riri

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ✦ 𝕮𝖍𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖊𝖗 1 ✦

You are going to die.

This is not a dramatic statement. This is simply the truth, the same way the sky is blue or the rent is due or the loan sharks have been calling your phone every hour for the past three weeks. You are twenty-one years old, you are drowning in debt you will never repay, and you are sitting on the edge of your bathtub with a gun in your lap that cost you the last of your cash and most of your dignity.

The bathroom light flickers. It's been doing that for months. You never fixed it. Why would you? You weren't planning to be here long enough for it to matter.

Your phone buzzes on the sink. Another text from a number you've memorized but never saved.

"We know you're home. Pay what you owe or we take fingers this time."

You turn the phone facedown. Your fingers ache. Two of them healed crooked from the last warning.

You press the barrel to your temple. The metal is cold. You didn't expect it to be cold. You expected it to feel like nothing, the way everything else has felt like nothing for months now.

Your finger finds the trigger. You close your eyes.

You think: I'm sorry.

You think: I don't even know who I'm apologizing to.

You pull the trigger. And everything stops. Not in the way you expected. Not the white light or the rushing tunnel or the life flashing before your eyes. No. The world simply... pauses. The flickering bathroom light freezes mid-flicker, stuck between on and off, casting the room in a strange half-glow. The drip from the leaky faucet hangs suspended. And the gun doesn't fire.

You pull the trigger again. Nothing. Again. Nothing. You pull it three more times in rapid succession, your breath coming faster now, panic replacing resignation, because you can't even do this right, you can't even die properly-

"That's really not going to work."

The voice comes from somewhere to your left. Somewhere that should not contain a voice, because your bathroom is approximately the size of a broom closet and you are very definitely alone in it. Or you were. You should be.

You turn your head slowly, the gun still pressed to your temple, and find yourself staring at a tear in reality. That's the only way to describe it. The air beside your shower has split open, and through the gap spills light that is somehow both gold and pink at the same time, and standing in the middle of this impossibility is a young man who looks approximately your age and approximately like he's never had a bad day in his entire life.

He's wearing what appears to be some kind of uniform, dark fabric, sharp lines, an emblem you don't recognize embroidered on the collar, but he's wearing it wrong, top button undone, sleeves rolled to his elbows and tie hanging loose.

He smiles at you. It's the kind of smile that knows exactly how charming it is. "Hi," he says. "You're not hallucinating."

"I'm definitely hallucinating," you say. Your voice comes out hoarse. When was the last time you spoke to another person? Two days? Three? "This is a hallucination. I'm having a mental break. That's fine. That tracks."

The young man steps out of the tear in reality and into your bathroom. The portal doesn't close behind him. It just hovers there. "You're not hallucinating," he repeats. He reaches out and plucks the gun from your hands. "This is real. I'm real. The portal is real. And you're not dead, which I feel like we should focus on right now."

You stare at him. You stare at the portal. You stare at your empty hands, which are trembling. "I pulled the trigger," you say.

"You did."

"It didn't work."

"I stopped it."

"You stopped it."

"Time, mostly. Just this room. Just for a minute." He says this like it's a minor inconvenience, like he's explaining how he fixed a leaky faucet. "The bullet will resume its trajectory if I let go, so I'd appreciate it if you'd step away from the line of fire before I do."

You look down. There is a bullet hanging in the air six inches from your head. Frozen. Motionless You slide off the bathtub edge and press yourself against the opposite wall. Your legs don't feel like legs. The young man waves his hand. The bullet drops to the floor with a small tink. Time resumes. The light flickers properly. The faucet drips. The tear in reality stays exactly where it is.

"There," he says pleasantly. "Crisis averted. You're welcome, by the way."

"Who," you manage, "the hell are you?"

He places a hand over his heart, mock-offended. "I'm hurt. I go through all this effort to save your life and that's the tone you take?" Then he drops the act and grins. "My name is Sunoo. You're Y/N. Well, you're a Y/N. One of them. There are more than you'd think, actually. Infinite universes, infinite variations. Most of you are very boring, but you-" He points at you. "You're interesting."

You slide down the wall until you're sitting on the bathroom floor. "I don't understand anything you're saying," you tell him.

"That's fair." Sunoo crouches down to your level. He's still smiling, but something in his expression shifts. Softens. It's almost convincing. "Let me start over. You were about to do something permanent. I'm here to offer you an alternative."

"What kind of alternative?"

"The kind where you don't die and instead get a new life, a new identity, and a purpose." He tilts his head. "Also there's magic. And an academy. And you might have to kill someone. But we can get to that part later."

You stare at him. The gun is on the floor between you. Neither of you reaches for it. "Magic," you repeat.

"Magic."

"Academy."

"Academy."

"Killing someone."

"Allegedly. It's more of a long-term goal than an immediate requirement."

You press the heels of your palms against your eyes. When you open them, he's still there. The portal is still there. The bullet is still on the floor. You are still alive, which was not the plan five minutes ago. "Okay," you say, because what else do you say to the impossible when it shows up in your bathroom? "Explain."

Sunoo explains. He explains it slowly, patiently, like he's talking to a child or a particularly skittish animal. There is a world called Emperion. It runs on magic drawn from sin, anger, greed, pride, all the worst parts of human nature, harvested and weaponized. In this world, there was another version of you. A wealthy, powerful, deeply unpleasant version of you who attended an elite magical academy and made a lot of enemies and one very bad decision.

"She made a deal with something she shouldn't have," Sunoo says. "A deity outside the sanctioned seven. Tristitia. The Sorrow. It gave her power, and then it took her life. Or rather, a witch took her life. Working for Tristitia. The details are messy."

"Messy how?"

"Messy in the sense that I don't fully know them." He says this lightly, but his eyes flick away for just a moment. "I was there when she died. It happened fast. One moment she was casting, the next she was-" He makes a vague gesture. "Not casting. Very permanently not casting."

You're still on the floor. Your legs have gone numb. "And you want me to replace her."

"I want you to be her. There's a difference." He stands up and offers you his hand. "She's dead. No one knows except me. If you take her place, you get her life, her room, her status, her spot at the Academy. All you have to do is pretend to be her and help me find the witch who killed her."

"Why?"

"Why what?"

"Why do you care who killed her?"

Something flickers across Sunoo's face. It might be grief. It might be guilt. It might be neither. With him, it's hard to tell.

"She was my best friend," he says. "Is that enough of a reason?"

You don't know if you believe him. But you also don't know if it matters. You're sitting on a bathroom floor with a bullet on the tiles and a portal to another universe hovering beside your shower. Your options are limited. They've been limited for a long time.

"What if I say no?"

Sunoo shrugs. "Then I leave. Time resumes its normal flow. The bullet stays on the floor. You're back exactly where you started, with exactly the same options you had before I arrived." He pauses. "I won't stop you a second time, if that's what you're asking. I'm offering you a choice, not a prison sentence."

You look at the gun. You look at the portal. You think about the loan sharks and the hospital bills and the two crooked fingers that ache every time you try to move them. You think about the silence that has followed you since you were fifteen years old, since your parents died and left you with nothing but a cramped apartment and a stack of unpaid bills and the slow realization that no one was coming to save you.

But someone did come, didn't they? Someone just walked through a hole in reality and offered you an escape. Not a savior. A deal. "Is it dangerous?" you ask.

"Extremely."

"Am I going to die?"

"Possibly. But not tonight. Tonight you'll be safe."

You take his hand. His palm is warm. You didn't expect that. "Okay," you say. "I'm in."

Sunoo's smile returns, brighter this time. "Wonderful. Now for the unpleasant part."

"The unpleasant part?"

"The switch."

He doesn't explain what "the switch" means. He just raises his hand and makes a gesture like he's turning a page in a book, and suddenly there's a body on your bathroom floor.

Not just any body. Your body.

It's you. The other you. The dead one. She's wearing the same uniform as Sunoo, dark fabric and sharp lines and an emblem on the collar. Her hair is the same as yours. Her face is the same as yours. But she's paler, and her lips are slightly blue, and she's very, very dead.

You stumble backward. Your hip bangs against the sink. "What the fuck."

"Language."

"What the actual…why is there a…where did you-"

"I retrieved her from where I've been keeping her preserved. Temporal stasis. Very useful." Sunoo says this like he's discussing meal prep. "She needs to be found here. In your world. If she just disappears from Emperion, people will ask questions. So we're leaving her body in your apartment, staged to look like she's you, and then you're coming with me."

"You want me to just-" You gesture wildly at the corpse. "Leave a dead body in my apartment?"

"It's not your apartment anymore. You're not coming back." Sunoo is already crouching beside the body, adjusting her position with unsettling gentleness. "She'll be found. She'll be identified as you. Your debts will die with her. Your loan sharks will move on. You, meanwhile, will be in another world entirely, attending a prestigious academy and sleeping in a much nicer bed."

You want to argue. You want to point out all the ways this is insane. But you find yourself watching his hands as he aRranges the other you's hair, and you can't stop thinking about how strange it is to see yourself from the outside. She looks peaceful. You've never looked peaceful. You've always looked tired.

"Did she suffer?" you ask quietly.

Sunoo's hands pause. "No," he says. "It was very fast."

You don't know if he's lying. You decide it doesn't matter. "Okay," you say. "Let's do this before I change my mind."

Sunoo stands and offers you his hand again. "Hold on tight. First-time travel can be disorienting."

You take his hand. His fingers close around yours. The portal pulses once, twice, and then the world dissolves.

Teleportation, as it turns out, feels like being turned inside out and then right-side in again, but very quickly, and with a lot more colors than you've ever seen before. Your stomach lurches. Your vision whites out. For a single, horrible moment, you feel like you're falling in every direction at once.

Then your feet hit solid ground, and you're somewhere else entirely.

You stumble, and Sunoo catches your elbow. "Easy. It passes."

You want to tell him you're fine, but you're too busy staring at everything. You're standing in what appears to be a dormitory hallway, but it's like no dormitory you've ever seen. And the window at the end of the hallway shows a sky that is definitely, absolutely, not the sky you grew up under. It's purple. Deep purple, scattered with more stars than you've ever seen. And the moon-

"There are two moons," you say. Your voice comes out faint.

"Yes," Sunoo says. "Selene and Noctis. The sisters. They've been chasing each other across the sky for ten thousand years."

"Chasing each other?"

"It's a myth. I'll tell you later." He's already steering you down the hallway. "Keep your voice down. Most students are asleep, but some of them have very good hearing."

"What species has very good hearing?"

"Werewolves, mostly. Vampires. Shapeshifters in bat form. The occasional paranoid elf." He counts them off on his fingers. "Oh, and the Hypogean, but they don't sleep, so they don't count."

You have no idea what a Hypogean is. You're not sure you want to know. You let him guide you down the hallway, past identical doors with nameplates you can't read. "Is the whole world like this?" you ask.

"Nocthaven is special. It's the only territory under perpetual night. The rest of Emperion has a normal day-night cycle." Sunoo pauses in front of a door. "This is mine."

The nameplate reads: Kim Sunoo - Goat Hall. The emblem beside it is a goat with curling horns.

"Goat Hall," you read aloud.

"It's the Lust dormitory."

You stare at him.

"I'm an incubus," he adds, as if this explains everything. Which, given the context, it sort of does.

"Of course you are," you mutter.

Sunoo grins and pushes the door open. "Come in. We have a lot to cover and not much time before morning."

His room is exactly what you would expect from someone who introduced themselves by stopping time and stealing a corpse. It's large, larger than your entire apartment, with silk sheets on the bed, candles that light themselves as you enter, and a balcony that overlooks the Academy grounds. You stand in the center of the room, not sure where to put yourself. Sunoo gestures at a velvet armchair.

"Sit. You look like you're about to collapse."

You sit. The chair is too comfortable. You hate it a little. "The other me," you say. "The dead one. Tell me about her."

Sunoo settles onto the edge of his bed, crossing one leg over the other. "What do you want to know?"

"Everything. If I'm going to pretend to be her, I need to know everything."

"She's human," he begins. "That's important. Most of the elite students at the Academy are something more, vampires, demons, elves. She was fully mortal, which made her talent even more impressive. Or infuriating, depending on who you ask."

"What was she like?"

Sunoo considers this. "Cold. Confident. Kind of a bitch if you ask me. She was the top of our class without seeming to try. People admired her or hated her. There wasn't much middle ground."

"That's not very helpful. What did she like? What did she do? How did she treat people?"

"She treated people like furniture," Sunoo says frankly. "She was not a nice person, Y/N. I know it's weird to speak ill of the dead, but you should know what you're stepping into. She was my best friend, and I loved her, and she was also a nightmare."

This is not comforting. "Great. So I'm replacing a nightmare."

"You're replacing a nightmare and you need to convince everyone you're still her. Which means you need to be cold and confident and kind of mean, at least at first." He tilts his head, studying you. "Can you do that?"

You think about the loan sharks. You think about the way you learned to make yourself small, to avoid eye contact, to apologize for things that weren't your fault. The opposite of cold and confident. The opposite of mean. "I don't know," you admit.

"You'll learn." He says it like it's a guarantee. "Now. Magic."

"Magic."

"The old Y/N had no defined sin affinity."

You frown. "What does that mean?"

"Most sinners have a natural pull toward one of the seven sin categories by the time they reach adolescence. It's like-" He pauses, searching for his words. "It's like a calling. A resonance. You feel drawn to a particular type of magic the way some people feel drawn to music or art. The old Y/N never felt that pull. She was completely neutral. It's rare. It's also why she was so powerful. She could theoretically access any of the seven."

"But she couldn't?"

"She was still waiting for her affinity to manifest. Most students have theirs by sixteen at the latest. She was twenty. It was a point of... frustration for her. One of the reasons she made that deal with Tristitia." Sunoo's expression darkens briefly. "She was tired of waiting."

You digest this. "So I'm supposed to have no magic?"

"For now. But here's the thing." He leans forward. "You're not her. You're from another universe. Your soul is different. Exposure to Emperion might trigger an affinity in you that she never had. Or it might not. We won't know until we know."

"How do we find out?"

"We wait. You should feel it eventually, if it's going to happen. A pull. A resonance. Something that feels like-" He gestures vaguely. "Like coming home."

You sit in the too-comfortable chair and try to feel something. Anything. A pull, a resonance, a sense of coming home. You close your eyes and reach out with whatever internal sense you're supposed to have.

Nothing.

Just the vague nausea of teleportation and the lingering shock of not being dead. "I don't feel anything," you say.

Sunoo's brow furrows. "Nothing at all?"

"Nothing."

"That's..." He trails off. "Weird. Usually Dimensionals start feeling the resonance within hours of arrival. Your soul should be reacting to the ambient sin energy by now."

"Is that bad?"

"I don't know." He doesn't sound happy about this. "It might mean your affinity will take longer to develop. It might mean you don't have one at all. It might mean something else entirely." He waves a hand. "We'll figure it out. For now, the important thing is that no one finds out you're not her."

"How do I explain not knowing things I should know?"

"Head injury." Sunoo says it immediately, like he's already thought this through. "The mission where she died…where she was supposed to have died involved a confrontation with a witch. We'll say she took a magical blow to the head. It affected her memory. It's not uncommon. Sloppy spellwork can scramble things. People will believe it because they'll want to believe it. No one likes the alternative explanation."

"The alternative explanation being that I'm an imposter from another dimension?"

"Exactly. Which you can never, ever tell anyone." His voice loses its playful tone. He is suddenly, startlingly serious. "Dimensional travelers are rare, Y/N. They're studied. Dissected. The Academy would love to get their hands on someone from a non-magical universe. You'd spend the rest of your life in a research cell. Do you understand?"

You swallow. "I understand."

"Good." The playfulness returns, but it doesn't quite reach his eyes. "I'll tell you everything else you need to know step by step. There's no point overwhelming you tonight. Tomorrow, we'll start with the basics. The Academy layout. The other students. The professors. What classes you're supposed to be taking." He stands up. "For now, you should sleep."

"Here?"

"Where else?"

"In your room?"

"It's fine. The old Y/N stayed over all the time." He says this casually, already moving toward his closet. "We had an arrangement."

You feel your face do something complicated. "An arrangement."

"Mutually beneficial." He pulls out a spare blanket and tosses it to you. "We slept together. It wasn't romantic. Don't look at me like that."

"I'm not looking at you like anything."

"You're looking at me like I just confessed to murder."

"You did confess to stealing a corpse!"

"That was retrieval. Very different." He drapes himself across his bed. "Look, the old Y/N and I were close. We were friends. We were also both attractive and bored and neither of us had any interest in emotional attachment. It worked for us. If people think we're still doing that, it gives you an excuse to spend time with me. And you need to spend time with me, because I'm the only one who knows your secret."

This is, unfortunately, logical. You hate it. "Fine," you say. "But I'm sleeping in the chair."

"Suit yourself. The bed is big enough for two."

"I'm sleeping in the chair."

"Your loss."

You wrap the blanket around yourself and curl up in the velvet armchair. "Weird," you whisper to yourself. "Everything is so weird."

Sunoo has already closed his eyes. His breathing is slow and even. You don't know if he's actually asleep or just pretending. With him, it's impossible to tell.

You don't sleep. You can't. Every time you close your eyes, you see the other you's face, pale and peaceful on your bathroom floor. You see the bullet hanging in the air. You see the portal. You hear Sunoo's voice: She was not a nice person. She was my best friend, and she was also a nightmare.

You think about the fact that you are, technically, dead. Y/N died tonight in a cramped bathroom.

But eventually, despite everything, your body gives up. Your eyes grow heavy. And you dream. You are in a garden.

Not the Academy grounds. Something else. Somewhere else. The garden is vast and formal. Roses climb trellises made of bone-white wood. The flowers are red. So red they're almost black. The sky above you is neither purple nor blue. It's gray. Featureless.

You walk down a path of crushed white stone. The roses watch you. You can't explain how you know they're watching, but they are. Their petals turn to follow your movement. The path ends at a fountain. The water in the fountain is black. Not dirty. Just black, like ink, like oil. It reflects nothing.

"Do you like my garden?"

The voice comes from everywhere and nowhere. It is not a voice so much as the memory of a voice, the impression of sound pressed directly into your mind. It is cold. It is very, very interested in you. You turn. There is nothing behind you. There is nothing anywhere, except the roses and the fountain and the gray sky.

"I asked you a question."

"I-" Your voice echoes strangely. "Who are you?"

A pause. The roses rustle, though there is no wind. "Disappointing," the voice says. "You're not her. You're wearing her shape, but you're not her. The contract was with her. Not you."

"Contract?"

"The Sorrow remembers its own. You are not its own." A sigh, like stone grinding against stone. "I will have to start over. How inconvenient."

The roses burst into flame. Not real flame, black fire that consumes without heat. The petals curl and blacken. The bone-white trellises crack. The crushed stone path turns to ash beneath your feet. The fountain boils, and the black water rises, and the voice speaks one last time:

"Find me anyway. Perhaps you'll be more useful than she was."

You wake up. You're still in the chair. The blanket is tangled around your legs. The candles in Sunoo's room have burned down to stubs. Outside, the purple sky has lightened slightly, taking on a grayish tinge. Dawn, or whatever passes for dawn in a land without sun.

Sunoo is sitting up in bed, watching you. His expression is unreadable. "You were talking in your sleep," he says.

You press a hand to your chest. Your heart is pounding. "I had a dream. There was a garden. Roses. A voice."

"A voice."

"It said I wasn't the real contractor. It said-" You struggle to remember the exact words. "The Sorrow remembers its own. I am not its own."

Sunoo goes very still. "That's Tristitia," he says quietly. "That's the deity she made the deal with. It spoke to you."

"It wasn't happy."

"No. It wouldn't be." He swings his legs over the side of the bed, suddenly all business. "This complicates things."

"What things?"

"Everything." He stands up and crosses to the window, looking out at the impossible sky. "Tristitia doesn't let go of contracts easily. If it knows you're not her, it might come looking for answers. Or payment. Or just to express its displeasure."

"Can it hurt me?"

"I don't know. Probably. Eventually." He turns back to you, and his smile is back. "But that's a problem for later. Right now, we have a more immediate concern."

"What?"

"Breakfast." He tosses you a folded uniform from his closet. It's identical to the one he's wearing. "Put this on. You have a reputation to maintain, and mean girls don't skip meals."

You catch the uniform. It's heavier than it looks. You stare down at the emblem on the collar, the crest you don't recognize, the colors you've never worn.

Somewhere in the back of your mind, you can still smell the burning roses. Find me anyway, the voice said. Perhaps you'll be more useful than she was. You don't know what that means. You don't know what any of this means. But you're here now, in a world with two moons and purple skies and seven kinds of sin magic, wearing a dead girl's clothes and carrying a dead girl's secrets.

And breakfast, apparently, waits for no one. "Alright," you say. "Let's go."

Sunoo grins. "That's the spirit."

You're not sure it is. But it's the only spirit you've got.

The uniform fits perfectly. This is unsettling for several reasons. First, because it means the dead girl really was identical to you in every physical way, down to the exact measurements of your shoulders and the precise length of your legs. Second, because the uniform itself is clearly expensive in a way you've never experienced, the fabric is soft and heavy and probably costs more than your monthly rent. Third, and most disturbing, because when you look at yourself in Sunoo's full-length mirror, you don't see yourself at all.

You see her.

The old Y/N stares back at you with your eyes. She wears the dark uniform with casual elegance, the emblem on her collar catching the candlelight. Her hair falls exactly the way yours does, but somehow it looks intentional on her. Like she woke up this morning and decided to be beautiful, and her body simply obeyed.

You lean closer to the mirror. Your reflection leans closer too. You try to find something in her expression that looks like you, the girl who worked double shifts at a convenience store, the girl who ate instant noodles for dinner six nights a week, the girl who sat on a bathtub with a gun in her lap and didn't die.

She's not there. Or maybe you're not here. Maybe you're both somewhere in between.

"You're making a weird face," Sunoo says from behind you.

"I'm practicing my mean face."

"That's your constipated face. Very different."

You turn away from the mirror. Sunoo is already dressed, which seems unfair given that you didn't see him change. He's leaning against the doorframe with his arms crossed, watching you with an expression that might be amusement or might be assessment.

"How do I look?" you ask.

"Like her." He says it simply, without flattery or comfort. "Your posture is wrong, though. She stood straight and confident. You stand like you're apologizing for taking up space."

"Sorry."

"Don't apologize. That's exactly what I mean."

You straighten your spine. Pull your shoulders back. Lift your chin. It feels ridiculous. It feels like wearing someone else's bones.

"Better," Sunoo says. "Still not right. But better. We'll work on it."

"Can we just go to breakfast? I'm starving."

"Just remember-" He opens the door and gestures for you to follow. "You're not the new girl. You're the old girl. You've been here for years. You own this place. Everyone else is beneath you."

"I thought you said she was a nightmare."

"She was. But she was their nightmare. They respected her for it." He flashes you a grin over his shoulder. "Fear and respect are the same thing in this academy. Remember that."

You follow him into the hallway. A group of students passes you in the hallway. They're younger than you, first or second years, probably, and the moment they see your face, something changes in their expressions. Eyes widen. Postures straighten. One of them actually stops mid-sentence, her mouth hanging open slightly.

"Morning," you say, because you don't know what else to say.

The students exchange glances. One of them, a girl with pointed ears and silver hair, clearly an elf manages a nervous nod.

"Good morning, Lady Y/N," she says. Her voice is slightly shaky. "We heard you were injured on your last mission. We're glad to see you recovered."

Lady Y/N. You have a title. Of course you have a title.

"It was nothing," you say, channeling every mean girl you've ever seen in a movie. You let your voice go flat. Dismissive. "A scratch."

The students don't question this. They just nod rapidly and hurry past, their whispers trailing behind them like smoke. You keep walking. Your heart is pounding so hard you can feel it in your teeth.

"That was good," Sunoo murmurs. "The it was nothing was a nice touch. Very her."

"Who calls someone 'Lady'?"

"You do. Well, you don't. But people call you that. Your family is nobility. Old blood. Lots of money. I probably should have mentioned that earlier."

"You think?"

"Shh. More students."

Another group rounds the corner. These ones are older, your age, maybe, or close to it. Their reactions are more subtle but no less noticeable. Conversations pause. Eyes track your movement. One boy with dark hair and distinctly wolfish features actually flattens himself against the wall to let you pass.

You don't know whether to be flattered or horrified. "Do they always do this?" you whisper.

"Always. She was the top of the food chain. Everyone else is just trying not to get eaten."

"Great. No pressure."

You reach the end of the hallway and descend a spiral staircase that seems to go on forever.

The dining hall is at the bottom of the stairs. It's massive, far larger than you expected, with vaulted ceilings supported by pillars carved to look like the seven animals of the sins. A peacock pillar. A lion pillar. A pig, a toad, a goat, a snake, and a snail, all rendered in dark wood that gleams in the candlelight.

The tables are arranged by dorm affiliation. You can tell by the banners hanging above each section: the peacock for Pride, the lion for Wrath, the pig for Gluttony. Students cluster together in their respective groups, and the room hums with the low murmur of conversation and the clink of silverware.

Sunoo guides you toward the Goat section with a hand on your lower back. His touch is light, familiar. You realize with a start that he's performing, that this is what the old Y/N and Sunoo looked like together. Intimate. Comfortable. Two people who shared more than friendship.

You try not to stiffen under his hand. "Relax," he breathes. "You're doing fine."

"I haven't done anything yet."

"Exactly. Keep doing nothing. Nothing is very in-character for her."

The Goat table is populated by students who all share Sunoo's particular brand of effortless beauty. Incubi and succubi, mostly, though you spot a few humans and what might be a siren based on the faint iridescence of her skin. They greet Sunoo with casual waves and lazy smiles. They greet you with something closer to wariness.

Sunoo steers you to a seat at the end of the table, slightly apart from the others. A plate of food materializes in front of you the moment you sit down. You stare at it.

The food is... not what you expected.

The main dish appears to be some kind of meat, but it's faintly blue and glistening. The side dishes include something that looks like purple mashed potatoes studded with silver seeds, and a bread roll that appears to be steaming, except the steam is going downward instead of up. The drink in your goblet is clear, but when you tilt it, the liquid moves in slow motion.

"This is breakfast?" you ask.

"Welcome to Emperion cuisine," Sunoo says cheerfully. "The blue thing is moonhare. It's a delicacy. The purple mash is starroot. The bread is…well, it's bread. Mostly. And the drink is crystallized dawn mist. Very refreshing."

"Refreshing."

"Try it."

You pick up your fork. The moonhare quivers slightly. You cut a small piece and lift it to your mouth. It tastes like someone liquefied a dream and then added salt. You swallow convulsively. Your throat tries to reject it. You manage to keep It down through the knowledge that vomiting at breakfast would probably not be in-character for the old Y/N.

"Good?" Sunoo asks innocently.

"Delicious," you manage. Your voice comes out strangled.

"You're a terrible liar."

"I know. I'm working on it."

You push the moonhare around your plate and focus on the bread instead. The bread, at least, tastes like bread. Normal bread. You tear off pieces and chew slowly while Sunoo launches into what you quickly realize is a prepared lecture.

"The Academy operates on a term system," he says, his voice low enough that the other students can't hear. "Eight terms per year. Each term is four weeks. You've already completed six terms of your third year, which means you have two terms left before the final assessments."

"What are the final assessments?"

"Combat trials. Academic examinations. And the Selection." He pauses. "The Selection is the most important part. It's when the Imperial Division chooses the next seven Deadly Sins. You’re possibly one of the seven."

"One of the seven."

"Obviously. You're one of the strongest sinners in the Academy." He says this matter-of-factly. "Or you were. Before you died. But I don’t think the old Y/N would have go for the Imperial Division, that’s not her style at all."

"Great. No pressure. Again."

"Your schedule is as follows: Sin Theory in the morning, taught by Professor Vex. She's a demon. Don't make eye contact for too long. Then Combat Training with Professor Thornwood, he's a Graveborn, very stern, hates tardiness. Then Basic Hexes and Curses after lunch, which is taught by Professor Willowisp. She's an elf, she's been alive for nine hundred years, and she will know if you haven't done the reading."

"I can't do any of those things."

"You can't do them yet. That's what the extra lessons are for." He spears a piece of moonhare and eats it without flinching. "After classes, I'll teach you the basics. What you should already know. We'll start with magical theory and work our way up to practical application."

"And if I can't learn?"

"Then we're both in trouble." He says it lightly, but his eyes are serious. "This isn't a game, Y/N. If people find out you're not her, it's not just embarrassment. It's dangerous. For both of us."

"I know."

"Do you? Because you keep making jokes."

"I make jokes when I'm terrified. It's a coping mechanism."

Sunoo studies you for a moment. Then his expression softens, just slightly. "Fair enough. Just be careful. Not everyone here is as forgiving as me."

"Are you forgiving?"

"No," he admits. "But I'm on your side. That's almost the same thing."

You're not sure it is. But before you can argue, a voice cuts across the dining hall.

"Y/N!"

The voice is loud and warm. You turn toward it and see a young man weaving through the tables toward you. He's mortal. You can tell immediately, though you're not sure how, something about the way he moves, the way his eyes are just eyes. He has brown hair that flops across his forehead and a smile that takes up his entire face and arms that are already reaching for you before he's even close enough to touch.

"Y/N! You're back! I heard you got hurt and I was so worried and Sunoo wouldn't tell me anything and I thought-" He reaches your table and pulls you into a hug without breaking stride. "I'm so glad you're okay!"

You go rigid. His arms are around you, warm and solid and completely unexpected. He smells like something sweet, honey, maybe, or vanilla. You have no idea who he is. Your arms stay at your sides. Your spine locks up. Your brain, which has been handling the morning's challenges with surprising competence, decides to shut down. You stand there, frozen, while a stranger hugs you like you're his favorite person in the world.

"Um," you say.

The young man pulls back. His smile flickers. "Y/N? Are you okay?"

Say something. Do something. Be mean. Be cold. That's what she would do.

"I'm fine," you manage. "Just tired."

He doesn't look convinced. "Are you sure? You seem..."

"She's recovering," Sunoo cuts in smoothly. He's suddenly at your side, his hand on your elbow. "Magical injury. It's affected her memory a bit. She's still getting her bearings."

"Memory?" The young man's expression shifts to concern. "How bad is it?"

"Nothing permanent. Just some gaps. She'll be fine in a few days." Sunoo's voice is perfectly casual. "Right, Y/N?"

"Right," you echo. "Gaps. Temporary. No big deal."

The young man looks between you and Sunoo. His brow furrows. "You're being weird. Both of you."

"We're always weird," Sunoo says. "Jake, don't you have somewhere to be? Don't you have…what is it you do…eating? Don't you have eating to do?"

Jake. His name is Jake. You file this away frantically.

"I was eating. Then I saw Y/N and came over to say hi." Jake crosses his arms. "Is that a crime now?"

"Technically, yes. New Academy rule. No saying hi to Y/N without written permission."

"There's no such rule."

"I'm proposing it. I have connections."

While they bicker, you study Jake. He's wearing the emblem of the pig on his collar, Gluttony, the Gula dorm. He's mortal, which is rare among the elite students. And he knows you. He knows you well enough to hug you in public, well enough to notice when you're acting strange, well enough to look at you with those worried eyes and make you feel like the worst person in the world for deceiving him.

"We should get to class," Sunoo says abruptly. "Jake, we'll catch up later. Y/N needs to-"

"Wait." Jake reaches out and touches your arm. His hand is warm. "Y/N. If something's wrong, you can tell me. You know that, right? We've known each other since we were kids. You can always tell me."

Childhood friends. This man was the old Y/N's childhood friend. "I know," you say quietly. "Thank you, Jake."

His smile returns, smaller this time but real. "Okay. Good. Come find me later? I missed you."

"I will."

He squeezes your arm once and then heads back to his table, where a plate piled high with food waits for him. You watch him go and feel like the worst kind of fraud.

"Come on," Sunoo murmurs. "Before anyone else decides to check on you."

He pulls you out of the dining hall and into a side corridor. The moment you're out of sight of the other students, you slump against the wall and press your hands to your face.

"That was awful."

"That was fine."

"He knew something was wrong. He could tell."

"Jake always knows. He's perceptive in ways people don't expect." Sunoo's voice is thoughtful. "But he doesn't know what he's perceiving. He just knows something's different. We can work with that."

"Who is he?"

"Jake. Gluttony. Pig dorm. Your oldest friend." Sunoo leans against the wall beside you. "Your families were neighbors when you were children. He's known you since before you got into the Academy."

"Great. So he knows the real me better than anyone."

"He knew the real her. Not the real you." Sunoo tilts his head. "That's an important distinction. The girl he grew up with was already on her way to becoming the nightmare. You're not her. You're something else entirely."

"A worse liar."

"True. But maybe a better person." He pushes off the wall. "Come on. We have time before your first class. I should show you around."

"Wasn't my first class like twenty minutes ago?"

"I told Professor Vex you were still recovering. She was... understanding."

"Understanding? You said she was a demon."

"She is. Demons understand injury. They also understand the importance of appearing strong. She agreed that you shouldn't return to class until you can make a proper entrance." He grins. "See? I'm good at this."

You're not sure if "good at this" means good at lying or good at manipulating demons, but either way, you're grateful. You push yourself off the wall and follow him back into the main corridor.

The Academy tour takes the better part of an hour.

Sunoo shows you everything. The Verity Palace, where most academic classes are held, The Stellar Chamber, an observatory whose ceiling shows a real-time map of the night sky, The library, a multi-story cathedral of books where the shelves rearrange themselves when you're not looking and certain texts are chained to their pedestals with chains that glow faintly red.

"The restricted section is through there," Sunoo says, pointing to an iron gate at the back of the library. "Don't go in without permission. The books bite."

"The books."

"Some of them. Others just scream. It's very distracting."

You file this under "things I wish I'd known before signing up" and keep walking.

The greenhouse is next. It's a massive glass dome filled with plants that move. Some of them turn toward you as you pass, their leaves rustling like whispers. One vine reaches out and tries to grab Sunoo's ankle; he steps over it without breaking stride.

"The Venomous Kiss," he says, gesturing at a flower with petals the color of dried blood. "Beautiful but fatal. Students use it in potions. Carefully."

"What happens if you're not careful?"

"Then you don't make it to graduation."

The tour continues. The Nocturna Dorms, seven buildings arranged in a semicircle around a central courtyard where a fountain sprays water that glows faintly silver. The medical wing, where a harried-looking healer is treating a student whose arm appears to have been temporarily turned into glass. The administrative offices and then the arena.

It's a massive stone amphitheater, open to the purple sky, with tiered seating that could hold the entire student body. The floor is sand, but it's not normal sand, it's darker than it should be, and it shifts occasionally, as if something beneath it is breathing.

And in the center of the arena, a young man is training.

He's tall. Pale. His hair is black as ink and his face is the kind of beautiful that makes your brain skip a beat. He's wearing training clothes instead of the uniform, simple black fabric that clings to his shoulders and arms in ways that seem specifically designed to make thinking difficult. He's holding a sword that appears to be made of crystallized shadow, and he's moving through forms with a precision that is almost hypnotic.

Around the edges of the arena, students have gathered to watch. They're not subtle about it. They're staring openly, whispering to each other, pointing. A few of them are fanning themselves.

"Who is that?" you ask.

"That," Sunoo says, his voice carrying a note of warning, "is Sunghoon. Avaritia. Greed. Your ex-fiancé."

"My what!?"

"Ex-fiancé. You broke up with him last year. Well, the old you did. She said he was boring." Sunoo's tone is carefully neutral. "He's been trying to win her back ever since."

You stare at the young man in the arena. He finishes a particularly complicated sequence, the shadow-sword cutting through the air and pauses. His chest is rising and falling with exertion. His dark hair is slightly mussed. There's a sheen of sweat on his forehead that catches the light from the purple sky and makes him look like a painting come to life.

"Boring," you repeat.

"Her words, not mine."

"She called that boring?"

"Are you okay? You look a little flushed."

"I'm fine. I'm totally fine. I'm just processing the fact that I apparently broke off an engagement with someone who looks like he was carved out of moonlight by a team of very dedicated artists."

Sunoo makes a face. "Please don't romanticize him. It's bad enough that he's been pining for a year. If you start encouraging him-"

In the arena, Sunghoon looks up. His eyes find you instantly, as if he knew exactly where you were standing. As if he always knows where you are. His expression shifts, and a smirk spreads across his face, slow and confident and deeply irritating.

He raises his hand in a wave. And you, operating on pure instinct, raise your hand back. It's small and shy and accompanied by a smile that you didn't give permission to appear.

Sunghoon's smirk falters. His hand freezes mid-wave. His pale cheeks flush slightly, barely noticeable, but you catch it. His eyes widen just a fraction. He looks, for a single moment, completely thrown off balance. Then he recovers, his smirk returning, but it's different now. Softer. Almost uncertain.

You realize what you've done. "Oh no," you whisper.

"Yeah," Sunoo says. He grabs your arm and starts dragging you away from the arena. "Oh no is right."

He pulls you around a corner and into an empty corridor. The moment you're out of sight, he rounds on you with an expression somewhere between exasperation and horror. "What was that?"

"I waved!"

"You waved. You did not just wave. You did a whole thing. You did a shy little wave with a shy little smile and he blushed, Y/N. I have known Sunghoon for three years and I have never seen him blush. He doesn't have enough blood flow for blushing. He's a Graveborn. He's technically dead."

"It was an accident! I panicked! He waved first!"

"Waved? Waved? He was being arrogant. You were supposed to ignore him. That's what the old you would have done. She would have looked at him like he was a piece of furniture and then walked away."

"I don't know how to do that!"

"Clearly."

You press your back against the corridor wall. "I'm going to mess this up. I'm going to mess everything up. I can't do this."

Sunoo sighs, his expression shifting from exasperation to something closer to sympathy.

 "You can do this," he says. "You just need to be more careful. Sunghoon is…he's intense. He loved her. The old her. He loved her even when she was cruel to him. If he thinks she's suddenly become soft-"

"Maybe that's a good thing? Maybe people will think she changed after the injury?"

"Maybe. Or maybe they'll think something else happened. Something worse." Sunoo's eyes are serious. "There are people at this Academy who would love to find a weakness in you. In her. If they think you're vulnerable, they'll exploit it."

"So what do I do?"

"You learn. You adapt. And you stop waving at your ex-fiancé like you're in a romance novel."

You groan and drop your head into your hands. "Who is he, anyway? You said ex-fiancé. Why were we engaged?"

"Your families arranged it when you were children. Noble politics. Sunghoon's family is old money, older than yours, actually. The engagement was meant to merge your houses. And then you broke it off because you got bored."

"Bored."

"According to her, he was too sincere. Too devoted. She said it was exhausting being loved that much."

You think about the young man in the arena. The way he looked at you like you were the only person in the world. The way your tiny, accidental wave made him blush.

"That's really sad," you say quietly.

"It's also not your problem." Sunoo stands and offers you his hand. "You're not her. You don't have to love him or hate him or anything in between. You just have to avoid making him suspicious."

"What if he already is suspicious?"

"Then we deal with it. But for now…Let's focus on getting through your first day. One disaster at a time."

"I think I've already had three disasters."

"Those were small disasters. Practice disasters. You haven't even met Jay yet."

"Who's Jay?"

Sunoo's smile turns slightly evil. "He hates you. Well, he hated her. He's going to hate you too, but for different reasons."

"What reasons?"

"Because you won't be able to do any of the things she could do. And he's going to notice." Sunoo pats your shoulder. "Good luck."

You stare at him. "I thought you said you were on my side."

"I am. That doesn't mean your life is going to be easy."

You follow him down the corridor, your mind spinning with new information. Jake, the childhood friend who knows you too well. Sunghoon, the ex-fiancé you apparently broke for no reason. And somewhere out there, Jay, the guy who hates you and is about to discover you can't do magic. You've been in this world for less than twelve hours, and you're already exhausted.

"What was the old me even like?" you mutter. "How did she handle all of this?"

Sunoo glances back at you. "She didn't have to handle it. Everyone was either beneath her notice or a tool to be used. She didn't worry about what people thought because she genuinely didn't care."

"That sounds lonely."

"It was. I think that's why she made the deal with Tristitia." His voice goes quiet. "She wanted power because power was the only thing that made her feel safe. And in the end, it killed her."

"I'm not her," you say finally. "I can't be her. I don't know how to be cold and cruel and untouchable."

"No," Sunoo agrees. "You can't. But you can pretend. And maybe-" He pauses, something flickering in his expression. "Maybe pretending will be enough."

You hope he's right. You really, really hope he's right. Because if he's not, you're going to have a lot more problems than expected. 

The rest of the day is a masterclass in improvisation. Your first class, Sin Theory with Professor Vex. Sunoo guides you to the front row before the other students arrive, his hand on your elbow steady.

"The front row?" you hiss. "Why am I in the front row?"

"Because the old Y/N always sat in the front row. She said it was easier to intimidate the professor that way."

"How does sitting in the front row intimidate anyone?"

"Eye contact. Unbroken eye contact. For the entire lecture." Sunoo pats your shoulder. "Good luck."

He retreats to a seat near the back before you can protest. Other students file in, filling the rings around you. You feel their eyes on the back of your head like tiny lasers.  You stare straight ahead. Your spine is rigid. Your face is, you hope, expressionless. The old Y/N wouldn't turn around. The old Y/N wouldn't acknowledge the whispers. The old Y/N would sit here like she owned the room and everyone in it.

Professor Vex enters through a side door.She stops when she sees you. Her black eyes fix on your face. "Lady Y/N," she says. Her voice is like silk. "You've returned."

"Professor Vex." You incline your head slightly. Sunoo told you not to make prolonged eye contact. You make exactly two seconds of eye contact and then look at a point just over her shoulder. "I apologize for my absence."

"No apology necessary. Magical injuries are unpredictable." She moves toward her desk, her robes sweeping the floor. "I trust you've recovered sufficiently?"

"Mostly."

"Good. We were discussing the theoretical foundations of cross-affinity contamination. Perhaps you can enlighten the class on the Terullian Paradox?"

You have no idea what the Terullian Paradox is. You have never heard those words in that order. For all you know, the Terullian Paradox is a type of pastry.

But Sunoo, bless his manipulative heart, prepared for this. "I'm afraid my memory is still... fragmented," you say, exactly as he instructed. "The healer advised against intellectual strain for the first few days of recovery. I'm here to observe and reacquaint myself with the material."

