*＊✿❀ hi ❀✿＊*

✦ • ─── AUGUST 30, 2026. 8 AM

Your phone buzzed against the cardboard boxes beside your bed, rattling your empty glass of water and shocking you awake. At first, you didn’t understand where the noise had come from and stared at your ceiling, disoriented.

You had fallen into such a heavy sleep last night that you hadn’t even heard Violet coming in through the cracked window. Hadn’t texted Yeonjun that she was here.

Shit, you didn’t even know if she was here.

Bleary-eyed, you sat up and squinted through the narrow gap in your bedroom door. The flat was so quiet that it made your stomach knot.

Then something white moved past the leaves of your monstera.

Your tension eased. You grabbed your phone.

REINA [8 AM] you up? coming over in 30 if yes

Without thinking, you typed back:

YOU [8:03 AM] yes ok

Then, before your mind properly caught up, you switched to another chat to inform Yeonjun about Violet and quickly locked your phone again.

There was a faint smell of rain in the flat. You shut the window and went into the kitchen.

Violet meowed the moment she saw you stumbling in, and kept meowing until you realised to open the curtains for her. It was another overcast day, but the faint light still hurt your eyes.

It was only as you splashed cold water over your face that it struck you how bizarre it was for Reina to come over before ten on a Sunday.

By the time the intercom buzzed, you’d already convinced yourself that something awful had happened. You analysed her muffled it’s me, let me in, looking for signs of distress: a trembling voice, perhaps a stifled sob.

Nothing.

You were still confused when you opened the door.

Reina looked the same as always, albeit slightly tired, her long hair damp from the drizzle. Immediately, she began to complain about the trip upstairs.

“Jesus,” she wheezed, shoving a white bakery box into your hands and pulling you into a hug. “How does this building pass inspection? This lift is pre-war. And the stairs have the incline of a fucking ladder.”

You laughed into her shoulder. “You’re just very small.”

“So, that’s discrimination, then. There should be someone we can call about—oh.” You felt her stiffen just before she pulled away. “There’s a cat here.”

You turned.

Violet sat politely on the armrest of the sofa, staring at Reina with wide, cautious eyes.

“Yeah,” you said, setting the bakery box on the kitchen island. “That’s Violet.”

You reached for the cupboard above the sink and pulled down two mugs.

Behind you, Reina stayed silent, eyes locked on the cat. “Yeonjun’s Violet?”

The back of your neck prickled.

“Yes,” you said, keeping your tone even. “She kept showing up here every morning, so we decided to just let her stay.”

Reina frowned as she shrugged off her damp raincoat and draped it over the back of the sofa. Violet leaned in to give it a sniff.

“You decided,” she repeated. You pretended to be deeply engrossed in picking out coffee capsules. “Together?”

“Well, yes,” you said. “It’s his cat.”

“Right. It’s his cat. Spending the day in your flat.” She parted her lips, suddenly amused. “Hey—that rhymed. But also, what the fuck?”

“It—okay, listen.” You shoved a capsule into the machine. “Did something happen? I mean, I love having you here, obviously, but it’s barely nine in the morning.”

“Oh.” She climbed onto a stool at the kitchen island, tucking one leg underneath herself. “Well, how about you tell me what happened? Bin and I left last night and missed all the entertainment, apparently.”

Something bitter twisted in your stomach. “You didn’t miss anything.”

“No?” She grinned. “So, what did you do after we left?”

“I went home.”

“Mhmm. And who did you go with?”

You leaned back against the cupboards, palms pressing into the cold marble on either side of you.

“We live in the same building,” you said.

Reina tapped her fingers rhythmically against the countertop. “Right. And you’re co-parenting a cat.”

“We’re not—okay, we’re not co-parenting. It’s just a cat, Rei.”

“I’ve got nothing against the cat,” she said, though she shot Violet another wary look. Under normal circumstances, Reina adored cats. Under these circumstances, however, she did not trust them. “It’s just that, um—I was joking before, about feeling like we were back in grad school. But are we actually back? Because between the party and this, it’s very—”

“We’re not back,” you said.

Thankfully, the coffee machine clicked off before Reina could say anything else. You handed her the blue mug with a red heart at the bottom, the foam trembling slightly on the surface, then turned back to make your own.

“He lives downstairs,” you said. “And his cat keeps coming up through the fire escape. It made more sense to leave her here instead of texting him every five minutes.”

“Oh,” Reina said lightly. “So, you’re texting, too.”

You winced. “Well, the cat keeps showing up. I can’t exactly throw her out.”

“Mhmm. Just like you can’t throw Yeonjun out, yeah? Funny how that works.”

You pressed your tongue against the inside of your cheek.

“Well,” you said, “he’s not here now, is he?”

“Not yet, I guess,” she said, taking a sip of her coffee. It burned down her throat exactly the way she liked it. “Has he been over, then?”

“Only to pick up the cat.”

It felt unpleasant, knowing that it was technically true, but still skipped over the peach cobbler and the lobby and the argument in the stairwell and the smoking area outside the restaurant.

Shit, you might as well have been back in grad school.

“And,” Reina continued, watching you pick up your red mug, “have you been over to his place?”

You lingered with your back to her for a second longer, fingers curled around the mug even as the ceramic burned your palms.

“I, uh.” You cleared your throat. “Once.”

“Oh, once.” Reina set the mug down on the countertop a touch too hard. “That’s interesting.”

“To help with a fern,” you added, turning around. “That’s it.”

“To—” She frowned. “To help with a what?”

You sat down opposite her and opened the box she’d brought. There were four cupcakes inside, with swirls of chocolate and vanilla frosting on top. The flat filled with the scent of warm sugar.

“He got a plant,” you explained.

“And he needed your help with it?”

“To find where to put it.”

“Where to—oh.” She picked up a vanilla cupcake from the box. “Is he four years old?”

Your lips twitched. “S’just a fern.”

“Right.”

Outside, the rain thickened, pattering against the windows. The whole flat dimmed, as though you’d been plunged underwater.

Violet, bothered by the noise, hopped off the sofa and trotted towards the bathroom. Bless her. She was probably going to inspect your washing machine; it appeared to have started leaking again. Either that, or you’d spilt water there last night after getting home.

You tried not to remember.

“So,” Reina said finally, taking a thoughtful bite, “it’s just a fern. And just a cat. And just a party.”

You spent an unnecessary minute peeling the paper from the base of the chocolate cupcake. “Right.”

“Mhmm.” She swallowed. “Won’t draw parallels to a year ago. But you see, of course, how easy that’d be, yeah? I mean, you said nothing was happening last time, too—”

“I see it.”

“Right.” She ran her tongue over her lower lip, fighting back a smile. “So, what actually happened yesterday? Because he spent the entire night following you around and then famously left with you.”

Your nose scrunched. “Is that really famous?”

“Did you check your phone?”

You took a large bite of your cupcake and tried to remember where you’d left your phone. The chocolate chips were half-melted, soft enough to stick briefly to your teeth.

“Wha’ should I have checked it for?” you asked through the mouthful.

“Doesn’t matter.” She waved dismissively with her mug. “Don’t unmute the group chat.”

“Oh. Brilliant.”

You could only imagine what was happening in the group chat that had otherwise been dead since graduation. Last you’d checked, Beomgyu and Nara had been arguing about which colour shoes went with the gown. She’d rather die, she insisted, than be caught in beige heels (she ended up wearing white).

“Is that why you came over, then?” you asked, lowering your cupcake to the island.

“Yes,” Reina said. “Had to hear everything straight from the source.”

“Not much to hear.”

“Mm. Give me a moment to process what I’ve already heard.”

You sighed and took another bite.

For a while, the two of you focused on eating and drinking.

Reina was mentally calculating how many flights of stairs separated her fists from Yeonjun’s face—just in case.

You, meanwhile, considered the medical likelihood of liquefying and seeping into the kitchen floorboards so you wouldn’t have to answer any of her inevitable questions.

Unfortunately, you remained solid.

“So,” Reina said at last, folding her cupcake wrapper into a perfect square, “should I be asking about the two of you going home together last night?”

You took a sip of coffee. It tasted bitter today. Should’ve added more sugar.

“You shouldn’t,” you said. “We just went home.”

Reina seemed willing to accept that and nodded once. “Okay. What happened leading up to going home, then?”

Your gaze fell to the cracked corner of the marble island. You couldn’t remember if the crack had come with the flat or if you’d somehow caused it yourself.

“I, uh—well, there was a point when I went out for a smoke,” you said slowly. “And he… came out, too.”

“And then what?”

Your eyes flicked briefly back to hers, then away again. “I’d rather not say.”

Reina paused with her mug halfway to her mouth.

“Oh.” She straightened so quickly that the stool creaked beneath her. “That—okay. Is he fucking with your head again?”

“No.”

“Okay. I’ll assume he is anyway.” She took a large sip to soothe the tickling in her throat. “Walk me through the thought process there, then. Come on.”

You clicked your tongue against your teeth. “I don’t think thoughts were involved in that process, to be honest.”

