bay⋆˙

Seonghyeon’s words ring heavy in Martin’s ears – look, although Martin hadn’t dated before, he does think he can flirt. He’s seen the discourse online.

Sure, was it a little corny sometimes? Yeah… a little. But most of the fans were eating it up, and Martin was more than happy to oblige if it meant that he would be making a little bit more money. Money didn’t fall from trees, and those clothes that Martin’s been eyeing for ages weren’t going to pay for themselves. 

“What?” Seonghyeon asks, laughing as he hugs his pillow a little tighter. “Come on, the fanservice barely counts. I know everyone’s been saying that you’re a fanservice king, but they're all basically in love with you anyways!” 

“Us,” Keonho pipes up. “They’re not only in love with Martin hyung. Also, you’re right – Martin, do you really know how to flirt?” 

Martin narrows his eyes at Keonho. “I think I know what you’re insinuating, and I don’t like it.” 

Seonghyeon and Keonho’s loud laughter somehow summon both James and Juhoon in the room, and Martin’s already preparing himself to become the laughing stock for the next 30 minutes. The life of a leader, he thinks. It's truly so difficult. 

It also wasn’t like Martin didn’t want love. He wanted it more than anything – he just didn’t exactly have the time for it right now, like most idols. He had so much to do every single day, from dance practices, to music shows, to producing music. Martin Edwards, despite having so much love to give, simply didn’t have time to do so. 

“James hyung, Juhoon hyung – do you think Martin can flirt?” 

James snorts. Juhoon makes a noise that’s a mix of a strangled laugh and a cough. At their reactions, Keonho laughs so hard his pillow falls right off his bed. 

Martin groans, turning his phone off and shoving it back into the pocket of his sweatpants. 

“I rest my case,” Seonghyeon says, grinning triumphantly. 

“I can flirt!” Martin says, defensively. He doesn’t know why he’s arguing so passionately for this – it wasn’t even that big of a deal. "Trust me, my flirting works on anyone."

He crosses his arms, letting out a deep breath as Seonghyeon lets out another laugh. He knows that the younger boy isn’t being malicious – they were just teasing each other like usual. 

"Anyone is a bit brave, Martin." Juhoon jokes. Martin rolls his eyes.

“Okay, Mr. Confident. Let’s see if you can make someone – a non-fan, by the way – fall for you before promotions end here in Korea,” James says, jokingly. But Martin can see the gears turning in Keonho’s head before that shit-eating smirk spreads across his lips. 

“James hyung, you’re a genius!” Keonho says, jumping up from his bed. “That’s 10 shows. Martin, if you get a girl to fall in love with you in 10 shows, we’ll officially say that you can flirt.” 

Martin furrows his brows. “That’s all I get out of it?” he frowns. “Seems like a pretty bad trade-off for something so risky, considering that we’re… idols?” 

“Fine. We’ll say that you can flirt, and Seonghyeon will pay for all your clothes the next time you buy something.” Keonho says, and Seonghyeon suddenly gets up from his bed. He looks at Keonho, shaking his head. 

“Me? You’re the one doing the bargaining, you pay!” Seonghyeon protests, and Keonho rolls his eyes. 

“Okay, new proposal. We all pay for your next shopping haul and we say that you can flirt. We’ll all chip in an equal amount so it’s fair, and so Hyeon can stop complaining,” Keonho grumbles. Seonghyeon sighs, nodding as he gives in to Keonho’s bargain. 

“Works for me,” James replies, putting his hands up. “I for one, don’t think I’m gonna lose any money.” 

“Oh, don’t be so confident,” Martin scoffs. Wow, his friends really had zero belief in him. It really made him all the more determined to prove them wrong. “You guys are so losing your money.” 

Keonho looks at Juhoon, eyes sparkling with mischief. “Juhoon hyung… you’re the only one left,” he says in a sing-song voice. “Come on, it’s not even going to be that hard. It's easy money, let's go.” 

“10 shows is still technically a lot, you know. It’s three weeks,” Juhoon hums, thinking it through. “Three weeks… well, Martin needs all the help he can get. Yeah, whatever – I’m in.”

“Juhoon!” Martin exclaims. 

The boy looks at him, shrugging. “I’m sorry! I’m just too curious to see how this will pan out – we need a little bit of excitement in our lives! Performing is exciting enough, but this is like a whole new level. I’m going to be entertained for weeks.” 

Juhoon drags the last word out, and Martin sighs. The air is thick with anticipation as the four of them look at Martin expectantly. 

Honestly, getting all his clothes paid for by his friends wasn’t exactly a bad trade-off. He’s just going to make sure to throw in a couple more expensive things in there for some payback before he officially starts the bet. And the girl would surely understand that dating an idol was difficult, and if it ended a little earlier… that was sort of to be expected, right? In three weeks he would be going to New York City anyways. No harm, no foul? 

“Fine,” Martin groans in exasperation, giving in. “Let’s see where this goes.” 

Keonho pumps a fist in the air triumphantly, and Martin rolls his eyes. “Okay, and if you don’t get a girl to fall in love with you in 10 shows… you pay for our clothes. And publicly say that you’re shit at flirting and have zero game.” 

“One piece of expensive clothing each. You’re four people, I’m one. If I paid for all of your clothes, I think I’d probably go broke.” Martin shoots back. Keonho shrugs, seemingly deeming it reasonable enough. 

“It’s a deal,” Keonho says, holding his hand out for Martin to shake. Martin does, albeit a little reluctantly. What the hell did he just get himself into? 

The room erupts into cheers so loud Martin thinks he’s suddenly transported back to MAMA. 

Seonghyeon’s already immediately searching for a new pair of shoes that he wants to buy. James has rushed back into his room to grab his phone to go on Gentle Monster to see which pair of glasses will suit him. Juhoon’s already pulling up photos of this jacket that he’s been talking about for ages. Keonho makes it a big show out of telling Martin the price of this bracelet that he wants. 

At their antics, there’s a fire lit up in the pit of Martin’s stomach. 

He was going to win this bet. Even if it was stupid. 

Your internship at Stereo is about to come to an end. 

You’re distraught. Most people would love for their internships to end – no more shitty coffee from the 10-year old dispenser that someone brought in as an ‘office gift’, no more tapping away at a dim-lit cubicle, and no more measly half-assed articles to write that are assigned haphazardly. But you’re not most people. 

Being a journalist at Stereo is your dream job. You get to write about the music that you love, review new albums, and you get exclusive perks and invites to music award shows every single week. You’ve been interning at Stereo for one and a half months now, and in just two weeks, you’re just going to be a high schooler in your final year. 

You’ve heard stories of Jisoo, your boss, giving an offer for a full-time job to interns before. You desperately want to be one of those people. 

You’ve heard her complaints behind closed doors about how Stereo’s latest content was becoming a little drab and boring, and that Stereo wasn't getting enough clicks online anymore. The most reads the publication had gotten recently was a review on Taylor Swift’s new album, but come on – it was Taylor Swift. 

You needed to find a way to write the most eye-catching, niche and exclusive article that the music world had ever seen. That way, Jisoo had to give you the job. 

Yoonchae, another intern who you’ve befriended, rolls her chair over so she’s sitting next to you. She taps her nails on your desk to get your attention. “So… last two weeks. How are you feeling?” 

Yoonchae started around the same time as you, but unlike you, Yoonchae wanted to get the hell out. She was tired of writing the weekly ‘Songs You Need To Know’ article. “I’m a gatekeeper,” she had said. “I don’t want people discovering the artists I like!” 

“Stressed,” you sigh, taking a sip out of your mug. “I’m trying to rack my brain to figure out how to write something so… fresh, I guess. Something that no other publication will be able to write.” 

Yoonchae raises a brow. “I don’t know why you’re so obsessed with keeping this job, (Name). What we’ve been writing really isn’t that interesting, is it? I just had to review some album from a rookie group that I don’t think anyone’s heard of yet,” Her voice drops low into a whisper. “It was like nails on a chalkboard. I threw away that pair of company-provided earphones because the memories of listening to it were so traumatic.”

You look at Yoonchae like she’s insane before diverting your eyes back to your laptop screen. You’ve just finished a review on ILLIT’s new album – you skim through your article, making sure that there’s no spelling mistakes or other errors before sending it to Lily, the in-house copy editor. 

“I love it though,” you say honestly. “I love music, I love writing about it – plus, Stereo’s the best place to get off the ground running if you want to work in this industry. I was at ILLIT’s comeback showcase literally last week – do you know how many people would die to have this opportunity?”

“I have to get that job offer from Jisoo.” Your voice is laced with determination, and despite Yoonchae not understanding why in the world you’d want to stay, she gives you a nod in support. 

In the cubicle across, you hear a loud noise from another intern – you can’t tell if it’s a screech or a wail, or something in between. You and Yoonchae’s eyes snap towards the direction of the noise. It’s Yuna, and she looks towards you two with absolutely zero shame on her face, even if the entire office was startled by the sound. 

“It’s my favourite idol! He’s dating someone! How could he?” She’s saying it like it’s the end of the world.

You’re looking at Yuna like she’s insane. You can’t tell if she’s being serious or not, and you blink at her. “Um… are you okay?” 

Suddenly, her demeanour changes, and she smiles brightly at you. “Yeah! I was literally just being dramatic, I couldn’t care less,” she says, and you let out a sigh of relief. You didn’t really want to be working with someone who was so incredibly parasocial over some guy who barely knew her. “It’s just crazy how he even has the time with how busy his schedules are.” 

You hear the sound of heels clacking on the marble floor, and your eyes widen. It must be Jisoo. 

“Was that you?” Jisoo asks, pointing at you. “The one who screeched?” 

“Oh,” you stammer. “No, Jisoo – it was Yuna.” You felt bad for throwing her under the bus, but you weren’t going to lie to Jisoo and take the fall. Jisoo's eyes divert towards Yuna, who gulps. 

“What happened?” she asks. Jisoo doesn’t sound like she really cares. She does have better things to be doing than partaking in conversations with interns who she probably won’t remember the names of in two weeks. 

“Oh, just some… idol… dating,” Yuna says, acting like she doesn’t care at all. It’s hard for her to pretend that she doesn’t when a photo of said idol in question is in a picture frame sitting on her desk. “Maybe we should report on it briefly, or something…” 

Jisoo takes in a sharp breath, sucking her teeth. You can hear the disapproval just from the noise, as if she’s already prepared to get rid of you three. “Alright. Get back to work.” 

You turn your head quickly back to your laptop, not wanting to be berated by Jisoo. The disapproving tone was already enough, and you feel embarrassed under her gaze. You click onto your calendar to see what you’ve got going on next week. You’ve got two comeback showcases to attend with Yoonchae – IVE and CORTIS, along with a couple of music shows. You pencil them in your notebook, along with the words ‘remind Yoonchae to bring the camera!’ 

“You know,” Yoonchae hums. “Speaking of dating idols, I do wanna know what it must be like to date one. It’s like Yuna said – they’ve always got so much going on, how would they have the time? Hey, maybe you should write an article on this.” Her words aren’t meant to be serious, but you take it as such. 

You can hear your pulse in your ears as your brain processes what Yoonchae has said. She’s tapping away at her laptop like she hadn’t just pitched the most amazing idea in the world. 

“Wait,” you pipe up, dropping your pencil on the desk. It clanks to the ground, and you don’t even bother picking it up. Your eyes snapping up from your notebook to look at her. “You’re onto something.” 

Yoonchae’s idea, if put into action, would give you an inside scoop that no journalist had ever had access to before – even if you were cordially invited to the shows and showcases of every group on the planet. Everybody wanted to know what it was like to date an idol, there was no doubt about that. 

If you turned this into a piece, you knew it would tick all the boxes. Exclusive? Check. Daring? Check. Eye-catching? Check. Three big fat checks. It was perfect.  

This… this was exactly the pitch that would land you a full-time job at Stereo. For someone who said they hated working in the news publishing industry, Yoonchae had just given you a golden ticket to a full-time job at Stereo. You’re just upset that you hadn’t come up with it first.

“What it’s like to date an idol,” you hum under your breath as you brainstorm, drumming your fingers on your desk. “Sure, it may be gossipy and scandalous, but Jisoo was saying that we’re not getting enough clicks, right? And after… I don’t know. 10 shows, maybe? I could just… dump him. Or find a way for him to dump me.” 

You say that so casually, and you wince when you’ve realised what you’ve said. You’ve never been one to be a heartbreaker, or one to get into casual relationships with an ulterior motive, but you really wanted this job. 

Finding someone to even be able to “date” for this article would probably be difficult. And once you got them to fall in love with you, getting them to dump you would likely be easy. Idols barely had time for relationships anyways, right? You wouldn’t necessarily be heartbroken at the prospect of losing him, because you had a job to do, and he wouldn’t really care that much. No harm, no foul. 

“That’s brilliant,” Jisoo breathes out. “That’s absolutely brilliant.” 

You thought she had gone back to her office by now. Your head snaps to look at her, fear evident in your eyes until her words register in your brain. Jisoo had just said the idea was brilliant. Your heart is beating so incredibly fast you think it might jump out of your chest. 

“Write it,” Jisoo says, and her lips quirk up into a smile. It’s like she can see the thousands, if not millions of views that your piece will bring in to Stereo already. 

“If you can, of course. You’ve got two weeks left here, but I’m more than happy to extend your internship if you need more time to work on the article. And if it goes well…” she trails off, and you swear that if you could read her mind right now, you’re sure she’s about to say something along the lines of: you have a place here permanently. 

You look at her, bright-eyed and with determination. “Of course, Jisoo. I’ll get right to it,” you stammer. Jisoo nods at you approvingly before she walks back to her office, heels clicking on the floor with a certain enthusiasm that wasn’t there before. She’s excited about your article. Your boss – the one who was notoriously difficult to appease, was happy with an article pitch of yours. Well, Yoonchae gave you the idea, but technically, you’d be the one to flesh it out. 

Yoonchae looks at you, eyes wide with a look of bewilderment. “What… what have you gotten yourself into?” she asks, her tone laced with disbelief. She wheels her chair over to you, grabbing onto your shoulders and shaking you. 

“How… How the hell are you going to go bag an idol in the two weeks that we have here? Are you crazy?” she hisses, and the realisation of how difficult your task was actually sinks in. Thinking about it was fine and seemed easy enough, but now… now you actually had to do something. 

“I… I’m going to figure something out, Yoonchae,” you say. “I have to.” 

You wanted this job. You were going to make it work. 

Jisoo would get that article, and it's going to be the best article that she’s ever read in her life. 

The CORTIS comeback showcase is buzzing with people. 

You scan your media pass at the entrance and wait at the side before Yoonchae comes through. You’ve got your notebook, pens and laptops in your bag, and the two of you head towards your designated seats at the front. 

The plastic chairs are arranged in an orderly fashion, with yours and Yoonchae’s names printed out on paper and stuck to the chair to tell you where you both will be sitting. Much to your delight, you two are seated in the front row. 

When the two of you sit down, you pull out your laptop, setting it on top of your lap. It’s been three days since you told Jisoo that you’d be writing that article, and as the days have gone by, you think you might’ve been a little too confident.

Music Bank was at the end of the week, and you think that you probably have your best shot there, but waiting was making you incredibly nervous. You didn’t want Jisoo to scrap the idea before you even started. 

“So… found an idol to date yet?” Yoonchae almost reads your mind, and you groan as you open up your notes app. You click to the note titled ‘CORTIS comeback’, and all the questions that you have prepared pop up right in front of you. 

“No, I haven’t,” you sigh, tapping your foot on the ground. “Thank you for reminding me, Yoonchae.” 

Yoonchae smiles with amusement, as if she’s somewhat entertained by the predicament that you’ve put yourself into. You groan as you think about the article once again, and you scan through your options. You really could only take your pick from some 4th gen groups and the 5th gen groups. 

This assignment was way easier in your head. The dating and dumping part was easy. The part where you had to get an idol to want to get to know you enough to move on to the dating stage was the hard bit. 

Backstage, Martin peeks behind the curtains to get a good glimpse of the crowd. Although their new album just released today, Keonho just had to remind him of the bet as they were getting dressed. 

Now, Martin has to actually find someone to make them fall hopelessly in love with him. Keonho had been ever so gracious to say that the comeback showcase didn’t technically count as a show, so in reality, Martin kind of had 11 shows. One more show couldn’t possibly make much of a difference, but 11 was a little less daunting than 10. 

So now, he's searching amongst the crowd to see if he can find someone who he thinks would help him win the bet.

Keonho joins him, and it's like he can read Martin's mind, because he instinctively does the same. “Okay, let’s see. Which girl…” he hums. His eyes are scanning the crowd with hawk-like concentration. 

“Okay, what about her?” Keonho says, motioning towards a brunette girl sitting in the second row. 

“No,” Martin replies quickly, shaking his head. “Looks like she’d ghost me, but tell all her friends that we dated for a month.” 

“Hard to argue with that,” Keonho replies. Seonghyeon catches wind of what’s going on and decides to join the two of them. Seonghyeon’s eyes land on a girl sitting not far away from the brunette, and she’s got dyed pink hair. He tilts his chin towards her. 

“Her?” Seonghyeon proposes.

“Nope,” Martin says. “Feel like she’d ask me if I can give her BTS’ phone number. Which I also wish I had.”

“Fine,” Keonho says, and his eyes land on Yoonchae. “What about her?” He gestures towards her, but Martin’s eyes land on you. 

You’re typing away at your laptop with determined focus, and Martin doesn’t know why he finds it so intriguing. You’ve got one earphone in your ear, the other dangling as you talk to Yoonchae. You’re wearing a striped zip-up jacket and jeans – you’re not trying to be noticed at all, but it makes you stand out even more to Martin. You’re sitting in the front row with a media pass around your neck, so Martin knows that you’re definitely not a fan. 

That checks the box. 

For him to actually win the bet, he should’ve made it easy for himself. But there’s something about you that makes Martin want to actually get to know you better. And truthfully, he did like a challenge.

Keonho notices how Martin’s gone silent. He’s looking in the direction that Keonho had originally pointed towards, but he sees that Martin’s looking at you, rather than Yoonchae. “Ah,” Keonho hums. “The one sitting next to her’s caught your eye.” 

“Sure,” Martin replies casually. “You could say that. You said any non-fan, right? She fits the bill.” 

“Alright, Martin hyung,” Keonho grins in amusement. “10 shows. It’s all you’ve got to make her fall in love with you.” 

“That's all I need,” Martin replies. 

Martin prays he’s right.

The comeback showcase goes well. 

You enjoy the music a lot – you liked CORTIS’ debut album anyways, so you weren’t really surprised that they had released something good again. Their stage presence was always insane from the videos you’ve watched online, and witnessing it in person was no different. 

However, you did seem to notice one of the members’ – Martin’s – eyes on you a little too often. You also had a hunch that perhaps they had talked about you, because whenever there was someone asking a question from your direction, Keonho would elbow Martin with a knowing smirk on his lips. 

“So, what was that?” Eight out of ten?” Yoonchae asks you as she begins to pack up her things. The fans have been told to leave by now, and the only people really left are media and industry professionals. You look at what you’ve written down, and you’ve practically given five stars to all of the songs. The lowest is a 4.5, and you’d like to think that you have a pretty high bar for greatness. 

“I mean… nine?” you hum. “There’s always room for improvement, right?” 

“High praises,” you hear a voice that’s not Yoonchae interrupting your conversation. It’s also a voice that you’ve heard far too many times tonight. You turn to look at the stranger, and you meet eyes with none other than the Martin Edwards. “It means a lot. Thank you.” 

Yoonchae opens and closes her mouth like a fish, stunned at Martin’s sudden presence. But then she remembers something the same time you do – the article. She purposely moves to stand behind him, mouthing at you: ‘he’s the one!’

You know Martin Edwards is exactly who he thinks he is. 6 '3, gorgeous dyed blonde hair, impeccable music-making skills and the coolest fashion sense in the industry right now. If you hadn’t seen more of him on your social media, you’d be genuinely a little intimidated by him.

But you know that he’s a sweet guy. He’s also a little bit of a goofball too – loud, likes making his friends laugh, and often gives in to a little too much of his fans’ requests. The fan call videos were certainly something, and you’re really wondering how much he gets paid to tell someone else ‘I love you, you’re my girlfriend.’ 

He’s still in his clothes from the showcase – silver jewellery hangs around his neck, with three rings on each finger. You observe his features for perhaps maybe a little too long, and his lips curl up in the slightest hint of a smirk.  

Yoonchae clears her throat, giving you a wink. “So, I’m gonna go grab something for us at the convenience store nearby. (Name), I’ll be back in about 15 minutes.” 

Before you can protest, she’s already darted off. You curse under your breath before looking back at Martin, who’s eyeing you with a mischievous glint in his eye. You can’t quite place your finger on why that is, but maybe he caught you staring. 

“So… (Name),” he says. His voice is smooth, and your name rolls off his tongue like he’s testing the waters. There’s a certain cadence in his tone that sends butterflies straight to your stomach. “I’m glad you liked the album. We worked hard on it.” 

“I’m sure you did,” you beam. “Do you go thanking every member of the media after the showcase?” 

Martin’s airy laughter rings through the air, and his smile grows even wider. “Oh, no,” he says breezily, waving you off. “Just the pretty ones.” 

You’re knocked off your feet for just a split second. Was Martin Edwards flirting with you? And was it… dare you say… working? 

And suddenly, the article doesn’t feel so difficult anymore. With Martin Edwards standing right in front of you, you realise that you have the perfect candidate. 

His group was still new on the scene, but everybody wanted to get to know CORTIS just a little bit better. Your article would do that. Even if fans said that Martin was practically an open book, the boy standing in front of you now wasn’t necessarily the one you saw on stage mere minutes ago. 

Sure, he was still confident and assured. But there was the slightest difference in the way he carried himself – a little less guarded, a little less… idol-like. Perhaps it was the flirting, honestly. 

You come to your senses, quirking a brow at him. “Oh, so you think I’m pretty?” 

The air is electric, and usually you’d be nervous, but just this once, you think that it’s perfect. Martin’s grin somehow grows wider before he nods. 

“I do,” he hums. “Thought I said that before. And if my eyes didn’t deceive me just before your friend scurried off… you might’ve been staring at my face for just a smidge too long.” 

Your cheeks heat up. “I… I was not!” 

Martin lets out another laugh, clearly amused at how flustered you were. “I’m just teasing,” he replies. “Regardless, it’s not often I see someone working in the media that’s around the same age as us. And as I’m saying this, I’m hoping that you’re in your last year of high school.”

You nod at his words. “I am,” you reply. “Same age as you.” 

“Perfect,” he grins. “I’m glad I was right, or I would’ve embarrassed myself coming up to you.” 

“Right,” you chuckle. “So… any other pretty members of the media you want to thank?” you look around, and the exhibition hall is just about empty. Martin shakes his head, pulling his phone out of his pocket. 

“Nope,” he says, popping the ‘p’ sound. “Just you.” 

“Way to make a girl feel special, Edwards,” you quip. Martin ignores how his heart flutters when you simply just call him by his last name. “What's the phone for? A selfie? Just a reminder that you're the idol there."

"You're funny," Martin replies. There's sincerity in his tone. "But, I was hoping that perhaps I could get your number.” 

You look at him, your lips curling up into a smile. “Ah, you’ve beat me to it,” you pout, jutting out your bottom lip. “I was hoping that I’d be the one to make that move.” 

Your words are awfully confident, making you sound completely unfazed at Martin’s flirtatious words. But inside, you’re internally screaming. You’re trying to hide your nerves, and Martin’s gaze on you is not helping as your thumb carefully presses the keys on the screen.

“There we go,” you say, pressing the ‘save’ button. “You should text me. I’d love to hear from you.” 

“You would?” Martin asks, almost in disbelief. He can’t believe how well the flirting is going. Keonho, Juhoon, James and Seonghyeon would so be losing their money. 

“Of course,” you beam. Your eyes tilt towards the exit, and you see Yoonchae standing there. She’s not hurrying you, but you know that it’s time to go. “Listen, I’ve got to head back home, but… yeah. Text me, and let’s hang out.” 

“Are you asking me out?” Martin says, a coy smile on his lips. 

“Maybe I am,” you reply. Your eyes dart back to Yoonchae again, and a sudden wave of boldness makes you inch closer to him, pressing a chaste kiss to Martin’s cheek. You watch as his cheeks flush bright pink, and you can’t help but feel satisfied with yourself. Got him, you think. “I’ll see you around, Edwards.” 

Before Martin can say anything, you’ve already rushed off. He instinctively brings a hand to his cheek, and he smiles triumphantly. 

“Oh, you’re already falling in love with me,” he says to himself, a wide grin on his lips. 