Professor Vex considers this. Her black eyes are unreadable. Then she nods slowly. "Very well. Observation is acceptable. I expect you to catch up on the missed material by next week."

"Of course."

She turns to the rest of the class. "The Terullian Paradox, then. Who can explain it?"

A student in the third row raises her hand. You let out a breath you didn't realize you'd been holding.

The lecture continues. You take notes frantically, scribbling down terms you don't understand. Sin magic, you learn, is not just about drawing power from wrongdoing. It's about resonance, the way a sinner's personal sins align with their deity's domain. A wrathful person draws Ira more easily. An envious person channels Vanagloria. The magic shapes the sinner, and the sinner shapes the magic.

It's fascinating. It's also terrifying, because you have no idea what sins you carry or which deity might claim you. If any deity claims you. You still haven't felt the pull Sunoo described. The resonance. The sense of coming home.

The second class is Combat Training with Professor Thornwood. The training ground is an outdoor space adjacent to the arena, covered in the same dark sand that shifts occasionally. Professor Thornwood is a Graveborn, tall and gaunt with hollow cheeks. He speaks in short, clipped sentences and does not appear to be the warmest person (literally).

"Today," he announces, "We practice defensive warding. Partner up. Y/N, you're with me."

You freeze. "Professor?"

"You've been absent. I need to assess what you've retained."

Sunoo, who was already moving toward you, stops in his tracks. His expression flickers with alarm before smoothing into careful neutrality. He catches your eye and mouths something that might be good luck or might be don't die. It's hard to tell.

You walk toward Professor Thornwood. "Defensive ward," Thornwood says. "Basic barrier. Show me."

You raise your hands. You've seen enough movies to know how this is supposed to look. You spread your fingers. You concentrate. You try to feel something, anything, any spark of magic, any pull of sin, any resonance whatsoever.

Nothing happens.

Thornwood waits. The students watch. The dark sand shifts beneath your feet. "Whenever you're ready," Thornwood says.

"I'm-" You lower your hands. "The injury. It's affected my connection. The healer said it might take time."

Thornwood's hollow eyes study you. For a long moment, he says nothing. Then he nods once. "Magical disruption is common after head trauma. We'll focus on physical conditioning instead. Run the perimeter. Ten laps."

The perimeter of the training ground is approximately half a mile. Ten laps is five miles. You haven't run five miles since high school gym class, and even then you walked most of it.

"Of course," you say, because the old Y/N wouldn't complain. The old Y/N would probably run twenty laps just to show off.

You start running. By lap three, your lungs are burning. By lap five, you've developed a stitch in your side that feels like someone is stabbing you with a very small, very persistent knife. By lap seven, you're fairly certain you're going to die a second time, and this death will be even less dignified than the first.

You keep running. The other students have moved on to practicing wards, their barriers shimmering in the air. Sunoo catches your eye as you pass and gives you a sympathetic grimace.

By lap ten, you're barely upright. You stumble to a halt in front of Thornwood, gasping for breath, sweat soaking through your clothes.

"Acceptable," Thornwood says. "We'll work on your stamina. Dismissed."

You nod, not trusting yourself to speak, and stagger toward the edge of the training ground. Sunoo appears at your side with a flask of water. "That was painful to watch," he says.

"That was painful to do."

"At least he bought the injury excuse."

"Is everyone going to buy the injury excuse?"

"Probably not. But we only need it to work for a few weeks." He hands you the flask. "Drink. You look like you're about to collapse."

You drink. The water tastes faintly of something floral, probably not normal water, probably enchanted or blessed or whatever they do to water in this world but it's cold and wet and you're too exhausted to care.

"Next class is Basic Hexes and Curses," Sunoo says. "Professor Willowisp. She's old, she's observant, and she doesn't like excuses. We need a different strategy."

"What strategy?"

"You're going to have a magical flare-up."

"A what?"

"Magical disruption from head trauma can cause unpredictable bursts of power. It's a documented phenomenon." Sunoo's voice takes on a scholarly tone. "If you accidentally destroy something in class, it'll explain why you can't do anything the rest of the time. Everyone will assume your magic is unstable rather than absent."

"Destroy something."

"Nothing important. A desk. A window. Something dramatic but non-lethal."

"How am I supposed to destroy something if I can't do magic?"

Sunoo reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small, glass sphere. Inside it, something dark swirls like smoke caught in a bottle.

"Throw this at the ground when I give the signal. It'll create a concussive blast. Very showy. Very convincing."

You take the sphere. It's warm in your palm, pulsing faintly like a heartbeat. "Where did you get this?"

"I have a supplier. Don't worry about it." He glances at the sky. "We have ten minutes before class starts. Try not to drop that before then."

Professor Willowisp's classroom is in the Verity Palace, on the third floor. The walls are lined with jars containing things you'd rather not identify. Professor Willowisp herself is ancient. Nine hundred years old, Sunoo said, and she looks every century of it. When she looks at you, you feel like she's reading your thoughts, which is probably not paranoia given that mind-reading magic almost certainly exists in this world.

"Lady Y/N," she says. "You've returned to us."

"I have, Professor."

"How fortunate. We were just beginning our unit on emotional affliction curses. Perhaps you'd care to demonstrate?"

The class goes very quiet. You grip the glass sphere in your pocket. "I'm not sure that's wise, Professor. My magic has been... unstable since the injury."

"Unstable?"

"Fluctuations. The healer warned me." You're getting better at lying. The words come easier now. "I wouldn't want to accidentally harm anyone."

Willowisp's ancient eyes study you. "A considerate concern. However, this classroom is warded against magical accidents. Whatever happens within these walls will be contained."

She's not going to let this go. She wants to see you do magic. She wants to test you. Sunoo catches your eye from across the room. He gives a tiny nod.

Now.

"Very well," you say. "But don't say I didn't warn you." You walk to the front of the classroom. Your heart is hammering. Your palms are sweating. The glass sphere is warm against your fingers. "What curse shall I demonstrate?" you ask, stalling for time.

"The Despondency Hex. A simple emotional affliction. Target the practice dummy." Willowisp gestures to a mannequin in the corner of the room. You position yourself in front of it, your back to the class.

You take a deep breath. You raise your hands dramatically. You make a show of concentrating, your brow furrowing, your fingers trembling with apparent magical effort. Then you "lose control." You throw your hands wide, stumble backward, and hurl the glass sphere at the ground between you and the practice dummy. The sphere shatters. A wave of force erupts from the impact point, sending the practice dummy flying across the room. The windows rattle. The jars on the walls shake. Several students scream. One desk is knocked over.

When the dust settles, you're on the floor, deliberately, because it sells the performance and the practice dummy is in pieces against the far wall. Professor Willowisp is staring at you. Her expression is unreadable.

"I did warn you," you manage.

For a long moment, no one speaks. Then Willowisp's ancient face creases into something that might be a smile. "Fascinating," she says. "A magical flare-up of considerable intensity. You're excused from practical demonstrations until your condition stabilizes. Please observe from the back of the room."

You pick yourself up off the floor. Sunoo helps you to a seat in the back row, his hand steadying your elbow. "Perfect," he whispers. "Absolutely perfect."

"I almost hit the ceiling."

"But you didn't. And now everyone thinks your magic is dangerously unstable. No one will ask you to demonstrate anything for weeks."

"Great." You slump into your seat. "Weeks of pretending to be magically volatile. This is going to be exhausting."

"Welcome to your new life."

After the final class, Sunoo walks you toward the training grounds. "Classes are done for the day, which means we have time for your first real lesson," he says. "Professor Thornwood might have bought your excuse, but you still need to learn basic combat skills. I'll teach you what I can."

"I thought you said we'd start with magical theory."

"We will. But you also need to know how to defend yourself physically. Magic isn't always available. Sometimes you just need to know how to throw a punch."

You've never thrown a punch in your life. You've been punched, the loan sharks' enforcer had a mean left hook but you've never hit anyone back. The idea of learning how feels strange. 

"Wait here," Sunoo says when you reach the training ground. "I need to grab some equipment from storage. Don't talk to anyone."

"Who would I talk to?"

"Anyone. Everyone. You're a magnet for attention. Just stand here and look unapproachable."

He disappears into a nearby building, leaving you alone on the edge of the training ground. You stand there, trying to look unapproachable. It probably looks more like you're constipated.

A shadow falls over you.

"There you are." You turn. Sunghoon is standing behind you, closer than you expected. He's still wearing his training clothes from earlier, though he's added a jacket that makes him look somehow even more put-together. His eyes are fixed on your face with an intensity that makes your stomach do something complicated.

"Sunghoon," you say. Your voice comes out slightly strangled.

"I've been looking for you." He steps closer. You step back. He steps closer again. "You left so quickly this morning. I didn't get a chance to welcome you back properly."

"I was busy. Classes."

"Classes." He says the word like it personally offends him. "You almost die on a mission and your first priority is classes?"

"The old Y/N would have prioritized classes."

"You're the old Y/N." He tilts his head. "Aren't you?"

Danger. Danger. Abort mission.

"Obviously, it’s just sarcasm," you say. "What do you want?"

"What I've always wanted. You." He says it simply, without embarrassment, like he's stating a fact. The sky is purple. The moons are sisters. He wants you. "I've been thinking about us."

"There is no us."

"There was."

"And now there isn't."

"Because you got bored." He doesn't sound angry. He sounds curious. "I've been trying to understand it. You said I was boring. But I remember the way you looked at me. I remember the way you-"

"Sunghoon."

"-responded to me. We were practically married, Y/N. Everyone assumed we'd formalize it eventually. And the physical aspect of our relationship was-"

"Oh my god."

"-extremely satisfying for both of us. You told me so yourself. Multiple times. You were quite vocal about it, actually."

Your face is on fire. "Please stop talking."

"I'm just trying to understand." He takes another step closer, and this time you're backed against the wall of the equipment building and there's nowhere left to retreat. "You ended things without explanation. You said you were bored, but you weren't bored. I know you weren't bored. So what was it?"

"I don't-" You struggle to remember what Sunoo told you. "I just needed space."

"Space." His eyes search your face. "You've had space. You've had a year of space. And now you're back, and you're different."

"I'm not different."

"You are. You waved at me this morning."

"So? People wave."

"You never wave. You used to walk past me like I didn't exist." His voice softens. "Today you waved. And you smiled. A real smile. Not the cold one you used to give me. A real one."

You have nothing to say to that. You can't explain it without revealing everything. So you just stand there, pressed against the wall, your heart pounding and your face burning, while your dead self's ex-fiancé looks at you like you're a puzzle he's desperate to solve.

"You're blushing," he observes.

"I'm not."

"You are. It's charming." He reaches up and brushes a strand of hair from your face. His fingers are cold against your skin. "I've never seen you blush before."

"I hit my head. It damaged my blood Circulation."

"That's not how blood circulation works."

"It's magical blood circulation."

He laughs. It's a soft sound, barely more than an exhale, but it transforms his face. "I've missed you," he says. "Even when you were cruel to me. Even when you ignored me. I've missed you every day."

"Sunghoon-"

"I know you don't want this. I know you don't want me. But I'm not giving up." He leans in, and before you can react, his lips brush against your cheek. It's barely a kiss, light, fleeting, cold and warm at the same time. "One day, I'll convince you to go on a date with me. A real date. And you'll remember why we worked."

He pulls back. Then he turns and walks away, his jacket billowing slightly in the breeze, leaving you pressed against the wall with your hand over your cheek and your brain completely offline.

Sunoo returns approximately thirty seconds later, carrying a bag of training equipment. "Why do you look like you've seen a ghost?" he asks. "You're pale. Paler than usual. What happened?"

"Sunghoon happened."

"What?"

"He came over. He said-" You press your hands to your burning face. "He said they had a very satisfying physical relationship and she was very vocal about it and he kissed my cheek and said he'd convince me to go on a date one day and I just stood there like an idiot because I didn't know what else to do!"

Sunoo drops the training bag. "He kissed you?"

"On the cheek! Just the cheek! But still!"

"Where?"

"My cheek! I just said!"

"No, I mean where were you? Were there witnesses?"

"I don't know! I was too busy having a crisis!"

Sunoo pinches the bridge of his nose. "Okay. Okay. This is fine. Sunghoon has been trying to win her back for a year. It's not suspicious that he's still trying. The cheek kiss is new, but it's not-" He pauses. "Did you respond?"

"I stood there like a statue!"

"Good. That's good. That's in-character. The old Y/N would have been cold about it. Dismissive."

"Sunoo, I think I blushed."

"You what?"

"I blushed. He noticed. He said it was charming."

Sunoo stares at you. Then he closes his eyes and takes a very deep breath. "I'm going to be honest with you," he says. "I don't know how to handle this. Sunghoon is not supposed to be charmed by you. He's supposed to be pining from a distance while you ignore him. That's the dynamic. That's how it's always been."

"Maybe he's just glad I'm not being cold to him anymore?"

"Which is exactly the problem." Sunoo opens his eyes. "The old Y/N was cruel. That's who she was. If you're not cold, people will notice. Sunghoon has already noticed. Jake noticed this morning. How long before everyone notices?"

"What do you want me to do? Start being mean to people?"

"Maybe! I don't know!" He throws his hands up. "I didn't plan for this. I planned for a smooth transition. I planned for you to be cold and distant and slowly warm up over time. I did not plan for you to be accidentally charming your ex-fiancé on day one."

"I wasn't trying to be charming!"

"That's the worst part! You're not even doing it on purpose!"

You both stand there in frustrated silence. "Can we just do the combat training?" you ask finally. "I think I need to hit something."

Sunoo exhales. "Fine. But we're not done talking about this."

The combat training is a disaster.

"Okay," Sunoo says, standing in the center of the training ground with a padded dummy. "The most basic defensive maneuver is the shield ward. It creates a temporary barrier between you and an attack. Even if you don't have an affinity yet, you should be able to produce at least a flicker of one. The theory is simple."

He explains the theory. It involves visualizing your sin energy, whatever that means, and channeling it through your hands into a physical barrier. The barrier doesn't need to be strong. It just needs to exist.

"Go ahead," he says. "Try it."

You raise your hands. You concentrate. You try to visualize your sin energy. Nothing happens.

"Try harder."

You try harder. You scrunch up your face. You push with your mind. You make straining noises that would be embarrassing if you weren't already beyond embarrassment. Nothing happens.

"Maybe try a different approach," Sunoo suggests. "Instead of pushing, try pulling. Imagine drawing energy from the air around you."

You imagine drawing energy from the air. The air does not cooperate. The air, in fact, seems actively uninterested in being drawn from.

"Anything?" Sunoo asks.

"Nope."

"Okay. Let's try a physical approach instead." He gestures to the dummy. "Basic punch. Just hit it."

You punch the dummy. It's not a good punch. Your thumb is inside your fist, which you're fairly certain is wrong. Your wrist bends at an awkward angle. The impact sends a jolt of pain up your arm.

"Ow."

Sunoo stares at you. "Have you ever thrown a punch before?"

"No."

"Ever?"

"I've been punched. Does that count?"

"No. It doesn't." He walks over and adjusts your stance. "Feet shoulder-width apart. Weight on your back foot. Thumb outside your fist, outside, Y/N, not inside. You're going to break your thumb if you punch like that."

"My thumb already hurts."

"Because you punched wrong. Do it again. Properly this time."

You punch again. It's slightly better. Your thumb remains unbroken. The dummy wobbles a little.

"Better," Sunoo says. "Now do it fifty more times."

"Fifty?"

"Muscle memory. Your body needs to learn what your mind already knows. Again."

You punch the dummy fifty times. 

"Good," Sunoo says. "Now the other hand."

"The other- are you serious?"

"Most people are right-handed, which means they expect attacks from the right. If you can throw a decent left hook, you'll have an advantage. Again. Fifty times."

You punch the dummy fifty more times with your left hand. Your left hand is even less coordinated than your right. Several punches miss entirely. One hits the dummy's stand and sends a fresh jolt of pain through your wrist.

"I hate this," you announce.

"You hate it because you're bad at it. You'll hate it less when you're good at it."

"Will I ever be good at it?"

Sunoo considers this. "Probably not. But you'll be better than you are now."

"That's not comforting."

"It wasn't meant to be. Again. This time, try a kick."

You kick the dummy. You miss and your momentum carries you around in a full circle. You end up facing the wrong direction with your back to the dummy and your arms pinwheeling for balance.

Sunoo covers his mouth with his hand. His shoulders are shaking.

"Are you laughing at me?"

"No," he says, his voice strangled. "Absolutely not."

"You're laughing at me."

"I'm not. I'm-" A snort escapes him. "Okay, I am. I'm sorry. It's just…you spun. You spun like a top. How did you spin like a top?"

"I don't know! Physics happened!"

"Physics doesn't usually make people pirouette!"

"I wasn't pirouetting!"

"You were definitely pirouetting. If we were grading this, you'd get full marks for artistic impression and zero for technique."

You grab a handful of training sand and throw it at him. He dodges, still laughing, and the sand scatters harmlessly across the ground.

"This is serious!" you protest. "I'm trying to learn how to defend myself!"

"You're right, you're right." He composes himself with visible effort. "I'm sorry. Let's try again. This time, don't spin."

"I didn't spin on purpose!"

"Plant your foot. Keep your weight centered. Kick through the target, not at it."

You try again. This time you don't spin, but your kick connects with the dummy's stand instead of the dummy, and the whole thing topples over. The dummy hits the ground with a thud that echoes across the training ground.

"I'm never going to be able to do this," you say quietly.

Sunoo walks over and rights the dummy. "You're not going to be able to do it today. Or tomorrow. Or probably next week. But eventually-"

"Eventually I'll what? Learn to throw a punch? That's not going to help against witches and demons and whatever else is out there."

"No. But it's a start." He turns to face you. His expression has lost its humor. "Y/N, I know this is overwhelming. I know you feel like you're drowning. But you're not alone. I'm going to help you. We're going to figure this out."

"And if we can't?"

"Then we'll figure out something else." He picks up the training bag. "That's enough for today. Let's go back to the dorm. We have plans tonight."

"Plans?"

"We're going to Malachar. There's someone I need you to meet."

The teleportation stone is a small, flat disc that fits in the palm of Sunoo's hand. "Teleportation stones are rare," Sunoo explains as you stand in his dorm room. "Most people use portals, but portals can be tracked. Stones are untraceable. This one is keyed to a specific location in Malachar, an underground bar called the Rusted Nail. Not the kind of place Academy students usually frequent."

"Then why are we going there?"

"Because the person we need to talk to doesn't frequent Academy-approved establishments."

He presses the stone into your palm and closes his fingers around yours. The stone is warm, warmer than it should be, and the silver veins pulse faster.

"Hold on," he says.

The world dissolves. This time, the teleportation is slightly less disorienting than before. Maybe you're getting used to it. Maybe the stone is smoother than whatever portal Sunoo used earlier. Either way, when your feet hit solid ground, you only stumble a little. 

"Where are we?"

"The Undermarket," Sunoo says. "Goblin territory. It's the black market of Malachar. Anything can be bought here if you know who to ask."

"And we're meeting a witch."

"An old contact of mine." He says it casually, but something in his tone makes you look at him sharply.

"An old contact?"

"We used to have an arrangement." He starts walking toward the end of the alley. "She provided certain services. I provided certain payments. It was mutually beneficial."

"What kind of arrangement?"

"The kind that's none of your business."

"Sunoo."

He sighs. "We slept together. Occasionally. It wasn't romantic. She's a witch, I'm an incubus, we both had needs. Are you happy now?"

You're not sure if "happy" is the right word. You're not sure what you're feeling. Surprise, maybe. Curiosity. A strange, uncomfortable twist in your stomach that you decide to ignore. "Is there anyone in this world you haven't slept with?"

"Plenty of people. I'm selective." He grins over his shoulder. "Don't worry. You're not my type."

"I wasn't worried."

"You looked worried."

"I looked curious. It's different."

He doesn't argue, but his grin widens. The Rusted Nail is tucked between a weapons shop and what appears to be a brothel. Its sign is a literal rusted nail. The door itself is iron, heavy and black, and it groans when Sunoo pushes it open. Inside, the bar is dim and smoky. Sunoo approaches the bar and orders two drinks in a language you don't recognize. The bartender, a goblin with one eye and a scar across his throat, grunts and produces two glasses filled with amber liquid.

"Don't drink too much," Sunoo says, sliding one glass toward you. "This stuff is stronger than anything in your world."

You take a cautious sip. It burns going down, but it's not unpleasant. It tastes like honey and smoke and something else, something that makes your head swim slightly. "The witch?" you ask.

"She'll be here soon. I sent word ahead."

You wait. Then the door opens, and a woman walks in. She's wearing robes that are clearly expensive but deliberately understated, and when she sees Sunoo, her lips curve into a smile that's equal parts warmth and wariness.

"Sunoo," she says. Her voice is low and smooth. "It's been a while."

"Mara." Sunoo rises to greet her. They don't embrace, but there's a familiarity in the way they stand close to each other. "Thank you for coming."

"You said it was urgent." Her golden eyes flick to you. "Who's this?"

"A friend. I need information."

"What kind of information?"

"About Tristitia."

Mara's expression doesn't change, but something in the air shifts. "Sit down," Mara says quietly. "And order me a drink." Sunoo signals the bartender. Another glass of amber liquid appears. Mara takes a long sip before speaking. "Tristitia," she says. "You don't ask easy questions, do you?"

"I wouldn't be here if I did."

Mara's golden eyes study you again, more intently this time. "Why do you want to know about the Sorrow?"

"I'm looking for a witch," you say. "One who serves Tristitia. She killed someone important to me."

"Who?"

"Someone I can't name."

Mara is silent for a moment. Then she shakes her head slowly. "I can't help you."

"Why not?"

"Because the Tristitia coven isn't like other covens. They don't operate in the open. They don't trade with other witches. They don't even acknowledge the rest of us exist." She takes another sip of her drink. "Most covens have structure. Hierarchy. Rules. The Tristitia witches are... something else. They answer only to the Sorrow itself, and the Sorrow doesn't share its secrets."

"So you know nothing?"

"I know they exist. I know they're dangerous. I know that anyone who makes a deal with Tristitia ends up dead or wishing they were." She sets her glass down. "That's all anyone knows. The Tristitia coven is a mystery, and it's a mystery that kills people who try to solve it."

You exchange a glance with Sunoo. His expression is unreadable, but you can see the tension in his jaw. "There has to be something," you press. "Any rumor. Any lead. Anything."

Mara considers you for a long moment. Then she leans forward, her voice dropping to barely above a whisper. "There's a place in the Wraithwood. Deep in the forest, some say the Tristitia witches gather there, but no one who's gone looking has ever come back." She sits back. "That's all I have. And frankly, I'm risking my life just telling you that much."

"Why?"

"Because the Sorrow doesn't like being discussed. And the Sorrow's servants don't like people asking questions." She finishes her drink in one long swallow. "My advice? Let it go. Whatever revenge you're looking for, it's not worth what you'll find."

You want to argue. You want to demand more. But Sunoo puts his hand on your arm, a gentle warning. "Thank you, Mara," he says. "We appreciate the information."

"Don't thank me. I didn't give you anything useful." She stands, pulling her hood up over her dark hair. "Be careful, Sunoo. I'd hate to hear you got yourself killed."

"I'm always careful."

"No, you're not. You're just good at surviving anyway." She smiles, but it doesn't reach her golden eyes. "Take care of yourself. And your friend."

She leaves. The door groans shut behind her. The bar resumes its low murmur, the other patrons returning to their drinks and their card games as if nothing happened.

"Well," Sunoo says, "that was unhelpful."

"She seemed scared."

"She was. Mara doesn't scare easily." He stares at his glass for a moment. "The Tristitia coven is even more secretive than I thought. This is going to be harder than I expected."

You watch him. His usual playful mask has slipped, and underneath it you can see something else. Frustration. Worry. Maybe even fear.

"Why do you care so much?" you ask quietly. "About finding this witch?"

He doesn't answer right away. When he does, his voice is softer than you've ever heard it. "Because she killed my best friend. And I couldn't stop it."

"Is that the only reason?"

He looks at you. "What other reason would there be?"

"I don't know. That's why I'm asking."

A long pause. Then Sunoo's mask slides back into place, and he smiles, bright and charming and completely fake. "We came all the way to Malachar," he says. "We might as well enjoy ourselves while we're here. Drink up. The night is young."

An hour later, you're both slightly tipsy. The amber liquid is stronger than you thought. Your limbs feel loose. Sunoo has abandoned his careful composure and is sprawled in his chair, laughing at something you said that wasn't even that funny.

"You're a terrible liar," he says, pointing at you. "Terrible. The worst. You couldn't lie to a rock."

"Rocks can't hear."

"That's how bad you are. You couldn't even lie to something that can't perceive lies."

"I lied to Professor Vex."

"You lied to Professor Vex with a script I wrote for you. That doesn't count."

You laugh. It feels good to laugh. The past two days have been so strange and terrifying that you'd almost forgotten what it felt like.

"Sometimes I think you're not telling me everything," you say.

"I'm not telling you everything. I've been very upfront about that."

"That's not comforting."

"It wasn't meant to be comforting. It was meant to be honest."

You drain the last of your drink. "I don't understand you," you say. "You found a dead body. You stopped time. You recruited a stranger from another universe. You're risking everything to find a witch who might be impossible to find. And you're doing it all with a smile on your face like none of it bothers you."

"It bothers me."

"It doesn't look like it bothers you."

"That's the point." He takes a sip of his drink. "I'm an incubus. We're not supposed to be bothered by things. We're supposed to be charming and carefree and shallow. That's what people expect. That's what people want."

"But it's not who you are."

He doesn't answer. "We should go back," he says. "It's late."

"Okay," you say. "Let's go back."

He pays the bartender with coins. Then he takes your hand and presses the teleportation stone into your palm, and the world dissolves.

Back in Sunoo's dorm room, he collapses onto his bed with a groan. He looks exhausted, not just physically, but something deeper. His skin is paler than usual. His eyes has dimmed.

"Are you okay?" you ask.

"I'm fine. Just... drained."

"Drained how?"

He hesitates. "Incubi need to feed. Emotional energy, physical intimacy. It's been a few days since I've-" He gestures vaguely. "It catches up with me."

"Is that why you look like death?"

"Thank you for that charming description." He pushes himself up on his elbows. "I'll be fine. I just need to find someone. There are usually willing partners in Goat Hall at this hour."

He starts to get up, but you reach out and catch his arm. "Wait." He looks at you. His expression is wary. "You've been helping me all day," you say. "You've been covering for me and teaching me and dragging me across the city to talk to witches. You're exhausted because of me."

"It's not because of-"

"It is. And I haven't done anything to help you." You take a breath. "So let me help you now."

The words hang in the air. Sunoo's eyes widen slightly. "Y/N..."

"I know what I'm offering. I'm not drunk. Well, I'm a little drunk. But I'm not so drunk I don't know what I'm saying." You meet his eyes. "You need to feed. I'm willing. It's the least I can do after everything."

"You don't have to-"

"I know I don't have to. I'm offering." You're blushing again. Your face is definitely on fire. But you don't look away. "The old Y/N did it, right? You said you had an arrangement. So it's not weird. It's not out of character. And you need it."

Sunoo stares at you. For a long moment, neither of you speaks. Then he laughs, a real laugh, surprised and slightly incredulous. "You're something else," he says. "You know that?"

"I've been told."

He sits up fully. His expression is still tired, but there's warmth in it now. "Are you sure?"

"Do I look unsure?"

He considers this. Then he reaches out and cups your face with his hand. His palm is warm. "Tell me to stop," he says quietly, "and I'll stop. At any point. For any reason. Do you understand?"

"I understand."

"I mean it. I don't care if we're in the middle of-"

"I understand, Sunoo."

He looks at you for another long moment. Then he leans in, and his lips meet yours. The kiss deepens, growing hungrier with each passing second. Sunoo's lips move against yours with practiced expertise, his tongue tracing the seam of your mouth before slipping inside. His hands find your waist, pulling you closer until there's no space between your bodies.

When he finally breaks the kiss, both of you are breathing heavily. His eyes, now glowing with renewed energy, lock with yours. "Last chance to back out," he murmurs, though his hands are already sliding under your shirt.

You shake your head, reaching for the hem of your shirt and pulling it over your head. "I'm not going anywhere."

A genuine smile spreads across Sunoo's face as he watches you undress. His own shirt follows, revealing his torso. As he removes his pants, your eyes catch something unusual, a dark, intricate mark on his lower belly, just above his waistline. It looks like a tattoo of swirling patterns that almost seem to move in the dim light.

"That's..." you start, but words fail you.

"The incubus mark," he finishes, noticing where you're looking. "It glows when I'm... well, you'll see."

Before you can respond, he gently pushes you back onto the bed. The mattress dips under your combined weight as he follows, hovering over you. His fingers deftly unhook your bra, tossing it aside before his mouth finds your breast.

Sunoo's lips close around your nipple, his tongue swirling in patterns that make you arch against him. One hand cups your other breast, thumb rubbing circles around the hardened peak while his free hand slides down your stomach, hooking into the waistband of your panties. He doesn't remove them immediately. Instead, his fingers dip beneath the fabric, tracing patterns on your skin that send shivers through your body. You can feel his smile against your breast as he feels your reaction.

"Sensitive," he murmurs against your skin before shifting his attention to your other breast.

When he finally slides your panties down, you're already wet with anticipation. His fingers part your folds, exploring with a familiarity that surprises you. Sunoo's fingers are skilled, moving with a precision that speaks of centuries of practice. He finds your clit immediately, circling it with just the right pressure to make your hips buck. Then he's sliding lower, collecting your wetness on his fingertips before returning to your sensitive bundle of nerves.

"You're so responsive," he whispers, his voice husky with renewed energy. "I can feel your emotions, your pleasure. It's... intoxicating."

As if to demonstrate, he increases the pressure slightly, and you gasp as a wave of pleasure washes over you. His mark begins to emit a soft purple glow, pulsing in time with his movements. "I want to hear you moan," he says, looking up at you with darkening eyes. "Your sounds... they feed me as much as your touch."

His words send another jolt through you, and you can't help but moan as he slides a finger inside you, then another. His thumb continues to work your clit as his fingers curl inside, finding that spot that makes you roll your eyes.

"That's it," he encourages, his own breathing growing heavier. "Let me hear you."

The magic is unmistakable now, each touch seems amplified, each sensation more intense than you've ever experienced. Sunoo shifts, turning you onto your side. He positions himself behind you, one arm wrapped around your waist to keep you close as he enters you with a smooth, practiced motion. The angle is new to you, hitting spots inside you that you didn't know existed.

"Is this okay?" he asks, his voice strained with restraint.

"More than okay," you manage to gasp out.

He begins to move, his hips rolling in a rhythm that has you moaning continuously now. Each thrust sends waves of pleasure through your body, building steadily toward something you've never experienced before. You can feel his mark growing hotter against your lower back, the purple glow intensifying.

"Sunoo..." you moan, reaching back to tangle your fingers in his hair.

He responds with a particularly deep thrust that makes you cry out. His own sounds join yours now, soft whimpers and moans that vibrate against your back. The closer he gets to his own release, the more his mark glows, bathing the room in an ethereal purple light. You've never enjoyed sex like this before. Every nerve ending is alive, every touch electric. You're so wet you can hear it with each movement, the sounds mixing with your moans and his to create a symphony of pleasure.

"I'm close," Sunoo gasps, his movements becoming more erratic.

His hand slides down to your clit again, rubbing in time with his thrusts. That extra stimulation is all it takes to push you over the edge. Your orgasm crashes over you with the force of a tidal wave, your body convulsing with pleasure as you cry out his name. Sunoo follows almost immediately, pulling out at the last second. You feel his warm release against your pussy and inner thighs as he moans your name, his mark flaring brightly before dimming slightly.

Before you can recover, he's shifting again, turning you onto your back and positioning himself between your legs. His eyes meet yours as he lowers his head.

"Sunoo, what-"

Your question cuts off in a gasp as his tongue laps at the mixture of your release and his on your skin. He's thorough, cleaning every drop with an enthusiasm that sends aftershocks of pleasure through your still-sensitive body. When he finally reaches your center, his tongue delves inside, and you arch off the bed. The pleasure is almost too much, too intense, but you don't want it to stop. You can feel him drawing energy from you, not just physical but emotional, the remnants of your pleasure, your contentment, your satisfaction.

With each pass of his tongue, you can see the color returning to his skin, the glow in his eyes brightening. His mark, once again dark, seems to pulse with renewed energy. Finally, when you're spent and trembling, he lifts his head. His face is flushed, his lips glistening, and he looks... healthy. Vital. The exhaustion that had plagued him earlier is gone, replaced by a vibrant energy that makes him seem almost otherworldly.

"Thank you," he says, his voice soft but strong now. "Are you okay for another round?"

You nod, still catching your breath. "Why am I still feeling hot though?"

"Incubi magic." He says with a small smile. 

You wake up sore.

Not the pleasant kind of sore that comes from a good workout. Not even the satisfying sore of muscles that have been productively used. This is the kind of sore that makes you question every life choice that led you to this moment. Your thighs ache. Your back protests when you try to move. Sunoo, the absolute menace, is already awake and looking disgustingly fresh. He's perched on the edge of his bed, his bed, which you are still in, because apparently you fell asleep here after last night's... activities, and he's scrolling through something on a thin crystal tablet that seems to function as this world's version of a smartphone.

"Good morning," he says cheerfully. "You look terrible."

"I feel terrible." You attempt to sit up and immediately regret it. "Oh my god. What did you do to me?"

"I did exactly what you asked me to do. Multiple times, if I recall correctly. You were very enthusiastic."

"Was I?"

"Incredibly. It was flattering, honestly. At one point you said-"

"Please don't finish that sentence."

"-something about my eyes being like honeyed starlight. It was very romantic. I didn't know you had it in you."

You grab a pillow and press it over your face. The pillow smells like him, something floral and slightly citrusy. "I was tipsy and under your incubi magic."

"You were two drinks in. That's not tipsy, that's barely buzzed. And my magic doesn’t make people poetic, it just makes them extra horny there’s a difference."

"I wish I was dead."

"That seems extreme." He plucks the pillow off your face. "Come on. We have classes in an hour. You need to shower, eat something, and figure out how to walk without limping."

"I'm not limping."

"You're definitely limping. I saw you try to stand earlier. It was pathetic."

You throw the pillow at him. He catches it without looking, which is infuriating. His reflexes are annoyingly good. Probably an incubus thing. Probably all the feeding he did last night, which, okay, you're not going to think about that. You're not going to think about any of it. You're going to shower and eat breakfast and pretend last night was a normal, reasonable thing that normal, reasonable people do.

Sunoo grins. It's the same grin he wore last night when he first kissed you, equal parts mischief and affection. "You're cute when you're flustered."

"I'm not flustered. I'm sore. There's a difference."

"Whatever helps you sleep at night." He stands and stretches, his shirt riding up to reveal a strip of stomach that you absolutely do not look at. "Bathroom's through there. Use whatever products you want. I recommend the blue bottle for muscle aches. It's enchanted."

"Enchanted how?"

"It makes your muscles stop hating you. Very useful for mornings after."

You stare at him. "Do you have a lot of mornings after?"

"I'm an incubus who lives in the Lust dorm. What do you think?"

"I think I don't want to know."

"Probably wise." He tosses you a towel. "Go shower. I'll get breakfast. You're going to need your strength, we have Potiology today, and Professor Thornwood doubled your conditioning laps."

"He what?"

"I may have mentioned that you were eager to improve your stamina. He was impressed by your dedication."

"Sunoo."

"Yes?"

"I'm going to kill you."

"That's the spirit. Channel that anger. Maybe it'll trigger your Ira affinity."

You throw the pillow at him again. He dodges again. You limp to the bathroom and slam the door.

The shower helps. The enchanted blue bottle helps more. By the time you're dressed and fed and walking (mostly) normally, you've been staring at Sunoo like he murdered your ancestors. 

"Why do you keep making that face?" Sunoo asks as you walk toward the Verity Palace.

"What face?"

"That scrunched-up thinking face."

"I don't have a scrunched-up thinking face."

"You absolutely do. It's very endearing."

"I'm not-" You take a breath. 

He pauses. "Are you sure you're fine?"

"I will throw you down these stairs."

"That's a no, then."

The first classes are doing strangely great for you. The break between Combat Training and Basic Hexes is when everything starts to go wrong.

You're sitting in the classroom, waiting for Professor Willowisp to arrive, when the door opens and a young man walks in. He's not the professor. He's a student, an elf, you can tell by the pointed ears and the faint luminescence of his skin. He's also, you notice, wearing the emblem of the snake on his collar. Vanagloria. Envy.

"Good afternoon," he says. His voice is smooth and pleasant and somehow makes you feel like you're being evaluated. "I'm here to collect the mid-term consent forms. Professor Willowisp asked me to handle the paperwork before class begins."

Consent forms. You have no idea what consent forms he's talking about. You have no idea if the old Y/N turned hers in. You have no idea what's happening at all. The other students are pulling papers from their bags. You sit frozen, your hands empty, your expression carefully blank.

The elf makes his way around the room, collecting forms from each student. When he reaches your desk, he pauses. "Y/N," he says. "Your form?"

"Right." You don't move. "The form."

"The mid-term consent form for practical hex application. It was due today."

"Of course. The form." You pat your bag, pretending to search for it. "I must have... forgotten it. In my room. The injury. Memory gaps."

The elf's eyes narrow slightly. "You forgot?"

"Temporarily. It'll come back."

"I see." He doesn't sound like he sees. He sounds like he's cataloging this information for future use. "I'll note the late submission. Professor Willowisp may deduct points."

"That's fine. Points are... fine."

He studies you for a moment longer. Then he smiles, a smile that doesn't reach his eyes, and moves on to the next student. You don't realize you've been holding your breath until he's on the other side of the room.

When the elf finally leaves, papers in hand, Sunoo slides into the seat beside you. His expression is carefully neutral. "That was Jungwon," he says quietly. "Student representative. Head of every committee. Controls the flow of information in the Academy like a spider controls a web." Sunoo's voice is low. "And he's suspicious of you."

"I noticed."

"Jungwon doesn't forget things. If he thinks something's wrong with you, he'll dig until he finds out what it is."

"Great." You press your palms against your eyes. "Another person I have to worry about."

"Jungwon is different from Jake or Sunghoon. They care about you. Jungwon cares about leverage. If he figures out you're not the real Y/N, he won't keep it secret out of loyalty. He'll use it."

"So what do I do?"

"Avoid him. Don't give him anything to work with. And for the love of all seven deities, turn in your paperwork on time."

"I didn't know there was paperwork!"

"Now you do." Sunoo squeezes your shoulder. "It's fine. One late form isn't proof of interdimensional identity fraud. Just be more careful."

Potheology is your first class without Sunoo. It takes place in the greenhouse. Sunoo isn't in this class. He's across campus in Advanced Luxuria Theory, which is apparently restricted to incubi and succubi for reasons you don't want to think about. You're on your own for this one. No safety net. No whispered instructions. No one to cover for you if you mess up.

You take a seat near the back, hoping to blend in. 

Then Jake walks in. He spots you immediately. His face lights up. "Y/N! You're in this class?"

"Apparently."

"I didn't know you took Potheology. I thought you said potions were beneath you."

The old Y/N said potions were beneath her. Because of course she did. "I changed my mind. The injury. It's given me a new perspective."

Jake's expression softens. "I'm glad. It's nice to have you here." He takes the seat next to you, dropping his bag on the floor. "Fair warning, today's lesson is on aphrodisiacs. Professor Nightshade thinks they're medicinally significant but really she just likes making students uncomfortable."

"Wonderful."

Professor Nightshade enters before Jake can elaborate. She surveys the class with the expression of someone who has seen everything and been disappointed by most of it.

"Aphrodisiacs," she announces without preamble. "Contrary to popular belief, they are not recreational substances. They are medically significant compounds used to treat a variety of conditions, including emotional trauma, sensory deprivation, and certain types of magical damage. Today you will learn to brew a basic desire tincture. The instructions are on your desks. Begin."

You look at the instructions on your desk. Moonbloom petals. Siren's tear essence. Crushed firepearl. Powdered duskwing moth. You have no idea what any of these things are.

"Need help?" Jake asks.

"No," you say automatically. Then, because you're trying to be better at accepting help: "Actually, yes. The injury. I'm having trouble remembering the... ingredient properties."

Jake's face softens even further. "Of course. Here, let me show you."

He walks you through the brewing process step by step. "The key is the proportions," Jake explains, his hands steady as he measures ingredients. "Too much moonbloom and it's basically a love potion. Too much firepearl and it's just... spicy. You want balance."

"Right. Balance."

"You're doing Great."

You're not doing great. Your tincture is a muddy brown color while Jake's is a shimmering rose gold. But you're following instructions and not actively setting anything on fire, which feels like a victory. By the end of class, you've produced something that might technically qualify as an aphrodisiac. It's lumpy and it smells slightly burnt, but Professor Nightshade passes by your station with only a raised eyebrow and a muttered "acceptable."

"See?" Jake says, beaming. "Told you you could do it."

"Thanks to you."

"That's what friends are for." He packs up his supplies while you do the same. "Hey, do you want to study together later? I know you've been spending a lot of time with Sunoo since you got back, but I thought maybe we could-"

"Actually, I'm going to the library after this. Sunoo said I should catch up on magical theory."

"Oh." Jake's face falls slightly. "Okay. Maybe another time?"

"Definitely."

He brightens. "Great! I'll hold you to that."

You feel a twinge of guilt as he leaves.

The Delictum Academy library is, as Sunoo mentioned during your tour, a multi-story cathedral of books with shelves that rearrange themselves when you're not looking. You find a seat in a quiet corner and pull out the list Sunoo gave you. Magical Theory for Beginners. A History of Sin Magic. It's a lot of reading. It's more reading than you've done in your entire college career combined.

But you need to understand this world. You can't keep faking your way through classes forever. Eventually, someone is going to ask you a question you can't deflect, and you need to have an answer ready. You start with A History of Sin Magic, Volume I. By the time you finish the third chapter, your eyes are starting to glaze over. You need a break. You need to stretch your legs. You need to-

You need to find information about Tristitia.

It's been lurking in the back of your mind all day, ever since last night's meeting with Mara. The Tristitia coven is a mystery. No one knows anything about them. But this is a library. Libraries have information. Libraries have records. Maybe there's something here that no one's thought to look for.

You glance around the reading room. The other students are absorbed in their own work. The librarians are busy at the front desk. No one is watching you.

