reasoned with. "Let it be an addiction. I don't care."

This is getting out of hand. You need to regain control of the situation, need to make him understand the severity of what's happening. "Jake, I'm serious. If you keep this up, if you keep sleeping this much, the elders are going to notice. They're going to see the pattern and they're going to pull me off your case immediately."

"Then let them pull you off. I'll just keep sleeping until they assign you back."

"That's not how it works. They'll assign you to someone else."

"I don't want someone else."

"You won't have a choice." Your hands move to his shoulders now, trying to ground him, trying to make him focus. "Listen to me. If I get pulled off your case early, you won't see me again. They'll reassign me and you'll have a new guardian and that will be it."

"Then don't let them pull you off."

"I can't control that if you keep sleeping fourteen hours a day. They monitor these things. They'll see that something is wrong and they'll intervene."

"So what am I supposed to do?" His voice cracks slightly. "Just go back to my regular life and pretend you don't exist?"

"Yes. That's exactly what you're supposed to do."

"I can't." His hands come up to cover yours where they rest on his shoulders. "I can't do that."

"You have to." You gesture between the two of you, frustration bleeding into your voice. "This isn't real, Jake. None of this is real. I'm not real. I'm just something your mind has personified because that's easier than accepting that you've just been healing on your own."

"That's bullshit and you know it." His grip tightens. "You're real. What I feel is real."

"Jake, please." Your hands slide from his shoulders to his face, cupping it gently, trying to make him hear you. "Please, you need to listen to me. I need you to start sleeping at normal hours. Eight, maybe nine at most. I need you to go to your classes and see your friends. Because if you don't, I'm going to get pulled from your case, and then you really will lose me. Do you understand?"

He's quiet for a long moment. His hands come up to cover yours where they're holding his face. "And if I do this, if I sleep normal hours and go to class and act like everything is fine, will you stay for the full few weeks you promised?"

"I'll stay as long as I'm allowed to."

"That's not a yes."

"It's the best I can offer."

He closes his eyes, and you can feel the war happening inside him. You keep your hands on his face, thumbs brushing his cheekbones in a soothing gesture, and wait for him to make the choice.

"Fine," he says finally. "I'll sleep less. I'll go to class. But you have to promise me something too."

"What?"

He struggles for the words. "You'll be present with me, like this."

It's a terrible idea. It's the opposite of pulling back. Feeding the attachment makes everything worse. "Okay, but you have to keep your end of the bargain.” 

"Do you just move on to the next person after all this is over?” 

"Yes. That's how this works."

He hesitates. "Will you think about me? After?"

"Yes," you say quietly. "I'll think about you."

"Good." His grip tightens on your hands. "Because I'm going to think about you. I'm going to dream about you and know it's just my mind recreating what we had. I'm going to miss you," he says, and his voice cracks on the last word. "Is that allowed? Am I allowed to miss you when you're gone?"

Your throat feels tight. "You can do whatever you want."

When he speaks again his voice is rough. "I'm going to miss feeling safe."

The words hit harder than they should. Because that's what this has always been about, isn't it? Not you specifically, but what you represent. He's not in love with you, he's in love with not being afraid.

"You'll learn to feel safe on your own. That's the whole point of what we've been doing."

"What if I don't want to feel safe on my own?” His hands are trembling slightly where they hold yours, and you can feel his emotions destabilizing the dreamscape, making the walls waver. "Admit that you want this.” 

"I've already told you I feel something," you say quietly.

"Then why are you fighting this so hard?"

"This isn't real, Jake.” 

"Stop saying that." There's real frustration in his voice now. "Stop trying to protect me from this." His hand slides to the back of your neck, fingers tangling in your hair. "I don't want protection. I just want you. Is that really so impossible?"

His mouth presses against yours with enough force that you gasp. His hand tightens in your hair, holding you in place, and his other hand comes up to cup your face like he's afraid you'll disappear if he doesn't hold on.

You kiss him back.

It's instinct more than decision, your body responding before your mind can catch up. Your hands come up to his chest, to push him away, you tell yourself, but they just flatten against him instead, feeling the dream-echo of his heartbeat. His mouth softens against yours slightly, the desperation giving way to something that feels almost like relief.

He pulls back after a moment, breathing hard, forehead resting against yours. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have—I just needed you to stop talking. Are you going to leave?” 

"No." The word comes out rougher than you intended. "I'm not leaving."

"You're not?"

"No."

He lets out a shaky breath. "Okay. Okay, good. I’m still sorry. I shouldn't have done that without asking."

"It's fine."

"It's fine?" He sounds almost dazed. He pulls you closer again, and you let him, because apparently you've lost all ability to maintain boundaries. "Can we just have tonight? Without talking about endings or protocols or what we're supposed to do?"

His hands are warm on your wrists, and the dreamscape is stable around you, and you're so tired of fighting this.

"Okay," you say quietly. "Just tonight."

────୨ৎ────

Jake can't stop smiling.

He knows it's a problem because Jay keeps looking at him like he's grown a second head, and Sunghoon has asked him twice if he's okay. 

He can't help it. She kissed him back. She didn't pull away, didn't disappear, didn't tell him he'd crossed a line he couldn't uncross. He felt alive in a way he hasn't felt in years.

"Dude, you're doing it again," Jay says, waving a hand in front of his face.

Jake blinks, realizes he's been staring into the middle distance with what is probably a ridiculous expression on his face. "Doing what?"

"That." Jay gestures at him vaguely. "The whole... whatever that is. You look like someone just told you you won the lottery."

"Maybe I did," Jake says, and he can hear how stupid he sounds but he doesn't care.

Sunghoon sets down his coffee and studies Jake with that quiet, assessing look. "You seem different."

"Different how?"

"Awake," Sunghoon says simply. "We've only ever seen you exhausted. This is new."

"Oh." Jake hadn't thought about that. They've known him through years of sleep deprivation and night terrors, through the worst of it. They've never seen him well-rested and happy. "Is it weird?"

"It's not weird," Jay says quickly. "It's good. Really good. You look like a person again."

"I feel like myself." It's true. For the first time in years, he feels like he's operating at full capacity instead of running on fumes and desperation. His mind is clear. His body doesn't ache. 

"So what changed?" Jay asks, leaning forward with interest. "Did you finally start taking those sleep meds?” 

"I kissed her," Jake says, and the words are out before he can think better of them.

Both of them go still. 

"You kissed her," Jay repeats slowly.

"Yeah."

"The girl from your dreams."

"She's not—" Jake stops, tries again. "Yes. Her."

"In your dream," Sunghoon says. 

"Yes."

The silence that follows is heavy, loaded with concern that neither of them is trying very hard to hide anymore.

"Okay," Jay says carefully. "That's... that's good, man. I'm glad you're happy."

There's something in his tone that makes Jake's smile falter. "You don't believe me."

"I didn't say that.” 

"You don't have to say it. I can hear it." Jake looks between them, at the worry written across both their faces. "You think I'm losing it."

"We think you're going through something," Sunghoon says quietly. "And we're trying to understand."

"I told you. I met someone. She's been helping me sleep. Last night I kissed her and she kissed me back,” He can hear how it sounds, but he keeps going anyway because they need to understand. "She's real. What I feel is real. Why is that so hard to believe?"

"You're sleeping fourteen hours a day—"

"Eight. I'm sleeping eight hours a day now.”

"—and talking about kissing someone who only exists in your dreams—"

"She exists," Jake says, and his voice is rising now. "Just because you can't see her doesn't mean she's not real."

"Jake—" Sunghoon starts, but Jake cuts him off.

"No. You don't get it. You've never had to deal with what I deal with. You don't know what it's like to be afraid of your own mind every single night.” His hands are clenched into fists under the table. "She saved me from that. She's the only thing that's ever made it stop. And if that means she only exists when I'm asleep, then fine. I'll take it. At least I have something."

"You have us," Jay says quietly.

"It's not the same."

"Why not?"

"Because you can't do what she does!" The words come out louder than he intended, and the people at the next table glance over. Jake lowers his voice, but the intensity doesn't fade. "You can't go into my dreams and make the nightmares stop. You can't make me feel safe the way she does. You try, and I love you for trying, but you can't fix this. She can."

"Jake, listen to yourself," Jay says. "You're talking about her like she's the only thing keeping you alive."

"Maybe she is."

The admission hangs in the air between them. Jay looks stricken. Sunghoon's expression has gone very careful.

"That's not healthy," Sunghoon says finally.

Jake stands abruptly, his chair scraping against the floor. "You know what? Forget it. I shouldn't have told you."

Jay reaches for him, but Jake steps back.

"I'm fine. I'm better than fine. For the first time in years, I'm actually sleeping, actually living, and you can't just be happy for me. You have to make it into something wrong."

"We're worried about you," Sunghoon told placates. "That's all this is."

"Well, don't be. I'm handling it." Jake grabs his backpack from the floor. "I have to go."

"Where?"

"I have errands to run."

He leaves before they can stop him, pushing through the café door and out into the afternoon sun. 

They don't understand. She's not just some fantasy he's projecting onto his dreams. She's real, and she cares about him. 

He's walking without a destination, just moving, trying to burn off the anxious energy thrumming under his skin. His feet carry him down familiar streets, past familiar buildings, until he finds himself standing in front of a pharmacy.

He stares at the storefront for a long moment, something clicking into place in his mind.

The inside of the pharmacy is bright and clinical, fluorescent lights buzzing overhead. Jake wanders down the aisles, past pain relievers and cold medicine, until he finds what he's looking for.

The sleep aids section is bigger than he expected. Melatonin in various doses. Diphenhydramine. Herbal supplements promising restful sleep. Prescription-strength options behind the counter.

Jake picks up a bottle of melatonin. 10mg. The label says to take one tablet thirty minutes before bed and to not to exceed recommended dose.

He picks up a second bottle. Diphenhydramine, 25mg. Sleep aid and antihistamine. The labels say not to combine them, but people do it all the time, don't they? 

────୨ৎ────

Something is wrong.

You can tell the moment Jake enters the dreamscape. Usually his consciousness arrives with a certain clarity, a presence that's become familiar over these weeks. Tonight he's sluggish, his form manifesting slowly like he's moving through something thick and resistant.

The dreamscape forms around him, but it's hazy at the edges, unfocused in a way that suggests his subconscious isn't operating at full capacity.

"Hey," he says when he sees you, and even his voice sounds off. 

You manifest fully and cross to him immediately. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong." He sways slightly when he moves toward you, and you have to catch his arm to steady him.

"Jake." You guide him to sit on the bed, studying his face. He looks tired, which shouldn't be possible. Exhaustion doesn't exist in the dreamscape the way it does in waking life. Dreams are supposed to be restorative. "What happened?"

"I'm fine. Just tired." He reaches for you, pulling you down beside him, but the movement is clumsy and uncoordinated.

"You're in a dream. You shouldn't be tired here."

"Well, I am." He leans his head on your shoulder, the weight of it heavier than usual. "Can we not talk about it?"

Alarm bells are going off in your mind. This isn't normal. This isn't how dreamscapes work. If he's this compromised here, something is very wrong in his waking life.

"Jake, I need you to tell me what's going on."

"Nothing's going on. I'm sleeping like you wanted." There's something defensive in his tone, even through the sluggishness.

"This isn't normal sleep. You can barely hold yourself upright." You pull back to look at him properly, and the unfocused quality of his eyes makes your chest tight with worry. "What did you do?"

"Nothing. I'm just really tired from today. I had a long day." But his words are coming out too slow, too deliberate, like he's concentrating hard on making them sound natural.

You take his face in your hands, making him look at you. "Tell me the truth. What did you do before you went to sleep?"

"Nothing." The word comes out too fast this time, overcompensating. 

"I can tell when you're lying. The dreamscape responds to dishonesty." You can feel the panic starting to rise in your chest, cold and sharp. "What did you take?"

"Can we please just drop this?" He tries to pull away from you, but the movement is sluggish and you hold on easily. 

"That's not how this works!" Your hands are shaking where they hold his face. "Dreamers don't experience physical exhaustion in the dreamscape, not unless something is interfering with their natural sleep chemistry."

Recognition flashes across his face, he understands what you're implying, but he schools his expression back to neutral. "I'm fine."

"You're not fine, and we both know it." You can feel the dread solidifying in your chest, heavy and cold. "If you won't tell me what you did, I'm going to have to find out myself."

His eyes widen slightly. "What does that mean?"

You don't want to do this. You've avoided this with him because it's invasive and a violation of the small amount of privacy dreamers have. 

"I'm sorry," you say quietly. You reach for his consciousness, bypassing his awareness and diving straight for his recent memories.

The reaction is immediate. Jake gasps, his whole body going rigid, and you feel the dreamscape shudder violently around you. Accessing memories without permission hurts. It's meant to hurt, a built-in defense mechanism to prevent guardians from abusing their access.

His hands come up to his head, and his face contorts with pain. You hate this. You hate hurting him. You push deeper anyway, searching for the memory of what he did before he went to sleep.

There. You find it and pull it forward.

Jake is in his bathroom opening the medicine cabinet. He takes out bottles, plural, and reading the labels before shaking pills into his palm. 

You pull out of his memories and back into the present moment. Jake is curled in on himself, hands still pressed to his head, breathing hard.

"Don't," he says, and his voice is raw. "Don't do that." He looks up at you, and there's betrayal written across his face, sharp and clear even through the drug haze. "You hurt me."

The words cut deeper than they should. "I needed to know what you did."

"So you just forced your way into my head?" He's moving away from you now, putting distance between you on the bed. "You were supposed to be safe.” His voice cracks. "Why would you do that?"

"You're taking medication you don't need to artificially extend your sleep," you interrupt, and you can hear the fear bleeding into your voice as anger. "Do you have any idea how dangerous that is?"

"I'm not hurting myself.”

"You are!” You stop, trying to find words that will make him understand. "Your brain needs natural sleep cycles. When you artificially induce sleep with medication, you disrupt that balance.” 

"I know what I'm doing."

"You clearly don't." You're standing now, pacing, the horror of what you saw in his memories crashing over you. "You're damaging yourself. For what? For a few extra hours in a dream?"

"For a few extra hours with you," he says, and even through the hurt and the drugs, his voice is certain. "And I'd do it again. "

"No. No, you won't." The words come out louder than you intended, sharp with fear. "You're hurting yourself because you're so desperate to hold onto something that was never meant to last. I can't watch you destroy yourself for this."

"For you," he corrects. "I'm doing this for you."

"If you care about me at all, stop."

He stares at you, and something in his expression shifts. The hurt is still there, but underneath it is a realization. "You're scared. You can't dismiss it anymore as just attachment or trauma bonding or whatever else you've been telling yourself."

"It doesn't matter if this is real," your voice sounds broken even to your own ears. "It still has to end."

"Then let me have as much of it as I can."

"Not if it means you're going to hurt yourself." You close the distance between you, taking his face in your hands, making him look at you. "Please, Jake. Please stop. I need you to be safe. Even after I'm gone, I need to know you're going to be okay."

His eyes search yours, and you can see the moment the fight drains out of him.

"Okay," he says quietly, giving into your fear.

The dreamscape is already starting to stabilize around you, responding to the easing of tension. Jake's consciousness is still sluggish from the medication, but he's present, holding onto you like you're the only stable thing in his world.

"I'm sorry I hurt you," you say quietly. "When I accessed your memories. I'm sorry."

"I know." His voice is soft against your ear. "I understand why you did it, but it still scared me. The one person who's supposed to be safe doing something that hurt."

You stay with him for the rest of the night, monitoring the way the medication affects his sleep cycle, making sure he's safe even though he shouldn't have needed you to. When he finally slips into deeper, dreamless slee, you disconnect and return to the archive room with your heart heavy.

Jungwon is there. He takes one look at your face and says, "What happened?"

"He's trying to extend his sleep artificially.” 

Jungwon's expression goes carefully neutral. "And you stopped him?"

"I tried." You sink into a chair, exhausted in a way that has nothing to do with the work. “I don't know if I can trust him to keep that promise when he's this desperate."

"You need to file a report. Let the elders handle this."

"If I file a report, they'll pull me off his case immediately. He'll get worse.”

"Or he'll adjust and find other support systems." Jungwon sits down across from you, and his expression is serious. "You need to request reassignment. Tonight."

"I can't do that."

He leans forward slightly. "Listen to me. I work with children, the elderly, and the terminally ill. Do you know how easy it would be to get attached to those cases?” 

"That's different.” 

"It's exactly the same." His voice is calm but firm. "I had a case two months ago with a six-year-old girl, dying of leukemia. Her dreams were beautiful, full of hope and wonder despite everything she was going through. Every night I had to watch her build these elaborate fantasies about growing up and living a full life. I had to maintain those dreams knowing she had weeks left at most.”

"I rotated off after three months. It hurt to leave her and know that someone else would be there for her final dreams instead of me, but I left anyway, because that's the job. Jake has had months of your time. Instead of getting better, he's now medicating himself to spend more time with you." Jungwon's expression doesn't change, but there's something almost pitying in his eyes. "You're enabling him."

The word lands like a slap. "I'm not.” 

"You're feeding his attachment." He pauses. "You're both bad for each other at this point. You need to leave."

"So what am I supposed to do? Just abandon him when he's like this?"

Jungwon's expression softens slightly. "I know it feels cruel. You care about him, maybe more than you're willing to admit. That care is making you blind to the fact that you being there is the problem, not the solution."

The words settle over you like a weight. You want to argue, to explain why leaving now would be worse than staying.

But a small, honest part of you knows he's right.

────୨ৎ────

The connection forms, and the dreamscape resolves back into the soft bedroom. You’ve barely fully manifested when he’s on you. One second you’re standing in the abyss, and the next his body is pressed against yours, arms locking around your waist with a desperate strength that steals your breath. He buries his face in the curve of your neck with a broken sound.

“You’re here, you’re here, fuck, you’re really here,” he mumbles, the words hot and damp against your skin. His hands are everywhere, skating up your back and clutching at your shoulders, as if trying to confirm you’re real through frantic touch.

“Please,” his voice is a shaky whine. He pulls back just enough to look at you. He looks exhausted, hollowed out. “Please, I need to touch you. I need you to let me touch you.” 

He’s trembling. You place your hand on his shoulder, trying to inject soothing energy inside him. It does little to help.

“I kept my promise,” he whispers, nuzzling back into your neck, his lips brushing your jaw. “No pills. I just laid there and waited. It took forever and I was so scared you wouldn’t come back after… after what I did.”

His hands fist in the fabric of your shirt. “I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry. I was stupid. I was scared. Please.” He grinds his hips against yours, and you can feel him already hard. The need radiates from him like heat. “I need you to take care of me. Please, just take care of me tonight. I’ll be good. I’ll be so good.”

It feels like the most intimate thing he’s ever done. You bring your hands up, one palm cupping the back of his head, fingers tangling in his dark hair. The other strokes down the tense line of his spine.

He melts at the touch, a full-body shudder of relief going through him. “Yes,” he whines. “Yes, like that. Just like that.”

His mouth finds yours with a consuming, clumsy desperation. The kiss is deep, and starving. His tongue sweeps into your mouth and you meet him in the middle. A groan tears from his throat.

“I can’t think straight when I’m awake,” he pants against your lips, his hands dragging your tunic up, fingers scrambling for purchase on your skin. “All I do is count the hours until I can sleep. It’s pathetic. I know it’s pathetic.”

“It’s not,” you murmur, and you’re not sure if that’s a lie or not.

He gets the tunic over your head, discarding it into the fog. His mouth drops to your breast, sucking a hardened nipple deep, his tongue flicking wildly. He kneads the other with a rough, possessive hand. 

“Need to be inside you,” he mumbles, his words slurred against your flesh.

He fumbles with the fastening of your pants, his fingers shaking too hard to work properly. A frustrated, almost childish sob escapes him. You help him, pushing the material down your hips, and he sinks to his knees, mouth trailing down your stomach.

His tongue laps a broad, wet stripe through your folds, and you gasp, fingers tightening in his hair. He moans like he’s the one receiving pleasure, the vibration against your clit making your knees buckle.

“You taste so fucking good,” he groans, his voice ragged. He devours you with a single-minded focus, his tongue plunging inside you, then circling your clit. His hands grip your thighs, holding you open. “Let me make you feel good. Please. I need to.”

The submission has twisted, turned into a different kind of control. His need to please, to serve, is just as dominant as any aggression. You look down at the crown of his head between your legs, the sheer abject devotion in the curve of his spine, and something cracks open inside your chest. You come with a choked cry, your hips stuttering against his mouth. He drinks you down, whining with satisfaction, not stopping until the last tremor subsides.

Then he’s rising, pushing you back until you’re laying on your back. He sheds his own clothes, cock jutting out. Pre-cum beads at the tip. He aligns himself and pushes forward, burying himself inside you.

“Fuck,” he breathes, his whole body trembling. “Fuck, you’re so tight. You feel like home.”

He starts to move, full of pure, pounding need. Each thrust is a deep, claiming slide, his hips slapping against yours. The sounds are obscene, wet skin on skin. He stares into your eyes, his gaze unfocused and drowning.

“Tell me,” he whimpers, his pace increasing and becoming frantic. “Tell me you feel me. Tell me I’m real.”

“You’re real,” you gasp, the words torn from you. He is a solid, desperate weight inside you. It is the most real thing you have ever known.

“I’m gonna come,” he warns, his voice high and broken.“I’m gonna come inside you. Is that okay? Please, can I?”

“Jake, slow down,” you manage to say, your hands sliding to his hips.

It’s a reflex, a guardian’s instinct to moderate, to control the environment. But the plea is weak. The drag of him inside you is perfect, a friction that ignites every nerve. Your own body arches, betraying you to seek more. 

“I can’t,” he whines, the words punctuated by another sharp, deep thrust. “Oh god, I can’t, it feels too fucking good.You feel too good.”

“I’m sorry,” he whispers between thrusts, his voice high and tight with impending release. His hands scramble for purchase on your skin, leaving fleeting bruises. “I’m sorry, I know, I’m sorry.” 

The apologies are meaningless, ritualistic, lost in the animal need. He’s not sorry.

His rhythm becomes erratic, desperate. He’s chasing that feeling of home he mentioned, trying to obliterate himself inside you. One of his hands leaves your hip, slips between your bodies, his thumb finding your clit and rubbing rough, frantic circles. The dual sensation is too much. A sharp, keening cry is torn from you. Your internal muscles clench around him, a vice grip of pleasure.

He follows you down, fingers digging into the flesh of your hips. He fucks into you, deep and final, his body bowing, every muscle locking.

“Take it,” he sobs, his voice shattered. “Take it all, I’m gonna—fuck, I’m gonna knock you up so you can never fucking leave me.”

The words are deranged.They should horrify you. Instead, a dark current of something terrifyingly close to pride thrills through your veins. He’s spilling inside you, his whimpers muffled against your shoulder blade. He collapses onto you, his breath hot on your skin, his softening cock still nestled within you, twitching with the last of his climax.

This is a dreamscape. He cannot impregnate you. Your body in this space is a projection, a confluence of his subconscious desire and your manifested form. The threat is empty, a fantasy of possession. But the emotion behind it, the raw, desperate wanting, is terrifyingly real.

He nuzzles the sweat-damp skin of your back. “Stay,” he murmurs, the word barely audible.

It’s the last plea of a drowning man. You wait, feeling his heartbeat slow against your spine, feeling the dream itself begin to soften at the edges as his mind descends into truer, emptier sleep. When his breathing evens out into the deep, rhythmic pattern of the dreamless, you gently disentangle yourself.

────୨ৎ────

You're standing at the edge of Jake's dreamscape, ready to enter, when Jungwon's voice stops you.

"Don't." Jungwon holds up the file. "He's been reassigned."

The words don't make sense at first. You stare at him, at the file in his hands, trying to process what he's saying.

"What?"

"The elders reassigned his case this morning. He's under my care now." Jungwon's voice is gentle, but there's no room for negotiation in it. "You're off the case. Effective immediately."

"His mental state has deteriorated to the point where he qualifies as a vulnerable case. Severe psychological distress, reality dissociation, compromised decision-making." Jungwon sets the file down on the table between you. "He needs a guardian who specializes in fragile cases. Someone who can work without getting their feelings involved."

The implication hangs in the air. 

"I can handle him," you say, but your voice sounds weak even to your own ears.

"You can't. That's why you're being removed." Jungwon's expression is sympathetic but firm. "The elders have been monitoring the situation. They made the call."

"When do I have to leave?" you ask quietly.

"You already have left. As of this morning, I'm his guardian. You're not to enter his dreamscape again."

"Not even to say goodbye?"

"A clean break is better."

"Better for who? The elders?" You can hear the bitterness bleeding into your voice. "Because it's certainly not better for him. He's going to wake up and I'll just be gone. He'll think I abandoned him."

"I know exactly what he'll do. He'll be upset. He'll be angry. He'll probably try to force himself to sleep more to find you, and I'll have to manage that." Jungwon's expression is steady, professional. "I've handled cases like this before. Dreamers who become attached to their guardians. It's not common, but it happens. There are protocols for managing it."

"He's going to hate you." The thought of him falling asleep tonight and finding you gone, finding Jungwon there instead, makes you feel like you're being torn apart. "Please, just let me see him."

"I can't. I'm sorry.” Jungwon moves toward the exit, then pauses. "For what it's worth, I don't think you did anything wrong."

He leaves, taking Jake's file with him, and you're left standing alone in the archive room.

You can feel Jake's dreamscape forming in the distance. He's falling asleep right now, his consciousness reaching for the familiar space where you've always been waiting.

But he’s not yours anymore.

────୨ৎ────

Jake knows something is wrong the moment he enters the dreamscape. The air doesn't feel right. The temperature is off by a degree or two. Everything looks correct on the surface, but something fundamental has shifted.

"Hello?" he calls out, turning slowly in the center of the room. His voice sounds too loud in the silence. "Are you here?"

Nothing, just the quiet hum of the dreamscape maintaining itself, a sound he's never consciously noticed before because she was always there to fill the space.

She's usually already manifested by the time he arrives, always there with that particular expression she gets when she first sees him, something between exasperation and something softer she never quite admits to. Jake can feel his heart starting to beat faster, that old familiar panic creeping in at the edges.

"I know you're here," he says, moving toward the center of the room, scanning the empty corners as if she might be hiding in them. "That's fine. I can wait."

He sits on the bed and waits, hands clasped between his knees, trying to keep his breathing steady. She's never been late before, but there's a first time for everything. He can handle it. He can.

Minutes pass. The dreamscape remains empty, unchanging, and the panic in Jake's chest is growing from a flutter to a roar.

"Okay," Jake says, and he can hear the edge of desperation creeping into his voice now, can't quite keep it out anymore. "Okay, this isn't funny. I know you're mad about last time. I’m sorry. I won’t do it again. I was desperate.”

The silence presses down on him like a physical weight. He stands up, paces to the window, back to the bed, unable to sit still. This doesn't make sense. She wouldn't just not show up. Even when she was angry with him, even when he'd done something wrong, she was always here.

"Please," he says, and his hands are gripping the edge of the bed hard enough that his knuckles are white. "Please, I'm sorry. Whatever I did, whatever I said, I'm sorry. Just come out. Please."

The air shifts.

Jake's head snaps up, relief flooding through him so intensely it makes him dizzy. "There you are.” 

A figure manifests in front of him, the space rippling and solidifying into a human shape. As the form becomes clear, Jake's relief curdles into confusion and then something darker.

It's not her.

It's someone else. A man, with a calm expression and dark eyes that take in the dreamscape with the kind of professional assessment that makes Jake's stomach drop.

Jake stands abruptly, the bed scraping against the floor of the dreamscape even though there is no floor, not really. "Who are you?"

"My name is Jungwon," the man’s voice is gentle, the kind of voice you'd use with a spooked animal or a confused child. "I'm your new guardian."

The words hit Jake like a punch to the chest. He stares at this intruder in a space that's supposed to be his and hers alone, trying to process what he just said. "My what?"

"Your guardian. I've been assigned to your case as of this morning." Jungwon takes a step closer, slow and deliberate, and Jake takes a step back on pure instinct. "I know this is unexpected. I'm here to help you adjust to the transition."

"Transition." Jake repeats the word like it's in a foreign language, like if he says it enough times it might start to make sense. "No. No, you're just part of the dream. She made you." 

He stops, looking around wildly as if she might appear at any moment to tell him this was all a lesson, something other than what it appears to be.

"I'm not part of a dream she made. I'm a guardian, the same as she was." Jungwon's voice remains infuriatingly calm, like he's explaining something simple and obvious. "I'm here because she's been rotated off your case. This is a standard protocol change. It happens with all guardian assignments eventually."

Jake's breathing is coming faster now, shallow and insufficient. His hands are shaking and he shoves them in his pockets to hide it. "That's not possible. She wouldn't just leave. She promised she'd stay. She promised."