Meanwhile, as you’re darting off to the car, a similar expression graces your lips. “I’m gonna make you wish you were dead,” you whisper.

Conversation with Martin is surprisingly easy. 

He texts you as soon as he gets back to the dorm, and you reply just as quickly. You shoot off flirtatious messages every other second like a seasoned professional, and Martin replies with just as much enthusiasm. You just know he’s probably cheesing behind the screen. You don’t notice how you’re grinning at your phone like an idiot, though.

Martin is incredibly flirtatious, like you’ve seen online. You really thought it was all just fan service, but it turns out, Martin did really act that way. You’ve earned a new nickname now, thanks to him – pretty. 

Minutes turn into hours, and sure enough, the two of you found yourself talking to each other until four in the morning. It’s not until you remind him that he’s got a schedule tomorrow and that you’ve got work, and then you two say goodnight. 

Martin gives you recommendations of his favourite songs, and you rate them just like you usually do for Stereo. You find that your music taste is surprisingly similar, and Martin just tells you that ‘perhaps it’s a sign that we’re meant to be.’ You smile a little too wide at that response, and your heart flutters in the slightest way. You reply with a ‘I think so’, and Martin beams seeing those words on his screen. 

You didn’t think that it was that easy to get Martin Edwards to fall in love with you, but honestly at this point, you think that you’ve got him absolutely whipped. 

For three days, you and Martin talk non-stop. Whenever you’ve got a break, and he’s got a break, the two of you are talking about anything remotely that interests you. Bailey, another colleague of yours, tells you that you seem awfully invested in this considering that it’s just an article assignment. 

On the fourth day, you head into work and find that there’s a tray of iced coffees on your desk. Yoonchae looks at you with a knowing grin as you pick up the sticky note, and sure enough, it’s Martin’s handwriting. 

Hi, pretty. For you and the team. – Edwards.

You fail to hide the smile that’s unconsciously crept up on your lips. When Yoonchae points it out, you just tell her to shut up. This was all for the article, you remind yourself. You weren’t really in love with Martin Edwards. You hand out the coffees, and when you give one to Jisoo, she raises an eyebrow. 

“Did you bring this in?” she asks, and you shake your head. 

“Martin from CORTIS did,” you say. There’s a coy lilt in your tone, and Jisoo seems to remember the article. She smiles at you proudly, and gives you a pat on the shoulder before taking a sip of the coffee. 

“Good work,” she beams. “Can’t wait to see the article.” 

She then walks off, heels clicking on the floor. Yoonchae clears her throat to catch your attention, and you look at her, taking a sip of the coffee that Martin had bought you. 

“So… what’s the plan to get him to dump you? Because… getting him whipped seemed pretty fucking easy. Like, this is three-month relationship stuff.” she says, gesturing to the coffee on her own table. Bailey, who's curiosity is piqued at the sound of Yoonchae's words, rolls her chair over to you to join in the conversation.

“I’m going to be entirely too much, too overbearing and too clingy to the point where he has to break up with me,” you say. Your plan is absolutely fool-proof. “They’re heading to New York in three weeks. Let’s get this done in the 10 shows they have in Korea.” 

Bailey hums, nodding at your words. “Okay, but like… do you have any specifics?” 

“Calm down,” you reply. “I don’t have to move that fast. We’ve known each other only for four days. No sane person is going to ask someone to be their girlfriend in four days.” 

“You have three weeks, (Name) – you better hurry up…” Yoonchae replies, her voice trailing off. “Maybe just a date? Tonight? You know how they’ve got to basically be in the middle of the night though, right – because cameras are everywhere. Your sleep schedule is going to be fucked when you’re dating Martin.” 

“Well, you didn’t have to put so much emphasis on the ‘fucked’,” you raise an eyebrow. “But yeah, a date sounds good. I’ll text him now.” 

you | 7:32am thanks for the coffee, edwards it was really sweet of you can i thank you with a date? 

martin edwards | 7:33am  ah, i was waiting for that text from you of course!  tomorrow? after you’re done with work?

you | 7:34am  sounds like a plan wear something nice

martin edwards | 7:34am i always do gonna step it up to impress you though can’t wait to see you, pretty

Yoonchae peers over your shoulder. “Don’t they have to go to Inkigayo tomorrow? How will you two have time to actually… go on a date?”

“Shoot, you’re right,” you reply. You quickly type out a message to Martin, your fingers flying over the screen. 

you | 7:35am you have inkigayo

martin edwards | 7:35am  ah. right date at inkigayo? you could be my plus one you’ll be there anyways right? as media?

you | 7:36am  first date at inkigayo is highly unorthodox  i’m in, though only because it’s you 

martin edwards | 7:37am i feel so special  sneaking around is gonna be awfully romantic i’ve got dance practice now and i’m sure you’ve got work talk soon pretty 

“Well… first date at Inkigayo,” you say, almost in disbelief. So this was what it was like to date an idol – music show dates, late-night dates, probably getting blown off because dance practice takes precedence. You note that down in your notebook, because you’re sure that it’ll be of use to you later. “That’s settled.” 

“I suppose it is,” Yoonchae says. She’s still in disbelief at the entire interaction – she was peering over your shoulder the entire time. “Also, you should probably change his contact name to something other than his full name. It’s not that romantic.” 

“I… ‘Chae, he’s not my real boyfriend,” you say, pointedly. “Heck, he hasn’t even asked me to be his girlfriend. Which actually reminds me, I have to get on that.” You do take her advice though, and change his name simply to ‘Edwards’ with an orange heart emoji. It’s plausible enough, considering that you do call him exclusively by his last name. 

“I must say… this is going surprisingly well,” Bailey hums. “Even though I know it’s really new. Just… don’t go falling in love with him, or something. That would ruin the entire thing.” 

You laugh, dismissing Bailey's words as if they were ludicrous. “Don’t worry,” you hum, your tone laced with a little too much confidence.

“I’m not going to actually fall in love with Martin Edwards.” 

For someone who’s allegedly not invested in this ‘relationship’ at all, you do spend an awfully long time picking out your outfit for Inkigayo tonight. 

CORTIS had a reputation for being incredibly fashionable – if you were going to be introduced as ‘Martin Edwards’ talking stage and to-be girlfriend’ tonight, you had to at least look the part. 

You opt for something so outrageously Martin-esque to the point where you look like you could genuinely be the sixth member of CORTIS. So much so, that any random staff member would probably think that you pulled it out of his closet. 

Members of the media were supposed to be unassuming, trying to avoid the public eye at all costs – but just for today, you were going to break that rule. Just based off of your outfit alone, you wanted it to be glaringly obvious that you were talking to Martin. 

You pull on these black, chunky boots that you haven’t worn in forever (you even have to blow the dust off of them) lacing them up with a smile on your lips. Martin Edwards was so going to freak out when he saw you. You could just envision it. 

Yoonchae looks at you oddly when you jump into the car – this was certainly not your style at all. “Okay, Martin’s girl. You might as well just dye your hair blonde too,” she quips. Usually you’d tell her to shut up, but that was exactly the reaction you were looking for.

edwards 🧡 | 6:23pm let me know when you’re here we’re in dressing room 103

you | 6:24pm im on my way see you 🧡🧡🧡

“You go find Martin,” Yoonchae tells you, a playful smile on her lips. “I’ll tell you where we’re seated for tonight’s performances… if you’ll even be joining me here.”

You laugh, waving goodbye to her before you go off and find dressing room 103. You see a bunch of staff members at Inkigayo give you odd looks. They saw you here last week too, and you most certainly were not dressed like this. A girl you’ve made conversation with a couple of times – her name was Yoojung – mouths ‘Martin fan?’ at you, and you simply give her a wide grin before disappearing down the corridor. 

You knock on dressing room 103, tapping your foot on the floor. Your mind runs through the plan – too overbearing, too clingy, too boisterous. You’re going to make Martin go insane. 

Martin opens the door, since he was expecting you anyways. But what he did not expect was for you to be dressed in clothes that seemed like they were pulled from his closet. He looks you up and down, mouth opening and closing as if he’s about to speak – but all the words he has to say become strangled in his throat. 

“Hey,” you say, trying to sound casual. You want him to think that no, this outfit did not take me forever. 

“You look…” Martin stutters. 

Time to pack on the dramatics, you think. “Gorgeous? Stunning? Beautiful?” you ask, batting your eyelashes at him. “Tell me something I don’t know, Edwards.” 

Martin’s brain almost short-circuits. He’s still at a complete loss of words, and for a split second he thinks that Seonghyeon may be right – does he even know how to flirt? He’s trying to rack his brain for a compliment, or anything that makes it known that he thinks you look good. 

Keonho clears his throat, and it brings Martin back to his senses – the bet. Time for him to make you fall hopelessly in love and make you weak in the knees, he thinks. He instantly puts a smile on his lips. “Yeah,” he replies. “All of those things.” 

“Next time though, if you wanted to dress like me, you should’ve just said so,” he adds. He hopes Seonghyeon’s listening – he was about to deliver a masterclass in flirting. “Just wear my actual clothes instead.” 

Your heart flutters a little too much at those words, and for a brief second, Martin thinks that he can see your confidence falter ever so slightly. Bingo, he thinks. Another win. 

“Oh, so that’s an invitation for me to just wear all your clothes, isn’t it?” you ask. “Moving fast, Edwards.” You peek behind him to see the other four boys watching the two of you talk with curiosity. Keonho’s eyes are practically sparkling. 

You raise your voice a little before you say your next sentence. “Mind you, you still haven’t asked me to be your girlfriend.”

You don’t know which member it is that hollers loudly hearing your words. Martin turns around so fast you think he’s going to snap his neck. He glares at the four of them, before diverting his attention back to you. 

This was going exceptionally well. Four days in, and you already wanted to be his girlfriend. Anyone who said that he didn’t have game was going to regret it. 

“Right,” he says, dragging out the word as a smile plays on his lips. “Let me introduce you to the members first, and then we’ll talk about that, pretty.” 

He opens the door a little wider to actually let you into the dressing room, and the four of them blink at you, stunned when they see your outfit. Your outfit was almost a carbon-copy of something that they think they’ve seen Martin wear before. Was it a little tacky to dress almost identical to your talking stage? Probably. But their reactions were golden, and you hope to God that Martin’s cheeks are heating up in embarrassment. 

“Guys, this is (Name),” Martin says, introducing you. You beam at the four of them just before lacing your fingers with Martin. The action comes out of nowhere, and Martin freezes for a split second before he closes his hand around yours. Your hand is warm, and Martin doesn't know why having your hand in his just feels oddly... right.

You swear Juhoon’s eyes pop out of his skull. Seonghyeon’s jaw practically drops. James puts his glasses back on to make sure that his eyes aren’t deceiving him. Keonho shrieks before falling to the floor dramatically. 

“I’m his…” your voice trails off. Suddenly, an idea pops into your brain. What did anyone in a talking stage hate the most? 

The dreaded ‘what are we?’ question. 

Martin would hate it even more if you asked that question right in front of his friends. It was perfect.

A devious grin threatens to creep up onto your lips before you turn to Martin. “What are we, exactly?” 

Seonghyeon chokes on his water while Juhoon has to suppress a laugh. Martin can’t believe you asked that question in front of everyone – you were impatient, alright. He was actually going to ask you to be his girlfriend, but in private. But considering your outfit choice today, perhaps you were someone who wanted to make your affection for him known. He knows that he should feel embarrassed, but surprisingly, he doesn’t. 

Four days is awfully fast to ask someone to be their girlfriend, but Martin wanted to win this bet. Badly. 

And the first step to actually make it known to his friends that he was going to win, was to loudly announce that you were his girlfriend. Martin can’t wait for Keonho to pay for those Rick Owens shoes that he’s been eyeing for ages. 

“She’s my girlfriend.” he says, a coy smile tugging at his lips.

The room practically explodes with questions, shouts and what you think are cheers. You weren’t exactly expecting this reaction from Martin, but it’s more than welcomed, considering the predicament that you’ve gotten yourself into. The first half of your job was done – you’ve gotten the idol. Now you just needed him to dump you. 

But for some odd reason, him telling everyone in the room that you were his girlfriend makes your chest tighten ever so slightly. You ignore the feeling, telling yourself that it’s just nerves. You’ll ease more into the role of annoying girlfriend as the days go on. 

You look at him, tilting your head with a small smile on your lips. “Didn’t even ask me,” you whisper in his ear. You hear Martin let out a light laugh amidst the chaos that those three words had created. 

“Isn’t that what you were hinting at me to do when you arrived at the door?” he replies, voice matching yours. Touché, you think. 

“Well,” you say, turning to face him. “That’s true. And I’m happy you did.” Your eyes quickly divert towards the four boys sitting on the couch – they’re still going on and on about how Martin actually has a girlfriend. They’re saying it as if they’re in disbelief that he’s actually with you. 

Believe it, you think. To really sell it, you dramatically plant a kiss on Martin’s cheek. You’re thanking yourself that you decided to wear lipstick that wasn’t transfer-proof today, and you can practically hear Keonho’s gasp. When you pull away, there it is – a glaringly obvious stain of your lips on the side of his cheek. 

“Oops,” you say, but Martin can tell you’re not really sorry about it at all. You bring a hand up to wipe the stain off, and Martin just shakes his head, gently clutching your wrist as if to tell you to leave it. 

“I’ll just use some makeup remover,” he replies, calmly. You’re surprised that Martin’s face isn’t heating up with embarrassment – maybe you just had to be even more dramatic than you already were. In fact, he was smiling like an idiot in love. Was he crazy? “Thanks for the good luck kiss, girlfriend.” 

It’s official. All Martin has to do is get you to stay with him until the end of the tenth show. All you have to do is get him to dump you before the tenth show. 

And as you squeeze Martin’s hand a little tighter before planting another overly obnoxious kiss on his cheek, you’re almost certain that you’re going to get that full-time job. 

Over the next week, Martin realises that first impressions are deceiving. 

You’re not who he thought you’d be when he first saw you at the comeback showcase – rather, you’re the complete opposite. Loud, boisterous, unrestrained. You’re overly sweet and romantic in a way that Martin thought only existed in rom-coms. It’s nice to be showered in love and affection, and Martin – despite his better judgment – allows his heart to flutter whenever you lean a little closer, or when his name rolls off your tongue like honey over the phone. 

You send him texts almost every single second now that you two are officially a couple (can he even call you his actual girlfriend when this was all a bet?). You also show up at almost every performance of theirs throughout the week. 

The members and the staff all get used to your presence rather quickly – it’s not surprising, considering that whenever you’re there, your presence somehow commands the entire room. Everyone’s eyes are on you, and he doesn’t know if he loves or hates the extra attention that you bring with you. In addition, Martin doesn’t even know how you have the time to basically cling to him like glue when you’ve got a full-time job. 

His phone pings again, and he already knows who it’s from. It’s you, sending him twenty messages in a row – each text is one word, and Martin would usually get a little frustrated, but it was you. He doesn’t think he can bring himself to actually get mad at you, which is the crazy part considering that this was all a bet. 

You send him four selfies of yourself sitting in the front row of the same exhibition centre where you guys had met. He’s admiring how pretty you look until he realises the article of clothing that you’re wearing is awfully familiar. It’s then when it hits him – you’re wearing his striped red and black zip-up hoodie. 

The one that he precisely wanted to wear today. 

Martin knows that the zip-up basically swallows you, because he’s seen you in his other clothes before. His heart does a flip at the thought. It’s just a bet, he reminds himself. 

You look pretty, he tells you. You respond almost immediately.

I know, is your response. Martin doesn’t realise how hard he’s grinning at his screen right now. 

Is that my jacket? he asks you. 

Your response? It’s mine now. 

His nostrils flare slightly at the fact that you’ve just claimed his favourite zip-up hoodie, but he relents and lets you have it anyway. You did look good in it, he had to admit. 

You practically demand his attention at all times, which is a little impossible considering his job. More often than not, whenever he’s practicing with the rest of the members, his phone would be buzzing so much to the point where it fell off the bench. Keonho only looks at him teasingly before Martin quickly shoots back a response to you, telling you that he’s got dance practice. 

You don’t seem to care, and you continue spamming him anyways. Despite this, Martin can’t seem to push you away. Or mute your contact. 

You’re sitting in the exhibition centre, confused as to why Martin hasn’t gone batshit crazy over the fact that you’ve taken his favourite zip-up without any warning. Keonho had warned you about how Martin didn’t like sharing his clothes. Perhaps you just had to take it a little further, then. 

So, a day later, Martin opens the door to his dorm to find you standing there. You hadn’t announced that you were coming, and Martin assumed that you had work anyways. What he didn’t know was that you’d asked Jisoo for some time off today to work on the article – it was going well, you had told her. At those words, Jisoo nodded, giving you time off without a single thought. 

“Hi?” Martin asks, stunned at the sight of you at his doorstep. 

“I thought you’d be a little happier to see me,” you pout, and Martin shakes his head. 

“No, no!” he says hastily. “I was just surprised to see you. Come on in,” he opens the door a little wider for you. You kick your shoes off at the door, and Martin winces a little when you just leave them there instead of putting it on the shoe rack. He decides to do it for you, like any good boyfriend would – placing your shoes next to a pair of his own sneakers. 

“Thank you, ‘Tinnie.” you beam, pressing a kiss to his cheek. Even though there’s nobody else there right now, you make it a big show and exaggerate every motion. You deliberately say ‘mwah’ when you pull away, admiring the lipstick print on Martin’s cheek. 

Oddly, Martin doesn’t wipe it off. Maybe he’s insane. Or maybe he’s just insanely whipped like Yoonchae said. 

“Tinnie is a new one,” he hums. “Finally moved on from calling me Edwards?”

You shake your head, bounding down the corridor like it’s your place rather than his. Martin follows you like a lost puppy. “Nope,” you reply, popping the ‘p’. “Just trying out something new. But, I wanted to grab some clothes.” 

Martin furrows his brows. “You want to go shopping?” he asks. “Sure, I’ll just go grab my coat.” 

You hold a hand out to stop him. “No, I want to wear some of your clothes,” you say like it’s the most casual thing in the world. It’s totally not like you two have only been dating for a week. “If that’s alright with you, of course?” 

Martin can’t say no to you. Not when he remembers how nice you looked in his striped zip-up. He nods reluctantly, and you squeal, dragging him towards his closet. 

You’re raiding Martin’s closet like it’s a department store sale. You’re grabbing hanger after hanger and asking him to hold onto them for you, and Martin can barely keep up. In five minutes, he’s somehow holding five of his own hoodies and three of his t-shirts, while you’re trying on another one of his zip-ups. 

You’re twirling around in it, looking at your own reflection in the mirror. You look at Martin for his approval, and he nods, giving you a thumbs up. “Looks great on you, pretty.” 

You really should be used to the compliments that Martin dishes out, but your cheeks heat up ever so slightly. Bailey’s voice rings in your head – don’t fall in love with him. You can’t believe you have to remind yourself. 

Seonghyeon walks in to grab a jacket, and he’s stunned at the scene. Martin’s got hoodies and shirts and jumpers draped over him as you pull out something else from his side of the closet. 

“What the…” he says, and Martin turns to look at him. 

“Hi,” Martin says. He can barely see. There’s a hoodie over his head, and he can’t bring his arm up to pull it off. “(Name) wanted some of my clothes.” Seonghyeon, who’s ever so kind, pulls the hoodie off Martin’s head. 

“Okay,” Seonghyeon giggles. “Have fun, you lovebirds.” Before he leaves, he mouths at Martin, 10 shows. Though your presence is awfully over-the-top, Seonghyeon doesn’t quite mind having you around. It was rather funny to witness yours and Martin’s dynamic. 

You take four more pieces of his clothing, and Martin helps you fold them all up neatly before placing them into a bag. “There you go,” he says, snaking an arm around your waist to pull you closer. “Happy?” 

“Very,” you giggle. You do feel a little guilty for stealing half his closet. “Thank you, ‘Tin. Do you want to watch a movie? I’ll let you pick, since I’ve taken so many of your clothes.” Though it was for an article, you weren’t a monster. You don’t realise how instinctively, you’ve leaned into his touch. 

Martin nods, grinning as he kisses your temple like he’s done this a million times before. It’s getting awfully easy for him to slip into the role of your boyfriend. “Sure,” he hums. “We can watch something on my laptop.” 

You curl up next to him on his bed, your head resting on his chest and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind playing on his laptop. Martin presses a kiss to the top of your head, his arms wrapped around you. 

This domesticity feels a little too natural. A little too real – like you two are actually two teenagers in love.

The slightest twinge of guilt pangs at your heart. You don't know it, but when the thought of the bet flashes through Martin's head, that same feeling strikes him in the chest too.

Martin’s eyes leave the screen for a split second to look at you, and he pushes the thought of the bet to the back of his head. 

His closet may be a little bit more empty now, but his heart feels the slightest bit more full.

“I think Martin is a lunatic.” you confess to Yoonchae at work one day. 

CORTIS had five more shows left in Korea before they were due to leave for New York City, and any logical person would have already broken up with you at this point.

But for some strange reason, Martin stayed. Not even just stayed – pulled you closer, even. He flirted with you more. Peppered your face with kisses. Proudly showed you off to his friends. 

He’s either insane, or he loves crazy girls. You don’t know which is worse. 

What you didn't know, of course, was that Martin was practically clinging on to this relationship for dear life. 10 shows, he reminds himself. He needed a girl to stay with him for three full weeks and to somehow put up with his insanely hectic schedule. Martin half-expected to barely see you, but you somehow managed to find a way to sneak into his life more often than not. It was welcomed, of course – he could show his friends that yes, he could flirt, and yes, an idol was able to date.

You were acting batshit crazy, and he still wanted you to be his girlfriend. Martin still hasn't dumped your ass, and that was absolutely shocking.

Idols were always busy, so you decided to do the very thing that all busy people hated: you spammed Martin all day. 

You sent him stupid TikToks, telling him to reply to each and every single one. You called him at random hours, sent him voice messages, and practically demanded his attention every single second. 

The crazy thing was, Martin would reply to every TikTok. He’d always pick up. He’d reply to every single voice message with his own, and you hated how you always smiled hearing his voice and his loud laugh through your headphones. 

You showed up unannounced to so many performances to the point where his manager would only sigh, and reluctantly let you in. You’ve embarrassed him by showering him with affection in front of quite literally everyone. You heard how Keonho tried – and failed – to hide a shriek when you made a big show of calling Martin ‘baby’ five minutes before they were due to head on stage. 

One night at his dorm, you’d even spent one whole hour asking the most basic questions about music production, forcing him to overexplain like he was teaching a toddler. You knew all the answers to the questions, but you’d asked them anyway just to rile him up. 

Martin thinks that for someone who’s working at Stereo, you should know. But regardless, he explains it all to you patiently, smiling like he’s glad that his girlfriend is actually interested in what he does – much to your dismay. 

Martin didn’t even bat an eye when you purposely stole all of his favourite clothes from his closet a few days ago. You’re sitting at your desk in the Stereo office, wearing Martin’s hoodie that is outrageously large on you. You’re shocked that he didn’t protest more, especially when you grabbed one of the expensive ones. Instead, he smiled, told you that you looked gorgeous, folded it up neatly and then gave it to you. 

You also realise that you don’t hate the affection that he showers you with. It feels quite nice, actually – to be cared for by Martin Edwards. 

But, this was truly not going well for your article. 

“Why is that?” Yoonchae asks. “Because he hasn’t dumped you?” 

“Yes!” you exclaim, as if it was the obvious answer. “He’s staying! Which is the crazy part! Idols don’t have time for this clingy, over-the-top nonsense, do they? So it’s either he’s insane, or he loves crazy girls.” 

“There’s another obvious answer,” Bailey chimes in, a smile playing on her lips. “He just likes you.” 

Bailey’s words hit you like a truck, and you ignore how your heart jumps at the thought. Martin Edwards likes you? You hate to say it, but that was truly… not implausible. But if Martin actually liked you – with all your craziness – surely, he had to be just the slightest bit insane. 

“I…” your cheeks heat up. “Okay.” you grumble, eyes diverting back to your laptop screen. You need to figure out a way to drive Martin absolutely up the wall – he had a strong resolve, there was no doubt about it. Something about music seemed right. 

Your eyes sparkle with delight when you remember that Martin said that he was going to be working on some music tonight in his studio. Something about recording some adlibs and some lines for their next album. Even while promoting music that was released recently, Martin was always working on something new. It was honestly incredibly admirable. 

So, you find yourself slumped on a chair next to Martin at 9:30 at night, watching as he works on a new song. There’s a microphone in front of his lips as he clips sections together with silent precision. His brows are furrowed in concentration, and you deem it the perfect time to enact your plan. 