Reina tightened both hands around her coffee in a visible effort to behave maturely.

She did not succeed.

It started with one snort, then another. Then she caught the twitch in your mouth and bent forward against the island, laughing properly.

Despite the reluctant smile pulling at your lips, you gave her a deeply miserable look.

“Sorry,” she wheezed. “Sorry. God.” She pressed a hand to her chest. “Okay. Ready to be an adult about this. What, um—what are we thinking now, then, babe? Surely, the thoughts are back now, yeah?”

You looked down into your mug. The foam lingered on the sides in pale rings.

Last night, you’d deliberately avoided thinking. Just returned home, washed your face, brushed your teeth, and gone to bed. But now, sitting here with Reina, your mind seemed to crack open, and every memory flooded in backwards: from the scarf Violet had dragged out of your box, to the dark basement corridor with the grey sofas on your first day of classes.

“I—” Your voice caught. You cleared your throat. “Remember that game we had? About which of us would be the last to find a campus crush?”

Reina didn’t understand where this was going, but her expression soured instantly at the memory.

“Yeah,” she said. “Still annoyed I lost my own game.”

You smiled faintly and took another sip from your mug.

“Well, at one point,” you said, “I texted you saying I’d lost. And then, about a minute later, I changed my mind. Don’t know if you remember tha—”

“Oh. I remember,” she said, pointing her cupcake wrapper at you. “First day of classes. Don’t think you ever told me who your crush was.”

It startled you that she recalled the exact date. Then again, over the entire course of the game, you’d only told her you’d lost once.

“Yeah,” you said with a long exhale. “Well. That was Yeonjun.”

“That wa—” Her expression turned blank.

You nodded, already bracing yourself.

Reina stared at you for three whole seconds before blinking.

“The puzzle pieces,” she said, “continue to fall into place.”

You snorted, lifting your mug before the instinct to minimise everything could kick in.

You remembered, still against your will, telling Yeonjun about this: on the sofa in his living room, while he’d had his cheeks stuffed full of grapes. He’d been euphoric. You tried not to linger on the memory.

“Right,” you said, swallowing the coffee. “So what I’m thinking now is… he probably shouldn’t have caught me off-guard back in grad school. I obviously must’ve liked him a little. I don’t know.”

Reina nodded carefully. She was trying to mirror your vocabulary, so she wouldn’t force conclusions onto you that you hadn’t yet reached yourself.

“Okay,” she said. This was her buffer word. “That—you’ve admitted that. That’s very good.”

A small smile appeared on your lips. “Oh, gentle parenting. Cheers.”

She let out a quiet snicker and nudged the cupcake box towards you.

You picked the one topped with chocolate sprinkles. The brown frosting had smudged slightly against the lid.

“The thing is, though,” you said, peeling back the wrapper, “he told me I’d won right after I accepted that—oh, hey, this doesn’t feel like a bet anymore. And I don’t want it to be. That—that’s when he said s’over. Fuck you and your feelings, basically.”

Reina reached for the last cupcake in the box. There was a stripe of chocolate smeared across the white icing.

“And,” you continued, “because everything between us was so brief, it feels like I haven’t even earned the right to feel this fucked up about it. Hurt, angry. Whatever. S’like it’s embarrassing. There’s this voice in my head constantly going, get a grip, it was only two weeks.”

The kitchen fell quiet once you finished speaking; the rain had softened back to a drizzle outside. At some point, Violet had returned to inspect the windows of the living room again.

Reina stared silently at the crack in the countertop.

Never—not once—in the year and a half since things ended with Yeonjun, had you openly admitted the bet had hurt you.

She’d seen that it had, of course. Seen the exhaustion, the irritability. She’d walked in on you sitting motionless at your desk, both hands over your face. You’d found an excuse every time your eyes met: stress, your thesis, New York. You were just tired. Just hadn’t slept enough.

Reina had even joked about him a few times, always gauging your reaction. You were consistent then, too: oh, I don’t care, he can get fucked.

This, right now, was very new.

“That was fucked up, ending the bet,” Reina said finally, setting her cupcake back down on the island. “Do you think I should’ve knocked him out when—”

Her focus drifted when Violet padded across the floor and came to a stop beside her stool.

“Oh, hi, baby,” she murmured, bending slightly towards the cat. “Came to help us figure out what your dad’s problem is? Think he’s just deeply unwell? Non compos mentis?”

You snorted. The majority of Reina’s co-workers at her NGO were former lawyers. She’d never trusted lawyers and had taken up studying Latin to make sure they knew what they were doing (they did not).

Violet, who did not speak Latin, sprang onto the island.

“Oh—hey!” Reina snatched her cupcake away just as Violet leaned in for a sniff and perhaps a little lick. “I haven’t agreed to share.”

The cat sat down in the middle of the countertop and turned her head towards you with a keen meow.

Snickering, you climbed off your stool.

Yeonjun had brought over a small plastic bag of treats the last time he dropped off her food. It sat beside the coffee machine now, clipped shut with one of your hairpins.

You shook out a cube of tuna into your palm.

“Here,” you said, lowering your hand towards her. “How’s this for you, little one?”

Violet accepted the treat immediately and leapt off the counter, carrying it back to her spot by the window. The rain had stopped altogether now, though the clouds still hung low outside.

Reina watched her with a faint smile.

“You’ve got snacks for her and all,” she said gently.

You lowered yourself back onto the stool and didn’t reply.

“Alright, then,” she said, taking a bite of her cupcake and turning back to you. “Where were we—ah, yes.” She swallowed. “Me beating up Yeonjun. Or do you want to do it yourself?”

You finished your cupcake in a few quick bites.

“I wanted to,” you said, wiping crumbs off your hands. Reina brightened. “But he kind of ran away from me the last time I tried to talk to him. Literally got into his car and drove off. And even later, when I found him again to ask about the—the whole scheme, he just walked off again.”

“Right.” She took a long sip of coffee. It was completely lukewarm now. “Break his legs, s’what I think. Never going to walk off again.”

You laughed.

Reina appreciated the momentary lightness. She set her mug back down on the island.

It made sense, she thought, why you’d denied being affected by this for so long. Getting hurt was one thing, but handing that hurt to someone and asking them to explain it, only for them to walk away, was another.

“What’s happening now, then?” she asked eventually. “Has he—I mean, he’s been downstairs for weeks now, yeah? And his cat’s practically moved in.” She glanced at Violet, who seemed to have fallen asleep against the monstera pot. “I’m assuming you’ve talked at least a little.”

You sighed. “Not really. We mostly talk about Violet.”

She lifted an eyebrow. “Mostly.”

You took your time folding the cupcake wrapper.

“He did offer to explain,” you admitted, wiping icing from your lips with your index finger. “Said we needed to talk.”

Reina didn’t need to ask. She already knew you’d refused, and that was likely why Yeonjun had been trailing you all night yesterday.

“I think,” she said, uncomfortably serious now, “that would probably be good. Listening to him.”

You stared at your hands.

“For closure, first of all,” she continued. “To, um—to understand what actually happened.”

“And second of all?”

She shrugged one shoulder. “You’d figure out what comes next once you’ve heard why he ended everything so suddenly.”

“Well, it wasn’t exactly sudden,” you said. “We did say the bet was—”

“Oh, come on,” she cut you off with a flick of her hand. “You can’t seriously believe it was really just a bet. Something had to have happened.”

“Did it, though?” You finally looked up. “He literally had a scheme to use me to embarrass his parents.”

Reina exhaled, forcing the lid of the cupcake box to tremble.

The scheme made no sense to her.

She’d made Soobin explain it to her three separate times and punished him by sleeping at home instead of at his house after each explanation. It remained excruciatingly stupid every time she heard it.

So, Yeonjun had wanted to date someone below his social status to spite his parents.

Reina had never held much hope for him, but surely he had to have been fucking joking. She’d seen the way he’d looked at you.

“Please don’t think I’m trying to defend him,” she said. “Fuck him, actually. But I thought that scheme wasn’t the reason he started the bet?”

You gave a weary shrug. “Maybe not. But the bet was still an ego boost.”

“Sure. But then, uh—he told you he had feelings for you,” she said, her gaze fixed on you in case she said too much. “That’s pretty far from that whole I’m the best in the world, and everyone loves me act.”

“Could’ve just been saying shit.”

“I guess,” she allowed, leaning back. “But do you honestly believe that?”

Your gaze dropped to the floor.

You remembered how Yeonjun had looked in the stairwell when he said he wanted to explain everything. The way he’d looked last night, too, clinging to that lamppost.

“No,” you admitted, but the word bruised on its way out. It felt like stepping on the same rake and taking the handle to the forehead all over again.

Reina nodded slowly.

“Right,” she said. “So, that’s what doesn’t add up. If he had feelings for you, why end the bet at all? You weren’t rejecting him. He had to know you liked him back. He’s a fucking idiot, obviously, but he’s not that stupid.”

That earned her a small twitch of your lips. Reina considered it a triumph.