"I understand this is difficult," There's something practiced about the way Jungwon says it, like he's said it before to other dreamers in other dreamscapes. "But guardian rotations are standard protocol. She was with you longer than usual, actually, much longer. But all assignments eventually end. That's how the system works."

"No, you’re lying. Where is she?” Jake backs up until his legs hit the bed again. The room is starting to feel smaller, the walls pressing in, responding to his rising panic.

"I want to see her." Jake's hands come out of his pockets, reaching toward Jungwon like he might be able to physically pull the answer he wants out of him. His throat is so tight it hurts to speak. "After everything, she owes me a goodbye."

"I'm afraid that's not possible."

"Why not?" The word comes out almost as a shout. "Why the hell not? You people can apparently do whatever you want. show up in my dreams and manipulate everything, but I can't have five minutes to say goodbye to someone who's been the most important person in my life for months?"

"Seeing her again would only make the transition more difficult. It would give you false hope that she might come back. This way is kinder."

"I don't care how it works!" Jake is shouting now, and the dreamscape responds violently to his emotion, the walls darkening from soft gray to charcoal, the light flickering like a dying bulb. "This is my mind. You can't just show up here and tell me she's gone and expect me to accept it. I didn't ask for you. I don't want you. I want her back."

Jungwon's expression doesn't change, but he takes a small step back, giving Jake space. His hands are loose at his sides, non-threatening, the posture of someone who's dealt with angry dreamers before and knows how to de-escalate. "I understand you're angry. That's a normal response to this kind of change. Loss of a familiar guardian, especially one you'd developed a strong working relationship with, is disorienting and painful. I need you to understand that I'm here to help you. That's my only goal. I'm not your enemy."

"You're not her." Jake's voice breaks on the words, and he hates the vulnerability, hates that this stranger is seeing him like this. The dreamscape shudders around them, the walls rippling. His voice drops to something quieter, more desperate. "I want to know why she left. I must have done something wrong, right?" He stops, pressing the heels of his hands against his eyes. "What did I do?"

"You didn't do anything wrong." Jungwon's voice is firmer now. "This wasn't about you failing or doing something that drove her away. The elders made a decision based on what they believed was best for your care and her wellbeing. You became attached to her in a way that was making it harder for you to heal, and her continued presence was reinforcing that attachment rather than helping you develop independence."

"I don't want your help." 

"You don't have to want it right now. You just have to not fight it." Jungwon gestures around the dreamscape. "This space is yours. I'm just here to keep it stable, to keep the nightmares away and help you rest. That's all. I'm not trying to replace her. I'm just trying to do my job."

Jake sinks down onto the bed, all the fight draining out of him at once. He feels hollowed out, like something vital has been carved out of his chest and all that's left is the aching space where it used to be.

"I miss her," he says, and the words come out broken. "I miss her so much and she's only been gone for a few hours. How am I supposed to do this?” 

"One night at a time." Jungwon says it simply, like it's the most obvious thing in the world. "You don't have to move on right now. You just have to get through tonight. And then tomorrow night. And the night after that. Eventually it will hurt less."

he presses the light out of curiosity.

there’s a bright flash, a weird pressure in the air, and suddenly there are two jays standing in your kitchen.

same face. same clothes. same slightly messy hair. same confused expression.

the original jay stares at his clone. the clone stares back.

“…what the fuck,” both of them say at the exact same time.

you, standing there with a half-eaten apple in your hand, just slowly put it down.

“okay,” you say carefully. “so. there are two of you now.”

the original jay looks at you, then at the clone, then back at you. “this has to be a dream.”

the clone tilts his head, eyes already drifting over you in a way that feels very familiar and very dangerous. “if it’s a dream, it’s a really good one.”

the first hour is pure… logistics (if you can call it that), and mild panic.

they have the same memories up until the moment of cloning. same voice. same little habits. the only difference is that the clone seems… slightly less filtered. a little bolder. like the version of jay that exists in the back of his mind when he’s too tired or hony to be polite.

you end up sitting on the couch while both of them pace.

“we can’t tell anyone,” original jay says firmly. “this would be a whole scandal.”

“agreed,” clone jay replies. then he looks at you and smirks. “but we can tell her everything.”

original jay shoots him a look. “don’t.”

“don’t what?” the clone asks innocently. “don’t point out that our girlfriend is currently looking at both of us like she just won the lottery?”

your face burns.

because… yeah. you kind of are.

by night two, the panic has fully transformed into something else.

you’re in the bedroom. original jay is behind you, chest pressed to your back, mouth on your neck, hands already under your shirt. clone jay is in front of you, on his knees, slowly dragging your leggings down while looking up at you with dark eyes.

“you’ve been thinking about this since the kitchen, haven’t you?” the clone murmurs, pressing a kiss to your inner thigh. “the two of us. both wanting you.”

original jay’s voice is rougher against your ear. “she’s been wet since she realized there were two of us. i felt it when i carried her to the couch earlier.”

you whimper. the clone laughs softly and leans in, mouthing over your panties before pulling them aside.

having one jay between your legs is already overwhelming.

having a second jay holding you upright while whispering filthy praise in your ear is almost too much.

“look at her,” original jay says, voice low and fond and a little wrecked. “taking it so well already.”

the clone hums in agreement, tongue finally dragging over you properly. your knees buckle. original jay holds you tighter.

they develop roles without ever discussing it.

original jay is still the one who makes sure you eat, who runs a bath afterward, who presses soft kisses to your forehead and asks if you’re okay every twenty minutes. the clone is the one who pins your wrists, who talks dirtier, who seems to enjoy watching his other self take care of you almost as much as he enjoys participating.

sometimes they switch.

one morning you wake up to original jay’s mouth on your breast and the clone already hard against your thigh, watching with a sleepy, satisfied expression.

“morning,” the clone rasps. “he woke up needy. i told him to be gentle.”

original jay makes a muffled sound against your skin that might be a protest and might be agreement.

you stretch, smiling, and reach down to stroke the clone slowly. “you two are going to ruin me.”

“that’s the plan,” both of them say at the same time, then exchange a look and huff almost identical laughs.

the best part is the way they both look at you like you’re the single most precious and filthy thing in the world.

one night you’re on your hands and knees. original jay is underneath you, letting you ride his face while the clone fucks you slow and deep from behind. every time you try to say something coherent, one of them does something that makes your brain short-circuit.

“she’s close,” the clone tells the original, voice tight. “feel how she’s shaking.”

original jay just grips your thighs tighter and keeps going.

when you finally come, it’s with both of their names tangled in your mouth. they follow soon after — one with a groan against your cunt, the other buried deep and pulsing inside you.

afterward the three of you collapse in a sweaty, sticky heap. original jay pulls you onto his chest. the clone curls up behind you, arm slung over both of you.

“seventy-two hours,” the clone murmurs eventually. “feels too short.”

original jay presses a kiss to your hair. “we’ll make them count.”

you smile into his skin, already half-asleep and thoroughly wrecked in the best way.

“best weekend of my life,” you mumble.

both jays laugh, low and warm and perfectly in sync.

“yeah,” original jay says softly. “ours too.”

the device stops glowing on the third night.

there’s another soft flash of light. when it fades, there’s only one jay left in the bed with you — the original one, slightly out of breath, staring at the empty space beside him like he’s already mourning the loss.

you reach for him immediately. he pulls you close, face buried in your neck.

“are you okay?” you whisper.

he nods. then, after a long moment, he adds: “…we’re doing that again if the weird box ever shows up a second time.”

you laugh, sleepy and exhausted and so, so happy.

“deal.”

© jongst4r, 2026

the two of you were making breakfast together in his kitchen. you stood behind him while he cooked eggs,  arms wrapped around his bare waist, chin resting on his shoulders as you hummed. every few seconds you’d press a kiss to his neck or cheek.

sunghoon laughed softly when you stole a piece of fruit from the cutting board.

“you’re gonna eat everything before it’s done, baby,” he teased, squeezing your hands on his tummy. you giggled and kissed his jaw, pressing you chest against his back.

“can’t help it… you look so cute when you’re cooking.”

you both ended up eating at the counter—you sitting on the top and sunghoon standing in between your legs as you fed him pieces of bacon. he laughed at how cute you looked, and you giggled at his terrible jokes.

it felt domestic.

at work, you two couldn’t keep your hands off each other. 

in the breakroom, sunghoon had you pressed against the wall, kissing you deeply. your hands were in his hair, pulling him closer as you moaned softly into his mouth. you made the breakroom like his bedroom.

jake walked in at the wrong moment. he froze, eyes wide, then quickly looked away with a muttered, “jesus christ…” before backing out. he found it odd. weird, bizarre even to see sunghoon and you… but you, especially in this state.

he supposed he didn’t know you enough—despite knowing each other since the earliest days of jake’s life.

haewon, who had been right behind him, looked visibly uncomfortable, eyebrows furrowed as she turned and left without a word. 

you and sunghoon didn’t even notice. or even if either of you did—no fucks were given.

on the floor, you were “checking out cds” together—but really, it mostly meant him standing behind you with his arms around your waist as the two of you decided which movie to watch for the night.

even during his band practice time that you’d tag along—sunghoon spent most of it teaching you how to use his electric guitar, sitting on his lap with your back pressed flashed against his chest, sunghoon’s arms wrapped around your waist.

his members would give him a look, and so did your girl friends who shared the room.

it’s weird. it’s unlikely.

every night was spent together under the sheets. 

you loved kissing him. you could do it for hours, everywhere, anywhere—slow, deep kisses that turned hungry, soft pecks all over his face, neck, chest, or just lying there with your lips pressed against his for long moments.

you’d pull him on top of you, legs wrapped around his waist, whispering i love you between kisses like it you couldn’t bear even an inch of space between your bodies.

sunghoon wasn’t complaining. not even a little.

he had never been this happy.

waking up with you curled into his side, making breakfast together while you hugged him from behind, stolen kisses, falling asleep with your head on his chest every night—it felt like a dream he never wanted to wake up from. the constant affection, the way you looked at him… it filled every empty space he’d carried.

days turned into weeks.

and now it had been almost two months together.

“acoustic guitar?” 

you and sunghoon were sitting across from each other at a small table by the window, sharing a plate of pastries and drinks. your fingers were playing with his hand on the table—tracing his knuckles, interlacing your fingers, gently squeezing every few seconds.

you genuinely couldn’t stop touching him.

sunghoon chuckled softly, watching the way your pretty manicured fingers traced the lines on his palm. “yeah. the band’s been doing mostly acoustic sets now. the electric stuff is fun but… i don’t know, it feels different when it’s just the guitar. personal, i guess?”

you nodded, still playing with his fingers. were you even listening?

“i like when you play acoustic. your voice sounds really nice like that.”

“you think s—”

RING—!

sunghoon glanced down to his phone with its screen facing upwards—seeing jake’s contact. he simply acknowledged it before flipping his phone. 

the conversation flowed easily as it should between two lovers—about his band’s past gigs, practice, and whether he should start his own project since the band wasn’t as active anymore.

“you should,” you said, eyes sparkling. you squeezed his hand, nails lightly digging into his flesh. “you’d be amazing leading your own band. i wanna come to every show—wanna follow you everywhere you go.”

sunghoon smiled, warmth spreading through his chest. 

“of course you will.”

you picked up a piece of bread, tore a small chunk, and fed it to him with your fingers. sunghoon accepted it, lips brushing against your fingertips. he was about to do the same for you when his phone buzzed on the table.

jake was calling, again.

sunghoon sighed. “hold on, baby. it’s the second time he’s called now. i’ll be quick.”

he excused himself from the table and stepped outside to take the call. 

you watched him go, your expression shifting. your smile faded. a subtle annoyance flickered across your face as you stared at him walking away, fingers tapping lightly, impatiently on the table.

“what?” he answered, a little impatient. “i’m busy.”

“busy with yn?”

sunghoon sighed. “what do you want?"

there was a beat of hesitation on the other line.

“okay, so…” jake started. “i haven’t told anyone because i don’t know how true this goes, but i went to yn’s house the other day to pass some pie. her grandma was asking where yn is.”

sunghoon frowned, “your point?” 

“she thinks yn lives with me. thought she was sick of her. i didn’t tell her what yn said about her kicking her out but… something’s going on.”

sunghoon glanced back at you. you were staring in his direction, smiling in an unnatural, almost too–wide way. he gave a small wave. you waved back, smiling.

jake continued, voice lower. “and plus, this is just so weird, man… i’ve never seen her acting this way. i didn’t even know she liked you.”

that ticked sunghoon off—he didn’t like that. so what if it was fucking weird? so what if jake didn’t know you liked sunghoon? jake didn’t need to know everyfuckingthing there is to know in this world. just because you and him were childhood friends, it doesn’t mean you need to tell him everything.

his grip on the phone tightened. “what the hell are you trying to say?”

a beat.

“i’m just saying it’s weird,” jake replied carefully. “i’m happy for you two, really. but it’s… it’s like yn snapped into a different person.”

sunghoon looked back at you again. you were still staring at him with that same unwavering smile. it was as if you didn’t stop smiling, at all. 

jake kept going. “i don’t know what’s going on with her… or you… but i think you guys should be apart for a while. she literally hasn’t been home.”

a beat.

“hello? sunghoon?”

call ended. 

sunghoon hung up and slowly walked back to the table. he was annoyed, slightly shocked, and trying hard to hide it. his mind was still replaying jake’s words.

you looked up with him with that soft, adoring smile.

“everything okay, baby?”

he sat down, forcing a small nod. “um, yeah.”

you tilted your head, watching him carefully.

“actually, do you…”

“mmmhm…?” you hummed, leaning forward slightly. sunghoon hesitated, then shook his head. “nothing.”

you studied him for a second longer before smiling again. “hm, okay…. i have something for you.”

you reached into your bag and pulled out a small red box, sliding it across the table toward him.

sunghoon blinked. “what’s this?”

“...open it.” 

he hesitated for a moment, fingers hovering over the box, before finally opening it. inside was a beautiful gem—a deep, dark onyx with flecks that caught the light. it was attached to a simple silver chain, clearly old but well–cared for.

“oh… wow,” he murmured, genuinely surprised.

you smiled gently. “it was my grandma’s… then my mom’s, then mine. but i want to give it to you.”

sunghoon looked up at you, confused. “why are you giving it to me?” 

you reached across the table and gently took his hand. “well… it’s important to me. and so are you—but you’re way more important.”

sunghoon looked at the onyx in his palm, then back at you. “you sound like you love me,” he said, heaf–teasing, half–testing. 

you gave him an eerier, almost creepy smile—too wide, too unwavering, full of teeth. “hoonie… i love you so much. i love you more than anyone else.”

the way you said it sent a chill down his spine.

he tried to keep his voice light. “you’d be sad without me?”

you didn’t even hesitate. “i could die.”

the silence that followed was heavy. sunghoon played with the stone between his fingers, the weight of your words sinking in. then, what jake had said slipped into his mind.

i’ve never seen her acting this way. i didn’t even know she liked you.

yn’s grandma thought she was sick of her.

“yn?”

“yeah?”

“did your grandma really kick you out?”

a beat.

you blinked. then you started chuckling—low, strange sound that quickly turned into scoffing. you stood up from the table abruptly. 

“no, no, no, no, no…”

sunghoon looked up at you, confused. “what?”

you raised your voice, almost childlike in your denial. “nooooo, don’t you do that!”

the entire restaurant went quiet. heads turned, the uncomfortable tension was immediate—all eyes on your table, whispers began scattering around in the space. 

sunghoon stayed seated but reached out, gently grabbing your hand. 

“what? baby, calm down. let’s sit first, please?”

your eyes were twitching, and so were your fingers—gripping into the hem of your pretty sweater. “why does it matter?!”

he looked around, clearly embarrassed, cheeks burning as people continued staring. you pulled your hand back slightly but didn’t sit back down. 

“i thought we were having a nice date?” your voice trembled. your head jerked and tilted sideways, shoulders shuddering. to others, it might just seem like a girlfriend getting psycho over the boyfriend, but to sunghoon who knew better—

it was anything but it.

“we are! we are…” he tried to reassure you, lightly nudging you to sit down again—but you wouldn’t budge. 

“so why does it matter?” you repeated, voice getting smaller. just then, you started crying—softly, almost childishly, tears rolling down your cheeks as you stood there by the table with sunghoon’s hand holding yours.

the silence around you was deafening.

sunghoon was growing concerned and embarrassed—people were getting the wrong ideas, he could feel the judgemental eyes on him—the guy must have done something terrible to make his girlfriend cry in public.

swallowing the lump in his throat, he squeezed your hand gently. “doesn’t matter to me, baby. doesn’t matter,” he said quickly, voice low and soothing.

he finally managed to pull you toward him. you collapsed into his lap and chest almost instantly, sobbing quietly against his shirt. sunghoon wrapped his arms around you tightly, one hand rubbing slow circles on your back, the other cradling the back of your head.

you finally went quiet.

“shhh, it’s okay… i’ve got you,” he whispered into your hair, holding you close as your body trembled with hiccups. “it doesn’t matter. it doesn’t matter to me.”

the restaurant slowly, very agonisingly so, went back to their own conversations, but the uneasy atmosphere lingered. 

sunghoon kept holding and rocking you gently, completely focused on calming you down.

——

the night ended with another fucking session. tonight lasted slightly longer than usual—one sunghoon could only assume was due to your frustration from the dinner date earlier. admittedly, it was sunghoon’s fault. he shouldn’t have brought it up, shouldn’t have listened to jake, shouldn’t have put you on the spot.

if you really wanted to talk about it, you would’ve.

sunghoon accidentally woke up sometime in the middle of the night. groggily, he checked the time on his phone.

03:47

and your side of the bed was cold. 

he sat up slowly, rubbing his eyes as he looked around the dark room. at first, he thought you might have gone to the bathroom, or went down to get yourself a glass of water. but then his eyes caught something in the far corner—behind a stack of boxes.

a figure. barely visible. so faint it might’ve been nothing.

sunghoon sat up and leaned forward, squinting to get a clearer view. the figure stepped forward at his movement.

“yn…?”

you were standing there in nothing but his oversized shirt, the hem barely covering your ass. your nipples were visibly perky through the thin fabric, and your eyes reflected just enough light from the window to look almost glowing. eyeshine.

“go back to sleep,” you said softly.

sunghoon’s heart rate picked up.

“what are you doing…?”

you tilted your head slightly. a small, serene smile on your lips. 

“watching you sleep. you’re cute when you sleep, hoonie.”

then, without a word, you stepped back into the shadow of the dark corner, becoming almost invisible again. sunghoon stared at the spot where you had been for god knows how long—unable to shake the chill that ran down his spine.

“...can you come back to bed?” sunghoon asked. voice careful.

“no.”

“yn?”

“no.”

the silence that followed was thick and suffocating. sunghoon sat there in the dark of his room, heart beating faster, tummy gurgling with uneasiness. he was getting weirded out—uncomfortable—getting scared by the girl of his dreams.

you were just standing there, not doing anything. not fiddling with the hem of his shirt that you were wearing, not moving an inch, not blinking or cracking a smile. hell—sunghoon couldn’t even see your lungs expanding. 

it was… uncanny. 

he thought of calling out again—but out of nowhere, you started giggling. a childish, high–pitched sound that didn’t belong in the middle of the night, and was definitely not yours. your shoulders shook and trembled with each giggle that slipped past your lips, but you weren’t moving.

“yn—”

you were acting fucking weird when you hopped back toward the bed like nothing had happened, crawling onto him and kissing his cheek with wet, eager presses of your lips.

“you know i love you the most, right?” you whispered sweetly against his skin, voice dripping with something unhinged. “i love you sooooo much…” 

your hands roamed his bare chest possessively, cold fingers digging into his skin as you groped his bicep, squeezing like you were testing how much of him you could claim—ripped out with your bare hands.

you kissed down his neck, grazing your teeth along his pulse point—not quite biting, but close enough to send a shiver of fear through him.

“i could eat you up…” you murmured, teeth scraping harder this time, voice low and obsessive and not yours. “just…. consume every little part of you until there’s nothing left for anyone else—not even for yourself. wouldn’t that be nice? you’d be all mine. only mine. forever.”

your nails dragged down his chest as you nuzzled into his neck again, pressing your chest against him. sunghoon state frozen beneath you, heart hammering. the earlier warmth completely replaced by a deep, instinctive dread. 

with your hand roaming along his body, they travelled down until you were caressing his thigh, close to his boxer. sunghoon let out a small grunt as you licked the part where his major jugular vein pulsed, then followed it with wet, butterfly kisses along the slope of his neck.

sunghoon had never noticed or felt how sharp your canines are. 

“i wanna do it again,” you murmured, fluttering your pretty lashes with that same unhinged adoration. 

even through the fear he’d never felt before in his life, sunghoon couldn’t deny you. not when you leaned in closer, lips brushing his ear as you whispered,

“fuck me, please?”

——

sunghoon stepped out of the bathroom, still half–asleep as he adjusted his shirt. at the same time, you walked out of the kitchen looking as normal, cute, girlfriend–ly, and happy as ever—bright smile, fresh face, still wearing the same oversized shirt as last night. 

“oh! good morning, my baby!” you chirped, immediately walking over and kissing his cheek sweetly.

sunghoon smiled despite the lingering unease from last night. “hi, morning.” he hummed, kissing you back softly on the lips. 

he hesitated for a moment, then spoke carefully.

“... can we, uh, talk about last night?”

your expression shifted. you looked down for a second, then back up at him with wide, innocent eyes.

“ugh, i’m sorry,” you said softly. “i had a really bad dream… and i think i was sleepwalking or something. i don’t even remember most of it…”

sunghoon hummed, rubbing the back of his neck. “it was kinda scary. you were saying and doing stuff. and the way you looked at me—” “i know, i know,” you cut in gently, stepping closer and wrapping your arms around his waist. you hugged him tight, pressing your cheek against his chest. “i’m so sorry, baby. i won’t do it again—promise.”

he slowly hugged your back, arms clinging around you. his voice was relieved, but still worried. 

“it’s okay. just promise me it won’t happen again.”

“i promise,” you said sweetly, giving him a squeeze. “i love you so much.”

“i love you too.”

it’s all so weird, but also not. just last night, sunghoon swore he could piss himself on the bed—but came the morning, and he couldn’t help himself.

he reached for his nametag on the counter and pinned it on. “i’ll see you later.”

“mmhm,” you hummed happily. then you suddenly perked up. “oh! i made you a little something.”

you hurried back to the kitchen counter and came back holding a neatly packed lunchbox, handing it to him with both hands like it was a precious gift.

“since i’m not working anymore, i couldn’t stand not doing anything for you and feeling like a useless sex doll—”

sunghoon frowned almost instantly, cutting you off. “what? what are you talking about?”

for a split second, your expression glitched in real time—eyes flickering, smile twitching unnaturally like a bad video feed. your pupils constricted and dilated before it went back normal. you recovered almost instantly, laughing it off like it was nothing. 

“what? sorry, just forget it! here.”

you pushed the lunchbox into his hands with a wide smile. 

sunghoon took it, a little confused. “um… alright.”

you leaned in and kissed him again—soft, lingering, and full of that obsessive affection. he kissed you back, placing his hands on your hips momentarily. 

you pulled away with a bright smile, brushing off nothing from his shoulders like a doting girlfriend. then, you did that cute giddy thing—standing on your tiptoes, dropping back down, then rising onto your tiptoes again, hands clasped in front of you.

“enjoy your day, hoonie!” you said sweetly. “but not too much.” you smiled.

“i’ll be right here when you get home.” 

sunghoon gave you a small smile, and turned toward the door.

only to find it taped shut, literally. layers of grey duct tape crisscrossing over them frame and knob and wall, sealing it completely.

he stopped dead in his tracks, eyes widened in shock and disbelief. “uh… um…”

he didn’t say anything else. he just walked over and tried to pull the knob—the tape held firm.

behind, you stood perfectly still, watching with that same serene smile. you were still standing on your tiptoes, then dropping back down, then onto your tiptoes again. 

“you okay, baby?” you asked, voice soft and innocent. “you seemed to struggle a little… maybe you should just stay at home?”

sunghoon forced a chuckle, still tugging at the door. “no, no, i uh… i got this, baby. just…”

with a sharp rip, he finally tore enough of the tape off to open the door. he turned back to you, trying to act normal. 

“i’ll see you soon.”

you waved at him with an unnervingly sweet, cute smile. still standing in the same spot—still doing your tiptoes movement.

——

sunghoon and haewon were in the aisles arranging the new cd arrivals. 

“been a while since we hung out,” she said casually, sliding a few albums into place. 

“yeah,” sunghoon replied, not looking up from where he was crouching down. “got busy. and yn’s not exactly the hang–out type anymore.”

haewon paused, looking down at him with a raised eyebrow.

“what, really? she used to come over a lot and watch movies with jake and i.” she shrugged. “huh. guess relationships change people.”

sunghoon chuckled, then he smiled, finally looking up to her. “what’s up with that?”

the girl laughed lightly, shaking her head as she continued with her task. “nothing? i always thought yn was like this really cool, whimsical girl, you know what i mean? but now i barely even see you, let alone her. just… bummed.”

sunghoon’s hands slowed on the cds. “uh. i guess so.”

the silence between them grew a little awkward. sensing it, haewon quickly changed the subject with a brighter tone. “oh, yeah, also—jake wants to hold this big, cool movie night at our place tonight. you’re joining?”

sunghoon pursed his lips, then thought for a little while. true—it’s been a while since the three—or four, if including you—hung out together since sunghoon and you became a thing. it had also been a while since he properly talked to haewon and jake outside of work.

everything lately had revolved around you.

“...yeah, sure, actually,” he finally said. “who else is joining?”

haewon smiled, relieved that the awkwardness had passed. “mm, i think jake invited some band people too. aerona’s there too, if you remember.”

sunghoon nodded. “sure. yeah, that works.”

they were cut off by kim calling out from the front counter. “haewon! can you work on this aisle? and sunghoon, you can take your break now!”

haewon grunted softly, rolling her eyes. “i’ll see you tonight.”

“sure,” sunghoon replied with a small smile. 

with another grunt from him, he stood back up, rubbing his hands together and setting the box aside.

as he was walking toward the counter to head to the breakroom, sieun—your bestfriend—suddenly appeared in front of him. she was wearing a low cut sleeveless top and jeans shorts, boots that rose up till her knees.

“sunghoon, hi!”

he was slightly taken aback. “oh, sieun, hey. what are you doing here?”

he kept walking, slipping behind the counter and into the small breakroom to grab his lunchbag. the breakroom door was right behind the front counter, so sieun waited in front with her arms folded in front of her, pressed against her chest—making her cleavage appear more… prominent. 

when he came back out with the lunchbox you’d made him, sieun grinned.

“oh, you know… i kinda wanna rent something,” she said, voice playful. “secretary, maybe?”

sunghoon didn’t know sieun like that aside from sharing a band practice room together occasionally. so seeing her this way, kinda changed the way he viewed her. 

he hummed, letting out a small scoff. “we don’t sell porn here.”

sieun giggled, tilting her head. “oh! so you know?” she leaned forward a little more. “it’s not porn, though? it’s just… suggestive.”

the atmosphere between them felt changed—flirty on her end. 

“well, you gotta pirate it, ‘cause we don’t have it here.”

he then set the lunchbag you made him on the counter between them, creating a space. sieun’s eyes flicked to it. 

“awe, mommy made you lunch, sunghoon?”

“nope,” he replied, a small smile tugging at his lips. “yn did, actually.”

sieun let out a soft laugh, raising her eyebrows. “oh, how sweet. she’s the best at cooking,” she hummed, raising an eyebrow. “very… housewife material of her.”

sunghoon chuckled lightly and opened the lid.

the smell hit them both at the same time. 

inside was the most unappetising, inedible, atrocious looking lunch either of them had ever seen—it was just a sandwich. except, the sandwich was both burnt and wet at the same time—the bread charred back on the edges while the middle looked soggy and slimy. a small bug was even crawling slowly across the top.

both of them recoiled instantly.

siuen made a disgusted noise and turned her head away. sunghoon quickly slammed the lid shut, eyes wide with horror.

the lunchbox landed in the trash.

——

the drive started quiet. after shift, jake asked for a ride home in which sunghoon agreed—having lived in the same row of neighborhoods, after all. 

then, jake cleared his throat.

“i wanna talk about you and yn.”

sunghoon kept his eyes on the road. “what’s there to talk about?

“come on.”

the driver sighed, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel. “you know i like her. for a long time too.”

“i know,” jake said carefully, knowing how fragile the topic was. “but i just think you guys should be apart for a bit—”

“i’ve never been so fucking happy,” sunghoon cuts in, voice sharp, laced with defensiveness. “not after my dad passed.”

jake tried again. “it’s just for a little—”

“and you’re trying to give me reasons not to be.”

a heavy beat of silence settled in the car.