“Tinnie,” you say, dragging out his name. He hums, acknowledging you, but his eyes don’t leave the screen. You nudge him gently, and he glances towards you. There’s a soft look in his eye, and a small smile graces his lips. “What do you think about this dog?” 

You show him a picture of this random white poodle that came up on your For You page. He squints at it, nodding. “It’s cute, baby. Why?” he asks, before his eyes divert back to his screen again. 

“I want a dog,” you say. “Let’s get a dog.” 

That catches Martin’s attention. “You want… us to get a dog?” he asks, in complete disbelief. You nod, and Martin’s eyes bug out of his skull. He can’t believe what you’ve just said. A dog was a big relationship commitment, right? 

Martin could barely take care of himself sometimes – how was he going to take care of a dog? And who was going to pay for the dog? He’d made enough money from the song royalties, but still. The proposal was a little insane. 

“That’s really sweet, baby – but we’ve only been dating for like a week,” he hums, hand gently caressing your shoulder. “And I don’t know how we’d even take care of it – would it live at your house? It can’t live in our dorm, you know.” 

You pout at his words. 

“I’m sorry. We can… go to a dog cafe, or something. I’ll take you sometime next week,” Martin looks at you sympathetically. Just give me a few minutes to work on this song, is that alright? I have to record some bits tonight, and then we can watch a movie.” 

You nod, letting out a small sigh. Martin thinks it’s because he lightly rejected your proposal for you two to get a dog. In reality, it was really because you can’t seem to figure out a way to get Martin to actually dump you. What normal person asks their boyfriend of one week to get a dog with them? 

Martin glances at you before he pulls up the lyrics of the song on his phone. He taps the record button, and just as he’s about to sing into the microphone, your voice cuts through the air. 

“Tinnie,” you pipe up, and Martin pauses the recording. He really wanted to get this song finished by tonight. You see the slightest hint of frustration on his face, and you do feel bad – but despite all your past attempts to get him to drive you away, nothing else seemed to work. 

“Hmm?” he asks. 

“Do you have any drinks?” you ask, and Martin nods, rolling his chair back so he can open the mini-fridge under the desk. He pulls out a can of Coke – he knows your favourite – cracking it open for you before sliding it over to you. 

“Thank you, Tinnie,” you beam. Martin thinks that seeing your smile is worth it, even if he did have to pause recording for a bit. Even if you sometimes did have awfully bad timing, he’s realising that he’s grown accustomed to your antics. “I’ll be quiet now.” 

“Okay,” he replies. “Thank you. I’ll be quick.”

You take a loud, dramatic sip of your drink just as Martin presses record. He pauses it again before turning to you, and this time, frustration is evident on his features. 

Guilt washes over you, and you realise that honestly, you didn’t really want Martin to get so mad at you to the point where he ended things. He looks tired, and you know it’s probably from a mix of hectic promotions, working on music and dealing with your incredibly annoying ass. 

Martin was too sweet for his own good, and you’re suddenly re-evaluating every little thing. You didn’t like seeing him upset, and you certainly didn’t want him to be upset at you.

You look at him sheepishly. “Sorry.” you wince, and Martin shakes his head, waving it off. 

“It’s okay.” he sighs, but exasperation is evident in his tone. He huffs, pressing the record button again.

This time, you don’t interrupt – and now you know why everyone in the industry calls him a musical genius. Martin’s working like a seasoned professional, putting in clips of his voice here and there. He presses play on the section that he was just working on, nodding in silent approval when he’s satisfied. 

You realise that you don’t want to drive him incredibly insane to the point where he can’t bear to see your face anymore. The article wasn’t going to write itself, but writing it meant that you had to hurt Martin. And looking at him now, and thinking about all of the times he had put up with you, you really didn’t want to hurt him. But you needed a way out.

The guilt is eating you alive as you sit there, making sure to quietly sip your drink. You think about every single moment you’ve shared with him for the last week, the flirting, the affection, the laughter – you don’t really want to let that go either. What were you going to do? This wasn’t supposed to be that complicated. You didn’t intend to actually catch feelings— 

Oh. 

Shit.

You might have feelings for him. 

Everything clicks into place right then and there. You like Martin Edwards. You make sure to say those words in your head so you don’t interrupt him, but those words settle in your chest like they actually belong there. 

Fuck. You did the one thing Bailey told you not to do. 

“Hey,” he says softly, snapping you out of your thoughts. You look up at him, and Martin doesn’t know why you’re looking at him a little differently. Your gaze is soft, warm, and filled with what Martin thinks – and he doesn’t realise, but hopes – might be love. He doesn’t think he’s seen this look in your eye before. “I’m done.” 

“Okay,” you say. Your voice is quieter than it’s ever been before. Martin’s slightly startled at the change. “Tin, I’m sorry.” 

Martin furrows his brows. “What for?” 

Everything, you want to say. “Interrupting you when you were working,” is what you say instead. Martin shakes his head, pulling you close in a hug. 

“It’s okay,” he replies. He presses a kiss to your cheek to comfort you, and you hate how much it works. “Don’t worry about it, baby.” 

You smile, albeit a little stiffly. “Movie?” you ask, pretending that everything is fine. Martin nods, gesturing to the couch situated at the back of the studio. 

You sit down on the couch, and Martin plops right down next to you, giving you a bright smile as he places his laptop on his lap. “What’d you wanna watch?” he asks, and you shrug, resting your cheek on his shoulder. 

“You pick,” you reply, and Martin nods. You lace your fingers with his, and he randomly clicks on a movie that he thinks Keonho had offhandedly mentioned was good before. He presses play before glancing at you to make sure you’re okay. 

Martin squeezes your hand a little tighter, just to let you know that he’s here. You hate that he’s far too good to you. 

You gulp, trying to ignore how the guilt is eating you alive. 

Then, you take a deep breath before pressing a chaste kiss to his shoulder, slipping into the role that you think you’ve gotten too good at playing. 

You have to end it with Martin. 

It’s what you realise is best for the both of you. You get your article, and he gets to rid himself of an annoying, overbearing girlfriend. You head into work with a little less enthusiasm, and Yoonchae can immediately tell. 

“What’s wrong?” Yoonchae asks, as you let out another loud sigh. Martin’s face is everywhere on your Instagram, and you hate that your lips instinctively tug into a smile at the sight of him. You were in love, damn it. 

“Nothing,” you reply. “The article’s just… a little harder than I thought.” You weren’t necessarily lying. Every word you typed out felt wrong. The bitter taste of guilt in the back of your mouth reminds you that you were technically a horrible person for inflicting psychological warfare on Martin Edwards, who couldn’t possibly hurt a fly. 

“Oh?” Yoonchae asks, surprised. “I thought it was going well with Martin.” 

“It is,” you mutter under your breath. “A little too well. He won’t end it with me. So I think I’m going to have to do it.” 

Bailey quirks a brow. “Oh, really? How are you going to do it?” 

“I don’t know,” you reply. “Maybe come up with some lame excuse saying that he doesn’t have time for us anymore, and it’s breaking my heart.” Bailey nods, giving you a look that indicates that it’s not that bad of an idea. 

You knew that Martin’s schedule was packed today – he had two variety shows to film and then Music Bank later. If anything, today was the perfect day to spam him and then complain about how you got no response. Then, you could use that as an excuse to break up. 

It was better to get it done early on before you both got too invested. Your heart does, however, twist at the thought of letting go. But it was for the better, you remind yourself. And you had an article to write. 

So, after one whole day of no responses from Martin like you’d planned, you find yourself standing outside the CORTIS dorm, rehearsing your words. You take a deep breath, telling yourself that you could do this. You could play the clingy, overbearing girlfriend role to perfection – this was the last time that you had to, hopefully. 

You knock, and you hear Martin’s voice. You fail to stop the smile spreading across your lips. 

When he opens the door, he instantly beams when he sees you. “Hi, baby!” He moves to wrap his arms around you in a hug, and for a split second, you nearly let him – until you remember that you’re going to break up with him. 

“I can’t believe you,” You slip into your role, sniffling to show how heartbroken you were. “I sent you messages all day and you didn’t reply to me! It’s like I don’t matter to you anymore.” 

Martin steps back in horror. Shit. Did he mess up? Well, not really, he thinks. He was far too busy – he barely had time to even check his phone all day, but seeing you heartbroken in front of his doorstep makes his stomach twist.

“No, no,” he says, reaching out to pull you into a hug in an attempt to comfort you, and you push him away. “Baby, I’m so sorry – I was really busy all day, and I didn’t have time to check my phone. The guys and I just got home, and I was going to text you, believe me!” 

“I don’t know what to believe anymore,” you say. Your words are absolutely ridiculous, and you know it. “I think we need to break up.” 

Saying those words makes your heart sink. You hated it. You didn’t want to let Martin Edwards go.

Martin’s heart drops. The rest of the members can hear everything, and all of their eyes widen. Martin had not a single clue of what to do. He didn’t reply for one day and you wanted to break up? This was ridiculous – he turns to Juhoon, who’s shaking his head as if to say: don’t ask me! 

He then looks at Keonho, who’s reminding him: 10 shows.

10 shows. He’s got a week left until he hits 10 shows. Shit. If you ended it with him right now, he would lose the bet. 

Asides from that, Martin found that he genuinely did care for you. He didn’t want you to hate him over his schedule being far too packed. He had to find a way to reason with you so you’d stay – not just for the bet, he tells himself. 

“No, (Name) – baby, please,” Martin’s begging. “I’m sorry, please stay.” 

Seonghyeon’s watching this as if it’s the best episode of television he’s seen in his life. Martin Edwards, begging for his overdramatic, overly clingy girlfriend to stay with him. This was gold. 

What did couples do when their relationship was in trouble? Martin racks his brain for ideas. 

He’d apologised already. What about gifts? He could get you those. Couples counselling? 

“What?” you pipe up. It’s only then when Martin realises that he’s said ‘couples counselling’ out loud. His eyes widen with panic, before he pretends like that’s what he intended all along. 

“Yes!” he says. “Let’s do couples counselling. Please, let’s fix this, baby.” Desperation is evident in his tone, and you’re so shocked at his proposal to the point where you don’t quite know what to say. 

“I…” you stammer out. You look at Martin, and you realise that you really can’t say no to him. Fuck, you think.

You’d have to find a fucking couples counsellor. Or someone who could pretend to be one. Maybe you could just get Yoonchae or Bailey to say that the two of you weren’t meant to be, and then that could be your excuse to end it. 

Yes, that would work, you think. 

“Okay,” you sigh, reluctantly. You suppose that you were in this predicament for a little longer. "I'm picking the therapist."

Martin lets out a loud exhale in relief. He's unbelievably happy that you've decided to give your relationship another chance, despite all this being a bet. A little voice in the back of his mind tells him that he seems to care more about you than the bet now. Even if you did, at times, drive him a little crazy.

He pulls you closer to him in a hug, and this time, you let him. 

The smell of blackberries and cedar envelopes you in a comforting embrace, and you allow yourself to melt in his arms. “I’m sorry,” he whispers against your hair. He presses a soft kiss to your cheek and it’s all just too genuine – you feel awful. 

Your heart twists with guilt at how genuine he sounds in his apology. 

He holds you a little closer, and all you know is that you don’t deserve Martin Edwards at all. 

One day later, you find yourself in Bailey’s apartment – or rather, Dr. Sok’s apartment. You didn’t even have to beg or bribe Bailey to pretend to be a fake therapist for you and Martin – she had said yes immediately, and with a little too much enthusiasm. Bailey wanted to witness whatever the hell you two had going on firsthand. 

“It’s going to be good,” she says, tapping her fingers together mischievously. She’s talking about it as if your couples’ counselling appointment is going to be the best movie she’s seen in years. 

Martin’s sitting beside you as he taps his foot nervously on the floor. This was insane. He feels a little too out of place here. Why did he agree to couple’s counselling for a relationship that had only just reached the two week mark? 

Despite Bailey’s living room looking very much not like a therapists’ office, she comes up with some lame excuse saying that her actual office (which doesn’t exist) is going under some construction. She peers at the two of you through her blue light glasses, leaning forward as she holds a clipboard in your hands. 

“So, (Name), Martin. Tell me what’s going wrong in your relationship,” Bailey says. You take a deep breath before slipping back into the role of annoying, overbearing girlfriend. 

“He doesn’t have time for us and this relationship!” you huff, crossing your arms. Martin gives you a pained look, sighing. “He’s not taking us seriously anymore.” You sniffle a little for good measure to really sell the fact that you’re heartbroken. 

“I… I have a lot to do, baby – you know this,” he pleads “I’m trying my best to make as much time for you as I can, I’m sorry.” You watch as Bailey writes something down on her clipboard. She’s never met Martin before, but she could immediately tell that he harboured a lot of affection for you. 

She’s starting to realise that maybe you were right in thinking that Martin was a lunatic – she’d heard about all the antics you’ve pulled, and yet, Martin was still grovelling and wanted you to stay? 

“It’s like you care more about being an idol than me,” you say – as the words leave your mouth, you realise how unreasonable it was. Perfect. You needed Martin to dump your ass. The longer you stayed in this ‘relationship’, the harder you knew you were going to fall. You were already in deep, and you needed to get out before this article left you completely heartbroken.

“I…” Martin’s at a complete loss for words. “I can balance my work and our relationship, baby. Please.” 

Bailey hums, tapping her pencil on the side of her clipboard as an idea pops up in her brain. You watch as her eyes light up in that way you’ve seen before – you just know this is going to be bad. You’re praying to God that you’re wrong. 

“I know,” she says, leaning forward with a glint in your eye. “I think you two need an opportunity to spend a little bit more time together, away from all the idol life. Maybe then, you’ll see your relationship with clearer eyes.” 

Your eyes widen in horror. Oh no. 

Martin leans forward, suddenly curious. Double oh no.  

“What may that be?” he asks – he’s genuinely invested in keeping this relationship, Bailey thinks. It was more clear than ever to her that Martin genuinely liked you, despite how you acted insane.

“When’s the next time you have a day off?” Bailey asks. 

“Tuesday. I’m heading back to my parents’ house to spend some time with them before we head off to New York,” Martin says. “Oh!” he looks at you, eyes gleaming with delight. Your heart sinks. Whatever idea Martin had, you knew it was going to be bad for you. 

“You can come with me,” he beams. “Right? Is that a good idea, Dr. Sok?” 

Bailey is surprisingly shocked at Martin’s willingness to introduce you to his family only two weeks into your relationship. But she had to admit, it was a brilliant idea. She plasters a smile on her face to hide her shock, and nods in satisfaction. 

“It’s brilliant, Martin,” Bailey grins. She turns towards you, who’s got a look of horror on your face. “(Name), you should go meet Martin’s parents. After all, you said he wasn’t taking this relationship seriously. What couldn’t be more serious than meeting the parents?” 

You fail to come up with a coherent response. Fuck, you think. You should’ve asked Yoonchae to be the fake therapist. 

Martin’s looking at you expectantly, and you can tell just based on his gaze alone that he wants you to come. Your gaze softens, and you realise that you’re in way too deep. You’re in love. Shit. 

“Fine,” you huff. “Let’s do it.” 

Martin beams, so bright that it could rival the sun. The corner of your lips pull upward into a smile at the sight, and he laces his hands with yours. You hate how it feels right. 

“Perfect.” he says. 

To you, this was anything but. 

Tuesday rolls around much faster than you thought. 

You put much more effort into your outfit to meet Martin's parents. You’ve practically been living in Martin’s clothes for the past few weeks, and as much as you knew that he liked it, you still had to make a good impression on his parents. Showing up in Martin’s oversized hoodie and a pair of sweats wasn’t going to cut it. 

You opt for something simple, a little more similar to what you wore at the comeback showcase. You arrive at the CORTIS dorm wearing a striped shirt and a pair of jeans. Seonghyeon greets you at the door, and the boy points at what you’re wearing, and then what he’s wearing. 

“Oh,” he says. “Why are we matching?” 

You let out a little laugh. “Don’t bring it up,” you reply. “Tin wouldn’t like it.” 

If Martin notices that you’re somehow dressed like Seonghyeon, he doesn’t make any mention of it. He holds your hand as the company car drives the two of you to his parents’ place, and the two of you share earphones, listening to Martin’s music. 

You gulp. This was not what you had planned when you first decided that you were going to write the article. You didn’t think that you’d have to go this far – you had already accidentally fallen in love with the subject of your article, and now you were meeting his parents. This was… simply great. 

When the two of you arrive, it’s like Martin can sense your nerves. He looks at you, his gaze soft and gentle like usual. “Don’t worry,” he beams. “They’re going to love you.” 

You don’t know if you love or hate the idea of Martin’s family loving you. On one hand, it was nice to get his parents’ approval – on the other, this relationship was practically completely fake. Or at least it started that way, until your real feelings got involved. 

Martin’s mother answers the door, and when she spots you, she pulls you in for a hug. You’re slightly stunned at how affectionate she is, but it’s awfully kind of her, and you return the gesture nevertheless. “You must be (Name),” she beams. “Martin’s been going on and on about you.” 

“You have?” you ask, turning to Martin. His cheeks heat up and he shrugs, trying to hide his embarrassment. 

Martin’s father greets you once you’re inside, sitting down at the living room table. He’s easy to talk to, much like Martin. He jokes around with you right off the bat, and your stomach twists with guilt. Your presence feels a little too foreign, as if you don’t belong –  because truly, you don’t. 

Here you were, sitting at the Edwards’ dining room table as if you were exactly who Martin said you were. His loving girlfriend who cared about him more than anything in the world. 

The truth? All you were was a music journalist who was writing an article on how to lose an idol in 10 shows, and their son was the target. It was simply awful, and here you were, basking in the Edwards’ family’s praises like you deserved them. Like you deserved their son. 

You didn’t. Martin Edwards was far too good to you, and for you. 

You listen as his mother tells you stories about Martin’s childhood, such as how he composed a piece of music at the ripe age of 10 about the Spider-Man movie that he’d watched. His sister teases him lovingly, telling him that he shouldn’t have hid you for this long – she doesn’t seem to know that you two have only been ‘dating’ for two weeks. They treat you like family. You realise how much you adore all of them.

It makes the guilt that’s been simmering in your stomach much, much worse. 

When Martin tells the story of how you two met at the comeback showcase, his sister’s eyes widen. “Wait, I thought you guys have been dating for two months!” 

“Nope,” you chuckle nervously. His sister only hums, nodding. That reaction strikes genuine fear in your heart. Is she okay with it? Does she hate you? Martin seems to notice how anxious you are, and he gently caresses your hand with his thumb in an attempt to comfort you. 

Martin beams as his family gushes over the new album, and you sit next to him, your fingers laced with his. You look at him, pride evident on your face as he talks about the songs, and Martin’s father realises that it’s only then when you relax your shoulders. 

When Martin’s whisked away by his mother and sister, his father approaches you. 

“(Name),” he says, pouring you a glass of water. “Thank you for being so kind to Martin. And being there for him.” 

Your breath hitches in your throat. Martin’s father looks at you, handing you the glass. “It’s not an easy life for him to be an idol, especially since he’s so young,” he hums. “I’m glad he has someone like you to… you know. Keep him grounded amidst all the chaos.” 

Oh god. The guilt. You want to throw up. His dad was extending so much kindness to you because he genuinely believed that you loved his son. 

And you did, but you had started everything with ulterior motives. Did it even matter now that you truly had feelings, when you’d approached Martin with zero intention of anything genuine?

But you plaster on a smile, something that you’ve gotten a little too good at doing. “Of course,” you say. You look out the window, seeing Martin and his sister laughing about something. Martin’s father recognises this look in your eye – one of genuine affection for his son – and he too, smiles. “I’m glad that I can… be that for him.” 

“And really, he is… absolutely amazing,” you say. “I don’t think I deserve him.” It’s the most truthful thing you think you’ve said all day.

The smile on his father’s lips grows a little wider. “For what it’s worth, I think you two are perfect for each other. Even if this is all a little recent.” 

Perfect. Those words should make you feel relieved. But now that you have his father’s stamp of approval, it makes ending things much more difficult. How were you supposed to do that now? 

It’s then when it hits you. You couldn’t write the article anymore. You had to tell Jisoo that you couldn’t. Because you’ve fallen for Martin Edwards. Hard. 

Martin returns, seeing you and his father speaking to one another. He sneaks up behind you, wrapping his arms around your waist before pressing a kiss to your shoulder. You lean into his touch, even as the guilt from the past two weeks piles up and threatens to crush you like a boulder. 

“Pops, what’d you say to her?” he asks, hoping that his father hasn’t embarrassed him in front of you. 

“Oh, nothing bad, Martin. Don’t worry,” he laughs. “Do show her around the house, though. I’m sure she’d love to see your room.” 

His father gives you a nod before going outside to find Martin’s mother and sister. Martin looks at you, and you’re standing there silently. “You okay?” he asks, and you nod, coming to your senses. 

“Of course,” you say. He smiles at the nickname before lacing your hand with his. He does it so casually now to the point where you’re not fazed by it at all. “So… are you going to show me your room?” 

He nods, leading you down the corridor. It’s the first room on the right. 

“Tada,” he says, flicking on the light switch. Your eyes immediately dart to the plane drawn on the wall, and Martin notices. 

“My dad painted that for me when I was little,” he says, and your eyes flick back to look at him. 

“He’s really good at painting,” you say, and Martin beams. Your eyes wander across the entire room, and the next object your eyes land on is a little Spider-Man figurine sitting on top of a cupboard. “You really did like Spider-Man, didn’t you?” 

Martin chuckles, walking over to pick it up. “I did,” he hums. He hands it over to you, before grabbing something else perched on top of the same cupboard. “I was a big Marvel fan. Case in point – Thanos’ gauntlet.” 

He tries to put it on, but it’s clearly too small for him now, and you laugh. “You try it,” he says, handing it over to you.

You put it on, and it fits. “If I snap my fingers, would we all turn to dust?” 

Martin bursts into a fit of laughter – were you really that funny? But the sound of his laughter is infectious, and for a second you allow yourself to forget about that daunting thought of feeling like an intruder in your boyfriend’s own home.  

You take off the gauntlet, handing it back to him so he can place it back in its original spot. He flops down on his bed, patting the empty space next to him. “Come,” he says. “My bed here is comfy. Much better than the dorm one, to be honest.” 

You lay down beside him, and to be fair, he was right. The mattress was slightly softer. Martin tugs at the corner of your shirt to get you to move slightly closer to him. 

“Your room is cozy,” you say as he wraps his arms around you. You turn to look at him, and he’s looking at you with so much sincerity and love. That feeling of guilt creeps up once again. 

“I know,” he hums. “Listen… I’m happy that you decided to come meet my family. I’m sorry about that day, by the way. I should’ve probably told you that I was going to be busy.”

You shake your head. You knew how unreasonable you were being. “It’s okay,” you say. Looking into his eyes, everything feels far too real – and instinctively, like you’ve done a million times before, you brush his hair out of his eyes. “Sorry for causing a scene. I was being overdramatic. Like usual.” 

Martin chuckles, his laugh light and airy. “Don’t worry.” 

Over the two weeks, Martin has found that he does care for you. Perhaps a little too much for something that was just a bet. But with you here in his home, things just felt right. His father seemed to love you, and outside in the garden, his mother and sister had both said that you were amazing. 

Martin doesn’t know what to do – was he supposed to tell you about the bet? You’d surely break up with him for good once you found out. 

But he looks at you, and he just can’t help but think about how pretty you are. Truthfully, his heart did skip a beat when he first saw you at their comeback showcase, and despite your overdramatic antics, Martin did… want you to stay. That realisation settles in his chest, and he doesn’t know if he should be happy about it. 

He’s not in love with you, is he? 

You look at Martin. Silence falls between the two of you, and it’s comforting, really. You look at him like he’s the most beautiful person in the world, and your breath hitches in your throat. He’s too pretty. Too kind. Too good for you. 

You don’t know when your eyes flick to his lips, but you realise that over the last two weeks, you two haven’t actually kissed. He’s kissed your cheek far too many times, you’ve done the same, but you’ve never actually pressed your lips to his. 

And the scary thing was, that you really, really wanted to. 

You lean in a little closer, inching his face closer to his. Martin suddenly seems to notice the proximity between you two, and he too, realises that he hasn’t actually kissed you on the lips before. For someone who his sister claimed to be ‘so in love’, he hadn’t even kissed his own girlfriend. 

He wants to kiss you. Really, really badly. 

You’re the one who leans in first, pressing your lips to his. It’s hesitant and slow, and Martin’s a little shocked at your tentativeness. For someone who was so dramatic, over the top and boisterous – this was a little out of character. 