“Soobin and I think his parents had something to do with it,” she said. “Otherwise, none of this makes sense.”

You folded your hands in your lap and pressed your thumbs together.

You’d had these thoughts looping over and over, hopeful and relentless, during those first months afterwards. Yeonjun had been convincing; he’d looked at you like he meant every word he said to you—which was why ending the bet hadn’t made sense. Something must’ve happened to change his mind.

But love wasn’t supposed to be something you changed your mind about.

“That’s even worse, then,” you said, “if it wasn’t just a bet for him, either. Because he still ended it without explaining anything. So it couldn’t have meant that much to him in the end.”

Reina lowered her gaze back to her empty mug.

“And then hearing him out now,” you went on, your voice tightening, “means I’ve got to dig up all of that. Admit that—admit that this is important. Maybe even forgive him. And then risk him just leaving again.”

A few stray raindrops tapped against the balcony, quiet against the glass, as though bashful to interrupt.

“That’s thinking three steps ahead, though,” Reina pointed out carefully, “isn’t it?”

You looked up at her. “Is it?”

“He spent the whole night following you around yesterday,” she said. “Seems genuinely desperate to be part of your life.”

“Seemed desperate for it last time, too.” Your eyes dropped back to your hands, a wry smile on your lips. “Still left.”

That was that, then.

Reina wanted to protect you from your own mind, but she couldn’t argue with you about this.

You leaned back against the stool, the metal edge digging into your lower spine. Your limbs felt strangely heavy, even though you hadn’t drunk all that much last night.

“I don’t know if I can do that,” you said. “Admitting that I wanted him outside the bet, that—that’s what ended up fucking me over. And I already said shit to him last night that I shouldn’t have. That’s it.”

Reina swallowed and tried to neutralise her expression. You were admitting things she’d expected to have to pry out of you inch by inch; she couldn’t get used to it.

“Okay,” she said again, still buffering. “I hear you. And I want to ask to elaborate, but I’m holding myself back. Please appreciate my efforts.”

One side of your lips stretched. “I appreciate your efforts.”

“Thank you.” She tapped her fingers against the marble. “So—uh, just to be technical about it for a second, yeah? You admitting that to yourself didn’t end things. That was good. It’s Yeonjun who ended things. And we still don’t know why. He knows, though. And wants to tell you, apparently.”

“Right.” You clenched your jaw. “But I don’t know if I want to know. Or if it even matters anymore.”

Reina lowered her head. She wanted to march downstairs and demand answers from him herself, maybe knock him out for good measure.

But this wasn’t her wound. Wasn’t her heartache.

“Babe,” she said after a moment.

You lifted your eyes.

“Do you really think it doesn’t matter?” she asked. “Or do you just wish it didn’t?”

You held her gaze for another second before turning towards the window instead. Violet was curled up like a little pretzel beside the flowerpots.

“I don’t know,” you said finally.

Reina shifted on the stool, tugging her left leg out from underneath her. It was completely numb.

“Shit,” she mumbled, shaking the feeling back into her foot. “Let me, uh—let me ask you something else, yeah?”

You turned back to her. “Mm. Love it when you come over just to interrogate me.”

She ignored that completely.

“Do you actually want him to just fuck off and leave you alone?”

You hooked your ankles against the bottom rung of the stool. You’d already anticipated the question and imagined your answer.

But, sitting here now, you could still feel his hands on you from last night, as though the traces of his touch were embedded under your skin.

“Probably not,” you said with a resigned exhale. “I mean, I kissed him.”

Reina coughed politely once, then less politely twice more.

“Right,” she breathed, pressing a fist to her chest. “O-okay, yes. I suspected that was what happened, so I don’t know why I—why I’m surprised. Um—”

“I’ll give you a minute,” you said, lips pressed tight. “More coffee?”

She tipped her head back and took a deep breath before looking at you again.

“I’m good,” she said, patting her chest. “We’re back.” She cleared her throat another time just in case. “Well, more or less.”

You snorted.

“This is smashing news to receive at nine in the morning, just so you know,” she said. “M’so glad I came over.”

“I can tell.”

“Mm.” She took another breath. “So, uh—okay. In light of this deeply important development, talking to him would make sense, no?”

You shook your head faintly. You’d followed your feelings before, ignored common sense, and this was where they’d led you.

“It would be better not to,” you said.

“For whom?”

You blinked. “For—well, for me.”

Reina ran her hand over the cold edge of the island and looked away from you for a second.

“Would it, though?” she asked.

You sighed again; a long, heavy sound. “I don’t know.”

That was the best you could manage, Reina was starting to notice. She recognised that she’d pushed far enough.

“Well, you don’t need to do anything right now,” she said. “You can think about it. Avoid it for a bit longer if you need to. Just, uh—you’re going to be seeing him anyway.”

You turned to Violet. “I know.”

“And it’s probably not going to get easier with time,” she added. “These things usually don’t.”

You pulled your bottom lip between your teeth, trying to organise your thoughts into something coherent.

“See, um…” You turned the empty mug between your hands. Your rings clicked against the ceramic. “I’m probably prideful enough to think this could get easier with time. Eventually, there might be no reason for us to talk anymore. Maybe Violet will stop coming here, I don’t know.”

Across the room, Violet lay so still that she resembled a plush toy. Reina watched her and did not share your optimism.

“Sure,” she said. “If that point ever comes.”

You looked back at her. “Why wouldn’t it?”

“Nara’s birthday is on Friday.”

You clicked your tongue. “Okay. Fuck. But maybe he won’t—”

“And Yeonjun’s is right after that.”

Your shoulders lowered again. “Well, I can skip that one.”

Reina tilted her head towards the sleeping cat. “Can Violet?”

You glanced back towards the window.

“Look.” Reina flattened both palms against the countertop, drawing your attention back to her. “This can very easily turn into a lifelong process of finding excuses to avoid him. And you might find enough of them—in fact, I don’t doubt you will.”

You opened your mouth to reply.

“But,” she continued before you could interrupt, “that means your brain stays switched on all the time. All the time, yeah? Constant fucking rerouting, planning ahead, avoiding places. It’s exhausting, babe. You can’t live like that.”

You tapped your finger absently against the edge of the island. The kitchen still smelled of coffee and chocolate.

“I get that,” you said. “It’s just a lot.”

“Well, of course it’s a lot,” she said. “You’ve been carrying all of it for over a year.”

You hummed.

“S’the band-aid thing, the way I see it,” she said. “You either rip it off in one go, and it hurts like hell for two seconds, and then it’s done. Or you peel it off slowly, tiny rip by tiny rip. And it stings the entire time, and your skin’s all raw by the end of it.”

A weak smile appeared on your lips. “Vivid imagery, Rei.”

“I know, yeah.” She smiled, then forced her lips back into a straight line. “S’what you’re doing, though. You peel the band-aid back a little, panic because it hurts, then try sticking it back on. But it’s never going to stick properly, is it? Corners all curled up. Hair’s getting caught underneath.” She shuddered. “S’a nightmare.”

The humour slowly faded from your face.

You dragged your fingers down your calf until your hand wrapped around your ankle, for no reason other than to give your nervous energy somewhere to settle.

“Well,” you said, looking back towards the balcony doors, “I could always just buy a new band-aid and slap that over the old one.”

“Over the—” Reina narrowed her eyes. “Oh, look at you, Miss Think-Outside-The-Box.”

You ducked your head with a soft chuckle.

“No, I mean, that’s true,” Reina said. “You could get a new band-aid. S’going to be fun, I imagine—and sustainable—having to find a new band-aid every time Yeonjun comes to collect the cat you’re co-parenting.”

You winced before you could stop yourself.

Reina noticed it immediately and leaned back from the island, already preparing to apologise.

“We’re not co-parenting,” you said before she could. “Violet just visits.”

She sighed. “Right.”

“I get it, though,” you added. “You’re right.”

Reina leaned slightly forward as if she’d misheard you.

“I—I’ll try to talk to him, I guess,” you continued, staring at your ankle. “Hear what happened. Rip off the band-aid. Whatever.”

Reina gave a slow nod. She climbed off the stool and, limping slightly on her numb leg, crossed the kitchen to you.

“Good,” she said, draping an arm over your shoulders. “And then we’ll get a new band-aid if we still need one, yeah? Not leaving you bleeding out.”

The thumping in your chest quieted.

“Yeah,” you said, resting your hand over hers. Her shirt was soft against your arm. “Thank you.”

“I’m with you, babe. Always. Will rip out his eyes, just tell me when.”

Laughing softly, you turned properly to wrap both arms around her. Reina leaned into you, exhaling.

“I don’t like seeing you suffer,” she whispered, her fingers brushing over the ends of your hair.

“I know.” Your throat tightened. “I love you, Rei.”

She squeezed you back. “I love you.”

✦ • ─── AUGUST 30, 2026. 10:30 AM

Eventually, you and Reina relocated to the sofa, where the conversation drifted back to her engagement party—focusing, this time, on the next plans.