“look, i just don't want you, or yn for that matter, to get hurt,” jake said, tone more serious now. “she’s my friend, and you’re my bestfriend, and i’m totally thrown and weirded out by this. can we please break this down?”

sunghoon’s grip on the wheel tightened. “i don’t want to break it down for you.”

jake pushed. “she lied about her grandma. she didn’t have a reason to—”

“i’m still not breaking down our relationship—”

“we don’t even hang out anymore—”

“right, like i had to hear about your cool–ass party from haewon—”

“and you don’t think this is fucking weird at all?”

“were you going to invite us?”

their voices overlapped, the argument building fast and messy in the confined space of the car.

jake frowned. “don’t change the subject. and i wasn’t sure if i wanted to, if i’m being completely honest.”

sunghoon’s jaw clenched. “why not?”

the car slowed to a stop in front of jake’s house.

he turned to sunghoon, expression serious. “because it looks like yn is going through something worse than molly, and it seems to me that you’re taking advantage of it—”

“oh, for fuck’s sakes!” sunghoon snapped, turning to jake. his arms rested on the shoulder of the car seat. “she’s all over me! are you fucking kidding?”

“exactly!” jake shot back. “you were all over her, now she’s all over you and it doesn’t look good. it doesn’t look good at all, man.”

sunghoon let out a bitter laugh, gripping the steering wheel tighter. “why are you trying to ruin this for me? she’s the one who won’t leave me alone.”

jake exhaled, rubbing his face. “alright. then be a man, and make that clear. you can come, but out of love, yn can’t. or yn can come, and you stay at home.”

just before jake stepped out of the car, he paused, one hand on the door.

“i don’t want my friend’s relationship to be built on some weird codependency or what-the-fuck-ever.”

he shut the door behind him.

——

tired from the long day and the argument with jake, sunghoon pushed the door open and flicked on the lights. he just wanted to shower and rest—and cuddle with you until sleep took over.

but the moment he stopped inside, the smell hit him first—sour, acrid, vomit, and urine.

you were still standing in the middle of the living room, the same spot he left you in, soaked in sweat and vomit, standing in a pool of your own piss. the same shirt from earlier was ruined, clinging wetly to your body. urine stained your legs and the floor beneath you.

you hadn’t moved from that spot.

“hoonie!” you said brightly.

sunghoon froze, eyes wide with horror.

“oh, shit—yn?! what the fuck? are you okay?”

you seemed to realise the state you were in. at his reaction, you stepped back embarrassed, looking down at yourself with a small, confused frown.

“i—i’m sorry… oh gosh, i should’ve showered…”

sunghoon moved toward you quickly, concerned and utterly confused. he grabbed a tissue from the tv stand and started wiping your face, trying not to gag at the smell.

“what happened?” he asked, voice laced with worry.

you looked up at him, eyes glassy. “my body feels weird and i couldn’t stop puking… ugh, i don’t know…”

sunghoon’s eyes widened. he scrunched his nose at the overwhelming stench. “did you have a seizure or something?" 

you shook your head slowly.

“i was waiting for you to come home.”

you looked down at yourself again and shivered with visible revulsion.

“oh gosh… i’m so disgusting… you’re probably so disgusted with me. i’m so sorry—let me shower, and i’ll clean this all up.”

you walked toward the bathroom. sunghoon followed close behind, but you slammed the door in his face before he could do anything. the shower water turned on a second later.

“yn, i don’t understand how—” he started, voice raised above the noise of the water.

“i’ll clean it, baby,” you called back, voice sweet despite everything.

sunghoon stood right outside the door, shoulders slumped, forehead resting against the door.

“yn?”

“yeah?”

“...you love me, right?”

“yeah, a lot!”

he closed his eyes.

“...okay. so never do that again, hm?”

“do what? wait for you to come home?”

sunghoon rested his head fully against the door, voice tired.

“not that, baby. you can wait for me—but you know, you can also do things around the house.”

“okay, baby.”

a beat of silence.

“so uhm… what did you do today?”

“nothing, baby.”

another long pause. defeated and unsure, sunghoon finally spoke up again, “i’m going to jake’s house tonight.”

the shower water stopped. and everything went eerily quiet. 

you sounded hurt when you replied. “okay.”

“so i, uh… i’m gonna go there, okay?”

“yup. i can get dressed after this.”

“that’s nice, baby, but uh… i think it’s just a band thing.”

“oh, i know ‘cause sieun was telling me she’s going.”

sunghoon frowned, taken aback. “sieun too? what, really?”

the bathroom door suddenly slammed open. 

you stood there, drenched, wrapping only in a towel. hair dripping water onto the floor. your eyes were wide and intense. 

“yeah. why? are you happy? excited? is that why you’re telling me not to go?” with every sentence, you walked towards him. your eyes were wide, and your skin was warm and flushed from the hot water. you tilted your head once harshly, it threatened to break.

sunghoon stepped back until his back met the wall, hands raised. “no, no, no, baby, no that’s not it—”

then, like a switch, you stood still, like normal, with an innocent look on your face. “but um, okay. if you want me to stay at home, i can stay at home, hoonie.”

now he was feeling overwhelmingly guilty. he didn’t know sieun, your bestfriend, was coming too—so now it just seemed like an overall big misunderstanding. 

“no, it’s okay. i’m sorry—you should come.”

“mm, it’s fine. you can go without me.”

he started persuading you to go, but you kept insisting in that soft tone of yours—”i don’t want to bother you, i’ll just wait here like always,” “i don’t want to make you uncomfortable…”

sunghoon didn’t know what to do.

——

jake deadpanned sunghoon the moment he walked in with you clinging to his arm. sunghoon avoided his gaze. around the low table were two other guys from the band circle and sieun, who gave sunghoon a flirty little wave. 

you and sunghoon sat together on the couch, your body pressed close to his. jake and haewon were sitting on single chairs across the table, and others just scattered around.

the group was playing “dare or drink”—a stack of cards with ridiculous and explicit dares.

one of the guys, jaemin, pulled a card and grinned.

“switch spots with whoever you want.”

“hell yeah,” he said immediately, eyes landing on you. “i wanna sit next to yn.”

your eyes widened slightly and you instantly looked over to sunghoon, pouting and pleading, “nooo…” and caught sunghoon’s hand as he got up, squeezing it lightly. “baby, i’ve showered…”

he gave your hand a gentle squeeze back. “it’s fine, babe.”

he stood up and moved to the only empty spot—right next to haewon.

jaemin happily took his place beside you. you looked visibly sad, like a kicked puppy with your eyebrows frowned inwards, scooting slightly from the other guy. 

he laughed. “damn, sunghoon, what kinda spell you got on her?”

the group chuckled. sunghoon forced a smile but didn’t say anything.

it was now your turn. you pulled a card but didn’t read it out loud. instead, you stared at it for a long second before standing up and suddenly speaking in a soft, rambling voice—like you were telling a story no one asked for.

“my wish is to die like an angel, sinless… i don’t know what it is, and i don’t think i’m the only one. falling from the sky with wings made of glass, shattering beautifully so everyone can see who i really am inside. but i can’t. i can’t die like an angel, and i think i can’t die at all. i can’t die like an angel like i wanted to. i’m not an angel—i’m not—i don’t know. i just want to be something.”

the room went deathly quiet. whatever it was… hung heavy in the air—deeply unsettling in everyone’s ribs. jake blinked, swallowing the lump in his throat. haewon, too, blinking confusedly, her lips parting like she wanted to say something—but not sure what.

sieun made a face—a clear what the fuck….? expression—while the other two guys exchanged awkward glances, one of them muttering a quiet, “what…?”

sunghoon just stared at you, completely confused, mouth slightly open like haewon—wanted to say something but couldn’t find the words.

sieun finally broke the silence, raising an eyebrow. “uh… you good, babe?”

you blinked, sat down again, then smiled like nothing strange had happened at all. 

“yeah. i’m perfect.”

haewon cleared her throat awkwardly. “um… okay, sunghoon—it’s your turn.”

sunghoon blinked, snapping out of it. “oh shit, okay.”

he reached forward and pulled a card. his face paled the moment he read it. he glanced at you—you were leaning forward with sweet anticipation, smiling brightly. then he looked at jake silently pleading. 

“...kiss the person to your left.”

it was haewon.

“ooohs,” and “wows,” rippled through the group. sunghoon made eye contact with you again. your expression had gone completely dead—emotionless, empty. then, the corners of your mouth stretched downwards tightly while your eyes remained unblinking and wide.

then you stood up slowly. everyone’s eyes followed you. 

you stood behind haewon’s folded chair for what felt like forever.

swiftly, you moved behind haewon’s chair and grabbed the back of it—dragged it backward with a loud, grating creak that echoed through the room. haewon’s eyes widened and she gripped the armrests for support and balance. 

then you crouched right next to sunghoon’s chair, puckered your lips, and waited.

the whole room was shocked into silence.

sunghoon stared at you for a second. he hadn’t even planned to do the dare—he was going to drink instead. but the way you were looking at him now…

he leaned in and kissed you. 

then, you looked at sunghoon with glassy eyes.

“no one on this earth will ever comprehend what it feels like to love someone as much as i love you,” you whispered against his lips.

you stood up abruptly and giggled, clapping your hands once like a child who’d just finished a performance. 

“that was fun!”

jake looked almost hurt for a second, but then forced a smile. “um, okay… dare still count. who wants shots?”

a beat.

jaemin raised his hand. “i’ll take one.”

“god bless, thank you jaemin,” jake said, trying to keep the mood light.

“who else?”

you locked eyes with sunghoon. he looked rather uncomfortable. guilt suddenly washed over your face. your heart beat once, then twice, then thrice before something in you snapped.

you jolted violently, swiping the entire stack of cards off the table with one arm. before anyone could react, you grabbed the vodka bottle and smashed it hard against the edge of the table.

CRASH.

glass exploded everywhere. everyone jerked back in fear, chairs scraping loudly as people scrambled away. haewon nearly stumbled over her chair. 

“it’s not me!” you screamed, voice cracking. “i’m not the devil!”

you kept smashing the broken bottle against the table, shards flying. sieun gasped aloud, but wasn’t able to do anything to stop you. sunghoon too, just watched in horror.

“help her! shit—sunghoon!”

“get her to the fucking hospital!”

then, in a frenzied motion, you lifted the sharp, broken vodka bottle and stabbed the jagged end into the side of your face. 

the blunt glass failed to puncture deeply, but it still caused crazy damage—tearing open your cheek in a ragged, bloody gash. blood poured down your face instantly, dripping onto your pretty little dress (too pretty for a simple movie night) and onto the floor. 

sobbing, you kept pressing it in, twisting it slightly. more blood spraying as the glass cut deeper into your skin.

“please—it’s not me!”

the room erupted into chaos—people standing up, chairs knocking over.

“yn, shit!”

sunghoon just stared at you from where he was sitting, almost… emotionless. almost. he blinked like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. his mind was racing—every moment, every strange behaviour, every time he’d ignored it all. he didn’t move.

he couldn’t.

you kept pressing the jagged glass into the side of your face for a few more terrifying seconds before you suddenly stopped. the broken bottle slipped from your bloody fingers and clattered to the floor.

your expression changed instantly. you blinked, looking around the room like you just woke up from a nightmare. 

“oh… oh my gosh, i’m so sorry…”

you looked horrifying. blood poured freely down the left side of your face from the ragged rash on your cheek, staining your pretty dress. your hands were cut and bleeding from gripping the broken glass—and your eyes were wide and teary.

you chuckled awkwardly, nipping at the bottom of your lip as you darted your tongue to lick the blood around your lips. 

everyone in the room was horrified. haewon had her hand over her mouth. sieun was colourless. the other guys were frozen. jake looked like he was about to be sick. 

you tried to smile, voice shaky as you stood up, wiping your bloody hands on your skirt. 

“okay, okay… i’m so sorry, guys. oh gosh, silly me,” you let out a weak laugh, tucking your hair behind your ear. “it was just a joke, um—i’m leaving. sorry, sorry…”

you started crying softly, tears mixing with the blood on your face.

then, you turned to sunghoon, voice small as you extended your arm out.

“come on, baby.”

everyone’s eyes snapped to him.

——

the hospital didn’t take you in.

the nurse had asked sunghoon to make a report and leave you there for treatment, but he refused. he didn’t want to leave you alone. not now, not like this, not ever.

so he drove home instead, your head nuzzling into his shoulder the entire ride, one of your hands tightly gripping his free arm like you were afraid he’d disappear.

back at his house, sunghoon sat at the dining table. the cut on your cheek had stopped bleeding but the parted flesh looked raw and ugly. it gave him chills how you were so unbothered by it.

he was about to stand up when you grabbed his hand.

“where are you going…?”

“just getting water, yn…”

you looked down on your lap, still holding his wrist. sunghoon stared at you for a long, heavy moment—contemplating, licking his dry lips wet.

“why did you do that?”

you finally looked up to him, eyes showing visible sadness, your eyebrows dropped. “...you and haewon were going to kiss…”

sunghoon sighed. he’d half–expected that’d be your answer. sighing, he ran his other hand along his face. “i wasn’t even going to do it,” he said, frustration creeping in. “i was going to drink—you… you scared everyone.”

swallowing the lump in your throat, your gave his wrist a gentle squeeze. “i don’t know why i did it…” you whispered. 

sunghoon shook his head, sitting back down. “look at your face,” he said, voice softer but still strained.

“i’m sorry—i got scared…”

he reached out and gently wiped the dried blood from your cheek with his thumb. you leaned into his touch like a starved animal. 

then, you added quietly, “sieun likes you too.”

sunghoon’s patience finally snapped. he frowned, and pulled his hand back, growing frustrated. why the fuck would it ever matter if sieun liked him? 

“that’s… god, that’s—”

you looked up at him, confused, pulling your hand back. “what…?”

it all blew up.

“god, everything was fucking normal!” he burst out, voice cracking as he stood up. sunghoon turned around to face the wall, clear frustration, anger, disappointment, confusion—all displayed on his face. 

“and now you’re so—you’re so—!”

sunghoon turned and stopped himself, seeing the way you flinched, eyes wide and shocked and teary. 

“i’m sorry… i’m sorry,” he said quickly, voice breaking as he reached for you again. his hands were shaking as he held your cheeks, thumbs gently brushing away the tears. 

“you’re normal,” he whispered, voice cracking. “you’re so normal, and you’re so beautiful and i love you so much but—oh god, yn, please don’t ever do that again.”

sunghoon’s eyes were glassy, filled with fear and guilt and love all at once.

“it’s not okay,” he murmured, shaking his head. “this isn’t okay.”

you looked up at him. he searched for your face desperately, still cupping your cheeks.

“do you… do you like me?”

“of course, hoonie. i love you—”

“no, no, no, no, no,” he cut you off, shaking your head frantically. his grip on you tightened a fraction. “do you like me? do you even like me?”

you tried to answer again. “i lov—”

sunghoon frowned—he almost pressed his thumbs into your flesh. “did yn like me?” he pressed, looking right into your eyes for answers. “is yn happy? did she like me?”

slowly, you cracked a smile, all teeth and almost like a grin. 

“yeah.”

sunghoon let out a shaky breath, eyes filled with pain and confusion. “yeah… no, no, no, no…” he whispered, suddenly pulling away, standing up and walking away.

you stood up too, voice small and scared. “where are you going?”

“bathroom, yn,” he said almost quickly, not turning around. “can i even do that?”

you frowned, now looking frustrated. the obsessive mask cracking as it bled through like the blood from your cut fleshes. “well, can you tell me you love me?” you said, tone laced with something of annoyance and eagerness. 

sunghoon stopped and turned around. his eyes were red, exhausted, and full of everything he’d been holding in.

“yn… this is all i’ve ever wanted.”

you tilted your head before stepping closer. “of course. i know that. this is all i’ve ever wanted too.” 

sunghoon shook his head slowly, stepping back. “no… it’s not…”

you stepped forward, eyes wide and pleading. “yes it is. this is all i’ve ever wanted.”

“i want this to work so bad,” he murmured, pain clear in his voice as he rubbed his face. 

“it can,” you said quickly, almost desperately as you stood before him. “of course it can.”

“no, it can’t.”

“yes it can.”

he ran a hand through his slightly sweaty hair, exhausted but not quite slowing down. sunghoon was borderline tearing up too out of frustration that you were just not getting it. “okay—so i’m gonna send you home and we’re gonna take some space—”

you immediately broke. your shoulders slumped like your soul just left you, like all the energy within had drained out. “noooo…” you started crying, then sobbing, then full–on wailing in a matter of seconds. 

“i don’t want space! i don’t wanna be apart from you! tell me what i should do!”

sunghoon frowned, voice cracked with frustration as he stepped away. “just be normal! be normal, yn!”

you screamed through your tears, “i can be normal!”

“god, i just want you to be yn!”

“i can be yn!” you screamed back, voice breaking and sobbing as your shoulder trembled. you followed wherever he went. “i can be anything you want!”

“don’t say that.” sunghoon said quietly, obviously drained. he held your shoulders, pressing his thumbs into your flesh to keep you steady. “yn will never say that.”

“it’s true!” you insisted, tears screaming. you held onto the hem of his shirt like an upset child. “i’ll be anything!”

sunghoon looked completely exhausted, no emotion left on his face. he was quiet now, staring at the floor. 

your lips parted when he didn’t look at you in the eyes. 

“oh… i’m so sorry. i’m so sorry, baby.”

you dropped to your knees in front of him with a thud, wrapping your arms tightly around his leg, clinging desperately as you buried your face against his thigh. your tears wet the fabric. 

“i can be yn… i can be yn… i’ll be whatever you want.” you murmured, kissing his thigh through his jeans.

“i’ll be sweet, and soft, and kind, caring… like yn… i’ll take care of you and we can cook and read together. i can be yn…” you continued, pressing your cheek into his flesh.

sunghoon slowly crouched to your level, cupping your cheeks so you were looking at him. 

“i love you too…” he whispered, voice breaking.

sunghoon really did.

then something in you snapped.

your face went completely emotionless. your eyes were empty, and you weren’t smiling—and it was as if your tears just stopped trailing down your flushed cheeks. you stood up in one unnaturally smooth, but quick motion—moving backward toward the table with stiff, mechanical steps. 

it didn’t look human.

sunghoon’s eyes widened in terror as he stumbled backwards against the desk, knocking things over. 

“stop! stop—fuck, yn, stop!”

you stood still in the darkness of the room, body rigid. for a terrifying second, he couldn’t predict what was coming next—only hearing his own heavy, ragged breathing and loud thumping of his own heart beat in his chest.

sunghoon didn’t know what was coming—cause you lunged forward, running straight at him—

but you stopped yourself.

“i’m sorry,” you murmured. 

a beat passed.

sunghoon was terrified, chest heaving as he tried to catch his breath.

“okay… god, okay. yn, i… i’m gonna step out. why don’t you… why don’t you take the bed, and i’ll just… i’ll just sleep somewhere else and i’ll come back in the morning before you’re even up.”

you stared at him for a long moment—sunghoon couldn’t see, but he could tell you were because of how heavy everything felt.

“okay.”

then you turned around and walked into the kitchen. a loud crashing sound echoed through the house—glass shattering, cabinets slamming, steel pans and pots clattering through the tiles. 

sunghoon flinched, frozen in fear. 

“yn?! what the fuck is happening? what are you doing?!”

the loud chaos went on for the next few seconds before it completely stopped. eerie silence. you came back out of the kitchen, still shrouded in shadow. your voice was calm, almost sweet, but the words were nothing but. 

and you were holding a knife.

“well… if i have the bed all to myself tonight…” you tilted your head, voice distant and almost flat, like you were not in the same space as he was. “...you’re not going to touch me. so i’ll do it myself. over and over and over. i’ll keep going until there’s nothing left inside. until every piece of me is used and hollowed out. my hands will move long after they go numb—and my body will keep moving even when it stops feeling like mine. it won’t stop until it hurts, and i won’t stop until i’m empty. i’ll just keep pushing until the last little bit of me breaks,” 

“...and then there’ll be nothing.”

the sharp blade of the knife in your hand glinted.

then you switched again.

“or you can stay!”

sunghoon’s eyes remained wide in terror as he gripped the carpet beneath him. trembling and shaking in fear, he let out a soft—

“...yeah.”

——

“do you love me?” 

that was the 27th time you asked that night.

you were on top of him, riding him slow and deep, hips rolling in a rhythm. your arms were wrapped tightly around his neck, pulling him as close as physically possible. you wanted to intertwine the cages of your ribs with his’—if that was possible. 

you couldn’t stop kissing him. kisses that tasted like salt from your tears and blood from your cut cheeks that didn’t want to leave your skin.

“do you love me?” you whispered against his lips for the 28th time that night.

sunghoon groaned softly, hands gripping your waist as you sank down onto him again, taking him to the hilt. despite everything—the fear, the confusion, the guilt, the violence—it felt so fucking good. too fucking good.

you’re perfect around him, warm and tight and desperately his.

“yeah…” sunghoon breathed, voice hoarse. “i love you.”

you smiled against his mouth, kissing him deeper, tongue sliding against his as you rode him harder. your hips moved with needy, possessive rolls, like you were trying to fuse your bodies together. 

“i love you so much, hoonie,” you murmured between kisses, whispering the confession straight into his insides. “i love you so much like no one else can…”

sunghoon’s eyes stung, wet. a tear slipped down his cheek as the overwhelming mix of pleasure hit him. he loved you. he loved you so much. even like this, he still loved you.

you noticed the tears and slowed your movements, cupping his face with both smaller hands. 

“why are you crying, baby?” you whispered sweetly, kissing the tear away. “i love you so much. i love you so much…”

you rode him again, slower this time, grinding down deep as you kissed him like the world was ending tomorrow. your bodies moved together in the dark of his room. 

sunghoon held you tighter, burying his face in your neck as tears fell down your shoulder, along your collarbone, tits, and down.

he didn’t know what this was anymore.

and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to know.

——

some hours later, after the sex and the clinging, sunghoon was awoken by the soft buzz of his phone.

slowly, quietly reaching for it and careful not to wake you up. the screen lit up.

sieun: can you meet me at the park? sieun: i need to tell you something about yn.

at first, he quickly typed back with one hand.

sunghoon: i can’t. sieun: please. it’s important.

sunghoon: text.

the bubble appeared, then disappeared.

siuen: if youre not cmg, then im cmg over sieun: its about yn

he stared at the scene for a long second. 

sunghoon: fuck. fine

he glanced at you—sleeping on his arm, naked beneath the blanket, looking as soft and calm as ever. slowly, very slowly, he moved your arm off his chest and slipped out of the bed. he put on his pants and shirt as quietly as possible.

sunghoon was just about to leave the bedroom when—

“sunghoon.”

he froze.

“i’m just getting water…” he whispered back, heart pounding. he didn’t want to deal with another breakdown. 

there was a long pause. then your voice came again—different, smaller, quieter. 

“sunghoon… kill me. please.”

he stopped dead in his tracks, ashamed and in disbelief as he stared at your unconscious, sleeping body.

“what?” “shh… she’s sleeping. it’s me.”

despite the tremble in your voice, you were sleeping soundly. 

“you are you, yn.”

“shh… please don’t wake her up.” your voice cracked, desperate. “just kill me.”

a beat of heavy silence.

sunghoon’s throat tightened as he glanced at the floor, before returning to your sleeping form. your hair covered your face, but even so, he knew your eyes were closed, and your mouth was shut.

“what would be so bad… about being with me?”

he could hear the tears in your voice. 

“i’ve never been with you, sunghoon.”

a single tear slipped down your cheek.

“just kill me. please.”

sunghoon stood there, frozen. his heart shattered like it had never been before. without sparing you another glance, he turned and left the room. 

behind him, your voice followed, weak and broken, repeating and chanting like a prayer—

“please… please… please… please… please…”

——

sunghoon got into her car, closing the door behind him. 

“alright. so what about yn?”

sieun raised an eyebrow, unbuckling her seatbelt. “jeez, calm down… what’s up with her first? is she fine?”

sunghoon darted his eyes away, sighing. “nothing. she’s uh… she’s fine. she just wasn’t feeling well at the party.”

the girl gave him a look. a long one. full of suspicion and doubt. “she was about to kill herself.”

“i know,” sunghoon said quickly, trying not to recall the moment you stabbed yourself in the face with a vodka bottle. “but she’s fine now. she’s just going through something.”

the car fell quiet for a moment. sieun tapped her fingers on the steering wheel before she shifted in her seat.

“um, okay… well, first of all, i’m saying this as yn’s friend. and also your acquaintance, somehow.” she paused, raising an eyebrow, then continued. “i’d hate to see your hurt, and—oh, yn too, i guess. and i wouldn’t have done this if you guys weren’t together.” 

sunghoon frowned. “yeah…?”

sieun took a deep breath, dropping her hands from the steering wheel and onto her lap where she played with the hem of her short skirt. “i promise yn i wouldn’t tell you this.”

“what are you on about?”

“well… yn and jake have been hooking up on and off like, three years ago—and they’ve stopped, but i’m not sure when. probably a year ago, or something. it’s chill. i don’t think it’s romantic. and i know jake’s your bestfriend and all, and i’m sure he stopped going after her because he knows you like her. i’m just saying this just so you know.”

sunghoon stared at her, stunned. his heart was beating as fast as it could. he never knew this. he never fucking knew you had a history—a fling—with his own bestfriend before. 

the thought of jake fucking you the way sunghoon did was making his blood boil. the thought of you moaning jake’s name the way you did in his dream was making his skin crawl. the thought of the two of you sharing a kiss—the same lips sunghoon kissed every night—was making him… repulsed.

“what the fuck…?”

“yeah,” sieun said softly. “i just… i don’t know if she’s told you that, so i felt like i had to.” she said, still playing with the fabric. “you couldn’t imagine what it’s like being me, and having to be in a room with jake, you, and yn all together.” 

the mood in the car shifted. sieun leaned a little closer, her voice dropping into something more… slicky. 

“i just think you deserve someone more… outgoing. or something. like, chill…”

sunghoon looked at her and swallowed the lump in his throat. distracted, his hands landed on the way her fingers were moving around the skirt. 

he parted his mouth to say something when—

CRASH.

the driver–side window shattered violently. 

glass exploded inward as you ran head–first into it like a battering ram. before sieun could even scream, you wedged a brick against the steering wheel, grabbed a fistful of her hair—so tight it threatened to rip off her scalp—, and slammed her face down hard against the brick.

HONK!

the horn blared with every slam..

you didn’t stop.

you yanked sieun’s head back by the hair and smashed her face into the brick again.

HONK!

blood sprayed across the dashboard and onto sunghoon’s face. sieun’s nose crunched on impact, splitting open. her cheek tore wide open, teeth falling down on her lap. 

HONK!

more blood poured from her broken nose and split lip. her cheekbone cracked with a wet sound. one of her teeth flew out, clattering against the windshield.

HONK!

you were relentless, animalistic. your face was covered by your hair, unfiltered rage as you kept yanking her head back by the hair and driving it down over and over and over again. 

HONK! HONK! HONK!

it was a bloodbath inside. on the seats, the roof, the windows, sunghoon. her face was unrecognisable, swollen, and mangled, one eye swelling shut, the other was exposing her eyeball. she was gurgling, choking on her own blood,

dead.

nothing to the name anymore.

playgirl’s just lost the lead singer.

sunghoon sat frozen in the passenger seat, paralysed by shock and terror. his body wouldn’t move, not a centimeter. his mouth hung open in silence as he watched you—the girl he loved—violently smashing her bestfriend’s face with raw force. 

he could only stare.

HONK!

with one last slam, you let go of sieun’s chunk of hair that you’d pulled out. her body slumped lifelessly against the seat, head tilting back. warm blood poured from her face, dripping down.

sunghoon stared. smoke from the broken horn lingered in the air like a ghost. he was paralysed—eyes widened, body frozen in horror.

you finally sighed, lifting your head up to face him with a bright, almost cheerful smile, blood smeared across your cheek and hands.

“oh—oh gosh! i’m sorry you had to see that, baby!”

you moved your hair out of your face, still smiling.

“my heart took a path i never chose… but just know you wanted this. this is all your fault. this is what you’ve wished for.”

sunghoon’s face was pale, mouth slightly open but nothing came out. upon his terrified reaction, your heart broke and the smile was instantly wiped off your face, replaced with a concerned look. 

“oh, no no no no no—” you rushed to his side, opening the passenger door. you cupped his face with your bloody hands, wiping the sweat and specks of blood from his skin. “breathe, baby, breathe,” you said, taking deep breaths.

“it’s okay. i’ve got you. that’s all that matters… you’re fine, baby. i’m soooo sorry for the drama, but this is your fault. sieun’s your fault.”

you pulled him into a tight hug, pressing your blood stained cheeks against his chest. 