Martin can hear his own pulse thundering in his ears as he kisses you back – slow, gentle, like he means it. Yes, this was exactly what he had been missing this entire time. Everything feels right, and Martin completely forgets about the bet. At this moment, all of it was real. 

His hand moves up to gently cup your cheek as the other finds your waist, and you kiss him a little harder, a little more insistent. As Martin melts into the kiss, he’s also simultaneously praying to God that he’s closed his bedroom door. The last thing he really wanted was his parents or sister catching him making out with his girlfriend – he'd never hear the end of it. 

But when your hands find his shirt to pull him impossibly closer, that thought leaves his mind completely as he allows you to kiss him senseless. It’s fine if the door’s open, he thinks. All he cares about is you, and how your lips feel on his. He’s drunk on the feeling, almost – he doesn’t think that he can go a day without kissing you now. 

When you pull away for air, you’re beaming at him like an idiot in love. Because truthfully, that’s what you were. The guilt that’s been eating at you is completely forgotten, and all you really want to do is kiss him again. 

“You kissed me,” Martin says, a little breathless and a little astonished that this was all real. You had kissed him. And he felt something. Something real, something genuine – something that told him that it wasn’t a bet anymore, at least not to him. 

Martin Edwards might really be in love with you.

It was horrifying and exhilarating at the same time. On one hand, Martin was thinking about what would happen if – god forbid – you found out that you were a bet. On the other, Martin just wanted to kiss you over, and over, and over again. 

“Is it that hard to believe?” your voice cuts through his thoughts, your breath hot against his lips. Your eyes flick down to his lips once again, stained with your lipstick. Martin doesn’t – and won’t – wipe it off. “I think you better get used to it, Edwards.” 

And when Martin Edwards leans in again to press his lips against yours, he allows himself to be irrevocably and truly yours.

You tell Jisoo that you can’t write the article. 

She’s disappointed, but simultaneously, not surprised at all. “I thought you might’ve caught feelings for that CORTIS boy,” she hums, tapping her pencil on the desk. You don’t think you’re getting that full-time job now. “It’s okay. I knew it was too good to be true.” 

Ouch, you think. That stings. 

But you’re honestly on too much of a high after that kiss in Martin’s house. With the weight of the article off your shoulders, you can actually date Martin without feeling completely guilty now. Sure, some of it still remained knowing that you started the relationship with ulterior motives, but it was slightly more of a clean slate than before. 

Despite Jisoo's disappointment in you, she still does invite you, Yoonchae, Bailey and Yuna to this music awards show after-party. You immediately text Martin, asking him if he’s going to be there. He responds with a yes, and you beam. 

I can’t wait to see you, he tells you. You smile at your phone, giddy and far too much in love.

“I knew this was going to happen!” Bailey exclaims as you two get ready for the after-party in her apartment. “I told you, that Martin boy was so deeply in love – he was practically looking at her with stars in her eyes when we were doing ‘couples counselling.’ Honestly, I’m surprised that you didn’t see it earlier!” 

You curl your lashes, coating them with mascara carefully. “I mean, I didn’t expect to actually fall for him.” 

“We all saw it coming a mile away, (Name),” Yoonchae laughs. “Come on, at the showcase you were gawking at him like he was your personal Prince Charming. The only thing I’m surprised at was how persistent he was in staying. If I were him, I would’ve broken up with you the second you humiliated me like that in front of all my friends.” 

You gasp at Yoonchae’s words, and she simply shrugs, a smile playing on her lips. The rest of the time spent getting ready is filled with chatter about how you and Martin are going to cope with having eyes on you the entire night tonight. He couldn’t hold your hand like he usually did – you now had to hide. 

When you arrive at the after-party, you immediately send a text to Martin, asking where he is. You look around the room to search for him, and you see idols, industry professionals and journalists like you conversing with one another. 

“Hi,” a voice all too familiar to you makes you turn around, and you see Martin standing there, in all his glory. He’s wearing a crisp, sharp suit – Dior, you assume, considering the brand deal – and he looks absolutely perfect. 

Your voice catches in your throat as you’re about to tell him he looks good, but rather a strangled noise escapes past your lips. You suppose you finally know what it’s like to actually be left speechless. You cover your mouth in embarrassment, and Martin simply laughs. 

“Hi,” you breathe out, when you’re finally able to speak. “You look really nice.” 

“And you do too,” Martin replies, looking at you. You’re wearing this stunning, satin yellow dress. In all honesty, Martin had grown accustomed to seeing you wearing his clothes, and seeing you in something like this made his heart race. A dainty necklace hangs around your neck, and Martin thinks that he might’ve just fallen in love all over again. 

“Thank you,” you say. You’re unsure how to actually speak to him knowing that there were always going to be eyes watching his every move. “So… you doing anything after this?” is the only thing you’re able to come up with, and Martin chuckles. 

“No, I don’t happen to be,” he replies, fixing the collar of his suit jacket. His voice drops low into a whisper, looking around carefully to make sure that nobody is listening. “Come to the dorm later for a movie date?” 

“Of course,” you whisper back. You fail to hide the lovesick grin on your lips, and Martin’s practically fighting the urge to kiss you right now. You look irresistibly good, and Martin hates that every move of his is likely documented right now. 

His manager approaches him, and he gives you a nod in acknowledgment. “Martin, we’re going to have to meet some members of the media. Please come with me – I’m sure the two of you will find time to talk later.” 

You nod, understanding that duty calls. Martin waves goodbye to you, and you wave back. You didn’t even realise how fast your heart was racing there. You find Bailey, Yoonchae and Yuna near the drinks, and you grab a glass of fruit punch and converse with them about some new album that Yoonchae reviewed recently. 

Martin straightens up his suit jacket before he walks up to the rest of the members, who are already talking to someone. “Hi, I’m Martin, the leader of CORTIS. Apologies for being late,” he says politely. “I had to catch up with a friend.” It’s a lie, but he couldn’t call you his girlfriend to everyone here. 

“Oh, don’t worry,” the lady says, waving him off. She seems awfully drunk, and she’s already taking another sip of the champagne in her glass. “We were just talking about some of the articles that we’ve been publishing about your group. You boys are some of the most exciting faces on the music scene.” 

“Thank you.” Martin beams.

“Her name is Jisoo,” James whispers in Martin’s ear. “I think she’s super drunk. Manager says that the rest of us are going to speak to some guy named John, but Jisoo really wanted to talk to you. So… we’ll leave you guys to it?” 

Martin nods in agreement, but he doesn’t really want to speak with her. She’s incredibly drunk, and to be honest, Martin would much rather be talking to you right now.

“Oh, and we’ve got something much more than just about your albums,” Jisoo pipes up. “Well, did. One of my interns – talented girl – was writing a piece about one of you.” Jisoo's so drunk that she thinks that the five of them are still there, when it’s really only Martin who’s left. 

She searches around the room, and her eyes land on you. She points in your direction. 

“Ah, her. Over there,” Jisoo says. “(Name).” 

Martin immediately straightens up at the sound of your name. He leans in to hear Jisoo better, curiosity suddenly piqued. “What article may that be?” 

“Oh, it was a little bit more fun. How to lose an idol in 10 shows, or something. Dating an idol, and then trying to get him to dump her in 10 shows or less. I was gonna give her that full-time job, honestly.” 

Martin’s heart drops. 

An article? You... were writing an article on dating an idol?

It hits Martin right then and there. That’s why you were so adamant on breaking up over something so trivial – he knew that you weren’t that unreasonable. 

The next realisation hits Martin like a truck. That’s why you would act so ludicrous and over the top sometimes – he had a feeling that it wasn’t really who you were. The night at the studio, the moments the two of you shared at his parents’ house. That was the real you. But Martin didn’t really care, he told himself he loved you all the same. 

But knowing that all of this was just for an article? It sends a knife through his heart.  

You kissed him like you actually loved him that day at his parents’ house. He thought you did. Did you love him? Did you even like him? 

Jisoo is so drunk she doesn’t even seem to know the state of shock and distress that she’s just put Martin through. His mouth suddenly runs dry, and he doesn’t know what to do – all he knows is that he feels sick at the thought that perhaps none of it was real. His heart aches with betrayal, and he doesn’t think he’s ever felt this awful before. 

His eyes are hot as he tries to blink back tears. “I’m sorry,” he stutters, his voice cracking. “I have to go.” 

Jisoo's too drunk to notice as Martin pushes past her, trying desperately to find any corner away from the cameras. 

When he finds a place secluded enough, covered by the black satin curtains, Martin finally lets a tear slip past his cheek.

This must be what heartbreak feels like, he thinks.

You’re already starting to get a little bored at this after-party. 

You know that Jisoo's practically drunk off her mind, and Bailey’s gone over to make sure that she doesn’t hurl on any of the guests. Yoonchae winces seeing Jisoo stumble on air, and Bailey sighs as she knows that she’s going to be babysitting her all night. 

You look at the crowd, trying to count how many idols you can see that aren’t completely drunk off their mind. 

“(Name)!” James snaps you out of your little game – you were at roughly 12 idols – and you direct your attention to him. He beams, greeting you with a wide smile. 

He’s got a glass of champagne in his hands – after all, he is the only one legally allowed to drink. You can tell that he’s slightly tipsy. 

“Hi, James,” you say, smiling at him. “Nice to see you again… after seeing you yesterday night.” 

James laughs, a little louder than normal – yeah, the alcohol was definitely kicking in. “That’s funny. Yes, so nice to see you again. I know that our Martin was a bit late speaking to some important people because he was caught up with you,” he says, wagging his finger at you. “It’s okay. No worries.” 

“Oh,” you say sheepishly. “Sorry about that.” 

“No worries,” he says, trailing off. There’s a beat of silence that falls between the two of you before James seems to remember something. “Oh! Oh! Don’t tell Martin. Wait, you two are dating for real, for real now. So you must know!” 

You look at James, confused. You don’t have a single idea in the world of what he was insinuating at. 

“Our Martin can flirt, can’t he?” James says, dragging out the word. “We all thought he couldn’t, so he proved us wrong. Now we all have to pay for his next shopping spree. Bleh. I’m going to be broke.” 

Your brows furrow, but there’s a sinking feeling in your stomach – you think you know what James is hinting at, but he’s tipsy, so he’s somewhat circling around the topic. 

“James, whatever do you mean?” 

“We made a bet!” he says, a little too gleefully. “So like, Seonghyeon was saying that Martin couldn’t flirt, so we made a bet – 10 shows to get a girl to fall in love with him with his flirting skills. And he had to make sure you stayed with him through those 10 shows.” 

He doesn’t know that those words had basically caused your personal apocalypse. You were a bet? 

You look at James, betrayal evident on your features. Your chest pangs with pain so visceral, you think you might actually double over. You were just a bet to Martin, and the betrayal and pain from that realisation hits you like a tidal wave. Martin being awfully sweet to you, being too kind, being too understanding – that was all a lie? 

You feel like you don’t even know him. You stand there, stunned, and at your silence, James somehow seems to sober up. 

“Oh, shit – you didn’t know,” James’ face contorts into one of horror, and he brings his hands to his lips. “Oh my god, (Name) – I did not mean a single word of what I said, I am so sorry–!” 

You push past James, running for the exit. You feel so violently ill – all you want to do is go back to your house and cry until you’ve got no tears left. You’re going to block Martin, and you never ever want to listen to a CORTIS song ever again. 

You push past the gates, but then you’re stopped by a voice that is awfully familiar, but it’s the last person you want to hear from right now. 

“Skipping town?” Martin asks. His hands are shoved into his coat pockets. Of course he still looks devastatingly beautiful, and for a second you forget that this is the boy who had made a bet that you’d fall in love with him in 10 shows.

Congratulations, it worked, you think. Maybe he should win a prize for it after you get over your heartbreak. 

You turn to look at him, brows furrowed in anger. “What do you want, Martin?” 

“What do I want?” he asks, voice laced with disbelief. He steps closer towards you, and you realise that he’s angry too. You don’t know what for. “I want to know why Jisoo told me about an article that you’d pitched called: how to lose an idol in 10 shows. Yes, she was drunk. But you know that drunk words are sober thoughts. I could tell she wasn't lying.” 

You’re stunned. Martin notices your expression, and his eyes narrow. “Yeah,” he replies, gritting his teeth. “Sound familiar?” 

You gulp, and that guilt that you thought you’d rid yourself of comes back tenfold. But then you remember the bet. You, in similar fashion, grit your teeth and look at Martin with the same betrayal in your eyes. 

“Right,” you hum. “And I want to know a little bit more about this bet that James told me about… perhaps something along the lines of you getting a girl to fall in love with him in 10 shows.” 

This time, Martin’s the one with the stunned look on his face. His breath stutters, and you cross your arms. “Yeah,” you tell him, using the same words he did mere seconds ago. “Sound familiar?” 

“You used me for an article,” Martin exhales. The heartbreak in his tone is evident, and you hate knowing that you’ve hurt him. But he hurt you too. 

“I was just a bet to you,” you gulp. Saying it out loud makes it more real. “I meant nothing to you, didn’t I?” 

“You can’t be the one saying this to me,” Martin says, pointing at you. “Are you serious?” 

“Dead serious,” you retort. 

“You wanted to lose an idol in 10 shows?” Martin seethes, trying to ignore how it feels like his heart is quite literally breaking. “Congratulations. You just lost him.” 

You gulp, trying to fight the tears that are threatening to spill past your eyes. You take a deep breath, strengthening your resolve – you were a bet to him anyways. It didn’t matter. 

“No, I didn’t.” you say. Even those words feel like a lie. You did lose him, and you feel terrible. “Because you can’t lose something you never had.” 

With that, you turn on your heel and leave. You only let the tears fall when you know that you’re far away enough, and you reel with the realisation that you’ve probably just lost the first person that you’ve ever truly loved. Because of some stupid job that you weren’t quite sure you wanted anymore.  

You leave Martin hanging as he watches your figure disappear. He opens and closes his mouth as if he wants to say something, but you’re already too far gone. It’s fine, Martin tells himself. It was just a bet. You were just a bet. You didn’t mean anything to him. 

No, he can’t lie to himself. It hurts much more than the truth. 

Martin stands there as the cool evening air tousles his hair. It’s then when he finally allows himself to sob as he crumples to the floor – despite it all, he doesn’t know why he once again, can’t bring himself to hate you. 

Martin Edwards lost you, and you lost Martin Edwards. 

Maybe after all of it, this was the outcome that you both deserved.

Martin feels absolutely awful. 

The members all look at him sympathetically, and they all notice that Martin’s not really his usual self nowadays. Seonghyeon buys him that jacket that he’s wanted for ages. Juhoon breaks his bank account to get Martin three hoodies. Keonho finally buys him those Rick Owens shoes, and he doesn’t complain about it. 

James, who feels the worst out of all of them for letting the news slip to you, buys him two pairs of expensive earrings and cashes in on an extra bracelet as if it’ll cure the heartbreak. 

"Well... I guess you can flirt," Seonghyeon says. He knows that it's really not helping Martin get over the heartbreak, but he's not quite sure what to say to make him feel better.

Sure, he could flirt. Hooray, Martin thinks. But he didn't really care about that anymore. Not when he just wanted to see you.

His life falls into the routine that he was so accustomed to before you barged into his life. Wake up, practice, make music, perform, repeat. Despite how much his stomach twists in anger at the thought that he was just an article to you, he misses your presence. 

In those two short weeks, you’d changed his life in a way that he didn’t think was possible. His eyes always linger a little too long at the dressing room door, hoping you’ll show up. He stocks up on Coke for the mini fridge in the studio just in case you swing by and want a can. He can’t even tell his parents that he’s not speaking to you anymore. 

He messed up too. You weren’t the only one. The guilt eats at him every single day, and he’s immediately reminded of it when he wakes up. Martin Edwards, despite it all, still thinks that he loves you. That may be even more ludicrous than your antics. 

He hears the doorbell ring, and Martin gets up from his seat at the couch to go answer the door. He’s the designated one to do that now, because he’s always hoping that perhaps you’ll show up. 

He swings open the door, and he realises that it’s Yoonchae. He recognises her from the comeback showcase. 

“Hi,” she gulps, a little hesitant. “Martin?” 

“Yes?” he asks. “How did you find–” 

“I’m not a stalker,” she says. Martin figured, considering that she was a friend of yours. “Sorry, I had to get that out of the way. But… I think you might want to read this.” Yoonchae hands Martin a stack of papers, and he furrows his brows, confused as to why. 

Yoonchae looks at Martin, and she knows that’s a devastated man if she’s ever seen one. His hair’s messy, he’s got dark circles under his eyes, and there’s just something heavy seeming to be weighing on his conscience. 

“Please,” she says. Martin motions for her to come in, and Yoonchae sits down at the dining room table. Martin flicks open the page, and there it is – the dreaded headline. How to Lose an Idol in 10 Shows. Your name is plastered right under it. 

Martin doesn’t even want to read it. He feels sick already seeing the title. But curiosity kills the cat, and he reluctantly reads the words printed on the page, letting out a deep sigh. 

Step one: Ask the dreaded question – “What are we?” in front of all of his friends. 

He remembers that day. He also remembers the instantaneous shock that he felt hearing those words spill past your lips, and how it filled him with a sense of intrigue but also overconfidence that he was going to win this bet. 

Step two: Be overly obnoxious – yes, again, in front of all of his friends. 

The over the top cheek kisses, the way you’d cling to him like a koala and the loud displays of affection – yep, that tracks, Martin thinks. The crazy thing was that he didn’t mind at all. 

Step three: Annoy him with text messages every single minute. 

You did that. But Martin wasn’t annoyed, per se. He went through every single message, replying to them with equal enthusiasm. You always had something interesting to talk about – it wasn’t just filler, so Martin didn’t quite mind. And it did bring him some much needed entertainment after busting his ass for a performance. 

Step four: Steal all his favourite clothes. 

Martin smiles, stupidly. The memory of you wearing his clothes and looking a little too good in them cuts through the anger and bitterness he’s been feeling for the past few days. The mention of those also makes him also remember that you haven’t given any of those clothes back. 

Step five: Interrupt him at the studio…

The next few words make Martin’s breath catch in his throat. 

Despite my ridiculous antics, Martin Edwards somehow puts up with me and has the patience of a saint. I decide that he’s either a lunatic who loves crazy girls, but my colleague Bailey offers me something else: that he might genuinely like me. It’s when I’m halfway through step five I realise that I’ve fallen in way too deep. 

It’s the first time where he actually shows frustration with my insanity, and it’s the first time where I realise that I don’t want to hurt him. Because despite starting this with unfortunately ulterior motives, I think I may have fallen in love in the process. 

My goal was to lose an idol in 10 shows. But after getting to know Martin Edwards – the real Martin Edwards – I didn’t want to lose him at all, and yet I have. He’s admirable. Dependable. Too kind for his own good. I don’t even think I deserved him during those two weeks. 

These two weeks have been riddled by mistakes. Starting this article, lying about my intentions, pretending that I was someone that I truly wasn’t… but the biggest mistake of all? 

Losing the love of my life.  

His vision blurs as tears prick his eyes. He was the love of your life? The words hit him like a ton of bricks, and Martin almost forgets how to breathe. The weight of those words settles in his chest, and somehow, the anger dissipates and is replaced with disbelief. He was the love of your life. 

The crazy thing is, Martin thinks you may be the love of his life too. 

He looks at Yoonchae with a look of determination in his eyes that wasn’t quite there before. 

“I… is she at the office?” 

“No,” Yoonchae replies. “She quit. I can give you her address, if you need—” 

“Please,” he says, desperation evident in his tone. He throws on a random pair of shoes as he practically shoves his phone into Yoonchae’s hand so she can type in your address into his GPS app. 

Martin runs out the door, Yoonchae trailing behind him and nearly failing to keep up. Juhoon asks him where the hell he’s going, but Martin doesn’t answer – he has pressing matters to attend to right now. Yoonchae calls a car for the two of them to head to your place, and on the way, she tells him that she really wasn’t supposed to show him the article – but she had to. She knew you were miserable too. 

The ride to your place feels like forever, and Yoonchae tells him that she’ll just wait downstairs. He bounds up the staircase – the lift was a waste of time, you lived on the third floor. Yoonchae thinks that he doesn’t even register her words. 

Martin double checks the apartment unit that Yoonchae had given him, and he knocks, tapping his foot on the ground nervously. 

You fling open your door, and you’re stunned to see Martin there. 

He’s almost speechless at the sight of your face – he hadn’t seen you in so long, and Martin has missed you, devastatingly so. 

“Martin?” you say in disbelief. You’ve been dreaming about him so much for the past few days to the point where you really wouldn’t be surprised if he was a hallucination. “What are you doing here?”

He holds up the article that Yoonchae had handed him less than an hour ago. You recognise it, and a mixture of guilt, shame and anxiety pangs in your chest – so he’s read it. That sickly feeling that you’ve grown accustomed to for the past week returns tenfold. 

“This article,” he breathes out. “Did you mean it?” 

“What?” 

“Did you mean it?” he asks. He’s looking at you with desperation, practically pleading for you to say yes. 

You blink back the tears in your eyes. A beat of silence falls between you two before you finally speak.

“I meant every word,” you confess, your voice barely above a whisper. 

Martin tries to hold back the smile that’s threatening to creep up on his lips. “Really?” he asks, and you nod. 

“Yes,” you say, a little louder this time. “ And I’m sorry about it all – you mean… so much more than an article to me.” 

Martin has another question. “And am I really the love of your life?” 

“Yes,” you exhale. “You are. I told you, I meant every word.” 

Martin finally allows himself to breathe, his shoulders relaxing as he beams, wider than ever before. “Ask me the same question.” he says, grinning. You look at his expression, a little confused but hopeful all the same. 

“Am I the love of your life?” you ask, your voice brimming with hope. 

“You are.” Martin replies. 

“Oh,” you reply softly, and you let a tear slip past your cheek. You’re crying, but they’re happy tears. 

Martin reaches out to you, pulling him close to you. His hand finds your waist like it belongs there, and like nothing has changed in the last few days the two of you have been apart. 

“I love you,” you choke out. “Unbelievably so. I’m sorry I lost you.” 

Martin leans in, inching his face closer to yours as he smiles. 

“I love you too,” he replies before he presses his lips to yours, and everything just feels right again. He pulls away for a split second to look into your eyes. “You’re never going to lose me.” he says, giggling before he pulls you in for another kiss. 

And now, Martin Edwards is truly, irrevocably yours.

© martinflms 2026. mini author's note: this was lowkey a challenge to write 20k in 2 days. i'm so glad i did and i hope you guys enjoyed <3

Well, turns out things don't really work like that.

The endings rarely announce themselves at the beginning. People don't arrive in your life wearing labels that tell you what they'll become to you, unfortunately.

And moments that change everything almost never look that important when they're happening.

The first thing you ever said to James was: "You're in my spot."

Not exactly the kind of opening that made for a good story, right? No charged glance across a room, no meaningful collision, no moment with enough cinematic power to justify all the things that came after it.

Just you, age nineteen— three months into your debut, standing in the doorway of Practice Room 7B at 11pm with your water bottle and your USB drive.

And James, eighteen, sprawled across the center of the floor with his headphones around his neck and his jacket thrown over the mirror rail. His long legs were taking up an amount of space that felt frankly unreasonable, looking up at you with an unbothered expression.

"There's no names on the floors," he said.

"I booked this room," you said. "7B, eleven pm. Check the system."

Safe to say he didn't check the system.

He looked at you for a moment with the assessing quality that you would not recognize as one of his characteristics until much later, and then he replied: "I've been here since nine."

"And your booking ended at eleven," you asserted, stepping inside because waiting in the doorway felt like conceding something. "So..."

He made a pause in which he conducted somekind of internal deliberation- the outcome of which was apparently a decision to be mildly entertained rather than annoyed.

Typical, you'd later think.

He sat up, reaching for his jacket with unhurried ease.

"You're from R3SET," he said. Not a question.

"You're from Cortis," you stated, equally declarative.

"James," his mouth drew a straight line, which was not exactly an introduction, so much as information delivered flatly.

"I know who you are,"

Something moved at the corner of his mouth. "Yeah?"

"You were the dude who changed the note... the one in the song at that showcase stage everyone talked about for two weeks."

"Three weeks," he corrected.

"Two," you said. "I checked."

He fully looked at you then, for the first time, the kind of look that was less social and more like observing, and something in it was so direct that it felt almost rude.

Then he stood up, gathered his things without any particular hurry, and walked toward the door.

"It was three weeks," he said, passing you.

"It really wasn't," you countered to his retreating back.

The door swung shut and you stood alone in Practice Room 7B and felt— despite having successfully reclaimed your space, that the exchange had ended in something closer to a draw.