“Sage,” she announced, “is still the leading colour for the bridesmaid dresses in my mind.”

“Wasn’t it emerald last week?” you asked.

“Oh, yeah.” She snorted. “But, see, I had a dream about this frog the other night—kind of like the one in Shrek, Fiona’s dad? No idea why my subconscious produced that, but anyway. Everyone wore this garish shade of green in the dream. In his honour, I assume, so—”

“The frog’s?”

“Yes.”

“Ah.”

“Yeah.” She grinned. “So, since then, emerald reminds me of frogs. So sage it is.”

You chuckled, leaning in closer to look at the Pinterest board on her phone screen.

It still startled you, sometimes, to hear her talk about marriage. She’d just turned nineteen when you met her, a year younger than you.

Now, listening to her describe, one more time, the way Soobin’s hands had shaken as he held the ring box, it felt as though you’d lived an entire lifetime alongside them. As though you’d watched them grow up and had grown up with them.

You couldn’t wait for all that would happen next.

When Reina left your flat a few hours later, she felt much lighter.

That was why, after the two of you hugged goodbye and confirmed your Friday lunch plans, she stopped one floor below. She stood on the landing for several seconds, one hand gripping the railing, and watched the weak midday light filter through the narrow stairwell windows.

This, she knew, was probably overstepping.

Maybe even catastrophically so.

Then she thought about the years the three of you—Soobin, you, and herself—had spent together. Thought about Yeonjun, too, lingering on the periphery of those memories, whether you and Reina wanted him there or not.

She turned and knocked on his door.

Then knocked again.

And again.

By the fourth knock, she was beginning to suspect he’d died, and she was bruising her knuckles for nothing.

Finally, the lock clicked. The door opened halfway.

Yeonjun had very clearly not expected to see her here.

“Oh,” he said first.

Then, “um.”

And finally: “Hi.”

“Hi,” Reina replied. “She doesn’t know I’m here.”

That seemed to answer the question he was about to have. But he still looked mildly startled, and a bit like he’d crawled from his bed and immediately regretted surviving the night. His hair stuck out in several directions, skin looked nearly translucent. Reina could practically see his headache.

“Okay,” he managed after a second. “Why, um—w-why are you here?”

“Um.” She glanced towards the stairwell as if you might suddenly appear and catch her here. “A question before I answer your question, okay?”

Yeonjun frowned faintly. “Sure.”

“Do you love her?”

The headache seemed to drop straight from his skull into his chest.

His grip tightened around the door handle.

“Yes,” he said.

Reina was glad he hadn’t hesitated.

“Okay,” she said. “Great. So, that’s why I’m here.” She inhaled sharply, and the rest of her words tumbled out in one furious burst: “I don’t know what the fuck your damage is, but you need to sort your shit out and explain the fucktrain of bullshit you pulled in grad school.”

Yeonjun closed his eyes briefly. This, he recognised, had to be where Soobin’s colourful vocabulary had come from.

He remembered, abruptly, taking the lift home last night. Remembered finding his jacket draped over the stairwell railing outside his door. No trace of you, other than a faint whiff of your perfume on the lapels.

“Sh-she won’t listen to me,” he said quietly. His eyes were so bloodshot that Reina wondered whether he’d slept at all or just lay there decomposing. “I’ve already tried.”

She took a moment to regain her breath.

“I talked to her,” she said then.

The corridor fell quiet. It smelled, she noted, oddly of burnt toast.

“You talked to her?” he repeated. “About talking to me?”

“Yes,” she said, gripping the edge of her raincoat sleeve. “But not for you. I did it for her. She deserves to know what the fuck happened to you back then. Honestly, I deserve to know, too, seeing as you two have dragged me into this mess against my will—but anyway. You need to explain, and you need to do it properly. In a way that makes sense.”

“It—yeah.” He dragged a hand through his already dishevelled hair. “I know. Yeah.”

He still looked dreadful and grey. But now he seemed to have a purpose again.

“And I swear to God,” Reina added, tipping her head back, “if you come up with another fucking bet, or lie to her about—”

“I won’t,” he interrupted. “I’m done with bets. And I never lied to her.”

She stared at him for a long moment.

“Not going to fact-check that,” she decided, “but that better not be a lie, either.”

“It’s not.”

“Good.”

She glanced toward the stairs again, debating, for a second, whether he’d earned the next part.

Finally, she sighed.

“Look… don’t expect anything once you’ve explained yourself,” she said. “For your own sake.”

Yeonjun tried to nod, but quickly decided he’d be better off not moving his head at all today.

“Trust me, I don’t expect anything,” he said. “Just want her to know what I was—what really happened. What she does with that isn’t up to me. She doesn’t owe me anything.”

For the first time since she came here, Reina allowed her shoulders to drop.

“That’s right,” she said. “She doesn’t. So don’t push her into anything she’s not ready for, yeah? Or I’ll be back here knocking on something other than your door.”

Yeonjun lowered his eyes, though the warning still stung enough for him to mutter, “I’d never push her.”

“No, that—” Reina clicked her tongue. “See, you say that, but you seem to push her just by standing too close. Remember that when you talk to her. Because you might think she wouldn’t give a fuck if you got struck by lightning tomorrow, but she’d start a fight with the fucking rain clouds for you. Alright? Remember that. Or I’ll really knock your fucking teeth in.”

A wave of dizziness rolled through him so suddenly that he had to lean harder against the doorframe to stay upright. His heart thudded heavily in his chest.

You’d told him you cared last night.

He squeezed his eyes shut. His ears were still ringing.

“Still with me?” Reina asked, leaning forward to check for signs of life.

Yeonjun opened his eyes again.

“Yes,” he said hoarsely. “Yeah, I—I’ll remember.”

“And if there’s still shit you haven’t figured out yet,” she added, “figure it out first. Don’t take another year to do it, because—why did you need a year?”

“I—”

“No.” She held up both hands. “Never mind. Not my place. Just—just be ready. She’s already got questions. Don’t leave her with more.”

His pulse seemed to thrum through every inch of his skin.

A part of him wanted to run upstairs immediately. Talk to you right now, while adrenaline was still drowning out everything else.

He suspected all he’d manage was please.

“I won’t,” he said, forcing himself to take a breath. “I mean, I’ll try not to.”

Reina nodded. She trusted that more than she would’ve trusted his confidence.

“That’s fair,” she said. “So, we’re clear?”

He gave a small nod. “We’re clear.”

“Okay.”

She stayed on his doorstep another moment, studying him. His shirt was wrinkled. There was a faint crease along his cheek, probably from sleeping on that side of his face. He looked like, if he let go of the doorframe, he’d drop right onto the floor.

For one second, she almost felt sorry for him.

Then she remembered everything you’d said upstairs and crossed her arms.

“And in case you somehow still haven’t got it,” she said, “I’ll emphasise that again: I don’t care how much you drink or how fucked up you feel, yeah? I will literally fold you in fucking half, light your ass on fire, and launch you directly into the next galaxy if you hurt her. Are we clear on that, too?”

A shadow crossed his face.

He doubted Reina could make him feel worse than he already did, but the threat was fair.

“Yeah,” he said. “That’s, uh—that part was already very clear.”

“Good.” Finally, she took a step back from the doorway. “Your cat’s at her place, by the way. What the fuck’s that about?”

“Oh—” He laughed, startling himself. “Yeah. That’s Violet. She sort of does whatever she wants. And apparently, what she wants is to be around her.”

Reina smirked despite herself.

“Interesting,” she said. “Seems she inherited that from you.”

Yeonjun felt a flush at the back of his neck despite the chill in the corridor.

“Yeah,” he said, finally pushing himself away from the doorframe. “Seems so.”

“Yeah,” she echoed, amused by the way he avoided her gaze. “Well. Don’t forget what I said.”

“I won’t,” he said. “And, f-for what it’s worth, I wouldn’t have given up. I’d have kept trying to talk to her, however long it took.” His fingers curled around the handle again. “It’s not—I’m not doing this because you told me to.”

Reina watched him quietly for another second.

“I know,” she said finally.

Yeonjun realised, with some surprise, that this was probably the closest thing to approval he’d ever received from her.

“And, um…” Reina’s mouth twisted. “I’m also thinking she probably doesn’t need to know I was here.”

“Scared?”

“A bit, yeah.”

He smiled softly. “I won’t tell her.”

“Good.”

Reina stayed on the landing, feeling awkward now that she wasn’t threatening him.

“Just so you know,” she said. “I’m not rooting for you. You’ve got a lot of shit to fix before we can talk about that. But I also don’t want to repeat grad school. So I had to talk to you.”

“Yeah,” he said quietly. “I don’t want that either. S’why I’ve been trying to talk to her.”

“Right. So try that again.” She paused, frowning. “Actually, maybe don’t. Let her come to you. She said she’d try to.”

His eyes lit up so quickly that it embarrassed them both. Reina looked away.

“She did?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

He glanced down to process that. The linoleum outside his flat was terribly scratched. Part of the damage, he knew, had come from his own boxes when he’d moved in.