You stand up, leaving your books on the table, and slip between the shelves. Tristitia is something else, a deity outside the sanctioned system, forbidden and dangerous. If there's information about it, it wouldn't be in the main sections. It would be in the restricted area.

You find the iron gate Sunoo pointed out during your tour. It's at the back of the library, tucked behind a row of shelves that seem to have been deliberately arranged to obscure it. You try the gate. It's locked.

Of course it's locked. You didn't expect it to be unlocked. But you also didn't come all the way here just to give up at the first obstacle. There has to be another way in. A side door. A gap in the wards. Something.

You circle the perimeter of the restricted section, looking for weaknesses. And then you see it. A gap in the shelves. Not a door, exactly, but a space where two shelf units don't quite meet. It's narrow, barely wide enough for a person to squeeze through and it's partially hidden by a tapestry. You check your surroundings. Still no one watching. Still no one paying attention.

You slip through the gap.

The restricted section is darker than the main library. You move carefully between the shelves, reading the labels. None of them mention Tristitia by name. None of them even hint at the Sorrow. You spend what feels like an hour searching. But nothing specifically about Tristitia. Nothing about its coven. Mara was right. The Tristitia coven is a mystery, and it's a mystery that doesn't want to be solved.

Frustrated, you slip back through the gap and return to your table. You came to this library hoping for answers, and all you found was more questions.

"Y/N!"

You look up. Jake is hurrying toward your table, something clutched in his hand. "Hey," you say, closing your book. "What are you doing here?"

"You left this in the greenhouse." He holds up the vial of your lumpy aphrodisiac. "I thought you might want it. Professor Nightshade said it was acceptable, which is basically an A in her class."

"Oh. Thanks." You take the vial from him. It's still warm from the greenhouse. "You didn't have to track me down for this."

"I wanted to." He grins. "Also, I was hoping to convince you to take a study break. You've been in here for hours. Your brain needs rest."

"My brain is fine."

"Your brain is going to turn to mush if you keep reading magical theory without breaks. Trust me. I've seen it happen."

"That's not a real thing."

"It's absolutely a real thing. Last year, a fifth-year tried to read the entire Terullian Principles in one sitting and his brain literally liquefied. They had to call a healer."

"You're making that up."

"Maybe. But do you want to risk it?"

You laugh despite yourself. Jake has a way of making everything feel lighter. Less serious. He's the opposite of Sunoo's calculated charm, he's just genuinely, effortlessly warm.

"Fine," you say. "A short break."

"Yes!" He pumps his fist. "Okay, so there's this spot in the greenhouse I want to show you. There's a plant that only blooms during the false dawn, and if you time it right, you can see-"

He's gesturing enthusiastically as he talks, his hands moving in wide arcs. One of those arcs catches the aphrodisiac vial, still balanced precariously on the edge of the table.

Time slows down. You see the vial tip. You see Jake's face shift from excitement to horror. You see his hand reach out, too late, as the vial tumbles off the table and hits the floor.

It shatters. The liquid inside, your lumpy, "acceptable" aphrodisiac spreads across the stone floor in a shimmering puddle. And the smell that rises from it is... intense. Floral and spicy and something else, something that makes your head swim and your skin prickle.

"Oh no," Jake breathes.

"What?"

"That's the aphrodisiac. The concentrated aphrodisiac. And we just-" He gestures at the puddle, then at the two of you, standing directly over it. "-inhaled a lot of it."

"How much is a lot?"

"I don't know. I've never-" He swallows. "Do you feel anything?"

You open your mouth to say no, of course not, you feel fine. But the words don't come out. Because you're suddenly very aware of the fact that you don't feel fine. You feel warm. Too warm. Your skin is tingling, and your heart is beating faster than it should be, and when you look at Jake, really look at him, you notice things you didn't notice before. The way his hair curls slightly at the ends. The way his eyes catch the light. The way his uniform fits across his shoulders.

This is bad.

"I feel something," you admit.

"Me too." Jake's voice is slightly higher than usual. "Okay. Okay, this is fine. Aphrodisiacs are temporary. The effects wear off. We just need to-"

He's interrupted by voices. Loud voices, coming from the direction of the library entrance.

"-absolutely unacceptable. The restricted section has been accessed without authorization."

"I'm aware, Headmaster. We're investigating."

Professors. Multiple professors. And they're heading this way. If they find you here, standing over a shattered aphrodisiac vial, clearly affected, alone together-

"We need to hide," Jake hisses.

"Where?"

"I don't know! Somewhere!"

He grabs your arm and pulls you between the shelves. The voices are getting closer. You can hear footsteps now, heavy and purposeful. The professors are searching the library, and they're going to find you if you don't find cover immediately.

Jake's eyes dart around wildly. Then they land on something, a panel in the wall, barely visible, half-hidden behind a bookshelf. "There!" He pushes against the panel, and it swings open to reveal a small, dark compartment. "In here!"

There's no time to argue. No time to think. You dive into the compartment, and Jake dives in after you, and the panel swings shut behind you just as the professors round the corner. The compartment is tiny. Cramped. It was clearly designed for storage, not for people. There's barely enough room for one person, let alone two people to hide.

You and Jake are pressed together in the darkness, your bodies flush against each other. It takes you a moment to realize what position you've ended up in. Your head is down near his legs. Your rear end is... somewhere near his face.

"Is your-" Jake's voice comes out strangled. "Is your- are you-"

"What?"

"Your... ass. It's on my face."

You close your eyes. You want to die. You want the floor to open up and swallow you. You want to go back in time and never come to this library, never brew this aphrodisiac, never agree to hide in this horrible, tiny compartment.

"I'm aware," you manage.

"Okay. Okay, that's- that's fine. This is fine. Everything is fine."

"Stop saying everything is fine."

"I can't. If I stop saying it, I'll start screaming."

The voices are right outside now. You can hear them clearly through the thin wall of the compartment. "-no sign of the intruder. The restricted section appears undisturbed."

"Keep searching. The wards were triggered. Someone was here."

You hold your breath. Jake holds his breath.The aphrodisiac is definitely still burning. You can feel it. Every point of contact between your body and Jake's is electric, heightened, overwhelming. The warmth of his chest. The press of his hands on your hips, trying to steady you. And from the way his breathing keeps catching, from the way his fingers are gripping your hips a little too tightly, you're pretty sure he's feeling it too.

"This is bad," you whisper.

"Very bad," he agrees.

"The aphrodisiac-"

"I know."

"It's making me-"

"I know. Me too."

You both fall silent. The professors are still outside, their footsteps heavy on the stone floor. The compartment is still dark, still cramped, still unbearably warm. And the aphrodisiac is still working its way through your bloodstream, turning every accidental touch into something more. Jake shifts slightly, trying to find a more comfortable position. You bite your lip to keep from making a sound.

"Sorry," he breathes.

"It's fine."

"It's not fine. Nothing about this is fine." A pause. "Can I just say, for the record, that this is not how I imagined my evening going?"

"You imagined your evening?"

"I imagined a lot of things. None of them involved hiding in a closet with my childhood best friend's ass on my face."

"Can we stop talking about my ass?"

"I would love to stop talking about it. Unfortunately, it's very present."

You would laugh if you weren't so mortified. You would cry if you weren't so pent up. The aphrodisiac is reaching its peak, you can tell, the warmth is spreading through your entire body now, pooling low in your stomach, making your thoughts hazy and your skin hypersensitive. And Jake is right there. His body warm and solid and smelling like honey and vanilla and something else, something that the aphrodisiac is making you notice far too intensely.

"Y/N," Jake says. His voice is strained. "We might have a problem."

"What kind of problem?"

"The kind of problem that is... physically manifesting."

It takes you a moment to understand what he means. When you do, your face burns so hot you're surprised the compartment doesn't catch fire.

"Oh," you say.

"Yeah."

"That's- that's the aphrodisiac."

"I know."

"It's not- you're not-"

"I know. But my body doesn't know. My body thinks-" He cuts himself off with a strangled sound. "Can you please stop shifting?"

"I'm not shifting!"

"You're shifting! Every time you move, your-"

The compartment door rattles. You both freeze.

"Is someone in there?" a voice calls out. One of the professors. Right outside. Right there.

You don't breathe. He doesn't breathe. The compartment is silent, and dark, and so hot that you're both sweating, and the aphrodisiac is still pulsing through your veins, and this is quite possibly the worst moment of your entire life.

The footsteps move away. The voices fade. "Must have been a false alarm. The old wards are too sensitive."

"We'll check again in the morning." The footsteps retreat. The library falls silent.

You don't move. Jake doesn't move. The two of you stay frozen in the darkness, pressed together, hearts racing, the remnants of the aphrodisiac still singing through your blood.

Finally, after what feels like an eternity, Jake speaks. "We should probably-"

"Yeah."

"Wait until we're sure they're gone."

"Yeah."

The silence stretches, thick and heavy in the darkness. You can still hear some faint voices.

"We should..." Jake starts, his voice a strained whisper. "We should try to stay still. Control our breathing. It'll pass faster if we don't... feed it."

You nod. Control. That's a good idea. A rational idea. You try to focus on your breath, pulling in slow, steady inhales and pushing them out. But every time you breathe in, you fill your lungs with Jake's scent, all amplified by the potion into something intoxicating, something that makes your mouth water. The heat inside you isn't fading. It's building. It pools in your stomach, a low, heavy ache that spreads downwards, between your thighs. You can feel a dampness gathering there, a slick warmth that has nothing to do with sweat and everything to do with the man pressed against you.

Jake shifts, a tiny, aborted movement meant to create space, but it only makes things worse. His hips roll forward, just slightly, and the hard line of his erection drags against the right side of your face. A gasp tears from your throat before you can swallow it.

"Sorry," he grits out, his voice tight. "I'm sorry. I'm trying."

"I know," you whisper back, your own voice shaky. "Me too."

His hands are still on your hips, his fingers gripping you through the fabric of your uniform skirt. You can feel the heat of them even through the layers of cloth. You want him to move them. You want him to take them away. You want him to slide them under your skirt and press them directly against your skin. The thought is so shocking, so potent, that it makes you dizzy. You're not supposed to be thinking about his hands on your bare skin. 

You feel one of his hands move. It slides slowly, tentatively, from your hip to the hem of your skirt. His knuckles brush against the back of your thigh, and you shudder, a full-body tremor that you can't control.

"Y/N," he breathes, his voice right next to your ear, a puff of hot air that makes you clench. "I can’t hold back anymore."

You don't say anything. Screw your inhibition. You just press back against him, a silent, involuntary plea. He takes it as permission. His fingers hook under the waistband of your tights. He pauses for a second, giving you one last chance to refuse. You don't. You hold your breath, your entire body tensed in anticipation. Slowly, carefully, he peels the tights down, followed by your underwear. The fabric whispers down your legs, bunching around your knees. The cool air of the compartment hits your heated flesh, and you gasp.

"Jake," you whisper, his name a ragged sound. "What are you-"

And then you feel something else. It's the wet, heat of his tongue, tracing a slow, deliberate line up your inner thigh. You bite down hard on your lip to keep from crying out. The sensation is overwhelming, a jolt of pure pleasure that shoots straight to your core. He does it again, on the other thigh, his movements slow and unhurried, as if he has all the time in the world. His thumbs part your folds, exposing you completely to him. And then his mouth is on you.

Not a tentative lick, but a firm, confident press of his lips against your most sensitive spot. A choked moan escapes your lips.

"Quiet," he whispers against you, the vibration of his voice sending another shockwave through you. "We have to be quiet."

You nod frantically, trying to focus, to muffle the sounds he's pulling from you, but it's impossible. He starts to move his tongue, and all rational thought dissolves. He's not rushing. He's exploring. He licks around your clit, tracing the shape of it. He dips down, gathering your wetness on his tongue before circling your entrance, teasing you with shallow thrusts that make you buck back against him. The aphrodisiac is amplifying everything, turning every flick of his tongue into a bolt of lightning, every slow lap into a wave of fire.

He builds a rhythm, a slow, maddening tempo that has you climbing higher and higher. He alternates between broad, flat strokes that cover your entire core and sharp, precise flicks of his tongue directly on your clit. It's too much and not enough. You can feel the pressure coiling in your stomach.

You're lost in it. Your mind is blank, filled only with the feeling of his mouth on you, his hands on your hips, the scent of his skin. And then, through the haze of pleasure, a new thought surfaces. Your own hands begin to move. You fumble in the darkness, your fingers searching for the button of his trousers. You find it, your knuckles brushing against the hard length straining against the fabric. He groans against you, a low, guttural sound that vibrates through your entire body.

Your fingers are clumsy, shaking with a combination of the aphrodisiac and your own rising desire. You manage to undo the button. His erection springs free, hot and heavy in your hand. You wrap your fingers around him, and he hisses, his hips jerking forward. You stroke him once, twice. A bead of moisture gathers at the tip, and you swipe at it with your thumb. He shudders.

You shift your position slightly, Until you can take him into your mouth. The taste is clean and salty. You hollow your cheeks, sucking gently, and he rewards you with another groan, the sound muffled against your skin. This is it. This is the breaking point. You're pleasuring him while he pleasures you, a tangle of limbs and mouths in the suffocating darkness. Every time he flicks his tongue, you tighten your grip on him. Every time you take him deeper into your mouth, his own movements become more frantic.

You have to swallow your moans, muffle your cries against his skin. He has to muffle his groans against you. The sounds you do make are choked, breathless, desperate. The pressure inside you is almost unbearable now. You're so close. You can feel the orgasm building. Jake seems to sense it too. He focuses his attention, his tongue working faster, harder, with a devastating precision. He slides one hand from your hip, his fingers finding your clit and rubbing in tight, circles as his tongue continues its assault. That's all it takes. The wave breaks and your orgasm crashes over. 

This is bad. Really really bad.

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ✠ 𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝖂𝖔𝖗𝖑𝖉 𝖔𝖋 𝕰𝖒𝖕𝖊𝖗𝖎𝖔𝖓 ✠

Emperion is a kingdom built on contradictions. The streets are lit by floating lanterns fueled by captured memories, each one glowing a different color depending on the emotion inside it. In the capital city of Malachar, you can buy anything: cursed jewelry, bottled laughter, dreams extracted from sleeping minds.

Magical creatures coexist here openly. Vampires run the banking houses in the financial district. Demons serve in the royal court. Elves maintain the great libraries. Shapeshifters work as spies and messengers. Graveborn beings resurrected from death walk among the living with pale skin and hollow eyes, neither fully dead nor fully alive. Mortals live alongside all of them, some gifted with magic, some not.

The kingdom is ruled by a monarchy that worships the seven deities, though in practice, the noble houses hold most of the real power. Politics in Emperion is a blood matter. Families rise and fall based on magical skills, strategic marriages, and the occasional well-timed assassination.

Far to the north, past the frozen forests and the mountains, lies Nocthaven. It's cold, isolated, and completely inhospitable to anyone who isn't a magic user. This is where the Delictum Academy was built, far from the distractions of civilization, close to the raw sources of sin magic that seep up from the cursed ground.

The celestial kingdom of Aetherlyn considers sin magic an abomination. Their realm exists on a different plane of reality, one built from virtue, order, and divine light. They are not peaceful nor merciful. They believe Emperion is a nuisance that must be destroyed.

Aetherlyn sends Archangels, beings of immense power, constructed from celestial energy to wage war on Emperion. These are not the angels of human religion. Archangels are weapons. They descend, destroy entire cities, and leave nothing but ashes where life used to be.

The war has lasted for centuries. Emperion created the Imperial Division specifically to fight it: a team of seven elite sinners, one for each deity, working together as a strike force. Every few years, when the current members die or retire, the Delictum Academy selects the seven most powerful students to replace them. These chosen ones are called the Seven Deadly Sins.

It is the highest honor a sinner can achieve and a near-certain death sentence.

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ✠ 𝕺𝖗𝖎𝖌𝖎𝖓𝖘 ✠

Long ago, before Emperion had a name, a scholar named Terullian made a discovery that changed the world. He noticed that human wrongdoing left traces. A man who stole bread left behind a residue of hunger and desperation. A woman who lied to her husband left behind a shimmer of deceit. These residues, Terullian theorized, were not just emotional traces. They were power.

He spent forty years in isolation, studying criminals, the dying, and the morally corrupt. What he found was a system. Every sin produced a specific type of magical energy, and that energy could be harvested, shaped, and wielded by those with the talent to do so. He called this practice Sinderomancy, sin magic. His writings became the foundation of Emperion's entire magical tradition.

The ethical implications were immediately controversial. Using magic meant drawing power from the worst parts of humanity. Every spell cast was, in some small way, profiting from suffering. But the power was undeniable. Within a century, Emperion had built an entire civilization on it.

Every magic user in Emperion is born with an affinity for one of the seven sin categories. This affinity is innate and cannot be changed. It shows up in childhood, usually around puberty, and determines which deity's power they can access.

Casting magic requires three things: affinity, focus, and source.

The affinity is your natural connection to a specific sin. The focus is your ability to shape that power into a spell, which requires training and mental discipline. The source is the actual sin energy you're drawing from, either your own emotions, the ambient sin residue in the world, or in advanced cases, the deity itself.

At the Academy, all students learn the basics of every magic category regardless of their affinity. This is considered essential education. A sinner must understand how each sin works to defend against it. But they can only ever truly master their own affinity. The curriculum dedicates the first two years to foundational courses in all seven disciplines before students specialize in their third year.

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ✠ 𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕾𝖊𝖛𝖊𝖓 𝕯𝖊𝖎𝖙𝖎𝖊𝖘 ✠

The accumulated sin energy of centuries did not simply dissipate. It coalesced. It gained awareness. Seven entities formed from the collected wrongdoings of mortal beings, each one embodying a specific category of sin. They are not gods in the traditional sense. They did not create the world. They are parasites grown powerful, forces of nature more than personalities.

⚚ 𝔊𝔲𝔩𝔞 (𝔊𝔩𝔲𝔱𝔱𝔬𝔫𝔶) Born from overconsumption in all its forms. Gula is not just gluttony for food but for anything: attention, substances, experiences, pain. Its followers tend to be sensory seekers. Magic drawn from Gula allows the user to consume almost anything, physical matter, energy, even abstract concepts like time or memory and convert it into power.

⚚ 𝔏𝔲𝔵𝔲𝔯𝔦𝔞 (𝔏𝔲𝔰𝔱) Born from lust and obsessive desire. Luxuria governs attraction, both physical and emotional. Its magic deals in obsession, charm, and the manipulation of relationships. Followers can make themselves irresistible, sense others' desires, and forge emotional bonds that feel like addiction. It's considered one of the most dangerous disciplines because it erodes consent.

⚚ 𝔄𝔳𝔞𝔯𝔦𝔱𝔦𝔞 (𝔊𝔯𝔢𝔢𝔡) Born from greed and possessiveness. Avaritia's domain is material wealth and the fear of losing it. Its magic allows users to bind objects to their will, create unbreakable contracts, and sense the location of anything they consider theirs. Avaritia sinners are often obscenely wealthy and paranoid to a fault.

⚚ ℑ𝔯𝔞 (𝔚𝔯𝔞𝔱𝔥) Born from wrath, rage, and vengeance. Ira is the most directly destructive deity. Its magic manifests as combat enhancement, pain manipulation, and destructive energy. Followers can draw power from their own anger or the anger of those around them. The angrier they are, the stronger they become, which makes discipline essential.

⚚ 𝔄𝔠𝔢𝔡𝔦𝔞 (𝔖𝔩𝔬𝔱𝔥) Born from sloth, apathy, and the paralysis of will. Acedia is the strangest of the deities. Its magic doesn't do things so much as undo them. Followers can slow time, drain motivation from enemies, make objects forget their purpose, and create spaces where nothing happens. It's subtle, frustrating, and deeply unsettling to face.

⚚ 𝔙𝔞𝔫𝔞𝔤𝔩𝔬𝔯𝔦𝔞 (𝔈𝔫𝔳𝔶) Born from envy and the desperate need for validation. Vanagloria's magic is about copying, stealing, and undermining. Its followers can temporarily duplicate others' abilities, drain confidence, and create illusions that show people what they most fear or desire. They are master manipulators who understand that destruction is often best achieved by making someone destroy themselves.

⚚ 𝔖𝔲𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔟𝔦𝔞 (𝔓𝔯𝔦𝔡𝔢) Born from pride and the belief in one's own absolute superiority. Superbia is considered the most powerful and most dangerous of the seven. Its magic deals in domination, command, and the warping of reality to fit the user's will. Followers can make people believe their lies, bend weaker minds to obedience, and in rare cases, reshape small portions of the physical world through sheer force of ego.

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ✠ 𝕯𝖊𝖑𝖎𝖈𝖙𝖚𝖒 𝕬𝖈𝖆𝖉𝖊𝖒𝖞 ✠

Delictum Academy was founded three hundred years ago by Evagrius Ponticus, who remains its headmaster to this day. No one knows exactly what Ponticus is. He appears human, but he hasn't aged in centuries. He speaks softly, smiles rarely, and seems to know things before they happen. Students speculate that he made some ancient deal with all seven deities simultaneously, which should be impossible.

The Academy's official purpose is to train sinners to master their abilities and defend Emperion. Its unofficial purpose, the one whispered in the dorms at night, is to identify the strongest among each generation and feed them into the war machine. Graduation rates are high. Survival rates after graduation are not.

The Academy is built on an estate the size of a small city, surrounded by walls enchanted to keep out the perpetual northern winter. Inside, the climate is controlled to a perpetual mild autumn. Dead leaves flying across cobblestone paths but never pile up.

☾ 𝔑𝔬𝔠𝔱𝔲𝔯𝔫𝔞 𝔇𝔬𝔯𝔪𝔰 The student housing is divided into seven buildings, each corresponding to one of the sin affinities. The dorms are named after the animals associated with the sins, and the architecture reflects the nature of each one:

Peacock Hall (Pride): Tall, elegant, and deliberately intimidating. Every room has mirrors on the ceiling. The common area features a throne-like chair that students compete to sit in.

Lion Hall (Wrath): Built low and solid like a fortress. The training rooms are in the basement, soundproofed to contain the screaming. Students here settle disputes in the combat ring and bet with everything.

Pig Hall (Gluttony): Surprisingly warm and comfortable, with a dining hall that serves food at all hours. The kitchens are never closed. The rooms are cluttered and cozy.

Toad Hall (Greed): Locked cabinets in every room. A vault in the basement for student valuables. The walls are thick with protective enchantments. Nothing gets stolen here because everyone is paranoid enough to ward their doors three times. The dorm was mostly funded by Sunghoon’s family.

Goat Hall (Lust): Silk sheets and dim lighting and private balconies. The rules about overnight guests are loosely enforced. The air is always faintly perfumed.

Snake Hall (Envy): Mirrored hallways that show you distorted reflections. The rooms are arranged so everyone can see slightly into everyone else's space. Gossip travels faster than light here.

Snail Hall (Sloth): Softest beds in the Academy. Sound-dampening walls. The common room has hammocks instead of chairs. Students here have perfected the art of doing absolutely nothing and looking good doing it.

☾ 𝔗𝔥𝔢 𝔙𝔢𝔯𝔦𝔱𝔶 𝔓𝔞𝔩𝔞𝔠𝔢 The main academic building. A sprawling structure of black stone and stained glass windows depicting the seven deities. Classrooms are arranged in circles rather than rows because the Socratic method is heavily favored. The library in the east wing contains restricted texts that literally bite if you try to read above your magic level.

☾ 𝔗𝔥𝔢 𝔖𝔱𝔢𝔩𝔩𝔞𝔯 ℭ𝔥𝔞𝔪𝔟𝔢𝔯 An observatory and ritual space. The ceiling is enchanted to show a real-time map of the night sky, which is used for divination and celestial magic tracking. Students come here to practice spells that require starlight, which is abundant in Nocthaven's eternal night.

☾ 𝔗𝔥𝔢 𝔊𝔯𝔢𝔢𝔫𝔥𝔬𝔲𝔰𝔢 A massive glass dome filled with magical plants. Some of them are ingredients for potions. Some of them are dangerous. A few of them are mildly sentient and will hold grudges if you water them wrong. The Greenhouse is maintained by a groundskeeper who may or may not be a walking tree.

☾ 𝔗𝔥𝔢 𝔄𝔯𝔢𝔫𝔞 Where combat training and duels take place. The stands can hold the entire student body. Bloodstains on the floor are cleaned between matches, but the cleaning enchantment never quite gets everything. There are older stains beneath the newer ones, layers of violence soaked into the ground.

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ✠ 𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕾𝖊𝖛𝖊𝖓 𝕯𝖊𝖆𝖉𝖑𝖞 𝕾𝖎𝖓𝖓𝖊𝖗𝖘 ✠

These seven students are currently considered the most likely to be selected as the next Imperial Division. They are not yet officially the Seven Deadly Sins, but everyone treats them as if they are. They sit at the top of the Academy's social hierarchy, feared, admired, and whispered about in equal measure. Students like to call them the Princes of Hell.

⛧°。 ⋆༺♱༻⋆。 °⛧

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ⚜ ꜱᴜɴᴏᴏ (ᴀꜱᴍᴏᴅᴇᴜꜱ) ⚜

Preacher of Luxuria and sinner of Lust. Sunoo is beautiful in a way that makes people uncomfortable. As an incubus, he naturally draws people toward him. He smiles often, laughs easily, and never raises his voice. This is not because he's gentle. This is because he doesn't need to raise his voice to get what he wants. He flirts with everyone regardless of gender, species, or availability, less out of genuine desire and more because flirtation is information-gathering. He is not evil, but he is not good either. Sunoo was the old Y/N's best friend before she died. They were "glued to each other," as other students put it. He was with her on the mission when the witch killed her. He watched her die. Why couldn't he save her? Sunoo is a powerful sinner in his own right. How did a witch kill his best friend right in front of him? He recruited Y/N from another world for reasons he has not fully explained. He claims he wants justice for his best friend. But Sunoo always has multiple motives, and he only ever reveals the ones that serve his purposes.

⛧°。 ⋆༺♱༻⋆。 °⛧

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ⚜ ʜᴇᴇꜱᴇᴜɴɢ (ʟᴜᴄɪꜰᴇʀ) ⚜

Preacher of Superbia and sinner of Pride. Heeseung's tall, dark-haired, with features that seem slightly too perfect to be natural, because they aren't. He's a demon, full-blooded, from one of the old families that trace their lineage back to the first coalescence of sin energy. He speaks quietly and rarely. When he enters a room, conversations falter. He's the kind of person you notice even when you're trying not to. No one knows much about Heeseung. He doesn't socialize. He doesn't explain himself. He attends classes, performs perfectly on every assessment, and disappears. His dorm room in Peacock Hall is the largest in the building, but no one has ever been invited inside. He is not cruel, which surprises people. He doesn't bully or belittle. He simply... doesn't engage. He knows he's the best. He doesn't need anyone else to confirm it. Heeseung can do things other sinners find impossible. The professors are wary of him. The headmaster watches him closely.

⛧°。 ⋆༺♱༻⋆。 °⛧

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ⚜ ᴊᴀʏ (ꜱᴀᴛᴀɴ) ⚜

Preacher of Ira and sinner of Wrath. Jay is a vampire from an old aristocratic family. He keeps his black hair immaculate and his uniform perfectly pressed. His hands are always gloved. It's actually because direct skin contact lets him sense pulse points, and that's distracting in a building full of living bodies. When Jay is calm, he's cold. When he's angry, which happens quickly and often, he's terrifying. Jay's anger is not random. It's principled, which makes it worse. He has a rigid sense of fairness and loses his composure when that fairness is violated. He hates cheaters. He hates bullies. He hates incompetence in positions of authority. The world constantly disappoints him, and he constantly punishes it for disappointing him. The rivalry with the old Y/N started on their first day of classes when she scored higher than him on an aptitude test. She didn't even study. He had studied for weeks. It's been war ever since. Everything is a competition: grades, combat rankings, professor attention. The old Y/N found it amusing. Jay does not find it amusing at all.

⛧°。 ⋆༺♱༻⋆。 °⛧

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ⚜ ᴊᴀᴋᴇ (ʙᴇʟᴘʜᴇɢᴏʀ) ⚜

Preacher of Gula and sinner of Gluttony. Jake is a mortal, fully human, which is rare among the Academy's elite. He has warm brown eyes and a smile that makes people want to trust him. He's extroverted, physically affectionate, and the kind of person who remembers everyone's birthday. He knows the names of the kitchen staff. He helps first-years find their classrooms. He is universally liked, which in a school of sinners is almost suspicious. Jake is gullible in the way of someone who has never needed to be otherwise. He grew up sheltered, the son of merchants who made their fortune honestly. He entered the Academy naive and has somehow remained naive despite everything. People assume he's stupid. He isn't. His sin is Gluttony, but his relationship with it is gentle, he genuinely loves food, experience, sensation. His magic lets him consume and convert almost anything into energy. Jake has known the old Y/N since they were children. Their families were neighbors before her parents moved to the capital.

⛧°。 ⋆༺♱༻⋆。 °⛧

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ⚜ ꜱᴜɴɢʜᴏᴏɴ (ᴍᴀᴍᴍᴏɴ) ⚜

Preacher of Avaritia and sinner of Greed. Sunghoon is cold in the way of marble statues and winter season. He's tall, pale, and beautiful in an uncanny, untouchable way. He is a Graveborn, a being who died and was brought back through necromantic ritual. He dresses impeccably. His family is old money, old magic, old everything. Professors love him. He is respectful, diligent, and never causes trouble. This is a performance, but it's a very good one. He expresses emotion precisely and sparingly. When he tells you something, he means it with his whole being, but you have to pay attention to notice. His greed manifests as possessiveness. He collects things, artifacts, knowledge, people and once something is his, he does not let it go. He protects what is his with a ferocity that surprises people who assumed he was emotionless. The old Y/N was his. He loved her, genuinely and completely, and she ended their engagement because she was bored. He has been trying to win her back ever since, not out of desperation but out of certainty. She belongs with him. He knows this. He just needs to convince her.

⛧°。 ⋆༺♱༻⋆。 °⛧

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ⚜ ᴊᴜɴɢᴡᴏɴ (ʙᴇᴇʟᴢᴇʙᴜʙ) ⚜

Preacher of Vanagloria and sinner of Envy. Jungwon is an elf, which means he's older than he looks and knows more than he shows. He appears to be in his early twenties but is closer to eighty. He's the student council president, the head of disciplinary committees, the voice of the student body to the faculty. He has positioned himself so thoroughly in the Academy's power structure that removing him would require dismantling the structure itself. Jungwon envies everything and admits nothing. His envy is not the hot, impulsive kind. It's cold and patient and deeply strategic. He studies the people he envies. He learns their weaknesses. He positions himself to benefit from their eventual downfall. He's not trusted so much as accepted. Everyone knows Jungwon is playing an angle. It's just easier to let him play than to fight him. He's helpful when it suits him, obstructive when it doesn't, and always, always aware of where everyone stands in the hierarchy.

⛧°。 ⋆༺♱༻⋆。 °⛧

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ⚜ ɴɪ-ᴋɪ (ᴀʙᴀᴅᴅᴏɴ) ⚜

Preacher of Acedia and sinner of Sloth. Ni-ki is a shapeshifter, which means his appearance is technically negotiable. His default form is tall and lean, with sharp features and dark eyes that look perpetually half-lidded. He skips classes constantly but maintains decent grades through natural talent and last-minute cramming. He's athletic in a way that seems unfair given how little effort he puts into it. Shapeshifting burns calories and keeps his body in constant low-level motion even when he's sitting still. He's usually found in Snail Hall, horizontal on whichever surface looks most comfortable. Ni-ki's sloth is not laziness exactly. It's more like extreme efficiency. He doesn't do things that don't interest him. He doesn't engage with people who bore him. He has a very clear sense of what matters to him and everything else gets minimal effort. He admires the old Y/N. She was everything he wasn't: driven, dominant, effortlessly powerful. He wants to be like her, or at least he wants the version of her he's constructed in his head.

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ♰ 𝕬𝖓𝖉 𝖞𝖔𝖚…𝖂𝖍𝖆𝖙 𝕾𝖎𝖓𝖓𝖊𝖗 𝖆𝖗𝖊 𝖞𝖔𝖚? ♰

The last day of the trip arrives with a sky so clear and blue it looks like it's been painted there just for you.

You wake to sunlight streaming through the window and the distant sound of someone's Bluetooth speaker playing an acoustic cover of a song you vaguely recognize. The mountains outside are dusted with fresh snow from an overnight flurry, and the whole world looks like it's been dipped in sugar.

You roll over and check your phone.

Heeseung: good morning! i have a whole day planned for us. wear something warm. and comfortable. and prepare to be romanced.

Heeseung: that sounded less intense in my head

Heeseung: i'm not trying to be intense. i'm trying to be romantic. there's a difference.

Heeseung: okay now i'm overthinking. just meet me in the lobby at 10.

Heeseung: please.

You stare at the string of messages, a smile spreading across your face despite the early hour. There's something deeply endearing about watching Heeseung, the same Heeseung who shouted his feelings from a mountaintop in front of hundreds of people second-guess his word choice in a text message.

You: i'll be there. try not to spiral before 10.

Heeseung: no promises.

You get dressed slowly, savoring the morning. Yunjin is already awake, sitting cross-legged on her bed with a cup of tea and her laptop open. She looks up when you emerge from the bathroom and lets out a low whistle.

"Someone's glowing," she says.

"I'm not glowing. I'm just… well rested."

"You're glowing. It's disgusting. I love it." She takes a sip of her tea. "Big plans today?"

"Heeseung says he has a whole program. He's being very mysterious about it."

"A whole program. That's ambitious."

"You know how he is. Once he commits to something, he goes all in."

Yunjin nods thoughtfully. "That's true. The mountaintop confession definitely proved that." She pauses, then adds, "Have you talked to Jungwon yet?"

The question lands in your stomach like a small stone. You've been avoiding it, if you're honest with yourself. The past few days have been a whirlwind of Heeseung and snowboarding and confessions, and somewhere in all of that chaos, you've managed to push the Jungwon situation to the back of your mind.

"I haven't," you admit. "I've been… busy."

"Busy making out with your hot engineer boyfriend?"

"He's not my-" You stop. "Actually, I think he might be my boyfriend? We haven't technically defined it, but he did shout about wanting to be with me from a mountaintop, and I shouted back, and there were witnesses, so I think it's legally binding at this point."

"It's definitely legally binding. Mountaintop declarations are admissible in court."

"I should talk to Jungwon, though. Before we leave. I owe him that much."

Yunjin's expression softens. "I think that's a good idea. Clear the air. Get some closure. Then you can fully enjoy whatever aggressively romantic program Heeseung has planned without any lingering guilt."

"Closure," you repeat, testing the word. "That's a scary word."

"The scariest words usually lead to the best things."

You check the time on your phone. 9:15 AM. Heeseung isn't expecting you until 10. That gives you forty-five minutes to find Jungwon and have what promises to be one of the most emotionally complicated conversations of your life.

No pressure.

You find Jungwon exactly where you expect to find him: in the lodge's quiet reading nook, tucked into an armchair by a window that overlooks the mountains. He has a book open in his lap and a mug of steaming tea on the small table beside him. The morning light catches the angles of his face, the curve of his jaw, the way his lashes cast shadows on his cheeks.

Your heart does a small, familiar flutter, the ghost of an old feeling, a muscle memory of affection. But it's different now. Softer. Less like a bruise and more like a scar that's healed.

"Hey," you say, your voice coming out quieter than you intend.

Jungwon looks up, and when he sees you, his expression shifts through several emotions in quick succession, surprise, then something that looks almost like nervousness, then a gentle, accepting warmth.

"Hey," he replies, marking his page and setting the book aside. "I was wondering if you'd come find me before we leave."

"You knew I would?"

"I hoped." He gestures to the armchair across from him. "Sit. Please."

You sit. The armchair is plush and comfortable, the kind of chair that swallows you whole and makes you want to stay there forever. Outside the window, a group of skiers are making their way down the intermediate slope, their laughter carrying faintly through the glass.

"I want to talk to you," you say. "About everything."

"I figured." Jungwon wraps his hands around his mug, his expression thoughtful. "I heard about the mountaintop thing. Well, everyone heard about the mountaintop thing. It's kind of the talk of the trip."

Your cheeks heat. "It was very public."

"Very public. Very loud. Very Heeseung." He smiles, but there's something wistful in it. "It suits him. The grand gesture. He's always been like that, once he decides something matters to him, he goes all in. No holding back."

"Jungwon-"

"Before you say anything," he interrupts gently, "I want you to know that I'm okay. Really. I meant what I said in the library. I'm glad it's him."

You swallow hard, the guilt that's been lurking in the back of your mind rising to the surface. "The letter I gave him… it was meant for you. The whole time. I'd been planning to confess to you for weeks, and I wrote that letter, and I walked into the PC room thinking you were there, but it was Heeseung instead, and I was too embarrassed to correct it, and then everything spiraled, and-"

"I know," Jungwon says quietly.

"You know?"

"Heeseung told me. Last night, actually. He came to my room and explained everything." Jungwon's smile turns rueful. "He was very apologetic. Kept saying he hadn't meant to steal my crush. It was the most flustered I've ever seen him."

Your brain struggles to process this information. "He told you?"

"He wanted to make sure there were no hard feelings. That's Heeseung for you, he can't stand the thought of hurting anyone, even accidentally. He probably would have stepped aside if I'd asked him to." Jungwon pauses, his gaze steady on your face. "But I didn't ask him to. Because I saw the way he looked when he talked about you. And I saw the way you looked at him yesterday, after the mountaintop thing. That's not something I could compete with. That's not something I'd want to compete with."

Your eyes are stinging. "Jungwon…"

"I meant what I said in the library," he continues, his voice gentle but firm. "Liking you was not a waste of time. It was nice. You're the first person who made me want to be brave enough to actually say something. And even though it didn't work out the way I imagined, I don't regret any of it. The gummy bears, the philosophy lectures, the study sessions in the library. It was all worth it."

"Even the part where I accidentally confessed to your best friend instead of you?"

"Especially that part." Jungwon laughs, and it's his real laugh, bright and warm, the one that crinkles the corners of his eyes. "How many people can say their crush story involved a wrong-letter plot twist and a mountaintop confession? We're basically in a romance novel. We just ended up in different chapters."

You laugh too, and it comes out wet and wobbly. "You're taking this really well."

"I've had time to process. And honestly? I think things worked out the way they were supposed to." He leans forward, his expression earnest. "You and me? We're too similar. We're both dreamers, both overthinkers. We would have been comfortable together, but I don't know if we would have pushed each other to grow."

"And Heeseung?"

"Heeseung is everything you're scared of. He's bold and direct and he puts his feelings out there without a safety net. He challenges you to be brave in ways you never thought you could be." Jungwon smiles, and this time there's no sadness in it, just genuine warmth. "You shouted your feelings from a mountaintop, Y/N. You did that. And that's because of him, but it's also because of you. He just helped you find the courage that was already there."

A tear slips down your cheek, and you wipe it away quickly. "You're too nice. You should be bitter and dramatic. You should be writing angsty poetry about how I broke your heart."

"Who says I'm not?" Jungwon pulls a small notebook from beside his book and waves it teasingly. "There might be some very angsty poetry in here. You'll never know."

"Can I read it?"

"Absolutely not. It's terrible. I'm not a poet."

You laugh again, and the sound mingles with his, filling the quiet reading nook with something that feels like healing. Like closure. Like the end of one chapter and the beginning of another.

"Friends?" you ask, holding out your hand.

Jungwon looks at your hand for a moment, then reaches out and gently pokes your cheek instead.

"Boop," he says softly. "Friends."

And that's it. The final boop. The last poke. A gesture that once made your heart soar with hope now feels like a fond farewell, a bookmark placed at the end of a story that's been beautiful, even if it didn't end the way you expected.

By the time you make it to the lobby at 10 AM, your heart feels lighter than it has in weeks. The conversation with Jungwon was a door closing, gently, without slamming, and behind you, a new door is opening. A door that leads to a lobby where a tall informatics engineering student is waiting for you with a thermos of hot chocolate and an expression of barely contained excitement.

"You're early," Heeseung says, his face lighting up when he sees you.

"You're earlier."

"I wanted to make sure everything was perfect." He hands you the thermos, and your fingers brush against his. Even that small contact sends a flutter through your chest. "Hot chocolate. Extra marshmallows. I remembered you said you liked marshmallows."

"You remembered that?"

"I remember everything you say. It's a problem. My brain is approximately sixty percent coding knowledge and forty percent Y/N trivia."

"That's a very specific ratio."

"I'm a very specific person."

You take a sip of the hot chocolate. It's perfect, rich and sweet, with exactly the right amount of marshmallows. "So what's on the agenda? You said you had a whole program."

"I do." Heeseung pulls a folded piece of paper from his jacket pocket with a flourish. "Behold. The itinerary."

You take the paper and unfold it. It's handwritten in his slightly messy script, complete with bullet points and little doodles in the margins. There's a snowman with a top hat. There's a mountain with a smiley face. There's what appears to be a very enthusiastic stick figure waving its arms.

LEE HEESEUNG'S OFFICIAL LAST-DAY-OF-SKI-TRIP PROGRAM FOR Y/N L/N 10:00 AM – Meet in lobby. Hot chocolate delivery. (CHECK! ✓) 10:30 AM – Souvenir shop visit. Find the most ridiculous thing possible. 11:30 AM – Snowman building competition. (I will win. Fair warning.) 12:30 PM – Lunch. There's a crepe place I found. It's supposed to be amazing. 2:00 PM – Snow angels. Because you can't go to a ski station and not make snow angels. 3:00 PM – Free time/rest/warming up by the fire. 4:30 PM – Sunset walk to the overlook point. I packed snacks. 7:00 PM – Dinner. I made a reservation. Yes, a reservation. At a ski lodge. I don't know how I did it either.

"This is…" you start, staring at the paper. "This is incredibly detailed."

"I told you. I want to make the day memorable."

"Memorable like a mountaintop confession?"

"Memorable like a day that's just for us. No misunderstandings, no drama, no crying on benches." He pauses. "Unless the crying is happy crying. Happy crying is allowed."

You look up from the itinerary, and Heeseung is watching you with an expression that's almost nervous, his brow slightly furrowed, his fingers drumming against his thigh. It's such a contrast to the confident boy who shouted his feelings from a slope in front of hundreds of people that it makes your heart squeeze.

"This is amazing," you say. "Really. No one's ever planned a whole day for me before."

"Really?"