“and you’re gonna have to help me get rid of her body, okay?”

sunghoon shook his head frantically. “no… no no no—”

“yes, baby. you’re gonna help me.”

“no, no, no—” he groaned, voice breaking.

you pulled back, still holding his face gently, eyes soft but insistent.

“baby, i forgive you and i won’t hold it against you. but we have to get rid of her, okay? now shake your head yes.”

he shook his head again, tears welling up.

you smiled patiently. “yes. yes. yes, baby.”

he kept shaking his head.

“nod your head yes.”

realizing he had no choice, sunghoon finally nodded, tears slipping down his cheeks.

——

sunghoon helped you move sieun’s body into the trunk of your car. you kissed him softly on the lips before saying you’d take it from here.

he drove back to his house but couldn’t bring himself to go inside. the fear was too heavy even though he knew you weren’t inside. the thought of being in his house by himself, waiting for you to come back was too much.

so instead, he drove until he reached crystal cove. 

it was barely 8 in the morning when he barged in, the bell above the door ringing violently. he went straight to the shelf where he’d found the one wish willow—

it wasn’t there.

“what the fuck…”

out of breath, sunghoon rummaged through the other display boxes, panicking—if it was all just his imagination. when he couldn’t find it, he stormed to the cashier, voice shaking.

“where is it? where’s the one wish willow?”

“what?”

sunghoon’s eyes twitched. “the one wish willow! it’s—it’s a white box with a twig that you can only wish for one thing!”

the cashier, with a cup of coffee in hand, raised an eyebrow, clicking his tongue.

“hey, look—you gotta chill… it like 7AM. what’s with the vibes you’re giving off?”

sunghoon was frantic, he looked around the shop for it. “come on, one wish willow! please, please—”

he stared at the bloodied guy like he was crazy. “...what? are you okay?”

sunghoon’s heart dropped. “what…?”

was it because of the blood on his shirt that nobody was taking him seriously? or was it because there was no such thing as one wish willow in the first place?

he was in disbelief. “no, no, no—don’t fuck with me. you guys had those!”

the cashier looked at him weirdly for a second—before chuckling like it’s the funniest fucking thing ever.

“chill out, jeez… i’m just messing with you. we moved them here.” he pointed right at the counter, where a small display now sat. 

sunghoon frowned, wanting to flip the cashier off but decided there was more important matter now. he grabbed the remaining one wish willow box from the display. 

“how can you fucking sell this to people?!”

the cashier shrugged, sighing. “look. we just sell what the boss wants us to sell. now if you can’t chill out and wipe that theatre blood off your face, i’m not gonna scan those for you.”

sunghoon snapped out of his rage for a second, realising how crazy and unhinged he sounded. he let out a deep breath and rubbed his face with one hand, on the verge of another round of tears and break down.

“sorry… fuck, i’m so sorry. oh god…”

the cashier’s expression softened a little when sunghoon calmed down, then he glanced at the boxes, and realisation kicked in.

“... what did you do?”

sunghoon couldn’t speak. the words wouldn’t come. 

the cashier sighed. “oh well. that’s just how it is.”

sunghoon’s voice cracked as he put the boxes on the counter. “help me reverse it.”

he shook his head. “nope. already used mine.”

“please, please, please—” 

sunghoon was begging at this point.

“nooo, you know that’s not how it works. it’s one wish for a reason! the box is full of warnings—did you read the instruction paper?”

“instru—dude, please, please—”

“nope. you know what you were wishing for.”

“i didn’t—”

“no.” the cashier said firmly, now looking at sunghoon straight into his eyes. “you do. there’s no way to undo, or break the wish unless you kill youself—”

sunghoon’s eyes widened, he froze.

“—unless you kill youself, or have someone else reverse it.”

“k—kill… myself?”

the cashier nodded, drumming his fingers against the countertop. “yeah. that’s usually the easy way people do it. i’ve dealt with unsatisfied customers like you all the time for the same reason. it’s too much of a hassle to explain it to others, so they just kill themselves.”

sunghoon remained frozen, swallowing the lump in his throat. his hands shook around the box. the weight of his mistake finally came crushing down on him when he realised just how heavy the consequences were. 

noticing sunghoon’s reaction, the cashier sighed, rubbing his head. 

“just have someone undo it for you. that’s probably the best option you got here—since,” he lifted an eyebrow, seeing sunghoon in a state of shock.

 “...you don’t wanna kill yourself.”

the cashier scanned all the one wish willows for sunghoon.

——

sunghoon knocked on jake’s door—loud, frantic, over and over until jake finally opened it, looking confused.

“hey, what’s up? you almost knocked my door over.”

sunghoon ignored it and pushed past him into the house. jake closed the door behind. the friend wanted to ask about the stain and blood on sunghoon’s shirt, but didn’t get the chance to when sunghoon began.

“is haewon here?”

jake frowned at his friend’s urgency before shaking his head. “no… she left cause she wanted to check up on yn…”

“what—?! fuck, uhm, okay, listen to me first. listen to me well. you know—you know how yn started acting all weird and liking me all of a sudden?”

jake nodded slowly, still confused. “...yeah?”

sunghoon pulled out one of the one wish willow boxes from his pocket and held it in front of jake with shaky fingers.

“it’s ‘cause… it’s ‘cause i made a wish. i made a wish—and i broke this twig and at first i was confused as hell but it’s real!”

jake frowned, staring back and forth between sunghoon and the box. “what…?”

“no, it’s real!” sunghoon insisted, voice shaking. “you can make a wish, but just one! just one… and it’ll work. i wished yn loved me, and i didn’t think it was gonna work but it worked and it’s why she’s acting insane all of a sudden!”

sunghoon’s voice cracked. “you don’t even recognise her anymore.”

a beat.

jake took it all in, quiet for a long moment. then he looked at sunghoon with wide, stunned eyes. 

“...you made a wish… on yn?”

sunghoon looked down on the box in his hands. “...yeah.”

jake was shocked, almost disgusted. it felt as if he didn’t know who was standing before him. “why the fuck would you do that… why the fuck would you wish something like that on her?”

“because i fucking like her, jake!” sunghoon exploded. “i fucking like her and you know it and you would’ve done the same too if you had this! and—and i know you guys have been fucking!” 

jake’s face hardened. “what the fuck? that’s none of your business! and for the record, you know i liked yn first. you fucking know it but you decided to like her too and i’m too kind of a friend to give that to you!”

he snapped, heart pounding. jake’s never fought with sunghoon this bad, ever.

quietly, like a murmur, he continued, “and no, i’m not that big of an asshole to wish something like this.”

sunghoon scoffed, bitter. “sure. right. ‘cause you’re yn’s most perfect guy that she loves. because you’ve been with her since childhood—so naturally, you guys are meant to be together? is that it?.” 

the tension in the room was suffocating. 

not being able to stand jake anymore, sunghoon swallowed the lump in his throat before storming away from the house, slamming the door behind him loudly.

——

“...yn…?”

the house was dark except for the slivers of sunlight cutting through the curtains and the candles flickering across the house. the air smelled like wax, and heavy with metal.

you were nowhere to be found.

but on the coffee table was a memorial, or at least what looked like it—photos of sieun, locks of her hair, her eyeball that threatened to roll out of the skull, her id, and her belongings from the car. 

there was also stuff of haewon’s, arranged carefully with flowers and little trinkets. it looked like a shrine too. 

next to the table, on the tv—played clips of sunghoon sleeping, with you recording and appearing every now and then.

sunghoon’s stomach dropped. “yn…?”

“i’m right here, baby.”

you stepped out from behind him.

you were wearing sieun’s clothes—a short denim skirt, boots, and a tight tank top. your hair was cut shorter, choppy, and you’d stabbed a nose piercing through your nostril. blood still trickled down from the fresh wound.

you smiled at him sweetly. 

“do you like me better now?” 

sunghoon was stunned, shocked into silence. his mouth opened, but no words came out. he couldn’t get his eyes off you.

“...yn… yn, i need you to do something for me… okay?”

you tilted your head, eyes wide and glassy. even after all these, you still weren’t enough for him. 

“why can’t you just love me? why don’t you love me?”

you started hitting yourself—hard, open–palmed slaps against your own face until sieun’s rings and bracelets split your cheek open, fresh blood running down. 

“i just want you to love me!”

“stop! stop!”  

you stopped, standing still. sunghoon stumbled backwards, backing away slowly, terrified. you stepped closer, voice dropping obsessively, hungrily, and almost sweetly inhumane.

“gosh, i want to eat you up… i want to be with you,” you licked your lips, tilting your head as you followed him. “i want you to love me… i love you more than anyone else in this world…”

sunghoon’s breath hitched.

outside, a loud knocking started on the door. 

jake’s voice came through, urgent. 

“dude, i’m sorry! i’m so sorry—tell me again what’s happening and let’s fix it! can we still save her?!”

sunghoon’s eyes widened. he fell back onto the couch, mouth open like he wanted to scream at jake not to come in—but he couldn’t bring himself to. the words died in his throat as he’s forced to look at you.

you straddled his lap, eyes wild and unhinged. the screaming outside grew louder as jake kept banging on the door. 

“hoon—i’m coming in! shit, i’m coming in!”

you pressed the tip of the knife you’d been holding right in front of your left eyes, smiling with pure psychotic glee as blood trailed out of your mouth. 

“i’ll kill myself, hoonie! i’ll fucking kill myself right in front of you!”

the horror in sunghoon’s face was pure. his body was shaking as he stared at the blade hovering too dangerously close to your eye.

right at that moment, you turned with crazy speed and hurled the knife toward the door.

THUD.

the blade sank deep right into jake’s chest the second he forced the door open. he stumbled back, eyes wide with shock as blood instantly soaked his shirt. he collapsed, back hitting the door shut.

dead, before he even hit the ground.

almost instantly, you turned back to sunghoon, fisted the collar of his shirt before screaming—

“i’ll rip my fucking eyes out of my skull and shove them up my fucking cunt, hoonie!”

you vomited stomach acid right at his face. sunghoon flinched, shutting his eyes as the warm, burning  liquid slid down his skin. 

he was trembling, broken, unsure what to do or what was real anymore, but the words still came out soft and full of the love that had ruined everything. 

“i love you. i love you, yn. i love you.”

you screamed at him, eyes wild. “scream it!”

“i love you! i love you, yn!”

like a flick of a wrist, you fell on top of him, sighing contentedly as you rubbed your cheek against his chest. your voice dropped into that sickly sweet tone again.

“i know… i know. i love you too, baby. you owe me that. you owe me that.” 

sunghoon’s voice was hoarse and dry as he lifted his arms to wrap them around your frail body. “we can… we can work this out.”

his hand came upon your head, brushing your hair. 

“mmhm. mmhm. i’m sorry for the drama… ugh, i don’t know why i do that. i know you love me. i’m gonna stop on the mollies…”

he nodded slowly, still in shock. if you could feel, or hear his heartbeat—you didn’t comment.

you nuzzled closer, kissing his jaw. “i’m such a mess… i’ll be pretty again, i promise."

“no, no,” he whispered, holding you tight as he planted a kiss on top of your head. “you’re gorgeous, baby. i love you so much. i love you.”

“i’m sorry—”

“you’re beautiful. my beautiful girl.”

you smiled against his neck, all soft and loving. 

“i love you so much. more than anyone else in this world.”

he knew that.

sunghoon closed his eyes and looked up, tears slipping down his cheeks. he’s fucked up. he’s fucked up like no one else ever did before. he’d ruined you—an angel, the sweetest girl anyone’s ever met. he’d turned you into a version of yourself not even your parents could recognise—admit it was theirs. 

a version not even you, would know. 

“let’s take a shower. let’s take a shower, okay? freshen ourselves up.”

you hummed happily. “mmhm.”

——

“open up! open this fucking door, hoonie!” 

you were yelling and slamming on the door like manic, voice shifting from wild rage and sickly sweet.

“baby, please… i’m sorry, i’m so sorry—did i scare you? just open the door. i love you. i love you so much. don’t leave me! don’t you dare leave me—!”

“let me in, bitch! fuck you, fuck you!”

“oh shit—just a second, baby! just a second!” he screamed back.

“okay, just a second. thank you!”

sunghoon stood in front of the sink, staring back at himself in the mirror. his face was bloodied—did some belong to him? some yours, some sieun’s. he’d like to think jake’s and haewon’s were there too.

his eyes were empty. he couldn’t cry if he wanted to. there was just nothing left.

he touched the onyx necklace you had given him, the stone cold—meant for protection and grounding, felt meaningless in his hand. 

“baby?”

a beat.

“i thought about what you said, and maybe you were right… we need some time apart for us…”

sunghoon opened the cabinet with shaking hands and pulled out a razor. he held it to his wrist, then his throat, then his neck—aiming for the spot that would it fast. 

his hand trembled as he pushed the blade deeper into his skin, not yet puncturing, but making a dent.

he couldn’t do it.

“if space is what you need—then sure, okay, we can take some space.”

sunghoon pulled away with a deep breath, shaking his head and tossing the razor aside. he rubbed his face and pressed the heels of his palms deep into his eyes—praying this was all some sick nightmare that was about to end.

and then he’d wake up, and everything will be fine. you’ll invite him over for a movie night where he would come in bringing popcorn and drinks. and he’ll confess—tell you everything he’s been keeping to himself.

just like the way he rehearsed it. 

“i’m really sorry for scaring you, hoonie. i just—i just love you but i want to respect your decision.”

instead, sunghoon opened the cabinet again and found the old bottle of insect poison pellets—the same ones that had killed kibbles.

he sat on the toilet, staring at the bottle for a long moment. he knew there was no turning back. he poured one pellet into his palm, then put it in his mouth and swallowed it.

not convinced enough, he dumped the rest of the bottle straight into his mouth and forced them all down, choking them dry.

“hoonie…? baby, please open the door…”

sunghoon got off the toilet and rested his forehead against the door, when he knew you were standing and waiting for him on the other side of the door. 

he spoke softly, exhausted.

“um, yn… i… i’m really sorry.”

he swallowed hard, eyes closed.

“i’ve liked you for so long. so fucking long. i just… i couldn’t find the courage to confess. i thought you didn’t like me back and i was scared of losing you,” sunghoon said, the tip of his nose brushing against the hard wood.

“and now… now this is happening and there’s nothing i can do to fix it. i just like you so much. i love you so much.”

a beat of silence.

it felt like hours passed in a matter of seconds.

then a whisper, barely audible through the door—

“she likes you too.”

sunghoon’s eyes snapped open.

“what?”

before something shifted.

a spark ignited within him. the world snapped back into focus as the heavy fog that clouded everything lifted. 

his eyes widened. he stared at the bathroom door like it was the first time he was seeing it. slowly, sunghoon opened the door and walked out.

you were standing across from him, smiling shyly at him, a little nervous, a little hopeful. your hands are clasped in front of you. all sweet and innocent girlfriend.

he smiled back.

the two of you laughed together.

it was romantic when he approached you. sunghoon leaned in and kissed you passionately, hands cupping your face. his lips moved against yours with all the love and longing he had. on your tiptoes, you cupped his cheeks as well and with a soft flick of his tongue, you parted your lips partly and he wasted no time slipping his tongue in, overlapping and dancing your own. 

“i love you,”

when sunghoon pulled back slightly, his face was covered in blood from your wound, but neither of you cared. 

then suddenly, his knees buckled.

sunghoon collapsed—but you caught him, lowering him onto the sofa on your lap. pure panic flooding your face as you cradled his cheeks, hands trembling.

“baby… babe… oh gosh, don’t leave me alone—what did you do? oh gosh, baby no!” 

your voice cracked, high and desperate, as you searched his face for anything. his eyelids fluttered, skin already turning clammy. you could feel his warmness fading beneath your palms.

“no, no, no—stay with me. stay with me, baby,” you whispered, pressing frantic kisses to his forehead, his temples, his lips. tears streamed down your cheeks, mixing with the blood still drying on your hands. “you can’t leave me. i love you more than anything. i did everything for you… everything. don’t you dare go. i won’t let you.”

you wailed, hugging his head tightly to your chest, rocking him back and forth. you stroked his hair while the other clutched his shirt, fingers digging into the fabric as if that could hold his soul down.

sobs wrecked your entire body as you buried your face in his hair, breathing in his scent. his breathing was growing weaker and shallower—white foam of saliva began forming to the corner of his mouth as his body went limp. 

"i love you... i love you so much, hoonie, please—"

his body gave one final, weak shudder in your arms.

then everything went still.

for a heartbeat, the room was silent except for your ragged breathing.

the moment his heart stopped beating, you snapped back. 

your eyes widened in horror—followed by a blood-curdling scream ripped from your throat as you shoved yourself backward, letting sunghoon's limp body fall onto the bloodied floor with a dull thud. 

you stared at your bloodstained hands first—they were coated in sticky crimson that you could probably never remove no matter how many times you washed your hands. then your gaze darted around the room, confused, panicked, scared.

jake's body slumped by the door, eyes still open.

the memorial of haewon's and sieun's on the table.

and... sunghoon's motionless on the floor when you'd pushed him off you.

the wish shattered, and reality crashed over you like ice water.

"no... no, no, no—"

you scrambled onto the sofa, pulling your legs up and hugging your knees tightly to your chest. your sobs came harder and harder, violent, whole body shaking as you rocked back and forth. 

tears poured down your face as you buried it between your knees, screaming and sobbing louder. the weight of every horrible thing you had done—despite being only a witness hit you at once.

you were finally yourself again.

and you had never felt more alone.

ㅤ© ⌞hoonkitti⌝ ⁞ all rights reservedㅤ please don't share, copy, or translate my work.

“uh… uh huh.”

sunghoon pushed on, gaining confidence after that little push. he cleared his throat, eyes fixed on the female in front of him. 

“my heart flutters every time you walk into the room, and every word you confide in me—” 

“nope. stop.” jake cut him off, waving his spoon like a referee. “dude, nah. what are you? you’re not 72, you’re only 23!” 

sunghoon groaned loudly, covering his face with both hands, elbows planted on the table. his dark hair fell forward as he slumped. “then how am i supposed to say it?” he mumbled through his fingers, voice muffled and frustrated. 

jake leaned forward on the chair, grinning. oh, his poor little bestfriend. he turned to the poor waitress, who was holding the pot of water as she refilled sunghoon’s cup for the fifth time of the night. 

“alright, be honest,” jake asked her, tilting his head. “would you accept his confession?”

the waitress blinked, cheeks tinting ping. she shifted on her seat, chuckling softly. “uh… um… well, it’s a bit too… much? like, too fast?” she gave a nervous little laugh. “i mean, that was really sweet! a little gross, but so sweet!”

jake clapped his hands in victory. “exactly. thank you.” he flashed her his charming smile. the waitress smiled back, scooting to leave the banquette chair. “also, can i get a cup of coffee? thank you.”

“sure,” she nodded quickly. before leaving, she glanced at sunghoon, whose head was still slumped against his palms. her voice softened a little. “and don’t worry too much about it. girls are simpler than you think. it’ll go well.”

sunghoon just muttered a soft, weak “thanks…” without lifting his head.

once she disappeared toward the counter, jake stood up, swung the single chair back to its original spot and slid back into the booth across from sunghoon. he stretched his arms along the back of the seat, sighing. 

they’d been practicing for the past hour straight, and it honestly wasn’t looking too good for sunghoon. every attempt came out either painfully stiff and awkward or overly dramatic—like it was so obviously scripted and rehearsed. 

the fluorescent lights of the diner above them flicked once, casting a brief shadow over sunghoon’s flushed face. he couldn’t believe they just stole away a waitress, her time, and made her the victim of his endless confessions.

jake watched him for a second, the grin faded into something more to sympathy. he leaned forward, arms on the table now. 

sunghoon finally dropped his hands, thoroughly defeated. “i’m never doing this again.”

“you’re overthinking it.” jake said, voice lower than before. “yn isn’t the type who wants fireworks and bouquet of roses. she literally laughs at the smallest things in the world and more than anything, she’d value your honesty and sincerity more than these… superficial things.” he tapped the table twice for emphasis.

“just be honest and direct. tell her how you actually feel when you see her. that’s it.” 

sunghoon finally lifted his head, dragging a hand through his dark hair. his jaw clenched, dark brown eyes tired under the warm lighting. “i know that,” he muttered, sighing. “but every time i think about actually saying it to her… my brain just goes blank, man.”

“what if i ruin it? everything? we’ve been friends for some time now—i can’t just fuck it we ball. what if she doesn’t feel the same and it gets weird?” 

jake shrugged, stealing a fry from sunghoon’s forgotten, unfinished plate. “then it gets weird for a bit. but at least you’ll know how it actually goes if you do confess.” he pointed a fry at his friend. 

“and besides, you know how she is. she’s not going to throw a friendship over some temporary feelings. she’s more mature despite her looks.”

sunghoon didn’t answer right away. he stared at his glass instead, watching droplets of condensation slide down the glass. the thought of you made his chest ache in that terrifying way of rejection. 

he could already picture it.

your soft voice saying no, the same voice that sunghoon loved hearing more than the sound of his band’s songs. the way your fingers would probably hold his’, telling him how sorry you are, the same fingers that strummed his guitar. how you’d look turning him down—no longer the peaceful look you always have on your face. 

ugh, fuck. you’d probably look awkward, guilty, and pity him. looking pathetic in front of you was the last thing sunghoon ever wanted. 

and the thing was—sunghoon’s feelings, he’s sure it’s not just temporary. they weren’t just a passing crush like how the other boys had for their crushes. this feeling settled deep in his chest and it only grew stronger every single day.

“i don’t know,” he finally said, voice low. his fingers messed with his hair again, tugging at the strands in frustration. 

“ah, fuck it,” sunghoon muttered under his breath, tipping his head back before his shoulders slumped. “i’ll just… shit, i won’t do it.”

jake’s eyebrows shot up. “hey, don’t be like that. what gives?”

sunghoon shook his head, refusing to meet his best friend’s eyes. he slumped back against the seat. “nah, i don’t want to hear it when she says no.”

there it was—the insecurity he kept locked away that’s slipping out in his tone. sunghoon wasn’t the type to say it out loud often, but tonight it sat right on the surface. jake knew this too well. 

jake leaned forward a little more, frowning in confusion. it wasn’t going well, sure—but sunghoon looked determined enough just a few seconds ago. “you won’t know that unless you try.”

“nah, it’s fine, man,” sunghoon replied quickly, scoffing. he leaned back, arms crossed over his chest. pure body language sign that he didn’t want to have this conversation anymore. “i’ll just regret it.”

jake, still slightly frowning, watched him for a few seconds, then sighed. “alright… well, you do you.” he paused, tapping his fingers once on the table before adding, more seriously this time. “i’m just saying… it’s not like you have all the time in the world. you either take the risk, or lose the chance.”

the words landed like the moon between them. sunghoon didn’t reply. he only stared at his cold glass again. jake quietly sipped on his coffee, drumming his fingers against the table.

the diner went quiet. 

——

when did it all start? 

maybe it was the first time he ever saw you.

it was a few years back—a lazy, hot afternoon in jake’s dorm meant to study but turned into doing nothing. jake had been showing him old photos on his phone, scrolling through memories when sunghoon wasn’t even in. 

then there you were, standing next to jake in one of the pictures, maybe fourteen, or younger than that. sunghoon couldn’t tell. but you were smiling brightly with messy hair and stained uniform. jake laughed and said something like, “that’s my childhood bestfriend, yn. she’s starting here this semester.”

sunghoon had only nodded at the time.

or maybe it started the day you stepped into their elective class—graphic web designing—half an hour late. 

you’d missed the bus, hair—again—slightly messy from rushing across the campus, cheeks flushed and the collar of your blouse was slightly wet with sweat. the professor made you introduce yourself in front of the entire auditorium as “punishment”.

just like others, you were embarrassed. but a cute kind. the kind where sunghoon was glad the bus ran late because he got to see you this way. 

or maybe the night his band performed at the campus music festival.

the lights were blinding and the crowd was loud. but in the middle of one song, his vision had cleared for a split second and he saw you. standing near the front with jake, smiling and not singing cause you had no idea what you’d just dragged yourself into. 

you’re an awkward girl, sunghoon could tell that. probably not as awkward as him, but definitely not as outgoing like the others in the crowd. when the set ended and you smiled up at the stage—not at the band or the performance, but specifically him when your eyes met—something within sunghoon shifted.

that was the moment he knew it wasn’t casual anymore. 

HONK!

sunghoon startled, snapping back into reality as the sharp sound of a car horn cut through his thoughts. he was behind the wheel of his sedan, halfway home. the traffic light in front of him had turned green while he was lost in his head. 

“gosh… jesus, calm down,” he muttered under his breath, cheeks warming with embarrassment even though he was alone. he quickly shifted gears, pressing the accelerator a little too hard before easing off. 

his hands tightened slightly on the steering wheel. that spiral of memories left a strange tightness in his chest. the way you looked at him. not the lights, not his bandmates, not jake. just him. 

he exhaled slowly, trying to shake the feeling off. driving usually helped him clear his head, but tonight, every red light felt like a warning. 

you either take the risk, or lose the chance. 

sunghoon bit the inside of his cheek. he wasn’t sure if he was ready to even risk it… but the longer he waited, the more he’s at a loss.

how was he supposed to say it then? 

sunghoon tried practicing in his head again, muttering under his breath like an idiot. 

“hey, yn… i’ve been wanting to tell you something for a while now…”

too casual. basic.

“i like you. a lot. more than a lot, actually—”

no. that sounded too desperate. 

“if you don’t like me back, i don’t know what i’m gonna to myself.”

what the fuck was that? sunghoon cringed hard, gripping the wheel tighter. he’s not saying that to you.

every version felt wrong. too stiff. too awkward. too much. not enough. 

damn. was this even the right thing to do?

you… you were so full of light. so whimsical and kind to everyone in a way sunghoon had never known before. smiling, laughing, giving pieces of yourself away so… so easily. sunghoon wanted that. he wanted all of it for himself. 

but what if you didn’t feel the same? what if you only saw him as someone from your graphic class? as jake’s bestfriend?

he hated how that was possible. and how much power you had over him without even knowing it.

“... i just want her to look at me,” he muttered quietly, drumming his fingers against the steering wheel.  “is that too much to ask?”

the selfish want sat heavy in his chest, mixed with the familiar fear of rejection. sunghoon didn’t think about what his confession might do to you. the thought about what not having you was already consuming him too much. 

——

“kibbles?” sunghoon called softly, voice echoing a little in the dim hallway. he kicked off his shoes by the entrance, setting it aside with his foot. “kibbles?”

huh. she’d usually come running. or at least meowed from her favourite spot on the windowsill where she liked to watch the car headlights. the sound of the door unlocked should already alert her that he was home.

but tonight there was nothing.

sunghoon frowned, sighing as he set his keys down on the console table. he made his way through to her usual spots first—the windowsill, none. the corner of the couch where she’d bundle in the blanket, none. on top of his speaker stack, not there too. under the dinner table, no sign of her.

“kibs, come on,” he muttered, a small thread of annoyance and worry creeping in as he walked further into the house. deciding to let her be for now, sunghoon went into his room and flipped on the bathroom light.

he froze.

there—kibbles was lying motionless on the cold tile floor near the sink, her small gray body curled unnaturally. a half–chewed blue-green pebble was sitting right in her slightly opened mouth. white, foamy drool trailed at the corner of her cat mouth.

insecticide bait pellets for the tiny ants he’d bought. 

“shit…” sunghoon whispered, heart dropping. 

he crouched down slowly, hand hovering over her without touching. she was already cold—must’ve been a while ago today while he was out the whole day. sunghoon glanced at the pellets he scattered around the floor. 

he must’ve forgotten to throw the rest of those pellets out after he placed them. he’d meant to, really had. but between band practice, the constant thinking about you, work, assignments—it had slipped his mind. 

“sorry, kibs,” he breathed, scratching the back of his neck, then ruffled through his messy hair. 

what a shitty fucking day. 

he crouched there on the bathroom floor for a long moment, just staring at her. she’d been with him since his first year—a low–maintenance companion who never asked for much, but always kept him together. 

and now she was gone because he’d been careless about throwing those damn poison pellets out. 

eventually, sunghoon stood up. he grabbed an old towel from the rack and gently wrapped her in it, carrying her out of the bathroom. she felt heavy and unnaturally stiff in his gentle grip. he placed her on the kitchen counter for a second while he looked for a bag.

once he found one, a paper bag, he carefully slid her inside and set the bag near the edge of the counter, meaning to deal with it properly later. to bury her outside, or something. 

but his phone suddenly rang, cutting through the silence of the house.

he pulled it out of his pocket. 

haewon.

“hey,” sunghoon answered, voice tired and weary. 

“hey, are you and jake okay?” haewon asked without much greeting. it’s always been like that anyway. she sounded like she was walking somewhere, keys jingling in the background.  

“yeah, why?”