“That—well, knowing her,” he said, exhaling shakily, “that doesn’t necessarily mean she’ll talk to me soon.”

“True,” Reina admitted. “Nothing you can do about that now, though. You got yourself into this mess. Let her find you when she’s ready.”

Yeonjun didn’t argue. This was already more than he’d allowed himself to hope for after last night.

“Yeah,” he said. “Okay. I already know what I need to say to her anyway.”

Something in Reina’s expression softened very slightly.

“That’s good,” she said.

He ran a hand through his hair again. “Also, uh—m’sorry about drinking half the open bar last night.”

Reina’s lips twitched.

“Yeah. S’fine.” She nodded towards his face. “But take some aspirin. Your temples are turning blue.”

“Ah.” His hand lifted automatically to the side of his face. He could only feel the heat now, and none of the pain. “I will. Thanks.”

With a final nod, Reina turned and climbed down the stairs.

✦ • ─── AUGUST 30, 2026. 4 PM

When Yeonjun came to pick up Violet that afternoon, he wore a black jumper with the hood pulled up and did not look at you. The two of you communicated entirely through mime.

You opened the door.

He gave a nod.

You nodded back and stepped aside.

He bent, one hand braced against his knee, and whistled softly for Violet.

Violet walked over, tentative, her tail held high.

Yeonjun scooped her against his chest and stood. He gave you another nod.

You closed the door before either of you could accidentally say an actual word.

✦ • ─── AUGUST 31, 2026. 4 PM

When you returned from university the following Monday, Yeonjun wasn’t in the lobby.

You’d suspected he might stop waiting there eventually, and you were glad you didn’t need to search for what to say, yet his absence still felt odd in the empty space. The air was dry and still. Someone had left muddy footprints near the entrance; they’d already begun to dry.

You checked your letterbox and pulled out another advertisement for window frames—it had to be a joke, considering that ninety per cent of the windows in this building didn’t open. You crumpled it into your palm.

Your gaze drifted to the peeling adverts across the opposite wall. Alfred, the dachshund, had probably been found; the flyer was gone.

It was quiet here.

You could hear a faint ticking sound, as though that of a clock.

You turned up the stairs.

Inside your flat, you kicked off your shoes, grabbed a banana from the kitchen counter, and changed into your jumper and sweatpants. Violet was still here.

Before you could text him, Yeonjun rang the doorbell. This time, his jumper was blue.

The two of you performed the routine again: one nod, step aside, cat, another nod, door shut.

It felt worse today.

✦ • ─── SEPTEMBER 1, 2026. 4 PM

On Tuesday, Yeonjun wasn’t in the lobby.

And then he forgot the second nod before he left with Violet.

✦ • ─── SEPTEMBER 2, 2026. 4 PM

On Wednesday, Yeonjun wasn’t in the lobby.

At your flat later, he nodded an additional two times.

✦ • ─── SEPTEMBER 3, 2026. 4 PM

On Thursday, Yeonjun wasn’t in the lobby.

But he looked at you, this time, as he picked Violet up. Then nodded and left.

✦ • ─── SEPTEMBER 4, 2026. 4 PM

By Friday, you’d stopped expecting him in the lobby.

Exhaling heavily, you hitched the grocery bags higher against your wrists and started upstairs. The paper handles bit into your skin with every step. The carton of eggs kept thumping against your knee as if the eggs were suicidal.

You were exhausted.

University had wrung you dry this week; you’d forgotten how stressful that first month of the term could be. Professor Lee already needed your help reading through sixty essays from his undergrads. Even your lunch with Reina—during which she kept shooting you expectant looks—didn’t relax you as much as it used to.

Still, you hoped to recover in the next four hours before Nara’s birthday dinner. Hoped to squeeze in a nap as well.

Violet was stretched out in the middle of the living room when you unlocked the flat. She stood the moment she heard the grocery bags rustle and hurried toward you. You bent down to scratch under her chin. She enjoyed that tremendously, though not as much as she enjoyed the paper bags afterwards.

Twenty minutes later, the doorbell rang.

Violet was still sitting inside one of the bags, her tail waving through the opening.

Expecting another silent exchange, you opened the door. Yeonjun stood there, holding a plate of biscuits. He smelled of sugar and vanilla.

“Hi,” he said. Hearing his voice after nearly a week hit you straight through the ribs. He lifted the plate. “For you.”

For a second, your mind was empty.

“Oh,” you tried. “Th—thank you.”

You accepted the plate without registering your hands moving. The ceramic felt cool against your palms.

He’d been baking again, then.

You set the biscuits down on the kitchen island. Behind you, Yeonjun’s eyes followed you automatically.

The sunflowers, he noticed, were gone.

Violet untangled herself from the paper bag and scampered towards him, circling his ankles with an affectionate meow.

“Oh.” He crouched to scratch her ears. “Now you act as if you’ve missed me. Can you tell I’ve been baking, love? Hmm?”

You glanced down at the cat. “You smell like it.”

He looked up. “Hm?”

You leaned one hip against the island. “Like sugar.”

“Oh.”

Something in his eyes softened helplessly. He scooped Violet into his arms and straightened, his gaze dropping to the floor.

It struck you, suddenly, that if he nodded politely and left again, you might actually lose your mind.

“You, uh—” Your eyes flicked back to the plate. He’d used the same one he’d brought the peach cobbler on before. “You baked biscuits, then.”

Yeonjun couldn’t help a smile.

“Yes,” he said. “Thank you for noticing.”

“Mhmm.”

“They’re cherry.”

You turned back to him.

You remembered, of course, the neon pink, cherry-flavoured biscuits. The rain drumming against the roof of his car. The precision of his pen against your wrist.

You cleared your throat and looked away again.

“Have you got a minute?” you asked.

Yeonjun inhaled sharply.

“Yeah,” he said. Then, quieter: “Always.”

“Okay, um…” Your gaze drifted towards the balcony doors. “Can we talk? Or do you think we’ll end up late for Nara’s?”

He’d been waiting for this, but now that you were actually asking, he felt a reflexive urge to bolt.

What if he said something wrong and it became the last thing you ever said to each other, and he’d have no one to blame but himself, and—

He took another long breath.

“Yeah,” he said. “We—no, we can talk.”

You nodded.

“Do you want to go out on the balcony?” You gestured towards the living room. “Warm day today.”

“Sure.”

You carried the biscuits onto the balcony and set them down on the round metal table between two white chairs. They’d come with the flat, their legs slightly rusted and paint peeling in thin curls along the sides. You’d loved them immediately.

The balcony barely fit the furniture, let alone both of you, but it was cosy in the golden late-afternoon light. The metal table scorched your fingertips briefly when you touched it, still radiating the heat of the day.

Yeonjun lowered Violet by the balcony doors. She stepped outside cautiously, her whiskers twitching. The moment she felt the breeze, she scrambled towards the ledge to sniff at the wind.

Yeonjun took the chair on the left.

You sat on the right.

And then, neither of you spoke for a very long time.

Cars rolled steadily below. A pigeon landed on a nearby rooftop with a heavy thump of wings; Violet tracked it with wide, curious eyes. You realised you didn’t feel all that tired anymore.

“Well,” Yeonjun said eventually, leaning back in his chair, “reckon that’s a solid prequel.”

You snorted despite yourself. His shoulders relaxed at the sound.

He nodded toward the biscuits. You leaned forward to take one, and he did, too.

“Can’t remember us ever being quiet around each other for this long,” he added, taking a quick bite.

The biscuit was still warm in the middle when you tried it, buttery and soft enough to crumble against your fingers. It wasn’t as dangerously sweet as the ones from grad school.

“Yeah,” you said. “Would’ve spared us from your wardrobe room.”

His chair creaked as he shifted back. You wiped your palms against each other.

“Think I would’ve found another way to get to you, though,” he said. “Even without the Seven Minutes.”

He used to say things like that constantly back then, you remembered; careless little comments meant to fluster you into silence. Your instinct was still to drop your gaze and clench your hands.

“Right,” you said. “To get back at your parents, yeah?”

The warmth drained from his face.

“No,” he said. “Not for my parents. For me. Because I wanted to be with you.”

Your shoulders stayed taut against the back of the chair.

Across the street, a window slammed shut. Violet’s ears flicked toward the noise. Yeonjun looked that way, too, briefly distracted by the movement on the street below.

It occurred to him, as he watched the traffic, how easily you could just stand up and leave. Close the balcony door, end the conversation. End everything.

Immediately, he started to think of all the ways to stop that from happening, before he caught himself.

If you wanted to leave, you should be able to.

“C-can I start from the beginning?” he asked. “I don’t want to—I want you to know everything.”

You took a slow breath. “Yeah. Start wherever you like.”

Yeonjun had rehearsed this conversation hundreds of times in the past week: lying awake at four in the morning, standing outside your door with Violet, driving to work, in the queue at the shops, choosing between two brands of chocolate bars.

None of those rehearsals had included the look on your face, he realised now. He didn’t know what to expect.