"Really. I'm usually the one doing the planning. In my head, at least. I have a lot of elaborate daydreams that never actually happen."

Heeseung's expression softens. "Well, today, one of them is happening. If you want it to. We can skip anything you don't want to do. The itinerary is a suggestion, not a contract."

"I want to do all of it. Especially the part where you lose the snowman competition."

"I will not lose."

"You will definitely lose. I've been building snowmen since I was five. I have techniques."

"I have engineering knowledge. Physics is on my side."

"Physics doesn't apply to snowmen. Snowmen are art."

"Snowmen are architecture. Temporary architecture, but architecture nonetheless."

You're still arguing about the fundamental nature of snowmen when you arrive at the souvenir shop. The shop is packed with the kind of merchandise that only exists in ski lodges, t-shirts with puns about snow, mugs shaped like mountains, keychains featuring the slightly deranged-looking mascot.

"Okay," Heeseung says, rubbing his hands together. "The goal is to find the most ridiculous thing in this store. Winner gets bragging rights for the rest of the day."

"Define ridiculous."

"Subjective. That's what makes it fun."

You split up, browsing the aisles with the intensity of detectives searching for clues. Heeseung gravitates toward a shelf of snow globes that play tinny music when you wind them up. You find yourself in front of a rack of socks with increasingly bizarre patterns, socks with llamas wearing scarves, socks with penguins doing yoga, socks with a pattern that appears to be just… cheese.

"I found it," Heeseung announces, appearing at your elbow with a triumphant expression. He's holding a stuffed animal that looks like a cross between a bear and a snowball, with googly eyes that are slightly misaligned and a scarf that's definitely too long for its body. "It's a snow-bear. Or a bear-snow. The tag just says Fluffy. No further explanation."

"That's terrifying."

"That's what makes it perfect."

You hold up your own find: a pair of socks depicting a very angry-looking reindeer with the words "SLEIGH ALL DAY" written beneath it. "I think I win. This reindeer has seen things."

"That reindeer has trauma." Heeseung examines the socks with a critical eye. "Okay, you win. The reindeer is more ridiculous than Fluffy."

"I told you. Snowman-building champion and souvenir-hunting champion. I'm undefeated."

"We haven't done the snowman competition yet."

"But I already know I'm going to win."

"We'll see about that."

He buys Fluffy anyway, tucking the stuffed animal under his arm with the casual affection of someone who's already formed an emotional attachment to a googly-eyed snow-bear. You buy the reindeer socks, because they're ridiculous and because they'll make Yunjin laugh when you show her later.

The snowman competition takes place in a quiet clearing near the beginner slope. You roll the first snowball with the practiced efficiency of someone who has, as claimed, been building snowmen since childhood. Heeseung approaches his own snowball with the analytical precision of an engineering student, measuring angles and testing snow density and muttering things about structural integrity.

"You're overthinking it," you call over. "It's a snowman, not a bridge."

"Art is engineering," he calls back. "Michelangelo understood physics."

"Michelangelo wasn't building snowmen."

"That we know of."

Your snowman comes together quickly, a classic three-tier design with a carrot nose (procured from the lodge kitchen), button eyes (borrowed from your spare coat), and a scarf (the colorful one Yunjin lent you, which you've temporarily sacrificed for the cause). Heeseung's snowman is taller and more elaborate, with what appears to be an attempt at snow-arms and a snow-hat that keeps collapsing.

"He needs a face," you say, standing back to admire your work. "He looks like a ghost."

"I'm working on the face. The face is the hardest part."

"The face is the easiest part. You just stick things in the snow."

"That's the problem. I want him to have dimension. Bone structure. A jawline."

"You're giving a snowman a jawline."

"All snowmen deserve jawlines. A jawline as defined as Jay's."

In the end, Heeseung's snowman has a face that's slightly lopsided and arms that are definitely too long, but there's something endearing about it. Something earnest. Something that makes you look at it and think he really tried.

"You know what," you say, stepping back to compare the two snowmen. "I'm calling it a tie. Your snowman has more ambition, but mine has better execution."

"Ambition versus execution. The eternal struggle."

"Story of my life, honestly."

You high-five, your mittened hands meeting in the cold air with a soft thump, and then you both stand there admiring your creations until the cold starts seeping through your layers and you decide it's time for lunch.

The crepe place is everything Heeseung promised, warm and cozy, with red-checkered tablecloths and the smell of melted chocolate and fresh strawberries hanging in the air. You order a crepe with Nutella, and Heeseung orders one with ham and cheese, and you both agree to share so you can try both.

"This is the best crepe I've ever had," you say, your mouth full of Nutella.

"You say that about everything."

"Because everything today has been the best. The hot chocolate was the best. The souvenir shop was the best. The snowman competition was the best. The crepe is the best."

"I'm detecting a pattern."

"The pattern is that you planned a really good day."

Heeseung ducks his head, and you could swear his cheeks go slightly pink. "It's not over yet. We still have snow angels and the sunset walk and dinner."

"You're spoiling me."

"Good. You deserve to be spoiled."

There's something in his voice when he says it, something earnest and almost vulnerable, that makes your heart flip. You reach across the table and take his hand, and his fingers interlace with yours automatically, like they've been doing it for years instead of days.

"I talked to Jungwon," you say. "This morning."

Heeseung's expression flickers. "Oh?"

"It was good. Really good, actually. He told me you'd already talked to him. Explained everything."

"I wanted to clear the air. I didn't want things to be weird between us, between any of us." He pauses, his thumb tracing circles on the back of your hand. "Was that okay? I probably should have asked you first."

"It was more than okay. It was…" You search for the right word. "It was very you. Taking care of everyone's feelings even when you didn't have to."

"People-pleasing is a hard habit to break."

"I don't think you need to break it. I think you just need to make sure you're included in the people you're pleasing." You squeeze his hand. "Are you okay? With everything?"

"Me?" He seems genuinely surprised by the question. "I'm more than okay. I'm-" He stops, his brow furrowing slightly. "I'm really happy. Like, almost suspiciously happy. I keep waiting for something to go wrong."

"That's the anxiety talking."

"I know. But it's hard to turn off." He smiles, but it's a smaller smile than usual. A more vulnerable one. "I'm used to being the one who manages everyone's expectations. The one who makes sure everyone else is comfortable. Being on the other side of that, being the one who gets to be happy feels unfamiliar."

The words settle into your chest, heavy with meaning. Heeseung, the people-pleaser who can't say no, the boy with the reputation that doesn't reflect who he actually is, he doesn't know how to let himself be happy. He's spent so long managing everyone else's feelings that he's forgotten how to prioritize his own.

"We're going to work on that," you say. "The letting-yourself-be-happy thing."

"That sounds like a long-term project."

"Well I'm planning to be a long-term project so you should get used to it."

The afternoon continues in a blur of snow and laughter. You make snow angels in a pristine patch of snow behind the lodge, your arms and legs sweeping arcs into the powder, your breath fogging in the cold air. Heeseung's snow angel is noticeably larger than yours, and he insists on taking a picture of them side by side "for documentation purposes," he says, but you know it's because he wants to remember this moment.

Then comes the free time, which you spend huddled by the massive stone fireplace in the lodge, sipping more hot chocolate and watching the flames dance. Heeseung sits beside you, close enough that your shoulders touch, and you talk about everything and nothing, his brother's upcoming birthday, your plans for next semester, the League of Legends patch that just dropped and even more.

But somewhere in the back of your mind, a small, nagging thought starts to take root.

Heeseung is acting… different.

Not bad different. Not distant or cold or any of the things you might have feared. But there's something slightly off about him, a hesitancy in his movements, a carefulness in his words. When he hands you your hot chocolate, he almost fumbles the mug, catching it at the last second with an awkward laugh. When you suggest going for the sunset walk early, he trips over the leg of the coffee table and nearly sends a lamp crashing to the floor. When you ask him what he wants to do after dinner, he freezes for a full three seconds before answering, like he's running through a mental checklist and can't find the right response.

It's subtle. So subtle that you might not have noticed if you hadn't spent the past few weeks paying very close attention to Lee Heeseung's every move. But you have. And you notice.

Is he okay? you wonder, watching him fidget with the zipper of his jacket. Did I do something wrong? Is he having second thoughts about the mountaintop thing? About me?

The overthinking spirals, as it always does. By the time you set out for the sunset walk, your brain has cycled through seventeen different worst-case scenarios, ranging from he's realized he doesn't actually like me to he's secretly been in love with someone else this whole time to he's actually a spy and this whole relationship was a cover for his mission.

That last one is unlikely. But your anxiety doesn't care about likelihood.

The overlook point is a short hike from the main lodge, a wooden platform built into the side of the mountain that offers a panoramic view of the valley below. The sun is just beginning to sink toward the peaks, painting the sky in shades of amber and rose and soft lavender. The snow-covered mountains stretch out in every direction, and the silence is so complete that you can hear the faint whisper of the wind through the pine trees.

Heeseung has packed snacks, as promised, a thermos of tea, a small bag of cookies from the lodge bakery, and a blanket that he spreads out on the wooden platform so you can sit without freezing.

"It's beautiful," you say, your voice hushed.

"It is," Heeseung agrees. But when you glance at him, he's not looking at the sunset. He's looking at you.

"Smooth," you say, trying to keep your tone light.

"I'm not trying to be smooth. I'm just stating facts." He pulls the blanket tighter around both of your shoulders, his arm brushing against yours. "The sunset is beautiful. You're beautiful. Both facts can coexist."

There it is again, that slight hesitation in his movements, that flicker of uncertainty in his eyes. He's sitting close to you, but his posture is rigid, like he's holding himself back from something. Like he's afraid of making a wrong move.

The overthinking spiral tightens its grip on your chest.

"Heeseung," you say, turning to face him fully. "Can I ask you something?"

"Of course." But his voice is a little too quick, a little too eager. "Anything."

"You've been… different today. Not bad different," you add quickly, seeing the flash of alarm in his eyes. "Just… different. Like you're nervous. Or walking on eggshells. And I've been trying to figure out if I did something wrong, or if you're having second thoughts, or if there's something you're not telling me, and my brain has gone to some very unlikely places, including a scenario where you're secretly a spy, which I know is ridiculous but-"

"Wait." Heeseung holds up a hand, his expression shifting from alarm to something that looks almost like relief. "You think I'm nervous?"

"I think you've been acting like someone who's afraid of breaking something. And I'm worried that the something is… us. Or me."

Heeseung is quiet for a moment. Then he lets out a breath, a long, slow exhale that seems to release tension from his entire body.

"I'm not having second thoughts," he says. "And I'm not a spy. Although that would be a pretty good cover story."

"Then what is it?"

He looks down at his hands, which are clasped in his lap. "I'm nervous."

"About what?"

"About… this." He gestures vaguely at the sunset, the blanket, the snacks. "The whole day. The itinerary. Making it perfect. I wanted today to be memorable for you. Something you'd look back on and smile. And I think I got so focused on making everything right that I forgot to just… be myself."

Your heart, which has been clenched with anxiety all afternoon, begins to loosen. "You were nervous about impressing me?"

"I know it's stupid. We've already done the mountaintop confession. We've already…" He trails off, his ears turning pink. "We've already done a lot of things. But this felt different. This felt like our first real day as… whatever we are. And I wanted it to be perfect."

"Whatever we are," you repeat.

"I didn't want to assume. I know we haven't exactly defined things, and I didn't want to push, and-"

"Heeseung."

He stops, looking at you with those dark, earnest eyes.

"You shouted your feelings from a mountaintop in front of hundreds of people. You planned an entire day with a handwritten itinerary and a crepe place and a souvenir snow-bear named Fluffy. You poured coffee on your head so I wouldn't feel alone. You held me while I cried. You waited weeks for me to tell you the truth because you didn't want to pressure me." You reach out and take his face in your hands, your mittens soft against his cheeks. "You don't have to be perfect. You don't have to impress me. You just have to be you."

"But what if just me isn't enough?"

The question is so quiet, so vulnerable, that it cracks something open in your chest. This is the real Heeseung, the one beneath the charming smile and the confident exterior. The one who has spent his whole life trying to please everyone, trying to be what people expected him to be, trying so hard to never disappoint anyone that he's forgotten he's allowed to just exist.

"It's more than enough," you say. "It's everything."

His eyes search yours, looking for something, reassurance, maybe, or proof that you mean what you say. Whatever he finds must satisfy him, because his shoulders relax, and his hands come up to cover yours, and the smile that spreads across his face is the realest one you've seen all day.

"I've been so focused on being the confident one," he says. "The one who has it all figured out. The one who sweeps you off your feet. But the truth is, I'm terrified. I've never felt like this about anyone before, and I don't know what I'm doing, and I keep worrying that I'm going to mess it up."

You lean forward and press your forehead against his. "We're both terrified. We're both disasters. That's kind of our thing."

"Disaster twins."

"Disaster twins," you confirm. "And the thing about disasters is that they're not supposed to be perfect. They're supposed to be real."

Heeseung lets out a shaky laugh. "When did you get so wise about relationships?"

"I've been watching you be a disaster for weeks. I've picked up a few things."

"Did you just quote your best friend at me?"

"Plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery."

The sunset is still blazing behind you, painting the mountains in shades of gold and crimson and violet. The air is cold and clean and quiet. And sitting there on that wooden platform, wrapped in a shared blanket, forehead to forehead with the boy who has turned your life upside down, you feel something shift inside you.

"I love this," you say quietly.

"The sunset?"

"No. Well, yes, the sunset too. But I meant…" You pause, searching for the right words. "I love this side of you. The nervous side. The side that second-guesses himself and overthinks things and worries about being enough. Because that's my side too. That's who I've been this whole time, the girl who was too scared to say what she felt, who hid behind letters and misunderstandings. And seeing you be the same way… it makes me feel less alone."

Heeseung pulls back just enough to look at you, his expression soft and wondering. "You're never alone. Not anymore."

"Neither are you."

He kisses you then, soft and sweet, his lips cold from the mountain air but warm underneath. It isn't a dramatic kiss or a passionate kiss. It's just a kiss, a quiet, perfect, real kiss, shared on a wooden platform overlooking a mountain sunset, with a bag of cookies forgotten beside you and a snow-bear named Fluffy tucked into Heeseung's jacket pocket.

When you pull apart, the first stars are starting to appear overhead.

"So," Heeseung says, his voice lighter now, the nervous edge finally gone. "About dinner. The reservation is at that fancy restaurant on the top floor of the lodge. I've heard they have a three-course meal and a dessert menu that's supposed to be life-changing."

"Sounds perfect."

"But before that, we should probably go back and change. You have snow in your hair."

You reach up and touch your hair, which is indeed full of snow from the snow angels. "So do you."

"We match."

"We always match."

Heeseung smirks. "Actually...I have something else in mind that we can do before dinner..."

"Is that...what I think it is?"

"I just really can't hold back anymore."

You quickly pack up the blanket and the snacks and the thermos of tea, and you walk back down the mountain path hand in hand.

The cold mountain air bites at your exposed skin as you and Heeseung rush toward the small ski lodge, your boots crunching through the fresh snow.

As soon as the heavy wooden door closes behind you, sealing out the cold, Heeseung's hands are on you, pulling you close. His lips claim yours in a hungry kiss.

"I'm sorry I just can't hold back anymore," Heeseung murmurs against your lips, his hands roaming down your back to cup your ass through your pants. "It made me so hard when you said those sweet things to me. I couldn't wait to get you alone."

Heeseung managed to get the keys of the assistant professor who was supervising the trip before organising his little program (just in case). The lodge is cozy, with a roaring fireplace in the main room and the promise of a warm bed upstairs. But Heeseung seems unwilling to wait that long. He pushes you against the wall at the bottom of the wooden staircase, his body pressing against yours as his kiss deepens.

"Here?" you gasp between kisses, your heart racing with excitement and a hint of nervousness.

"Can't wait," he growls in response, his hands already working to unfasten your snow pants. "I waited all day."

You help him, your fingers fumbling with the zipper in your coat. Soon, your pants are pooled around your ankles along with your underwear, exposing you to the cool air of the lodge. Heeseung's fingers find your folds immediately, discovering how wet you already are.

"You've been wanting this too, haven't you?" he asks with a knowing smirk, circling your clit with his thumb.

You can only nod, your breath catching as he slides one finger inside you, then two. His movements are practiced now, knowing exactly how to touch you to make you writhe with pleasure.

Your hands, meanwhile, work to free him from the confines of his own pants. When you finally wrap your fingers around his hard length, he groans against your neck.

"God, your hands feel so good," he murmurs, thrusting into your grip. "So much better than my own."

You stroke him in time with the movements of his fingers inside you, both of you building toward a climax that you know won't be satisfied here like this. The tension between you is palpable, a live wire of need and desire that demands release.

Before you can reach your peak, Heeseung pulls away, leaving you breathless and wanting. "Not like this," he says, his voice husky with arousal. "I want to be inside you when you come."

He fumbles in his pocket for a moment before producing a foil packet. With practiced efficiency, he rolls the condom onto his length, then lifts you effortlessly. You wrap your legs around his waist as he positions himself at your entrance.

"Okay?" he asks, his eyes dark with desire.

You nod, unable to form words as he slowly lowers you onto him. The feeling of him filling you completely takes your breath away. There's still that initial stretch, that moment of adjustment before pleasure takes over.

Heeseung begins to move, his thrusts deep and measured. His mouth finds yours in a passionate kiss as he sets a rhythm that quickly has you seeing stars.

"You feel so incredible," he groans against your lips. "So tight, so warm around me."

Your hands tangle in his hair as you meet his movements, your body responding instinctively to his. The build toward orgasm is swift and intense, a coiling tension in your stomach that demands release.

"Heeseung," you gasp, your nails digging into his shoulders. "I'm close."

"Me too," he grunts, his movements becoming more erratic. "Come with me. Let go."

With a few more deep thrusts, you shatter, crying out his name as waves of pleasure wash over you. Heeseung follows moments later, burying his face in your neck with a guttural moan as he finds his own release.

For a moment, you stay connected, catching your breath as the aftermath washes over you. Then Heeseung carefully sets you down, disposing of the condom before helping you redress.

"I'm exhausted..." you begin, but words fail you.

"I know you are," he says with a grin, pulling you into a soft kiss. "But it's not enough."

You look at him in surprise. "What do you mean?"

"I mean," he says, his hands roaming your body again, "that you're finally my girlfriend and I promised you that next time we have sex it will be better than in a jacuzzi. In a bed, where we can take our time, where I can explore every inch of you."

He takes your hand and leads you up the stairs, his urgency palpable. The lodge room is small but cozy, with a large bed taking up most of the space. As soon as the door closes behind you, clothes are flying in every direction.

This time, there's no rush, no urgency driven by fear of being caught. Instead, there's a slow, deliberate exploration of each other's bodies. Heeseung lays you down on the bed, his lips and hands mapping every curve, every hollow, every sensitive spot.

"I could spend hours just touching you," he murmurs, his fingers tracing patterns on your skin. "Learning what makes you gasp, what makes you moan, what makes you clench tighter."

He demonstrates, finding all the spots that make you arch your back with pleasure. His mouth follows his hands, tasting and teasing until you're writhing with need.

"Heeseung, please," you beg, your hands tangling in his hair as he hovers over your core.

"Please what?" he asks with a teasing glint in his eyes. "Tell me what you want."

"I want you," you gasp. "Inside me. Now."

Heeseung grins, reaching for another condom. "As you wish."

He enters you slowly, savoring the moment of connection. This time, the rhythm is different, slower, more intimate, but no less passionate. His hips move in a deep, steady rhythm that drives you wild, hitting all the right spots with each thrust.

"You clenching so hard," he groans, his voice thick with pleasure. "I'll never get tired of this feeling."

The afternoon passes in a blur of passion and pleasure. He takes you in various positions. Each time you reach your peak, Heeseung brings you down gently before building you up again.

Time passes, you're both exhausted but satisfied, lying tangled in the sheets of the bed. Heeseung reaches for the box of condoms he'd brought, only to find it empty.

"Looks like we're out," he says with a sheepish grin. "I didn't expect to need so many."

You laugh, pulling him close for a kiss. "I guess it's our cue to get ready for the restaurant."

Heeseung's expression turns serious. "We will continue later," he promises, his hand cupping your cheek. "I love you."

———————

The campus café is a small, cozy establishment nestled between the student union and the art building. You have been here exactly twice before, both times with Yunjin, and both times you have spent more money on a single drink than you usually spend on an entire meal.

Today, the café is moderately busy. A few students hunch over laptops, a couple in the corner have what looks like a very intense conversation about something, and a barista with an impressive mustache wipes down the counter. The smell of espresso hangs in the air.

"Why don't you grab us a table?" Heeseung suggests, pulling out his wallet. "I'll order. What do you want?"

You blink at him. "You don't have to pay for me."

"I'm the one who invited you. It's the least I can do." He tilts his head, that curious expression settling over his features. "Consider it part of the starting slow thing. Coffee first, then maybe a meal, then eventually I'll work up to buying you a gift."

You don't know how to respond to that, so you just tell him your order: a vanilla latte, the most basic thing on the menu, and flee to a small table near the window before your face can betray you any further.

Okay, okay, okay. This is fine. This is manageable. You are just having coffee with Heeseung, the guy who thinks you confessed to him, the guy you have been actively trying to repel, the guy who starred in your extremely inappropriate dream three nights ago. This is fine. Everything is fine.

You watch him at the counter, chatting easily with the mustachioed barista like they are old friends. He laughs at something the barista says, and the sound carries across the café, warm and genuine. A group of girls at a nearby table glance over at him, then put their heads together and whisper. Heeseung doesn't seem to notice. Or if he does, he doesn't react, doesn't do any of the things you would expect from someone with his reputation.

It's infuriating.

A few minutes later, he walks toward your table with two cups in his hands. "One vanilla latte for the lady," he says, setting yours down with a flourish, "and one Americano for me. I got you an extra shot of vanilla. You seem like you could use it."

"I could use a lot of things," you mutter, wrapping your hands around the warm cup. "Vanilla is a start."

Heeseung settles into the chair across from you, his long legs stretching out under the table. "So," he says, "do you want to tell me why you were hiding behind a bulletin board earlier? Or should I just keep guessing? My current theory is that you're secretly a spy for a rival university and you're gathering intel on our science department."

"Your theory is wrong."

"Then what's the real reason?"

I was hiding from you, you don't say. I was hiding from you because I dreamed about you eating me out and now I can't look at your face without spontaneously combusting.

"I'm just… very committed to checking bulletin boards," you say instead. "There's a lot of important information on them. Club announcements. Study group postings. Lost and found notices. Someone lost a cat last week. Did you see that poster? Very sad. I hope they found the cat."

"You're doing it again."

"Doing what?"

"Rambling. You ramble when you're nervous." He takes a sip of his Americano, his eyes never leaving your face. "It's cute. But you don't have to be nervous around me, you know. I'm not going to bite."

The word "bite" should not make your stomach flip. It is a normal word. A mundane word. A word that people use in completely innocent contexts all the time. But your brain, still apparently haunted by the ghost of that dream, chooses to remind you of the part where Heeseung's lips trailed down to your collarbone, and suddenly you can't look at his mouth anymore.

"I'm not nervous," you lie. "I'm just… naturally like this. I'm a naturally weird person. This is my baseline."

"Your baseline is being weird?"

"Extremely weird. The weirdest. I once alphabetized my entire book collection by color instead of author name because I wanted to see what it would look like. It looked terrible. I kept it that way for three months."

Heeseung considers this. "That's not really weird. That's just… creative organizational choices."

"I also talk to my plants. All of them. Individually. I have a succulent named Jason and I tell him about my day."

"That's just being a good plant parent."

"I cannot snap my fingers. I've tried for nineteen years and I simply cannot do it. My fingers make no sound. It's like they're broken but specifically only for snapping purposes."

Heeseung smiles now, that same genuine smile that appeared in the cafeteria when you talked about League of Legends. "Okay, that one's a little weird. But in an endearing way."

Endearing. He called you endearing. This is not going according to plan.

"I should go get napkins," you say abruptly, pushing back your chair. "We need napkins. For the coffee. In case of spills. You can never be too prepared."

Heeseung glances at the napkin dispenser that is already sitting on the table between you. "We have napkins."

"These aren't… good napkins. I need the good ones. The thick ones. From the counter. I'll be right back."

You escape before he can protest, weaving through the tables toward the counter where the barista is busy steaming milk. You don't actually need napkins. You need a moment to breathe, to collect yourself, to remind your heart that it is supposed to be beating for Jungwon, not doing gymnastics every time Heeseung smiles at you.

The barista hands you a stack of napkins without you even having to ask. You clutch them to your chest like a shield and turn back toward your table.

Heeseung is watching you, his chin propped on his hand, his expression soft and curious and completely unguarded. The afternoon light from the window catches the angles of his face, the sweep of his hair, the slight quirk of his lips. He looks like a painting. He looks like something you would pin to a Pinterest board titled "dream boyfriend" and then immediately feel bad about because no real person should look that good while just sitting in a café.

You start walking back toward the table, your mind a whirlwind of panic and confusion and the desperate need to get through this interaction without making a bigger fool of yourself.

And then your foot catches on the leg of a chair.

It happens in slow motion. One moment you are walking, your napkins clutched to your chest, your eyes fixed on Heeseung. The next moment your toe hooks around a wrought-iron chair leg that is sticking out slightly from a nearby table, and your body pitches forward, and the napkins fly out of your hands, and the coffee, dear God, the coffee who's sitting on the table gets knocked off and sloshes out of your cup in a great wave.

Time speeds up again. You hit the floor with a thud that rattles your teeth, and the coffee hits you approximately 0.3 seconds later, soaking through your sweater and your jeans and possibly your very soul. The liquid is still warm, not scalding but definitely not pleasant, and it is everywhere, on your clothes, on your hands, dripping from the ends of your hair, pooling on the floor around you in a sad, beige puddle.

The café goes silent.

You sit there, on the floor, covered in your own vanilla latte, and stare at the puddle spreading beneath you. The napkins have scattered across the tiles like confetti, completely useless now. A drip of coffee rolls down your forehead and off the tip of your nose.

This is it. This is the moment you finally break. All the stress of the past week, the letter, the misunderstanding, the dream, the bulletin board incident has been building toward this, and now, sitting in a puddle of expensive café coffee with every eye in the establishment fixed on you, you feel the tears prick at the corners of your eyes.

You are going to cry. You are going to cry in front of Heeseung and the mustachioed barista and the couple in the corner and those girls who have been whispering about Heeseung earlier. You are going to cry, and there is absolutely nothing you can do to stop it.

But then you look down at your hands, and you realize something.

His coffee. The Americano. The cup who's been next to yours, you have managed, in the chaos of your fall, to keep it upright by holding it. Your arm lifted it above your head at the last second, some primal survival instinct kicking in to protect the beverage that isn't even yours, and the Americano is still sitting perfectly intact in its cup, not a single drop spilled.

You are covered in latte. Your sweater is ruined. Your dignity is in shambles. But his coffee is safe.

"I saved yours," you say, your voice coming out as a croak. You hold up the Americano like a trophy, your arm trembling slightly. "Look. I saved yours."

Heeseung is already out of his chair, already crouching beside you, his expression shifting from shock to concern to something else entirely, something soft and wondering and absolutely devastating.

"You saved my coffee," he repeats.

"It was a reflex. I don't know why. I don't even like you that much. I mean, I like you a normal amount. A regular amount. The amount you're supposed to like someone you accidentally-" You stop yourself before you can say more. "I saved your coffee."

Heeseung stares at you for a long moment. Then, very deliberately, he reaches out and takes the Americano from your hand. He looks at you, covered in vanilla latte, sitting in a puddle on the café floor, your glasses askew and your hair dripping.

And then he pours his own coffee over his head.

Just… tips the cup over and lets the dark liquid cascade down his hair, over his forehead, along the sharp bridge of his nose, soaking into the collar of his black hoodie and leaving trails of coffee across his skin.

You gape at him. The entire café gapes at him.

"What-" you start, but your voice has stopped working.

Heeseung sets the empty cup down with a quiet click and smiles at you, a warm, genuine, completely unhinged smile that makes your heart do a full backflip inside your chest.

"Now we match," he says.

You can't speak. You can't think. You can only stare at him, this absurd, beautiful, incomprehensible boy who has just poured coffee on himself in the middle of a crowded café for no other reason than to make you feel less alone in your humiliation.

"But… your hoodie," you manage. "Your hair. The floor. The-"

"I have other hoodies. My hair will dry. And the floor can be mopped." He reaches out and gently straightens your glasses, which have gone crooked during your fall. His fingers brush against your temple, feather-light. "You looked like you were about to cry. I couldn't let you cry alone."

"Alone?" Your voice cracks. "You couldn't let me cry alone?"

"I mean, ideally you wouldn't cry at all. But if you are going to cry, I figure I should give you company. Solidarity in humiliation, you know?" He's still smiling, still crouching in front of you, still covered in Americano like it is the most normal thing in the world. "We make a pretty good pair of disasters, don't you think?"

Your heart flips. It doesn't flutter. It doesn't skip a beat. It does a full, acrobatic, Olympic-level flip inside your chest, and you feel the sensation reverberate through your entire body.

Why is he like this?

Why is Lee Heeseung, reputed womanizer, notorious player, the guy everyone warns you about, sitting on the floor of a café covered in his own coffee just to make you feel better about spilling yours? Why is he looking at you like that, with those dark, gentle eyes, like you are something precious instead of the absolute disaster you clearly are?

You don't know. You don't understand. And the not understanding is starting to become a problem, because every time you think you have Heeseung figured out, he goes and does something like this, and your careful mental categories crumble a little more.

"We should probably…" You gesture vaguely at your coffee-soaked selves. "Clean up. Or something."

"Probably," Heeseung agrees. He stands up and offers you his hand, his coffee-stained, still-damp hand and you have no choice but to take it. His grip is warm and solid, and he pulls you to your feet with an ease that suggests you weigh nothing at all. "There's a student services office around the corner. They keep spare t-shirts for emergencies. We could both use a change of clothes."

You look down at your sweater, which is now more latte-colored than its original blue. "That's… probably a good idea."

Heeseung pulls out his wallet and drops several bills on the nearest table, far more than the cost of two coffees with a nod to the mustachioed barista. "For the mess," he says. "Sorry about the floor."

The barista nods slowly, his expression suggesting he has seen many things in his years at the café but has never quite witnessed anything like this.

And then Heeseung guides you out of the café, his hand hovering at the small of your back but not quite touching, and you walk through the student union in matching coffee-stained clothes like the world's most unfortunate pair of twins.

The student services office is a small, cluttered room tucked into a corner of the union building. It is staffed by a perpetually exhausted-looking graduate student who has clearly seen too much in his years of dealing with student emergencies. When you and Heeseung walk in, dripping coffee and smelling like a coffee explosion, he doesn't even blink.

"Coffee incident?" he asks flatly.

"Yes," Heeseung says.

"Both of you?"

"I'm told we match now."

The student stares at him for a long moment, then sighs with the weariness of someone who long ago stopped questioning the absurdities of university life. "We have spare t-shirts in the back. They're not fashionable. They have the university logo on them. You don't get to complain about the design."

"We wouldn't dream of it," Heeseung says.

The student disappears into a back room and emerges a moment later with two folded shirts. They are, as promised, aggressively unfashionable, a mustard yellow color with the university mascot printed on the front in peeling letters. Beneath the mascot are the words "Embrace the process!"

"These are incredible," Heeseung says, holding up his shirt with genuine delight. "I'm keeping this forever."

"The bathrooms are down the hall," the student says, already turning back to his computer. "Please don't track coffee into them. I just had the floors cleaned."

You and Heeseung change in separate bathrooms, and when you emerge, you are confronted with the sight of Heeseung wearing a mustard-yellow shirt that is slightly too small for him, the fabric stretching across his shoulders in a way that is definitely not doing things to your heart. The coffee has been wiped off his face, but his hair is still damp, curling slightly at the ends, and the combination of the terrible shirt and the wet hair and the ridiculously attractive face is so absurd that you actually laugh out loud.

"What?" Heeseung asks, grinning. "Do I look as good as I think I do?"

"You look like you traded shirts with a child."

"A very fashionable child. This slogan will hype me up for my next exam." He looks you over, his eyes crinkling. "You don't look half bad yourself. Yellow's a good color on you."

You are wearing the exact same shirt. You look like a banana. But Heeseung says it like he means it, and you feel that traitorous flutter in your chest again.

"We should go," you say, because standing in a hallway with Heeseung while wearing ridiculous matching shirts is doing something strange to your brain chemistry. "I have… I need to… there's a thing…"

"The mysterious thing," Heeseung says. "Your nemesis. Your arch-enemy. The eternal obstacle to us spending more time together."

"It's a very busy thing. It takes up a lot of my schedule."

"Right." He is still smiling, still looking at you with that soft, curious expression. "Well, before you run off to your very important thing, let me walk you to-"

"There you are, Heeseung! I've been looking everywhere for-"

The voice comes from the end of the hallway, and you know that voice. You know it the way you know your own heartbeat, the way you know the lyrics to every Ariana Grande song, the way you know that vanilla lattes are now your mortal enemy.

Jungwon walks toward you, his phone in his hand and a slight frown on his face, like he has been searching for Heeseung for a while. He looks so unfairly beautiful that your heart does the thing it always does when you see him, that painful, hopeful, aching thing that feels like a bruise that won't heal.

But then his eyes land on you, and he stops walking.

"Y/N?" His gaze travels from your face to your shirt to Heeseung's matching shirt to the general air of disaster that still clings to both of you. "What… happened to you guys?"

"Coffee incident," Heeseung says, with the casual air of someone explaining something completely normal. "She spilled hers, so I spilled mine too. Now we're twins."

Jungwon blinks. "You poured coffee on yourself?"

"Matching disasters. It's a new concept. We're pioneering it."

You want to say something, anything, to salvage this situation. Jungwon is looking between you and Heeseung with an expression you can't quite read, and your brain screams at you to explain, to clarify, to make sure he doesn't get the wrong idea about what he is seeing.

"It's not… we're not-" you start, but your voice comes out squeaky and strange. "The coffee was an accident. Well, my coffee was an accident. His coffee was on purpose. But not in a romantic way. In a… solidarity way. Against the humiliation. We are fighting humiliation together."

"Fighting humiliation," Jungwon repeats slowly.

"Enemies," you say, nodding too hard. "We're humiliation enemies. Humi-nemies. It's a whole thing."

Heeseung watches you with that amused expression again, and you can tell he is biting back a smile. "Humi-nemies," he echoes. "Right. That's what we are."

Jungwon is quiet for a moment. Then, unexpectedly, he smiles, but it isn't his usual warm smile. It is something smaller, something more careful, something that makes your stomach drop even as you can't identify why.

"You guys make a cute couple," he says.

The words hit you like a physical blow. Your mouth opens. Closes. Opens again. No sound comes out.

"We're not-" you try, but Jungwon is already stepping back, already half-turning away.

"I've got to get to class," he says. "Heeseung, I'll catch up with you later. Y/N… nice shirt."

And then he walks away, and you stand in the hallway with your heart in your stomach and Heeseung's matching shirt still warm against your skin.

"We're not a couple," you say, but it comes out as barely a whisper.

"Not yet," Heeseung says cheerfully, apparently completely oblivious to the emotional devastation that just occurred. "But we're off to a good start, don't you think? Coffee disasters, matching outfits, running into my friends, this is basically a textbook meet-cute progression."

You turn to stare at him. He is grinning, still radiating that unshakeable, inexplicable joy that seems to follow him everywhere. He has no idea. He has absolutely no idea that the boy you actually like just saw you in matching shirts with someone else and assumed you were a couple.

"Are you okay?" Heeseung asks, his smile fading slightly. "You look a little pale. Was the coffee too hot? Do you need to sit down?"

"I'm fine," you manage. "I just… I need to go. The thing. The very important thing. It's calling me."

You don't wait for him to respond. You turn and walk away, not running, because running would be too obvious, but walking very quickly, your mind a tornado of panic and regret and the image of Jungwon's smile fading as he says the words that just shattered your entire world.

You guys make a cute couple.

He thinks you are a couple. Yang Jungwon, the boy you have been pining over for four months, the boy you wrote a three-page love letter to, the boy who poked your cheek in the library and called you cute, he thinks you are dating Lee Heeseung.

You are trapped. You are so, so trapped.

By the time you reach your dorm room, you are practically vibrating with suppressed emotion. You close the door, lean your back against it, and press your hands to your face.

You guys make a cute couple.

"We're not a couple," you whisper to your empty room. "We're not a couple. We're humi-nemies. That's a real thing that I definitely didn't just make up because I can't communicate like a normal human being."

Your room does not respond.

You slide down the door until you are sitting on the floor, your legs stretched out in front of you. You look ridiculous. You feel ridiculous. Your entire life has become a comedy of errors, and you are the punchline.

But even as you sit there, drowning in self-pity and the lingering scent of vanilla latte, you can't quite forget the look on Heeseung's face when he poured his coffee over his head. The way he smiled at you, open and unguarded. The way he said I couldn't let you cry alone like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Why is he like that? Why is he so… him?

You don't have an answer. And that, more than anything else, is starting to scare you.

The library has become your second home.

Not by choice, exactly. More by necessity. The library is neutral territory, a place where you can exist without fear of coffee-related disasters, unexpected bulletin board ambushes, or tall informatics students appearing out of thin air to pour beverages on themselves in acts of solidarity. The library has rules. The library has silence. The library has mercifully dim lighting that hides the dark circles under your eyes from three consecutive nights of restless sleep.

It has been four days since the coffee incident. Four days since Jungwon looked at you in your matching shirt and said those fateful words: You guys make a cute couple. Four days of replaying that moment over and over in your head, analyzing every micro-expression on his face, every nuance in his voice, trying to determine if there was something else there, something like disappointment, or regret, or maybe even jealousy.

You have come to no conclusions. Your analytical skills, apparently, are useless when applied to matters of the heart.

So you do what any reasonable, emotionally overwhelmed STEM student would do: you throw yourself into your studies with the intensity of someone trying to forget their entire life. You have read the same paragraph about cellular respiration seventeen times. You have highlighted so many sentences that your textbook looks like a rainbow has thrown up on it. You have consumed approximately four hundred milligrams of caffeine in the past three hours alone, and your hands shake slightly as you turn another page.

It is fine. Everything is fine. You are fine.

"You're going to burn a hole through that book if you keep staring at it like that."

The voice comes from directly above you, and you jolt so hard that your highlighter goes skidding across the table and rolls onto the floor. You look up, your heart already doing that familiar, traitorous leap, and there he is.

Jungwon.

He stands beside your table with a gentle smile on his face, his backpack slung over one shoulder, his hair slightly messy like he has been running his fingers through it.

"Sorry," he says, stooping to pick up your fallen highlighter. "I didn't mean to startle you. You just looked so intense. Like you were trying to intimidate the biology into making sense."

"The biology is winning," you admit, accepting the highlighter with a hand that trembles slightly. From the caffeine. Definitely from the caffeine. "I've been reading the same page for twenty minutes and I still have no idea what oxidative phosphorylation is."

"It sounds like a spell from Harry Potter."

"That's what I've been thinking! But apparently it's something about electrons and I just-" You gesture vaguely at the chaos of papers spread across your table. "I'm losing the war."

Jungwon laughs, that bright, sunny sound that never fails to make your heart flutter. "Mind if I join you? I've been looking for a quiet spot to study, and honestly, sitting next to someone who's fighting for their life against biology sounds way more entertaining than sitting alone."

Your heart, the same heart that belongs to this boy, that has belonged to him since the moment he slid gummy bears across a library table at 2 AM, screams YES with the force of a thousand suns. Your brain, the traitorous organ that got you into this mess in the first place, reminds you of all the reasons this is a terrible idea.

"You probably don't want to sit with me," you say, the words tumbling out before you can stop them. "I'm not very good company right now. I've been mainlining caffeine and I think I can hear colors."

"That sounds like excellent company." Jungwon pulls out the chair across from you and sits down without waiting for permission. "What colors can you hear?"

"Biology textbook beige, mostly. It sounds like despair."

He laughs again, and the sound settles into your chest like a warm blanket. This is fine. This is okay. You can study with Jungwon without making it weird. You have done it before, you have spent a whole hour in this very library, watching him take notes and push his glasses up his nose and poke your cheek with that devastating smile. You can do it again. You are a professional. You are a master of emotional compartmentalization.

For a while, you actually do study. Or at least, you both pretend to. Jungwon opens his philosophy book and starts reading, his brow furrowed in concentration, his pen tapping absently against his notebook. You stare at your biology textbook with renewed determination, willing the words to make sense.

But your eyes keep drifting up, against your will, over the top of your book, to the boy sitting across from you. The way the library light catches the highlights in his hair. The way he bites his lower lip when he is thinking. The way his fingers curl around his pen, elegant and deliberate.

"You're doing it again," Jungwon says, not looking up from his book.

Heat floods your cheeks. "I'm not doing anything. I'm reading about oxidative phosphorylation. It's very interesting. Lots of electrons."

"Y/N." He looks up then, and his expression is softer than you expected. Gentler. "It's okay. I told you before, right? I don't mind being looked at like that."

"Like what?"

"Like I'm something worth looking at." He sets down his pen and folds his hands on the table, giving you his full attention. "You have a very particular way of looking at people. Did you know that? It's like you're trying to memorize them. Every detail. Like you're cataloguing things that most people wouldn't notice."

Your heart pounds so hard you are certain he can hear it. You want to say I'm only looking at you like this because it's you. But the words won't come. "That's… that's my STEM brain. I'm very analytical. I notice things. It's a curse."

"I don't think it's a curse." Jungwon's voice is quiet, thoughtful. "I think it's actually really special. Most people don't pay attention like that. Most people look at you and see what they want to see, not what's actually there." He pauses, his eyes searching your face. "You're different, Y/N. You actually see people."

The words hang in the air between you, heavy with meaning. This is it. This is the moment. The conversation has shifted into something deeper, something more intimate, and you can feel the confession building in your chest like a wave about to break.

You can tell him. Right now. You can tell him everything, the letter, the misunderstanding, the way your heart has been his since the very beginning. You can clear the air and finally, finally be free of the tangled web you have accidentally woven around yourself.

"Jungwon," you say, and your voice comes out steadier than you expect. "There's something I need to tell you. About Heeseung. About the confession. About everything. It's not what you think. It's never been what you think."

Jungwon's expression flickers, surprise, confusion, something else you can't quite name. "What do you mean?"