You didn't think about it again for two weeks— which was its own kind of foreshadowing.

• • •

The thing about HYBE was that it was enormous and also, paradoxically, very small.

Enormous in the way of any machine with global reach -the floors and corridors and practice rooms and studios multiplying upward and outward. The kind of place where you could theoretically spend a month without seeing the same person twice.

And yet the industry within the industry was genuinely, inescapably small.

You saw the same faces, you learned people's schedules by accident, by proximity, by the way your paths intersected in corridors and elevators and waiting rooms.

You started seeing James everywhere approximately two weeks after the practice room—- which you attributed to coincidence, and then to probability, and then eventually just accepted it was because of shared geography.

He was in the elevator one morning when you got on with your members, both groups maintaining a polite, comfortable distance.

He nodded. You nodded. Simple

Hye-ri, who had not yet heard the Practice Room 7B story and would later respond to it with a bunch of conspiracy theories, smiled brightly at everyone.

The elevator arrived at its floor and one group filed out. James held the door for Soeun, who was the last one off, moving as slowly as was her nature at 9am.

"Thanks," Soeun said sleepily.

He said nothing, just released the door once she was through. You glanced back as the doors closed and he was looking at something on his phone.

Not at you, so you looked forward again.

• • •

The first real conversation -not some kind of territorial exchange about practice room 7B— but the first one with actual content— happened at the canteen at an off-hour on a Tuesday

You'd come down at 2am, between schedules, when the dinner rush was long over and the space was quiet.

You wanted something warm and uncomplicated and to sit somewhere that wasn't a practice room or a meeting room or a corridor for approximately twenty minutes.

James was at a corner table with what appeared to be a cup of coffee and nothing else, looking at his phone with a focused scowl.

The canteen was otherwise empty.

You got your food -the plain rice and the soup, because your stomach was demanding something simple— and made the social calculation that sitting at the opposite end of the canteen from the only other person there was ruder than sitting nearby, so you chose a table two away from his.

He glanced up when you sat down, registered you, and looked back at his phone. James had this thing about him, you noticed, he was always on doing something, whether it was being on his phone, tapping his fingers against the table or bouncing his leg. Silence seemed to make him restless, as if he stopped moving for too long he'd have to sit with his thoughts.

Maybe he didn't like that, you thought.

Regardless, you ate your soup silently, playing with the little bits of bread you'd thrown in it.

"You're always here at weird hours," you heard him say eventually, without looking up.

"So are you," you retorted.

"I'm avoiding a meeting."

For some odd reason, you were starting to think conversations with this stranger felt slightly one-sided —like he was halfway in, halfway somewhere else.

"I'm between schedules." you told him.

"What kind of schedule runs until 2am?" he asked, and now he did look up properly this time. His phone tilted slightly in his hand, forgotten mid-scroll, like the conversation had finally managed to pull him out of whatever digital gravity he'd been stuck in.

You shrugged, leaning back in your chair. "Um, the kind that pays for the rest of my life? Rehearsal ran late, we have a comeback in six weeks."

"The second?" He said it like he'd already known and was confirming.

James kept his phone close all through it— even when nothing was happening on it, like it was an excuse not to fully engage.

"Yeah." You looked at him. "You're not avoiding a meeting, though. Your schedule's on the third floor board, you don't have anything until four."

There was a pause.

"You read the third floor schedule board?" he asked, one eyebrow cocked.

Was he really that pretentious to think you'd looked at it just for him?

"I pass it every day." you subtly rolled your eyes. "It's hard to miss"

"And you memorized my schedule." James concluded, finally setting his phone down to give you his full attention.

In retrospect a few years later, he had always been like that— you could only earn his concentration by flattering him. He had this shallow way of engaging, cohesive with his whole being really, this unnerving habit of half-listening just long enough to decide whether you were worth it, and if you weren't, he'd let the conversation slide off him without ever quite refusing it.

James was a maze.

How he could stand there, talk, even laugh sometimes, and still feel like he was somewhere slightly out of reach— like the version of him you were interacting with was only ever a partial map of the real thing, if there even was a full one to find.

"I memorized the general layout," you deadpanned, almost the way you'd speak to a dumb child. "You happen to be on it."

He looked at you for a moment with an almost-smile that wasn't quite, that lived in the small muscles around his eyes rather than his mouth. "Right..."

Halfway amused, then also halfway unbothered.

You ate your soup and he went back to his phone. And minutes passed in a quiet that was, you noticed, not uncomfortable.

When you stood up to leave he said, without looking up: "Seven weeks."

You remembered thinking back then, 'Is he okay in the head?'

"What?"

"Your comeback. It's seven weeks out, not six. The release dates got pushed on monday."

You stood there for a moment. "How do you know R3SET's release schedule?"

"I read the boards," he raised his eyebrows. "You happen to be on them."

He looked up then, and the almost-smile was doing the thing where it almost became an actual smile and then pulled back at the last moment.

You held his gaze and then picked up your tray.

"Thanks," you muttered.

"Sure," he said.

You walked out and made it to the elevator before you let the small, involuntary smile happen, where nobody could file it as evidence of anything.

• • •

It built the way these things built — in the accumulation of small moments that wouldnt individually amount to anything and collectively amounted to everything.

You started adjusting to him— even if it wasn't your job to do— you bent, trying to navigate his weirdness. It felt comforting in a way, discovering a new person, trying to predict how they would be the next day, mapping out their inconsistencies. There was a kind of satisfaction in it, in getting it right, in noticing the patterns before anyone else did. Like you were being let in on something subtle and exclusive.

James started saving you a spot in the one practice room with the good sound system when he finished early, without mentioning it — you'd just arrive to find a piece of tape with your initials on the booking board in his handwriting.

You never acknowledged it out loud and neither did he. It simply happened, and then continued to happen, and you both treated it as unremarkable.

You gave him your extra energy bar once, in a corridor, because you had two and he looked like he hadn't eaten since morning.

He took it without excessive gratitude, just ate it while you talked about something unrelated, and the next week a different brand of bar appeared in your bag that you hadn't put there.

There was an award show in November — your first major one as a group, filled with th underlying anxiety of a milestone.

You were waiting in the corridor behind the stage in your outfit— which was a confection of different fabrics that looked extraordinary but made sitting down a pain— when he appeared from a different direction in his own stage clothes, and you both stopped.

James looked at you, with absolutely no moderation whatsoever— direct in a way that didn't quite match the rest of him.

"You look-" he started, and seemed to reroute something. He blinked once, almost annoyed at himself, "Good luck tonight."

Did he think saying 'you look good' was a sign of weakness ?

Something that gave too much away, too quickly, like it handed over control in a way he didn't trust himself with.

Or maybe it wasn't even about strength. Maybe it was just him— his instinct to edit anything that sounded too honest before it could exist in the open for longer than a second. Like certain words, could only be kept in a locked safe.

"You too," you nodded

He nodded right back before walking past, and your stylist appeared from around the corner to start fussing with your hair

The moment subsided and later, on stage, in the middle of your third song, you looked out into the audience and found him in the seats assigned to Cortis. You hadn't been looking for him, but just so happened to find him.

He was watching. Actually watching, full on focused— and he didn't look away when you made eye contact.

You looked away first, because you had choreography to execute and couldn't afford the distraction, but the heat of it stayed on the side of your face for the rest of the song.

• • •

James was the first person (other than your members) in the building who ever made you genuinely laugh.

The actual laugh, the one that caught you off guard and came out bigger than you intended, the one that made your eyes crease at the corners in a way your makeup artist always had to correct before filming.

It was something stupid. You couldn't even remember what, later, when you tried — some observation he'd made in that flat, deadpan delivery of his, something about Martin's weird posture.

And you'd laughed, the real one, before you'd had time to present the curated version instead.

You hated it, it felt like handing him a key to a locked dooor.

He'd looked surprised. Then his almost-smile finally completed itself. The both of you had looked away simultaneously like two people who had accidentally seen something they weren't supposed to.

That was 7 months in.

By then you already knew you were in trouble.

• • •

The first fight was in January.

Not a small one— no— the whole real inaugural event, the one that established the template for everything that followed, that revealed the specific architecture of how you two functioned, when the politeness dissolved.

It was about something professional, technically.

A collab arrangement that had fallen through due to scheduling and a comment he'd made in a group setting, that you'd taken as pointed and that he'd claimed was general.

But the claim itself felt like a provocation rather than a clarification.

Because at the end of the day, when two people have that particular appetite to argue, nothing is really strong enough to stop them. Not timing, not context, not the fact that everyone else had already moved on from it.

It had escalated with a speed that surprised you both, the way flash fires did -the combustibility of two people who had spent seven months building up a charge without discharge.

Every careful canteen silence, every piece of tape on a booking board, every unremarked energy bar, every held glance and looked-away-from moment: all of it apparently convertible into fuel.

You said things. He said things.

The things were sharp and specific, which was worse than general and vague.

That meant you both knew exactly where to aim. Because people who don't know each other well argue clumsily, you and James didn't.

You knew which buttons to push, where to tug, where to pull, to get that intoxicating reaction out of him. You were greedy with it, once you saw the color of his anger you always wanted more and more.

He told you that your drive was so relentless it was alienating. You told him that his emotional unavailability was a character flaw he'd dressed up as depth.

And other particularly childish things.

Both of you hit something real.

Both of you knew it.

It ended not with resolution but with you walking out of the conversation, and him letting you. The two of you spending eleven days not speaking in a building you shared, navigating around each other with effortful precision.

On the twelfth day he was in the elevator when you got on, alone, the doors closed, and in the four floors between you and your destination neither of you spoke.

When the doors opened he held them and let you out first with the same gesture he'd used for Soeun seven months ago.

"The tape's back on 7B," he said, as the doors were closing. "If you want it."

You walked to the practice room.

The tape was there, your initials in his handwriting, unremarkable and consistent and saying more than either of you had managed in eleven days of silence.

So you pulled out your USB drive and started the music.

You didn't think about what it meant, because thinking about what it meant required a vocabulary you hadn't yet developed for whatever this was.

• • •

The second fight happened in March, and it was the one that changed the coordinates of everything.

In retrospect — and you would spend a considerable amount of time in retrospect, dissecting this particular evening with forensic attention, like someone trying to locate the exact moment a thing became a different thing -it wasn't even a significant fight.

Not by the standards.

It was a Tuesday, late, and you were both in the building past reasonable hours. You'd crossed paths in the corridor outside the vocal booths in the specific way that felt, by now, less like coincidence and more like the building itself was engineering your proximity through some architectural conspiracy.

You'd said something.

He'd responded.

The response had landed wrong.

The details were almost beside the point -they always were with James, the specifics of the argument always slightly less important than the current running underneath it.

What mattered was the escalation, which was quick and hot —the two of you falling into the rhythm of it with the terrible fluency of people who'd already mapped each other's pressure points and couldn't help pressing them.

You were in his face in the way you got when you were angry — close, refusing to let height function as advantage, chin tilted up, voice controlled and precise in the way that was somehow more aggressive than shouting.

He was doing the jaw thing, the one where the muscle flickered at the corner, and his eyes were dark, direct and giving nothing.

"You don't actually know me," you bit out, which was what you said when he'd gotten too close to something accurate and you needed to push him back. "You think you do-"

"I know you better than you're comfortable with," he lashed back, flat and certain. "That's the problem."

"That's not a problem, that's a fucking delusion-"

"You went still," he observed. "Just now. When I said that. You went still."

"I didn't-"

"You always go still when something's true. C'mon, don't act like I don't know you. You're so predictable."

You stared at him, he stared back. He was so on point— but so mean, so so mean.

And something shifted without announcement —like pressure shifted before weather, air changing in density.

You didn't decide. That was the thing you'd return to later, examining it from different angles.

It didn't feel like a decision.

It felt like an inevitable conclusion of seven months of accumulated charge finally finding its outlet. It was physics rather than choice -the thing that happened when you built up enough of something and ran out of room to keep containing it.

You kissed him.

Or he kissed you.

The honest answer was that it was simultaneous in the way that made attribution impossible, the two of you crossing the remaining distance at the same moment as if you'd both received the same signal from the same source.

His hand came up to the side of your face with a roughness that almost comforting, and you had a fistful of his jacket like you wanted to hurt him right back.

The anger didn't disappear —that was the thing that surprised you most in the moment, that the anger didn't disappear but instead converted, transformed into something that ran in the same channel at the same intensity in a completely different direction.

It lasted approximately ten seconds.

You both pulled back. Looked at each other. The corridor was still empty, the distant practice track was still running.

Nothing had changed about the physical reality of the space, but everything had changed about what existed in it.

His hand was still near your face. Neither of you moved for a moment.

Then you let go of his jacket.

"That," you breathed out, with all the composure you could assemble on short notice, which was not as much as you would have liked, "didn't happen."

Something moved through his expression, not really agreement nor disagreement. "Okay," he simply said.

"I'm serious."

"I know."

"James."

"I said okay, jeez," he scoffed.

You straightened. Fixed your top, met his eyes one final time with the look you used when you needed to communicate that you were in complete control of a situation.

You walked back down the corridor and took the stairs, because the elevator required waiting- and waiting required standing still- and standing still was not something you were capable of in that particular moment.

In the stairwell you sat on the third step from the bottom, pressing your fingertips to your mouth and stared at the concrete floor.

You said, quietly and with feeling, a word that started with 'F' and covered approximately forty percent of what you were actually feeling, the other sixty percent being substantially too complicated for a single word to manage.

Fuck, it didn't happen.

Your heartbeat said otherwise, loud and inconveniently informative.

• • •

Ironically, it happened again three weeks later.

This time there was less plausible explanation about what it was -it wasn't the end of an argument, wasn't the discharge of accumulated charge. It was a different kind of moment entirely, which made it both better and worse at the same time.

You'd been in the practice room late, alone, running the bridge section of the new choreography for what felt like the fortieth time because something in the transition wasn't landing cleanly. You couldn't locate the problem from inside the movement, which was the particular frustration of dance —sometimes you just needed external eyes, someone to stand outside the thing and see what you couldn't

As if on cue, James had appeared in the doorway, passing by.

"The weight transfer," he said, from the doorway. "You're anticipating the next count. You lose the accent."

You stared at him."You watched that for three seconds.”

"Didn't need longer."

Of course he didn't.

You rolled your eyes but reset your position. It's like he knew things without even asking. So you listened, ran it again, adjusting.

"Better," he nodded when you got it right.

There was a note of satisfaction in his voice that made something warm settle low in your stomach.Then he pushed himself off the doorway and stepped into the room.

"Move over." James gestured.

He took his place beside you in the mirror, close enough that your shoulders nearly brushed, to run the count with you —not the full choreography, just the four bars in question, his reflection beside yours in the practice room mirror.

When you ran it clean he caught your eye in the mirror and said: "There. You're insanely good when you focus."

And you responded with blurry eyes : "Yeah."

The room was very quiet because then, neither of you was looking at the mirror anymore

The second time was slower than the first. That was the difference - the first time had been the speed of reaction, of something that had been held too long finally releasing.

You felt the shift in the air before his hand moved -his palm sliding slowly up your arm, over the thin strap of your practice top, until his fingers curled around the back of your neck.

His grip was warm, firm, not quite gentle. When you finally looked up at him, his eyes had gone dark, pupils wide. He didn't ask. He simply leaned in and kissed you like he'd already made the decision minutes ago.

It started slow, almost careful -his lips pressing against yours with deliberate pressure, warm and slightly damp from the heat of the room. Then the restraint slipped.

His mouth opened, and the kiss deepened with a hunger. His tongue brushed yours, claiming, stroking in a slow, heated rhythm that made your stomach tighten. You tasted salt on his lips from the earlier dancing, felt the faint scrape of stubble against your skin as he tilted his head and took more.

His other hand found your waist, fingers digging in just enough to pull you flush against him. The kiss grew hotter, wetter.

A soft, involuntary sound escaped you, and he answered it with a low exhale through his nose, as he backed you half a step until your lower back met the barre.

He pressed forward, chest to chest, one thigh sliding between yours as the kiss turned unmistakably heated -messy, urgent, tongues sliding and lips sucking, breathing growing ragged between the brief moments you broke apart only to crash back together.

When he finally pulled back just enough to look at you, his lips were flushed and shiny, breath coming hard.

His forehead rested against yours, eyes half-lidded, and for a second the only sound in the mirrored room was the two of you trying to remember how to breathe.Your makeup from earlier had faded to its bones. Your hair had come partly undone.

You looked, you thought, like someone in the middle of something they hadn't planned. Which was accurate.

James was watching your reflection rather than your face, which felt like a concession of some kind -the mirror was easier, the distance of the reflection, the ability to look at something without quite looking directly at it.

"We should probably..." you started.

"Yeah," he nodded.

"Talk about-"

"Probably," he agreed.

Safe to say you both didn't talk about it. Not that night, not in the days following. By unspoken mutual agreement you treated the practice room the way you'd treated the corridor -as something that had happened in a pocket outside normal time.

You saw each other in the building and were normal, which is to say you were exactly what you'd always been —two people with an unclassifiable dynamic and an ongoing low-grade tension.

It was, you would think later, an approach with significant structural flaws.

• • •

        The first time you slept with James was inevitable in the way that cellular reproduction is inevitables.

Something had been pulling since the moment the charge between you became too dense to ignore, building and building through every charged silence, every almost-smile, every fight that left you both raw and buzzing.

It happened six weeks after the second kiss, in the aftermath of one of those late nights where the building was almost empty. You'd both been avoiding each other again after a stupid argument about nothing — that had somehow spiraled into everything yet again. Three days of careful, professional distance in the corridors. Three days of pretending the other person didn't exist in a space where existence was technically impossible to avoid.

You were in 7B again, alone, running through vocals until your throat felt like sandpaper because stillness was worse than exhaustion.

James appeared in the doorway like he always did, unannounced, carrying two bottles of water he couldn't explain.

He set one down near your bag without a word and leaned against the mirror rail, watching you with that cataloguing stare.

You didn't tell him to leave. He didn't ask if he should stay.

The conversation that followed was sparse, edged, full of the things you weren't saying. Accusations dressed as observations. Defenses that sounded like attacks.

Until the space between you simply ran out.

The kiss that started it was less explosion this time and more surrender -slow at first, almost reluctant, like both of you were still trying to talk yourselves out of it even as your hands moved. It was intoxicating, like drinking straight from the bottle, bypassing the glass entirely.

He knew exactly how to touch you.

That was the terrifying part.

From the first slide of his palm up your waist under your shirt, he read your body like he'd been studying it for months in secret, the way his thumb pressed just under your ribs made your breath catch. The way he bit down on your shoulder when you tugged at his hair drew a sound from you that felt humiliatingly honest.

You knew him too —knew the tension at the base of his spine when he was trying to hold back, knew how his breath stuttered when you dragged your nails down his back, knew the exact rhythm that made his control fracture.

There was no discussion. No "what are we doing."

No neat categorization.

You ended up on the floor with the lights still on, door locked and the faint smell of rubber mats and sweat in the air, clothes shoved aside rather than removed entirely because stopping felt impossible.

It was slow at first -agonizingly so- James pushing into you with a controlled patience that felt like punishment, forehead pressed to yours, eyes open the whole time. Every inch deliberate. Every roll of his hips measured to draw out the kind of sound you refused to let anyone else hear.

But it was the loudest you've ever felt him, deep in your bone marrow, all-consuming.

Not loud, but so devastatingly precise.

He fucked you like he'd already memorized every map point of your pleasure and was now tracing them with ruthless focus -slow, deep strokes that made your back arch off the floor. Like he knew precisely which pieces of you would collapse and which would fly.

His hand clamped gently but firmly over your mouth when your voice started to climb, because even then, even in that moment, the building and the world outside still existed.

You came so hard your vision whited out at the edges, thighs shaking around his waist, and he followed shortly after with a low, broken sound against your neck, hips stuttering as he buried himself deep.

Afterward you lay there tangled on the floor, breathing hard, neither of you speaking for a long time. The weight of what had just happened settled over both of you like a second skin -intimate, terrifying, and already laced with the knowledge that this would complicate everything without solving anything.

You didn't label it. Not that night, not ever. It simply became another layer of the thing between you: a new way to argue with your bodies instead of your words.

Sometimes it followed a fight -angry, rough, biting kisses and hands that gripped too hard, the kind of sex that felt like punishment and absolution at once.

Sometimes it happened in the quiet lulls, slower and almost tender in its exhaustion, where he would press his face into your neck and you would let yourself hold him like he was yours without ever saying it.

The toxic rhythm continued, unchanged at its core.

He would disappear for days after particularly raw nights -ghosting texts, avoiding your usual corridors, throwing himself into work like distance could reset the scale.

You would do the same, blocking his number for forty-eight hours only to unblock it when the silence felt worse than the fighting. You'd show up at each other's dorms at odd hours under flimsy excuses (a forgotten charger, a question about a stage cue, clothes left behind on purpose), and end up in his bed, against his door or in the shower with the water running loud enough to cover the sounds you couldn't quite muffle.

He knew your body with devastating accuracy-the exact pressure on your clit that made your legs give out, the angle that had you clenching around him with a broken whimper, the way sucking on the spot just below your ear made you forget every defensive retort.

You knew his -the way his hips stuttered when you whispered filthy observations against his mouth, the way gripping the back of his neck grounded him when he got lost in his own head, the way he groaned your name like a curse and a prayer when you rode him slow and deliberate, refusing to let him rush.

It was never just sex.

It was the continuation of every conversation you refused to finish out loud.

Every thrust carried the weight of 'I see you.' Every bite carried 'I hate how much I need this.'

Every time he came with your name muffled against your skin, it felt like another thread tightening around the thing neither of you would name.

You kept orbiting. Fights, silence, explosive nights that left you both wrecked and temporarily softer, then more fights.

The push and pull became the architecture of whatever this was -intimate, codependent, and fundamentally unresolved.

Because naming it would require choosing, and choosing felt more dangerous than the endless cycle of coming together and pulling apart.

▬▬ THREE YEARS OF VIOLENCE, three years, and James was still the same.

Still the same flat delivery and assessing gaze and emotional availability of a particularly well-defended fortress. Still the same almost-smile that completed itself approximately four times a year and each time felt like being handed a delicious forbidden fruit.

Still the same fluency in your pressure points, still the same precision with words when he wanted them to land somewhere specific, still the same capacity to fill a room with his particular brand of charged.

You'd never been able to adequately explain to anyone who asked, though.

You'd tried, once, when Hye-ri had asked you to describe what it was about him -what the actual thing was, underneath the toxicity narrative, underneath the drama, the real answer.

You'd sat with the question for a long moment and then said: "he's the most specific person I've ever met."

In conclusion, you were both still the same, only maybe worse.

You rolled your eyes so hard it actually hurt, tossing your phone onto the silk duvet of your bed.

Lock my doors? Who the fuck does this fucking little bitch think he is?

As if he hadn't already broken through every single one of your defenses years ago, making sure you were now opened raw and spread on a fucking platter for him - aphrodisiac foods and all.

You knew exactly what he was doing, playing that toxic game where he'd insult your existence one minute and then pull you against him so tight you could feel his heartbeat the next.

Grabbing your oversized hoodie, you didn't even bother changing out of your stage makeup, the glitter still clinging to your eyelids like shimmering armor.

You knew you were playing with fire, but the adrenaline of a fight was the only thing that made you feel alive lately.

Maybe that was the whhole problem.

Every argument with James sent something electric through your veins, sharp and addictive, the way his jaw clenched when he was angry, the way your pulse quickened when neither of you backed down, the way every cruel word felt like a challenge thrown across a battlefield.

It was exhausting. It was toxic. It was also the closest thing to feeling alive you had found in months

Silence bored you. Peace made your skin itch. But a fight with James? A fight with James could have your heart hammering against your ribs so hard it felt like it was trying to escape.

It made you feel seen. Seen in the worst possible way, maybe, but seen nonetheless.

Because no one got under your skin the way he did and you hated him for it.

You hated how he could turn a harmless conversation into a screaming match. Hated how he knew exactly which buttons to push. Hated how anger always burned hotter when it was directed at him.

And maybe the sickest part was that, somewhere between the insults and slammed doors, you found yourself craving it.

Craving him.

Not because fighting felt good, but because it was the onnly language neither of you lied in.

Ten minutes later, you were standing in the hallway of the Cortis dorms, your knuckles rapping sharply against the wood, and your keys in your hand (which you'd hoped you could stab through his stupid face).

The door swung open almost immediately, and there he was, hair a mess, eyes bloodshot, looking absolutely wrecked but still somehow infuriatingly handsome.