“So,” he said, “the beginning is that I’m in love with you.”

Your gaze dropped immediately to the plate on the table.

His heartbeat was so violent that he wondered if you could hear it over the traffic below. You wondered if he could hear yours.

“You, um…” He rubbed the back of his neck. “You probably already know that. I told you before. Once.”

“Yeah.” You let out a long breath. “And I almost believed you. Once.”

His jaw tensed.

Violet, sensing the shift in the air, took a turn around your chair and settled in the shade underneath it.

“I meant it,” he said. “And I mean it now. I’m in love with you. Probably have been since the day I sat next to you outside class in our first year, and you were mean to me.”

You turned to look at him. “You earned that. Acted like a knobhead.”

“I know.” His jaw relaxed enough to let him smile. “But I was done for immediately. And then you kept making it worse for me—unintentionally, I’m assuming. You always get this look in your eyes when you realise you’re talking to a complete idiot, and I—”

You frowned. “I don’t get a look.”

“There!” He jumped, pointing at you with ridiculous delight. “That’s the look.”

You turned away the moment your lips twitched. He laughed, settling back in the chair. The metal at the back poked his spine.

“S’lovely,” he said. “Makes me want to keep annoying you just to see it again.”

“You have problems,” you informed him, not cruelly.

“Yeah,” he replied easily. “Quite severe ones, too. We both know that.”

“Hmm.”

You took another biscuit from the plate.

Across from you, Yeonjun watched your legs swing beneath the metal chair: back and forth, back and forth. You still looked nervous, but you were staying.

“I, uh…” He rubbed his thumb along the edge of the table. “I’ve already told you about the first time I wanted to kiss you.”

You let the biscuit melt on your tongue.

You remembered exactly the way he’d told you: standing by the window in your old bedroom, saying he’d spotted you on the balcony of his dorm room once, years ago, with a cigarette. He’d hidden behind the wardrobe door so you wouldn’t catch him watching.

It had been cute, if it was true.

“I remember,” you said, brushing crumbs off your sweatpants. They dropped to the floor.

Violet twitched under your chair, offended at the disturbance, and cracked one eye open. The crumbs smelled excellent, admittedly, but she had standards. She wasn’t eating crumbs. And off the floor, no less.

“I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately,” Yeonjun said, “and I identified another moment that was particularly bad for me.”

You looked up. “Yeah? How bad?”

“Very.” The corners of his lips curled. “Thought I was properly fucked if you never liked me back.”

You turned back ahead, lips pursed.

“Oh—” He clapped his hands. “There’s that look again.”

You shook your head, fighting back a sudden laugh. “What’s the moment, then?”

He smoothed his palms over his black trousers. He’d got flour on them earlier, but you wouldn’t be able to tell now.

“D’you remember our final year of undergrad?” he asked. “November, maybe late October. When we usually started racing.”

You didn’t know what you were supposed to remember.

“Sure,” you said anyway, reaching for another biscuit. You pushed the plate with the last one towards him.

“Right.” He leaned forward to take it, turning it between his fingers. “Soobin and Reina had just started dating, and he refused—I say that with love—to shut the fuck up about her. Thought I was going to go insane.”

You smiled.

Even before they started dating, Reina and Soobin already talked about each other as if they were being paid per mention. Once they actually got together, it increased exponentially. You remembered complaining about the broken radiators in your flat once, and Reina sighing dreamily, Soobin and I were just talking about that yesterday.

It had been endearing. And a little nauseating.

“So then,” Yeonjun continued, pausing to chew, “one day, Soobin tells me he’s going to be late for the first race because he’s got plans with Reina. And I was—now, we know I’ve got problems.”

You snorted into your biscuit.

“At that point, I was making real progress, though,” he said. “Massive character development, yeah?” He gestured with the biscuit. “Huge. So instead of accusing him of abandoning me forever because he’d got a girlfriend, I kept quiet. But I still wanted him there. He’s my good luck charm.”

You swallowed, the cherry jam warm against your throat.

Yeonjun had told you how he’d spiralled when Alain got a girlfriend and started spending less time with him.

It happened to him again, then, with Soobin. And there’d been no one who was proud of him for handling it better.

You realised, absurdly, that you were.

“So,” he said, the white of his shirt reflecting the sunlight, “the day before the race, I told him, hey, Soobin. Why don’t you bring Reina? That way we can all hang out.”

Your gaze drifted sideways as you searched through old memories.

“So, uh—naturally,” he went on, swallowing the last of the biscuit, “after Soobin invited her, Reina got nervous. Thought hanging around his mates would be awkward. He said it wouldn’t be. She disagreed, apparently, and brought you along just in case.”

He could imagine how much convincing that must’ve taken, despite not knowing that part of the story. All Soobin had told him at the time was that Reina would bring her best friend. And Yeonjun, knowing exactly who said best friend was, proceeded to put his jeans on backwards.

“Hmm.” You leaned back in your chair, hands dropping loosely to your sides. Violet’s tail brushed against your fingers. “What’s special about this race, then?”

“I’m getting to it,” he said. “I remember the exact moment you arrived.”

You glanced at him.

“You wore dark jeans and this white top with glitter writing across the chest,” he said. “Don’t know what it said. Stared at you for ten minutes, and my brain stopped cooperating.”

You ran your tongue over your lips, an ironic smile spreading across your face. “You once accused me of seeing you in the shapes of the clouds. Bit ironic now, yeah?”

He snorted. “Yeah, I’m great at deflection. You didn’t know?”

“Hmm. Go on, then.”

“Right. I remember you had sunglasses on, too,” he went on, “even though it was dark. Bit performative if you ask me, but—”

“Okay—” you paused to let him finish laughing, the memory vague in your mind, “—it was light when we left the flat.”

“Fair,” he accepted, tipping his head back. “It was a good night anyway. The wind kept blowing your hair into your mouth. You kept spitting it out. And you were carrying your leather jacket in your hands. I thought you looked like an actress from a 00s film.”

“Please.”

“No, really.” His grin widened. “It pissed me off how hot you looked.”

That finally made you laugh again.

The sound satisfied him unreasonably.

“I remember you saw me,” he said, “and just stopped dead. Reina turned to look at you. You said something to her—probably that you were leaving because I was there.”

“Probably.”

He snickered. “Yeah. And then you were actually about to leave, but Beomgyu found you. He did that a lot back then. Always seemed to seek you out.”

Now you remembered.

Beomgyu had asked you, earlier that day, if you were coming to the race. You’d said no. So when he spotted you there anyway, he’d marched straight across the old camping grounds, grabbed your wrist and refused to let you escape.

“He wanted to know if I’d brought drinks,” you recalled.

Yeonjun didn’t like the fond smile on your face. “Why?”

“A few days before, he overheard Reina and me in class, talking about her grandmother’s homemade spirits,” you said. “And I mentioned that my gran used to make them too, when she was young. Cranberry liqueurs, Kahlúa knockoffs. You know. Stuff where, if you threw it on a wall, paint would probably come off.”

Yeonjun laughed under his breath.

“Beomgyu got obsessed,” you said. “Spent days begging us to bring him some.”

“Did you bring him any?”

“No,” you said. “Our grans were generous with alcohol, and Beomgyu already drank enough as it was. We weren’t helping him become a full-time alcoholic. Think he’s held a bit of a grudge since then.”

Yeonjun laughed again, louder this time.

It was the drinks, then, that Beomgyu had wanted from you.

Good.

“Yeah, that sounds like him,” he said, his foot bouncing lightly under the table. “I remember him moaning at you the entire night.”

“Yeah, well.” You shrugged. “He’s very good at making people feel guilty.”

“Yeah.” He shifted his ankles, trying to ease the pressure against his spine. “Anyway—so, later that night, I was getting into my car for the first heat, and I looked over, and Beomgyu was wasted. Just gone. Walking circles around the pergola, one shoe on, another in the grass under the drinks table.”

You snickered, raising your hand to cover your mouth. Yeonjun wished you wouldn’t; he wanted to see your smile.

“A-and then,” he said, “I saw him trying to shove you into his Audi, saying he’d be your navigator. Just drive. He couldn’t miss the race.”

You looked up at the roof of the building across the street, an amused smile on your lips.

Beomgyu’s Audi, you remembered, had been in a tragic state when you’d climbed in: wrappers and empty energy drink cans rolled under your feet, the seats smelled of strawberry yoghurt. Your fingers clung to the steering wheel with something sickeningly sticky.

“I remember,” you said. “He was too drunk to drive. Kept saying I had to do it in his honour because I’d betrayed him over the drinks.”

“Hmm.” Yeonjun watched you across the table, one elbow propped against the metal edge. “He actually made you start the race.”

You nodded. Before the sirens had signalled the start, Beomgyu had already been halfway out the passenger window. He’d promised to give you directions. Instead, the moment the engine coughed to life, all you got was, oh God, I’m going to throw up, please pull over—wait, no, don’t pull over, I’ll lose my place, oh God. Then he’d passed out.