"I mean-" You take a deep breath, gathering your courage. "The letter. The one I gave to Heeseung. It wasn't-"

"Wait." Jungwon holds up a hand, stopping you mid-sentence. "Before you say anything else, can I say something first?"

You nod, your heart hammering.

Jungwon leans back in his chair, his eyes never leaving your face. "I've been watching you and Heeseung," he says slowly. "The past few weeks. Ever since he told me about the confession. And I've never seen him like this before."

Your stomach drops. "Like what?"

"Like… happy. Genuinely happy. Not the surface-level people-pleasing happiness he shows everyone else, but something real. Something that goes all the way down." Jungwon's voice is earnest, almost protective. "Heeseung is my friend. One of my best friends. And I know what people say about him, that he's a player, a womanizer, that he'll charm you and then move on. But that's not who he really is."

You don't know what to say. You don't know where this is going. But you can't seem to interrupt, can't seem to find the words to stop him.

"Heeseung is…" Jungwon pauses, searching for the right words. "He's the guy who will stay up all night helping you debug code even when he has his own assignments due. He's the guy who remembers everyone's birthday and always gets them a gift that shows he actually paid attention to what they like. He's the guy who can't say no to anyone, ever, because he's so terrified of disappointing people that he'd rather burn himself out than let someone down."

He smiles, but there is something sad in it. "Girls think he's flirting with them because he's nice to everyone. And he won't correct them because he doesn't want to hurt their feelings. So he just… lets them believe what they want to believe, and then he feels guilty when they get attached, and the whole thing becomes this cycle he can't break out of. It's not malice. It's the exact opposite of malice, it's too much kindness, too much caring, and not enough ability to set boundaries."

Your throat is dry. "Why are you telling me this?"

"Because I think you're different." Jungwon meets your eyes, and his gaze is steady and sincere. "I think you actually see him. Not the reputation, not the rumors, but the real him. And I think he's starting to see the real you too." He pauses, and when he speaks again, his voice is softer. Almost fragile. "So I need you to promise me something."

"What?"

"Take care of him. Please." Jungwon's smile is gentle, but there is something behind it, something that looks a lot like pain, carefully hidden, expertly concealed. "He's been alone for a long time, even when he's surrounded by people. I don't think he even realizes how lonely he is. But you… you could change that. I can see it."

The wave of emotion that crashes over you is so overwhelming that you can't speak. This isn't how this conversation is supposed to go. You are supposed to confess to Jungwon. You are supposed to clear up the misunderstanding. You are supposed to finally tell him the truth.

Who knows - Daniel Caesar playing now

But Jungwon isn't finished.

"There's something else I should tell you," he says, and his voice drops even lower, barely above a whisper. "Something I probably shouldn't say. But I think I need to, or I'll regret it forever."

"What is it?"

Jungwon looks down at his hands, folded on the table. When he speaks, his voice is steady, but you can hear the effort it takes to keep it that way.

"I like you."

The words don't make sense. They can't make sense. You hear them, understand them individually, but your brain refuses to assemble them into a coherent meaning.

"What?" you breathe.

"I like you," Jungwon repeats, and now he looks up at you, and his eyes are so full of something, regret, maybe, or longing, or both, that it makes your chest ache. "From the first day of philosophy class. You sat in the front row, near the window, and you had like eight different colored highlighters lined up on your desk, and you took notes so furiously that your pen ran out of ink halfway through the lecture. I remember you made this little frustrated noise and searched your bag for a spare, and you looked so genuinely distraught that I almost offered you mine."

The library. The philosophy lecture. The day you ran out of ink. You remember it, vaguely, distantly, a moment so mundane you never thought about it again. But Jungwon remembers. Jungwon has been watching you, just like you have been watching him.

"I noticed you after that," he continues, and his voice is achingly soft. "The way you always sat in the same spot. The way you organized your notes. The way you bit your lip when you were concentrating. I kept telling myself I'd talk to you, but I could never find the right moment. And then midterms happened, and we were both in the library at 2 AM, and I saw you looking exhausted and stressed, and I just…" He laughs, but it is a sad sound. "I gave you gummy bears because I couldn't think of anything else to do. It felt so stupid at the time. Who gives gummy bears to a stranger at 2 AM?"

"A stranger who hadn't slept in thirty-six hours and was about to cry over organic chemistry," you whisper. "It wasn't stupid. It was the nicest thing anyone has ever done for me."

Jungwon's smile flickers. "I was working up the courage to actually talk to you. To ask you out properly. But then…" He trails off, and his expression shifts, something closing off behind his eyes. "Then Heeseung told me about the confession. And I saw the way he looked when he talked about you. And I knew… I knew I'd missed my chance."

No. No, no, no. This is wrong. This is all wrong. He hasn't missed his chance. The chance is right here, right now, sitting in front of him with a heart full of feelings that have always been meant for him.

"Jungwon," you say, and your voice cracks. "The letter… it wasn't-"

"I'm not telling you this to make things awkward," Jungwon interrupts gently. "I'm telling you because I want you to know. I like you. I really, really like you. And sometimes I wonder what would have happened if I'd been braver, if I'd said something sooner, if I hadn't waited until it was too late." He pauses, and his eyes meet yours, and the weight of what he says presses down on your chest like a physical force. "But I'm glad it's Heeseung. He deserves someone like you. And you deserve someone who sees you the way he does."

"You don't understand," you try, desperation creeping into your voice. "It wasn't supposed to be Heeseung. The letter was meant for-"

"Take care of him," Jungwon says again, and this time his voice is final. Resolute. Like he has already made his peace with something you haven't even realized he was struggling with. "That's all I ask."

He stands up, gathering his book and his notebook, and you watch him with a growing sense of panic. This can't be how it ends. You can't let him walk away without knowing the truth.

But then he pauses, looking down at you with that devastating smile, the one that crinkles the corners of his eyes and makes your heart do somersaults, and he reaches out and gently pokes your cheek.

"Boop," he says softly.

The gesture that once made you giddy with joy now feels like a knife twisting in your chest.

"Liking you was never a waste of my time, Y/N," he says, and his voice is tender in a way that breaks your heart into a thousand pieces. "I don't regret it. Not even for a second."

And then he walks away, and you are left alone at your table with a biology textbook you haven't read and a heart that is shattering into so many fragments you don't know if you will ever be able to put it back together.

I like you.

I gave you gummy bears because I couldn't think of anything else to do.

Liking you was never a waste of my time.

He liked you. He liked you this whole time. All those months of pining, of yearning, of writing and rewriting that letter and he has been feeling the same thing. You have been two ships passing in the night, each carrying the same cargo of unspoken feelings, and you have missed each other by a margin so narrow it is almost laughable.

But it isn't laughable. It is devastating. It is the most devastating thing that has ever happened to you, and you are sitting in the middle of a silent library trying not to fall apart.

You don't remember packing up your things. You don't remember leaving the library. One moment you are staring at the spot where Jungwon was sitting, and the next you are walking across campus in the fading evening light, your backpack hanging heavy from your shoulders, your feet carrying you automatically toward your dorm.

And then the tears come.

They start slow, a burning sensation behind your eyes, a tightness in your throat. You try to swallow them down, try to hold them back, but they won't be contained. By the time you reach the pathway between the science building and the student union, you are crying openly, tears streaming down your cheeks in hot, relentless rivers.

This isn't a romantic cry. This isn't the kind of crying that happens in movies, where the heroine looks beautiful and tragic and a single perfect tear rolls down her cheek. This is an ugly cry. A messy, hiccuping, snotty cry that makes your nose run and your shoulders shake and your breath come in ragged gasps. You are crying because the boy you liked liked you back, and instead of ending up together like you were supposed to, everything has gone terribly, irreversibly wrong.

You stop walking. You can't keep going. Your legs won't carry you any further. You lean against the rough bark of a tree and press your hands to your face, trying to muffle the sounds that escape from your throat.

You cry for the letter you sent to the wrong person. You cry for the courage it took to write it, and the cowardice that has kept you from correcting your mistake. You cry for Jungwon, who liked you and gave up on you because he thought you wanted someone else. You cry for yourself, for the hopeless romantic who dreamed of grand gestures and perfect moments and has ended up with nothing but misunderstandings and a heavy heart that breaks into smaller and smaller pieces.

You cry until your throat is raw and your eyes are swollen and you don't think you have any tears left to shed.

And then a voice, gentle, concerned, painfully familiar, cuts through the fog of your grief.

"Y/N?"

You look up.

Lee Heeseung stands on the pathway a few feet away, his hands in the pockets of his jacket, his expression shifting from casual curiosity to alarm as he takes in your tear-streaked face and trembling shoulders.

"Hey," he says, and his voice is softer than you have ever heard it. "Hey, what's wrong? What happened?"

You should make an excuse. You should say you are fine, that it's allergies, that you just got something in your eye. You should tell him to leave you alone, to give you space, to let you fall apart in private.

But the words won't come. All that comes out is another sob, and your knees buckle slightly, and then Heeseung is there, his hands on your shoulders, steadying you.

"It's okay," he says, even though he doesn't know what is wrong, even though you haven't explained anything. "It's okay. I've got you."

"No, you don't understand," you choke out. "Everything is messed up. Everything is so messed up and it's all my fault."

"Then we'll fix it." He says it with such simple certainty, like it is the most obvious thing in the world. "Whatever it is, we'll fix it."

"You can't fix this. No one can fix this."

"Maybe not." Heeseung's hands move from your shoulders to your upper arms, his grip gentle but grounding. "But I can be here. I can listen. And I can promise you that whatever it is, you don't have to deal with it alone."

Something in his voice, the steadiness, the sincerity, the complete lack of judgment, cracks through the last of your defenses. You stop trying to hold yourself together. You let the tears fall, let your shoulders shake, let yourself be exactly as broken as you feel.

And Heeseung doesn't flinch. He doesn't look uncomfortable or try to escape or offer meaningless platitudes. He just stands there, his hands warm on your arms, his presence solid and unwavering, letting you cry without asking for explanations or justifications.

After a while, you don't know how long, the tears begin to subside. Your breathing steadies. The storm inside you quiets to a dull, aching calm. You wipe your eyes with the back of your hand, suddenly aware of how awful you must look, how puffy and red and wrecked.

"I'm sorry," you whisper. "Your jacket is probably wet."

"My jacket has survived worse." Heeseung's voice is gentle. "Come on. Let's sit down somewhere."

He guides you to a bench nearby, a small wooden bench tucked under a cluster of trees, partially hidden from the main pathway. You sit down heavily, your legs still shaky, and Heeseung sits beside you, close enough that you can feel the warmth of his body but not so close that it feels invasive.

Dream - Keshi playing now

For a long moment, neither of you speaks. The evening settles around you, the sky shifting from pale blue to soft pink to deeper purple. A few stars start to appear, faint pinpricks of light against the darkening canvas overhead. The campus is quiet, most students already back in their dorms or the library, and the only sounds are the distant hum of traffic and the occasional rustle of leaves in the breeze.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Heeseung asks eventually.

"Not really."

"Okay." He doesn't push. He doesn't pry. He just sits there, his shoulder almost touching yours, his presence a quiet comfort in the gathering dark.

"You're not going to ask questions?"

"You'll tell me when you're ready. Or you won't. Either way, I'm not going anywhere."

The simplicity of it, the uncomplicated, undemanding kindness of it, makes your eyes sting with fresh tears. You blink them back, determined not to start crying again.

"Why are you being so nice to me?" you ask, your voice hoarse.

Heeseung turns his head to look at you, and his expression is unreadable. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"Because… because I'm a disaster. Because I've been weird and awkward and I ran away from you and hid behind bulletin boards and spilled coffee on myself and I can't seem to do anything right. Because you barely know me, and what you do know is mostly just me making a fool of myself."

Heeseung is quiet for a moment. Then, unexpectedly, he smiles. Not the smirk or the teasing grin, but something softer. Something realer.

"Can you guess the movie I've watched recently?"

The question is so random that you blink. "What?"

"A movie I've watched recently. Can you guess?"

"Am I supposed to?"

"No, because I've never told you." He leans back on the bench, tilting his face up toward the emerging stars. "I don't usually tell people. It's kind of embarrassing."

You sniffle, curiosity temporarily overriding your grief. "What is it?"

"To All the Boys I've Loved Before."

You stare at him. "The Netflix movie? The one with Lara Jean?"

"The very same." He doesn't look embarrassed at all. If anything, he looks almost proud. "I've watched it like eight times. Maybe nine. I lost count somewhere around the sixth viewing."

"But… that's a teen romance. That's a movie about fake dating and love letters and-" You stop. "Oh."

"Yeah." Heeseung's smile turns wry. "The parallels weren't lost on me. Girl writes love letters she never meant to send. Letters end up reaching the boys. Chaos ensues." He glances at you sideways. "Sound familiar?"

Your heart does something strange, something fluttery and uncertain. "Why did you watch it?"

"Because Lara Jean is a hopeless romantic who's terrified of actually living the romance she dreams about." Heeseung's voice is thoughtful, almost contemplative. "She's brave on paper but scared in real life. She has all these feelings and no idea what to do with them. And she's convinced that if she actually tries to be vulnerable, everything will fall apart."

He turns to look at you fully, his dark eyes catching the faint glow of the distant streetlamps. "Does any of that sound familiar to you?"

Your breath catches in your throat.

"You write beautiful letters," Heeseung continues, his voice dropping lower. "You pour your heart onto paper because it's safer than saying things out loud. You make graphs about video game balance because you're passionate and detail-oriented and you can't help but go all-in on the things you care about. You talk to your plants and name your succulents and hide behind bulletin boards because real life is scary and rejection is terrifying and it's easier to dream about love than to actually risk your heart for it."

You can't speak. You can barely breathe. He is describing you, not the surface-level you, not the "weird first-year STEM student" you, but the real you. The you that lives in daydreams and love letters and the safety of your own imagination.

"The letter you wrote wasn't just a confession," Heeseung says quietly. "It was a work of art. The calligraphy, the words, the way you talked about noticing small things and finding beauty in ordinary moments, that's not something you write to just anyone. That's something you write when you've been paying attention. When you really see someone."

He pauses, and when he speaks again, his voice is almost a whisper.

"You remind me of her. Lara Jean. The girl who was so busy dreaming about love that she almost missed it when it showed up in front of her. You are Lara Jean. My Lara Jean."

Your heart races. Your palms are sweaty. The evening has grown dark around you, the stars fully emerged now, and Heeseung's face is half in shadow, half illuminated by the distant campus lights.

"Why are you telling me this?" you whisper.

"Because I think you're scared," Heeseung says simply. "I think you've been scared since the moment you handed me that letter. I think you're scared of what it means, scared of being vulnerable, scared of letting someone actually see you. And I want you to know that I see you anyway. Even when you're trying to hide."

He reaches out, and his hand finds yours in the darkness. His fingers are warm, his grip gentle.

"You don't have to be scared with me," he says. "I'm not going anywhere. I'm not going to hurt you. And I'm not going to stop being interested just because you're awkward or clumsy or you spill coffee on yourself or you ramble about League of Legends until you run out of breath." He squeezes your hand. "That's the stuff I like about you. That's the stuff that makes you real."

You stare at him, your eyes still swollen from crying, your nose still red, your heart still aching from the conversation with Jungwon. And yet, sitting here on this bench with Heeseung's hand in yours and his words echoing in your ears, something shifts. Something changes.

"I don't know what I'm doing," you admit, your voice barely audible. "I don't know what I want. I don't know what I'm supposed to feel."

"Then don't figure it out tonight." Heeseung stands up, still holding your hand, and gently pulls you to your feet. "Come on. Let's get you back to your dorm. You need rest and probably some water. Crying is dehydrating."

Despite everything, the heartbreak, the confusion, the complete emotional chaos of the past hour, you almost smile. "That's a very practical observation."

"I'm an engineering student. We're practical by nature." He falls into step beside you, your hands still joined, and begins walking you toward your dorm building. "Also, I may have done some research on crying. You know, for science."

"You researched crying for science?"

"It was for a psych elective. But also for life skills. You'd be surprised how many people don't know that emotional tears contain stress hormones that need to be flushed out of your system. Crying is literally good for you."

"You're very weird," you say, but there's no bite to it.

"Coming from the girl who named her succulent Jason, I'll take that as a compliment."

You walk in silence for a while, the campus quiet and peaceful around you. The stars are bright overhead, and the air is cool against your tear-stained cheeks, and Heeseung's hand is warm in yours, steady and reassuring.

When you reach your dorm building, he stops at the entrance, turning to face you. The light from the lobby spills through the glass doors, illuminating his features, the sharp line of his jaw, the gentle curve of his lips, the way his dark eyes fix on your face like you are something worth looking at.

"Y/N," he says.

"Yeah?"

"I meant what I said earlier. You don't have to figure everything out tonight. You don't have to have all the answers. But whatever you're going through, whatever made you cry like that… I hope you know you can talk to me. About anything. Even if it's hard. Even if it's confusing. Even if it's not what you think I want to hear."

Your throat tightens. He has no idea how relevant those words are. He has no idea that the thing that made you cry is, in part, him or at least, the situation he is unknowingly caught up in.

"Thank you," you whisper.

Heeseung smiles, that same soft smile that appeared when he poured coffee over his head, when he called you a little mouse, when he listened to you talk about video games for fifteen minutes straight. And then, before you can react, he leans forward and presses a gentle kiss to your cheek.

It isn't romantic or it isn't supposed to be. It is brief and soft and chaste, the kind of kiss you might give a friend who is hurting. But his lips are warm against your skin, and when he pulls back, your cheek is tingling, and your heart does that traitorous flutter again.

"Goodnight, little mouse," he says. "Get some sleep."

And then he walks away, his hands in his pockets, his silhouette disappearing into the darkness of the campus night.

You stand there for a long moment, your hand pressed to your cheek where his lips have been, your heart a tangled mess of grief and confusion and something else, something warm and growing, something you don't want to name.

This is supposed to be simple. You are supposed to like Jungwon. You have liked Jungwon for four months. You wrote him a letter and dreamt about him and catalogued his habits and built an entire future around the idea of him.

But Jungwon walked away. Jungwon made his choice. Jungwon told you to take care of Heeseung and then poked your cheek one last time, a goodbye disguised as a signature gesture.

And Heeseung… Heeseung poured coffee on himself to make you feel less alone. Heeseung held your hand and told you that you were his Lara Jean. Heeseung kissed your cheek and called you little mouse and looked at you like you were something precious.

You don't know what to do anymore. You don't know what to feel. The map you have been following, the one that leads straight to Jungwon has crumbled in your hands, and now you stand in unfamiliar territory with no compass and no guide.

You push open the door to your dorm building and walk to your room in a daze, your mind still spinning. When you finally collapse onto your bed, still in your clothes, still wearing the tear tracks on your cheeks, you stare up at the ceiling and try to make sense of the chaos in your heart.

Jungwon liked you.

Jungwon gave up on you.

Heeseung said he wouldn't go anywhere.

Heeseung kissed your cheek.

You press your fingers to the spot where his lips have been and close your eyes.

"I don't know what I'm doing," you whisper to your empty room. "I really, really don't know what I'm doing."

Your room, as always, offers no answers. But somewhere in the distance, you can almost hear Heeseung's voice: You don't have to figure everything out tonight.

So you don't. You let the exhaustion pull you under, let sleep claim you, and try very hard not to think about the fact that the boy who just comforted you through your heartbreak is the same boy who might be slowly, quietly, unexpectedly stealing your heart.

The university, in its infinite and questionable wisdom, has decided that what the student body really needs is a three-day trip to a skiing station.

You received the email three weeks ago, skimmed it with the vague interest of someone who has never skied in her life and has no intention of starting now, and promptly archived it into the dark abyss of your inbox alongside seventeen other emails you will never open again. The trip is optional, after all. Attendance is not mandatory. You can simply stay on campus, enjoy the quiet emptiness of the dorms, and continue your ongoing mission of avoiding all tall informatics students while trying to piece together the shattered remnants of your romantic life.

It is a perfect plan. Flawless. Foolproof.

Until Yunjin gets involved.

"You're going," Yunjin says, standing in the doorway of your dorm room with her arms crossed and her expression one of immovable determination. She has just finished reading the email over your shoulder, and the glint in her eye is the same one she gets when she is about to bulldoze through every objection you can possibly raise.

"I'm not going," you reply, not looking up from your biology textbook. "I don't ski. I don't snowboard. I don't even own a proper winter coat. The heaviest thing I own is a cardigan, and I'm pretty sure it's made of acrylic."

"Then we'll get you a coat."

"Yunjin."

"Y/N."

"I can't go to a skiing station. I have studying to do. I have lab reports to write. I have approximately eight hundred flashcards to review before the next exam. My social life is already a disaster zone, I don't need to add frostbite and potential avalanche-related injuries to my list of problems."

Yunjin steps fully into the room, closes the door behind her, and fixes you with a look that you recognize as her "I'm about to say something brutally honest and you're not going to like it" expression. "You've been moping for two weeks."

"I haven't been moping. I've been processing."

"You've been moping. You've been staring at walls, listening to sad music, and eating instant ramen for every meal. I saw you crying over a nature documentary the other day because the baby penguin got separated from its family."

"That was emotionally manipulative editing! They set it to sad piano music! Anyone would have cried!"

"Y/N." Yunjin sits down on the edge of your bed, her voice softening. "I know about Jungwon. I know he told you he liked you and then walked away. I know you've been carrying that around like a weight on your chest. But hiding in your room isn't going to make it better. You need to get out. You need fresh air. You need to do something that isn't just staring at the same four walls and replaying the same conversation over and over in your head."

You set down your highlighter. "What if I run into Jungwon on the trip?"

"Then you'll be a normal human being about it. Or you'll be weird and awkward, which is your default state anyway, so nothing will have changed."

"Comforting."

"What if you run into Heeseung?"

The question catches you off guard. Your hand stills on your textbook, and you feel that familiar, complicated flutter in your chest, the one that has been appearing more and more frequently whenever someone mentions his name. "I don't know. I haven't really talked to him since…" Since the night he kissed your cheek. Since the night you realized that maybe, just maybe, your heart is no longer as firmly in Jungwon's camp as you always assumed.

"Exactly," Yunjin says, as if your silence has proven her point. "You need to figure things out. And you can't do that if you're hiding in your dorm room subsisting on sodium and self-pity. The ski trip is three days. Three days of fresh mountain air, hot chocolate, and the chance to actually talk to people face-to-face instead of through a fog of depression ramen."

"The ramen isn't that bad."

"The ramen is a cry for help."

You are quiet for a moment, staring at the pages of your textbook without really seeing them. Yunjin is right. You know she is right. You have been hiding from Jungwon, from Heeseung, from the tangled mess of feelings that you still haven't sorted out. The past two weeks have been a blur of avoidance and overthinking, and you are no closer to clarity than you were on that bench under the stars.

"Fine," you say finally, the word escaping before you can stop it. "I'll go."

Yunjin's face lights up. "Really?"

"But I'm not skiing. I refuse to ski. I'll sit in the lodge and drink hot chocolate and judge people from the window like a ghost."

"That's the spirit."

The morning of the trip arrives with a gray sky and a biting chill in the air. You stand outside the student union with your hastily packed duffel bag, which contains exactly zero items suitable for winter sports because your wardrobe is approximately eighty percent oversized sweaters and twenty percent academic stress, and watch your breath fog in the cold morning air.

The bus is already parked at the curb, a massive coach with the university logo emblazoned on the side. Students mill around, dragging suitcases and carrying thermoses of coffee, their chatter filling the air with a buzz of excitement. You spot a few familiar faces from your classes, a group of engineering students comparing snowboards, and your heart lurches, a flash of dark hair that might be Jungwon disappearing into the bus.

Yunjin has already boarded, abandoning you for a seat near the front because she wants to "network with the economics majors" or some other nonsense that you can't relate to. You are alone, clutching your bag and wondering if it is too late to fake a sudden illness, when a voice speaks directly behind you.

"Need help with your bag?"

You spin around so fast that your duffel bag swings in a wide arc and nearly takes out an innocent bystander. The innocent bystander, thankfully, has very good reflexes. He ducks, straightens up, and smiles at you with that familiar, devastating smile that has been haunting your dreams for weeks.

Heeseung.

He wears a black puffer jacket that makes his shoulders look even broader, a gray beanie pulled low over his hair, and a pair of snow boots that actually look like they belong on a ski trip. His cheeks are slightly pink from the cold, and his eyes are bright with that unshakeable, inexplicable cheerfulness that seems to follow him everywhere.

"Hi," you say, because your brain has apparently decided that monosyllables are all you can manage.

"Hi," he replies, his smile widening. "Fancy meeting you here. I thought you said you were photosensitive and couldn't be exposed to direct light. Is snow-light different from regular light?"

"That was a lie and you know it."

"I know." He reaches out and gently takes your duffel bag from your white-knuckled grip. "Come on. Let's find seats together. The bus is filling up."

"I… what… together?"

"Unless you already have a seatmate?"

Yunjin has abandoned you. You have no allies, no escape routes, and no valid excuses. "No," you admit. "I don't."

"Great." Heeseung starts walking toward the bus, your bag slung easily over his shoulder like it weighs nothing. "Fair warning, I'm a chronic window-seat person. I need to be able to stare dramatically at the scenery while contemplating the meaning of life."

"That's very specific."

"It's a lifestyle choice."

You follow him onto the bus, your heart doing that complicated gymnastics routine that it has perfected over the past few weeks. Heeseung navigates through the aisle with practiced ease, nodding at people who call out to him, exchanging quick greetings, but never stopping until he reaches an empty row near the middle of the bus.

"Window seat's yours," he says, gesturing for you to go first.

"I thought you said you were a chronic window-seat person."

"I am. But I'm making an exception." He stows your bag in the overhead compartment, then steps back to let you pass. "Consider it part of the whole starting slow thing. Sacrifices must be made."

You slide into the window seat, your heart hammering, and Heeseung settles in beside you. The seats are closer together than you expected. His shoulder brushes against yours, and even through the layers of your coats, you can feel the warmth of his body. You press yourself slightly closer to the window, trying to create more space, but the universe, in its infinite comedic wisdom, has clearly designed this bus to maximize accidental physical contact.

"Comfortable?" Heeseung asks, his voice tinged with amusement.

"Extremely. Never been more comfortable in my life. This is peak comfort."

"You're pressed against the window like you're trying to phase through it."

"The window is cold. The glass is… nice. I like glass."

Heeseung laughs, that genuine, surprised laugh that you heard in the cafeteria and the café and on the bench under the stars. "You're doing it again."

"Doing what?"

"The rambling thing. The nervous rambling thing." He turns in his seat slightly, facing you. "You know you don't have to be nervous around me, right? I thought we established this. Coffee disaster solidarity. Matching shirts. The whole thing."

"I'm not nervous," you lie. "I'm just… the bus is very… bus-like. It's making me feel things."

"Bus-like feelings."

"Exactly."

Heeseung shakes his head, still smiling, and pulls a pair of earbuds from his jacket pocket. "Here. Music helps me relax on long trips. We can share if you want."

He offers you one of his earbuds, holding it out between his fingers like it is something precious. The gesture is so simple, so unexpectedly intimate, that your breath catches in your throat. Sharing earbuds means sitting close enough for the cord to reach. Sharing earbuds means listening to his music, hearing the songs he likes, experiencing something together in the quiet space between words.

"Okay," you whisper, taking the earbud.

Your fingers brush against his, just for a second, and the contact sends a spark of electricity up your arm. You quickly insert the earbud, focusing very hard on not thinking about how close he is, how warm his shoulder feels against yours, how the faint scent of his cologne fills the space between you.

"What are we listening to?" you ask.

"A playlist I made," Heeseung says, scrolling through his phone. "It's kind of all over the place. Some indie, some R&B, some stuff I found on TikTok that got stuck in my head. I'm not very organized with my music."

"That's shocking. I assumed an informatics engineering student would have their music meticulously categorized by genre, mood, and decade of release."

"You assumed wrong. My playlists are chaos. This one is literally called vibes idk."

"That's the worst playlist name I've ever heard."

"It's an accurate playlist name. You'll see."

Lovers - Anna of the North playing now

He presses play, and music fills your ear.

"We should play a game," Heeseung says after a few songs have played. "To pass the time."

"What kind of game?"

"Twenty questions. But the version where you can skip questions if you don't want to answer. No pressure, no judgment, no awkwardness."

You consider this. Twenty questions with Heeseung is a dangerous proposition. There are so many things you don't want to answer, so many topics you have been carefully avoiding, so many truths that are still tangled up in misunderstandings and misplaced letters. But there is also something disarming about the way he offers the terms, no pressure, no judgment, no awkwardness, like he genuinely cares about making you feel safe.

"Fine," you say. "But you go first."

"Okay." Heeseung leans back in his seat, his shoulder still pressed against yours, his expression thoughtful. "What's your favorite movie of all time?"

"Pride and Prejudice. The 2005 version with Keira Knightley."

"The hand flex scene?"

You turn to stare at him. "You know about the hand flex scene?"

"Every person with a functioning heart knows about the hand flex scene. It's cinema history. Mr. Darcy flexing his hand after helping Elizabeth into the carriage because he's so overwhelmed by touching her? Iconic. Revolutionary. I think about it at least once a week."

You don't know what to do with this information. Lee Heeseung, reputed womanizer, hot informatics engineering student, the guy who is currently wearing a beanie and looking unfairly attractive in bus lighting, knows about the hand flex scene from Pride and Prejudice. He thinks about it weekly.

"You're very strange," you say.

"I prefer culturally literate."

"You said you've watched To All the Boys I've Loved Before at least six times."

"That's one of my favorite modern movies. Pride and Prejudice is my favorite classic. I contain multitudes." He nudges your shoulder with his. "Ask me something else."

The questions flow back and forth as the bus winds its way out of the city and into the mountains. You learn that Heeseung has an older brother who he FaceTimes every Sunday, that he chose informatics engineering because he loves the logic of coding but secretly dreams of being a music producer, that he loves Shin ramyeon and has created his own way of eating his instant noodles. He learns that you started collecting highlighters in middle school and now own over forty different colors, that you have named every plant in your dorm room after characters from classic literature, that you once won a poetry contest in high school but never told anyone because you were embarrassed.

The landscape outside the window shifts as the bus climbs higher into the mountains. Snow begins to appear, first in patches, then in sweeping blankets that cover the trees and the slopes and the distant peaks. The sky is a pale winter blue, and the sun glints off the snow.

"Next question," Heeseung says. "What's something you're scared of?"

The question hangs in the air between you, weightier than the ones that have come before. You could give a surface-level answer, spiders, heights, the dark, but something about the quiet intimacy of the bus, the warmth of his shoulder against yours, the gentle music in your ear, makes you want to be honest.

"Being seen," you say quietly. "Really seen. By someone who matters."

Heeseung doesn't respond right away. When he does, his voice is soft. "Why?"

"Because if someone really sees you, they might not like what they find. It's easier to stay on the surface. To be the version of yourself that you can control." You pause, watching the snow-covered trees blur past the window. "I'm good at dreaming about things. Imagining them. Writing them down. But actually doing them… actually putting myself out there… that's the scary part."

"That's why you write letters," Heeseung says. It isn't a question.

"Yeah. It's safer on paper. You can edit a letter. You can cross things out and start over. You can't do that with real life."

Heeseung is quiet for a long moment, and when he speaks, his words are careful and measured.

"For what it's worth," he says, "I've been seeing you for a few weeks now. The real you, I mean. The one who rambles and spills coffee and hides behind bulletin boards. And I haven't found anything I don't like yet."

Your heart stutters. You don't know what to say, so you say nothing, just let the music fill the space between you and try to memorize the exact timbre of his voice saying those words.

The skiing station is everything the brochure promised and more. A sprawling complex of wooden lodges and snow-covered slopes, nestled in a valley surrounded by towering peaks. The air is crisp and clean, carrying the scent of pine and woodsmoke, and the snow glitteres under the afternoon sun like a carpet of crushed diamonds.

You step off the bus and immediately sink three inches into a snowdrift.

"Excellent start," Yunjin says, appearing at your elbow and grinning. "Really graceful. Ten out of ten."

"I didn't see it."

"It's snow. It's everywhere. How did you not see it?"

You extract your foot from the drift and shake the snow off your boot with as much dignity as you can muster. "I was distracted by the scenery."

"Uh-huh." Yunjin's grin widens. "And by the scenery, you mean the six-foot-tall informatics student you spent the entire bus ride cuddled up with?"

"We weren't cuddling. We were sharing earbuds. There's a difference."

"There's really not."

You grab your duffel bag from the luggage compartment and follow the crowd toward the main lodge, your cheeks burning despite the cold. The lodge is a massive timber-frame building with a soaring ceiling, a massive stone fireplace, and windows that look out over the slopes. Students are already scattered across the lobby, checking in, collecting room keys, and making plans for the afternoon.

Your room is small but cozy, with a window that faces the mountains and a bed that looks impossibly inviting. You dump your bag on the floor, plug in your phone to charge, and then immediately find yourself staring out the window at the snow-covered landscape.

Yunjin finds you an hour later, dragging you out of your room and into the lodge's main café for hot chocolate. The café is warm and bustling, filled with students comparing ski passes and swapping stories about near-misses on the slopes. You find a table near the window, and Yunjin wastes no time in grilling you about the bus ride.

"So," she says, stirring her hot chocolate with a cinnamon stick, "Heeseung."

"What about him?"

"You spent three hours cuddled up with him on a bus."

"Sharing earbuds is not cuddling."

"You let him listen to music with you. You played twenty questions. You told him about your highlighter collection and the poetry contest you never told anyone about." Yunjin fixes you with a knowing look. "Those are not casual bus acquaintance topics. Those are I'm emotionally vulnerable with this person topics."

You stare into your hot chocolate. "I don't know what I'm doing, Yunjin. Everything is so tangled up. I started this whole mess because I was too scared to confess to the right person, and now the wrong person has been nothing but kind and thoughtful and unexpectedly perfect, and the right person told me he liked me and then walked away, and I don't know what I'm supposed to feel anymore."

Yunjin is quiet for a moment. Then she reaches across the table and places her hand on yours. "Maybe there isn't a supposed to. Maybe there's just what you actually feel, when you strip away all the expectations and the plans and the ideas about how things were meant to go."

You look up at her. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, you've been so focused on the idea of Jungwon, the letter, the confession, the grand romantic gesture, that you might have missed what's been happening right in front of you." She squeezes your hand. "Heeseung poured coffee on himself so you wouldn't feel alone. He held your hand while you cried. He looked at you on that bus like you were the most interesting person he'd ever met."

"That doesn't mean-"

"Y/N." Yunjin's voice is gentle but firm. "When are you going to stop being scared and start being honest?"

The question hits you like a punch to the chest. Because she is right. Yunjin is always right, that is the infuriating thing about her. You have been scared since the moment you walked into that PC room, scared of rejection, scared of humiliation, scared of what would happen if you actually let someone see you. And that fear has led you into a labyrinth of misunderstandings and half-truths, and somewhere along the way, you have gotten so lost that you can't even see the exit anymore.

"I need to tell him," you say quietly. "Heeseung. I need to tell him the truth about the letter."

Yunjin nods. "I think that's a good idea."

"He might hate me."

"He might. But he also might not. And either way, you'll finally be able to stop carrying this around." She leans back in her chair, blowing on her hot chocolate. "Besides, from everything you've told me about him, I don't think hating you is high on his list of priorities."

"What if it ruins everything?"

"What if it fixes everything?"

You don't have an answer to that. You just sit there, watching the snow fall outside the window, and feel the weight of your decision settling onto your shoulders. Tonight. You will tell him tonight. Before dinner, maybe, or after. You will find a quiet moment, away from the crowds and the noise and the chaos of the ski trip, and you will finally, finally tell him the truth.

Finding Heeseung turns out to be easier said than done.

The ski station is massive, a maze of slopes and trails and lodges that all look exactly the same. You wander through the main lodge, check the café, peek into the game room, and even brave the equipment rental shop where a terrifyingly efficient employee tries to convince you to try snowboarding. You escape with your dignity barely intact and a pamphlet about beginner lessons that you immediately stuff into the nearest trash can.

It isn't until you step outside, squinting against the glare of the sun on the snow, that you spot him.

He is on the intermediate slope, a dark figure against the white expanse of snow, cutting down the mountain with the kind of effortless grace that makes your heart lurch into your throat. He is snowboarding, of course he is snowboarding, because apparently there is nothing Lee Heeseung can't do and he moves like he was born on a board.

You have two options. Option one: wait at the bottom of the slope like a normal person and flag him down when he finishes his run. Option two: try to reach him now, which will involve navigating the snowy terrain between you and the slope, a task for which you are woefully underprepared both in terms of footwear and basic motor coordination.

You choose option two, because you are an idiot.

The path to the slope is a gentle incline of packed snow that looks deceptively easy to traverse. You take three steps and immediately realize your mistake. The snow is slippery, not the powdery kind of snow that crunches satisfyingly underfoot, but the packed, icy kind that has been trampled by hundreds of skiers and snowboarders and now has the texture of a skating rink.

You take a fourth step. Your foot slides. You windmill your arms frantically. Your other foot slides in the opposite direction. For one glorious, suspended moment, you do something that might generously be called a split, and then gravity takes over and you go down in a tangle of limbs and snow and absolute humiliation.

"Y/N?"

The voice comes from above you. You look up, snow clinging to your hair and your eyelashes and probably places you don't want to think about, and there is Heeseung, standing over you with his snowboard tucked under his arm and an expression somewhere between concern and barely suppressed laughter.

"Hi," you say weakly. "I was looking for you."

"You found me." He kneels down beside you, brushing snow off your shoulder. "Are you okay? That looked like a pretty spectacular fall."

"I've had better. I've also had worse. This is somewhere in the middle."

"Your standards for falls must be very high."

"I'm an overachiever."

Heeseung laughs and offers you his hand. You take it, and he pulls you to your feet with the same easy strength he showed in the café, steadying you when you wobble on the slippery snow.

"Come on," he says, still holding your hand. "Let's get you somewhere less treacherous. The beginner slope is over there, it's flatter and a lot less likely to attack you."

"I don't snowboard."

"I'll teach you."

"Heeseung-"

"It'll be fun. I promise." He already guides you toward the beginner slope, his hand warm and solid around yours. "Besides, you came all this way to find me. The least I can do is give you a snowboarding lesson."

The beginner slope is, as promised, much less intimidating than the intermediate one. It is a gentle hill with a slow incline, populated by other beginners who fall over with the same frequency and enthusiasm that you anticipate for yourself. Heeseung finds a quiet spot near the edge, props his snowboard in the snow, and turns to you with an expression of exaggerated seriousness.

"Okay, lesson one: standing on the board without falling."

"That sounds fake."

"It's very real. I've done it many times."

"Show-off."

He grins and proceeds to walk you through the basics of snowboarding with the patience of a saint and the enthusiasm of someone who genuinely loves sharing his hobbies. He holds your hands when you wobble, catches you when you fall, and laughs with you instead of at you when you face-plant into a snowbank for the third time in ten minutes.

"You're getting better," he says, pulling you upright after your fourth fall. Snow dusts his beanie and clings to his eyelashes, and his cheeks are flushed pink from the cold. "That time you almost made it five feet."

"Almost being the key word."

"Almost is progress. Almost is the first step toward eventually."

You look at him, really look at him and feel something shift in your chest. This is it. This is the moment. You can't put it off any longer.

"I need to tell you something," you say, your voice coming out steadier than you feel. "Can we sit down for a minute?"

Heeseung's expression flickers, curiosity, concern, something else you can't name but he nods. "Of course."

You find a bench near the edge of the slope, tucked under a pine tree whose branches are heavy with snow. The afternoon sun starts to sink lower in the sky, painting the mountains in shades of gold and pink, and the air is cold enough to make your breath fog. You sit down, and Heeseung sits beside you, close but not too close, his snowboard propped against the bench.

For a long moment, you don't say anything. You are gathering your courage, trying to find the right words, trying to figure out how to start a conversation that might change everything.

"The letter," you say finally. "The one I gave you in the PC room. There's something I need to tell you about it."

Heeseung doesn't react. He just waits, his dark eyes steady on your face.

"It wasn't meant for you," you say, and the words come out in a rush, tumbling over each other in their hurry to escape. "I wrote it for someone else. For Jungwon. I'd been planning to confess to him for weeks, and I'd written this whole letter, and I asked someone where he was and they said he was in the PC room, and I walked in and I saw someone sitting at the computer and I just assumed it was him, and I didn't look, I didn't check, I just handed over the letter and started talking, and then you looked up and it wasn't him at all, it was you and I was so embarrassed and everyone was watching and I couldn't correct you in front of all those people, and then everything spiraled and I kept trying to tell you but I couldn't find the right moment and then Jungwon found out and I couldn't correct it in front of him either and now everything is a mess and I'm so, so sorry, and I understand if you're angry, I understand if you hate me, I just… I couldn't keep lying to you anymore. You deserved to know the truth."

You stop talking. Your heart pounds so hard you can feel it in your temples. Your hands shake, and you press them together in your lap to keep them still. You don't look at Heeseung, you can't look at him, can't bear to see the expression on his face.

The silence stretches for what feels like an eternity.

And then Heeseung says, in the most casual voice imaginable: "I know."

Your head snaps up. "What?"

"I know the letter wasn't meant for me." He smiles, not a smirk, not a grin, but something gentle and warm and completely without judgment. "I've known since the beginning."

"But… how… since when-"

"Since I read it." Heeseung leans back on the bench, looking out at the snow-covered slope with a thoughtful expression. "The letter was beautiful. Every word of it. But it wasn't about me. It was about someone who smiles a certain way, someone who gave you gummy bears at 2 AM, someone who studies hard during free time at the library." He glances at you sideways. "I've never given anyone gummy bears. And I'm an informatics student, I don't take philosophy."

Your brain short-circuits. "You knew. This whole time. You knew."

"I knew."

"And you didn't say anything?"

"What was I supposed to say?" Heeseung's voice is gentle. "You were so flustered and embarrassed, and I could see you panicking in front of everyone. If I called you out right there, you would have been humiliated. And then I kept waiting for you to tell me yourself, but you never did, and eventually I just…" He shrugs. "I got curious. You wrote this incredible letter, and you were so weird and skittish and interesting, and I wanted to understand you. So I kept showing up."

"You kept showing up because I was interesting?"