"The hell you doin' here?" James muttered, leaning heavily against the doorframe. His voice was raspy, thick with the remnants of alcohol and irritation. He looked you up and down, his gaze lingering a second too long on your legs before he scowled. "Thought you'd be tucked in at 9pm, acting all high and mighty like always."

"You're a dick, James," you snapped, stepping past him into his space without waiting for an invitation. "Juhoon told me you were out here throwing a tantrum like a child."

"A tantrum?" He let out a dry, bitter laugh, closing the door with a heavy thud behind you.

He stepped into your personal bubble, looming over you so you had to tilt your head back just to meet his eyes. The tension was thick enough to choke on that familiar, jagged energy that always preceded a blowout or a breakdown.

"You're the one who came here. I was just drunk, it wasn't that deep."

"Not that deep?" You scoffed, stepping closer, your chest nearly brushing his, refusing to let his height intimidate you. "You're literally texting people like a fucking psycho, James. You're embarrassing yourself."

James let out a huff, the scent of expensive whiskey and something uniquely him, hitting you full force. He didn't back away. Instead, he leaned down, his face inches from yours, his eyes dark and swirling with a mix of intoxication and pure irritation.

"Embarrassing? Please," he sneered, his gaze dropping to your lips for a split second before snapping back to your eyes. "You love it. You love comin' over here in the middle of the night just to tell me how much of a prick I am. You're addicted to the drama, y/n. Don't even lie to yourself, that's embarrassing."

He reached out, his fingers catching a strand of your hair, tugging it just slightly not enough to hurt, but enough to make the contact feel intentional, aggressive.

"You're so damn extra," he muttered, his voice dropping an octave, turning low and dangerous. "Walkin' in here lookin' like that...full of attitude. You think you're so untouchable, huh? Like you're too big for this shit?"

He stepped even closer, forcing you to take a half step back until the edge of his kitchen counter pressed into your lower back. He loomed over you, his presence heavy and suffocating in the best possible way.

"You're a menace," he whispered, his thumb grazing your jawline, his touch surprisingly soft compared to the venom in his words. "A loud mouthed, beautiful girl. And you're drivin' me fucking crazy."

His eyes searched yours, searching for the spark of a fight, for the retaliation he knew was coming. He was baiting you, pushing you to the edge because he knew that once you tipped over, there was no going back to being 'just friends' or 'just a situationship.'

"So, what's it gonna be tonight?" he challenged, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth, though it didn't reach his eyes. "You gonna scream at me 'til your throat hurts, or are you gonna shut the fuck up and actually do something about it?"

You let out a sharp, mocking laugh, refusing to let his proximity intimidate you even as your heart thudded a frantic rhythm against your ribs.

God, he was so predictable, using his hands to distract you when he knew he was losing the verbal war.

You reached up, grabbing the front of his shirt with a white knuckled grip, pulling him down until your foreheads collided.

"You're so full of yourself, thinking i'm the only one addicted to this," you hissed, your eyes flashing with a mix of fury and hunger. "Maybe I didn't come here to scream, James. Maybe I just came to remind you exactly who it is that actually puts up with your bullshit."

Without waiting for his smug comeback, you stood on your tiptoes and crashed your lips against his, the kiss less of a romantic gesture and more of a car crash, hard, desperate, and tasting faintly of whiskey. The moment your lips slammed into his, a low, guttural sound escaped the back of James's throat halfway between a groan and a growl.

He didn't do gentle. He didn't do "sweet." And that was more than enough.

The second you initiated the contact, his hands moved from your hair to your waist, his fingers digging into the fabric of your oversized hoodie with a bruising intensity, as if he were trying to pull you inside his very skin.

He kissed you back with a frantic, starving energy— tongue sweeping against yours like a battle for dominance. It was messy, teeth clashing, the taste of unbridled tension coating your mouth. He tasted like the chaos you both thrived in.

"Fuck," he breathed against your lips, breaking the kiss for just a fraction of a second to catch his breath, his forehead still pressed hard against yours.

James' eyes were blown wide, the pupils swallowing the iris, looking dark in the dim light of the apartment. "You're such a brat. Always gotta have the last word, even when you're using your mouth for something else."

He didn't give you time to retort. His hands slid down from your waist, gripping your thighs and hoisting you up so you had to wrap your legs around his waist just to stay upright. He backed you up against the counter, the granite cold against your skin, but he was pure heat.

"You think you're so smart, huh?" he muttered, his lips grazing the sensitive skin just below your ear, sending a violent shiver down your spine. He nipped at your lobe, his voice dropping into that rough, drawl that always made your knees weak. "Thinkin' you can just walk in here, look all pretty and smug, and make me forget how much you pissed me off hours ago?"

He pulled back just enough to look you in the eyes, his gaze heavy and hooded, his thumb dragging roughly over your bottom lip, smearing the remnants of your lip gloss.

"I still hate you." He declared, as if you could care less.

He leaned back in, his kiss deeper this time, more possessive, his hands roaming your body as if he were trying to memorize every inch of the girl who knew exactly how to ruin him.

A wicked, dangerous thought flickered in the back of your mind.

You weren't just going to let him have his way not tonight.

He thought he was the one in control, the one who could just summon you with a few drunken, messy texts and expect you to fall into his lap.

Not a chance, fucker.

You leaned into the chaos, matching his intensity with a fervor that was almost manic, let your hands slide under his shirt, your nails grazing the skin of his back, tracing the muscles there just enough to make him hiss through his teeth.

You kissed him like you were trying to consume him, your movements calculated and devastatingly effective. You knew exactly where to press, how to tilt your head, how to let your breath hitch in a way that he could feel against his skin.

You felt him react the way his breathing went wild, the way his grip on your thighs tightened until it was almost painful, and the unmistakable shift in his body as he grew hard against you. He was losing it.

The smug, cocky James was being dismantled by the very person he'd spent the last hour insulting.

Just as his hands began to slide lower, just as he let out a sound that was finally pure and honest, you pulled back.

A sharp, sudden break. You slid off him, your feet hitting the kitchen floor with a soft thud that felt deafening in the sudden silence.

James stumbled slightly, his hands grasping at empty air where your waist had been seconds ago. He blinked, his eyes glazed and dark, looking completely dazed and desperately needy.

"Where the fuck are you going'?" he rasped, his voice cracking. He reached for you, his movements uncoordinated, his face a mask of confusion and frustration. "Y/n, don't be a bitch. We just-"

"We just what, James?" you interrupted, your voice cool, smooth, and entirely too calm for someone who had just been devouring him. You reached up, smoothing down your oversized hoodie, your expression unreadable despite the glitter still shimmering on your eyelids. "You were 'just drunk,' remember? You said it wasn't that deep.”

You turned toward the door, a small, triumphant smirk playing on your lips that you made sure he couldn't see.

Gotcha bastard.

"Wait, hold up," he growled, stepping toward you, his chest heaving. He looked wrecked hair a disaster, lips swollen, and a look of pure, desperate irritation on his face. "You're really gonna do this? You're gonna leave me like this?"

"Get used to it you manchild," you tossed over your shoulder, grabbing your keys. "You wanted a tantrum? You got one. night, James."

As you walked out the door, you could practically feel his gaze burning a hole in your back, his frustration radiating off him in waves. You knew he was standing there, probably cursing your name under his breath

And that was exactly the point.

▬▬ THE NEXT DAY HIT like a hangover, except for the part you weren't the one who'd been drinking.

You pushed through the revolving doors of the HYBE building with your signature Prada sunglasses perched on your nose even though the lobby lighting was soft and flattering. Your manager scurried behind you like an overworked shadow, clipboard in hand, already rattling off the day's agenda in rapid-fire mode.

"R3SET styling at 10:30 sharp. You're filming joint content today with Enhypen for their new single promo - dance challenge, variety games, and that 'chemistry talk' segment the fans love. Their company specifically requested some cross-group pairings."

You offered her a small, tired nod instead of words, flipping your hair so the ends brushed your shoulders in a smooth motion. The echo of your shoes against the marble floors cut through the quiet hum of staff and distant practice room bass as you kept walking.

'No need to snap at her just because you're exhausted' you thought to yourself. She was just doing her job in this machine that never stopped spinning.

You saved your venom for people who actually deserved it. Not that you had a specific name in mind.

Enhypen. Cute. At least it wasn't him. Today you could breathe without the weight of last night's wreckage pressing on your ribs.

Inside the fifth-floor styling suite reserved exclusively for R3SET, he air smelled of warm curling irons, fresh coffee from the craft table, and that signature Jo malone diffuser scent they pumped in to "set the mood."

Clothing racks dominated one wall —today's concept was cool, street style: oversized Adidas zip-up jackets in sleek black and washed-out grey, layered over fitted crop tops, paired with relaxed cargo pants and sneakers.Your members were already deep in transformation mode. Mina sat regal while a senior stylist perfected her long extensions, Hye-ri was getting her nails done in a glossy blood-red, and maknae Soeun was dozing in her chair as the makeup artist contoured her cheeks into something angelic.

You dropped into the center makeup chair like you owned the entire floor, crossing your legs with a dramatic sigh.

Ji-eun, your long-time makeup artist who had survived two years of your moods, gave you a quick once-over in the mirror.

"Rough night?" she asked under her breath, already squeezing primer onto her palette.

"Define rough," you muttered, scrolling through your phone even though the notifications were painfully empty.

No drunk apologies.

No blocked-number workarounds. Just silence.

"Just make me look... alive please.'"

Ji-eun smiled faintly. "Got it."

Mina glanced over, lips already glossed to perfection. "You disappeared after practice yesterday. Again. You good?”

"Spectacular," you replied, voice laced with sarcasm. "Just dealing with manchildren who thinks 2 am. drunk texts are romantic."

Hye-ri's head snapped up like a meerkat. "James again? Seriously, unnie, how many times are you two gonna do that toxic shit before one of you actually taps out?"

Never, your mind whispered traitorously.

"It's complicated, what can i say?" You shrugged.

The memory of last night flooded in uninvited; his wrecked hair, whiskey breath, the way he'd pinned you against the counter like he wanted to disappear inside you.

It all felt like a blade you kept pressing into both your palms just to feel something real.

Ji-eun worked in focused silence, blending cool concealer under your eyes to erase the shadows of sleeplessness. She layered on a smoked-out lid with razor-sharp black wings, turning your gaze predatory and elegant. Your lips got a venomous berry stain -kiss-proof, because your line of work demanded perfection even when your insides felt like chaos

The K-pop content machine never stopped turning.

Joint promotions like this with Enhypen were calculated gold: their boy-group energy paired beautifully with R3SET's girl-crush concept. Dance challenges, playful variety games, forced "get-to-know-you" segments -all designed to spark fan edits and trending hashtags.

Companies loved this shit. Fans ate it up.

Your phone buzzed. A staff message confirming the pairings. You didn't bother opening it fully.

Hye-ri spun in her chair, now fully styled in a cropped metallic top. "Jake and Sunghoon are stupid fine. Think we'll get paired for the couple dance segment?"

You scoffed, examining your reflection as Ji-eun finished with setting spray. The girl in the mirror looked lethal  -flawless skin glowing, hair in sleek waves with face-framing pieces.

But inside, something softer twisted. Last night you'd ghosted James properly after months of toxic push-and-pull. Deleted everywhere. Left him standing there wrecked. And now, even on a day that had nothing to do with Cortis, his stupid ghost lingered like expensive cologne you couldn't wash off.

'Let him suffer', you thought, but the thought carried a quiet ache -like pressing on a bruise just to watch the colors bloom.

Of fucking course he wouldn't suffer, how naive could you be?

"Yeah, well," you said aloud, voice dripping venom, "hot doesn't fix emotional constipation. Most of these guys are better at choreography than conversation anyway."

You had... weird ways to cope.

Soeun giggled. "Unnie, you're so scary."

"I'm trying to give you realistic expectations," you corrected, standing up as the stylists adjusted your jacket to hang off one shoulder just right.

Your manager popped her head back in. "Fifteen minutes until we head to Studio 4 with Enhypen. Smile. Be friendly. The director wants natural vibes."

You smirked at your reflection one final time, tilting your chin.

Natural vibes.

Sure. You could do that

As R3SET filed out toward the elevators - sneakers tapping in unison, ther familiar tension coiled low in your stomach.

Not because of Enhypen, but because somewhere in this same building, James was probably nursing the same bruised ego and headache you'd gifted him last night.

You wondered if he'd heard about today's schedule. You wondered if he'd care, which was obvious, he probably wouldn't care

The distant bass from practice rooms thrummed through the walls like a heartbeat. Your own heart did that stupid, traitorous flip it always did when your thoughts drifted to him -equal parts hate and hunger, wrapped in the prettiest shade of toxicity.

This is going to be a long day, you thought, a small, but at least today, the battlefield didn't have his name on it.

You stepped into Studio 4 with a soft smile, the bright lights warming your face as you adjusted the oversized zip-up jacket hanging casually off one shoulder. The polished floors reflected the group's energy, professional. and you gave a little wave to everyone already there, your glittery eyelids catching the light in a subtle shimmer.

Your members moved around you comfortably- Mina offering polite hellos, Hye-ri stretching with a laugh, and Soeun rubbing her eyes sleepily.

The Enhypen boys were clustered near the craft table, looking sharp in their coordinated streetwear. Jake noticed you first and flashed that warm, dimpled smile. "Hey! So glad you guys made it."

You returned the smile easily, tilting your head with a small laugh. "Hi, yeah, we're excited to be here. Thanks for having us, the new song is amazing, by the way."

Okay, just breathe and be normal. No need to overthink this, you thought, suspicious they'd read through your mind and find out just how much of a crazy bitch you were

Jake had a face that screamed 'I like being pegged.'

Your manager gave you an approving nod as you kept things light and friendly, your members chatting politely with them.

Sunghoon offered you a curt nod, while Heeseung bowed politely. Jungwon, the leader, stepped forward with easy warmth.

"I watched some of your latest stages y/n! The dance machine herself- it's really cool to finally collab like this."

Dance machine. The nickname always made you duck your head a little, cheeks warming with humble pride. You'd earned it through endless hours in practice rooms, pushing your body until the music felt like it lived in your bones, but you never let it go to your head.

"Ah, stop, it's too sweet," you said with a shy grin, waving it off. "I'm just happy to dance with all of you. And Riki and i gotta live up to the title of best dancers of this generation."

You caught Riki's eye across the group and gave him a friendly fist bump when he approached, his tall frame and sharp grin matching your energy in the best way. There was an easy respect between you two, no awkwardness, just shared love for the craft.

"Yeah i'm sure we could never disappoint" Riki said, voice low and teasing but kind.

"Pretty sure we won't," you replied softly, smiling wide. "I've been practicing that footwork you posted last month - it's killer."

The director clapped his hands, calling everyone into position before the conversation could continue. "Alright! Starting with the dance challenge for the 'Bite me' remix. Let's keep it natural, lots of energy and good vibes."

The cameras started rolling, and you moved with effortless grace, your body syncing to the heavy bass like it was second nature. Every sharp isolation, every smooth body roll, every powerful pop flowe out of you, drawing quiet cheers from the staff. Riki matched you perfectly, the two of you creating that unspoken chemistry that made the dance feel alive. During the partner section, his hand guided your waist for a small lift- professional, precise, and supportive.

Between takes, you found yourself chatting with the tall man near the water station. He leaned against the wall, wiping sweat from his brow with a towel. "Your timing on that pre-chorus footwork is insane. How do you even make the transitions feel so natural?

You smiled, twisting open your water bottle and taking a sip. "Lots of late nights pushing it until it clicked, honestly. But you're incredible too - you know that ankle detail you added? I tried stealing it for our teaser, but it looked mid." A soft, genuine laugh escaped you. It felt refreshing, this easy conversation without any sharp edges.

God, when was the last time talking to someone didn't feel like walking through a minefield?

Your mind drifted traitorously back to James, as it always seemed to do.

He would've noticed already -the single rebellious lash at the outer corner of your right eye that curled upward like a tiny black wing, refusing to cooperate no matter how carefully Ji-eun applied the mascara. It looked like deliberate eyeliner, but it wasn't.

James knew that.

He noticed everything about you: the way you favored your left hip when it tightened from over-practice, the specific tilt of your head when you were holding back a real smile, the faint scar on your knuckle from that mic stand incident two years ago. Even in the trainwreck of your relationship, he saw the small things that made you feel truly seen... and that was part of what made everything so complicated.

You shook the thought away gently (aggressively) as the director called for the variety games segment.

The group split into mixed teams for the silly relays -balloon passing with no hands, quick karaoke bits, and freestyle dance prompts. You ended up with Jake and Riki, fumbling through the challenges with plenty of laughter and when it was your turn to freestyle, Riki kicked it off with footwork that had everyone clapping. You followed with fluid waves and isolations, keeping it playful and encouraging the others, the cameras rolled capturing the brotherly energy that Enhypen had towards your members and you.

This was fun, better than sulking all day because of some self centered prick-

Jungwon laughed from the sidelines. "You really are the dance machine. That was so smooth!"

You blushed a little, smiling shyly. "Thanks, but you guys killed it too, no really."

The chemistry talk segment wrapped things up, everyone sitting in a loose circle on the studio floor with mics clipped on. The questions started light -favorite collabs, funny stage fails, dream variety show ideas. Hye-ri's dramatic reactions had the whole group giggling. Then it shifted to partnerships.

"So, y/n and Riki," the MC staff prompted with a friendly smile. "You two are always trending for your dance collabs. What's it like working together?"

Riki glanced at you thoughtfully. "She pushes everyone to be better. It's easy to sync up cause i feel like we both catch the little details that make a performance special."

You nodded, smiling softly as you tucked a strand of hair behind your ear. "He's right. It's nice when someone just... gets the feeling behind the moves. And Riki's always so encouraging, like a brother,- i learn a lot from him."

You gave his shoulder a light, friendly nudge and the laughter that followed felt natural, the cameras capturing the easy, likeable vibe the director wanted. Filming wrapped with group photos, warm goodbyes, and promises of future collabs and some Enhypen members filed out first, waving cheerfully.

You were gathering your things, slinging your bag over your shoulder with a content sigh, when the studio door opened briefly.

James walked past in the hallway, probably heading somewhere else in the building, his messy hair and sharp jawline unmistakable even from a distance.

His eyes flicked inside the studio and landed on you- specifically on you chatting animatedly with Riki near the exit, the two of you still exchanging quick notes about the choreography with easy smiles.

You didn't see him at first, but your chest did.

His expression tightened for a split second -something unreadable- before he kept walking. You caught the movement out of the corner of your eye too late, your smile faltering just a touch as that toxic mix of ache and hunger twisted quietly inside you again.

You adjusted the strap of your bag on your shoulder, and waved goodbye to the other members as they headed off to their next schedule.

Jake shot you a thumbs-up, and you waved back with both hands, cheeks still carrying that post-filming flush.

Being kind came naturally most days -it was easier to smile and lift others up than to sharpen your words like weapons- but moments like this reminded you how fragile that calm could be when James was involved.

Not that you actually gave a fuck.

Your members gathered around you near the mirrors as staff began packing up equipment.

Mina tilted her head, noticing the tiny shift in your expression. "You okay, unnie? You looked like you were having fun with Riki earlier."

You let out a soft breath and smiled again, this one a little smaller but still real. "Yeah, I'm good. It was really fun. Riki's so talented -it's nice when you can just... dance without thinking and all that corny stuff."

"You two are literally the dance machine duo everyone talks about. I swear, the way you synced up? Chef's kiss. But seriously, you've been a little spacey today." Hye-ri slung an arm around your shoulders, her blood-red nails flashing under the lights. "Is it because of... looser king?"

Looser king was the -ridiculous and childish- nickname you'd given James, it was some sort of code name to make it easier to speak about him under full confidentiality.

But you were pretty sure James was aware that he was in fact the looser king.

Soeun perked up from where she was sipping her water, eyes wide and curious. "Wait, James again? Unnie, you gotta tell us the full story one day. You always come back from seeing him looking like you got into a fight with 10 elephants or something."

You ducked your head with a shy laugh, tucking that stubborn strand of hair behind your ear again.

The rebellious lash at the outer corner of your right eye caught in the mirror's reflection -curling upward just enough to look like intentional liner flair.

You knew James would have zeroed in on it instantly if he'd been closer.

It was scary, really -how someone who drove you so crazy could still make you feel more seen than the thousands of fans screaming your name.

Why did he have to notice the small things? It would be easier if he just... didn't

Screw that, it would be easier if he just fucking died.

"I don't know," you admitted quietly to your members, voice kind and a little vulnerable as you all started walking toward the elevators. "It's complicated. He texts something messy at 2 a.m., i show up like an idiot, and then... well, you know. But today was nice. No drama, just dancing and laughing with good people. I'm tryna keep it that way."

Hye-ri squeezed your shoulder supportively. "You deserve easy days, unnie. You work harder than anyone I know. Him on the other hand? He deserves to get properly beaten up."

The compliment warmed you, but the last comment made you even happier, and you bumped her lightly with your hip, grinning.

"Stop, you're gonna make me blush in front of the staff, i'm gonna start thinking it's okay to beat men up sometimes."

Inside your head, though, the gremlin of misconduct whispered: "Beat him up until he can't even curse at you anymore. Violence IS the answer."

•••

As you rode the elevator down, your phone buzzed in your pocket -a staff message about the next schedule and a few fan edits already popping up from previous projects.

You looked through the myriad of comments, some outstandingly mean for no reason, but some comforting.

And every few seconds your mind circled back to James standing in that hallway, jaw tight, eyes locked on you like he couldn't look away. He'd seen the easy smile you gave Riki, the open body language, the way you were genuinely enjoying yourself without the usual push-and-pull.

You wondered if he'd text again tonight. If you'd answer. If you'd end up right back where you started —face down in his bed or storming out his door.

For now, though, you zipped up your hoodie a little higher and followed your members out into the lobby, offering small smiles and waves to passing staff.

Self control was a beautiful invention.

Because you were about 99% sure that without it, you'd be yelling at everyone by now.

Mina walked on your left, her long extensions swaying elegantly with each step like a curtain, one hand absently twirling a strand around her finger in that regal quirk of hers that always made her look like she belonged in a drama scene even during casual walks. At 24, she carried herself with this quiet, big-sister poise that somehow made everyone around her feel steadier.

Hye-ri, on your right, bounced along, her freshly done blood-red nails flashing like warning signs every time she gestured wildly, cracking her knuckles with a satisfying pop that made Soeun cringe beside her. 20 year old Hye-ri was the spark plug of R3SET -bold, dramatic, but with a heart so big it could probably power the entire building

"I swear, y/n-unnie, you and Riki looked like you were born to share a stage, it's so sad fans would make rumors if you guys collabed... Meanwhile, I was over here trying not to drop that balloon on Jake's head during the relay. Did you see his face? Poor guy went full puppy eyes."

She let out a bright, infectious laugh that turned a few heads in the lobby, slinging her arm around your shoulders again in that casual, protective way she had. She'd had a long time crush on Jake, he had this thing about him, almost like a little dog, harmless and awkward. You could see the appeal— that is if you weren't so blinded by toxicity.

Maknae Soeun trailed just behind, rubbing at her eyes with the heel of her hand in her signature sleepy way, her angelic contoured cheeks still flushed from the variety games. At 19, she was all wide-eyed curiosity mixed with this adorable habit of dozing off mid-conversation if things got too calm, only to pop back awake with the most random questions.

"Can we get snacks on the way back? My stomach's doing that rumble thing again." She patted her belly.

As your manager's van pulled up to the curb, Hye-ri hopped in first, dramatically claiming the back seat with a flourish of her red nails. "Shotgun for snacks! Soeun, no falling asleep on my shoulder this time -you drool."

Soeun climbed in after her with a sleepy protest and a giggle, "I don't. Only time i did that was cause i was exhausted."

Mina slid in gracefully beside you in the middle row, her extensions pooling neatly as she offered you a piece of gum from her bag -another one of her quiet caring quirks, always prepared with little comforts, her eyes flicking to you with that perceptive big-sister intuition.

You accepted it with a grateful smile, popping the minty gum into your mouth as the van merged into traffic. "Thanks, Mina. Seriously, you all made today feel easy, no pressure, just... dancing and laughing. It's been a while since it felt that light, you guys are the best."

The girls smiled at you, Hye-ri pulling you into a side hug as the van settled. The city lights started blurring past the windows as evening crept in, and Soeun's head was already starting to tilt toward Hye-ri's shoulder despite her earlier denial. Hye-ri just rolled her eyes fondly, adjusting so the maknae could rest comfortably -her tough exterior hiding the softest spot for the youngest.

"You know," Hye-ri said after a beat, voice dropping into something more sincere as she looked at you, "whatever's going on with James... you don't have to figure it out alone, you know that right?"