“dunno… he just looked kinda bummed when he came home. you okay?”

sunghoon let out a long breath, leaning against the counter. his eyes drifted to the plastic bag holding kibbles.

“not really,” he admitted quietly. “kibbles died.”

there was a soft gasp, then followed with a short pause on the other end.

“oh gosh…” haewon muttered, her breath hitched in her lungs. “sunghoon, i’m sorry… what happened?”

“she just… she ate something bad,” he said, the words coming out carefully. he didn’t mention the insecticide pellets. didn’t mention he’d forgotten to throw them out days ago. it happened. 

“i found her in the bathroom earlier.”

he left it at that—vague, but enough. people didn’t need to know about details. part of him felt kinda guilty for not telling the full truth, but another part of him just didn’t want to hear the judgement in her voice. or worse, the pity.

haewon sighed softly on the line. “that’s awful… i know how much you loved her. do you need anything? want me to come over or bring you food or—?”

“nah, it’s fine,” sunghoon replied, rubbing his temple. “i’ll deal with it. thanks though.”

“oh—alright, just let me know if anything, okay?”

“sure.”

the call didn’t last much longer. after a few more gentle words from haewon, he hung up and set the phone down. 

sunghoon stood there in silence for a moment, staring at the paper bag. he then glanced at the clock on the wall—it was almost 2. too late to deal with this properly. he’d handle it tomorrow. whatever people did in these situations.

with a tired sigh, he picked up the bag and carried it over to the kitchen trash bin. sunghoon hesitated for half a second—he didn’t want to throw her out, of course; but he didn’t want to have a dead cat lying on the counter. 

so he dropped it inside.

the soft thud it made when it hit the rest of the trash felt heavier than it should have.

sunghoon didn’t want to think about it anymore tonight. what would change?

he turned off the lights, dragging himself to his bedroom, changed to his shorts before collapsing onto the bed. he closed his eyes, hoping sleep would come fast.

what a shitty fucking day.

——

“hah—ngh—?” 

you were underneath him.

a broken sound escaped your throat as pleasure coiled tight in your tummy. you were spread out on his bed, legs wrapped around his waist as he moved deep inside you in slow, rolling thrusts.

missionary. intimate. close.

“shit, yn…” sunghoon groaned, his fingers digging into the fat of your hips. you felt impossibly warm and tight around him. like a fucking vice. your hands were gripping his back, pretty little manicured nails digging into his skin every time he sank in fully. 

he leaned to kiss you hard, tongue sliding against yours, swallowing every little gasp and whimper that left your lips. your bodies were slick with sweat and saliva and cum—skin sliding together with every movement like oil on oil.

sunghoon pulled back just enough to look at your face—flushed, eyes hazy and teary and blurry with pleasure, lips parted with your lipstick smudged across your lips and his’. so fucking pretty. fuck—the way your tits bounced back and forth every single time he rammed into you.

that made him thrust harder, deeper, grinding against that spot that instantly made your back arch off the bed. your eyes rolled back into your head, and you gasped so aloud it made sunghoon’s hair stand up.

your head tilted back, nails digging into sunghoon’s back.

“ahh—fuck! right there!” 

your voice was wrecked, desperate, and so fucking sweet. you clung to him tighter like a lifeline, arms wrapped tightly around his shoulders, hips rolling up eagerly to meet every thrust. your tight walls fluttered and clenched around his cock, pulling him deeper with every desperate movement.

sunghoon groaned against your neck, kissing and biting the sensitive skin as he picked up his pace. he fucked you harder, grinding against up the pace. he fucked you harder, grinding against that perfect, gummy spot inside you with every stroke. the way your body responded—arching, trembling, soaking his length—drove him insane. 

“you’re so tight, ugh shit—feels s’good.” he moaned, capturing your lips in a messy, heated kiss, swallowing your moans as he drove into you again and again. your breasts pressed against his chest, nipples hard from arousal. one of his hands slid down to grip your thigh, spreading you wider so he could bury himself even deeper.

you moaned louder into his mouth, nails raking so hard and deep it left angry, red marks down his canvas of a skin. your hips kept rolling up like you couldn’t get enough. “g—gonna cum, i’m gonna cum—!”

so wet. so tight. so perfect.

sunghoon wanted to stay buried inside you forever.

“yeah—? oh jesus,” he grunted, nudging your head up to expose more of your neck so he could press his hot lips to your jugular. he kissed the spot first—soft and open–mouthed—before sucking hard on that soft spot, tongue dragging over your pulsing vein as he continued thrusting into you with deep strokes.

the wet, filthy sound of his hips meeting yours filled the room. 

he pulled back just enough to look at your pretty flushed face, eyes clouded with lust.

“i love you,” he whispered hoarsely against your lips. “do you love me?”

your eyes slowly fluttered open. you looked up at him with that soft, hazy expression he loved so much. your fingers brushed his messy, damp hair away from his forehead tenderly, then you smiled—sweet and warm and honey dripped. 

and then you whispered back,

“i love you, jaeyun.”

what—?

sunghoon woke up with a violent jolt, gasping sharply as he sat up in bed. 

his heart was racing so fast, skin covered in a thin layer of sweat, and his cock—his cock was painfully hard, straining against his boxes. the dream still clung to him, the heat of your body, the way you moaned, the way your tight pussy tightened and clenched around him felt so real.

but those last words hit him like ice water.

jaeyun.

sunghoon sat there in the dark of his room, chest heaving, staring at his own reflection on the wall in front of him. the name echoed in his head, twisting something ugly and sharp in his stomach. 

he ran a shaky hand through his hair, trying to calm his breathing. 

it was just a dream. just a stupid fucking dream that felt so, so, so fucking real. 

just a dream. shit.

he let out a heavy sigh and glanced down. the front of his boxers was visibly wet and sticky, soaked through from how hard he’d cum during the dream. at the age of 23. he cursed under his breath and pulled the blanket off his lap.

then he finally looked at the clock on his nightstand.

16:53

“damn…” sunghoon muttered, rubbing his face. he had slept through the entire morning and most of the afternoon. he’d missed practice—but thank god the rental store was closed for the day. 

RING—!

his phone suddenly rang, vibrating loudly on the nightstand. sunghoon reached over to grab it—the screen lit up with jake’s name.

he stared at it for a long second before picking up, his voice coming out rough and slightly annoyed when he was reminded of the dream. 

“what?”

“whoa, damn,” jake laughed on the other end. easy. “did i wake you up or something? you sound like shit.”

sunghoon leaned back against the headboard, running his fingers through his hair again. “uh—yeah, sorry. long night. what do you want?” sunghoon cleared his throat, sounding less… irritated. 

jake didn’t seem fazed. “band night at the hollow tonight. a couple of the guys from fine arts are playing. thought you might wanna come through. you in?”

sunghoon hummed, leaning his head back, staring at the ceiling. kibbles’ death and the dream was still clinging to him like sweat. 

“uh… no, i don’t think so actually.”

there was a short pause. 

“you are?” jake asked, both teasing and concerned lilt slipping into his voice. he wondered if sunghoon was still annoyed and bummed from last night’s conversation. “yn will be there.”

sunghoon’s grip tightened slightly on the phone. the mention of your name sent a mix of heat and unease through his chest. it’s nice if you were there—it’d been a minute since sunghoon last saw you. he figured he could…

kibbles.

his heart ached.

“uhm… yeah, no. i don’t know, maybe not,” he muttered, rubbing his eyes. “something came up.”

jake hummed, not buying it. haewon must’ve not told him yet about kibbles. “something came up, huh? you’ve been weird since last night, man. are you good?”

“i’m fine,” sunghoon replied a little too quickly. “just… ‘m just not in the mood tonight. tell haewon and yn i said hi though.”

a beat.

“...alright, sure.” jake didn’t push further, but his tone made it obvious he was suspicious and slightly disappointed. “but if you ever change your mind, we’ll be there from like, 8–ish. don’t rot in your room all night, hoon.”

“yeah, and i won’t—later, jake.”

sunghoon hung up and tossed his phone onto the bed beside him. he sat there in silence for a while, the wet spot on his boxers now cold and uncomfortable.

he glanced at the clock again—it’s a little past 5pm. knowing jake and haewon, they were probably going to drag you out to eat first before heading to the bar for the night. the thought made his tummy twist.

it’s so… bad.

sunghoon hated how easily jealousy sat in his chest now. hated how vivid that dream still felt. hated that even after everything, the first name that left your lips in his fantasy wasn’t his. 

with a heavy sigh, sunghoon forced himself up and out of bed. he stripped off his boxers, tossed them into the laundry basket, and headed to the bathroom. the shower water was hot when he stepped under it, steam quickly filling the small space.

he closed his eyes, letting the water run down his face. 

it’s because you and jake were childhood friends.

that had to be it. that closeness from time. the inside jokes. the way you finished each other’s sentences and food. the way jake could casually throw his arm around your shoulder and you’d just laugh it off, not tensing up. 

the two of you had years of platonic history. sunghoon had… what? a few months—a year, at least—of stolen glances, late–night study sessions, occasional group hangouts, and bar nights where he always ended up sitting near you but never close enough.

the four of you even worked together at the old movie rental store off campus. that was how he got to see you more often—organising shelves together, sharing lunch times together, the chats when the store was empty. those shifts were everything to him. 

sunghoon pressed his forehead to the cool tile, jaw tight.

he wanted more than that, though.

the water kept falling, but it did nothing to wash away the ugly twist in his chest.

——

after his shower, sunghoon stripped the messy sheets off his bed to replace them with fresh ones, trying to keep his hands busy, mind occupied. he was smoothing out the comforter when his phone started ringing again.

gosh. endless calls.

but this time, the screen lit up with your name. 

yn ♡

sunghoon’s heart jumped, and he nearly let go of the pillow he was puffing up. he cleared his throat a couple of times, quickly running his still–damp hair to compose himself before swiping to answer.

“hi, yn,” he said, trying to sound casual even though his voice came out a little lower than usual. 

“hi, sunghoon,” your voice came through the line, soft and warm like always. like you. “are you coming to the band night at the hollow later?”

sunghoon sat on the edge of his freshly made bed, fingers gripping the phone a little tighter. he sucked the inside of his cheek before replying, “uh… maybe not. i don’t know yet,” he answered, hesitating. did you call him just to ask if he was going? did jake put you in on this?

“are you?”

a short second paused before you answered.

“yeah, i am,” you hummed. “one of my girls is performing with her band tonight, so i have to show up,” you continued with a small laugh. there was another short pause before you added, 

“it’d be nice to have you there, though. i’ve got something to tell you.”

sunghoon’s tummy flipped. his heart jumped, and the words got stuck in his throat. 

“really?” his voice softened, a grin plastered on his face. “what is it?”

you let out a soft giggle. “haha, you’ve got to come then if you want to know.”

he couldn’t help the smile that rugged at his lips. canines digging down the flesh of his lower lip, sunghoon fumbled with his pants’ drawstrings. 

“hmm… we’ll see.”

there was another brief pause. then, you continued, tone shifting to something more casual but sincere. “oh, also… i wanna let you know that i’ve put in my two weeks at the store. i wanna focus on helping my mom with the family business we got going on.”

sunghoon’s smile faded. he hadn’t expected that. the only time he could see you for eight hours a day was when you shared a shift. but now, you were going? leaving him?

“oh… wow. that’s… that’s sudden.”

“yeah,” you replied quietly. “i’ll tell you more about it later if you come tonig—crap!” 

there was a sudden clatter on your end, followed by shuffling sounds like you were moving around quickly.

sunghoon sat up straighter. “yn? are you okay?”

he heard a soft grunt on the other line, then your voice. “yeah, yeah—but ugh,” you muttered, crouching down. he could hear the faint echo of your voice like you were near a tiled floor or drain. “my gem fell!”

“your what?”

“my necklace,” you explained, voice a little strained and clearly frustrated. sunghoon heard more shuffling on your end, like you were trying to look for it down the drain. “my onyx, ugh. it’s for protection and i’m supposed to bury it—it just slipped off…”

sunghoon’s lips twitched despite everything. even in small, troubled moments like this, you were still so you.

just as he was about to drift back into that dangerous fantasy, your voice pulled him back. “—of all days! i already feel so crappy, gosh.” 

there was a soft sigh on your end before you continued, “today’s been awful… anyway, i’ll see you tonight?”

sunghoon hesitated for half a second, then answered quietly, “sure. i’ll be there.”

your voice brightened, sunghoon could hear it. he bit back a smile. “really? okay, great. i’ll text you if anything changes. see you later, sunghoon.”

“mmhm. see you, yn.”

the call ended.

the promise of seeing you tonight—with the something you wanted to tell him—made his chest feel tight in a way that was both exciting and terrifying. 

tonight could be the night that everything changes.

——

“welcome to crystal cove.” 

sunghoon gave the girl behind the counter a small smile as he stepped inside the quirky little shop. the place smelled in incense and old wood, with soft ambient music playing in the background. he looked around slowly, taking in the shelves packed with crystals, tarots, and spiritual… weird trinkets. 

the girl, who looked to be around his age with dyed purple hair, multiple piercings, barely looked up from her nails at first. 

“if you need help with anything, let me know,” she said lazily, then went back to filing her nails.

sunghoon just nodded and wandered into the store, browsing quietly. after a couple of minutes, he cleared his throat. “uh, yeah… actually i do need help. do you have crystal or gem necklaces?”

the girl finally put down her nail file and walked out from behind the counter.

“yeah, let me show you.”

she led him to a small table that had a spinning display rack full of necklaces and pendants. different stones in shapes and colours hung neatly. 

“this is all we have,” she said, giving the rack a little spin. “they all have their own energies and stuff, so yeah… take your pick.”

sunghoon leaned in slightly, scanning the many options. “wow, thanks…” he paused, then asked, “what’s one for… calmness, or something like that?”

the girl tilted her head, thinking for a second before picking out a necklace with a smooth, pale blue stone. “this one’s blue lace agate. pretty good for calmness and communication. helps with anxiety too, supposedly.”

sunghoon stared at it for a moment, then nodded before taking it from her hand. “okay, cool… thanks.”

“mmhm,” the girl replied with a small hum, already turning away to go back behind the counter. she picked up the nail file again.

sunghoon held the necklace for a few seconds, turning it over in his palm. huh… yn’s not gonna like this. it felt too generic. he quietly placed it back on the spinning rack. 

just as he was about to walk away—get you another thing, bracelet, or something—something else caught his eye.

on the shelf right in front of him sat a small collection of boxes, tiny voodoo keychains, and other oddities. tucked between a "manifestation jar” and a pack of antique–degined tarot cards was an unassuming item labeled—

one wish willow.

the box was small and white, almost minimalist. on the front was a delicate illustration of a slender, weeping willow branch with a single growing orb at the tip. the text printed in a thin, elegant serif font:

grab your wish willow! 

break with intention. one use only.

below that, in a smaller faded letting:

wishes do come true. be careful what you ask for.

the packaging looked old, like something you’d find in an actual vintage shop rather than a crystal store like this. sunghoon turned it around. on the back was a simple set of instructions printed in the same font:

spark the middle, break in half.

he stared at it for another few seconds.

huh… a wish. a small, crooked smile tugged at his lips. 

“yn’s gonna like this.”

sunghoon grabbed the box without thinking twice and headed to the counter. the girl looked up from filing her nails again when he placed it down. 

“no crystals?” she asked, raising an eyebrow.

he shook his head, smiling. “this one’s better, i think,” he replied, shrugging.

she scanned the item with a bored expression. “oh right, sure. ‘cause you can make a wish. everyone wants a wish.” she said, her tone subtly sarcastic as she put the box in a small paper bag.

sunghoon let out an awkward laugh. “haha… yeah. it’s, um… it’s not for me.”

“right…” the girl glanced up at him, as she slid the bag towards him with a half-smile. “well, don’t come back complaining if it actually works.”

sunghoon raised an eyebrow. “oh, don’t worry, i won—wait, what do you mean? people complain about these?” 

the girl leaned her elbows on the counter, looking mildly entertained for the first time she puts her file down. “well, they’re from the 70s, so most people buy them as collectibles. not really meant to be used. the ones who do use them… usually come back complaining.”

sunghoon let out a short, disbelieving laugh. “haha, why? ‘cause they make regretful wishes or something?”

the girl didn't laugh. she just looked at him for a beat too long. 

“yeah. and then they wish they were dead.”

a heavy silence fell between them. the soft ambient music in the store suddenly went deafened.

sunghoon blinked, slightly taken aback. the girl didn’t bat her eyes away. 

“... what?”

she held his gaze for another second before she suddenly cracked a smile and laughed lightly, waving her hand. 

“well, that’d be 15000 won.”

the eerie tension vanished as quickly as it came. sunghoon blinked, letting out an awkward chuckle but still a little unsettled. 

“ah, haha… um, here.” he handed her his card. she rang him up quickly, slipped the receipt into the bag. “you’re good at creeping people out.” he complimented her nervously.

the girl laughed, shrugging. 

“enjoy your wish.”

when sunghoon walked off with his paperbag, he turned to look at the girl behind the counter.

she smiled very still, eerily.

wow, sunghoon thought, shaking his head. she needs a raise.

——

the hollow was loud but cozy, being a small bar after all. a local band warmed up on stage followed by low chatter of regulars. the four of you were seated at a round wooden table near the back: you, sunghoon, jake, and haewon.

“—so this guy at the volunteering site tried to flirt with me in the midst of cleaning up the chicken’s cage. mid–scooping he goes, ‘you have really pretty eyes.’”

jake bursted out laughing. “ew, that’s disgusting. what did you say?”

“i told him my eyes were only pretty when i wasn’t smelling shit,” haewon replied, laughing.

you were laughing too, leaning forward with your chin resting on your hand. “he sounds silly. did he keep trying?”

sunghoon smiled along, but honestly, he wasn’t really listening. his eyes kept going back and forth from you, then haewon, then back to you again. under the table, he kept nudging jake’s foot with his own.

jake finally glanced at him, mouthing, what? 

sunghoon jerked his head subtly toward you, then gave jake a look that clearly said—leave us alone for a bit. 

jake raised his eyebrows, now?, then glanced at haewon who was still mid–story and fully engaged. 

haewon suddenly paused, catching the weird energy and the way they’ve been silent between the two boys. “what the hell are you guys doing?” 

jake’s eyes widened then he chuckled, shaking his head. “nothing! nothing, nothing.” 

nothing—was what he said, but jake’s foot nudged haewon’s underneath the table as well. she frowned, but was quick on catching it, haewon looked at sunghoon—then to you who looked a little confused, and a knowing little smirk appeared on her face.

“oh, oh, okay,” she said, clearing her throat and standing up, “well, i’m kinda thirsty so i’m gonna get more drinks. anyone want anything?”

you immediately started to stand too. “i’ll come with you!” 

then sunghoon suddenly spoke up. “wait—no, i’ll go.”

everyone paused. haewon blinked at him, jake—who was mid–standing in his seat, ready to go with haewon—looked back and forth between you and sunghoon. “uh…” 

“o—okay…” haewon murmured, slowly sitting back down. jake cleared his throat and plopped back into his chair as well. “alright, yn and sunghoon can go then. i just want a coke.”

you glanced at sunghoon, slightly surprised by the sudden switch–up when nobody wanted to go with haewon. still, you didn’t question it. “...sure,” you said with a small smile, gesturing toward the bar. 

“let’s go, sunghoon.”

the bar area was nicely lit with string lights hanging overhead, accompanied with chatters and a band playing on stage in the background. you and sunghoon found a small open spot, slightly away from the main crowd.

you leaned forward slightly, catching the bartender’s attention with a small wave.

“hi—yeah, can i, uh, get two beers, one coke, and a strawberry soju spritzer, please?” you ordered, then added with a grateful smile once he nodded. “thanks a bunch.”

the bartender tapped on the terminal. “alright, that’ll be 38,500 won,” he said. “oh, and we only take cards, hun.”

you nodded quickly, smiling. “oh yup, sure sure,” you replied, already reaching for your wallet.

sunghoon instinctively moved to pull out his own card, but you were faster. your card beeped on the reader before he could do anything. “no, no, it’s fine!” you said, smiling. the machine beeped in approval. 

“i got it.”

then, you gently pushed his hand back down with a soft laugh. sunghoon opened his mouth, then closed it again, a small smile forming despite himself. 

“you didn’t have to do that.”

“i wanted to,” you replied simply, flashing him that smile he loved so much. “you can bring the drinks later.”

sunghoon smiled. as the bartender turned to make the drinks, you turned toward him, resting your elbows on the wooden counter. he felt his pulse pick up, and rubbed the back of his neck before speaking.

“so, uhm… any new movies you’ve been watching lately?”

your eyes lit up instantly—movie talk was always a safe, comfortable topic between the two of you, having worked in a rental store and all.

“oh yeah, actually…” you got comfy. “i watched undertone two nights ago. but don’t tell kim, okay? i promised her i’d rent it at the store first so it counts toward our numbers.”

sunghoon let out a genuine laugh, the sound low. the tension from earlier eased a bit. “you watched it without renting? that’s bold. kim’s gonna kill you if she finds out.”

“i know, i know,” you giggled, covering your mouth with one hand. “i felt so guilty the entire time, but i couldn’t wait. it was so good, sunghoon. the sound design’s absolutely crazy, oh my gosh. i don’t think i’ve ever been so scared without all the jumpscares, ghosts action, you know?”

sunghoon nodded, smiling. he placed the top of his chin on his palm. “i’ve been meaning to watch it. everyone’s been talking about the score. was it as creepy as the trailer made it seem?”

“oh—creepier.” you said, eyes widening for emphasis. sunghoon loved all the expressions your pretty face could do. “if you’re ever gonna watch it, don’t watch it alone—i kept thinking, ‘why am i watching this by myself?”

he smiled. you always got that spark in your eyes when you talked about films. the way your eyebrows lifted, the small scrunch of your nose. so animated. it was one of his favourite things about you.

“haha,” sunghoon chuckled. for a moment, he almost forgot everything else. forgot about the confession, the dream, kibbles. but then he remembered—you said you had something to tell him tonight. 

“oh, yeah… about the thing you wanted to tell me—” he started, voice a little quieter. 

before you could hum a reply of what he was saying, haewon suddenly appeared beside the two of you.

“playgirl’s playing! they’re starting their first song!” she said excitedly, already grabbing your arm. playgirl was one of your friend’s bands that was performing for the night. 

“come on, we have to go back!”

your eyes widened slightly, quickly grabbing your phone on the counter. haewon gently pulled you away. “already?! wait—”

you turned your head toward sunghoon, giving him an apologetic but sweet smile. 

“finish what you’re gonna say later!”

sunghoon nodded, trying to hide his disappointment, annoyance, and embarrassment. he clicked his tongue, drumming his fingers against the bar counter.

dang.

“yeah… later.”

——

the group walked out into the parking lot together, still laughing about something from earlier. your voices echoed between the parked cars under the glow of the streetlights.

suddenly, you stopped mid–step.

“oh, an orangey!” you said, eyes lighting up. a small stray tabby was lurking near one of the cars. without hesitation, you jogged towards it and crouched down, rummaging through your bag until you pulled out a small pack of dry cat food. you tore it open and carefully poured some onto a clean tissue you’d taken out, placing it on the ground.

the three of them slowed down and watched you.

haewon tilted her head, amused. it hadn’t been that long since she became friends with you. “does she always have cat food around?” she asked the two boys.

jake nodded with a grin. “mmhm. pretty much.”

a few moments later, you stood back up, brushing your hands together as the cat approached the food. 

“sorry, what were we saying?” you asked, catching up to them again with an apologetic smile. obviously that small act of kindness towards the cat brightened you up, because you couldn’t contain the smile on your face.

haewon linked arms with you. “we’re going to karaoke! the night is still young~”

you let a tired groan, leaning your head on her shoulder for a second. “but i’m getting older~ ugh, i’d love to join but i’m just so sleepy…”

“awe, come on!” haewon whined, shaking your arm. “it’ll be fun! we haven’t done karaoke in forever.”

“i know, but…” you smiled tiredly, shaking your head. “nooo, seriously you guys, i’m kinda tired.”

jake chuckled. “you sure? you didn’t even drink a lot today.”

you turned to him with a pleading look. “but i do—jaeyun, please? i’m tired… i wanna go home.”

your childhood friend scratched the back of his neck. “my car is headed to the karaoke place though…”

you gave him your best puppy eyes, clasping your hands together like you’re praying. “please drop me off first?”

before jake could even respond, sunghoon stepped forward, unable to hide the quiet eagerness in his voice. 

“i can take you home.”

you turned to sunghoon with a slightly surprised but grateful expression. “are you sure?” 

“yup,” sunghoon nodded, trying to sound casual. “it’s uh… getting late for me too.”

haewon immediately pouted. “aw please, you never go to sleep right away anyway! who’s gonna play the bells while i sing, then?”

jake laughed, covering up haewon’s mouth. “i’m here, let them go home, already.”

you giggled, smiling softly at sunghoon. “thanks, sunghoon.”

the four of you exchanged quick goodbyes. sunghoon waved at jake and haewon—then jake pulled you into a hug. his arms wrapped around your waist.

“get home safe, okay?”

“mmhm, i will,” you murmured against his shoulder before pulling away.

sunghoon watched the hug a second longer than necessary, jaw tightening just slightly before he looked away.

——

the drive was quiet at first.

it wasn’t the first time sunghoon had ever driven you home, but every time he did—it always started quiet. like the two of you were giving yourselves some room to get comfortable. you sat in the passenger seat of his sedan, the streetlights casting patterns across your face.

in the smallness of the car, the alcohol had clearly hit you harder now. your movements were a little more abrupt, head occasionally leaning against the window as you stared off into the passing scenery and stores. your words started to slur just a tiny bit at the edges.

after a few minutes of silence, you turned your head toward him.

“oh, right… haewon told me about your cat,” you began, voice softer now, laced with sympathy. “i know it’s kinda iffy to hear it from someone else but… i just wanted to let you know i’m sorry about your cat.”

sunghoon’s hands tightened slightly on the steering wheel. he kept his eyes on the road.

“oh… no, no, it’s okay,” he replied quietly. “i mean… it’s not okay, but i don’t think it’s fully hit me yet.”

you nodded slowly, blinking a few times like you were trying to focus. you knew how much his cat meant to him—based on the amount of times he’s talked about it. “well… you can call me when it does. if you want. i’m here.”

sunghoon glanced at you for a brief second. even drunk and sleepy, you were still looking at him with that gentle care that always made his chest feel tight. 

“i know,” he said, flashing you a soft smile. “thanks.”

the quiet hum of the engine filled the car again before sunghoon spoke again. “oh, i got you something… but only after you tell me what you wanted to say.”

your eyes widened and you turned to look at him. the mood in the car shifted slightly. “you bought me something? you shouldn’t have—wait, why am i kinda nervous?”

sunghoon chuckled awkwardly, his eyebrows’ slightly pinched in slight confusion. “i don’t know. why is that a reaction?”

you scoffed playfully, shaking your head. “um—anyway, it’s nothing really,” you said, voice slightly slurred. “just wanted to tell you i put my two weeks in.”

the boy glanced at you, eyebrows furrowing slightly. “you told me that on the phone though?”

you let out a small, awkward laugh and nodded, looking out the window for a second. “i know… i just wanted to say it again in person.”

sunghoon didn’t buy it. it was obvious on his face—the slight tightening in his jaw, the way his eyes narrowed just a fraction. there was something more—he knew it. felt it. but before he could press further, you said something.

“also… you know my friend sieun?” you turned to look at him, trying to sound casual. “what do you think of her?” 

his grip on the steering wheel tightened a little. sieun? sieun park? your bestfriend? “...nothing? i don’t really talk to her aside from our rehearsal time. why?”

you smiled, humming. “well… what do you feel about her?”

sunghoon chuckled softly, glancing at you before his eyes drifted ahead. “you’re asking how i feel about her? like, if i like her?”

“just wonderin’ cause…” you shrugged, still looking out the window for a moment before turning back to him with a small, tipsy smile. “she likes you. and i think… you guys would be cute together.”

the words hit him harder than they should have.

sunghoon’s expression shifted—a flash of surprise, followed by something sharper, almost pained, and irritated. his crush—the girl he’d been liking for months—was trying to set him up with someone else. the irony burned.

“what?” he let out a short, disbelieving laugh. “that’s kinda silly. she doesn’t even know me. i don’t even know her.”

“well, maybe it’s time to get to know her then,” you replied lightly with a smile. as if it was the most obvious solution in the world. sunghoon swallowed. his chest felt tight. 

“i don’t… i don’t like her like that.”

there was a beat of silence. at the emphasis, you tilted your head, watching him with those soft, slightly unfocused eyes. 