"At first. Then it became something else." He turns to face you fully, his expression open and earnest. "You're not like the other people who confess to me. They want the idea of me, the reputation, the image. You didn't even want the real me. You wanted someone else entirely. And that was… refreshing. You weren't trying to impress me. You were trying to get rid of me. It was the first time anyone ever hid behind a bulletin board to avoid me."

"I wasn't… I didn't…" You bury your face in your hands. "This is so humiliating."

"It's not humiliating. It's human. You made a mistake. A very entertaining, very elaborate mistake." He gently pulls your hands away from your face, forcing you to look at him. "And somewhere along the way, while you were busy trying to make me lose interest, I got to know the real you. The one who names her plants after literary characters. The one who writes passionate essays about video game balance. The one who cried over a baby penguin last week."

"Yunjin told you about that?"

"Yunjin and I have been texting. But don't worry she didn't spilled all your dirty secrets."

You gape at him. "You and Yunjin have been texting?"

"She reached out after the coffee incident. Said she wanted to make sure my intentions were good." He smiles, a little sheepishly. "I think I passed the test. She said I was less of a disaster than expected."

"I'm going to kill her. I'm going to kill both of you."

"Before you do, let me finish." Heeseung's voice softens, and he takes your hand in his, the same way he did on the bench under the stars, steady and warm and reassuring. "I knew the letter wasn't for me. But I also know that somewhere along the way, something changed. Maybe it changed for you too. Maybe it didn't. Either way, I wanted to give you the space to figure it out on your own terms."

You stare at him, your mind reeling. He knew. He has known this entire time, and instead of being angry or hurt or humiliated, he just… waited. Gave you space. Let you come to him when you were ready.

"You're not upset?" you whisper.

"I'm not upset."

"You don't feel… I don't know, betrayed? Lied to?"

"Y/N." He squeezes your hand. "You were scared. I get it. I've spent my whole life being scared of disappointing people, scared of saying no, scared of letting anyone down. I know what it's like to be trapped in a situation you didn't mean to create. I'm not going to hold that against you."

The tears threaten again, not the ugly, heartbroken tears from that night on the pathway, but something softer. Something that feels almost like relief.

"I'm sorry," you say, your voice cracking. "I'm so sorry for not telling you sooner."

"You're telling me now. That's what matters."

"I don't know what I feel," you admit. "About anything. About anyone. Everything is so confusing."

"Then don't figure it out right now." Heeseung stands up, pulling you gently to your feet. "We have three days at a ski station. There's a jacuzzi. There's hot chocolate. There's an entire mountain to explore. Let's just… enjoy it. See what happens. No pressure, no expectations, no misunderstandings."

Just like that, the weight you have been carrying for weeks, the guilt, the anxiety, the tangled knot of secrets, begins to loosen. Not disappear entirely, but loosen enough that you can breathe again.

"There's really a jacuzzi?" you ask.

Heeseung grins. "There's really a jacuzzi. I saw it on the map. Outdoor, heated, with a view of the mountains. Very romantic. Very much the kind of thing you'd put in a letter about someone."

"You're making fun of me."

"A little bit. But also, I'm serious." He picks up his snowboard and tucks it under his arm. "What do you say? After dinner? We can go check it out."

You think about it. The jacuzzi. With Heeseung. In a swimsuit. In warm water under the stars, surrounded by snow-covered mountains. It is terrifying. It is ridiculous. It is exactly the kind of thing the hopeless romantic inside you has always dreamed about.

"Okay," you say. "After dinner."

By the time dinner rolls around, you are a nervous wreck.

You have spent the rest of the afternoon in your room, alternating between staring at the ceiling and frantically texting Yunjin for advice. Yunjin has responded with a series of increasingly unhelpful messages:

Yunjin: wear the cute swimsuit

You: i don't OWN a cute swimsuit

Yunjin: wear the one you borrowed from me for the pool party last semester

You: the black one???

Yunjin: YES the black one. he won't know what hit him

You: i don't want him to be HIT i want this to be NORMAL

Yunjin: nothing about your life has been normal since the moment you walked into that PC room. embrace it. wear the swimsuit.

You wear the swimsuit.

Underneath your clothes, of course. Underneath a thick sweater, a pair of jeans, and the oversized winter coat you borrowed from Yunjin specifically for this trip. You feel like you are wearing armor, except the armor is actually a swimsuit, and the battle is against your own nervous system.

Dinner is a blur. The lodge's restaurant is packed with students, the noise level somewhere between "lively" and "chaotic," and you barely taste the food on your plate. You keep glancing toward the table where Heeseung sits with a group of his friends, and every time he catches your eye, he smiles at you, that same soft, knowing smile that makes your stomach do complicated acrobatics.

At one point, you accidentally make eye contact with Jungwon across the dining hall. He sits with a group of philosophy students, and when your gazes meet, he raises his hand in a small wave. His expression is unreadable, not sad, not angry, just… neutral. You wave back, and then you both look away, and that is it. A quiet acknowledgment of everything that has happened and everything that hasn't.

After dinner, you return to your room and proceed to have a minor meltdown.

The text from Heeseung arrives at exactly 8:47 PM.

Heeseung: jacuzzi? meet in the lobby in 10? bring a towel

You stare at the message for approximately three full minutes. Then you type out seventeen different responses, delete all of them, and finally settle on:

You: okay

Just "okay." No punctuation. No enthusiasm. Just the monosyllabic response of someone who is either incredibly chill or seconds away from spontaneous combustion.

You grab your towel and make your way to the lobby. The lodge is quieter now, most students either in the game room or in their own rooms recovering from the day's activities. The fireplace in the main lobby still crackles, and a few people gather around it with mugs of hot chocolate.

Heeseung is already there, leaning against the reception desk with a towel slung over his shoulder and that same gray beanie pulled over his hair. He has changed out of his snowboarding gear into something simpler and when he sees you approaching, his face lights up with that genuine smile that never fails to make your heart flutter.

"Ready?" he asks.

"No," you admit.

"Good. Let's go anyway."

The jacuzzi is on the outdoor deck of the spa building, a steaming oasis surrounded by snow-covered rocks and pine trees draped in lights. The mountains rise in the distance, dark silhouettes against a sky so full of stars it looks like a painting. The air is freezing, the kind of cold that makes your lungs ache, but the water is perfectly, blissfully warm, and when you finally shed your coat and your sweater and your jeans and slip into the bubbling water in your borrowed black swimsuit, you let out a breath you didn't realize you have been holding.

"This is nice," you admit, sinking down until the water reaches your chin. "This is really, really nice."

"Told you." Heeseung slides into the water across from you, his towel discarded on a nearby bench. The lights catch the angles of his face, the curve of his shoulders, the way his hair curls slightly at the ends from the steam. "Sometimes I'm right about things."

"Sometimes."

"Rarely. Occasionally. Once in a blue moon."

You laugh, and it feels good, lighter than it has in weeks. The warm water, the cold air, the stars overhead, the boy across from you who has known the truth all along and hasn't run away, it all feels like something out of a dream.

"I'm glad you told me," Heeseung says quietly. "About the letter."

"Me too."

"And I'm glad you're here. At the ski station. In the jacuzzi. With me."

Your heart flutters. "Me too."

"So what happens now?" Heeseung asks, but there is no pressure in his voice. Just curiosity. Just openness.

"I don't know," you say honestly. "But I think… I think I'd like to find out."

Heeseung smiles, soft and real and full of something you are only just beginning to recognize.

"Then let's find out," he says. "Together."

The jacuzzi is bathed in purple light.

You don't know if it is intentional or if someone just installed colored LEDs and called it a day, but the effect is undeniably, unfairly romantic. The water glows with a deep violet hue, shifting to indigo where the bubbles break the surface, and the steam rising into the cold mountain air catches the light and turns it into something almost magical. It looks like a movie.

A romance movie, specifically. The kind you have watched a hundred times in your dorm room, wrapped in a blanket, dreaming about the day something like this would happen to you.

And now it is happening. And you are absolutely, catastrophically unprepared.

Heeseung sits across from you in the bubbling water, his arms stretched out along the edge of the jacuzzi, his head tilted back slightly to look at the stars. The purple light paints shadows across the planes of his face, the sharp line of his jaw, the curve of his lips, the column of his throat disappearing into the steam. Droplets of water cling to his skin, and when he tilts his head forward to look at you, his dark eyes reflect the violet glow in a way that makes your stomach drop straight through the floor.

"You're doing it again," he says, his voice low and amused.

"Doing what?"

"Staring at me like you're trying to figure me out."

"I'm not staring. I'm… observing. It's different."

"Is it?"

"It's scientific. I'm conducting research."

Heeseung's lips curve into that familiar smile, the one that is definitely a smirk's first cousin by now, maybe even its sibling. "And what has your research concluded so far?"

"That you're very annoying," you say. "And that the purple light is doing unfair things to your bone structure."

"Unfair things to my bone structure," he repeats, laughing. "That's a new one. I'll add it to the list of compliments I've received."

"You keep a list?"

"Mentally. It's not written down anywhere. I'm not that egotistical."

"Debatable."

He laughs again, and the sound echoes across the water, mixing with the gentle hum of the jacuzzi jets. You try very hard to be normal, to act like you aren't sitting in a bubbling hot tub with a boy who has known your secret all along and has still chosen to be here, in the purple light, looking at you like he wants to kiss you.

And then he reaches for your foot.

His hand closes around your ankle beneath the water, warm and gentle, and before you can process what is happening, he lifts your leg, guiding your foot toward him. Your heel presses against his chest, against the firm warmth of his skin, the steady rhythm of his heartbeat, and your breath catches in your throat so abruptly that you make a small, strangled sound that is definitely not dignified. The memory of your wet dream surges instantly, and you mentally thank the purple lights for hiding the sudden flush on your face.

"What are you doing?" you manage, your voice coming out several octaves higher than normal.

"You were floating awkwardly," Heeseung says, like this is a perfectly reasonable explanation. His thumb traces a slow circle against your ankle bone, feather-light and devastating. "I thought you might want something to anchor you."

"My ankle. You're anchoring my ankle."

"Ankles are very anchorable."

"That's not a word."

"It is now. I'm an engineering student. I can invent words."

Your heart pounds so hard you are certain he can feel it through the sole of your foot. His hand still wraps around your ankle, warm and steady, and the position is so unexpectedly intimate, your leg stretched across the space between you, your foot pressed against his chest, his thumb drawing lazy patterns on your skin, that you don't know where to look or what to say or how to breathe.

"You know what's funny?" Heeseung says, his voice conversational, like he isn't currently holding your foot against his heart. "The jacuzzi scene in To All the Boys I've Loved Before."

Your brain, which is already operating at approximately ten percent capacity, struggles to process the shift in topic. "The… jacuzzi scene?"

"Lara Jean and Peter. The ski trip. The hot tub." He gestures vaguely at the purple water around you. "They're in a jacuzzi together for the first time, and Lara Jean is all nervous, and Peter is trying to be cool about it, and there's all this tension because they're fake dating but they're both starting to feel real things."

"I know the scene," you say, your voice faint.

"It's kind of the turning point in the movie. The moment where the fake relationship starts becoming real." Heeseung tilts his head, and his eyes meet yours, and there is something in them, something dark and warm and knowing—that makes your skin tingle. "Funny how we ended up in a jacuzzi too. At a ski station. Just like them."

"Are you saying we're in a romance movie?"

"I'm saying the parallels are getting a little uncanny." His thumb traces another circle on your ankle, slow and deliberate. "The letter. The ski trip. The hot tub."

"Well, technically the parallels are there but it's still different…"

"You're right. At the end of the day we're not in a movie… This is real life."

"Which means…"

"Which means we're in uncharted territory now." Heeseung's voice drops, becoming something lower, something that vibrates through the water and into your bones. "No movie to reference. No script to follow. Just… whatever happens next."

Your mouth is dry. When did your mouth become so dry? You are surrounded by water, and yet every drop of moisture has apparently evaporated from your body.

"That's terrifying," you whisper.

"Is it?" His hand tightens slightly on your ankle, grounding you. "I think it's kind of exciting. Don't you?"

You don't know how to answer that. You don't know how to articulate the complicated knot of fear and anticipation and something else, something warm and fluttering that has taken up residence in your chest. So you do what you always do when you don't know what to say: you deflect.

"You're very smooth, you know that?" you say, aiming for teasing and landing somewhere closer to breathless. "Has anyone ever told you that? The ankle thing, the movie reference, the uncharted territory line, it's a lot."

Heeseung's lips twitch. "Is it working?"

"I'm not answering that."

"That's an answer in itself."

"You're insufferable."

"And yet you're still here." His eyes flicker down for just a moment, barely a second, but enough to make your skin flush. "Letting me hold your ankle."

You pull your foot back, but he doesn't let go. His grip remains gentle, steady, his palm warm against your skin. "I'm not letting you do anything. You just… did it."

"And you didn't stop me."

"I was being polite."

"Polite." Heeseung's smile widens. "Right. That's what this is. Politeness."

The purple light flickers slightly, casting new shadows across his face. The bubbles swirl around you, warm and enveloping, and the cold mountain air nips at your exposed shoulders, creating a contrast that makes every sensation feel heightened. You are acutely aware of everything, the heat of the water, the chill of the breeze, the rough texture of the jacuzzi edge beneath your fingers, the steady pressure of Heeseung's hand on your ankle.

"Can I ask you something?" Heeseung says.

"You're going to anyway."

"True." He pauses, and when he speaks again, his voice is softer. More curious. "Have you ever done this before?"

"Done what? Sat in a jacuzzi?"

"Been physical with someone. Intimate." He says the words without embarrassment, without leering, just genuine curiosity. "You get so flustered every time I touch you. Earlier, when I kissed your cheek, I thought you were going to combust. And I'm not trying to make fun of you, I'm genuinely asking. Is this… new for you?"

Your cheeks, already flushed from the heat of the water, burn even hotter. "That's a very personal question."

"You don't have to answer. Remember? Twenty questions rules. No pressure."

You are quiet for a moment. The bubbles churn around you. The stars glitter overhead. Heeseung's thumb continues its slow, hypnotic circles on your ankle.

"I've kissed people before," you say finally. "A few times. But it was always… quick. Awkward. Spin the bottle at parties, that kind of thing." You pause, gathering your courage. "I've never had a real relationship. I've never… you know."

"Made out with someone?"

The bluntness of the question makes you choke on air. "I… that's… yes. That. I've never done that."

"Okay," Heeseung says simply.

"Okay? That's all you have to say?"

"What else would I say?"

"I don't know. Something. Most people would say something."

Heeseung is quiet for a moment, his expression thoughtful. Then he says, "I haven't either. Much, I mean. I've had my few moments but the amount you can count on your fingers. People assume I have, because of the reputation, but the truth is I've never really… connected with someone like that. I've had opportunities, I guess, but I didn't want to do it just for the sake of doing it. I wanted it to mean something."

The confession catches you off guard. You assumed, everyone assumed, that Lee Heeseung was experienced, that his womanizer reputation was built on a foundation of romantic conquests. But here he is, in the purple light of the jacuzzi, telling you that the reputation is just that: a reputation. Smoke and mirrors. Assumptions built on his inability to say no.

"We're both disasters," you say.

"Absolutely. But at least we're disasters together."

"Disaster twins."

"Matching shirts and everything."

You laugh, and it comes out lighter than you expected. The tension that has been coiling in your chest begins to ease, replaced by something warmer. Something that feels almost like comfort.

Wus Good/Curious - PARTYNEXTDOOR playing now

Somewhere in the lodge, someone has connected their phone to the outdoor speakers. The song that starts playing is slow and sensual, the timing so absurd, so perfectly, comedically timed, that you can't help but laugh. "Did you plan this?"

Heeseung laughs too, shaking his head in disbelief. "I swear I didn't. The universe is just showing off at this point."

"This is the least romantic song that could have possibly played."

"I don't know. It's got a certain vibe." His eyes meet yours, and there is a glint of mischief in them. "Very sensual. Very on-the-nose for a jacuzzi scene."

"It's about-" You stop, your face heating.

"It's about what?"

"You know what it's about."

"I want to hear you say it."

"You're the worst."

Heeseung grins, and the purple light catches the curve of his lips, the sparkle in his eyes, the way the water droplets trace paths down his neck and across his collarbone. The song continues playing, and you are suddenly very aware of how close he is, how the space between you has somehow shrunk without you noticing.

"Come here," he says softly.

"What?"

"Come here. I want to show you something."

Your heart hammers so hard you can feel it in your throat. "Show me what?"

"Trust me."

And you do. That is the terrifying thing. Despite everything, the misunderstandings, the secrets, the weeks of chaos and confusion, you trust him. You trust the boy who poured coffee on his head to make you feel less alone. You trust the boy who held your hand while you cried. You trust the boy who has known your secret all along and has never once made you feel foolish for it.

You move through the water, closer to him, and the purple light swirls around you like something out of a dream. When you are within reach, Heeseung's hands find your waist beneath the water, gentle but sure, and he guides you until you are straddling his lap, your knees on either side of his hips, your faces inches apart.

"Is this okay?" he asks, his voice barely above a whisper.

Your breath comes in short, shallow gasps. His hands are warm on your waist, his thumbs tracing slow circles against the curve of your hips. His face is so close you can see the individual droplets of water on his eyelashes, can count the shades of brown in his eyes, can feel the warmth of his breath against your lips.

"Yes," you whisper. "This is… okay."

"You're shaking."

"I'm nervous."

"I know." His hands slide up from your waist, over your ribs, coming to rest on either side of your face. His palms are warm against your cheeks, his fingers threading gently into the wet strands of your hair. "We don't have to do anything you're not ready for. We can just sit here. We can talk. We can get out and go back inside. Whatever you want."

The gentleness of his voice, the patience in his eyes, the way he holds your face like you are something precious, it makes your chest ache in a way that has nothing to do with fear and everything to do with the realization that you are in very, very deep trouble.

Because this boy, this absurd, beautiful, incomprehensible boy who stumbled into your life through a misplaced letter and a catastrophic misunderstanding, has somehow become someone you can't imagine letting go of.

"What I want," you say, your voice barely steady, "is for you to kiss me."

Heeseung's eyes darken. The purple light flickers across his features, and his thumbs trace the line of your cheekbones, and his lips part slightly, and for one suspended moment, the entire world holds its breath.

"Okay," he murmurs. "But we're going to do this right."

And then he kisses you.

His lips meet yours softly at first, gentle, exploratory, the barest brush of contact. He tastes like the mint tea he had after dinner, and his mouth is warm, and the kiss is so sweet and so tender that you feel your entire body melt into him. Your hands, hovering awkwardly at your sides, come up to rest on his shoulders, and you feel the muscles beneath his skin shift as he pulls you closer.

But then you try to deepen the kiss, and it goes wrong.

Your nose bumps against his. Your teeth clack together with an audible click. You pull back, mortified, your face burning. "I'm sorry… I didn't… I don't know what I'm doing-"

"Hey." Heeseung's voice is gentle, his hands still cupping your face. "Hey. It's okay. Look at me."

You force yourself to meet his eyes, expecting to see amusement or frustration or something worse. But all you see is patience. Warmth. Something that looks a lot like affection.

"Everyone's first real kiss is awkward," he says. "That's normal. That's how it's supposed to be."

"It wasn't supposed to be with someone who actually knows what they're doing."

"Then let me teach you." His thumb traces your lower lip, feather-light. "We'll go slow. You follow my lead. And if at any point you want to stop, just say the word. Okay?"

Your heart pounds so hard you can feel it in your temples. "Okay."

He leans in again, slower this time, giving you every opportunity to pull away. When his lips meet yours, the pressure is deliberate, gentle but firm, guiding you. His mouth moves against yours in a slow, languid rhythm, and you follow, mimicking his movements, learning the dance as you go.

"Tilt your head a little," he murmurs against your lips. "There. Like that."

You adjust, and suddenly the angle is better, the kiss deepening naturally. His hands slide from your face down to your waist, pulling you closer, and you feel the length of his body against yours, warm and solid and very, very real.

"Now try parting your lips," he whispers. "Just a little."

You do, and the kiss changes. Becomes something deeper, more intense. His tongue brushes against your lower lip, a question rather than a demand, and when you open for him, the sensation is so overwhelming that a soft sound escapes your throat, something between a sigh and a gasp.

"Good," Heeseung breathes. "You're doing so good."

The praise sends a shiver down your spine. Your fingers curl into his shoulders, gripping him like he is the only solid thing in a world. The kiss deepens further, his mouth moving against yours with a confidence that makes your head spin, and you follow his lead, letting him guide you, letting yourself get lost in the warmth of his body and the taste of his lips and the steady, grounding pressure of his hands on your waist.

"Now," he murmurs, pulling back just enough to press a kiss to the corner of your mouth, "there's variation. You don't have to do the same thing the whole time."

"Variation," you repeat, your voice dazed.

"You can kiss here-" His lips brush the edge of your jaw. "-and here-" A kiss to the sensitive spot just below your ear. "-and here." A kiss to the hollow of your throat that makes your breath catch and your fingers tighten on his shoulders.

"That's… a lot of places."

"There's more." He pulls back, and his eyes meet yours, dark and warm and full of something that makes your stomach flip. "But we can save those for later. If you want."

"If I want," you echo, still dazed.

"Only if you want." His hand comes up to cup your face again, his thumb tracing your cheekbone.

"This is insane," you whisper.

"Completely insane."

"I can't believe this is happening."

"Neither can I." He presses his forehead against yours, his breath warm against your lips. "But I'm really, really glad it is."

"Can we try again?" you ask, your voice small but steady. "The kissing thing. I think I need more practice."

Heeseung laughs, and the sound vibrates through his chest and into yours. "Practice makes perfect."

"I'm a STEM student. I believe in empirical evidence."

"Then let's gather some data."

He kisses you again, and this time, you are ready. Your lips meet his with more confidence, your hands sliding from his shoulders into his hair, it is soft, damp from the steam, and the way he sighs against your mouth when your fingers thread through it makes you feel powerful in a way you have never experienced before.

This time, when you deepen the kiss, it's less clumsy. It's more natural, instinctive, the kind of kiss that feels like it has been waiting to happen for weeks and is finally making up for lost time. Heeseung's hands tighten on your waist, pulling you impossibly closer, and the water swirls around you.

Your hands roam over his chest, feeling the firm muscles beneath your fingertips. Heeseung's tongue teases your lower lip, seeking entrance which you grant without hesitation. The kiss becomes hungrier, more desperate as your bodies press together in the warm water. He has been patient with you, letting you set the pace, never pushing for more than you are ready to give.

You feel something hard pressing against your thigh through the thin fabric of your swimsuit. You pull back slightly, breathless, your cheeks flushed with both desire and embarrassment.

"Don't mind it," Heeseung murmurs, his voice husky with arousal. "It's just a natural reaction to kissing someone I find incredibly attractive."

But instead of shying away, something bold awakens inside you. You've been waiting for this moment, wanting to take your relationship to the next level. Taking a deep breath, you meet his gaze directly, though your words come out in a clumsy rush.

"I want to... I mean, if you want to... I think I'm ready to... do it," you stammer, feeling your face heat up even more. "With you."

Heeseung's eyes widen slightly before softening with affection. "Are you sure? Here? Your first time should be special."

"It is special because it's with you," you insist, trying to sound more confident than you feel. "I want this. I want you. I want to be honest with myself."

A slow smile spreads across his face. "Okay," he murmurs, his hands moving to cup your face. "But we need to prepare you properly. I don't want to hurt you."

His thumb brushes against your cheek as he continues, "Have you ever... touched yourself before?"

You shake your head, feeling a mix of embarrassment and excitement.

"That's okay," he assures you. "I'll teach you. I'll make sure you feel good."

WGFT - Gunna playing now

Heeseung shifts slightly, adjusting your position on his lap. One hand trails down your back, over your hip, and between your legs. Even through the fabric of your swimsuit, his touch sends sparks through your body.

"First, I need to make sure you're ready," he explains softly. His fingers find the edge of your swimsuit bottom, toying with the fabric. "May I?"

You nod, your breath catching in anticipation.

Slowly, his fingers slip beneath the fabric, finding your folds. You gasp at the contact, your body tensing for a moment before relaxing into his touch.

"It's twitching," he murmurs against your ear. "That's good. It means your body wants this too."

His fingers explore gently, learning your anatomy as you bite your lip to hold back moans. He finds your clit and circles it slowly, watching your face for reactions.

"When I touch you here, it should build pleasure." he explains.

He demonstrates, applying a bit more pressure. You can't help but arch your back, a soft cry escaping your lips.

"Like that?" he asks with a knowing smile.

You can only nod, lost in the sensations he's creating.

After a few minutes of this delicious torture, he slides one finger lower, testing your entrance. "I'm going to prepare you," he warns softly. "It might feel a little strange at first, but I promise it will get better."

His finger enters you slowly, carefully. There's a slight discomfort, but as he begins to move in and out, the sensation transforms into pleasure. He watches your face intently, adjusting his movements based on your reactions.

"Does that feel good?" he asks.

You nod, your hips beginning to move in rhythm with his hand.

He adds a second finger, stretching you further. "You're so tight," he groans. "I can't wait to be inside you."

His words send another wave of desire through you. His thumb returns to your clit, rubbing in circles as his fingers continue their work inside you. The dual stimulation is overwhelming in the best way possible.

"Heeseung," you gasp, your hands clutching at his shoulders.

"I know, little mouse," he murmurs, kissing you deeply. "Let it build. Don't fight it."

The pleasure intensifies, coiling in your stomach like a spring. Your movements become more erratic as you chase the feeling building within you.

"That's it," he encourages. "Good girl"

With a cry, you shatter, waves of pleasure washing over you. Heeseung continues his movements, drawing out your orgasm until you collapse against his chest, trembling and breathless.

"You're so beautiful when you come," he whispers, kissing your forehead. "Can you do more?"

You can only nod, still recovering from the intensity of your first orgasm with someone else.

He slides down his shorts slightly just to reveal his already hard cock and slides your swimsuit to the side. His hands move to your hips, and you begin to grind against him instinctively. The water sloshes around you as you move, his lenght sliding between your folds, creating a delicious friction under the water. Lost in the moment, you shift your hips, trying to get closer, to feel more of him.

Suddenly, you both freeze as you feel him slip inside you. There's a sharp pain, followed by a sense of fullness that takes your breath away. Your eyes widen in shock as you look at Heeseung, whose expression mirrors your surprise.

"Oh my god," he gasps, his hands tightening on your hips. "I... I didn't mean for that to happen. Are you okay?"

You nod, still processing what just happened. The initial pain is already fading, replaced by a strange mix of discomfort and pleasure.

"I'm so sorry," Heeseung continues, his cheeks flushing with embarrassment. "I should have been more careful. I didn't..."

As he stammers through an apology, you can't help but let out a small laugh. The absurdity of the situation , your first time happening so accidentally, so clumsily, suddenly strikes you as hilarious.

Heeseung looks at you in confusion before a smile breaks across his face. "You're laughing?"

"We're so clumsy," you giggle, the tension breaking between you. "All that careful preparation and then..."

He joins in your laughter, the moment transforming from awkward to intimate. "Well," he says once the laughter subsides, "since we're already here... are you okay to continue? We can stop if you want."

You shake your head, a new determination filling you. "No, I want to continue. Show me what to do."

Heeseung's expression softens with affection. "Okay," he murmurs, his hands guiding your hips. "Just relax and let me do the work. Move with me, but let me lead."

He begins to move slowly, guiding you in a gentle rhythm. The water sloshes around you as you find a pace together. With each thrust, pleasure builds, different from before but just as intense.

"You feel so good," Heeseung groans, his control beginning to slip. "So tight around me."

His praise only heightens your arousal. You try to meet his movements with your own, but your motions are awkward and uncoordinated. You feel clumsy, unsure of exactly how to move to maximize pleasure for both of you.

"Don't worry about doing it perfectly," Heeseung reassures you, noticing your frustration. "Just feel. Let your body respond naturally."

He adjusts your position slightly, changing the angle of his thrusts. A gasp escapes your lips as he hits a particularly sensitive spot.

"There," he murmurs, repeating the movement. "How does that feel?"

"Amazing," you breathe, your hands clutching at his shoulders.

Heeseung's hands roam your body, caressing your breasts, your back, your hips. His mouth finds your neck, sucking gently at your pulse point. Marking you as his.

"I've wanted this since the moment we got in the jacuzzi," he admits between kisses. "But I was too scared you would run away if I decided to act up."

"I want it," you assure him, your voice breathy with pleasure. "I want all of you. I'm not scared anymore."

Your words seem to unleash something in him. His movements become more deliberate, more purposeful as he chases his own release. One hand moves between your legs again, finding your clit and rubbing in time with his thrusts.

The dual stimulation quickly pushes you toward another orgasm. "Heeseung," you cry out, your nails digging into his shoulders.

"I know," he groans. "Come with me this time."

His words are all it takes to push you over the edge. As you clench around him, Heeseung finds his own release, burying his face in your neck with a guttural moan.

For a moment, you stay connected, catching your breath as the water continues to bubble around you. Heeseung presses soft kisses to your shoulders, your neck, your cheeks.

"Are you okay?" he asks softly, pulling back to look at you.

You nod, a contented smile spreading across your face. "Better than okay. That was..."

"Incredible," he finishes for you, returning your smile. "You're incredible."

As you slowly separate, Heeseung adjusts your swimsuit back into place before

As you both recover in the warm bubbling water, you notice something pressing against your thigh again. You glance down and see that Heeseung is already getting hard once more. A blush spreads across your cheeks as you meet his eyes.

"Already?" you ask with a small laugh.

Heeseung grins, a hint of embarrassment in his expression. "I can't help it," he admits. "You feel so good, and I've wanted this for so long. My body seems to have a mind of its own around you."

A boldness takes hold of you, spurred by the confidence your first time gave you. "If you want to do it again... your way this time... I don't mind," you say, trying to sound casual despite the flutter in your stomach.

Heeseung's eyes darken with desire at your words. Without warning, he pounces, lifting you effortlessly from his lap. He carries you to the edge of the jacuzzi and gently sets you down on the edge. The contrast between the warm water and the cool air sends a shiver through your body.

"My way?" he asks, his voice husky with arousal. "I like the sound of that."

He kneels in the water between your legs, his hands spreading your thighs apart. His eyes never leave yours as he leans forward, pressing soft kisses to your inner thigh. You watch, mesmerized, as he works his way upward, leaving a trail of fire on your skin.

When he reaches your core, he pauses, his breath warm against your most sensitive flesh. "I've wanted to taste you since the first time I saw you in that swimsuit," he confesses, his voice low and intimate.

Then he dives in, his tongue exploring your folds. You gasp, your hands flying to his hair as waves of pleasure wash over you. Heeseung maintains eye contact as he eats you out, his dark eyes watching your every reaction, learning what makes you moan, what makes you arch your back.

"You taste so sweet," he murmurs against you before returning to his task, his tongue circling your clit before dipping inside you.

The sensations are overwhelming, building quickly toward another orgasm. Heeseung seems to sense your approaching release and redoubles his efforts, adding his fingers to the mix, curling them inside you as he continues to lavish attention on your clit.

"Heeseung," you cry out, your hips bucking against his face. "Please don't stop."

He doesn't. Instead, he increases his pace, his tongue and fingers working in perfect harmony until you shatter, crying out his name as waves of pleasure crash over you. He continues his ministrations, drawing out your orgasm until you're trembling and breathless.

Only then does he pull back, a triumphant grin on his face as he licks his lips. "Delicious," he declares, rising from the water.

He kisses his way up your body, over your stomach, between your breasts, along your collarbone, up your neck, until finally his lips claim yours. You can taste yourself on his tongue as the kiss deepens, passionate and hungry.

Without breaking the kiss, Heeseung positions himself at your entrance. This time, there's no accidental slip, he enters you deliberately, slowly, filling you completely. You moan into his mouth at the exquisite stretch and fullness.

He begins to move, his hips thrusting in a deep, slow rhythm that drives you wild. Each stroke is measured and controlled, hitting all the right spots. His movements are faster and harder than before, but still gentle, still considerate of your inexperience.

"You feel incredible," he groans, his voice thick with pleasure. "You're taking it well."

His hands roam your body as he moves, caressing your breasts, your hips, your thighs. His mouth finds your ear, his warm breath sending shivers down your spine as he whispers praises and encouragements.

"You're doing so well," he murmurs. "Taking me so deep. You feel amazing wrapped around me."

His words only heighten your arousal, pushing you closer to another peak. You wrap your legs around his waist, pulling him deeper, matching his rhythm as best you can despite your inexperience.

After a few minutes, Heeseung pulls out gently. "Turn around," he commands softly.

You obey, positioning hands at the edge of the jacuzzi. He enters you from behind, this new angle allowing him to reach even deeper inside you. You cry out at the intensity of the sensation.

"Is this okay?" he asks, his voice strained with restraint.

"More than okay," you manage to gasp. "Don't stop."

He resumes his movements, his hands gripping your hips as he thrusts into you. The water sloshes with each movement, adding to the sensory experience. Heeseung's pace increases, his thrusts becoming more urgent as he chases his release.

His moans fill the night air, raw and uninhibited. "I'm getting close," he warns. "Where do you want me?"

"Inside me," you answer without hesitation.

Heeseung hesitates for a moment. "Are you sure? We didn't use anything."

Your mind races for a second before you respond, "I'm on the pill. It's okay."

With a groan of relief, Heeseung continues his movements, his pace becoming erratic as he approaches his climax. With one final deep thrust, he buries himself inside you, his body trembling as he finds his release.

For a moment, he stays inside you. Then he pulls out gently and helps you turn back over. He leans to slowly kiss you while stroking himself a few times before releasing again onto your stomach, warm and sticky.

You look at him in surprise.

"I couldn't," he explains, noticing your confusion. "I couldn't resist, I wanted to see you covered of me."

He reaches for a nearby towel, gently cleaning your stomach before pressing a soft kiss to your lips. "Next time," he promises, "I'll be more gentle. We'll take our time, explore everything properly."

"There's going to be a next time?" you ask with a smile.

Heeseung grins, pulling you into his arms. "Oh, there's definitely going to be a next time. And a time after that, and after that... I'm never getting enough of you."

The walk back to your room feels like floating.

Not literally, of course, your feet are very much on the ground, leaving wet footprints on the wooden floorboards of the lodge hallway, but your mind is somewhere else entirely. Somewhere purple-lit and steaming, somewhere filled with the taste of mint tea and the feeling of warm hands on your waist and the sound of Heeseung's voice murmuring instructions against your lips.

You have had sex. In a jacuzzi. Under the stars. With Lee Heeseung.

The hopeless romantic inside you does cartwheels. The realistic part of your brain is still buffering, stuck on a loading screen that says "please wait while we process what just happened." Your body is somewhere in between, pleasantly warm despite the cold air, tingling in places you hadn't known could tingle, wrapped in your borrowed coat and your towel and the lingering sensation of his skin against yours.

Heeseung walks beside you, his hand intertwined with yours. He hums softly, and when he catches you looking at him, he smiles that devastating smile and squeezes your hand.

"What?" he asks.

"Nothing. Just… processing."

"Processing what?"

"Everything." You gesture vaguely with your free hand. "The conversation. The jacuzzi. The… everything after the conversation."

"The everything after the conversation," he repeats, his smile widening. "Very descriptive."

"I'm a STEM student, not a poet."

"You wrote a three-page love letter with calligraphy. You're absolutely a poet."

"That was a one-time thing. A fluke. I've since retired from poetry."

"Tragic. The literary world has lost a great talent."

You reach your door, and Heeseung stops, turning to face you.

"Are you okay?" he asks, and his voice is gentle. "Really okay? That was… a lot. I know it was a lot. And I want to make sure you're not freaking out."

"I am absolutely freaking out," you admit. "But in a good way. I think. It's hard to tell. My brain is still catching up."

"Good freak-out or bad freak-out?"

"Good. Definitely good. Just… overwhelming." You pause, searching for the right words. "It wasn't how I imagined my first time would be. It was awkward and clumsy and it accidentally went in, and I'm pretty sure I made some very weird sounds, and-"

"It was perfect," Heeseung interrupts softly. "It was real. It was you. That's all I want."

Your heart, which has already been through approximately seventeen different emotional states in the past hour, does another complicated flip. "You're very good at saying the right thing."

"I'm not trying to say the right thing. I'm just telling you the truth." He reaches up and tucks a damp strand of hair behind your ear, his fingers lingering against your temple. "You're amazing, Y/N. And I'm not saying that because of what just happened. I'm saying it because it's been true since the moment you walked into that PC room and handed me a letter that wasn't meant for me."

"You're going to make me cry again."

"Please don't. I've seen you cry twice now, and both times it made me want to fight whoever made you sad. I can't fight myself. That's a conflict of interest."

You laugh, and it comes out a little watery. "You're ridiculous."

"I'm aware." He leans down and presses a kiss to your forehead, soft, gentle, lingering. "Goodnight, little mouse. Get some sleep."

"Goodnight, Heeseung."

He pulls back, his hand slipping from yours, and walks backward down the hallway for a few steps, still smiling at you. "Dream about me."

"I make no promises."

"I'll take that as confirmation."

He turns the corner and disappears, and you are left standing in front of your door with the lingering warmth of the best night of your life.

The moment you step into your room, Yunjin is on you like a hawk on a field mouse.

"WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?"

You close the door behind you, leaning against it with a dazed expression. Yunjin sits cross-legged on her bed, her phone in her hand, a half-eaten bag of chips on the nightstand. Her eyes are wide, her expression a mixture of curiosity and accusation.

"The jacuzzi," you say faintly.

"For three hours?"

"Was it three hours? It doesn't feel like three hours."

"Y/N." Yunjin shuts her laptop with a decisive click. "You're wearing a towel. Your hair is wet. You have that look on your face, the one that says I just did something and I don't know how to process it. Spill. Now. Every detail."

You push yourself off the door and collapse onto your bed, staring up at the ceiling.

"We had sex," you say.

"What?!"

"We had sex, don't make me repeat it please or I'm gonna die…"

Yunjin is silent for exactly two seconds. Then: "YOU GUYS FUCKED?"

"Yeah…"

"IN THE JACUZZI?"

"There aren't exactly a lot of alternative locations. The water is warm. There's purple lighting. It's very atmospheric."

Yunjin scrambles off her bed and crosses the room in three steps, grabbing your shoulders and pulling you upright. "I need details. I need all the details. How did it happen? Who initiated it? Was it good? Was he good? Did he-"

"Yunjin!" You press your hands to your burning cheeks. "I can't just… I don't know how to-"

"Start from the beginning. The jacuzzi. What happened?"

You take a deep breath, gathering your scattered thoughts, and then the words start tumbling out of you as you tell her everything.

Yunjin is quiet for a moment, processing. Then she lets out a long breath. "So your first time was in a jacuzzi, under the stars, with a hot informatics engineering student who knew you'd accidentally confessed to the wrong person and liked you anyway."

"That's… yeah. That's basically the summary."

"And you're telling me you're still worried this is some kind of disaster?"

"I'm not worried," you say slowly. "I'm just… confused. About what we are. We don't exactly have the what are we conversation. We just kind of… had sex. And now I don't know if we're dating, or if it was a one-time thing, or if he's going to wake up tomorrow and realize he made a huge mistake and-"

"Stop." Yunjin holds up a hand. "Just stop. I'm going to tell you something, and I need you to actually hear it."

"I'm listening."

"Lee Heeseung has known your secret for weeks. He's seen you at your absolute worst, hiding behind bulletin boards, choking on lettuce, spilling coffee all over yourself, crying on a bench in the middle of the night. He's seen you ramble about video games until you run out of breath, and he's seen you face-plant in the snow eight times in one afternoon. And after all of that, he still chooses to spend three hours in a jacuzzi with you and make sure your first time is special and safe and good."

Yunjin leans forward, her expression intense. "That's not the behavior of a guy who's going to wake up tomorrow and change his mind. That's the behavior of a guy who is completely, thoroughly, absolutely gone for you."

The words settle into your chest. "You really think so?"

"I know so. And I think you know so too. You're just scared to admit it because admitting it means this is real, and real is scary."

"When did you get so wise about relationships?"

"I've been watching you be a disaster for months. I've picked up a few things."

You laugh, and it comes out lighter than you expected. "So what do I do?"

"Tomorrow, you go find him. You see how he acts. And if he acts like nothing's changed except that he's even happier to see you than usual, then you'll have your answer."

"And if he acts weird?"

"Then I'll key his snowboard."

"Yunjin!"

"Kidding. Mostly." She grins and flops back onto her bed. "Now go to sleep. You've had a big night. You need rest. And honestly, I need time to process the fact that my best friend had a romantic jacuzzi rendezvous while I was sitting here eating chips and doomscrolling on TikTok."

"You could have come to the jacuzzi."

"And interrupt whatever is happening between you two? I'm a good friend, not a saint. I'd be third-wheeling so hard I'd need a snowplow to get out."

You laugh again, and for the first time in weeks, you feel light. Unburdened. Like the weight you've been carrying since the moment you walked into that PC room has finally been lifted.

"Goodnight, Yunjin."

"Goodnight, you absolute disaster of a human being. Dream about your hot engineer boy."

"He's not my-"

"Yet. He's not your boy yet. But I give it twenty-four hours."

You throw a pillow at her. She catches it and tucks it under her head with a satisfied grin.

The next morning, you wake up with a start, your heart racing. Dreams of purple light and warm water and hands on your waist and a voice murmuring good girl, you're doing so good against your lips haunt your memory.

You press your face into your pillow and scream.

It is a happy scream, mostly. A disbelieving, giddy scream. But it is also a nervous scream, because in approximately one hour, you are going to have to go downstairs and face Heeseung in the cold light of day, and you have absolutely no idea how that is going to go.

Would he be awkward? Would he be distant? Would he pretend nothing happened? Would he-

Your phone buzzes on the nightstand.

Heeseung: good morning little mouse. breakfast in 30?

You stare at the message for a solid ten seconds. Then you type back:

You: okay

Heeseung: you're very eloquent in the morning

You: i haven't had caffeine yet

Heeseung: i'll have a vanilla latte waiting for you. extra shot of vanilla. just like last time

Heeseung: hopefully with less spilling this time

You: no promises

You get dressed in a daze, pulling on approximately four layers of clothing because you still don't own proper winter gear and the borrowed coat can only do so much. Yunjin is already gone, she has left a note on the nightstand that says went to find the economics majors. don't do anything I wouldn't do. (do everything I wouldn't do), so you are alone with your thoughts as you make your way down to the lodge's dining hall.