You leaned your head against the cool window, watching the streets pass in a gentle rhythm, and let out a small self-deprecating laugh.

"I know. And I appreciate it more than you guys realize. He's just... he's so weird. And so i get weird too, it's a never ending cycle. And it's kinda...complicated. "

The van filled with understanding hums and a few teasing but kind jabs from Hye-ri about "toxic hot boys,"  but you just refused to categorize him as that. He was mean, and rude, and moody, but toxic?

Was it really toxic if you wanted it that much?

• • •

           You stepped into the dorm after what felt like an eternity, the heavy door clicking shut behind you with a sigh of relief. The familiar scent of vanilla candles and the faint trace of Hye-ri's strawberry body spray wrapped around yu.

She always had this way of spraying the sweetest scents that reminded you of your childhood, back when you weren't this tormented by fat CEOs and executives.

The living room was dimly lit by the string lights Soeun had insisted on hanging last month -soft golden glows that made the space feel less like a high-end prison and more like an actual home. You kicked off your sneakers, letting them thud against the shoe rack, and padded toward your room in socked feet, the cool hardwood a small mercy against your aching soles.

"Unnie, don't stay up too late doing black magic on James, we've got early meetings tomorrow." Hye-ri called from the kitchen

She was already raiding the fridge for late-night snacks (cucumbers since the company had made her go on an -unnecessary- diet). Her voice carried that signature playful lilt, the one that always made you snort even when you were drained.

She was teasing you about the last fan rumors: people claiming they'd seen you do black magic on other idols at an award show; when you'd thought black magic meant the kind of princess-and-pony magic that people of color did.

"Yeah, yeah, I'll try not to summon any demons..." you shot back, voice tired but teasing.

In your room, you peeled off the oversized hoodie and cargo pants, tossing them into the laundry hamper with more force than necessary. The glitter on your eyelids had survived the day surprisingly well, but it was time to let the armor come off. You headed straight for the bathroom, twisting the faucet until steam rose in lazy curls. The tub filled slowly as you added a generous scoop of Epsom salts and a few drops of lavender oil -the good stuff your manager had gifted after that brutal comeback week.

Sinking into the hot water felt like sinking into oblivion, the heat seeped into your muscles, loosening the knots from hours of dancing and the invisible tension James always left coiled in your chest.

Somehow it all came back to him. Even when it wasn't inherently about him.                                                

God, just one night without thinking about that walking glob of spit and dust, you thought, tilting your head back against the cool porcelain edge while bubbles popped softly around you.

You scrolled through your phone with damp fingers -harmless stuff: fan edits, a few memes Soeun had sent in the group chat, a skincare tutorial that promised to fix "tired eyes."

For once, James didn't dominate every corner of your brain. You let yourself float there, eyes half-closed, humming the melody of Enhypen's new track under your breath.

After the bath, skin flushed and smelling like an Ulta store, you wrapped yourself in a fluffy robe and tackled your mini skincare ritual. Double cleanse, toner, serums layered like a protective spell -  your makeup artist Ji-Eun would be proud. You even did the gua sha thing Mina swore by, rolling the cool stone along your jawline while staring at your reflection.

Energized by the warm water and the rare quiet, you settled at your desk in soft lounge shorts and a cropped tank, laptop open.

You had a half-finished lyrics draft for a potential solo track- something about 'wanting what you shouldn't.'

Your fingers hovered over the keys, then dove in, you tweaked melodies on your keyboard setup, layering soft synths over a moody bassline. You even laughed at yourself when a particularly cheesy line came out - "heart like a battlefield, but damn if I don't love the war" -and deleted it immediately. Cringe. But accurate.

Your phone buzzed on the desk beside you, the screen lighting up with a new message. You glanced over, expecting a text from the members' group chat or a staff alert.

Instead, it was from him. James.

The preview showed an image attachment. Your stomach did that annoying little flip despite everything, what could he possibly have to say that fit into a singular photo?

You opened it. There, in crystal clear detail, was his hand -long fingers, veins prominent, the same hand that had gripped your thighs last night- holding up a pair of familiar red lace panties.

Your red lace panties. The delicate ones with the tiny bow at the front.

Your face heated instantly. That smug fucking asshole.

You could practically hear his raspy voice saying it, that low drawl laced with mockery. You stared at the photo, thumb hovering over the screen. The panties looked small in his grip, almost fragile against the rough masculinity of his hand.

Heat pooled low in your belly uninvited before you locked the phone and set it face down, refusing to give him the satisfaction of an immediate reply.

Ignore. Let him stew.

You tried going back to your lyrics, but the words blurred.

Then came another buzz, and against your better judgment, you checked.

It was a single picture with a small message.

JAMES ˗ˏˋ ꒰ ✉︎ ꒱ ˎˊ˗ they still smell like you

The same red lace panties were now wrapped tightly around his very hard cock. The fabric stretched obscenely over the thick length, the lace pattern visible where it strained. His hand was gripping the base, thumb pressing just below the head. The lighting in his room was low, shadows accentuating every single ridge and vein.

"Fuck," you whispered aloud, thighs pressing together instinctively, not without a bit of annoyance. Your pulse kicked up, a traitorous warmth spreading between your legs. The image was burned into your retinas now -raw, deliberate and meant to ruin your peace.

You typed back quickly, fingers flying:

YOU : ˗ˏˋ ꒰ ✉︎ ꒱ ˎˊ˗ You're actually deranged. Delete those.

Then, because you couldn't help poking the bear:

YOU ˗ˏˋ ꒰ ✉︎ ꒱ ˎˊ˗ And stop stealing my shit, you klepto

You waited. The typing bubbles appeared... then disappeared with no response. Minutes ticked by. Nothing. You refreshed the chat like an idiot, heart hammering.

Of fucking course. He started the fire and walked away. This was his sick revenge for yesterday.

The ache between your thighs grew insistent, slick and frustrating. You shifted in your chair, trying to focus on anything else- your laptop, the half-written chorus... But all you could picture was him, lounging in his bed, smirking at his phone while you sat here wet and bothered.

Eventually, you gave up, you brushed your teeth aggressively, changed into an oversized sleep shirt, and crawled into bed.

The sheets felt too warm, too smooth against your sensitized skin, you felt like you were about to blow up any minute, taunt nipples brushing against the mattress.

You tossed and turned, the image replaying behind your closed eyelids, his hand, the lace. The way he'd looked at you last night -desperate and furious and hungry all at once.

Your hand slipped under the covers once, hovering, but you stopped yourself with a groan,

Not giving him that power tonight.



▬▬▬ MORNING LIGHT FILTERED through your curtains, soft and golden. Your alarm hadn't even gone off yet when your phone vibrated on the nightstand. Groggy, you reached for it, rubbing sleep from your eyes.

And who better than an entitled motherfucker to wake you up when things were already going downhill.

JAMES : Two can play that game, you brat.

You stared at the screen, a slow smile tugging at your lips despite the fresh wave of heat low in your stomach. The dynamic between you two was a live wire -dangerous, addictive, impossible to quit, cold turkey. He pushed, you pushed back harder; he teased, you left him wrecked; he ignored, and you burned.

Still, he'd woken up and still thought about last nights events, stupid. Really amateur move.

YOU: Keep dreaming. Those panties are yours now. Consider it a parting gift.

You set the phone down, stretching languidly under the covers, body still humming from last night's unresolved tension. You wondered how long it would take before one of you cracked again.

JAMES : They were already mine, finders keeper.

• • •

The HYBE lobby was already in full morning swing when you pushed through the revolving doors. You had your phone pressed against your ear, pretending to be on a call so no one would stop you for small talk, which was a technique you'd perfected to a fine art over the years.                      

Your manager walked three steps behind you, mercifully quiet for once, scrolling through her own device.

You hadn't replied to James's last text yet. That was a choice. A very deliberate, very painful choice, like holding your hand over a candle flame just to prove you could.

You were fully aware that the longer you waited, the more it would eat at him, and the thought of James checking his phone every ten minutes with that jaw-tight, eye-twitching irritation he got when he was being ignored made something deeply petty bloom in your chest like a very satisfied flower.

You were not above petty. You had built an entire personality around it

The elevator dinged open on the third floor and you stepped out into the corridor that ran between the mid-size practice rooms, the ones with the slightly better sound systems that the senior acts got priority access to.

You were scanning your schedule on your phone, half reading, half still replaying his text in your head - two can play that game, you brat- when you nearly walked directly into Park Sunghoon's elbow.

"Whoa, sorry-" he started, stepping back.

"No, my fault," you said automatically, phone disappearing into your pocket like you weren't supposedly on a call, as you offered him a polite smile. He looked mildly alarmed in the way that extremely handsome people sometimes did when they accidentally inconvenienced someone, like they were genuinely surprised they could do something bad. "I wasn't looking where I was going."

"Neither was I," he said easily, readjusting the water bottle under his arm. "Good collab yesterday. You and Riki make everyone else look like they're moving through concrete."

"You're being modest, your lines yesterday were clean," you said, and meant it.

Sunghoon smiled. "The transition in the second section gave us trouble for a while. Didn't feel right until about two days before filming."

"You couldn't tell," you said. "That's the point."

"That's what our choreographer keeps saying," he said. "I'm starting to believe it."

You smiled. There was something straightforwardly easy about Sunghoon -direct without being pointed, warm without requiring anything in return.

Or maybe things were just so easy outside of the James sphere.

"The new single's really good, by the way," you said, because it was and because you'd meant to say it during the collab and the schedule hadn't allowed. "The bridge especially. The production detail in it."

"Jake's been working on that arrangement for weeks," Sunghoon smiled, "He'll be glad to hear that."

He lifted the water bottle in a small departing gesture and turned back down the corridor.

James saw it all from the far end of the hall.

He hadn't been heading this direction specifically - or rather, he had been, because the third floor had the good practice rooms, he had a session booked and the route took him through this corridor, which was a fact and NOT a choice.

He'd seen you before you saw him.

That was also a fact.

You were talking to Sunghoon. James slowed. Not stopped -he didn't stop, he kept walking, but at a pace that was slightly below his normal pace.

He couldn't hear the conversation. He just had the visual: you and Sunghoon in the corridor, the natural ease of it, you saying something and Sunghoon listening in the attentive way he had, then you both smiling at something, and your smile -landing in James's chest like a key finding a lock.

He kept walking. He was very focused on the middle distance, on the practice room he was going to and the session he had booked

He was fine.

He passed the two of you on the opposite side of the corridor — enough distance that proximity wasn't a thing, that nobody needed to acknowledge anybody, that he was simply a person walking down a hall and you were two people having a conversation and none of it required any interaction.

Sunghoon glanced over briefly. The nod of an industry acquaintance. James returned it with the economy of someone who was very focused on his destination.

He did not look at you. He felt you notice him anyway — the slight shift in the quality of the conversation, the atmospheric change that happened whenever he was in your space. A space that didn't belong to him.

James didn't see it though, he just knew it was there because after three years he could read the room you were in from his peripheral vision alone.

He kept walking. Turned the corner. Stopped. Stood against the wall with his coffee in both hands and looked at the corridor in front of him

The smile. The real one.

Directed at fucking Sunghoon.

He'd seen that smile maybe fifty times in three years. Each time it had cost him something. Each time he'd looked away before anyone could file it as evidence. And you'd given it to him. Hell you'd given it to so many people.

But it was his. His smile. It belonged to him.

You headed in opposite directions with nothing more than a nod, which you appreciated. Sunghoon had always struck you as someone who understood the value of not overstaying a conversation. You could respect that.

You were halfway down the hall when you felt it before you saw it  -that presence your nervous system had apparently been trained, like a very stupid Pavlovian dog, to recognize.

James was coming from the other direction, having circled back. He had his hood up, headphones around his neck, a coffee in one hand, and the particular walk he had when he'd slept badly -slightly slower than usual, shoulders carrying extra tension, jaw working like he was grinding through something mentally.

He looked like a weather system. Specifically, the kind with a rotating center and a name assigned by meteorologists.

You didn't slow down. Neither did he.

You passed each other with approximately forty centimeters of clearance and zero words exchanged. His eyes slid to yours for exactly one second -dark, unreadable, and annoyingly direct -before you both looked away simultaneously, with the practiced indifference of two people who had touched each other's skin less than thirty-six hours ago and were now pretending to be strangers in a hallway.

You turned the corner and stood still for two full seconds.

Cool, you thought. Great. Fantastic. Incredible start to the day.

Your phone buzzed, and you stared at the screen with the expression of someone watching a car roll slowly into a ditch.

You pocketed your phone with more force than necessary and pushed open the door to Practice Room 3B, where Mina was already stretching in the center of the floor serene, like someone who had slept eight full hours and woken up without a single unresolved situationship weighing on their conscience.

It must be nice, you thought, not for the first time, to be Mina.

"You good?" she asked, not looking up from where she was bent over one extended leg, her long extensions fanned across the floor.

"Perfect," you said, tossing your bag toward the mirror wall.

Completely, entirely, one hundred percent fine.

She looked up at that, because after a few years Mina could identify the specific frequency of your lies with the accuracy of military-grade sonar. One perfectly shaped eyebrow climbed toward her hairline. "Looser king?" she asked.

"Passed him in the hallway." you admitted.

"And?"

"Nothing. We didn't talk."

Mina made a small, diplomatic humming sound that somehow communicated, 'I have opinions about this but I love you so I won't say them right now,' which was honestly one of her most advanced social skills. She uncurled from her stretch and stood up with effortless grace.

"Hye-ri's getting coffee downstairs, Soeun already called in that she's running fifteen minutes behind because she fell back asleep.

"So out of character," you said, and meant it with great affection but with extreme sarcasm.

You pulled up the playlist for your current practice track, dropped into a stretch of your own, letting the familiar burn in your hamstrings pull your focus back into your body and away from the seven-layer cake of annoyance currently occupying the front of your mind.

Music drifted from the Bluetooth speaker -a pre-release track you'd been given early for choreography study, something with a heavy trap undercurrent. You hummed along absently, working through your warm-up sequence.

The thing about dancing -the real thing, the thing you couldn't explain to people who didn't do it-was that it required your entire brain. Not just the motor cortex doing its job, but everything: musicality, spatial awareness, emotional translation, split-second physical decision-making

When you were actually in it, properly in it, there was no room for anything else.

No James, no red lace photographs, no hallway eye contact that lasted exactly one second too long to be purely coincidental.

The problem was warm-up. Warm-up was not properly in it yet. Warm-up left your mind running parallel tracks, which meant James had real estate in your head and was currently doing absolutely nothing productive with it.

The door banged open.

"I got oat milk lattes and one matcha because Mina will make that face at me if I don't." Hye-ri swept in with a drink carrier, her red nails vivid against the cardboard, wearing a cropped sweatshirt that said PROBLEMS across the chest in block letters that you privately thought was too on the nose for a Tuesday morning.

She set the carrier down and looked between you and Mina with a swift social intelligence like she'd grown up reading rooms as a survival skill. "What'd I miss?"

"She passed 'looser king' in the hallway," Mina said, accepting her matcha.

Hye-ri turned to you with a curious exprsssion. "And?"

"Why does everyone keep asking 'and' like something interesting happened?" you said, taking your latte. "Nothing happened. We walked past each other. That's it."

"Did you make eye contact?

"Err... briefly."

"Did it kill you?"

"A little bit."

"Okay yeah that tracks." She dropped onto the floor beside you, tucking her legs into a butterfly stretch. "You know what your problem is? You're too proud to be the first one to crack and he knows it

You took a long sip of your latte and stared at the middle distance. "I really need you to not be right about this."

"Unfortunately," she said brightly, "I'm almost always right. It's actually a burden how smart and on the point i am."

"Tragic," Mina said, very quietly, into her matcha.

The door opened again and Soeun stumbled in looking like she'd been reassembled from several different directions, her hair in a lopsided bun and her bag hanging off one shoulder.

"I'm here, I'm here -the alarm got delayed.. AND I fell asleep, it wasn't just the falling asleep part-"

"We know," the three of you said simultaneously.

She dropped her bag and looked at you with sudden alertness, the way she sometimes snapped into clarity completely at random, like a phone screen turning on when you weren't expecting it.

"Did something happen with looser king?"

You looked at the ceiling.

"Everyone mind your business," you said, with all the conviction of someone who was absolutely going to tell them everything eventually. You liked gossip way too much.

Practice went well, which it usually did when you threw yourself into it. By the time your choreographer ran you through the new bridge section for the fourth time, you'd stopped thinking in words entirely and were operating purely on music and muscle memory, which was exactly where you liked to be.

Soeun caught the hip accent on the pre-chorus after several attempts and let out a delighted noise that made everyone in the room smile, because Soeun happy, made everyone happy.

Your phone stayed in your bag drugs whole time.

That was the rule -the one rule you actually kept consistently.

Whatever chaos was happening in the outside world, the practice room was the one place that remained clean.

When you finally surfaced two and a half hours later, sweaty and pleasantly wrung out, you had three messages from James waiting. You sat on the floor against the mirror wall to cool down, water bottle in hand, and read them in order.

JAMES : you know what's funny, you walking out the other day like that. pretty sure that's the most attention you've ever paid me

You looked at the screen for a long moment.That was more honest than anything he usually sent. James had always been dense, texting barely a few words before loosing interest, the fact that he'd made full sentences was concerning?

He wouldn't have said that if he'd thought it through. He was more careful than that when he was composed. Which meant he'd sent it before he was fully composed, which meant he'd been thinking about it for a while.

YOU : that's the saddest thing you've ever said to me. and you once told me my stage presence was "mid" so that's saying something

His reply came in thirty seconds, which told you everything.

JAMES : i was drunk when i said that

YOU : you're always drunk when you say the things that actually matter

JAMES : don't psychoanalyze me before noon

YOU:it's 11:47

JAMES : close enough

YOU : James.

A pause, longer than the previous ones.

Your chest did the thing it did sometimes -the complicated clench that wasn't quite longing and wasn't quite anger but lived in the narrow territory between them.

JAMES : come get your panties back

You let out a sound that was caught precisely between a laugh and a frustrated groan and Hye-ri looked up from where she was re-taping her fingers.

You held up a hand: 'don't ask'. She held both hands up: 'wasn't going to'.

YOU: burn them. keep them. donate them to a museum. I don't fucking care.

JAMES : you care, you love these panties.

YOU: I really don't anymore now that i know you had your filthy hands on it.

JAMES : same hands that had you bent over just last week.

You put your phone face down on the floor and pressed your palms to your eyes.

The maddening, infuriating, genuinely impressive thing about James was that he was a cruel asshole but also so particularly interesting. You knew the way his mood shifted when he was actually upset versus performing irritation, the minute tension around his eyes that appeared before a real argument. You knew he held his coffee cup with two hands in the morning even though it wasn't heavy enough to need two hands. You knew he got quieter, when something actually got to him, and that the loud version —the insults and the jaw clenching and the aggressive proximity- was almost always armor.

You knew his armor better than most people knew his face. That was the problem, distilled to its ugliest and most honest form.

You knew each other too well for any of the distance to actually work. Every exit you staged, every blocked number, every time you walked out his door with something that felt like triumph and tasted like loss- he could see through it.

And you could see through his.

It was like trying to hide from someone who had your exact same prescription lenses.

You picked up your phone.

YOU: fine. I'll come get them. but if you say anything stupid I'm leaving immediately.

JAMES : define stupid

YOU : anything that comes out of your mouth

JAMES : so you're definitely leaving immediately

YOU :yeah probably

JAMES : tonight?

YOU : yeah. tonight.

You locked your phone, stood up, rolling your neck until it cracked satisfyingly, and gathered your bag from the corner.

Soeun was demonstrating something to Hye-ri near the mirror, both of them half-watching you. Mina was on the phone across the room, not looking at you, which was actually the most suspicious thing she could have done

"Practice is over," you announced to no one in particular. "Everyone go be normal people somewhere else."

"We live with you," Soeun pointed out helpfully.

"Then go be normal people in our home."

"You're going to see him tonight, aren't you,"

Hye-ri said. It wasn't a question.

Her blood-red nails caught the overhead lighting as she crossed her arms, expression somewhere between fond and long-suffering, like a person watching their favourite disaster film for the eleventh time.

They already knew the ending and were choosing to watch anyway.

You slung your bag over your shoulder, in an exaggerated professional tone "I'm going to retrieve personal property that was stolen from me."

"In the middle of the night."

"Theft doesn't have business hours, Hye-ri."

She pointed at you with one finger. "You're going to come home and either look like you got thoroughly fucked or like someone ran you over, and either way I want a full debrief."

"Absolutely not," you said, heading for the door.

"I'm setting an alarm!" she called after you.

You waved your hand without turning around, the door swung shut behind you, and you stood in the corridor for a moment - in the particular specific quiet of having made a decision you knew was probably not wise and were going to make anyway.

Because some gravitational fields were simply too strong to resist with willpower alone.

▬▬▬THE CORTIS DORMS were exactly as chaotic as they always were at nine in the evening. You could hear them before you even reached the floor -the specific layered noise of  young men (more like boys) existing loudly and simultaneously.

Someone's music bleeding through a closed door, the distant sound of what was either a heated gaming session or a genuine argument, and the smell of instant ramen drifting into the corridor like an olfactory welcome mat

You'd changed before coming. Not a lot -you weren't about to give James the satisfaction of thinking you'd dressed for him- but you'd swapped the practice sweats for a pair of black sweatpants and a top. Hair down, lip tint, the same pair of sneakers you'd been wearing all day because you genuinely could not be bothered to perform any harder than this.

You were here on an errand. A retrieval mission.

A very normal, very emotionally uncomplicated visit to collect an item of personal property from a person you definitely did not have complicated feelings about.

This was a lie and you were aware of it.

You raised your knuckles to knock on the main dorm entrance when the door swung open from the inside, and you came face to face with Seonghyeon, who was clearly on his way out with his gym bag and had not been expecting you.      

"Oh," he said. "Hey."

"Hey," you gave a right smile.

A beat of the specific silence that existed between people who knew each other primarily through someone else's drama.

"He's in his room," Seonghyeon offered.

"Cool," you said. "Thanks."

He held the door open for you and left, which you appreciated enormously. You stepped inside, where the living room was occupied by Martin on the couch with a controller and Keonho eating ramen at the kitchen counter.                                         

Martin glanced up, did a small double take, and then looked back at his screen, Keonho lifted his chopsticks in a gesture that you interpreted as a greeting.

"He knows you're coming?" the younger asked, not unkindly.

"Allegedly," you shrugged.

"Cool." He went back to his ramen. No further questions.

You appreciated the Cortis members' collective commitment to minding their own business, which was either a very mature group dynamic or a survival mechanism developed from living with James the tyrant.

You knocked on his door with three sharp raps- not soft, never soft, softness at James's door felt like conceding something- and waited.

"It's open," he called.

You opened the door. His room was dim, lit by the lamp on his desk and the ambient glow of his monitor, which had a paused game on the screen. He was sitting on the edge of his bed, elbows on his knees, wearing a black hoodie and sweats, hair unstyled like when he'd showered and not thought about it afterward.

He looked up when you walked in and said nothing for a moment.

"You actually came," he noted

"I said I would."

"You say a lot of things."

"So do you," you said, stepping inside and letting the door fall shut behind you.

You crossed your arms, staying near the door, because proximity to James in a dimly lit room after nine pm was a variable that required careful management.

"Where are they?"

One corner of his mouth moved. Not quite a smile. Something more infuriating than a smile. He reached to the nightstand beside his bed without breaking eye contact and held up the red lace, dangling from one finger with a casual ease that made your jaw tighten.

"You came all the way here for these," he said.

"You made a whole deal out of having them," you said. "Don't act so surprised."

"I'm not surprised." He set them down on the bed beside him, which meant you'd have to get closer to take them, obviously intentional.

You stared at him for a moment with the knowledge that you saw exactly what was happening and was choosing to walk into it anyway, because what was the alternative —admitting you couldn't get within arm's reach of him without losing structural integrity?

Absolutely the fuck not.

You sprint-crossed the room and picked them up.

But caught your wrist in time. Not hard -barely any pressure at all, really- just the curl of his fingers around your wrist bone— and your pulse spiked before your brain had even fully processed the contact.

"You're just gonna leave," he said. It wasn't quite a question

"That was the plan," you answered.

"You're not gonna say anything?"

"I said plenty today. Over text. Which you started, by the way, with your little stupid photos."

"You could have ignored them." a hint of a smile tugged as his lips.

"How does one possibly ignore a dick pic?"

"Fair," His thumb moved slightly against the inside of your wrist, slow and thoughtless. Like he truly did that out of pure habit.