“oh. so you have someone you like, then?”

sunghoon’s heart fluttered. he kept his eyes fixed on the road, then he glanced at you before replying. “yeah… i guess so.”

the air in the car suddenly felt a bit heavier—it was hard for you to grasp it in your drunken condition, but you knew enough not to push it further, just hummed quietly and leaned your head against the headrest.

sunghoon’s mind was racing.

how could you say that so easily? how could you just… tried to set him up with another…?

then, you turned your head to look at him again. “actually, i never thought you would have someone you like. you’re just so… composed and to yourself. it’s hard to figure you out.”

sunghoon gave a small, self–deprecating smile.

“well, i’m not exactly an open book when you wanna get to know me.”

still smiling, you replied, “i think you still are.”

a laugh escaped both of you at the same time—a little awkward, but it managed to ease the tension for a moment. sunghoon’s fingers tapped once against the steering wheel. he hesitated, then asked the question that had been burning in his chest since the starter of the conversation.

“what about you? do you have someone you like?”

you went quiet for a second, then nodded slowly. “i think so, yeah…” your voice was softer now, almost shy. “but i don’t think it’s reciprocated. or it is—i’m not sure.”

sunghoon’s heart picked up speed. so you have someone you like too. sunghoon wondered who it was—that lucky motherfucker. he tried to keep his voice steady.

“does he know you like him?” you shook your head, a small, embarrassed smile tugging at your lips. 

“no, i don’t think so. i get really… shy? around someone i like. so, yeah. if i like someone, nobody will know.”

the silence that followed was nothing like what’s in sunghoon’s mind. every word you said twisted something deep inside him—hope, frustration, and ache all at one. he wanted so badly to ask who it was.

he didn’t.

sunghoon didn’t even confess, yet it felt like he was already rejected. 

or maybe he never stood a chance.

“oh—well, we’re here.” sunghoon murmured as he pulled up in front of your grandmother’s house. you unbuckled your seatbelt, gathering your things. just as you were about to thank him and step out, sunghoon spoke again.

“oh yeah, um… do you have a partner for the end of the year party yet? or are you even coming? ‘cause i’m performing.” 

you paused, hand already at the handle, and turned back to him with a small smile. “oh yes, yeah. at jay’s house, right? i’m planning to ask jaeyun if he wants to come with me.”

sunghoon’s expression froze. 

i love you, jaeyun.

“...jake?”

“yeah. who else?” you replied, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

it’s always him.

the words left his mouth before he could stop them.

“do you like him?”

you blinked, a little confused by the sudden shift in his tone. your eyebrows pinched in confusion, and your head’s slightly tilted. “yeah…? jake’s my bestfriend…”

sunghoon’s jaw tightened. his voice came out lower, edged with something bitter. “...cause i’m pretty sure he likes liz.”

you stared at him for a second, the playful mood from earlier completely gone. it felt like the two of you were autumn. cold and warm air clashing, shifting from sunny to stormy, windy, and freezing in a matter of minutes.

“ah… okay? why are you telling me this?”

the words came out faster than his brain allowed them to. sunghoon shifted in his seat. “i don’t think he’s good for you. i mean… jake’s great as a friend, but he’s kind of all over the place. he doesn’t really commit to anything. one day he’s all in, the next he’s distracted by something new. i just don’t think he’d treat you—”

“sunghoon, stop.”

your voice was firm. sharp. 

you looked up at him with a frown—in confusion, disbelief, and disrespect that he just said that to your face. you gripped your purse tighter on your lap.

“he’s your friend. why are you saying all these things—? i don’t like this at all. you know how close we are.”

the silence that followed was heavy and awkward. 

you unbuckled your seatbelt quickly and opened the car door. “i’m going to pretend like i didn’t hear this at all.” before stepping out, you turned back to him one last time, expression tight and clearly, clearly, disappointed. 

“i’m really uncomfortable with you saying all this about jaeyun. um… thanks for the ride, anyway. goodnight.”

you closed the door with a soft but firm click and walked toward your house without looking back. sunghoon sat frozen in the driver’s seat for a second, staring at your retreating figure. 

“wait—fuck… shit…” he muttered under his breath. he quickly pressed the button to roll down the passenger window. “yn—!” he called out, but you had already disappeared. the door shut behind you with a thud.

the street fell silent again.

sunghoon leaned back heavily against the headrest, dragging both hands down his face. 

“what the fuck did i do…” he whispered to the empty car. “why did i do that… ugh, i’m so fucking dumb…”

his heart was pounding. the jealousy he wasn’t able to control that had been simmering all day had boiled over in the worst way possible. he’d badmouth his own bestfriend—jake, of all people—in front of you. the one person whose opinion mattered most to him. 

sunghoon groaned, tilting his head back and closing his eyes. 

“she’s never gonna look at me the same way again… fuck.”

the silence in the car felt suffocating. this was the most the car has been through since the last years sunghoon got it from his dad. his chest was tight, regret clawing at him from the inside. he needed something—anything—to take the edge off.

why the fuck did i say that? 

sunghoon knew why.

he reached down toward the glove box where he usually kept his pack of cigarettes. his slender fingers fumbled blindly in the dark, brushing against the small box before he fished it out without thinking. 

instead of his dark marlboro pack—it was a white box instead.

one wish willow. 

the illustration of the glowing branch stared back at him. the tagline at the bottom suddenly felt louder than it had in the shop. 

wishes do come true. be careful what you ask for.

oh. he was supposed to give this to you. 

sunghoon’s thumb brushed over the smooth packaging. his mind was still reeling of annoyance, disappointment, and that ugly twist of jealousy all mixing together. the way you defended jake so quickly. the way you looked at him with discomfort and disappointment before getting out of the car. the way you wanted to ask jake to go with you to the party.

his chest felt tight. his jaw clenched. if he were to keep and give it to you later, what would change? it won’t magically get rid of tonight.

sunghoon’s fingers tightened around the box, he turned it over and read the instructions printed on the back in that minimalistic, fun, red font:

usage:

hold the one wish willow gently with both hands. 

state your wish clearly and with intention.

break in half.

disposal: after granting your wish, the one wish willow loses its magical properties.

sunghoon mouthed the words as he read them, almost scoffing under his breath. 

he looked up toward the front door of your house, the porch lights still on. 

“as if…” he muttered, half bitter, half exhausted.

but his hands didn’t put the box down.

in the silence of the car, with the weight of the night pressing down and all the emotions came washing down upon him—sunghoon opened the box and held the small twig in both thumbs and indexes. 

wishes do come true.

be careful who you ask for.

his voice came out low, raw, and half–serious.

“i wish yn ln loved me more than anyone else in the fucking world.”

crack.

sunghoon broke the one wish willow in half. 

the sound was small and almost insignificant. like it was… nothing. a toy. a faint shimmer of something—dust? light? glitter?—seemed to sparkle for a split second before disappearing into thin air. 

sunghoon let out a drag, shaky breath and rested his forehead against the steering wheel, eyes closed.

the broken pieces of the willow sat in his lap.

a beat passed.

then a second.

then a whole minute.

nothing happened.

sunghoon let out a bitter scoff, tossing the broken pieces of the one wish willow onto the passenger seat. he wasn’t sure what he was hoping for—he bought it at a fuckin’ crystal toy store for fucks sakes. 

“fuck it,” he muttered. “should’ve known it was a scam anyway.”

he reached for the gear shift, ready to drive off—when a soft knock came from the passenger window.

shit—

sunghoon froze. through the glass, he saw the upper half of your body just standing there by his car. frowning slightly in confusion, he slowly rolled down the window.

it took you a few seconds to crouch down smoothly, elbows resting on the open window frame so your face was level with his. your eyes looked… different. not completely wrong, but off. a little too intense? a little too focused.

like something behind them was watching him more closely than usual.

you were probably still disappointed and bothered by it—and wanted to give sunghoon another warning. 

“uh, yn… hey,” sunghoon said, swallowing the lump in his throat. “i just… i just had to pull up directions.”

you didn’t respond right away. you just looked at him for a long second, head slightly tilted.

“you said you had something for me?” your voice was soft, almost too soft.

oh, crap—sunghoon glanced at the broken willow twig on the passenger seat. thank god it was so dark that you didn’t notice it. “oh yeah, i uh… i left it at my house.”

the silence that followed felt heavy. 

you visibly deflated a little, eyes dropping. “oh… okay…”

the quiet stretched. your fingers started tapping lightly on the window frame—slow, rhythmic, almost absentminded. the movement felt a little too precise. a little too repetitive. it’s almost like you didn’t want to get back inside.

sunghoon’s stomach twisted.

“i can bring it to work tomorrow…” he offered quietly, smiling.

you blinked slowly, then gave him a small nod. “um… okay…”

your voice dragged just slightly at the end. you stayed crouched there for another second, staring at him with the same unnervingly focused gaze. sunghoon swallowed the lump in his throat nervously, licking his lips. 

“well—uh, goodnight yn.” 

“wait, actually…” you tilted your head, eyes still locked on him. “um, i think you could use some company tonight. i mean, i did just lose my cat—”

sunghoon frowned. “...you lost your cat?”

you blinked again, like a glitch had passed through your expression. you shook your head, then quickly corrected yourself. “oh wait, i mean you lost your cat. i’m sorry… i’m so sorry for your loss.” your voice softened, but there was something oddly eager beneath. “what should we—are you—do you wanna come inside?”

sunghoon stared at you, visibly confused. his eyes flicked for a split second to the broken piece of the one wish willow. 

could it be…

“... are you okay?” 

you smiled—soft, almost too sweet. “are you okay?”

“yeah, i’m okay,” he answered slowly. 

“well… why don’t you come inside?” you offered again, fingers still lightly tapping the window frame. “we can—you know, talk about your cat and have a few drinks together.”

the invitation hung in the air. your eyes never left his face.

sunghoon rubbed his temple, trying to make sense of the situation. “yn, i’m a little confused…” he chuckled softly, dry. “i think you’re drunk.”

“no, i’m not,” you said quickly, almost defensively. “really.”

he sighed softly. “just… get some sleep, okay?”

that threw you off. 

“no, no, no.” you stood abruptly, crossing your arms over your chest. your posture was stiff, almost childlike in its stubbornness. “i know what you’re trying to do.”

sunghoon blinked. “what—?”

you didn’t answer. instead, you reached for the door handle, pulled it open, and slid back into the seat without warning. you sat directly on the broken pieces, the twig crunching faintly beneath you. 

“you’re trying to get rid of me,” you said, voice low but strangely intense, eyes fixed on him again.

sunghoon’s heart jumped. 

“what? no, no, no—” he stammered, hands lifting slightly in surrender and defense. he could never get rid of you as hard as he tried to. “i just—i just think you’re not in your right head right now.”

you pouted—a soft, almost childish expression crossing your face as you leaned over and pressed your cheek against the dashboard, eyes still locked on him.

sunghoon thought you were cute.

“i promise you i am…” you murmured. “i just… i feel really bad about your cat. you know how much i love cats, right? i don’t want you to be alone. and honestly… i don’t want to be alone either.”

sunghoon’s chest tightened. the way you said it—so vulnerable, so sincere. especially when you barely opened up to him like you did to jake—made something inside him soften despite his brain’s ringing warning bells.

“why? is everything okay?”

you stayed quiet for a moment, cheek still resting against the cool surface. then your voice came out smaller. “well… i don’t think my grandmother wants me around anymore…”

the words hit him harder than expected. your grandmother—? the same one who had been taking care of you since infancy? didn’t want you around anymore? you looked so small like this—curled slightly in his passenger seat, eyes glassy. sunghoon felt a strong wave of sympathy washing over him.

“oh… what? i—i’m sorry, yn… do you, um… wanna talk about it?”

you shook your head slowly, still not lifting your cheek from the dashboard.

“...not here.”

——

sunghoon wasn’t sure if you eventually convinced him, or if he convinced himself to let you come inside. 

the two of you walked into his house. the moment the door closed behind you, you looked around with wide, curious eyes. 

“your house is so nice…” you whispered, almost reverent as you took off your flats by the door. sunghoon rubbed the back of his neck, suddenly self–conscious. had he known he was going to have you over—

“i like it here.”

he glanced at the lotion bottle on the coffee table.

“oh, thanks… it’s your first time here, right? i’m sorry if it’s not really that clean… i wasn’t expecting company tonight so—”

he didn’t even get to finish his sentence.

while sunghoon was still talking, you had already wandered off toward the kitchen like you knew your way around. that gave him the time to put the bottle somewhere else though. you stopped in the middle of the room, closing your eyes and breathing in deeply. 

“it smells like you.” you said softly.

sunghoon froze by the kitchen arch. 

“...me? like… bad?”

you turned to him with a small, dreamy smile and shook your head.

“no. it’s nice. i like it.”

warmth bloomed and spread through his chest despite everything. sunghoon had forgotten about the whole incident that happened in front of your house. he cleared his throat. 

“yn,” he paused, trying to regain some control of the situation. “you need some sleep, okay? i’ll get you some water.”

sunghoon moved toward the fridge, but you stayed standing in the middle of his kitchen, watching his every move with that same unnervingly soft gaze. sunghoon poured you a glass of cold water, standing in front of you as he held it up.

“here.”

you looked up to him. instead of taking it in your own hands, you wrapped your hands around his’ and brought the glass to your lips, taking a sip. 

a few minutes later, the two of you were in his bedroom.

you sat on the edge of his bed, still fully clothed, one leg hanging off the side, the other folded beneath your weight. sunghoon lingered in the doorway, like a father bidding goodnight. 

“i’m sorry if i was being weird earlier,” you said quietly. your finger traced the hem of your midi skirt. “i don’t know what was wrong with me.”

“it’s okay,” sunghoon replied, smiling. his voice gentle. “you don’t have to explain it. you’ve been through a lot, so just take all the time that you need, alright?”

you nodded slowly, looking small on his bed.

sunghoon looked around, unsure what to do before he reached over and turned off the main light switch, leaving only the tall floor lamp by the end of the room. the warm, dim lighting cast long shadows across the walls.

he was about to say goodnight and leave when your voice stopped him.

“wait.”

sunghoon turned back.

“will you sleep with me?”

sunghoon froze. “what?” 

he looked at the state of you on his bed—slightly disheveled, looking a bit like a pretty mess. “i don’t think i should…” 

you looked up at him, eyes wide and pleading. “please… i can’t be alone right now. i’ll get in my head if i’m in here by myself.”

a beat passed.

sunghoon felt a heavy wave of guilt and unsure–rity settled in his chest. he exhaled slowly.

“...yeah. i can do that.”

he kicked off his home slippers by the door. you didn’t waste a single second either—started undressing right there and then, peeling off your top and skirt. sunghoon quickly looked away out of respect, but the mirror in front of his bed betrayed him. he caught the reflection of your body as you stripped down to just your underwear. 

his throat tightened.

he wasn’t complaining. 

shit… your covered breasts behind your white bra was even better than your bare tits in his dream. sunghoon loved the fats in your body, the little, subtle childhood scars and marks. 

when you were done, he turned around and approached the bed slowly. sunghoon reached out and softly touched your arm, almost like he was making sure you were real and on his bed. you gently pulled him toward you.

the two of you ended up sitting against the headboard. he stiffened as you immediately curled into his side, placing your head on his shoulder and nuzzling closer, almost like a cat seeking warmth. one of your legs draped lightly over his as you got comfortable, letting out a soft, content hum.

“i needed this,” you whispered, voice low and breathy against his neck. 

sunghoon’s heart fluttered. he couldn’t contain his smile. “really?”

“mmhm…” you rubbed your cheek against his shoulder in a slow, affectionate motion. “i’m sorry about your cat again…” 

there was something almost feline in the way you moved—slow, seeking constant contact. you pressed closer, tits flushed against his bicep. it was like you wanted to melt to him, fingers tracing patterns on his chest like marking territory. 

sunghoon swallowed hard, one arm hesitantly wrapping around you. 

you shifted slightly, then gently took his chin between your pretty fingers and tilted his face toward yours. your eyes were half–lidded, lips parted as you leaned in.

sunghoon’s breath hitched. 

“wait—” he whispered, pulling back just slightly. “i… i think you’re drunk.”

you shook your head slowly, still holding his chin. your voice was soft, but steady. “i’m not. i promise.”

he gazed into your eyes. in the warm lamplight, they looked darker, deeper, almost… bottomless. for the first time, he saw—really saw—his reflection in your eyes and realised how much he had wanted this. 

how long sunghoon had ached for you. how badly he had needed you to look at him like this. all the longing, jealousy, nights thinking of you—it was at this moment that worthed it all. 

sunghoon must’ve been the easiest man ever—

he succumbed.

he leaned in and kissed you—slow at first, then deeper and more passionate. his hand slid to the back of your neck, pulling you closer as his lips moved against yours with pent–up hunger. the kiss was hungry and desperate and full of everything he’d kept to himself.

you melted into it immediately, letting out a soft, needy sound against his mouth as your fingers curled into his shirt.

the two of you kissed. and kissed.

and the longer it went on, the more desperate it became. you climbed onto his lap, straddling him as your hands cupped his face. sunghoon’s hands roamed your back, pulling you closer, tugging onto the clasps of your bra.

he’s so lost in the heat of everything he’d wanted for so long.

his fingers gently touched the side of your neck.

and something in you snapped.

your eyes flew open. so wide it almost popped out of your socket. for a split second, the hazy, overly affectionate version of you vanished. you realised you were kissing sunghoon. half–naked. in his bed.

terror flooded your expression.

you shoved him back hard, scrambling off his lap and falling backward onto the floor with a loud thud. your back hit the floor.

“sunghoon—oh my god!” you gasped, eyes wide with horror as you stared up at him from the ground. 

sunghoon looked completely panicked, frozen at where he was. “what?! what, what?! holy shit?!”

you sat up quickly, covering your chest with your arms, face burning with embarrassment. “oh my gosh, i’m so sorry! i’m so sorry—!”

“you kissed me!” sunghoon blurted out, voice cracking slightly. 

“i know!” 

the terror on your face melted away into an apologetic look. you stayed on the floor for  a moment, blinking up at him with wide, watery eyes. “i’m sorry… i’m so sorry…” you kept whispering, voice small.

sunghoon’s heart was beating so fast—still in shock, breathing hard.

“no, shit—what was that?!”

you flinched at his tone. “don’t yell at me… i don’t know… i thought i saw something!”

your eyes welled up with tears. the sudden switch made you emotionally raw, and the sudden outburst from him broke something in you. your lips trembled as tears started falling down your cheeks. 

sunghoon’s anger and confusion immediately crumbled into guilt. 

“...hey…” he quickly got off the bed and crouched down, gently pulling you up from the floor. “i’m sorry, i didn’t mean to yell.”

you let him lift you, still sniffing. “i really don’t know… it's a panic attack, i—i panicked.”

he sat back on the edge of the bed and pulled you into his lap like a baby—one arm wrapped around your back, the other cradling your head as he tucked you into his chest. 

“i—it’s okay, i was just—” he murmured, rubbing slow circles on your back. “i was just surprised… cause you kissed me first.”

you curled into him, burying your face in his neck, still letting out soft, hiccuping sobs. your arms wrapped tightly around him like you were afraid he’d disappear. sunghoon held you close, heart still racing.

when sunghoon felt your body relaxed, he kissed the top of your head.

“don’t do that next time…”

——

the next day at work felt strangely normal.

you and sunghoon stepped into the video rental store together after arriving at the same time—having rode the same car and all. the bell above chimed as you both entered. 

“oh, right. can i stay—”

before you could finish your sentence, the store manager, kim, appeared from the sides and immediately grabbed your arm, pulling you aside. “yn! i don’t know how many times i have to tell people we don’t sell porn here—”

the rest of her sentence was cut off as she dragged you away.

sunghoon barely had the time to process everything before jake popped right in front of him like a damn jack in the box. 

“ooooohhh?” jake grinned, wiggling suggestively. 

sunghoon’s eyes widened. “breakroom. breakroom. breakroom.”

he turned jake around and shoved his friend toward the staff breakroom just behind the entrance wall. once they were out of sight, jake turned on him. 

“what happened last night?”

sunghoon ran a hand through his hair, exhaling sharply. he tasted the words on the tip of his tongue, unsure how to put it in words. last night was… to blame on the alcohol. 

“you wouldn’t believe me.”

jake’s eyes widened. he couldn’t believe it—his childhood friend, and his bestfriend—that had been liking you for so long. finally—?

“you guys FUCKED?”

sunghoon’s eyes widened, and he was quick to slap a hand over jake’s mouth, muffling the loud exclamation. “oh my gosh, keep it down!” sunghoon hissed, glancing nervously around the room. “and no… we didn’t.”

jake pulled sunghoon’s hand off his mouth, looking suspicious. “then what the hell happened? you didn’t update us at all last night, and now you’re coming to work together? something’s fishy.”

sunghoon leaned against the doorway, crossing his arms. “we just… we just slept together, that’s all.”

jake raised an eyebrow. “huh, okay.” then he grinned again. 

“well… how was she?”

“um, i don’t know…” sunghoon hesitated, looking visibly conflicted. “she’s… she’s acting weird last night.”

“weird? how?”

sunghoon paused, recalling the night in fragments. after the thing… that happened, sunghoon cuddled you to sleep, and you woke up the next day just fine. he dropped you off at your house to change, waited outside, then drove the two of you to work.

“well, first she said her grandma’s kicking her out.”

jake’s face instantly shifted from playful to shocked. “no way?” his voice dropped. “she’s been living with her grandma since we were kids. what happened?”

“i don’t know,” sunghoon admitted, shrugging. “we didn’t talk about it last night. but… she’s having like, this mental breakdown. she’d freak out one second, then be all happy and clingy the next, then start crying. it was… weird. really weird.”

jake stared at him, processing everything.

“damn… that doesn’t sound like her at all.”

sunghoon nodded slowly, a heavy feeling settling in his stomach. 

a beat of silence passed between them. 

“you think she’s on… molly again…?”

jake frowned deeply, crossing his arms. “she’s been sober for almost a year. she has no reason to… unless because of her grandma, that is.”  

“shit, maybe,” sunghoon muttered, rubbing his face. “i don’t know how to ask her though.”

“i’ll do it then,” jake said without hesitation. if anything, it’s weird jake didn’t know about it. you’d always come to him firsthand. sunghoon glanced toward the breakroom door, suddenly paranoid. 

“is she still staring?”

jake darted his eyes toward the entrance, peeking through the small gap in the door. he’s met with the sight of you standing behind the cashier machine, body looking forward, but head’s turned towards where jake and sunghoon’s conversation was taking place.

you were smiling.

“yeah.”

——

jake drove you home after work.

the moment he got back to his apartment, sunghoon dropped his bag, kicked off his shoes, and went straight to his computer. he opened a browser and typed into the search bar: does the one wish willow actually work?

u/sorrowfull: no it’s an urban legend. my cousin swore it worked but he was just high as fuck lol.

u/rik999: yeah it really granted a wish for me back in 2023!

u/godaddy: it’s not supposed to be used. my dad still has it unopened till now cause it’s just a collector thing. 

u/xuser: don’t even play with that thing lol i wished for braces cos my teeth was fucked and now theyre PERFECT

u/tickdrip: placebo effect at best. one can try though. 

sunghoon stared at the screen, conflicted and confused. he licked his lips, index finger tapping on the mouse like he wasn’t sure what to do with it. with a heavy sigh, he eventually shut his laptop, rubbing his face.

what the hell am i even doing…

for all he knew, his wish didn’t even come true, and it was just a coincidence. maybe you had a change of mind. maybe you finally had the courage to tell him you liked him. maybe—

knock knock. 

sunghoon whipped his head toward the door. it’s almost eleven, and he wasn’t expecting anyone at this hour. regardless, he walked over and opened it.

you—

you were standing there in a thin spaghetti strap black dress that hugged your figure beautifully, full makeup done perfectly—glossy lips, soft eyeshadow, curled lashes, flushed cheeks, the works. you looked stunning—it genuinely took him aback for a second.

“hi, hoonie,” you said softly, a shy smile on your face. 

“...yn? what’s up?” where are you going?” he asked, still a little stunned. 

you fidgeted with the hem of your dress, looking nervous. “i didn’t know what to wear…”

“what do you mean?”

you bit your lip, clearly nervous. 

“i—i’m really sorry about last night. jake told me what happened… you were freaked out—”

“no, no, it’s okay, yn!” sunghoon said quickly, waving his hands in front of him. you looked so cute and he was way too down to even regard everything last night as odd. even if it was. 

you stayed in the doorway for a moment, then swallowed the lump in your throat. “i probably shouldn’t have taken anything…”

a beat.

sunghoon blinked. “huh?”

you looked up at him. the outside light behind you made your eyes look darker than it already was. “yeah… i, um, i was on mdma and i was drunk. but i promise… no more.”

“right, okay…” sunghoon said slowly, trying to process everything. he knew you’d taken drugs before, but he never knew it was this bad. “well, do you remember… stuff?”

you stayed quiet for a second, eyes lowered. 

“most of it, yeah,” you finally answered. “if i was weird… it was because of the stuff i’m going through. i didn’t mean it…”

sunghoon’s eyes narrowed with a clear disappointment. your gaze shifted, a flicker of concern crossing your face as you noticed his reaction. 

he looked away for a moment. 

“...oh. okay.”

you took a small step closer.

“also… i want to be transparent about some things."

sunghoon’s heart spiked. out of pure fear—fear of being rejected, fear of hearing you say it was all a mistake, that you didn’t mean any of it, that you two should just go back to being friends and nothing more, or worse stopped being friends at all—

he quickly cut in.

“you don’t have to explain—”

“i know you like me.”

the words hit him like a truck.

sunghoon froze, quickly thrown off.

“no—i—why? what?”

your face dropped instantly. the hopeful, nervous expression you’d been wearing shattered into something vulnerable and raw, like you’d… just been rejected on the spot.

then, after a heavy beat of silence and unspoken things, sunghoon began, voice quieter. 

“...do you like me?”

you looked up at him, eyes soft and vulnerable. 

“would it freak you out if i said yes?”

a long beat passed. 

it was an oddly romantic moment—the kind you only see in movies. sunghoon stared at you, completely caught off guard. his lips parted slightly in surprise. then, slowly, a shy, disbelieving smile spread across his face as he let out a soft chuckle, almost like he couldn’t believe this was real. 

he rubbed the back of his neck, voice quiet.

“how long have you felt this way?”

you shifted on your feet, nervous but honest. “it happened over time… maybe with all the time we hung out, and by the time i knew it, i just—” you looked at him, head tilted, searching his face. 

“don’t you have feelings for me?”

sunghoon covered his mouth with his hand for a second, shy and overwhelmed. this was the moment he had dreamed about for so long—late nights wondering if you’d ever look at him the way he looked at you, replaying every small interaction in his head, wishing for exactly…

this.

“yeah,” he finally admitted. “i do.”

your face softened. you stepped closer, gently tugged the front of his shirt, and wrapped your arms around him. sunghoon didn’t hesitate. he hugged your back tightly, one arm around your waist, the other cradling the back of your head. you stood there in the doorway, holding each other like the world didn’t exist.

after a long moment, he pulled back just enough to whisper against your hair, 

“do you wanna sleep over tonight?”

——

sunghoon slammed you against the wall, kissing you fiercely. all the months of longing, stolen glances, and quiet admiration poured out in that single moment. his mouth was hungry, desperate, claiming yours like he’d been starving for you. 

his hands roamed your body—one gripping your waist, the other sliding up your thigh, pushing the hem of your black dress higher. 

“ah, babe—” you moaned into his mouth, hands fisting his shirt as you kissed him back just as desperately. the pent–up lust between you was explosive. sunghoon groaned, grinding against you as he pulled the top of your dress along with your bra, exposing your pretty tits. 

his mouth left yours to trail hot, open–mouthed kisses down your neck, then lower, sucking and biting at your skin while his hands squeezed and caressed your perky nipples. 

you arched into him, gasping, fingers tangled in his locks.

“f—fuck, hoonie…”

sunghoon was losing himself completely—the way you tasted, the way you sounded, the way your body responded to every touch. he wanted to devour you. whole and full. wanted to mark you. wanted you to be his in every possible way.

then, mid–moan, your pearly eyes locked with his.

your eyes widened like it was going to bulge out—expression shifted to sheer panic.

with a frantic shove, you pushed him hard. sunghoon stumbled backward onto the bed as you let out a blood–curling scream, body trembling violently. almost instantly, you hugged your body, colour drained from your body. 

“sunghoon, what the fuck?!”

he remained on the bed, shocked and unfazed for a split second—still breathing hard, lips swollen from kissing you. your lipstick stained the corner of his lips.

but within moments, the switch flipped again.

you crawled on top of him like nothing had happened, straddling his waist and sitting on his stomach. your wetness through your thin panties rubbed against his skin as you leaned down and kissed him again, deep and possessive—like you couldn’t bear even a second of separation. 

sunghoon didn’t question it. the disturbance registered as nothing more than a fleeting inconvenience.

you pulled back just enough to whisper against his lips, 

“sorry, baby…”

sunghoon smiled, hands sliding up your thighs, lifting up your dress until the pooled around your waist.