You spot Heeseung immediately. He sits at a table near the window, two cups of coffee in front of him, his hair still slightly messy from sleep. When he sees you approaching, his entire face lights up.

"There you are," he says, standing up and pulling out a chair for you. "I was starting to think you'd bailed."

"On breakfast?"

"On me. On this. On everything." He says it lightly, but there is a flicker of vulnerability in his eyes, a tiny crack in his usual confident demeanor. "I wasn't sure if you'd want to see me this morning, or if you'd need space, or-"

"Hey." You reach out and touch his hand, just briefly. "I'm here. I want to see you."

The relief that washes over his face is so genuine, so unguarded, that your heart clenches. "Okay. Good. That's… good."

You sit down, and he slides the vanilla latte toward you. Your fingers brush as you take the cup, and the contact sends a spark of electricity up your arm. You both pretend not to notice, but the way Heeseung's ears turn slightly pink suggests he feels it too.

"So," you say, taking a sip of your latte to give yourself something to do with your hands. "Breakfast."

"Breakfast," he agrees. "Eggs. Bacon. Possibly a pastry if we're feeling adventurous."

"Very adventurous."

"I'm a risk-taker."

You try to eat normally. You really do. But every time you look up from your plate, Heeseung looks at you with that soft, wondering expression, and you forget how to chew, and you end up staring at him with a piece of toast halfway to your mouth like you've been frozen in time.

"You're doing it again," he says.

"Doing what?"

"The staring thing. The I'm trying to figure you out thing."

"I'm not trying to figure you out. I already figured you out. You're a people-pleaser who can't say no and you have a secret soft spot for romantic comedies."

"Then what are you thinking about?"

You set down your toast. "I'm thinking about last night. And what it means. And what we are now."

Heeseung's expression shifts, becoming more serious. "Do you want to have that conversation? The what are we conversation?"

"I don't know. Do you?"

"I asked you first."

"That's very mature."

"I have my moments." He leans forward, resting his elbows on the table. "Look, I know we did things kind of backwards. Most people start with coffee and work their way up to jacuzzis. We started with a misplaced love letter and somehow ended up in a hot tub under the stars. It's not exactly a conventional timeline."

"When has anything about us been conventional?"

"Fair point." He reaches across the table and takes your hand, his thumb tracing circles on your palm. "I don't know what we are. Labels feel… complicated. But I know what I want us to be."

"What's that?"

"Something real. Something that isn't built on misunderstandings or accidents or letters that weren't meant for me. Something that's just… us. Figuring it out together."

Your heart does that fluttering thing again. "That sounds terrifying."

"I know. But you've been scared this whole time, and you've still kept showing up. That's the bravest thing I've ever seen."

"I haven't felt brave. I've felt like a disaster."

"Disasters can be brave. The two aren't mutually exclusive." He squeezes your hand. "So what do you say? Want to be brave together?"

You look at him, really look at him, and see the boy who poured coffee on his head, the boy who held you while you cried, the boy who knew your secret and waited for you to tell him in your own time. And you feel the fear, familiar and insistent, coiling in your stomach.

But beneath the fear, there is something else. Something warmer. Something that feels a lot like hope.

"Okay," you say. "Let's be brave together."

Heeseung smiles, real and open and devastating. "Okay."

The afternoon finds you back on the beginner slope, strapped into a snowboard and wondering how you let Heeseung talk you into this again.

"You said you wanted to practice," he reminds you, tightening the bindings on your boots. "Snowboarding, I mean. Not… other things."

"My entire body is sore from yesterday. Both from the snowboarding and from the… other things."

"Then we'll take it slow. No jumps, no tricks, just a gentle run down the beginner hill." He stands up and offers you his hand. "I'll be right there the whole time."

"You said that yesterday, and I still fell eight times."

"And you got up eight times. That's the important part."

You take his hand and let him pull you to your feet. The beginner slope stretches out before you, populated by other beginners who fall over with roughly the same frequency as you.

"Okay," you say, taking a deep breath. "Okay. I can do this. I'm a capable human being. I understand physics. Snowboarding is just physics with extra steps."

"That's the spirit."

"I'm going to fall."

"Probably."

"And you're going to catch me?"

"Always."

The word hangs in the air between you, heavier than it should be. Always. Not just on the ski slope, but everywhere. Always.

"Okay," you whisper. "Let's go."

You push off.

The first few seconds are wobbly, your balance shifts, your arms flail slightly, your heart pounds in your ears. But then something clicks. Your body remembers the lessons from yesterday, the way Heeseung taught you to lean into the turns, to keep your weight centered, to trust the board beneath your feet.

You pick up speed, and instead of panicking, you lean into it. The wind rushes past your face, cold and exhilarating.

And then, miraculously, impossibly, you reach the bottom of the slope without falling.

"I DID IT!" you scream, your voice echoing across the mountain. "I DID IT! I SNOWBOARDED!"

You are laughing, giddy with adrenaline and triumph, and you turn around to find Heeseung, to share this moment with him, to see the proud expression on his face.

But Heeseung isn't at the bottom of the slope.

He is still at the top.

And he is shouting something.

"Y/N! Y/N L/N!"

The entire slope seems to go quiet. Other skiers and snowboarders slow down, turning to look at the boy standing at the top of the beginner hill, his hands cupped around his mouth, his voice carrying across the snow with startling clarity.

"I HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY!"

Your heart stops. Then starts again, twice as fast.

"I'VE BEEN TRYING TO FIGURE OUT HOW TO SAY THIS FOR WEEKS!" Heeseung shouts. "AND I REALIZED THAT THE BEST WAY TO TELL YOU IS THE SAME WAY YOU TOLD ME, WITH WORDS THAT I CAN'T TAKE BACK!"

People are staring. Everyone is staring.

"LEE HEESEUNG, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" you shout back, your voice cracking.

"I'M CONFESSING!" he yells. "PROPERLY! IN FRONT OF EVERYONE! BECAUSE YOU DESERVE A CONFESSION THAT'S JUST FOR YOU! YOU DESERVE THE LOVE YOU'VE DREAMED ABOUT!"

"THE FIRST LETTER WASN'T FOR ME!" Heeseung continues, his voice ringing across the snow. "BUT I WANT TO WRITE YOU ONE! I WANT TO WRITE YOU A HUNDRED LETTERS! I WANT TO LEARN YOUR FAVORITE HIGHLIGHTER COLORS AND THE NAMES OF ALL YOUR PLANTS AND THE EXACT WAY YOU LIKE YOUR VANILLA LATTES!"

Someone in the crowd lets out a wolf whistle. Someone else starts recording on their phone. You can't move, can't speak, can't do anything except stand at the bottom of the slope and stare up at the boy who shouts his heart out for everyone to hear.

"YOU'RE A DISASTER!" Heeseung yells, and his voice is full of joy, full of affection, full of something that looks a lot like love. "YOU'RE A HOPELESS ROMANTIC WHO'S TOO SCARED TO LIVE THE ROMANCE YOU DREAM ABOUT! YOU HIDE BEHIND BULLETIN BOARDS AND YOU CHOKE ON LETTUCE AND YOU SPILL COFFEE ON YOURSELF AND YOU MAKE GRAPHS ABOUT VIDEO GAME BALANCE AND YOU CRIED OVER A BABY PENGUIN IN A NATURE DOCUMENTARY!"

"This is the worst confession I've ever heard!" you shout back, but you are laughing, tears streaming down your face, your heart so full it feels like it might burst.

"I'M NOT FINISHED!" Heeseung takes a deep breath, and when he speaks again, his voice is softer, still loud enough to carry, but more intimate, more vulnerable. "YOU'RE A DISASTER, Y/N L/N! AND I'M A DISASTER TOO! I'M A PEOPLE-PLEASER WHO CAN'T SAY NO, I HAVE A REPUTATION THAT DOESN'T REFLECT WHO I ACTUALLY AM, AND I POURED COFFEE ON MY HEAD BECAUSE I COULDN'T STAND TO SEE YOU CRY ALONE!"

He starts walking down the slope toward you, his snowboard forgotten at the top, his boots crunching through the snow.

"AND I THINK, NO, I KNOW THAT I'VE BEEN FALLING FOR YOU SINCE THE MOMENT YOU WALKED INTO THAT PC ROOM AND LOOKED AT ME LIKE I WAS THE WORST THING THAT HAD EVER HAPPENED TO YOU!"

He gets closer now, close enough that you can see the nervousness in his eyes, the vulnerability beneath the bravado, the way his hands shake slightly despite his confident posture.

"SO I'M ASKING YOU, IN FRONT OF ALL THESE PEOPLE, ON THIS VERY EMBARRASSING SKI SLOPE, IF YOU'LL BE MY DISASTER. OFFICIALLY. NO MORE MISUNDERSTANDINGS. NO MORE LETTERS MEANT FOR OTHER PEOPLE. JUST US."

He stops a few feet away from you, his breath fogging in the cold air, his dark eyes fixed on your face.

"WHAT DO YOU SAY, LITTLE MOUSE?"

The silence that follows is deafening. Every person on the slope watches you, waiting for your answer.

And you, you, the hopeless romantic who has always been too scared to live the romance you dream about, you take a deep breath, throw your arms out wide, and shout at the top of your lungs:

"I LIKE YOU TOO, YOU ABSOLUTE IDIOT! I'VE LIKED YOU FOR WEEKS AND I DIDN'T KNOW HOW TO SAY IT AND YOU JUST SHOUTED IT FROM A MOUNTAINTOP LIKE A CHARACTER IN A KDRAMA!"

Heeseung's face breaks into the biggest smile you have ever seen. "IS THAT A YES?"

"THAT'S A YES! THAT'S A THOUSAND TIMES YES! NOW COME HERE AND KISS ME BEFORE I PASS OUT FROM THE EMBARRASSMENT OF HAVING THIS CONVERSATION IN FRONT OF LITERALLY EVERYONE!"

He doesn't need to be told twice. He crosses the distance between you in three long strides, catches your face in his hands, and kisses you, deep and thorough and joyful, right there at the bottom of the beginner slope, with the snow sparkling around you and the crowd erupting into cheers and someone's phone recording what will undoubtedly become the most-watched video on the university's social media for the next month.

When he pulls back, his forehead pressed against yours, his breath warm against your lips, he grins like he has just won the lottery.

"You shouted your feelings from a mountaintop," he murmurs. "You, the girl who was too scared to even correct a misunderstanding, just shouted your feelings from a mountaintop."

"You started it."

"I did. And you finished it." He kisses the tip of your nose. "I'm so proud of you."

You have never been more embarrassed in your entire life, and you have never been happier.

"We're still disasters," you say.

"Absolutely. But now we're disasters who are dating."

"Are we dating? Is that what this is?"

"This is me, shouting from a mountaintop that I want to be with you. I'm pretty sure that counts as dating." He pauses, his expression shifting to something more serious. "Unless you don't want-"

"I want." You grab the front of his jacket and pull him closer. "I want everything. The letters and the coffee disasters and the matching shirts and the snowboarding lessons and the jacuzzi conversations and the ridiculous mountaintop confessions. I want all of it."

Heeseung kisses you again, and this time it is softer, sweeter, full of promise.

"You know what this means," he says against your lips.

"What?"

"We're going to have to tell Jungwon."

You groan. "Can we wait until after the trip? I need at least twenty-four hours to recover from this before I have another emotionally complicated conversation."

"Deal." He pulls back, taking your hand in his. "Come on. Let's get out of here before someone asks us for an interview."

And hand in hand, laughing like fools, you run away from the crowd and the chaos.

・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・・

You’re staring at your own reflection in the bathroom mirror, and the girl staring back looks like she’s about to either throw up or ascend to another dimension. Maybe both. In that order.

The letter is clutched so tightly in your hand that the pale lavender envelope is starting to crease, and you force yourself to loosen your grip before you ruin the one thing you’ve spent three weeks perfecting. Three weeks. That’s twenty-one days of drafting, crossing out, rewriting, Googling “how to write a love letter without sounding like a desperate loser,” and then rewriting again. You’ve used up an entire pack of stationery. You’ve watched so many calligraphy tutorials that the YouTube algorithm thinks you’re training to become a medieval scribe. All for this one moment. This one letter. This one massive, terrifying, possibly life-ruining leap of faith.

You are a hopeless romantic. Hopeless being the operative word.

It’s not that you don’t believe in love. You do. Desperately, overwhelmingly, with every fiber of your first-year STEM student soul. You believe in meet-cutes and slow burns and the exact moment when two people look at each other and the entire world goes soft around the edges. You’ve read about it a hundred times. You’ve watched it play out on every screen you own. You’ve composed entire daydreams about it during particularly boring chemistry lectures. Love is your favorite subject, the one you’ve studied with more dedication than calculus or physics combined. There’s just one tiny, inconvenient, absolutely infuriating problem.

You’re terrified of it.

Not the idea of it. The idea is lovely. The idea is safe. The idea lives in your head where everything unfolds exactly the way you want it to, where you always say the right thing, where you never trip over your own feet or laugh too loud at the wrong moment or stand frozen in a doorway like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming truck. But real love? The kind that requires vulnerability and eye contact and actually speaking words out loud with your mouth? That kind of love makes your palms sweat and your heart race in a decidedly unromantic, fight-or-flight kind of way. You are, and this is the most embarrassing part, a coward. A romantic coward. You dream of grand gestures but can barely manage a coherent sentence when an attractive person so much as glances in your direction.

Which brings you back to the letter.

The letter is your loophole. Your workaround. Your way of confessing your feelings without actually having to say them, because writing them down felt manageable in a way that speaking never has. You can be eloquent on paper. On paper, you can say things like “the first time I saw your smile, it felt like someone had turned on all the lights in a room I didn’t even realize was dark” without immediately wanting to crawl into the nearest hole and live out the rest of your days an hermit. On paper, you’re brave. On paper, you’re the kind of person who goes after what she wants.

In reality, you’ve been hiding in this bathroom for fifteen minutes, and your hands are shaking so badly that a passing person would think you are having an epileptic seizure.

“Okay,” you whisper to your reflection. “Okay. You can do this. You are a woman on a mission. You are a warrior. You are-”

A toilet flushes in one of the stalls behind you, and you nearly launch yourself through the ceiling.

A girl you vaguely recognize from your introductory programming class emerges, gives you an odd look as she washes her hands, and leaves without saying anything. You wait until the door swings shut, then press your forehead against the cool glass of the mirror and contemplate every life choice that has led you to this moment.

His name is Jungwon.

Yang Jungwon. Second year. Undeclared major but leaning toward something in the humanities, which you know because you may have done a bit of light, respectful, completely non-creepy research. He has a smile that crinkles the corners of his eyes and a laugh that sounds like sunshine if sunshine could make noise, and he holds doors open for people even when they’re still like ten feet away, which creates that awkward situation where the person has to speed-walk to not seem rude, but he never seems to mind. You first noticed him at the campus library during midterms when he quietly slid a pack of gummy bears across the table toward you at 2 AM, muttering something about glucose being good for brain function, and then went back to his book like he hadn’t just fundamentally altered the trajectory of your entire emotional existence.

That was four months ago. You’ve been pining ever since. Pining, yearning, longing, you’ve run through the entire lexicon of unrequited affection, and you’re exhausted. Today, you’ve decided, is the day it ends. One way or another.

You push yourself off the mirror, square your shoulders, and march out of the bathroom with the determination of someone going to war. The envelope is slightly damp from your grip, but it’s still intact, and the words inside are still true, and somewhere on this campus, Yang Jungwon is about to receive the most heartfelt confession letter ever written by a first-year student who has consumed an unhealthy amount of romance media.

Now you just have to find him.

—————

The hallway is bustling with students, the usual midday chaos of people rushing to classes or huddling in groups to complain about assignments. You scan the crowd, looking for a familiar face that might point you in the right direction, and your eyes land on a guy leaning against the wall, scrolling through his phone with the dead-eyed expression of someone who has just finished a three-hour lab.

“Excuse me,” you say, and your voice comes out about an octave higher than normal. You clear your throat. “Sorry, um, do you know where I can find Yang Jungwon? Second year?”

The guy looks up, blinks slowly, deciding whether or not to acknowledge your presence, and then shrugs. “PC room, I think. Saw him heading there like twenty minutes ago.”

The PC room. Of course. It’s in the engineering and informatics building, a place you’ve rarely ever been to. But you know where it is, roughly, and you thank the guy with what you hope is a normal smile and not the rictus grin of someone rushing toward emotional catastrophe.

The walk across campus takes approximately seven minutes, and you spend every single one of them rehearsing what you’re going to say. You’ve already written the letter, so technically you don’t have to say anything, you can just hand it over and flee but you want to say something. Something cool. Something memorable.

“Hey, Jungwon, this is for you.” Simple. Direct. Good.

“I wrote you something. No pressure, just read it when you have time.” Casual. Low-stakes. Excellent.

“Hi, I’ve been emotionally compromised by your existence for several months, please accept this paper rectangle of feelings.” Okay, maybe not that one.

The engineering building looms in front of you before you’re ready. You push through the main doors and immediately feel out of place. The students here move with a different energy, less frantic, more focused, the kind of people who probably know what a server is and have opinions about programming languages you’ve never heard of.

You follow the signs toward the PC room, your footsteps echoing in the corridor, and with every step, your heart climbs higher up your throat. This is it. This is the moment. You’re going to walk in there, find Jungwon, hand him the letter, and then whatever happens happens. At least you’ll have tried. At least you’ll have been brave, even if it’s only for thirty seconds.

The door to the PC room is slightly ajar, and you can hear voices inside, multiple voices, which gives you pause. You assumed he’d be alone. Or with maybe one other person.

You hesitate. Your hand hovers over the door handle. Every instinct is screaming at you to turn around, go back to your dorm, and spend the rest of your life wondering what could have been. And maybe you would, if not for the small, stubborn voice in the back of your mind that says: You’ve already come this far. Don’t you want to know? Don’t you want to be the kind of person who actually does the thing instead of just dreaming about it?

Yes. Yes, you do.

You squeeze your eyes shut, take a breath so deep it makes you lightheaded, and push the door open with more force than strictly necessary. It slams against the wall with a bang that makes approximately twelve heads swivel in your direction, and for one horrifying moment, you are the center of attention in a room full of strangers.

But you don’t see any of them. You only see the figure sitting at the computer closest to the door, his back half-turned to you, hair falling over his forehead, the exact silhouette you’ve been looking for. Or at least, the exact silhouette you think you’ve been looking for.

You don’t stop to confirm. You don’t let yourself think. You just march forward, thrust the letter out in front of you like a shield, and launch into the speech you’ve been rehearsing for three weeks.

“This is for you. I’m sorry if this is weird or sudden but I’ve liked you for a really long time and I couldn’t keep it to myself anymore. You don’t have to respond right away. You don’t have to respond ever, actually. I just wanted you to know that someone out there thinks you’re wonderful and I wrote it all down because I’m better at writing than talking and honestly I might pass out if I keep standing here so please just take this and I’ll go-”

You finally look up.

And the face staring back at you is absolutely, categorically, one hundred percent not Jungwon.

The boy in front of you is taller than Jungwon. Broader shoulders. Sharper jawline. Different eyes, darker, deeper, currently widened in a mixture of surprise and something you can’t quite read. His lips are parted slightly, as if he was about to say something before you launched into your emotional word-vomit, and he’s holding a half-eaten protein bar that’s now frozen halfway to his mouth.

The room has gone completely, utterly silent.

You can feel the stares of every single person boring into the back of your head. Someone coughs. Someone else whispers something that sounds suspiciously like “did she just-” before being shushed by their neighbor.

And then the boy, the very handsome, very wrong boy, sets down his protein bar, takes the letter gently from your trembling hand, and says in a voice that’s low and smooth and completely unfamiliar: “Wow. Okay. What’s your name?”

This is the worst moment of your entire life. You are going to die right here, in this PC room, surrounded by computer monitors and half-empty energy drink cans and a dozen witnesses who will spread this story to every corner of the university within the next three hours. Your obituary will read: here lies Y/N, the loser who can’t even recognize her ultimate crush.

“Y/N,” you croak, because your mouth is apparently still functioning even though every other part of you has shut down. “L/N Y/N. First year. STEM.”

You don’t know why you said STEM. He didn’t ask for your department. You’re offering information nobody requested. This is a disaster.

But the boy, he’s looking at you with an expression you can’t decipher, his head tilted slightly to the side like you’re a puzzle he’s trying to figure out. He’s wearing a dark hoodie with the informatics department logo on it, and there’s a pair of expensive-looking headphones draped around his neck, and his hair is slightly mussed in a way that suggests he’s been running his fingers through it while concentrating. He’s absurdly good-looking, the kind of good-looking that makes you simultaneously want to stare and look away, and you’re only now noticing the way several girls in the room have been watching him since you entered, not just because of your blunder, but because they’ve been watching him.

“I’m Heeseung,” he says, and there’s a hint of a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Lee Heeseung. Third year. Informatics engineering.”

Lee Heeseung. The name registers somewhere in the back of your panic-addled brain. It’s familiar in the way that campus gossip is familiar, attached to words like hot and player and don’t get your hopes up because he’ll charm you and then move on. You’ve heard girls in your dorm talking about him in hushed, giggling tones, trading stories about brief encounters and misinterpreted invitations. And you, in your infinite wisdom, have just handed a love letter meant for someone else directly into his notorious hands.

You have to fix this. You have to tell him it was a mistake. You have to-

“I’m flattered,” Heeseung says, and his smile widens slightly, not quite a smirk but definitely approaching smirk territory. “Really. This is... I mean, no one’s ever confessed to me with an actual letter before. It’s kind of old school.” He turns the envelope over in his hands, examining it with what seems like genuine curiosity. “The handwriting is really pretty. Did you do the calligraphy yourself?”

“Yes,” you say, because you are physically incapable of lying when put on the spot, and also because your brain has apparently decided that the best course of action is to just answer whatever questions he asks like this is a normal conversation and not the emotional equivalent of a tornado.

“Impressive.” He looks at you, really looks at you, and something shifts in his expression. The teasing edge softens just a fraction. “A confession is a lot, though. I mean, I’m honored, but we don’t even know each other.”

This is your opening. This is the moment where you say “actually, that’s because this letter wasn’t meant for you, there’s been a terrible misunderstanding, I’m so sorry, please forget this ever happened.” The words are right there, lined up on your tongue, ready to go.

But the room is still watching. A dozen pairs of eyes. The whispers have stopped, but the staring hasn’t, and you can feel every single gaze like a physical weight pressing down on you. If you correct him now, in front of everyone, you’ll have to explain. You’ll have to admit that you walked into a crowded room and confessed to the wrong person like an absolute buffoon. You’ll become a campus legend for all the wrong reasons: the girl who was too stupid to even identify her own crush. The story will follow you for the rest of your university career. You’ll never live it down.

But if you just... let him believe it... if you just nod and agree and leave as quickly as possible... you can fix this later. Privately. Without an audience. You can find him tomorrow, or send him a message, or do literally anything other than humiliate yourself further in front of all these people.

Your mouth opens. Closes. Opens again.

“I know,” you hear yourself say. “It’s a lot. I know.”

Heeseung nods thoughtfully, like you’ve said something profound. “But I’m not against it. Starting slow, I mean. If you want.”

What.

“What,” you say, but it comes out more like a statement than a question.

“I’m okay with starting slow,” he repeats, and now the smile is definitely back, a little crooked, a little curious. “You’re cute. And clearly brave. I like that. So if you want to, I don’t know, get coffee sometime and see where this goes... I’m open to it.”

Someone in the room lets out a low whistle. Someone else says “Heeseung, are you serious right now?” in a tone of utter disbelief. But Heeseung doesn’t look away from you. He’s waiting for your answer, his gaze steady and warm, and you are standing in the epicenter of a complete and total catastrophe with absolutely no idea how to get out.

Say no. Say it was a mistake. Say the truth.

“Okay,” you whisper.

Okay?! Okay?!

“Okay,” he echoes, and the smile breaks fully across his face, transforming him from handsome to devastating. “Good. I’ll find you. Y/N, first year, STEM, right?”

You nod mutely.

“Cool.” He tucks your letter carefully into the pocket of his hoodie, like it’s something precious, like he’s planning to read it later, and the gesture makes your stomach twist with guilt so intense you think you might actually be sick. “I’ll see you around, Y/N.”

You don’t remember leaving the room. You don’t remember the walk back across campus or the elevator ride to your floor or the moment you collapsed face-first onto your dorm bed. All you know is that one moment you were standing in the PC room, and the next you are here, staring at the ceiling, replaying every single agonizing second on an endless loop.

You confessed to the wrong person.

You confessed to the wrong person.

And for some reason that you absolutely cannot comprehend, he said yes.

Across campus, in a PC room that has finally returned to its normal hum of activity, Lee Heeseung pulls a slightly crumpled lavender envelope out of his hoodie pocket and stares at it for a long moment.

“Dude,” says his friend Jay from the next computer over, not bothering to hide his grin. “What just happened?”

“I don’t know,” Heeseung says honestly. And he doesn’t. He’s used to attention, he knows how to handle it, how to smile and nod and gently redirect without hurting anyone’s feelings. It’s a skill he’s developed over the years, the only way he knows to deal with the unfortunate side effect of his people-pleasing tendencies. He’s nice to someone, he helps them with an assignment, he holds a door open or offers a pen, and suddenly they’re looking at him with stars in their eyes, and he doesn’t know how to tell them that he was just trying to be polite without sounding like an arrogant jerk. So he lets them down easy, or he avoids the situation entirely, and his reputation grows in ways that don’t reflect the truth at all.

But this, this is new. A letter. An actual, physical, handwritten letter, with swooping calligraphy and a lavender envelope and a girl who looked so terrified that he thought she might actually pass out right there on the linoleum floor.

She looked at him like he was a natural disaster. Like she was watching a building collapse in slow motion and couldn’t do anything to stop it.

And then she said okay anyway.

“She’s interesting,” Heeseung murmurs, more to himself than to Jay, and carefully opens the envelope.

“Interesting how?”

He doesn’t answer. He’s too busy reading, his eyes moving slowly across the carefully penned words, the ink slightly smudged in places where the writer’s hand might have trembled. It’s beautiful. It’s earnest. It’s the kind of letter that someone writes when they mean every single word, when they’ve poured their entire heart onto the page without holding anything back.

He’s never received anything like it before.

And he wants to know more about the girl who wrote it, the girl who burst into his afternoon like a hurricane of nerves and feelings.

“Jay,” he says, still staring at the letter, a hint of a smile playing on his lips. “I think something interesting just walked into my life.”

He doesn’t notice the way his friend shakes his head and mutters something about “here we go again.”

He’s too busy wondering when he’ll see Y/N next.

—————

The following forty-eight hours of your life can be accurately described as a masterclass in strategic avoidance and tactical regret.

You skip two classes. Not on purpose, exactly, you just can’t bring yourself to leave your dorm room when every shadow in the hallway might be Lee Heeseung coming to collect on that coffee date you apparently agreed to in a moment of temporary insanity. You survive on instant noodles and the protein bars your friend left on her desk with a sticky note that said “FOR EMERGENCIES ONLY,” which this absolutely qualifies as. You watch three entire seasons of Bridgerton without retaining a single moment because your brain is too busy replaying the PC room incident on a continuous, merciless loop.

“I’m Lee Heeseung. Third year. Informatics engineering.”

“I’m okay with starting slow.”

“You’re cute.”

You bury your face in your pillow and scream, but it comes out muffled and pathetic, like a small animal giving up on life.

By day three, you’ve developed a system. You only leave your room during off-peak hours, skittering through campus, your head on a constant swivel. You’ve memorized the locations of every vending machine in buildings Heeseung is unlikely to frequent. You’ve started taking the long way to your remaining classes, cutting through the art department and the greenhouse and once, memorably, a service corridor that smelled strongly of bleach and soap. You’ve become a ghost. A phantom. A creature of the shadows who survives on granola bars and instant noddles.

But the problem with running away from your problems is that your problems don’t actually go anywhere. They just wait. And think about you. And eventually, when you least expect it, they catch up.

It happens on a Thursday.

You’re crouched behind a potted plant near the science building, scanning the courtyard for any sign of tall, attractive informatics students, when your phone buzzes with a text from your best friend, Yunjin.

Yunjin: heard you’ve been living like a sewer rat. want me to bring you real food?

You: can’t. i’m in the middle of a crisis

Yunjin: You’re executing what we talked about yet?

You: it’s in process

Yunjin: at the end of the day, you will have to tell him

You stare at the message for a long moment. It’s such a simple solution. So elegant. So reasonable. And yet, every time you imagine yourself walking up to Heeseung and saying “actually, I meant to give that letter to someone else,” your entire body physically recoils like you’ve touched a hot stove. The humiliation would be astronomical. The look on his face, surprise, then confusion, then that horrible moment of realization that he was never supposed to be the recipient would haunt you for the rest of your natural life. And you’d still have to explain the Jungwon part. And Jungwon would find out. And then you’d be the weird girl who couldn’t even confess to the right person, and Heeseung would be the guy who got accidentally confessed to, and everyone would laugh about it for weeks, and-

Your phone buzzes again.

Yunjin: i can hear you overthinking from across campus. just rip off the bandaid. what’s the worst that could happen

You type back a single message: he could tell everyone and i’d have to transfer schools and change my name and become a farmer in New Zeland

Yunjin: dramatic. but valid. good luck with your plant hiding

You shove your phone back into your pocket and peek around the potted plant again. The courtyard is clear. This is your window. You take a deep breath, steel your nerves, and scuttle out from behind the foliage.

The plan for today is simple: find Heeseung, explain the misunderstanding, and disappear forever. You’ve spent the entire morning psyching yourself up for this. You’ve practiced the speech in the mirror seventeen times. You’ve even written a script on your phone that you can refer to in case of emergency. It’s thorough, it’s clear, it leaves absolutely no room for misinterpretation, and it ends with a sincere apology and a polite request that you both pretend this never happened. It’s perfect. It’s foolproof. All you have to do is locate the target.

Easier said than done. You’ve been looking for him since yesterday, not to talk to, but to observe from a safe distance so you could plan your approach and the universe, in its infinite comedic wisdom, has made him completely unfindable. It’s like he vanished off the face of the earth the moment you actually wanted to see him. Three days ago, you couldn’t walk three feet without catching a glimpse of him, but now? Now he’s a ghost. A myth. A concept rather than a physical entity.

You’re going to have to ask for help.

This is, objectively, a terrible idea. Asking for help means talking to people, and talking to people about Heeseung means potentially revealing that you’re looking for him, which means potentially revealing why you’re looking for him, which means the whole campus could know about the letter situation by lunchtime. But you’re running out of options, and you’re running out of granola bars, and you can’t live behind potted plants forever.

You find your informant near the engineering building, a girl with neon green headphones and a laptop covered in stickers, sitting on a bench and typing furiously at something that looks like code. She seems approachable. She seems like she won’t ask too many questions. You approach with what you hope is casual confidence and not the desperate energy of someone who has been living on protein bars.

“Excuse me,” you say, and your voice comes out surprisingly normal. Points for you. “Do you know where I can find Lee Heeseung? Third year, informatics?”

The girl looks up, her eyes flicking over you with mild curiosity. She doesn’t ask why you’re looking for him, which makes you want to hug her. “Heeseung? Yeah, I think I saw him heading to the quad about ten minutes ago. Something about meeting up with some people before his next class.”

The quad. Of course. The most open, public, exposed location on the entire campus. The place where literally everyone congregates. The absolute last place you want to have a conversation about accidental love confessions.

“Great,” you say, and your voice is definitely an octave higher now. “Great. Thank you. Thanks. So much.”

The girl gives you a weird look, shrugs, and goes back to her coding.

You’re already moving, your feet carrying you toward the quad before your brain can catch up and talk you out of it. This is fine. This is progress. You’ll find him, you’ll pull him aside, you’ll give him the speech, and then you’ll be free. You’ll be a normal person again. You’ll be able to walk through campus without checking every corner for a tall informatics student who thinks you’re cute and brave and worthy of a coffee date.

The quad is bustling when you arrive, clusters of students sprawled across the grass and gathered around the stone benches near the fountain. The afternoon sun is bright and warm, the kind of weather that makes everyone want to be outside, which is lovely and picturesque and deeply inconvenient for your purposes. You squint against the glare, scanning the crowd for a familiar dark-haired figure.

No Heeseung.

You circle the perimeter, weaving between groups of friends and dodging a frisbee that comes sailing dangerously close to your head. You check near the fountain, near the big oak tree, near the cluster of food trucks that’s set up along the east edge. Still no Heeseung. Your informant said ten minutes ago, he should be here. Unless he already left. Unless you missed him. Unless this is a sign from the universe that you should give up and commit to the farmer life plan after all.

You’re so focused on your search that you don’t notice someone approaching until a shadow falls across your path, and a voice, warm, familiar, the exact voice you’ve been daydreaming about for four months, says:

“Y/N? Hey, it is you!”

You look up.

Yang Jungwon is standing right in front of you, smiling like the sun just came out from behind a cloud, and every single coherent thought in your brain immediately evaporates.

He’s wearing a soft-looking cream sweater with the sleeves pushed up to his elbows, and his dark hair is slightly windswept, and there’s a tiny mole near his chin that you’ve never noticed before but is now seared into your memory forever. He’s holding a book, something with a cracked spine and a title in a language you don’t recognize and he’s looking at you with genuine, undiluted pleasure, like running into you is the best thing that’s happened to him all day.

“It’s me,” you say, because you are a conversational genius. “I mean. Yes. Hi. Hello.”

Smooth. Flawless execution. Ten out of ten.

Jungwon doesn’t seem to notice your complete lack of verbal grace. His smile widens, crinkling the corners of his eyes in exactly the way you’ve catalogued in your mental Jungwon database. “I thought I recognized you. You’re in my philosophy elective, right? Front row, near the window?”

He knows where you sit. He knows where you sit. This is both the best and worst information you’ve ever received, because on one hand, Yang Jungwon has noticed your existence, but on the other hand, Yang Jungwon has noticed your existence, and now you have to be a normal human being and not the disaster you currently are.

“Front row near the window,” you confirm, nodding a little too vigorously. “That’s me. I like the natural light. For... note-taking purposes.”

“Makes sense.” He shifts his weight, tucking the book under his arm. “You take really detailed notes, by the way. I sat behind you once, and I was honestly impressed. Your color-coding system is no joke.”

Jungwon has looked at your notes. Jungwon has been impressed by your notes. Your brain is short-circuiting at approximately the speed of light, and you have to physically resist the urge to fist-pump in the middle of the quad.

“Thank you,” you manage. “I have a lot of highlighters. Maybe too many. Is there such a thing as too many highlighters? I don’t think so, but I’ve been told my stationery collection is concerning.”

Oh no. Why are you talking about stationery? You need to say something charming. Something witty. Something that will make him see you as more than the girl with the aggressive color-coding system.

“I don’t think it’s concerning,” Jungwon says, and there’s a teasing lilt to his voice that makes your knees go weak. “Passionate, maybe. Dedicated. I respect it.”

“Passionate and dedicated,” you repeat faintly. “That’s... yeah. That’s my brand.”

He laughs, and it’s exactly like you remember, bright and warm, the kind of laugh that makes you want to do whatever you just did again and again just to hear it on repeat. “I like it. Passion is underrated.” He tilts his head, studying you with an expression you can’t quite read. “So what brings you to the quad? You usually eat lunch in the science building courtyard, don’t you?”

Your heart stutters. He knows where you eat lunch. He’s observed your habits. This is either a sign of mutual interest or you’ve accidentally become the subject of a sociological case study, and at this point you’re willing to accept either outcome.

“I’m, um, looking for someone,” you say, and the confession letter debacle comes crashing back into your consciousness like a wrecking ball through a glass window. Right. You’re supposed to be finding Heeseung. You’re supposed to be fixing the misunderstanding. That’s why you’re here. Not to bask in the radiant warmth of Jungwon’s attention like a lizard on a sunny rock.

“Anyone I know?” Jungwon asks, and there’s something in his tone, curiosity, maybe.

“Probably not,” you say quickly. “Just a... just a person. A random person. Not important.”

Jungwon raises an eyebrow, clearly unconvinced, but before he can press further, a new voice cuts through the afternoon air like a knife through butter.

“There you are.”

You freeze. Your blood turns to ice. Every cell in your body screams in unison: run.

Lee Heeseung is walking toward you across the quad, his headphones hanging around his neck and his hands tucked casually into the pockets of his jacket. He looks exactly as devastatingly attractive as he did three days ago, which is deeply unfair. His expression is a mixture of curiosity and amusement, and when his eyes meet yours, that slight smile, the one that’s not quite a smirk but definitely is a smirk’s second cousin, curves across his lips.

“I heard you’ve been looking for me,” he says, coming to a stop beside Jungwon like this is the most natural gathering in the world. “You know, if you wanted to see me, you could have just messaged. I would have given you my number at the PC room.”

Jungwon looks between you and Heeseung with visible confusion, his earlier smile fading into something more guarded. “Wait. You two know each other?”

This is it. This is the moment the universe has been building toward. Every terrible decision, every act of cowardice, every misguided attempt to avoid embarrassment, it’s all led here, to this exact spot on the quad, with the wrong guy standing next to the right guy and your entire romantic future hanging in the balance.

“I wouldn’t say know,” you begin, but Heeseung is already talking over you, apparently immune to the desperate telepathic signals you’re trying to beam directly into his brain.

“She confessed to me two days ago,” Heeseung says, and his tone is so casual, so conversational, like he’s discussing the weather or what he had for lunch. “Walked right into the PC room, handed me a letter, told me she’d liked me for a long time. It was very romantic. Very old-school. I was impressed.”

Silence. Jungwon stares at Heeseung. Then at you. Then back at Heeseung.

“She... confessed to you,” Jungwon repeats slowly, and his voice has gone flat in a way that makes your heart splinter into approximately seven thousand pieces.

“Full confession,” Heeseung confirms, still smiling. “I’m thinking we’ll start with coffee. Keep it simple, you know? She’s shy. I don’t want to overwhelm her.”

This is a nightmare. This is a waking, breathing, actively-unfolding nightmare, and you are trapped in it like a fly in amber, unable to move or speak or do anything except watch as every possible future with Jungwon crumbles to dust before your eyes.

Because here’s the thing you realize in that horrible, crystal-clear moment: you can’t correct Heeseung now. Not in front of Jungwon. Not when Jungwon has just been told, in no uncertain terms, that you confessed to someone else. If you explain the truth, that the letter was actually meant for Jungwon, that the whole thing was a catastrophic mistake, then what? Jungwon would know you’d been planning to confess to him, but he’d also know that you somehow managed to mess it up so spectacularly that you confessed to his friend instead. You’d look incompetent at best and completely unhinged at worst. And Heeseung would be humiliated, and Jungwon would be awkward, and you’d be the epicenter of a social catastrophe so immense that all three of you would have to avoid each other for the rest of your academic careers.

You are trapped. Completely, utterly, irreversibly trapped.

“Interesting,” Jungwon says, and the word is so neutral that it cuts deeper than any insult ever could. “I didn’t realize you two ran in the same circles.”

“We don’t,” you croak. “We really, really don’t.”

“We’re just getting started,” Heeseung says cheerfully, and he has the audacity to wink at you. Like this is some kind of adorable inside joke instead of the emotional apocalypse it actually is.

You have to get out of here. You have to escape before the sob building in your chest forces its way out and makes everything infinitely worse. You can feel it pressing against your ribs, hot and insistent, and if you don’t leave right now, you’re going to burst into tears in the middle of the quad in front of both of them, and then the disaster will be complete.

“I have to go,” you blurt out, and you’re already backing away, your feet moving before your brain can issue any kind of warning. “I have… a thing. A class. A lab. A lab class. It’s very important. I can’t miss it. I have to go.”

Heeseung’s brow furrows slightly. “Wait, I thought you wanted to talk to-”

“Nope! No talking! We’re good! Everything’s fine! Bye!”

You spin around and power-walk toward the nearest exit, which happens to be in the direction of the fountain, which you only realize when your foot catches on the low stone ledge and you go sprawling forward with all the grace of a newborn giraffe.

Your knee hits the ground. Your dignity hits the ground approximately three feet to the left. Several people turn to look.

“Y/N!” That’s Jungwon’s voice, concerned and moving closer, and you absolutely cannot handle that right now.

“I’m fine!” you shriek, scrambling to your feet with adrenaline-fueled desperation. “Totally fine! Happens all the time! I’m very clumsy! It’s part of my charm!”

You don’t look back. You can’t look back. If you look back, you’ll see Jungwon’s worried expression and Heeseung’s confused one, and you’ll have to confront the full magnitude of what just happened, and your fragile emotional state simply cannot withstand that kind of pressure. So you run. Not jog, not power-walk…run. Across the quad, past the food trucks, through a gap between two buildings, and out onto the main campus pathway like the hounds of hell are snapping at your heels.

You don’t stop until you reach the arts building, and you don’t start breathing normally until you’ve locked yourself in a practice room on the third floor, surrounded by soundproof walls and a piano that’s seen better days. You slide down against the door, pull your knees up to your chest, and let out a sound that’s halfway between a groan and a wail.

Everything is ruined. Everything. You had one chance, one single, solitary chance to fix the misunderstanding and salvage your dignity and maybe, just maybe, preserve the possibility of something with Jungwon somewhere down the line. And instead, you let your hopeless romantic heart get distracted by a five-minute conversation about philosophy notes and highlighters, and now you’re the girl who confessed to Lee Heeseung, and Jungwon thinks you’re interested in someone else, and there is no conceivable way to untangle this mess without making everything exponentially worse.

You’re going to have to transfer schools. You’re going to have to move to another country. You’re going to have to fake your own death and start a new identity as a goat farmer in New Zeland.

The door handle jiggles behind you. “Occupied!” you yell, your voice cracking.

“Y/N? Is that you?”

Your best friend Yunjin’s voice filters through the door, muffled but unmistakable, and the sound of it is enough to crack the dam you’ve been desperately trying to hold together. You scramble to your feet, fumble with the lock, and yank the door open to reveal Yunjin standing in the hallway with a cup of bubble tea in each hand and an expression of profound concern on her face.

“I saw you running,” she says, her eyes scanning your disheveled appearance. “Like, truly running. I’ve never seen you run before. You once told me running was for people who don’t appreciate the journey.”

“Yunjin,” you crumble, and your voice is so pitiful that she immediately sets down both drinks and pulls you into a hug.