“Yeah,” you said. “I didn’t get far.”

“Mhmm.” Yeonjun bent one leg under his chair. “But you did finish the first lap.”

“Okay,” you said, “and then I spent the rest of the night holding Beomgyu upright while he threw up in the grass.”

He snickered softly. He remembered crossing the straight and catching sight of Beomgyu folded over the guardrail, while you stood behind him rubbing circles over his back.

“Alright, yeah,” he said. “But, uh—did you check your lap time?”

You frowned. “Did they even record it? I wasn’t supposed to race.”

“They logged it under Beomgyu’s name.”

“Yeah?”

“Mhmm.” He sat up straighter, a small smile on his lips. “You beat me.”

Your eyebrows shot up. “No.”

“Yeah.”

“No.”

He laughed. “Yeah. First time driving Beomgyu’s wreck of an Audi, with his drunk ass passed out beside you, and you still beat me on your first go.”

The delight on your face was beautiful. He’d known it would be.

“I thought it didn’t count,” you said, nearly out of breath.

“Of course it didn’t. I spent the next ten minutes shouting that it shouldn’t. It was very important to me.”

You laughed again, your head tilting back. Violet looked up from beneath your chair to inspect the noise. Once she was sure that no one was dying, she curled back into herself.

Yeonjun watched the crinkles forming around your eyes and thought he’d have gladly watched you beat him a hundred times over just to get to this point.

“Wow,” you breathed at last.

“Yeah,” he said, still grinning. “Humiliated the absolute shit out of me. Never fucking wanted you more.”

You shook your head.

“You really are insane,” you said, but there was a softness in your voice now. An old instinct.

He forgot to swallow for a moment and inhaled too sharply, coughing into his fist.

“Sorry,” he muttered, clearing his throat. “Yeah, uh—well, it only got worse from there, as you know very well.”

“It makes no sense, though,” you said, brushing the crumbs on the table into a tiny pile with your fingertip. “Because I remember all the times we argued. All your provocations. All of it.”

“Yeah.” He nodded along to every word. “I was in denial for a long time. But, fuck, let’s be honest, the more I pissed you off, the more I reinforced my problem. You were so mean to me. I was thriving.”

“That’s such—” A helpless laugh cut you off. Yeonjun lit up instantly. “I think we should be finding you help instead of sitting on my balcony.”

He snorted, shaking his head hard enough for his hair to fall into his eyes.

“S’fine,” he said. “I’ve accepted this is an incurable condition.”

“Ah, so just gave up, then. Typical.”

He gasped, clutching dramatically at his chest.

“Nooo,” he whined. “Don’t say that. You’re making this worse for me.”

You laughed so easily that he had to grip the back of the chair to physically stop himself from leaning across the table. Heliotropic, like a fucking sunflower.

Violet finally emerged from under your chair and stretched across the warm tiles, flexing her claws. Then she looked up at you. You looked back, still smiling.

Taking that as permission, she hopped into your lap, startling you slightly with her weight, and lifted her head in expectation, her pupils widening.

Obediently, you smoothed a hand down her spine.

“So, it was clearly bad for me,” Yeonjun said. He couldn’t look away from Violet sprawled contentedly across your thighs. “And that was why I talked our professors into letting me host that workshop with you later.”

“Hmm.”

“And…” His voice faltered. “After that, I suggested the bet.”

The warmth of the afternoon slowly drained away. You felt the cold at the nape of your neck every time the breeze lifted your hair.

“Right,” you said.

Yeonjun lowered his gaze to his hands. His thumbs moved restlessly against each other in his lap. He could feel the biscuits sitting in his stomach.

“All through this,” he said slowly, “from the moment we first talked, I kept looking for ways to get closer to you. That was all I did.” He swallowed. “I—I know I’ve got issues, yeah? Plenty. But wanting you is genuine. It’s got nothing to do with—with fucking schemes. None of that. It’s just you.”

Your eyes dropped to the dark tiles under your slippers and stayed there. Violet, offended you’d stopped stroking her, hopped off your lap and wandered back into your living room.

This time, Yeonjun was grateful you weren’t looking at him.

“On the last night of the bet,” he said, “after I sprained my wrist, my mum called me.”

The wind slid down your spine. You looked up, and the tension in his face made your stomach clench before he said anything.

“She gave me two options,” he said. The breeze caught the hem of his shirt and lifted it slightly. “Option one was that I break up with you.”

Your pulse stumbled hard enough to make you momentarily dizzy.

“Option two…” His jaw locked. “Option two was that I don’t break up with you. But the Board doesn’t let you graduate. Your thesis fails review for contract cheating.”

For a second, you forgot how to breathe.

It was surreal, at first, that accusing you of paying someone to write your thesis was a realistic option to begin with. Then you remembered the stark white walls of his parents’ house, and the heavy silence within. Remembered Yeonjun telling you his mother had once delayed his flight because he’d tried to run off on a holiday with friends.

Falsifying academic misconduct probably wouldn’t have troubled her much.

“That’s why I ended the bet,” Yeonjun said. “I didn’t want to lose you. But I couldn't let them do that to you.”

You looked up again. The sun was beginning to cast long shadows through the railings, painting stripes across the tiled balcony. Golden light brushed the edge of the plate and turned the white of Yeonjun’s shirt the colour of honey.

You felt almost nauseous.

He’d ended the bet, then, because he thought that wanting him would ruin your life.

“Why—why are you only telling me about this now?” you asked finally. “S’been over a year since we graduated.”

A flash of pain crossed his face. “I was afraid of what else my mum might do.”

“What else could she have done? My thesis had already passed review.”

He dropped his gaze and didn’t answer. The noise of the city filled the silence instead: the hum of the cars on the street, the distant wail of a siren several blocks away.

Your thoughts raced as you watched him.

You remembered the fellowship offer at New York University, the absurd timing of it—right after Yeonjun ended the bet. Right after his mother threatened your future if he didn’t leave you.

“Your mum—” Your stomach lurched. “Sh-she was behind my fellowship. Wasn’t she?”

Yeonjun squeezed his eyes shut. “I think so.”

“Fuck.”

“I don’t know what she did, exactly.” He opened his eyes again and fixed his gaze somewhere past your shoulder. “Could’ve just put in a good word. Made sure your name stayed in front of them. I don’t know.”

Your hands clenched into fists.

“The email I got,” you said, swallowing thickly, “said it was a nomination.”

He lowered his head. “Yeah. It was—it was still you, though. If you hadn’t done the work, she couldn’t have nominated you.”

“Mhmm. And if she hadn’t nominated me,” you returned, dryly, “I wouldn’t have got it.”

He didn’t try to argue. Instead, he let you sit with this for a minute.

“I-I think she wanted to make sure,” he said then, quieter. “Breaking up with you wasn’t enough. She needed you far away from me.”

You shook your head—in disbelief, Yeonjun thought, not realising that it was in disagreement.

It wouldn’t have worked.

If you’d known, it wouldn’t have worked.

He had thought there was no other way. Thought that staying together meant giving up everything else.

You didn’t think so.

You thought that staying together meant staying together. Thought it meant searching for some impossible solution, because that would still be easier than letting go.

“You…” You swallowed against the lump in your throat. There were twenty different things your mind was screaming at you. You tried to focus on the loudest one. “You didn’t explain anything. Just left. Did you really think I’d just fly to New York, be angry for a bit, and then move on?”

His whole posture folded inward.

He didn’t answer.

“You made me think that I wasn’t—made me think I had to be someone else,” you said. Your hands shook in your lap. “Someone worth staying for.”

He took a tentative breath.

“Fuck, I—I realise that now,” he said. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t know how else to protect you from the fucking mess that is my famil—”

“You could’ve told me right away.” Your voice sharpened before you could stop it. “I didn’t know your mum called you. Didn’t know New York was them.”

“It—I didn’t know for sure it was them,” he said. He felt too large, suddenly, for your small balcony, too heavy for the flimsy chair. “You were a brilliant student; the fellowship made sense. But, um… after a while, I thought—thought the timing felt too convenient.”

“Why didn’t you tell me then?”

“I was afraid you wouldn’t go,” he said. “If you knew my parents had anything to do with it. Thought you’d refuse on principle. And New York was an incredible opportunity for you. It would’ve been—”

“And you don’t think I would’ve got other opportunities?” you cut in. “Think I couldn’t have done anything without your parents handing it to me?”

He winced. “No. Fuck no. That’s not what I mean. I know you could’ve. But this was already happening. This was your future. I thought if I—”

“Why do you think that was my only future?”

He finally looked up.

Your eyes locked across the small table, and something electric crackled through the warm air.

“I wanted you in my future,” you said. Yeonjun felt every sharp thing inside his chest twist at once. “I could’ve still gone to New York. You could’ve come with me. We could’ve—fuck, I would’ve defended my thesis, and they would’ve seen in the viva that I hadn’t cheated. It—”

You stopped to steady your breathing.