“it’s okay, baby,” he murmured, voice husky. “molly effect, hm?”

you giggled softly, nuzzling into his neck like a contented critter—pressing warm kisses along his jaw. 

the two of you kissed again—slower this time, but no less hungry. your hands roamed his chest, then lower, until you slid down between his knees. sunghoon’s breath hitched as you settled on the floor in front of him, looking up at him with those dark, adoring eyes.

sunghoon couldn’t believe this was happening.

you reached for his belt, undoing it with clumsy but eager fingers. when you freed him—his cock was curvy and at a perfect size, if not slightly bigger, for a lean man like sunghoon. it throbbed visibly in the air between you, the tip already glistening with beads of precum.

“s—shit, baby, look how hard you made me…”

you smiled, leaning to press a soft kiss to the tip first, almost reverent. your lips brushed against the sensitive head as you murmured, warm air hitting the slit. 

“you’re so big…”

you kept kissing the tip tenderly like it’s his lips—then dragged your tongue slowly across it, licking up the beads of precum with a soft, satisfied hum. the taste of him seemed to spur you on. you opened your mouth wider and took him in—slow at first, letting your tongue swirl around the head before sinking down further. 

sunghoon let out a low groan, head falling back for a second. “fuck…” 

his hand gently threading through your hair as you worked him with passionate, wet strokes. your mouth was hot and eager, sucking with just the right amount of pressure while your hand stroked what you couldn't fit. you moaned around him, the vibrations sending up sparks up his spine. 

“fuck… just like that, baby…” he whispered, hips twitching slightly but holding back, letting you set the pace. you looked up at him through your lashes, eyes watery but full of devotion as you took him deeper—hollowing your cheeks and bobbing your head. 

then, you pulled back just enough to catch a breather—lips glossy. 

“i’ve never done this before…”

sunghoon’s eyes widened, breath ragged.

“at all?”

you tilted your head, a small, hazy smile on your face. your hands continued to jerk him off back and forth, catching your own slicky saliva on your grip. 

“mmm… i think so?”

there was a strange, fleeting disconnect in your works—like your memories were clashing with one another. but sunghoon was too far gone to question it. 

you leaned back in, taking him deeper again. the wet heat of your mouth, the way you moaned around him, the way you looked up at him like pleasing him was the only thing that mattered was overwhelming. 

his breathing grew heavier, low groans slipping out as you worked him with sensual devotion. 

sunghoon’s breathing grew heavier. low, broken groans slipped from his throat as your head bobbed, tongue swirling around the underside of his cock while your hand stroked the base. every so often you’d pull back to kiss and lick the wet tip, almost in a teasing manner before sinking down again.

“baby,” he rasped, fingers tightening in your hair. “you’re so good at this… feels so fucking good.”

the sight of you on your knees, lips stretched around him, tits wet with your drippy saliva—it was better than any dream he’d had. imagining this exact moment, paled in comparison to the real thing—he was losing himself completely. 

his hips started twitching, thighs sensing as pleasure coiled tighter and tiger in his tummy. “hngh—baby…” he groaned, voice strained. “i need to be inside you.”

sunghoon pulled you up slightly with a wet pop, lips shiny and swollen. without a word, you climbed back onto the bed and laid down, pulling him on top of you.

he hovered over you, drinking in the sight. you looked breathtaking underneath him—flushed cheeks, swollen lips, hair fanned out prettily on his pillow, black dress bunched around your waist. your tits rose and fell with every quick breath, nipples hardened from arousal. your legs spread for him, panties pushed to the side. 

“you’re so beautiful,” he whispered, voice thick with emotion as he positioned the head of his cock at your entrance. “i’ve been wanting to tell you that for so long.”

you giggled shyly,  biting your lip as you looked up at him.

“come on… love me.”

“i do love you,” sunghoon breathed. 

then he pushed in. 

the first thrust was slow but deep, stretching you open around his curved length. you gasped, back arching slightly as he bottomed out. sunghoon groaned, forehead pressing against yours. 

“fuck… you’re so tight.” 

you moaned softly, nails digging into his shoulders.

“you’re my first—oh gosh, you’re my first…”

that single sentence sent a bolt of raw heat through him. sunghoon’s hips snapped forward harder, fucking you deeper strokes. the thought that he was your first—that no one else had ever had you like this—made something primal inside him snap.

he thrusted harder, the sound of skin slapping skin filling the room along with your moans and his groans. 

 it was going good—your pussy was tight and heavenly, and sunghoon had never felt a hold other than his hand so good like this. but then—

you suddenly laughed—a bright, almost delirious sound—and tilted your head back, arching your back as pleasure overtook you.

it freaked sunghoon out a little.

your body convulsed underneath him as uncontrollable giggles spilled from your lips. your eyes rolled back, whites showing for a terrifying second, like you found this whole situation fucking hilarous. 

it was wrong. inhumane, almost. 

his hand shot up instinctively, wrapping around your throat—not hard enough to hurt, but firm enough to pin you down and stop the violent twitching. 

“no, no… don’t do that, baby,” he rasped, still buried deep inside you, hips faltering for a moment. “stay with me—look at me.”

the laughter cut off abruptly.

your body went still. then your eyes rolled back into place, focusing on him again. the eerie, too–wide smile slowly softened back into normal. the smile he loved so much. sunghoon’s cock tip then kissed the gummy spot inside you, eliciting a soft moan from your lips.

“hngh—!” you gasped, eyes momentarily shut in pleasure before they opened again, finding his—but not entirely looking. 

“...sorry, baby,” you whispered sweetly, blinking.

      part two of two

ㅤ© ⌞hoonkitti⌝ ⁞ all rights reservedㅤ please don't share, copy, or translate my work.

you had always been affectionate. soft, clingy, eager to please, always seeking his touch, his attention, his approval. but these days things were different. lately, your affection felt different. it lingered, trembled, came with something a little warmer underneath. something that maybe you didn’t really knew what it was, judging by the way you dealt with it.

you were trying to hide it, that much was obvious. avoiding him just enough to make it noticeable. going to bed earlier, pretending sleep would make it go away. pulling back from things you used to crave, like sitting on his lap, pressing yourself close just because you could.

your body wasn’t cooperating with you. your reactions had become slower, hazier, distracted by thoughts you couldn’t quite control. your breathing would shift at the smallest things. your gaze would flicker, unfocused, before snapping away like you’d been caught.

and then there was the worst of it. the way your mouth would water when he let you playfully bite him.

what used to be harmless, soft teeth against his skin, had turned into something else entirely. slower. heavier. your lips lingering a second too long, your tongue getting in the way, your grip tightening on his shirt without meaning to.

sometimes, you didn’t even notice the way your saliva would drip against his skin. 

he did.

you’d pull away after, embarrassed, asking sorry for being messy. but your body would be burning, wanting to bite more, lick at his skin. wanting him to bite and lick back at you. wanting him to pet your fluffy ears and touch you in places you had never felt his gentle, warm hands before.

restless. needy. confused. and still trying so hard to act like nothing had changed.

beomgyu watched all of it. quietly and patiently. because you weren’t hiding anything from him, not really. 

still, he hesitated.

the plan had always been to let you experience your first heat on your own. to let you grow into it naturally, to learn how to deal with your own body without depending on him for everything.

of course, he would take care of you if you needed it. he always would. what kind of owner would he be if he didn’t? but he didn’t want to interfere too much. didn’t want to blur that line before you even understood what you were feeling and craving.

and yet… watching you like this was starting to test that resolve.

beomgyu had just come out of the shower when he stepped into his bedroom, steam still clinging faintly to his skin.

you were sprawled across his bed, comfortably settled like you belonged there. hugging his pillow close to your chest, his phone loose in your hand as something played forgotten on the screen.

“oh, princess. hi” he greeted, voice warm, casual, as he flicked the lights on. “thought you were already sleeping” he barely thought about it, walking in like that —wearing nothing but a pair of black boxers, skin still flushed from the heat of the shower, damp strands of hair falling over his forehead.

“sorry for entering like this” he added, almost absentmindedly.

you froze completely. the sound from the phone kept playing for a second too long before the screen dimmed on its own, slipping into darkness as your attention dropped entirely. your eyes were now locked on him. your pupils dilating slowly, unmistakably, as they traced over him.

“it’s ok…” you answered, barely above a whisper.

you didn’t move, just tightened your grip on the pillow, pulling it closer against your body to ground yourself, already starting to feel restless.

beomgyu didn’t usually walk around like that in front of you. you had seen him shirtless a few times before, sure, but… it wasn’t like this. you didn’t remember your body heating up like this, your mouth watering like it was now.

“gyu… are you going to go out today?” you asked, suddenly, too quickly. the words slipping out like an attempt to sound normal.

he glanced at you briefly as he rummaged through his wardrobe, then back to what he was doing, unfazed.

“no. i’ll be staying home today.” a small pause. then, softer “sounds good?”

you nodded first, before realizing he couldn’t see it properly.

“mmhm” you hummed instead.

your fingers curled tighter into the fabric of the pillow, pressing it closer between your legs —your thighs shifting slightly to accommodate it better without you even noticing.

you tried to look away, you really did. but your eyes kept betraying you, drawn back to the broad line of his back like something magnetic.

the way the heat from the shower still lingered on his skin, leaving it faintly flushed, the dampness catching the bedroom light as it traced along the subtle definition of muscle. the slow shift of his shoulders as he moved…

it wasn’t your fault he looked so good, right?

your gaze followed down the length of his spine, to the slight dip at his lower back, to the way his muscles flexed just enough to make your breath hitch. you were starting to feel dizzy from it.

you lifted yourself slightly from the bed, sitting back on your heels, the pillow still pressed between your thighs. not really knowing what to do with yourself anymore.

“why you ask, sweet girl?” he said, closing the wardrobe door and turning back to you with his pajamas in hand before tossing them onto the bed, just a little in front of you, but you didn't take your attention off him.

your eyes didn’t know where to settle now. you had to consciously still your tail, keeping it from moving too much and giving your excitement away. or at least, you were trying to.

your gaze flickered first to his neck, still slightly flushed, a faint sheen of dampness clinging to his skin. a droplet of water traced slowly downward, disappearing beneath the line of his collarbone, and you followed it without thinking.

you had seen that part of him up close before. felt it too. the warmth of his neck when he leaned down to murmur something just for you, the way your breath would hitch when his voice brushed too close to your ear —how easily it made your stomach flutter without you ever quite understanding why.

his chest rose and fell slowly with each breath, not overly sculpted, but firm and defined. just enough to make your breath catch. 

you knew that place too. knew what it felt like to be pressed there, held close without warning, his body warm and steady around you, how it always made you go quiet, made something soft and restless bloom in your chest.

his shoulders…

broad in a way that felt almost unfair up close.

you had felt those too. when he leaned over you earlier to play on the sofa, caging you in for a second —your hands pressing against them instinctively. solid and unmoving. like he could keep you there without even trying.

your eyes lingered there a second too long before trailing down his arms. noticing the faint bite marks your teeth had left scattered along his skin from earlier too, some a little more visible than others. 

your stomach twisted at the sight. you remembered that too. the way he was just there, letting you take what you needed like it was nothing.

but your eyes still dropped to his stomach, drawn by instinct more than intention.

there was a hint of muscle beneath, a subtle tension that showed whenever he moved, whenever his body shifted just enough to make it visible.

you didn’t have a memory for that part.

not really.

just a feeling. a strange, heavy pull low in your stomach.

your grip on the pillow tightened. you didn’t even realize you were staring anymore. and, just as your eyes were about to drop even lower, beomgyu pulled you out of your thoughts:

“...have something you want to do together tonight, puppy?” he asked, his tone low. it slid under your skin in a way that made your breath hitch, your body reacting before your mind could even catch up.

he was looking straight at you.

a small, knowing smile tugged at his lips as he pulled his shirt on, not taking his eyes off you.

he had caught you.

caught the way your eyes were ogling him like you couldn’t help it. caught the way your body shifted, your hips moving shyly, almost involuntarily, against his pillow.

your throat went dry instantly, your movements stopping the moment you became aware of them. heat rushed up your neck, spreading across your cheeks as you froze under his gaze, looking down quickly, fidgeting with the pillowcase like you were trying to play it off.

nononono

gyu wasn’t supposed to see you like that

you should behave properly.

beomgyu watched you for a second longer.

then exhaled. slow.

his hand came up, dragging through his damp hair before he set his sweatpants aside, showing no intention of putting them on anymore.

“i know i said i wouldn’t do it…” he murmured, almost more to himself than to you.

he hadn’t meant to encourage that behavior. hadn’t meant to let it get this far.

but the way you were looking at him. the way your body was reacting, and how you weren’t even aware of it. it made his heart ache to help his poor puppy.

and maybe, just maybe, indulge in it a little too. after all, his girl was just so pretty, and he loved you so much.

“but i guess it’s okay just this once, hm?”

he sat on the edge of the bed, making himself comfortable, leaning back on one arm and spreading his legs slightly. he patted the space beside him on the mattress.

“come here, puppy” he said, his voice soft and careful, encouraging you to follow his command and come closer. “i know it’s my fault too. it was mean of me to walk in like that… to do that to you when i know my princess is a little more sensitive than usual.”

you swallowed, not dry this time. because the amount of saliva your mouth had produced in the last thirty seconds of beomgyu speaking to you in that gentle, careful tone, was almost alarming.

you hesitated for a moment, still a little afraid to face all of that. all of those feelings you barely even understood yet. but as your owner gently reassured you that it was okay, that he would help you, you felt a little less anxious.

and so, you got on your hands and knees, moving toward him across the bed, your arms trembling slightly against the softness of the mattress. your tail giving a small, uncertain twitch behind you.

he watched every movement from where he sat.

“how are you feeling, hm?” he asked quietly now that you were there, right beside him. you sat the same way as before, back on your heels.

he turned his body toward you, and your gaze, still lowered, brushed briefly against the faint outline beneath his black boxers before you startled and quickly looked up, straight into his eyes.

“...strange, gyu” you answered, soft and needy, leaning into his hand on your cheek as his thumb gently stroked your skin. “the new panties you gave me after i showered earlier… i got them wet again. i don’t know why…” you sighed, frustrated with yourself, embarrassed to admit it to him.

he always said you were so good. that you were never any trouble.

and here you were.

being trouble.

“aw, sweetheart, don’t worry” he said, his tone soothing, though still a little deeper than usual. “that’s normal for puppies like you, hm? there’s nothing wrong about it.”

your expression softened as he spoke, even if your gaze still dropped to your lap every now and then. your fingers fidgeting together, your fluffy ears giving a small, shy twitch on top of your head.

beomgyu noticed immediately. his hand coming up to gently brush over one of them, thumb smoothing over the soft fur in a slow, comforting motion.

you melted a little at the touch.

beomgyu smiled softly, fond.

“do you want to show me?”

heat rushed back to your face.

“d-do you want to see…?” you asked, lifting your head shyly.

his dark eyes sent a shiver down your spine, even if you didn’t quite understand why.

“i do, pretty” he replied, even quieter now, almost a whisper. “no need to be shy, hm? i’ll make everything feel better.”

“hm… okay then” you answered, almost hypnotized by him.

everything about him pulled you in, left your breathing uneven. the damp hair, his parted lips, his half-lidded eyes that never left you, the warmth of his body so close to yours.

you really hoped beomgyu would be able to fix your little problem, because if not, you weren’t sure you’d be able to sleep that night.

and so, beomgyu guided you to the middle of the bed with him, where he leaned back against the headboard and encouraged you to settle against him, asking you to take off your sleep shorts and, soon after, to open your legs so he could take a careful look.

beomgyu took his time, slowly touching and pressing against your pussy through your panties, which only grew wetter and wetter under his touch. he was practically drooling against the curve of your neck where he rested his head, indulging in every sweet little reaction you gave him to even the smallest movements.

he could swear he had never been this hard in his life.

if you were already being this sweet for him with just his fingers lightly brushing your clit through your panties, he could barely wait to see how much you’d like having him stretch that tight, warm, inexperienced pussy on his cock. how you wouldn’t even know what to do with yourself with how good it would feel.

“do you like it, princess?” he whispered, warm against your ear.

his fingers alternated their pace —slow and teasing when you seemed to get a little too worked up, faster and firmer when your reactions slowed too much, just to hear you let out a small, startled whine and chuckle meanly at it.

“y-yes, gyu” you answered slowly, with some difficulty.

your eyes flickered between his fingers —and the way they played with you over your underwear— and his arms —one holding your left thigh open, the other crossing over your body to reach your cunt.

“so good…” you whimpered softly, needy.

“c-can you… do it under it?” you asked meekly, your gaze dropping now to his face just inches from yours. his hair slightly messy, his lazy eyes making your heart race even faster.

“hmmm…” he seemed to think for a few seconds, his eyes flicking back down to your clothed pussy briefly. 

you were so wet that the fabric of your panties was practically clinging to you now.

poor puppy, it must’ve been getting a little uncomfortable for you.

“since you asked so nicely…” his fingers slid to the waistband of your panties, his gaze lifting to meet yours as he hooked one of fingers there, and —instead of pulling it down right away— snapped the material lightly against your hip.

a quiet, mean chuckle slipped from him when your breath hitched and you let out a small sound, somewhere between surprise and sting, pouting at him when you saw his pleased reaction.

“gyu…”

“sorry, love. was just playing with you” he murmured, soothing you now, finally sliding your panties down your thighs, warm and soft under his hands. he had to clear his throat to keep himself from drooling when he saw a wet string connecting your pussy lips to the fabric as he pulled it away.

you opened your legs for him again, trembling, but eager. eager for more of what he was giving you, eager to feel your owner’s fingers directly on you now.

“you’re a little too excited about this, i think…” beomgyu said, observant, pretending to keep control as he watched your anticipation, his hands now slowly caressing your thighs. “what am i going to do with you, hm? i think i just got myself into a big mess…”

your breathing started to grow uneven again, anticipating his touch that still hadn’t come, just teasing you.

“i only wanted to help you, sweet thing…”

his fingers started to move closer now, tracing along the curve of your thigh toward your center, brushing right over your lips.

you lifted your hips slightly, seeking his hand as you let out a soft whine.

“but with you acting like this… i think i’ll end up needing to rub this sweet little pussy every night before bed, hm?” he said with mock concern, sighing softly right before dragging his middle finger straight to your clit, pressing gently, but with intention.

your eyes nearly rolled back, your mouth falling open in silent shock. he watched your face with an expression like he was the one being edged.

“g-gyu, p-please, i-” you let out another soft, needy moan, saliva starting to gather in your mouth with the way he focused on your clit now, rubbing slow, circular motions. “it feels so good… do-don’t know what to do…”

“shhh, easy, puppy” he murmured against your neck, coaxing you gently. “if you promise to be good and not close your legs, i’ll give you my hand to lick and bite, hm? how does that sound?”

you nodded eagerly right away, almost frantic, your feet kicking lightly at the thought.

“pleasepleaseplease” you begged, voice high, somehow growing even wetter, if that was even possible.

“mmh…” he hummed in approval at your reaction, his cock impossibly hard, leaking inside the tight confinement of his boxers. “go ahead then, pretty.”

his touch slipped away from your thigh, leaving only the warmth and pressure behind on your skin. your hand found his, fingers curling around his wrist as you pulled it close, guided more by instinct than thought. your lips brushed against his skin, starting to lick and gently bite your owner’s fingers, holding onto him as your breathing grew uneven.

whatever small sounds you tried to swallow only slipped out softer, more frequent, the closer you got. 

“good girl” he whispered against your ear, dizzy with his craving for you. his fingers speeding up over your sensitive nerves. you were absolutely dumb, dripping down the sheets. “you’re gonna get there for me, yeah?”

you only let out a long, needy moan in response, two of his fingers still inside your mouth as you drooled over his hand. you were far too gone to form any proper sentence.

“seems like it” he laughed softly, cruelty dripping like venom from his tone. “say it to me, then: i’m beomgyu’s good girl.”

you squirmed in place, feeling impossibly close at his words. but you still tried —just to please your owner, just to be good for him.

“i-i’m beomgyu’s… good… good g-girl…” you said slowly, stumbling over the words, his fingers still in your mouth.

“that’s it… good girl” he whispered, warm against your ear one last time, as the knot in your stomach finally snapped, his skilled fingers doing all the work. “sweet baby, so sweet for me always…”

that sharp, overwhelming feeling spread through you, pulling a broken sound from your throat as your back arched and your thighs trembled around his hand. your fingers curled uselessly against the sheets, while your other hand still held tightly to his wrist.

your body trembled through it, soft, uneven breaths spilling from your lips as the feeling slowly ebbed away, leaving you warm, sensitive, and heavy.

your grip on his hand loosened, lips parting as you let it fall from your mouth, a faint string of saliva still clinging before it broke.

“gyu…” you murmured, dazed, your head tipping forward, almost instinctively seeking him —your body still buzzing, still wanting.

he felt it immediately, in the way you leaned in. the way your thighs shifted again, slower this time, needy rather than frantic. 

the way your eyes, still hazy, lifted to him with something new in them.

expectation.

beomgyu’s hand came up to your face, steadying you before you could get any closer.

“easy” he murmured, his voice low again, but different now.

firmer.

you stilled.

his thumb brushed lightly over your cheek, grounding you as your breathing struggled to settle.

“that’s enough for now.”

your brows knit together slightly, lips parting like you were about to protest.

a small, almost amused exhale left him as he tilted your chin up just enough to make you look at him properly.

“what?” he murmured. “you thought i’d give it all to you at once?”

your cheeks burned.

your thighs pressed together unconsciously, a soft, frustrated whine slipping out before you could stop it.

beomgyu’s gaze softened at that, but he didn’t give in. instead, his hand slid down to your thigh, squeezing lightly.

“you need to learn how to handle it first, puppy” he said, calm and patient, like he had decided this long before. “this is your first time feeling it like this, isn’t it?”

you hesitated. then nodded, small.

he hummed, satisfied.

“then we take it slow.” his fingers brushed absentmindedly against your skin, no longer teasing.

“be patient for me” he added softly, his thumb brushing your lower lip now, catching the way it trembled. “you’re my good girl, right?”

your breath hitched.

you nodded again.

because you were.

To be loved is to be kept.

Birds are kept in gilded cages so they never learn the sky; relics are kept alive long after they should have been laid to rest. And people? People are kept, frangible and insubstantial until the weight of another’s devotion hardens into something they can’t escape.

They’re studied, preserved, handled with veneration so consuming it erodes the edges of who they once were, leaving behind only what someone else deemed worth devouring.

LOVE has always masqueraded as sanctuary, though sanctuaries have a peculiar way of locking from the outside. And see, there’s something almost holy about being known so completely that nothing escapes another’s gaze— until knowing becomes anticipating, and God knows anticipation leaves no room for choice.

To be loved, is also to be perverted.

Deviance, friend and foe, can tarnish or render bare- until there’s nothing more than flesh, bones and an existential need to satisfy without even knowing why. Bodies reduced to instinct become too thin from being wanted too much and understood too little; like a lamb is cherished because it’s gentle, because it’s somewhat helpless, because it never learned how to bite the hand of the shepherd that keeps it.

And the curious thing is that even the smartest of people, can become prey to the devil.

Your husband’s a quiet man, he keeps to himself most of the time— too self absorbed to look at the world around him; he spends most of his days painting in the attic, and it would be a tremendous lie to say you’ve never caught him answering imaginary interview questions about his works.

By the standards of the typical megalomaniac artist— his name is as incongruous as the canvas he paints. Samael, which in Hebrew often interprets as ’the poison of God’— has an unfortunate relationship with his mother, which begs the question : why would someone deliberately name their child something so grim?

The story behind all of this, is that when Samael was only a foetus in his progenitors’ womb— the latter recounts feeling him kick her in the ribs every time she got down on her knees to pray the good Lord. One day— as she retells— the holy Spirit descended straight into her humble bedroom and whispered that her descendent was a spawn of Satan.

You’d think as a good pious woman, she’d choose to exorcise the newborn or slip holy water in his nighttime milk— instead she gave him a name so sordid even her own parents chastised her.

The ironic thing though, is that as much as you’d like to believe she was experiencing religious psychosis— the name Samael clung to him like prophecy. If the shoe fits, after all.

You and your husband got married extremely young on a passing fancy— a whim if you will— it was nothing short of a messy 2 hour long celebration that you had no intention of explaining to your future kids.

You’re not proud of it, but love’s never been something grand to you; you and Samael found each other at 16— call a spade a spade— decided it fit your narrative to get hitched at 18 and delive together as total opposites— him as a good devout artist, you as an untouched bride who sought nothing more but good-willing hands.

You don’t care much for connection, to you it’s a vain thing— you don’t need to be understood by others as long as you understand yourself. Samael on the other end, is too precious about his paintings and longs to be perceived as a wiseman, to be fully acknowledged— something you couldn’t possibly give him.

And believe it, it’s not fruits of a lack of affection— God no— you like him lots.

Surely your husband is a reliable man, strong in his stance— he often brings peaches home after work, carefully washing one and cutting it in small bits before feeding them to you. He likes to place his hands on your shoulders and tug at the straps of your nightgown in the evenings, until what’s left of you is bare skin under pale moonlight.

But when it comes to good conversation, he isn’t all that great anymore. See, Samael hates talking— he’d rather use his hands, trace paths from your soft neck to your perky breasts like his fingertips can tell the story instead.

He’d never sit down and exceed the usual 3 sentences rule — no, he hates being confronted to his thoughts, hates carrying out basic human interactions, and on top of it all— he’s not really good with words. Horrible at it, even. The man doesn’t even know the difference between then and than.

So to say, your husband is as shallow as kiddy pool is highly accurate— he paints himself as a wounded creator, showing up with acrylic under his nails like it gives him authenticity— but the only thing it says is that he’s seen way too many movies. He uses religion as a core trait, hides behind principles and morals until he is nothing but a saint; thinks the world’s a given and that he’s earned his stay just because he attends sermons on Sundays.

You’re always lonely, hoarding books because it’s easier than talking to yourself, watching life go by while flies buzz by the window-still of your small shared house. Compounding this, it’s not like you have many friends outside of the 60 year old neighbors Mr. Paulson, and church people— the church he drags you to every sunday, claiming it’s “the things you do to be a better person”. The women there are sweet there- you wouldn’t be surprised that they talk behind your back, surely, but they’re nice to be around nonetheless.

Your social life is non-existent. The closest you’ve been to an entertaining conversation was about two weeks ago when the cashier asked if you whether you were going to pay by card or cash.

So deep down— being a creature of many words— being deprived of dialogue is something that pains you. You’d rather talk about the significance of dreams and nightmares or how the human brain tricks people into thinking they’re content with what they have; rather than scraping your knees on a confessional floor because your husband dragged you.

See, it all started when he caught you reading a book on the couch one random morning— you were quick to cover the title with your hand, feigning casualness as you leaned back onto the leather. But unfortunately for you, and much to Samael’s deceit— the cover art spoke for itself, some kind of drawn representation of a naked woman in a man’s lap, cunt bare and open to temptation.

He argued it wasn’t healthy, snatched the book from your hands and lit up the chimney all in one breath. Then he threw the paperback in the fire and watched the corruption burn before him, indifferent to your stiffness.

Sin isn’t welcome in the house— save for when he’s the one committing it.

Being still in a student doesn’t make this any better— during spring break, it leaves you nothing to do but to watch all seasons of The Big Bang Theory, then all seasons again and again until you know much more about the characters than you know about yourself. You bring The Big Bang Theory in the bathroom with you, so you don’t have to be alone in there too. You fall asleep watching it— such terrible American pre-chewed slop. It’s a homeopathic dose of comedy that helps silence that companionship-starved part of you.

Which brings you to do the most logical thing a sane person could think of. You book a therapy session with a renowned therapist in town.

Part because the priest doesn’t know how to listen when you sit down in the confessional and tell him about how lonely you feel— part because you want to talk to someone without feeling like you’re being an inconvenience. At least Dr Sim’s paid to do this, paid to sit in a fancy armchair and listen to people elaborate on their latest meals and two seconds later their experience with rape.

He’s paid to nod, offer reassurance, keep secrets like they’re his own. What he’s not paid for though, is to be a friend, but that’s enough.

SESSION OO1. 🎤︎︎

The moment you step out of the car, your head snaps from side to side. This isn’t a secluded part of town, which means you’re likely to encounter people you know here. Whether it’s women from church, driving their perfect little sons to school, or your husband’s colleagues going to work— there’s always going to be someone you know around.

You’d love to say you’ve read enough books to pretend like therapy isn’t scary and socially acceptable, but the truth is— if people were to see you right now, you’d probably crawl into the ground in seconds.