He was looking up at you from where he sat, which was a strange reversal of the usual geometry between you, and something about it stripped away layers of defense.

"You wanna fight?" he asked, like he was asking if you wanted a glass of water.

"I always wanna fight with you," you said honestly.

"Yeah." A pause. "Me too."

You looked at him. He looked at you. The lamp threw warm shadows across the angles of his face -- somewhere down the hall someone scored a goal based on the brief eruption from the living room, and none of it touched the specific atmosphere of this room, which had its own weather system entirely.

"Come here," he motioned, quietly.

Not commanding, just that, two words with the pretense stripped out. And that was the version of James that was the most genuinely dangerous, because it was the one you couldn't construct a defense against.

You let the red lace fall from your fingers like it had burned you, the fabric whispering against the nightstand as it landed.

James didn't move at first. He just watched you with that half-lidded stare, the one that always made you feel 20 pounds heavier. Then his hand was on your wrist again, firmer this time, tugging you down until your knees hit the edge of the bed between his spread thighs.

You went willingly. That was the worst part -you always went.

His other hand came up to your jaw, thumb pressing just under your chin to tilt your face toward his.

"You're pissed," he murmured, voice low enough that it vibrated against your skin.

"So are you."

"Yeah." His grip tightened, not enough to be rough but enough to remind you he could if you ever asked. "Come here and be pissed with me, then."

You kissed him first, skill issue.

It was immediate, messy, all teeth and frustration, the kind of kiss that felt like an argument with no words. His mouth was hot, demanding, tasting faintly of the mint he'd probably chewed to cover the taste of whatever he'd been stress-eating earlier.

You climbed into his lap without breaking it, knees bracketing his hips, hands fisting in the front of his hoodie like you wanted to rip it off and strangle him with it at the same time.

His hands settled on your hips, fingers flexing against the soft fabric of your sweatpants. Not pulling, not yet. Just holding. Testing.

"You really came all this way just to pretend you don't want this," he said, voice low, rough around the edges.

"I came for my panties," you answered, even as your hands slid up his chest, feeling the steady thump of his heart under the hoodie.

Too fast for someone pretending to be casual.

It was beating so hard his entire chest cavity was vibrating.

Could he feel yours doing the same thing? you wondered, panic rising in your throat like bile. Could he feel that it was beating because of him? Could he feel the difference between a heart that was just pumping blood, and a heart that was begging for him?

"Liar." He tugged you closer with a firm grip, guiding you until you were straddling one of his thighs.

The solid pressure of muscle against your core was immediate, warm, and maddening. You had to bite the inside of your cheek to swallow the sound that tried to escape, his thumb slipped beneath the waistband of your sweats, stroking bare skin in slow, lazy circles that sent heat pooling low in your belly.

"You always lie when you're already wet for me."

"Fuck you," you whispered, but there was no heat in it. Or maybe there was too much.

He huffed a quiet laugh against your collarbone, then pressed an open-mouthed kiss there, slow and deliberate, teeth grazing just enough to make you shiver.

"That's the plan."

He took his time, savoring the slow unraveling. Your top came off first, dragged upward by his hands, his calloused palms skimming up your ribs, thumbs brushing the sensitive underside of your breasts before cupping them fully.

He watched your face the entire time- cataloguing the way your breath hitched, the flutter of your lashes, the flush creeping across your chest. When he leaned in, mouth closing over one nipple, tongue slow and teasing in wet circles, you let out a shaky exhale and threaded your fingers through his hair, tugging harder than necessary.

James groaned softly against your skin, the vibration traveling straight through you. "Still so fucking sensitive here."

He switched sides, sucking harder this time, one hand sliding down your stomach until his fingers dipped beneath your waistband. He stroked you through the thin fabric of your underwear first- firm, deliberate circles that made your hips twitch forward involuntarily, chasing the friction.

"James-" you started, voice already fraying.

When he finally pushed your sweats and underwear down your thighs, you stood just long enough to kick them away. Naked now, while he was still mostly dressed.

The power imbalance felt deliberate and infuriating.

He pulled you back into his lap fully, both of you facing each other.

His hands mapped every inch of your bare back, then lower, squeezing your ass as he rocked you against the hard, insistent line of his cock still trapped in his sweats. The friction was torturous- too much fabric, not enough skin, the heat of him radiating through the material. You reached between you, palming him firmly, feeling the thick length twitch under your touch. He was hot, already leaking against the fabric.

"You're just as bad you know," you muttered against his mouth, stroking him slowly. "Acting like you don't think about this every single night."

"I do." Honest and raw. His voice dropped. "Every fucking night."

The confession cracked something open in your chest. You shoved his hoodie and shirt up and off in one impatient motion, running your hands over the familiar planes of his chest, the faint ridges of muscle, the tension coiled tight in his shoulders. His breathing had grown heavier, forehead pressed to yours, eyes half-closed as you freed him from his sweats and stroked him skin-to-skin-slow, deliberate pulls that made his hips jerk.

He caught your wrist again -the same one from earlier- and pulled your hand away. "No time."

And he was right, there was no time indeed. This was a quickie, one of the many you'd had with him, nothing more nothing less.

So he flipped you onto your back with controlled strength, the narrow dorm bed creaking under the shift in weight. He settled between your thighs, broad shoulders blocking out most of the lamplight. His cock nudged against your entrance, sliding through your slickness in slow, teasing drags against your clit, but never pushing inside. Just rocking, building the ache until your nails dug into his biceps.

You squirmed, nails digging into his biceps. "Stop fucking teasing."

"Make me." His smirk was infuriating, but his eyes were dark with the same need clawing at you.

You wrapped your legs around his waist and tried to pull him in, but he resisted, holding your hips down with one hand while the other braced beside your head.

He leaned down, kissing you deeply again, then trailed his mouth along your jaw, your neck, sucking a mark just below your ear that would be hell to hide tomorrow.

Only when you were trembling, hips chasing him desperately, did he finally push inside -inch by slow, thick inch. The stretch burned in the best way, filling you completely.

Your mouth fell open on a silent cry. James's hand clamped over your mouth instantly, palm firm, fingers pressing into your cheek.

"Quiet," he growled against your ear, voice strained as he bottomed out and stilled, letting you feel every inch of him. "Whole dorm's still awake. You want them to hear how badly you need me?"

You glared at him, but your walls clenched hard around him in response. He hissed through his teeth, eyes fluttering shut for a second before locking back on yours.

He started moving -slow, deep rolls of his hips that dragged against every sensitive spot inside you. Not frantic, not yet. Every thrust was calculated, angry in its restraint, like he was punishing you both for how much you needed this. The bed creaked softly with each movement.

Skin against skin, the faint wet sounds of him sliding in and out, your ragged breathing against his palm.

You moaned into his hand, the sound muffled and desperate and he leaned closer, forehead to forehead again, sweat starting to bead on his skin.

"Feel that?" he whispered, grinding deep on a particularly slow thrust. "So fucking tight. Like you were made for me.”

And maybe in its own fucked up way, you were. You were equally as mean, equally as complicated, you both probably deserved each other.

All you knew was that, you'd let him do anything to you, beyond what even the most depraved people could conceive

You bit the side of his palm in retaliation.

He chuckled darkly, then snapped his hips harder once, twice, making your eyes roll back before he slowed again, dragging it out. He did it until you molded around him, slowly taking his shape, filling all the spaces and cracks inside of him.

"Say it," he demanded, voice barely above a breath. "Tell me you missed this.”

You shook your head stubbornly, even as tears of overwhelming sensation pricked at the corners of your eyes.

He pulled almost all the way out -leaving you devastatingly empty-then slid back in so torturously slow you nearly sobbed against his hand.

"Say it."

"...Missed it," you mumbled against his palm, the words barely intelligible. "Missed you, asshole."

His eyes darkened further. The pace picked up gradually - still controlled, but deeper, rougher, hips slapping against yours with more force. Every thrust carried weeks of unsaid fights, missed calls and slammed doors. Anger and longing twisted together until you couldn't tell where one ended and the other began.

You wanted more, more, more.

You wanted to crawl into his skin and tear at his flesh until he was nothing but bones and a filthy ego.

His free hand gripped your thigh, spreading you wider, angling so he hit that spot inside you with every stroke. Your nails raked down his back, leaving red lines you knew he'd feel tomorrow. James groaned low in his throat, pressing his face into your neck, teeth grazing your shoulder as he fucked you harder.

You were close -embarrassingly close both to orgasming and dying as weirdly as it sounded— body tightening around him, thighs shaking.

James could feel it. He always could.

"Not yet," he rasped, slowing again, keeping you right on the edge. "Not until I say."

You whined against his hand, frustrated tears pricking at the corners of your eyes from the intensity of it all. He kissed the corner of your eye, almost gentle, then started moving again -long, dragging strokes that made your toes curl.

When he finally let you tip over, it crashed through you like a wave. Your whole body seized, back arching hard as you came with a broken cry muffled completely by his palm.

He fucked you through every wave, hips stuttering only slightly as your orgasm milked him, drawing it out until you were trembling and oversensitive beneath him.

James's rhythm grew erratic, thrusts turning rough and desperate. His breathing was ragged against your neck, hot and uneven.

"Fuck-fuck, I'm-" The words were barely coherent, growled into your skin. His hand finally slipped from your mouth so he could brace himself better, fingers digging into the sheets beside your head.

He drove into you one last time, burying himself to the hilt so deep you felt it in your stomach. His entire body went rigid above you -muscles locked, back bowing, thighs trembling against yours.

A low, guttural groan tore from his throat, raw and broken, vibrating against your collarbone as his hips jerked forward in sharp, involuntary pulses. You felt every pulse of his release-hot, thick spurts flooding deep inside you, each one accompanied by a helpless grind of his hips, like he was trying to push even deeper, trying to fuse the two of you together.

His cock throbbed hard with every wave, the warmth of him spilling and spilling until it started to leak out around where you were joined. His breath came in harsh, stuttering gasps, his forehead pressed tight to yours, sweat dripping from his hair onto your cheek.

For several long seconds he stayed buried inside you, hips making tiny, reflexive movements as the last aftershocks rolled through him, his body shuddering with the intensity of it.

When it finally ebbed, he collapsed half on top of you, heavy and boneless, face buried in the crook of your neck. His heart hammered against your chest, matching the frantic rhythm of your own.

Afterward, the room was very quiet. The lamp was still on. It was always still on, after, because neither of you ever thought to turn it off in the chaos of everything.

You lay on your back staring at the ceiling, one arm folded behind your head, and James lay on his stomach beside you with his face turned toward the wall, breathing slowly.                           

The distance between you was maybe four inches of mattress and approximately several miles of everything else.                                                          

You stared at the ceiling's small imperfections. There was a hairline crack in the plaster near the light fixture that described a gentle arc, like a parenthesis opened and never closed. You'd noticed it before. The thought arrived uninvited and you told it to leave.

"You're thinking too loud," James said into the pillow.

"You can't hear thoughts asshole."

"I can hear yours." A pause. "You get this specific kind of still when you're overthinking. Like you stop existing in your body a little bit."

You said nothing for a moment.

"That's very observant of you," you finally said, and your voice came out quieter than you intended but still filled with sarcasm.

"Yeah well." He shifted, turning his face toward you now, cheek pressed to the pillow, eyes half-closed but watching you in that steady way. "I pay attention."

"I know you do," you said. "That's the problem."

"Why's it a problem?"

"Because it makes it hard to pretend this is nothing."

The words sat in the air between you, neither retracted nor addressed immediately. After years, you'd finally been able to put words on the feeeling.

James was quiet for long enough that you started constructing your exit-  the mental logistics of gathering your things— the specific tone you'd use to say something deflecting and semi-sharp on your way out, the way you'd walk down the corridor past Keonho and Martin with your expression completely neutral.

"It's not nothing," James said.

Two words. Same economy as before. But so goddamn confusing. You turned your head to look at him. He was still watching you, and up close in the lamp light his eyes were less unreadable than usual -or maybe you'd just learned to read them, which was its own intimacy you'd never consented to.

"I know," you whispered.

"But you're still gonna leave."

"Yes."

"And tomorrow-"

"Tomorrow is tomorrow," you said.

He held your gaze for another moment, then something settled across his face -not resignation exactly, more like acceptance of a pattern neither of you had figured out how to break yet.

His fingers moved those four inches of mattress and found yours, not interlacing, just his hand covering yours, warm and still.

"Your lash was doing the thing today," he said, after a moment, gesturing to his own. "The outer corner one.”

You closed your eyes briefly. "I know."

"Ji-eun never gets it to lay flat."

The lamp hummed and for a few minutes neither of you moved or spoke. You were waiting for the sex trance to subside, so you could finally be yourself again, without the feeling of his hands etched in your ribs.

The four inches of mattress stayed exactly as they were, and his hand stayed on yours, and the ceiling crack remained a parenthesis with no closing bracket.

Eventually you sat up. Found your things as James watched you without speaking.

You paused at the door. "The lash always does that," you said. "Every time. You'd think I'd be used to it by now."

A beat.

"Some things you don't get used to, y/n," he said. "You just keep noticing them."

You stood in the doorway for one more second, not even knowing why, and then you walked out and pulled the door behind you with a quiet click that felt like punctuation.

Martin had fallen asleep on the couch. Keonho's bowl was in the drying rack. The corridor was empty and the building was quiet; you walked through it with your sneakers making soft sounds against the floor, the red lace in your jacket pocket, and the careful, fragile weight of 'it's not nothing' sitting somewhere behind your sternum like a splinter

Your phone buzzed as the elevator doors closed.

JAMES :get home safe

You stared at it for the entire descent. It was the sex. The sex made him like that. Nothing more.

YOU : yeah

You pocketed the phone and put on a face mask. The lobby doors opened to the night air, cool and immediate, and you stepped out into it and kept walking, and you didn't look back at the building, because some things were better approached from a forward direction, even when everything in you wanted to turn around.

Tomorrow was tomorrow.

▬▬▬ ONE MOMENT YOU WERE in the grey half-sleep, the next your alarm was going off. The full inventory of last night was loading in your chest like a program with too many files, slow and slightly painful.

'It's not nothing.'

You lay there for ninety seconds staring at the ceiling of your own room, which had no interesting cracks, just smooth white plaster and the faint shadow of the curtain moving in the air conditioning.

Then you got up, because lying still with your own thoughts first thing in the morning was a form of self-harm you weren't willing to engage in today.

This was as damaging as blasting Preacher's Daughter by Ethel Cain and hoping for the best.

The dorm was quiet. Hye-ri's alarm hadn't gone off yet, which meant you had maybe twenty minutes before the building became a person with feelings, specifically loud ones.

You moved through the kitchen on autopilot -kettle, mug, the good green tea Mina kept in the cabinet above the stove that she'd never explicitly said you could have but had also never said you couldn't. You wrapped both hands around the mug and stood at the kitchen window watching the city do its early morning thing.

James was silent, so were you. But this time maybe you'd been waiting for a different outcome, in that little naive headspace of yours.

You drank your tea and tried not to think about the weight of him inside of you, his hands on your neck.

You thought about it constantly.

ᴺᴼᵂ ᴾᴸᴬᵞᴵᴺᴳ

Who knows - daniel caesar ♫♬♪

The company building had a rooftop that technically wasn't for general use but that enough people accessed informally that it had developed a small ecosystem of folding chairs, a forgotten umbrella that had been there since at least February.

You'd discovered it eighteen months ago during a particularly brutal comeback period when the practice rooms felt like they were closing in— and you'd been going up there sporadically ever since.

Naturally, you went up there on your lunch break.

Not for any specific reason.

The afternoon had a weird energy to it -your schedule had been lighter than usual, a few meetings, a vocal session that had ended early, and you'd found yourself with ninety minutes of unstructured time that felt like a gift. Hye-ri had gone to get food with Soeun. Mina was on a call with her family. The practice rooms were occupied by other groups, and the styling suite smelled aggressively of hairspray.

You sat in one of the folding chairs with your knees drawn up and your jacket zipped to your chin, and you looked at the city spread out below, letting yourself be quiet

It lasted approximately four minutes.

Your phone buzzed. Not James -a staff notification about next week's schedule, which you read and immediately forgot.

But the buzz had disrupted the quiet, which made you pick up your phone— which made you open your messages— which meant you were now -magically- looking at the thread with James.

The way you sometimes prodded a bruise to check if it still hurt. It did. It reliably did.

You scrolled up. Not far -just enough to see the shape of what the last week looked like in text. You read it like reading someone else's story. A very compelling, very dysfunctional someone else's story.

And that was when the door to the rooftop opened. You expected staff. Maybe Hye-ri, who had an uncanny ability to locate you regardless of where you went, like a heat-seeking missile with gel nails.

You didn't expect Juhoon, who was one of the Cortis members you actually liked —quiet, thoughtful, someone who'd always existed pleasantly on the periphery of the James situation without ever inserting himself into it.

He looked mildly surprised to find you there.

"Hey," he said. "I didn't know you came up here."

"I didn't know you did either," you said. "You can stay. There's another chair."

He unfolded it and sat down, stretching his legs out, tilting his face up toward the sky. "You were at the dorms last night," he said eventually, not accusatory, just noting.

"Briefly," you looked down.

He nodded and there was another silence.

"Can I ask you something?" you said after some time

"Sure."

You wanted to ask him a thousand things, but he wouldn't have time to answer them all— or maybe he wouldn't know the answers, so you settled for something simple.

"What's he like," you asked carefully, "when I'm not there?"

Juhoon considered this with the seriousness it deserved, he wasn't someone who gave careless answers.

"Quiet," he spoke finally. "He's quieter than people think. The loud thing is-" he paused, choosing words, "-it's real, but it's not the whole thing. When he's actually upset about something he goes very still."

"I know," you said, because the question was dumb.

You knew James, knew how he was, knew how he felt, and especially knew how he lied.

"Yeah." He glanced at you sideways. "I figured you would."

"Is he-" you stopped looking at your phone in your hands, the thread with James still open, "Is he okay?"

You hated that you were asking, and asked it anyway because apparently that particular self-protective instinct was not functioning correctly today.

Juhoon was quiet for a moment. "I think he will be," he nodded, which was not the same as yes, and you both knew it, but he said it anyway, like protecting the two of you at the same time.

You nodded slowly, fiddling with the strings of your badge lanyard.

It was hard to hear, it's like in some way, you didn't want him to be okay. A very selfish and very ugly part of you begged for him to feel as strange as you felt without him. You didn't want him to be okay, you wanted him to be miserable. How naive?

"You know I like you," Juhoon said. "And I like him. So I'm not going to say anything about-" he gestured vaguely at the air between you, encompassing the last few years. "But I'll say this. He talks about you without meaning to. Like you come up in the middle of sentences about completely different things. He doesn't notice he's doing it." He paused. "And that's either really good or it's-"

"The problem," you finished.

"Yeah."

You sat with that, as heavy and as real as it was, and a pigeon landed on the railing six feet away looking at you with the blank assessment of a creature utterly unbothered by human emotional complexity. Totally enviable.

"Thanks," you told Juhoon.

"Didn't really say anything." He nodded once, you both sat there a while longer in the pale light, and you didn't look at your phone again.

• • •

        The thing happened at 4:17pm.

You were in the corridor outside the third floor vocal booths, waiting while your vocal coach finished a session with someone else, scrolling through your phone.

You heard him before you saw him.

Not his voice —you heard his laugh. That specific one, the one you hadn't seen much of in a while. The one you wished you'd drawn out of him more often, to get a sense of who he was really.

He came around the corner with Martin and Keonho in the middle of a conversation. He was gesturing with his coffee cup, and his hood was down, he looked easy in a way he almost never looked when you were in the same space as him.

You registered all of this in approximately two seconds.

He saw you on the third.

His laugh didn't stop immediately, but it changed. His body adjusted the way it always did in your presence, that slight shift toward readiness, like he was bracing for collision.

The members with him, noticed

"Hey," James said. His voice was normal, easy. He was okay.

"Hey," you nodded.

He stopped near you, coffee cup in hand, and looked at you with that familiar specific attention. And then Martin said something— not to you, to James, a quick murmured comment accompanied by a grin that you didn't quite catch —and James's mouth curved, brief and private, the smile aimed at the floor before he looked back up at you.

"What?" you said.

"Nothing," he said. "You just look-" he paused, assessing, and the look was warm in a way that your body recognized before your brain did, that attention he reserved for you only in your quieter moments. "You look tired."

"Thanks," you said flatly

"I didn't mean it badly." A pause. "You were up late."

"We were both up late."

"Yeah." The edge of his mouth moved again.

"Worth it though."

And that was it -that was the specific, small, ordinary thing that should not have been the thing. He said it quietly, almost to himself, genuine and unguarded, the way he sometimes spoke when he forgot to armor himself first.

Worth it though.

Like it was simple. Like the previous months of sharp words and slammed objects and were all components of something with a simple arithmetic, something that could be summed up and found to 'be worth it'.

Something in you looked at that -at his face, at the easy way he'd laughed seconds before you appeared, at the life he had that you orbited and disrupted. And something went very very quiet.

Worth it though.

Were you? Were you worth it? Was any of this worth it?

The way he handed you matches and then acted surprised by the fire?

The way you walked out his door feeling victorious and arrived home feeling like something had been excavated from you? 

The way you couldn't go through a normal workday without your thoughts circling back to him with the tireless repetition of water finding its lowest point?

You thought about Juhoon on the rooftop. "He talks about you without meaning to. Like you come up in the middle of sentences about completely different things."

You thought about the way you'd pressed your hand over a candle flame on the rooftop and called the burn worth it, and standing here now— you couldn't find the logic anymore.

Not because James wasn't -something.

He was something.

He was specific and perceptive and genuinely capable of moments that got through every defense you'd ever constructed.

He saw the lash. He was sweet, at times, weaponizing his soft edges just to wreck you even more.

But he also sent those photographs at midnight like a lit match through a letterbox.  He called you names and meant it to wound.

He pulled you against him and then held you at arm's length and then pulled you back again and called the cycle by your name like you were the one maintaining it.

He used your own hunger against you with the practiced ease of someone who'd mapped your weaknesses and filed them for deployment.

And you did the same to him. You knew you did, you matched his cruelty word for word, you showed up when you should have stayed away— and stayed away when he was genuinely reaching for something real.

You were doing it to each other.

Equally. Fluently. In a language you'd developed together.

Worth it though.

Looking at him now in the corridor, warm and unguarded, the laugh still faintly present in the lines of his face -you felt the pull of it.

Of course you did.

You thought you probably always would, in some residual way, the way you could always find north even in an unfamiliar city. But underneath the pull was something else.

Quieter than everything preceding it— some sort of exhaustion so thorough it had become a part of you, like a building that had been load-bearing something too heavy for too long and had finally taken stock of its own foundation.

You were so tired.

Of the version of yourself that existed in these moments -sharp and defended and constantly braced for impact, simultaneously craving the collision and flinching from it.

Winning small battles and losing something larger and more important in increments, until you stood in a corridor at 4:17pm and looked at a boy who could recite the inventory of your small imperfections from memory and felt, for the first time clearly: this is just not gonna work.

Not 'he is terrible'. Not a villain and a victim, which would have been easier.

Just: this specific thing— as it is— is taking more than it's giving, and has been for long enough that you've normalized the deficit.

You'd lied. You'd lied when you said you enjoyed it. You were such a skilled liar.

"I'll see you around," you spok

James's expression shifted slightly, reading the specific tone "You okay?"

"Yeah," you gave a flat smile, and it wasn't entirely a lie. You felt, in fact, unusually clear. "I'll see you around, James."

You walked away before he could respond.

Down the corridor, around the corner, past the elevators to the stairwell, you sat on the third step from the bottom and held your phone in both hands.

You opened instagram first.

His profile -which you'd visited with the compulsive frequency of someone returning to a bruise- looked back at you.

You pressed block and the account disappeared.

Clean and immediate, like a light switched off. It felt like the cliche 'exhaling after holding your breath for a very long time without realizing.'

Twitter. Same motion. Block.

The gesture was so small. The tap of a thumb. And yet each one felt like setting something down, something you hadn't noticed the weight of.

You opened your contacts and found his name- no special designation, just 'bitch ass piece of shit' because you'd never let yourself do something as revealing as save him with a nickname or a symbol.

You looked at it for a moment. You thought about the hand covering yours in the dark. You thought about the way he'd said : "it's not nothing."

no. it isn't. and that's exactly why.

Because if it were nothing, you could manage it. Nothing didn't keep you up at night.

Nothing didn't send make your heart stop beating like a cardiac arrest.

Nothing didn't notice the lash.

Nothing wasn't this.

And this, as it existed, was quietly making you less.

part 2 available !