“There were things we could’ve done,” you said, without looking at him. “But your mum gave you two options, and you never even considered refusing both.”

His breath hitched in his throat.

Just a few days ago, Reina had warned him to remember: she’d fight with the fucking rain clouds for you. He thought he could see it in your rigid shoulders, in the furious hurt brightening your eyes.

He’d known it, he remembered now, even as he walked away from you: if he’d told you about his mother’s call, you would’ve fought for him.

That was why he hadn’t.

He knew that fighting with his parents was like standing in front of an oncoming train and asking it politely to stop. That’s what it had always felt like. You could exhaust yourself, give it your whole soul, and still change nothing.

He didn’t think he deserved the effort. The sacrifice.

“So, then,” you said, hands clenched so tightly your knuckles hurt. “Since we’re talking now, you’re not worried about what else your mum might do?”

Yeonjun sat very still.

Below the balcony, a motorcycle revved hard enough for the sound to echo between the buildings. The two of you listened to it fade, block by block, into the city.

“I’m not in touch with my family anymore,” he said at last.

You frowned, turning back to him. “What does that mean?”

“It means,” he said, bringing a hand over his face, “I stopped going to dinners. Stopped answering their calls. Got a job. Got Violet. Moved out of the house they bought me, got my own place.” He glanced back toward the balcony doors. Violet’s tail was still visible beneath the shifting curtains. “I haven’t talked to my parents in months.”

Your brows stayed furrowed.

“Okay,” you said. “That—I get that.”

“Yeah.” He leaned back in the chair. “This had never happened before, them just letting me exist in silence. Even after Alain, we carried on as normal. But this is different. We’re not—we’re not talking anymore.”

Your gaze drifted past the balcony, towards the birch trees lining the street below. Their leaves shimmered with silver-green in the dying sun.

Alain, then.

People like you and me, he’d told you the only time you met him, aren’t irreplaceable in his life.

“It’s not entirely different, though,” you said. You could feel your pulse in every word. “Your parents forced Alain out of your life, and there was nothing you could do. Then years later, they forced me out, too.” Your gaze returned to him. “And again, there was nothing you could do.”

Yeonjun felt a wave of heat wash over him, so strong it hurt.

“It is different, though,” he said.

“How?”

He blinked incredibly slowly.

“It—I let them take Alain,” he said. “I played along when they acted like everything was fine. But I didn’t do that aft-after you.”

Something tightened in your expression. You lowered your head before he could recognise what it was.

“Okay,” you said slowly. “So what do you think would happen if your parents found out we both lived here? That we’re talking again?”

His gaze dropped.

“You think they couldn’t do anything else?” you pressed. “I’m back at university. I see your mum’s building every day. You really think your scheme wouldn’t accidentally come true anyway?”

He visibly flinched at the word.

“But I’m not speaking to them anymore,” he insisted. This was all he had. “They took it too far—t-they had to get the message.”

“Do you think they did?”

His eyes settled on the empty plate between you, red and blue around the edges. It was one of the first things he bought after moving out.

He realised now, staring at the crumbs, that his parents might not think this was permanent at all. They might think he was throwing a tantrum. Sulking. They might be waiting for him to come home again.

You were right, he thought. He hadn’t stood up for himself, or for Alain, or for you.

He’d just looked away.

“I don’t know,” he admitted quietly.

You nodded.

“Nothing’s changed, Jun,” you said softly. “We’re sitting here talking, and everything’s still the same as before.”

Yeonjun looked down.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured, staring at the grout between the tiles, “that I let my parents decide this, too.”

You let out a slow breath. “You shouldn’t apologise for that. You didn’t choose your family.”

“M’not apologising for my family.” He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, fingers locked together. “I’m apologising for not holding onto you. For not keeping my word when I said I’d never let them harm you. I—I shouldn’t have agreed with any of my mum’s options.”

You looked out beyond the railing.

The light was changing now. The birch trees had already fallen into shadow.

After you didn’t speak, he added quietly: “I should’ve told you.”

You moved at last, folding your hands together in your lap. Something turned low in your stomach while you tried to understand where to put all of this inside yourself. And where to go from here.

“Why, um—why did you want to explain everything now?” you asked. “After so long. I wasn’t exactly making it easy for you.”

He glanced down.

“I’ve wanted to for a while after you came back,” he said. “But I didn’t know how. And it—well, I suspected you wouldn’t want to hear from me anyway. But now—living here finally gave me an opportunity to do it.”

“But why do it at all?”

He took a shuddering breath.

“Because you should know,” he said. “I made you think that none of it was real. That I didn’t love you. And that’s not true.”

Your pulse thudded against your clasped hands.

“Why,” you said, losing your courage faster than you could catch it, “is that something I need to know?”

His chest tightened.

He realised what you were really asking him.

“Because it’s the truth,” he said. “And I’m not saying I love you because I expect you to say it back.”

You closed your eyes.

For a second, you could almost visualise the band-aid Reina had mentioned. You’d peeled it back just enough to see the wound underneath. It was still alive. It stung.

“Do you think it’s easy for me to hear that now?” you asked, your voice cracking on the last word. You cleared your throat immediately. “To believe it after everything.”

He swallowed. “I know. But it—it’s still true.”

You looked up at the table between you.

“I get it, though,” he added. “You think I’m explaining this because I want us to pick up where we left off.”

You didn’t answer.

Yeonjun looked back towards the street. In the evening light, the building opposite had turned blue. A few of the windows were already glowing.

“I appreciate you explaining,” you said after a moment. “I just—I thought I’d had my thoughts sorted. They weren’t bothering me. And then—then you started fucking hammering downstairs, and I went to check. And now I don’t know what anything means.”

He looked up from the balcony railings. “What would you want it to mean?”

You took a deep breath, glancing up at the sky overhead.

“It’s not that I don’t want things to be normal again,” you said. Then looked back down. “Actually, I don’t even know what normal is.”

“Yeah,” he said, turning away. “I-I get it. The least I could do was tell you everything, but that doesn’t change the fact that I didn’t do it before. Or that I left.”

You hated that it all came down to one decision not to tell you the truth. And now you were on your balcony, months later, and everything he was saying, the good and the bad, scared you in equal parts.

“Well,” you said quietly, “I understand why you didn’t do it before.”

His head dipped. “Thank you.”

Somewhere inside the flat, something dropped to the floor. You heard it roll across the tiles. Neither of you moved to check what it was.

The streets below you were growing louder now; it was Friday night. Nara’s birthday dinner would soon be starting across the city. Beomgyu was probably already on a last-minute booze run.

Yeonjun swallowed.

He wanted to promise that he would never leave again. Wanted to swear that he’d fight this time, that he’d stay, do better.

But he’d made promises before. And the memory of him breaking them still lived inside you both.

He inhaled carefully and offered the only honest thing he had:

“We don’t have to—we don’t need to do anything.”

You lifted your gaze to him. For once, neither of you looked away immediately.

The last glint of sunlight caught the loose strands of his hair falling over his forehead. His eyes were slightly squinted. You remembered tracing his features at night, lying in bed next to him, half-asleep. He’d been so beautiful then.

Even worse now.

“What will we do, then?” you asked.

Yeonjun found hope in the question. You didn’t trust this yet, but you still wanted there to be a this.

He glanced down briefly, thumb rubbing over the side of his left wrist.

“I’d like us to be friends,” he said.

When he looked back up, your lips were already curving. He smiled back instinctively.

He didn’t know what it meant to be your friend. But it sounded infinitely better than not being yours at all.

“Hmm,” you murmured. “Never tried that before.”

A soft laugh escaped him. “Yeah. Reckon it’d go well. We’re clearly very normal around each other.”

You laughed, too, and something lightened in your chest—just a little. Just enough to take a solid breath.

You didn’t know if friendship between you was possible at all, maybe it was a terrible idea. But it wasn’t nothing. And it wasn’t everything.

“Okay,” you said before you could change your mind. “We can try being friends.”

“Yeah?”

You shrugged. “Yeah. I don’t know. Why not?”

The smile that spread across his face was so warm that you had to look away for a second.

“Okay,” he said, pushing himself slowly out of the chair. His hands spread slightly at his sides. “Can I—?”

You stood before he finished speaking.

The movement startled a grin out of him. “Oh—yeah?”

“Fuck off.”

He laughed as you stepped into him and folded into his open arms. He pulled you against his chest at once, warm and shaking slightly.

Your hands settled around his waist, still familiar with his shape. Your cheek pressed against his shoulder. You could feel his heartbeat, a little uneven. But slower than last weekend. Calmer.

“Would you have invited me in,” he murmured against your hair, “if I hadn’t brought the biscuits?”

Your smile pressed against the side of his neck. “Of course not.”

His laughter was a gentle ripple between you. You relaxed into him.

“Did you bake the biscuits, then,” you returned, “just so I’d invite you in?”

His arms tightened around you. “Of course.”

You laughed softly, your breath warm against his skin. He exhaled fully for what felt like the first time in a year and five months.

The sky continued to darken overhead.

For now, this was enough.

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