There’s this unbidden fear that they’re all gonna laugh at you.

That they’ll laugh at your instability, they’ll refuse to let you babysit their brilliant heirs, they’ll call you names and ban you from the town’s book club.

So you pull your head down low, look at the dust your feet drag from the ground as you make your way to the little private practice. It’s situated between a pharmacy and a pub, significantly thinner than the two other buildings, like it’s trying to make itself shrink. You tap the code provided to you text, quickly looking around like a delinquent before stepping inside.

It’s a rich-man’s practice, sleek black walls that seem to be closing in, potted plants and a stack of psychology books on a mahogany table. You make your way to the door where a golden plate sits, the name Dr. Sim engraved on it. It’s with shaking hands that you ring the bell, quickly folding it inside your pocket before he comes.

You look around one last time, like maybe someone familiar is hiding behind the curtains of the reception room, waiting to make fun of you; when the door opens.

You don’t know what you imagined, but it certainly wasn’t the man you envisioned before coming here. You abstractly thought about him with greyish hair, salt and pepper beard, a crisp suit— for whatever reason that is— maybe a prominent belly. But the man standing in front of you isn’t the person you envisioned, so much so that you’re tempted to ask if he’s the receptionist.

“Y/l/n ? Welcome, come on in.” he gestures inside.

The first thing that catches your attention is his Aussie accent— then his eyes, the color of cooled tea, hooded and thin like he’s perpetually high. It’s an endearing thing really, paired with his carefully styled hair, he does look put together, painfully so even. There’s no denying he’s a fairly handsome man, someone you’d look at twice in the street— someone you’d tell a friend about.

Someone who’s currently inviting you inside and you can’t do a damn thing about it because your feet are stuck to the carpet.

Thinking about it he probably gets a lot of patients who are reluctant to come in— it can’t be unusual, maybe some of them even cry at the door, you think. But you look silly nonetheless.

Dr. Sim’s eyebrows lift with a silent confusion “Are you okay? Can I call you by name or would you rather I call you ma’am?”

Your teeth catches on the last of skin you’d been tearing off your lower lip sometime before, and you nod, “Y/n’s fine.”

You step inside, looking around like an animal being introduced to a new cage— your eyes catch the 3 paintings hung on the wall, ones you recognize to be Gustav Klimt’s.

‘The Kiss’, more precisely— an undeniably timeless piece, serene and so intimate it’ll make you think twice when seeing it. To you, it doesn’t look like a romantic embrace though— as iconic as the painting is— the female figure’s eyes are closed and she has a strangely blank expression. Her hands drape around the man’s neck and clutch at his hand at her throat.

There’s something domineering and violent about the male figure’s embrace, and something powerless, desperate, almost pathetic about the woman. Is she unconscious or are her eyes closed in bliss? Is she returning the man’s embrace or trying to claw his hands away?

It’s all left to silence, an open space for interpretation to fill. But what it leaves inside of you, is a strangely unsettling feeling, or maybe you’re just nitpicking.

Dr.Sim leads you to his office, where the walls are high, and a leather armchair sits in the middle of the room in a sort of platform, elevated from the rest of the room. The therapist points to a small sofa pushed against the wall and takes a seat in his own. When you’re finally settled, bare thighs clammy against the leather, you look up at him.

Dr. Sim sits higher up, not drastically so, just enough that you have to raise your eyes to be able to meet his. “What made you decide to come here today?” he asks with a polite smile.

Your palms clap awkwardly on your thighs, a nervous chuckle coming out of your throat. “My um… my friend recommended i go to therapy.”

That’s a lie. You don’t have any caring friends, certainly not any who believe psychology isn’t a satanic practice.

You found your answer in a sub reddit instead, people asked questions and some others answered. You felt safer sharing it with strangers from the internet than with your own husband, which said a lot about the nature of your relationship.

“That’s a good friend.” Dr. Sim nods, “Have you ever been to therapy, or is this your first time?”

“Um, no I haven’t.” you admit, almost as if it’s a shame, a thing in a bucket list you haven’t crossed yet.

“First sessions are often the hardest. There’s no pressure to tell me everything today, okay?” Dr. Sim says rather gently. “That’s one less thing for you to worry about, you won’t have any expectations of how this is supposed to go.”

You huff, you’ve seen a couple episodes of Sex Education, you’re pretty damn sure you know how this is supposed to go.

“Is there something you’d like to start with y/n?”

You genuinely don’t know where to start. There’s too much, you suspect that if you start talking, your thoughts will evolve in arborescence, until nothing makes sense anymore. “Well, i hoped you could… maybe give me prompts, I don’t really know where to start.”

Dr. Sim chuckles warmly, leaning back in his seat, “How about you tell me about yourself? I’ve gathered only so much from your email. How old are you, who are you?”

Your fingers grab the fabric of your summer dress, pulling it taunt. “I’m 23– well i’ll be 24 in a few weeks. I’m a… well I study sociology. I don’t really know what to say… I’m married.”

And there you go. As much as you seem to despise your husband, you can’t forget to mention him like he’s a part of yourself. How pathetic.

Dr. Sim smiles, amused maybe, “You’re married, okay, that’s a good start… Is it okay if i make a parentheses for the practical things?” You nod, and he explains the countless things you already looked up before coming here.

You listen, although distracted by the big clock ticking on the wall, it’s old fashioned perfectly centered with big numbers and an awfully ominous sound.

The therapist goes over confidentiality, the session length: typically 45 minutes, and ends it by telling you to feel free to avoid questions that make you uncomfortable. That he’s not here to open doors but rather to guide you towards opening them yourself and blah blah blah.

“With that out of the way, i’d like to ask, what are you hoping therapy might help with?” the man asks.

You take a moment to ponder it, mostly because it’s an answer you don’t have yourself, “I miss… I think i miss talking to someone. Maybe that’s not really the point of therapy but I just came in here to talk.”

Dr Sim lets out a soft amused sound, “Debatable, i’d say talking is the whole point of therapy. But if that’s how you feel then be it. Do you have an idea what you’d like to talk about?”

You shake your head, “Not really.. if you could maybe talk me through it like earlier, that’d be great.”

He straightens in his seat, spine impeccably straight, “Sure, you set the pace. How about you tell me what an average week looks like for you?”

It doesn’t take much pondering to get an answer out of you, plain and simple, “School, eating, sleeping.”

“That’s it? Not even… I don’t know, any hobbies? Reading, knitting…?” he says.

“Well I do read sometimes,” you nod, thinking back to the whole smutty book episode, “but my… husband doesn’t really like it when I do.”

Dr. Sim’s brows raise a fraction, “Oh? Why’s that? Is he against literature or…”

You shake your head, “No, it’s just, when the book has some kind of sinful thing in it, he gets mad. And you know how the books are these days, one can’t really escape sin.”

The therapist nods, he doesn’t grab a notebook or take notes, nothing of that sort, he just listens— and you can almost see the pen scribbling words in his mind. At some point he picks up a pair of black glasses from a small table next to his armchair and perches them on his long nose.

“Does he know you’re here today?” he asks.

“Yes,” you lie through your teeth, “well no.”

Dr Sim smiles at the immediate deceit, perpetually amused, “He doesn’t? Why’s that?”

You lean back against the couch, your clammy palms box each of your thighs, “He wouldn’t like it. He’d probably tell me to go to church or whatever bullshit he always—” you clap a palm to your mouth, eyes wide. “Sorry” you say through your fingers.

Something flickers in the therapist’s eyes, “That’s okay, you can curse, there’s no big deal.”

You carry on immediately after his approval, “He’d tell me to go to church and confess, but the priest at my church’s a child molester. I don’t want to confess my sins to someone who’s done such things.”

He nods, “Does your husband know that?”

“Yeah, but he says the kids are probably making it up for attention. Ive told him multiple times but he just won’t listen. Actually… i’ve considered leaving him for this.” you confess.

“Oh? Does that bother you a lot? The way he thinks?”

You nod vehemently, “I hate it. He makes it seem like that priest is a saint, like those kids are liars and attention seekers.”

Dr Sim hums, “Are you very religious y/n?”

You shake your head, looking up like the good Lord might see you, “Not really. I just go because my husband drags me there— I don’t mean it like the church is bad or anything…”

“No that’s fine, you can say whatever’s on your mind, no judgment.” he reassures.

“Well actually, i really think it’s bad. It’s made my husband really… angry and mean all the time.” you confess, twisting the fabric of your dress. “It’s like whenever he comes home from the sermon he’s ten times worse.”

Dr. Sim takes a breath almost like he’s treating a very important and delicate subject— which on second thought, he is. “How’s your husband. How is he around you.”

Your mind crowds with memories of the past few years, bad and good tangled together until you don’t know what to believe anymore, “He’s okay. He’s nice. We got married very young, we were freshly 18, no jobs. But I guess… time changes things. Or maybe i was just very very naive to think we’d always be the same.”

“Mmh, i see. How exactly did things change?” he asks.

“Well I feel like, he’s gotten so silent. All he ever does is hold me. And sometimes i just want to talk, sit down and discuss things. But then he’ll end up talking about his art — he’s a painter, for context— and i’ll get bored because let’s be honest, his stuff is not that deep.”

You catch yourself talking way more than intended, mainly because Dr. Sim seems like a neat person, calm and a good listener. You thought speaking so candidly in front of a man as conventionally attractive as him would leave you painfully aware of yourself. Instead, his gaze strips away the awkwardness before it can take root.

“What do you mean by ‘his stuff’s not that deep?’” he tilts his head, hair fanning on his forehead.

“Well he’s just so pretentious so it ruins the whole thing. He paints tigers and other felines, says he’s painting ‘masculinity’”

The therapist lets out an amused chuckle, “I see, and what’s your take on that?”

“I think it’s goofy and stupid. Felines are protective, and they don’t shy away from a fight… but he’s a coward. He hides behind his beliefs to excuse disgusting behaviors.”

“How do you feel about your husband ? How does he make you feel?”

You clasp your hands together, the back of the couch welcoming you, “Lonely. Bored. And a coward too, for not leaving him. I guess i should, with all the stuff he says… about these kids, about everything really. But i’d be the town pariah if I did that.” You let out a small self deprecating laugh, eyes tracing the lines of Dr. Sim’s black shirt.

Now that you think about it, he looks lean, not someone you would’ve pictured in this line of work. He has smooth dark brown hair, a little messy— a long straight nose and pinkish lips; he looks unfairly nice for a shrink, intimidatingly so at times.

“Lonely people have a habit of confusing survival with weakness.” His gaze never leaves yours. “I’m not convinced those are the same thing.”

“Well I do think it’s weakness. Debatably. Nobody stays with someone who destroys all their morals.” you shrug, eyes lowering to the small platform his armchair stands on.

“You’re holding yourself to a standard you don’t seem to extend to anyone else.” A brief pause. “If someone you cared about told you this story, would you call them weak?”

You nod immediately without thinking, “I would.”

“Oh? And what does a strong person do instead?”

“They leave. Argue. Everytime i tried to tell him that a child won’t just lie about such thing for attention, he dismissed me. So i let it go eventually.”

He makes a small inside note before looking up again. “You said, ‘I let it go.’ People rarely let convictions go. More often, they decide they aren’t worth the cost of defending.” A pause. “What did it cost you to keep disagreeing with him?”

“Nothing changed.” You toy with the hem of your dress. “I’d leave those conversations feeling like I’d spoken to a wall. So eventually… I stopped trying.”

“Being ignored has a way of convincing us our voice isn’t worth using.” Dr. Sim eyed the clock in the wall. “I’d like us to prove that wrong, yeah?”

SESSIONS OO2. to OO8.

A smart man is its own kind of danger because of how rare they usually are. This is the conclusion you came to after a couple session.

Dr. Sim’s a professional man, with a disarming charm. You gather he’s under 30– from the description on his website— he’s got a PhD in clinical psychology and he looks like he’s lived a total of 34 lives. The ratings on his website are generally the same— along the lines of ‘excellent with young adults, gentle and faith integrated therapy’ or in some more intense ones, ‘he’s helped me through countless depressive episodes, he’s incredibly insightful and remembers everything.’

It’s not news to you, you’ve noticed these things in the short period of time you’ve been seeing him. He sounds extremely smart and literate, which is something you recognize instantly in a man— someone who’s not trying to perform intelligence but rather make sense of it.

Dr. Sim’s an overall calm and soothing man, his voice never goes beyond a threshold, he knows how to coax the words out of you— often leading the cadence with a sentence only you can complete. He’s very validating— which is something you’ve lacked for years, being constantly told you were too much, that you had too many thoughts in such a pretty head. He makes you feel like a person instead of a woman, makes you feel like your voice is interesting.

You expect him to ask you to repeat everything from the previous week but instead, he remembers everything eerily well.

“You mentioned something last time,” he said on the third session, glancing down briefly. “That you often feel like you have to make yourself smaller to avoid overwhelming people. Do you still feel that way?”

It caught you off guard— not because he remembered. but because he remembered the exact thing you didn’t think mattered. Because it was such an insignificant detail to you, but it caught the attention of a man who had a degree in psych. “I still do, I’m very loud when I’m allowed to be. I talk a lot, I love debating. But these days I feel like if I so much as open my mouth everyone’s gonna sigh.” you confessed.

Dr. Sim nodded then, thinking to himself, “Do you feel like your husband’s dimming your light? You can tell me if i’m totally wrong.”

You didn’t even take a moment to ponder it, of course he did, “Yeah, he is. Not intentionally— well kind of intentionally, I guess.”

That had been enough for him to get the gist of it.

Dr. Sim gives language to what you feel, which is a beautiful thing really, for such a misunderstood girl. You totally underrated how important it was to be heard, to have a part of you bare in front of someone.

“I don’t think you’re confused,” he said during the 4th session. “I think you’ve just spent a long long time being told your feelings require justification before they’re allowed to exist.”

It was something so tender coming from a stranger. Something you’d expect to come out of a lover’s mouth— but then again, it was his job. He collected the money you’d worked your ass off for— in exchange for some brilliant words. But the money was worth it, so was the hassle of sneaking out, lying to your husband that you were meeting up with friends to study, when he most probably knew you preferred studying alone.

Being acknowledged was worth all the currencies in the world.

At some point, the sessions started exceeding the time limit a little bit. Little by little, you’d raise your eyes to watch the grand clock on his wall, and you’d notice you were running 10 minutes late.

“Dont worry about that.” he’d say, eyes softening. “We’re doing important work. I’m not going to rush you out because the clock says we’re finished.”

And it felt kind, impossibly kind. Like you were hogging 10 minutes of his carefully planned day, just to be talking about the most nonsensical things your brain held.

Sometimes you’d talk about your childhood, he’d ask specific questions, “Tell me about the people you grew up with.”

And you’d answer openly, “My dad worked with computers. He was… kind, but difficult sometimes. He was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, so my childhood was pretty messy. But i don’t blame him. And then, when I turned 14, he… well he ended his life. My mom found him already dead.”

Dr. Sim would listen, occasionally making comments about how growing up with a mentally unstable parent impacted a child. But you couldn’t relate because you genuinely couldn’t find it in you to hold your father accountable for your wounds.

“My mom went through many depressive episodes. She had a pretty tough life, so it was probably bound to happen like that, but she never let it get to us— me and my sister. She carried a lot, especially when my father got admitted to a psychiatric ward.” you told him, “I think… sometimes, him being dead is a good thing in a sense— well no, it’s a bad thing to say, but i think she can take care of herself now, and not constantly worry about someone else.”

Dr.Sim did a distracting movement with his hand, three taps on his thigh— stopping you from spiralling. “You know y/n, sometimes grief is complicated. Sometimes relief and sadness can exist in the same place.” the therapist tilted his head slightly. “Feeling one doesn’t erase the other.”

He let it sit for a minute, before continuing. “You seem very practiced at making room for other people’s pain, I think.” he paused, with a soft voice. “I’m wondering how often someone made room for yours.”

That was the first time you cried, uncontrolled, totally out of the blue like someone had coaxed tears out of your eyes with force. You shook your head, the heels of your palms trying to tame the outburst by pressing against your eyes.

“It’s okay. You can cry.” Dr. Sim said, with a gentle voice. You did, because you hadn’t been able to anywhere else.

One time, you mentioned the panic attacks you were experiencing outside of sessions, how you’d curl into a ball in the middle of the bed, wait for your husband to notice, to care. But he’d never.

Dr. Sim said, “Therapy can sometimes open things before it teaches you how to close them again.” He hesitated for a bit before continuing, “If something urgent comes up, you can always contact the practice’s number.”

He looked at you, examining your face before speaking again, “I’ll give you my personal number as well— I usually dont do this with patients but I hope you know I’m available if anything happens between sessions, for psychological support.”

Another time, you sat together for an hour because the words wouldn’t come and your throat felt too tight. Dr. Sim didn’t say anything, he just sat there, offering his presence where people often offer an aspirin. He made you feel listened too— even when you weren’t saying any words. He simply sat across from you, legs crossed, hands resting calmly on his knee, watching with quiet patience. Every few minutes he would offer the smallest nod or a faint, reassuring smile, as if to say I’m still here.

When the session ended, he walked you to the door, and said, “You don’t have to speak every time. Sometimes just showing up is enough. I’m glad you did.”

During another session, you told him about the way Samael sometimes looked through you, like you were furniture. How lonely marriage could feel even when you shared a bed.

Jake’s expression grew pained, almost personal.

“That sounds incredibly isolating,” he murmured. “Like you’re screaming underwater and no one hears you.” He paused, then added softly, “I hear you.”

He remembered you once mentioned liking the smell of rain; and the diffuser in the corner of his office smelled faintly of petrichor that day. You hadn’t mentioned it, but he noticed when you relaxed deeper into the sofa.

Before you left, Dr. Sim said, “Next week, if you want, we can sit in silence again. Or talk. Or anything in between. The door is always open for you, Yn. Always.”

The next session, you mentioned how Samael hadn’t touched you in months, the only times he ever did were to make himself feel good.

Jake’s pen stilled and for a moment, something unnameable flickered behind his gentle expression before he masked it. “That must be incredibly lonely,” he said, voice careful. “To be touched-starved in your own marriage.”

His eyes drifted to your hands, then slowly back up to your face, you remember feeling the weight of his gaze like a physical touch — as if he was tracing your lips, your throat, the rise of your chest with each breath. He caught himself and looked away, rubbing the back of his neck.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “That was unprofessional of me to say it that way. I just… I hate the idea of you feeling unseen. Everyone deserves more than that.”

When the session ended, he walked you to the door, standing closer than usual. His hand hovered near your lower back without touching as he said goodbye.

Its all too sweet, so much so that sometimes you sit across from your husband at night, watching him scroll through his phone like a machine, and feel something you don’t want to admit.

How can you spend an hour with a stranger and feel more like yourself than you do beside the person who sleeps next to you. How is a stranger more valuable than a man who knows your body by heart, knows how you take your coffee, how warm you like the water in the bath, how many pillows you like to sleep on.

And that thought disgusts you, because Dr. Sim isn’t even your friend, he’s not your confident, he earns a monthly salary for what he does, probably buys his groceries with the money you spend on him, and has a life of his own— which you know strictly nothing about.

You’re supposed to leave his office feeling lighter—not counting down the days until you can return.

Because Dr. Sim asks what you’re reading, he asks what you think and what you feel, he asks why and how.

Your husband only asks if dinner is ready.

Dr. Sim challenges you to put words on intangible things, his eyes tame the guilt, his attention softens your edges.

Your husband only touches your skin like it’s an extension of himself, never thinking to reach the person beneath it— like he already knows you belong to him.

Dr. Sim makes you feel like you belong to none other than yourself.

SESSION OO9.

Outside the building, there’s a dead bird. It lays on the ground, unmoving. It’s become its burial site now, the whole town is his because that’s where he spilled the last of his blood. You place a thick leaf on its frail body before standing back up, one goal in mind. The second you step into the therapist’s practice, you’re greeted by the same four walls, the ones you’ve learned to find more comforting than your bedroom.

Dr. Sim’s wearing a white shirt today, it makes his muscles stand out— a man carved like an unpretentious greek god, no excess only soft roughness.

You could spend hours talking about what makes his appearance different from all the other men you’ve encountered— what makes him so saccharine. Likeable to the point you want to pull your hair out. The coarse slope of his nose and the infuriatingly clean glasses sitting atop it; the crisp shirts and slacks he always smooths over with a hand made of steel, veins poking out of his skin. All of it is grounding yet distracting.

He sits on his armchair right after making sure you’re settling correctly, and begins the session with a small smile. “How have you been doing yn?”

“I’ve been okay,” you get comfortable in the sofa, after so many sessions it’s become a bubble, “Today was a little complicated, my husband insisted on driving me here. So i had him park a few streets down and I had to walk here.”

Dr. Sim furrows his brows, “Mhh… I have a question, only if you feel comfortable answering.” he waits for some sort of approval, a sign you’re comfortable enough, “What do you think his reaction will be if he finds out you’re in therapy?”

Your fingers twist on your lap, “He’ll probably yell, something stupid like ‘you don’t need therapy, you’re not crazy’ uneducated stuff, then he’ll probably say i’m doing too much. That im stupid.”

“Your husband seems to dismiss your feelings a lot,” Dr. Sim says, his hand resting motionless on his thigh. “I worry it’s affecting your sense of self-worth.”

You look down. “Maybe. I don’t know. Sometimes I wonder if I’m just too sensitive.”

His expression shifts— not pity exactly, but something much more human. “I want you to notice something y/n.” You look back at him. “Every time you describe being hurt, you immediately look for a reason you deserve it.”

You try to laugh it off, because that’s what you do when you feel uncomfortable, “That sounds dramatic.”

The therapsit shakes his head slightly. “Not at all. I’d say it sounds learned.”

“Well maybe, but deep down, i made this choice. I chose to marry him, i’m actively choosing not to ask for a divorce. So i can’t really complain now can’t I?” you let out a small self deprecating laugh before it fades away instantly, “well no, that’s actually not really a good thing to say. I’m just speaking for myself, to be clear, not including other women who might be in a situation where they—”

Dr. Sim always catches the guilt in your tone, the countless ways you correct yourself in fear of upsetting someone who isn’t even here, “You’re okay, I got that part, don’t worry. But see, I think you’re being hard on yourself, you find clemency for other women but somehow never for yourself. How’s your situation any different from theirs?”

Your eyes skim across the room, with the curiosity of a child you look at the wall like it might give you a suitable answer, and you notice how bare it is.

The clock that usually sits there, doesn’t anymore. It’s a curious detail certainly, but it doesn’t bother you any more than the lack of convenience. You’re tempted to ask why he took it down, but you shake the thought aside.

“It’s different because I have the choice to leave. And i should because he’s not really a good person.” he nods at that, almost like he agrees, “he doesn’t hit me, he’s not violent. So im not under any restraint.”

The man sits straighter, “That can be discussed, don’t you think? It’s all a matter of how we see violence.”

“Well I don’t see him that way. He can be a little harsh sometimes, a little ignorant. But he’s had a tough life, his mom was very… —well that’s not the subject, i’m sorry i’m completely digressing.”

Dr. Sim shakes his head with a fond smile, “It’s okay. I just want you to realise that what you’re doing is finding excuses for other people’s behaviour, it’s a way of forgiving them. But not one time did I hear you find an excuse for yourself.”

That hits you like reading a very important sentence in a book— one you’ll highlight, write down on a notepad and memorise. He says it like it’s something people say over a cup of coffee— not something that calls for introspection.

Dr. Sim is a big man in a body far too little for all he gives.

You start to understand the comments left under his website by then, even the most intense ones. He is helping you more than expected, he’s insightful and incredibly reliable. When you text him outside sessions— which has happened only 2 times, because you were genuinely lonely and didn’t know how to make the panic stop— he answers diligently, like he owes you something, he takes the time to explain breathing methods and to soothe you.

It makes you want to slip more cash than usual when the sessions are over— because of how benevolent he’s being with someone he shouldn’t bother with outside of work. Words are too small to explain how helpful he’s being. How essential he’s starting to become in your life.

See sometimes people fit into adjectives, they don’t spill out at the edges, they make no more sound than what they’re attributed.

And Dr. Sim’s too big of a concept to be contained in a few letters.

“I just think… I’ve spent enough time talking about myself today. You probably hear stories like this every day.” you let out a small awkard laugh.

The corner of his mouth lifts, it feels like a challenge, like he’s finding this amusing— and for some reason, it’s incredibly attractive. “See? There it is. You just dismissed your own feelings before anyone else had the chance.”

The therapist leans forward, eyes boring into you like bullets. “You don’t have to apologize for taking up space in this room.” he speaks when he sees he’ll get no answer out of you this time.

Your eyes drop to your lap where you tug at a loose string of fabric from your dress.

“Can I tell you something?” the man asks. When you nod, he continues, “I used to think being useful was the same thing as being valued.” His gaze drops briefly to his hands. “I spent a long time believing that if I wasn’t helping someone, I didn’t have much to offer.”

You look up, recognising the vulnerablity in his voice. He’s not looking back at you, because for the very first time, opening up costs the weight of a gaze. This shouldn’t be coming from him though— you wonder if he feels safe enough to tell you this, or if it’s just a psychological tactic.

“So when I hear you apologizing for talking too much, I recognize it.” He makes a small pause. “Not because our experiences are the same— but because we both learned to measure our worth by what we could make other people feel.”

At the end of the session, Dr. Sim walks you back to the door, you hand him a bill, neatly folded in an envelope, and you bow politely at the entrance.

“Thank you Dr.” you start to reach for the exit.

“No worries y/n.” He smiles warmly, looking down at you with the white envelope in hand. “These sessions are very efficient. Let me know if i’m wrong, but i think you’re a very self-aware woman. And I really believe you can help yourself.”

Your hand, which was reaching for the handle stops dead. “You think?” you turn around, looking up.

“I do,” Dr. Sim gives the gentlest smile. “You’re someone i really want to help, because I see how much you’re evolving even if you don’t think you are. You’re extremely smart y/n, very intelligent with your words. Sometimes you notice things about yourself without me even needing to intervene. I believe we can go a long way.”

Intelligence only seems to matter when someone else points it out— and right now, it feels like the most beautiful thing you’ve ever been told.

That’s why, before you know, water starts gathering in your eyes. You quickly turn back to the door, feeling ten times less smart now that sensibility’s crossed the line. Tears flow freely, a creature way too neglected finally hearing endearing words directly directed to her.

Dr. Sim watches your shoulders tremble slightly, notices how hard you’re trying to fight it. “You don’t have to leave this room pretending you’re alright.” he says in a low voice.

You close your eyes, praying the tears will die, but it only makes the tremor in your shoulders worse. “I’m sorry,” you hiccup. “I’m sorry.”

No words are spoken for a long moment— moment in which you try to compose yourself, to dry the tears with the back of your hands. But then you feel Dr. Sim shift behind you.

“Can I ?” he speaks.

You nod, not even knowing what he’s asking permission for. You assume with all the wonderful things he’s done for your brain— anything he does next will be your salvation.

You feel some kind of movement behind you, and before you know it— a warm hand presses between your shoulder blades. Fingertips make contact with the bare skin of your back, the part your top doesn’t reach; and they press, light enough that you could pull away at any moment, hard enough that the shaking slowly subsides into softer cries. Dr. Sim doesn’t speak, he grounds.

“You’re okay.” you feel him whisper behind you.

IN BETWEEN

“Are you coming or no?”

Your husband Samael’s voice sounds from the living room. As per usual, he’d rather yell than come closer so you can hear him.

“I’m looking for my shoes Sam. Give me a second.” you sigh from your spot in the bedroom. You’re on all fours, searching for your mary-janes under the bed, ass up in the air.

“They’re in the hallway y/n, are you blind?” Samael responds with annoyance.

To be young and in love, is to invent. Make up things that aren’t necessarily there. Just how you’d pretended Samael was a kind man, for a long time. You know he isn’t, we know he isn’t, even Mr. Paulson the neighbor knows he isn’t.

Ah, the things you do for a neat life in the golden American suburbia.

You make your way to the hallway, smoothing over your dress to hide the curve of your ass, and when you finally spot the shoes, you pick them up with a happy squeal that makes your husband sigh. “Okay, ready now.” you slip them on. “Did you close the back door?”

Samael nods, distracted by something on his phone, “Yeah, let’s go.”

You check one last time, because you know for a fact that he hasn’t checked it, but the door seems closed enough from where you stand.

20 minutes or so later, you step out of the car into the quiet suburban neighbourhood filled with trimmed lawns and white-picket fences that seem pulled from a catalogue. The monthly gathering is at the Thompsons’ house this time— one of those sprawling two-story homes with the wraparound porch and the perfectly manicured rose bushes that the church ladies always cooed over. Everyone called it “neighbourly gathering,” but it was really just another chance for the community to parade their blessings.

PLAY NOW