“Okay,” she says, steering you back into the practice room and closing the door behind her. “Okay. Sit down. Tell me everything. What happened? Did you talk to Heeseung? Did you fix it?”

You laugh, but it comes out wrong, high and wobbly, on the edge of hysteria. “Fix it? Fix it? Yunjin, I made it so much worse. I made it so much worse that I think I actually created new dimensions of worse. Scientists are going to have to invent new words to describe how badly I messed this up.”

“That’s... improbable,” Yunjin says carefully. “But I’m listening.”

She settles onto the piano bench, and you collapse onto the floor in front of her, crossing your legs and burying your face in your hands. The story spills out of you in a torrent, the quad, the search for Heeseung, the unexpected appearance of Jungwon, the conversation that made your heart soar, and then the moment Heeseung appeared like a harbinger of doom and casually announced your confession to the one person you never wanted to know about it.

“And then I fell,” you finish miserably. “In front of both of them. And I ran away. And now Jungwon thinks I like Heeseung, and Heeseung thinks I like Heeseung, and I can’t correct either of them without making everything even weirder, and my life is a romantic comedy written by a petty incel.”

Yunjin is quiet for a moment. Then she lets out a long, slow breath. “Okay. That’s... that’s a lot.”

“I know.”

“And you’re telling me you couldn’t just say, hey Heeseung, sorry for the mix-up, the letter wasn’t for you, my bad?”

You look up at her, your eyes rimmed with red. “In front of Jungwon? After Heeseung already told him I confessed? What would Jungwon think of me?”

Yunjin considers this. “That you’re a disaster, probably.”

“Exactly!”

“But a lovable disaster,” she adds. “Disasters can be endearing.”

“Yunjin, please focus.”

She holds up her hands in surrender, but there’s a glint in her eye that you recognize, the one that means she’s about to drop some wisdom on you whether you’re ready for it or not. Yunjin has been your best friend since orientation week, when you both accidentally joined the wrong club meeting and ended up spending two hours in a competitive gardening seminar before realizing your mistake. She’s practical where you’re dreamy, decisive where you’re hesitant, and she’s talked you down from approximately four hundred anxiety spirals since the semester started. If anyone can find a way out of this mess, it’s her.

“Okay,” she says, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees. “Let me present you with an alternative perspective.”

“I’m listening.”

“Lee Heeseung,” she says, ticking off points on her fingers, “has a reputation. A big one. Everyone knows it. He’s the guy who’s super nice to everyone, especially girls, and then they fall for him and he gets all surprised when they expect something more, and then things fizzle out because he wasn’t looking for anything serious.” She makes air quotes with her fingers. “Sound familiar?”

You blink. “I mean... I’ve heard things. But he didn’t seem like-”

“That’s his whole thing,” Yunjin interrupts. “He doesn’t seem like it. That’s why it works. He likes when everyone is after him. But nice doesn’t equal interested, so girls get the wrong idea and then they get hurt. It’s a cycle.” She pops a tapioca pearl into her mouth and chews thoughtfully. “My point is, you don’t need to do anything. You don’t need to fix this. You just need to wait.”

“Wait for what?”

“For him to get bored.” She says it like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “Think about it. You’re not actually interested in him, right? You’re not going to fall all over yourself trying to get his attention. You’re not going to be waiting outside his classes or accidentally showing up wherever he hangs out. You’re not going to be like every other girl who’s chased after him.”

You frown. “So... what, I just... do nothing?”

“No, you do the opposite of chasing.” Yunjin grins, and it’s slightly wicked. “You make yourself as uninteresting to him as possible. You’re awkward, you’re weird, you’re clearly not trying to impress him. You don’t dress up when you know you might see him. You talk about boring things. You mention, I don’t know, your extensive collection of vintage stamps or whatever nerdy hobby you can think of. You make yourself boring.”

“I don’t have a stamp collection.”

“Then make one up! The point is, Heeseung is used to girls who want him. If you clearly don’t want him, his interest is going to fizzle out faster than a cheap sparkler. He’ll move on to the next girl who bats her eyelashes at him, and you’ll be free. No confrontation necessary.”

You turn this over in your mind. It’s... not the worst idea you’ve ever heard. In fact, compared to your current strategy of blind panic and tactical fleeing, it’s practically genius. If you can’t correct the misunderstanding without making everything worse, maybe you can just... let it die on its own. Let Heeseung’s fabled short attention span work in your favor. Become so aggressively unappealing that he loses interest within a week and never thinks about you again.

And once he’s out of the picture, once enough time has passed, maybe you can try again with Jungwon. Properly. With better aim.

“You’re a genius,” you tell Yunjin, the hope creeping back into your voice. “An absolute genius. I could kiss you.”

“Please don’t, you’re covered in grass stains.” She nudges one of the bubble teas toward you with her foot. “Drink your tea. Hydrate. And then we’re going to brainstorm all the ways you can make yourself seem as unappealing as possible to a hot third-year informatics student.”

You grab the drink and take a long sip, the sweetness settling something in your chest. For the first time in three days, you feel something other than panic. You feel strategic. You feel determined. Lee Heeseung might think you’re cute and brave and worthy of a coffee date, but he hasn’t met the version of you that’s about to emerge, a version so bland, so uninteresting, so aggressively mediocre that he’ll run in the opposite direction before the week is out.

“Okay,” you say, wiping your mouth with the back of your hand. “Okay. Let’s do this. Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested starts now.”

Yunjin raises her bubble tea in a toast. “To being boring.”

You clink your cup against hers. “To being boring.”

Somewhere across campus Heeseung is still standing in the quad with a confused expression on his face and a lavender envelope in his pocket, wondering why the girl who supposedly has a crush on him just sprinted away like she was being chased by bears.

He’s not used to this. He’s not used to any of this.

And that, he realizes with a small, bemused shake of his head, is exactly what makes it so interesting.

—————

Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested lasted exactly four days before it encountered its first major obstacle.

That obstacle is approximately six feet tall, has flowing hair that falls perfectly across his forehead, and is currently walking directly toward your table in the cafeteria with a tray in his hands and a smile on his face that suggests he has absolutely no idea he's supposed to be losing interest in you.

You spot him approximately 2.3 seconds too late. By the time your brain registers the approaching danger, you are already mid-bite into a sad cafeteria sandwich, your mouth full of bread and lettuce and the dawning realization that you are trapped. There is no escape route. Your table is in the corner, surrounded on three sides by walls and on the fourth side by Heeseung's rapidly approaching form. You are a cornered animal. A very stupid, very panicked cornered animal with mayonnaise on her chin.

"Y/N!" Heeseung says your name like it's his favorite word, bright and warm and entirely too enthusiastic for someone who's supposed to be a notorious womanizer with a short attention span. "I was hoping I'd run into you. Mind if I sit?"

Mind if he sits? Of course you mind. You mind immensely. You mind with every fiber of your being. Sitting with Heeseung is the exact opposite of what Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested is supposed to accomplish. Sitting with Heeseung means talking to Heeseung, and talking to Heeseung means opportunities to accidentally charm him, and charming him is categorically Not The Goal.

But Heeseung is already pulling out the chair across from you, and his smile is so genuine, and there's a tiny bit of what looks like grease on his cheekbone that suggests he's just come from some kind of engineering lab, and you are weak. You are so, so weak.

"Go ahead," you hear yourself say, and then immediately want to punch yourself in the face.

Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested, Day Four, 12:34 PM: catastrophic failure already in progress.

Heeseung settles into the chair with an easy grace, setting his tray down and immediately stealing one of your fries like you're old friends who share food on a regular basis. You watch the fry disappear into his mouth and feel a small part of your soul leave your body.

"So," he says, leaning back and studying you with those dark, unreadable eyes. "You ran away from me pretty fast the other day. Should I be worried? Do I have something on my face?"

He doesn't. He absolutely doesn't. He has the kind of face that belongs on a billboard, all sharp angles and soft edges and that one little mole on his forehead that you are definitely not noticing because noticing things about Heeseung's face is counterproductive to the mission.

"No," you say quickly. "No, you're fine. Your face is fine. I mean, you don't have anything on your face. I just remembered I had somewhere to be. Very suddenly. It was urgent."

"An urgent… lab class?" Heeseung's lips twitch. "That's what you said, right? An urgent lab class on a Thursday afternoon?"

Your face heats. "Yes. Exactly. Lab class. Very urgent. Science doesn't wait."

"Mmm." He pops another one of your fries into his mouth. "Well, the good news is, you don't look like you're in a hurry right now. So we can actually talk. You know, like normal people who are supposedly getting to know each other?"

Right. Getting to know each other. Because you confessed to him. Because he thinks you like him. Because you're living in an elaborate lie of your own making.

This is your chance, though. This is the perfect opportunity to implement Phase One of the Make Him Uninterested plan: Be Weird and Off-Putting. You just have to be the most boring, strange, unappealing version of yourself that you can possibly imagine. How hard can it be?

Pretty hard, as it turns out, because your brain chooses this exact moment to go completely blank.

"So," Heeseung says, apparently unbothered by your silence, "tell me about yourself. What do you like to do for fun? Besides writing beautiful love letters and then running away from the recipient?"

You choke on your own saliva. Just… straight up choke on nothing, like a cartoon character. "I don't…that wasn't…I do normal things. Normal fun things. Like… watching paint dry. And counting ceiling tiles. Very relaxing. You should try it."

Heeseung's expression flickers, confusion, amusement, something in between. "Counting ceiling tiles?"

"There are forty-seven in this cafeteria," you say, doubling down with the desperate energy of someone who has already committed to the bit. "Forty-eight if you count the one that's partially covered by that vent over there. But some people don't count partial tiles. It's a philosophical debate, really."

"Fascinating," Heeseung says, and the worst part is that he sounds like he actually means it. "What else?"

What else? What else can you say that will make you sound completely unappealing? You cast around for inspiration, your eyes landing on your sandwich. Okay. Fine. If words can't do the job, maybe actions can.

You pick up your sandwich with both hands and take the weirdest bite you can physically manage, mouth open slightly too wide, chewing with exaggerated jaw movements, making an unfortunate amount of noise in the process. You feel like a cow. You look like a cow. You are embodying the spirit of a cow, and surely, surely, this is enough to make any self-respecting hot informatics student run for the hills.

Heeseung watches you chew. His expression doesn't change.

"Good sandwich?" he asks mildly.

"Mmf," you say, still chewing, still being a cow. "Very good. I love-"

And then the lettuce hits the back of your throat.

You don't know how it happens. One moment you're chewing normally, well, abnormally, but in a controlled way and the next moment a piece of lettuce stages a rebellion and lodges itself directly in your windpipe. Your eyes go wide. Your hand flies to your throat. You make a sound that is somewhere between a wheeze and a honk.

"Y/N?" Heeseung's amused expression shifts to concern. "Are you okay?"

You are not okay. You are choking. You are choking on lettuce in front of Lee Heeseung in the middle of the cafeteria, and this is how you're going to die.

Heeseung is on his feet now, moving around the table with surprising speed. "Hey, hey, can you breathe? Do you need me to-"

You shake your head frantically, still making dying cow noises, and grab your water bottle with shaking hands. The first gulp does nothing. The second gulp, by some miracle, dislodges the lettuce just enough for you to cough it up into a napkin with all the grace and dignity of a cat hacking up a hairball.

Silence.

The entire cafeteria, you're convinced, is staring at you. In reality, probably only a few nearby tables have noticed, but it feels apocalyptic. You sit there, red-faced and teary-eyed, clutching a napkin full of your own near-death experience, and want the floor to open up and swallow you whole.

Heeseung kneels beside your chair, one hand hovering near your shoulder like he isn't sure if touching you would be welcome. "Hey. You're okay. You're okay, right? Do you need me to get you anything? More water? A doctor? A new sandwich without lettuce?"

His voice is gentle. Genuinely gentle. Not the smooth, charming tone you expect from someone with his reputation, but something softer, something that sounds almost like real concern.

"I'm fine," you croak, your voice ravaged. "I'm fine. That happens. All the time. I'm very bad at eating. It's one of my traits."

"One of your traits," Heeseung repeats, and the corner of his mouth twitches despite his obvious worry. "Being bad at eating?"

"It's a lifestyle choice."

He laughs. Not a polite chuckle or a mocking snicker, but a real laugh, surprised and bright and completely unguarded. He sits back down in his chair, shaking his head, and looks at you with something that is definitely not boredom or disinterest.

"You're really something else, you know that?"

You don't know how to respond to that, so you don't. You just sit there, still clutching your napkin of shame, and wonder how Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested has somehow resulted in him laughing at your jokes and looking at you like you're the most entertaining thing he's encountered all week.

"So," Heeseung says, propping his chin on his hand, "I've been wondering. What made you decide to confess to me? Was there a specific moment? Something I did?"

Oh no.

Oh no, oh no, oh no.

This is the worst possible question he could ask. You can't tell him the truth…I didn't mean to confess to you, I meant to confess to your friend, you just happened to be sitting in the wrong place at the wrong time, please don't hate me…but you also can't just… not answer. He's looking at you expectantly, his dark eyes curious and open, and you have approximately three seconds to come up with a convincing lie before the silence becomes too awkward to recover from.

"Your… kindness," you say, grasping at straws. "You're very… kind. To everyone. I noticed."

Heeseung tilts his head. "My kindness?"

"Very kind," you repeat, nodding vigorously. "So kind. The kindest. I saw you… hold a door open for someone once. It was… inspiring."

"I held a door open."

"A door. Yes. It was a very heavy door. And you held it. For a long time. Multiple people went through. It was very impressive."

Heeseung stares at you for a moment, and you stare back, your face burning, your soul evacuating your body. This is it. This is the moment he realizes you are completely unhinged and decides to never speak to you again. This is the victory of Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested.

"That's…" Heeseung starts, and then pauses. "That's the first time anyone's ever confessed to me because I held a door open. Usually I get compliments about my face. Or my voice. One girl told me I had a nose made to be sat on, which I still don't fully understand."

"Your node is… fine," you say weakly. "I didn't notice your nose. Or your face at all. Just the door. The door was the important part."

"A door," Heeseung says, and that smile is spreading across his face again, the one that makes him look less like a notorious player and more like someone who has just found a particularly entertaining puzzle. "You wrote me a three-page love letter because I held a door open."

"The calligraphy alone took a week," you say, and immediately regret it.

Heeseung laughs again, and this time it's softer, almost wondering. "You're not what I expected," he says. "At all."

"Is that… good or bad?"

"I haven't decided yet." But he's still smiling, and his eyes are still fixed on you with that curious intensity, and you're starting to get the sinking feeling that everything you do, no matter how strange or off-putting you try to be, is having the exact opposite effect of what you intend.

You need a new strategy. Something foolproof. Something so aggressively unappealing that even the most determined people-pleaser can't pretend to be interested.

And then, like a gift from the gods of social awkwardness, the topic of video games comes up.

Heeseung mentions something about blowing off steam after a tough assignment by playing a few rounds of something, and the question slips out before you can stop it: "Wait, do you play League of Legends?"

He raises an eyebrow. "Sometimes. You?"

And that's it. That's the moment the dam breaks.

You don't mean to start geeking out. It just happens. One moment you're thinking be boring, be uninteresting, be bland, and the next moment you're fifteen minutes deep into an impassioned monologue about the current meta, the problems with the jungle role, and why Riot Games needs to nerf a specific champion into the ground before she single-handedly destroys the competitive scene.

"-and don't even get me started on the new items, because the balance team clearly doesn't play their own game, which is fine, whatever, it's not like I have strong opinions about it except I absolutely do, and I wrote an entire essay about it on the subreddit that got like two thousand upvotes, so clearly I'm not the only one who thinks the armor penetration scaling is completely broken-"

You stop.

You stop because you have just realized, with dawning horror, that you have been talking for an incredibly long time without letting Heeseung get a single word in. You have been gesticulating. You have been making sound effects. At one point, you're pretty sure you drew a diagram on a napkin to illustrate the optimal jungle pathing route.

This is it. This is definitely, absolutely it. There is no way a hot third-year informatics student wants to listen to a first-year STEM girl rant about video game balance for fifteen straight minutes. Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested has just achieved its first genuine success.

You brace yourself for the polite excuse, the awkward glance at his phone, the slow backing away.

Instead, Heeseung leans forward, resting his elbows on the table, and says: "Okay, but hear me out, what if the armor penetration scaling isn't the problem, and it's actually the base damage values that need to be adjusted? Because if you look at the win rate data across different elos, the issue isn't consistent at all levels of play."

You blink.

"I main ADC," he adds, as if this is a perfectly normal confession. "So trust me, I feel your pain about the jungle situation. Do you know how many times I've been left to solo dragon because my jungler was AFK farming? Too many. Too many times."

"You… main ADC?"

"Vayne and Kai'Sa mostly. Sometimes Jhin if I'm feeling dramatic."

You have no response to this. Your brain has short-circuited somewhere around the phrase "win rate data across different elos," and it's still rebooting.

"Your essay on the subreddit," Heeseung continues, pulling out his phone. "What was the title? I want to read it. I love seeing well-reasoned arguments about game balance, and honestly, most of what gets posted is just people complaining without any actual data to back it up."

"It was… it was called The Current State of Armor Penetration: A Statistical Analysis and Why I'm Losing My Mind," you say faintly.

Heeseung types something into his phone, scrolls for a moment, and then his face lights up. "Found it. Two thousand three hundred upvotes and fourteen awards? That's impressive. Wait, you made graphs? You made graphs?"

"I was very passionate about the subject."

"Passionate," Heeseung repeats, looking up from his phone with an expression you can't quite read. "Yeah. I'm starting to get that about you."

He tucks his phone away and smiles at you, and it isn't the smooth, practiced smile you expect from the campus womanizer. It's something smaller. Something realer. Something that makes your stomach do a weird, traitorous flip that you immediately try to suppress.

"You know," he says, tilting his head as he studies you, "you remind me of a mouse."

Your brain screeches to a halt. "A… mouse?"

"Yeah. A little field mouse. The way your nose scrunches up when you're thinking, and how you get all twitchy and skittish when you're nervous. It's cute. It's really cute."

Cute. He calls you cute. He compares you to a rodent and somehow makes it sound like a compliment, and worst of all, worst of all, you can feel a traitorous blush spreading across your cheeks like wildfire.

"I'm not…I don't…mice are not cute. Mice are pests. They carry diseases. I'm basically a health hazard."

Heeseung laughs, and it's the same genuine laugh from before, and he's looking at you like you're the most entertaining thing he's seen in years. "A health hazard. Right. Well, consider me warned."

He stands up, gathering his tray, and for one beautiful, hopeful moment, you think the ordeal is over. But then he pauses, looking down at you with that unreadable expression, and says the words that haunt you for the rest of the day:

"I was interested before, but now?" He shakes his head, still smiling. "Now I'm really interested. See you around, little mouse."

And then he walks away, leaving you alone at your corner table with a half-eaten sandwich, a napkin full of regurgitated lettuce, and the sinking realization that Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested is not only failing, it's backfiring spectacularly.

You try to be weird, and he calls you cute.

You try to be boring, and he engages with your niche gaming opinions.

You try to choke to death in front of him, and he kneels beside your chair with genuine concern in his eyes.

You bang your forehead against the cafeteria table once, twice, three times, not caring who sees. This is a disaster. This is an unmitigated, unprecedented, absolutely catastrophic disaster. Hana's plan was supposed to work. Heeseung was supposed to get bored. He was supposed to move on. He was not supposed to look at you like you're a puzzle he wants to solve, or call you a mouse in a tone of voice that makes your heart do gymnastics, or read your League of Legends essay and compliment your graphs.

You need to regroup. You need to call an emergency meeting with Yunjin. You need to figure out a new strategy before this situation spirals even further out of control.

But first, you need to go to the library and return the books that are due today before you accrue another fine, because no matter how catastrophic your love life becomes, the university library shows no mercy.

—————

The library is your sanctuary. It always has been, a quiet, climate-controlled haven where the smell of old paper and the soft hum of fluorescent lights can soothe even the most tensed of nerves. After the cafeteria incident, you need sanctuary more than ever. You slip through the main doors with your stack of books clutched to your chest, inhaling the familiar scent of knowledge and dust, and feel some of the tension begin to ease from your shoulders.

Everything is fine. Everything is going to be fine. You return your books, you find Yunjin, you regroup, and you figure out a way to-

"Y/N?"

The voice comes from somewhere to your left, and you know that voice. You know it the way a flower knows the sun, the way a compass knows north, the way a hopeless romantic knows the exact cadence of her crush's greeting.

Jungwon is sitting at a table near the history section, surrounded by a fortress of textbooks and loose papers. He's wearing glasses…glasses…and his hair is slightly mussed from what you assume is hours of intense studying, and he's looking at you with that smile, the one that crinkles the corners of his eyes and makes your entire nervous system short-circuit.

"Hey," he says, waving you over. "What are you doing here?"

Existing in the same space as you, you think. Breathing the same air. Trying not to spontaneously combust.

"Returning books," you say, holding up your stack as evidence. "I have some overdue ones. The library fines are no joke."

"Tell me about it. I had to pay fifteen thousand won last semester because I forgot about a book I'd checked out for a research paper." Jungwon winces at the memory. "My wallet still hasn't recovered."

"That's brutal."

"The library giveth, and the library taketh away."

You laugh, and it comes out surprisingly normal, not too loud, not too high-pitched, just a regular human laugh from a regular human person who is definitely not having an internal meltdown about how good Jungwon looks in glasses.

"Hey," Jungwon says, glancing at the empty chair across from him, "if you're not in a hurry, do you want to study together? I've been here for three hours and my brain is starting to melt. It would be nice to have some company."

Your heart stops.

Yang Jungwon, the Yang Jungwon, the owner of the smile and the laugh and the gummy bears at 2 AM is asking you to study with him. This is the kind of moment you've daydreamed about for months. This is a meet-cute in progress. This is the universe throwing you a lifeline after the cafeteria disaster, a chance to actually spend time with the boy you've been pining over since midterms.

"Yes," you say, before your brain can remind you of all the reasons this is a terrible idea. "Yes, I'd…I'd love to. Let me just return these first."

You practically skip to the returns desk, your heart doing a full backflip in your chest. By the time you make it back to Jungwon's table, your philosophy textbook and notebook spread out in front of you, you've convinced yourself that this is exactly what you need. Some time with Jungwon. Some time to remember why you wrote that letter in the first place. Some time to reconnect with the feelings that got buried under the chaos of the Heeseung situation.

The only problem is that you can't focus on studying at all.

You try. You really, genuinely try. You open your textbook to the assigned chapter. You uncap your highlighter. You fix your eyes on the page and attempt to absorb information about ethical frameworks and moral philosophy. But your eyes keep drifting up, against your will, over the top of your book, to the boy sitting across from you.

Jungwon is studying. Actually studying, not fake studying, not pretending to study while secretly watching you the way you're watching him. His brow is furrowed in concentration, his pen moving steadily across his notebook as he takes notes. Every so often, he pauses, taps the end of his pen against his chin, and then resumes writing with renewed focus. The late afternoon light slants through the window behind him, catching the highlights in his dark hair and making him look like he's stepped out of a painting.

He is beautiful. He's so beautiful that it makes your chest ache, a soft, sweet ache that you've been carrying around since the moment you first saw him in this very library. You watch the way his fingers curl around his pen, the way he bites his lower lip when he's thinking, the way his glasses slide down his nose and he pushes them back up with an absent gesture.

"I can feel you looking at me," Jungwon says, not glancing up from his notebook.

Your entire body jolts like you've been electrocuted. "I wasn't…I was just…there's a clock behind you. I was checking the time."

Jungwon looks up then, and there's a knowing glint in his eyes that makes your stomach do a slow, somersaulting flip. "The clock is to your right, Y/N. Not behind me."

You look to your right. Sure enough, there's the clock, hanging on the wall in plain view, which you would have noticed if you'd spent even one second actually looking for it instead of gazing at Jungwon's face like a Renaissance painter studying their muse.

"I'm… directionally challenged," you say weakly.

"Uh-huh." Jungwon sets down his pen, and the smile playing at the corners of his mouth is soft and teasing and absolutely devastating. "Come here for a second."

"What?"

"Just come here. Lean forward a little."

Your body obeys before your brain can intervene. You lean across the table, your heart hammering so loudly you're certain the entire library can hear it. Jungwon leans forward too, closing the distance between you, and you catch a faint whiff of something clean and subtle, laundry detergent, maybe, or the kind of fragrance that just smells like him.

His hand reaches out, and before you can process what's happening, his index finger gently pokes your cheek.

"Boop," he says.

You make a sound. You don't know what the sound is supposed to be. Maybe a laugh, maybe a question, maybe a plea for mercy. What comes out is something closer to a squeak, a small, strangled, completely undignified squeak that would be embarrassing if you had any brain cells left to feel embarrassment.

Jungwon's smile widens, and his finger lingers on your cheek for just a moment longer than necessary. "You had an eyelash," he says. "Right there. But also, you just looked really cute staring at me like that. I couldn't resist."

Cute. He calls you cute. That's twice in one day that a devastatingly attractive boy has called you cute, and your hopeless romantic heart doesn't know whether to celebrate or go into cardiac arrest.

"I wasn't staring," you whisper, but it comes out completely unconvincing.

"You were absolutely staring." Jungwon withdraws his hand, but his smile stays, warm and fond and knowing. "It's okay. I don't mind. It's kind of nice, actually. Being looked at like that."

"Like what?"

"Like I'm something worth looking at."

The words settle into your chest like a stone dropping into still water, sending ripples through your entire body. He thinks it's nice. He thinks you're nice or at least your staring is nice and he pokes your cheek and calls you cute and now he's going back to his studying like he hasn't just fundamentally altered your brain chemistry.

You try to return to your textbook. The words swim in front of your eyes, meaningless and blurry. You highlight a sentence at random, realize you have no idea what it says, and highlight it again for good measure. The page is now approximately forty percent highlighter ink.

"You're going to run out of highlighter at that rate," Jungwon observes, not looking up.

"I have backups," you say. "I always have backups."

"Of course you do."

The studying session continues for another hour, and you absorb approximately zero information about ethical frameworks. What you do absorb is a comprehensive catalogue of Jungwon's study habits: the way he organizes his notes with color-coded tabs, the way he mutters to himself when he's working through a difficult concept, the way he absentmindedly drums his fingers against the table when he's thinking. Every detail is another entry in your mental Jungwon database, another thread in the tapestry of your affection.

By the time you pack up your things and say goodbye, "See you in philosophy," Jungwon says, and you respond with something that might be words or might be a series of enthusiastic nods, you are floating. You are literally, physically floating, your feet barely touching the ground as you drift out of the library and across campus toward your dorm.

Jungwon pokes your cheek. Jungwon calls you cute. Jungwon says he likes being looked at by you.

You are winning. Despite the Heeseung disaster, despite the cafeteria catastrophe, despite everything, you are winning.

By the time you reach your dorm room, you are a mess of giddy energy with nowhere to go. You close the door behind you, throw your backpack onto your desk chair, and then proceed to wriggle across your bed like an ecstatic worm, kicking your feet and muffling your squeals into your pillow.

"He called me cute," you whisper to your empty room, your voice muffled by fabric. "He poked my cheek. He did the boop thing. The boop thing, you guys. Who does the boop thing? Adorable people, that's who. Perfect people. People with beautiful smiles and kind eyes and-"

You roll onto your back, staring at the ceiling with a dreamy expression. The ceiling has forty-three tiles in your room. You counted them on your first night in the dorm. But right now, all you can see is Jungwon's face, the way he looked at you across the library table, the way his finger felt against your cheek, the way his voice went soft when he said like I'm something worth looking at.

You are going to marry him. You are going to marry Yang Jungwon and have a beautiful wedding with string lights and wildflowers and a three-tier cake, and you will tell the story of how you stared at him in the library and he poked your cheek and-

You stop wriggling.

Wait.

Wait, wait, wait.

You can't marry Jungwon. You can't even confess to Jungwon, because Jungwon thinks you confessed to Heeseung. Jungwon thinks you're interested in someone else. Jungwon was sweet and friendly and maybe a little bit flirty, but that's just his personality. He's nice to everyone. He gives you gummy bears at 2 AM; he probably gives gummy bears to everyone who looks tired. You aren't special. You are just… there.

The giddiness begins to drain out of you, replaced by the familiar weight of reality. You are still trapped in the Heeseung situation. You are still the girl who confessed to the wrong person. And no matter how many times Jungwon pokes your cheek, that fundamental fact isn't going to change.

With a heavy sigh, you drag yourself through your evening routine: shower, skincare, the episode of the baking show you're halfway through and finally crawl into bed around midnight, your emotions a tangled knot of hope and despair.

Sleep comes slowly, a gradual descent into darkness, and then-

—————

You are in the PC room again.

But this time it's different. The lights are dimmer, the computers all dark, the chairs empty. It's just you, and the door is swinging shut behind you, and there's someone waiting at the computer closest to the door.

Heeseung.

He's sitting in the chair, facing away from you, his headphones around his neck and his shoulders relaxed. When he hears your footsteps, he turns, and his expression isn't surprised or amused or curious. It's something else entirely. Something darker. Something that makes your breath catch in your throat.

"You're here," he says, and his voice is lower than you've ever heard it, a rumble that vibrates through your bones. "I've been waiting for you, little mouse."

"I'm not-" you start, but he's already standing, already moving toward you, and you can't seem to make your feet work. You're rooted to the spot, watching him approach with a mixture of fear and something else, something you don't want to name.

He stops inches away from you, close enough that you can feel the warmth radiating from his body, close enough that you can see the individual strands of his hair and the curve of his lips and the way his eyes, God, his eyes are fixed on your mouth.

"You know what I've been thinking about?" he murmurs, and one of his hands comes up to brush a strand of hair away from your face, his fingers lingering against your temple. "I've been thinking about that letter. The way you said you only had eyes for me. The way you said you couldn't stop thinking about me."

"That wasn't-" you try, but your voice comes out as barely a whisper, and Heeseung's thumb is tracing along your jawline now, feather-light and devastating.

"I can't stop thinking about you either," he says, and his face is getting closer, closer, and you can feel his breath against your lips. "Do you want to know what I think about?"

Your heart is hammering. Your skin is on fire. You can't move, can't speak, can't do anything except stare up at him with wide eyes as his other hand settles on your waist, warm and solid and pulling you closer.

"I think about this," he whispers, and then his mouth is on yours.

The kiss is…it's…

It's intense. It's consuming. It's the kind of kiss that erases every rational thought from your brain and replaces it with pure, unfiltered sensation. His lips are soft but insistent, moving against yours with a confidence that makes your knees weak. His hand tightens on your waist, pulling you flush against him, and you make a sound against his mouth, something small and breathless and completely involuntary.

When he finally pulls back, his forehead resting against yours, his voice is rough. "You’re what I’ve been looking for my whole life, Y/N. You’re my miracle."

And then his lips are on your neck, trailing fire down to your collarbone, and your head falls back, and his name escapes your mouth in a way you've never said it before-

He kneels before you, his movements fluid and deliberate. His eyes never leave yours as he unzips his jeans, freeing his already hard cock. It stands proud and thick, the tip glistening with pre-cum. He takes your foot in his warm hand, bringing it to his shaft.

"Look what you do to me," he murmurs, his voice husky with desire. He wraps your foot around his length, his thumb pressing against your arch as he begins to move your foot up and down his cock. His eyes flutter closed for a moment, a low groan escaping his lips.

The sensation of his hot skin against your sole sends shivers through your body. You watch, mesmerized, as he uses your foot to pleasure himself, his hips thrusting in rhythm with the movements of your foot. His other hand moves to your ankle, his grip firm but gentle, his fingers stroking your sensitive skin.

His eyes open, locking with yours again, and the intensity in his gaze makes your breath catch. "You're so beautiful," he breathes, his movements becoming faster, more urgent. "You’re perfect the way you are."

His breathing grows ragged, his muscles tensing. With a guttural moan, he comes, his hot release spilling over your foot and his hand. He leans forward, his tongue darting out to taste his own cum from your skin, his movements slow and sensual. He licks your foot clean, his tongue tracing patterns on your arch, between your toes, sending waves of pleasure through your body.

Then he shifts, positioning himself between your legs. He looks up at you, his eyes dark with desire. "I need to taste you," he says, his voice rough with need.

He hooks his fingers into the waistband of your panties, pulling them down slowly, his eyes never leaving yours. He tosses them aside, then leans in, his breath hot against your most sensitive flesh.

His tongue flicks out, teasing your clit, and you gasp, your hands flying to his hair. He chuckles, the vibration sending another jolt of pleasure through you. "Patience, little mouse," he murmurs against your skin.

His tongue moves in slow, deliberate circles, building your pleasure gradually. He alternates between broad, flat strokes and quick, precise flicks of his tongue against your clit. His fingers join in, one, then two, sliding inside you, curling to hit that spot that makes you cry.

Your hips buck against his face, your breath coming in ragged gasps. "Heeseung," you moan, your fingers tightening in his hair.

He responds with increased enthusiasm, his tongue working faster, his fingers pumping in and out of you. The pressure builds inside you, a coil of pleasure winding tighter and tighter until it snaps.

You come with a cry, your body convulsing as waves of pleasure wash over you. But Heeseung doesn't stop. He continues his assault on your senses, his tongue and fingers working in perfect harmony to bring you to the edge again.

And then you are squirting, your release flooding his mouth and chin as he drinks you in, his movements never faltering. He looks up at you, his eyes gleaming with satisfaction as he laps up every drop.

When he finally pulls away, his face glistening with your juices, he crawls up your body, capturing your lips in a searing kiss. You can taste yourself on his tongue, and the intimacy of it sends another wave of desire through you.

"Tell me you’re only thinking of me," he whispers against your lips, his hands roaming your body. "and not Jungwon."

You wake up.

You wake up in your dorm room, in your bed, at 7:43 AM on a Tuesday morning, with your heart pounding and your skin flushed, your panties soaked and your sheets twisted around your legs like they've been through a battle.

For a long moment, you just lie there, staring at the ceiling, trying to remember how to breathe.

Did you just… did you just dream about… did Lee Heeseung, the guy you're supposed to be making uninterested in you, the guy you've been trying to avoid and ignore and repel, just star in what can only be described as an extremely obscene dream? The virgin you are just cringed at the memory.

You press your hands to your burning cheeks and let out a sound that is somewhere between a groan and a scream.

"No," you whisper to the empty room. "No, no, no. This isn't, this can't…I don't even like him. I like Jungwon. Jungwon! I've liked Jungwon for four months. I wrote a letter to Jungwon. I have a color-coded mental database of Jungwon's habits. I want to marry Jungwon and have a three-tier wedding cake with wildflowers!"

But your brain, traitorous and unhelpful, keeps replaying fragments of the dream, the way Heeseung's eyes go dark, the way his voice rumbles against your ear, the way his hand feels on your waist, the way his tongue is warm and-

You grab your pillow and press it over your face, screaming into it with all the force your lungs can muster.

This is wrong. This is so, so wrong. You are a Jungwon girl. You've always been a Jungwon girl. You don't think about Heeseung like that. You don't think about Heeseung like anything. Heeseung is an obstacle. Heeseung is a problem to be solved. Heeseung is the guy you're actively trying to repel, not the guy who shows up in your subconscious and does things that make you blush in the privacy of your own bed.

"I'm a psychopath," you say to your pillow. "I'm a complete and utter psychopath. Who dreams about this with a guy they're supposed to be making uninterested? A psychopath, that's who. A deranged lunatic. A person with a broken brain."

Your pillow, predictably, does not respond.

You drag yourself out of bed and into the bathroom, splashing cold water on your face and avoiding your own reflection in the mirror. You don't want to look at yourself. You don't want to see the evidence of the dream still lingering in your flushed cheeks…and between your legs.

This is a problem. This is a Major Problem with capital letters and possibly a warning siren. You can't afford to be having dreams about Lee Heeseung. You can't afford to be thinking about Lee Heeseung at all. Your entire strategy, Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested depends on you being able to keep a clear head and a steady heart, and neither of those things is going to be possible if your subconscious keeps ambushing you with extremely vivid, extremely inappropriate content.

You need to talk to Yunjin. Immediately. Before your brain can conjure up any more unauthorized imagery.

But as you grab your phone and type out a frantic message, EMERGENCY MEETING REQUIRED IMMEDIATELY CODE RED REPEAT CODE RED, you can't quite shake the lingering sensation from the dream.

The way Heeseung's thumb traces along your jawline.

The way he calls you little mouse in that low, rumbling voice.

The way he says you were perfect the way you were like he means it, like it's true, like he's been into you his whole life and hasn't even known it.

You shake your head violently, flinging droplets of water across the bathroom mirror.

"Nope," you say out loud. "Nope, nope, nope. We're not doing this. We're not thinking about this. We're going to go to class and eat lunch and avoid all tall informatics students, and we're going to get our brain back on the Jungwon track where it belongs."

But even as you say it, even as you try to mean it, a small, treacherous part of you wonders if maybe, just maybe, the Jungwon track isn't the only track worth following anymore.

You shove that thought into a mental box, lock it, and throw away the key.

You have a plan. You have a strategy. You are going to make Heeseung uninterested, and you are going to figure out a way to untangle the misunderstanding, and you are going to end up with Jungwon like you were always supposed to.

The dream is just a dream. It doesn't mean anything. It can't mean anything.

You refuse to let it mean anything.

(But when you catch yourself glancing toward the informatics building on your way to class, you walk a little faster, and you definitely, absolutely, one hundred percent do not wonder what Lee Heeseung is doing right now.)

—————

The dream haunts you for three days.

Not in a supernatural, ghost-in-the-corner kind of way. More in an I-can't-make-eye-contact-with-my-own-reflection kind of way. Every time you close your eyes, fragments of it flicker behind your eyelids like a movie you hadn't asked to watch. The dark PC room. The way Heeseung's voice drops to a rumble. The phantom sensation of his tongue on your clit, his hand on your ankle, his look-

You physically convulse every time the memory resurfaces, which is approximately every forty-five minutes. Your philosophy notes become a graveyard of distracted doodles, half of which look suspiciously like the curve of someone's jaw. You have to throw away an entire page because you accidentally write "little mouse" in the margin instead of "moral relativism."

Yunjin is no help whatsoever.

"So you had a wet dream about the hot guy who you’re supposedly getting bored of," she says over bubble tea the day after the incident, her expression thoroughly unimpressed. "This is a problem because…?"

"Because I don't like him, Yunjin! I like Jungwon! I've liked Jungwon since midterms! Jungwon is the goal! Jungwon is the three-tier wedding cake!"

"And Heeseung is…?"

"A temporary obstacle! A misunderstanding with legs! A very tall, very inconvenient plot twist!"

Yunjin sucks on her tapioca pearls with the air of a therapist who has heard it all before and is no longer surprised by anything. "You know what they say about protesting too much."

"I am not protesting too much. I am protesting exactly the right amount. I am protesting a perfectly calibrated quantity."

"Sure." She pats your hand with condescending sympathy. "Whatever helps you sleep at night. Oh wait-"

You throw a tapioca pearl at her face. It sticks to her cheek for a solid three seconds before falling off, and the look of absolute betrayal on her face is the only bright spot in your otherwise nightmare-plagued week.

But now it's Thursday. Thursday, 2:15 PM. You're stationed in the science building's main hallway, crouched behind a bulletin board that is absolutely not wide enough to hide your entire body, waiting for the coast to clear so you can sprint to your next class without encountering any tall informatics students.

Your system has evolved since the early days of the crisis. You now have a color-coded schedule of Heeseung's known movements, courtesy of some light reconnaissance work that Yunjin calls "stalking" and you call "strategic intelligence gathering." You know his class schedule. You know his preferred study spots. You know that he tends to grab coffee from the campus café at exactly 3 PM on Tuesdays and Thursdays, which means the science building hallway should, theoretically, be a Heeseung-free zone at 2:15.

Theoretically.

You're just about to make your move, a quick dash to the stairwell, then up two flights, then a straight shot to classroom 307, when you hear it.

"Hey, is Y/N L/N in there?"

Your blood freezes. Your muscles lock. Your soul briefly departs your body and then slams back into it with force.

That's Heeseung's voice. That's unmistakably, undeniably, catastrophically Lee Heeseung's voice, and it's coming from approximately ten feet to your left, where the door to your department's main office stands open.

You press yourself harder against the bulletin board, praying for invisibility, praying for a sudden power outage, praying for the ground to open up and swallow you into its merciful embrace. None of these things happen. Instead, you hear the department secretary respond with cheerful obliviousness.

"Y/N L/N? First year, STEM? I think I saw her in the hallway just a minute ago. Let me check, oh, there she is! Y/N! You have a visitor!"

The secretary is pointing directly at your bulletin board. Your bulletin board that is not hiding you at all. Your bulletin board that is, in fact, leaving approximately seventy percent of your body completely visible to anyone who happens to look in that direction.

Heeseung turns.

Your eyes meet.

Time stops.

There are moments in life that feel like they stretch into eternity, moments so profoundly awkward, so cosmically embarrassing, that the universe itself seems to pause and take notice. This is one of those moments. You are frozen in a half-crouch behind a bulletin board, your backpack dangling from one shoulder, your hair escaping from the ponytail you threw it into this morning, your expression one of pure, unfiltered terror. Heeseung is standing in the doorway of the department office, looking unfairly attractive in a simple black hoodie and jeans, his eyebrows rising slowly toward his hairline.

A small crowd of students has paused in the hallway to watch. You can feel their eyes on you like a physical weight. Someone whispers something to their friend. Someone else pulls out their phone.

You are going to die. You are going to perish right here in the science building hallway, and your ghost will be doomed to haunt this bulletin board for all eternity.

"Y/N?" Heeseung's voice is a mixture of confusion and amusement. He takes a step toward you, and you instinctively take a step back, which results in you bumping directly into the bulletin board and causing several flyers to flutter dramatically to the ground. "Were you… hiding behind that?"

"No," you say, too quickly. "No, I was…I dropped something. A contact lens. I was looking for my contact lens."

"You don't wear contacts."

"I might! You don't know my life!"

"Your glasses are literally on your face right now."

You reach up and touch your glasses, which are indeed sitting on your nose, clearly visible, doing their job of correcting your vision. You have no response to this. There is no response to this. You have been caught in a lie so transparent it's essentially a window.

Heeseung's lips twitch. "You know, most people who have a crush on me don't run away and hide behind furniture. This is very confusing for my ego."

The crowd is still watching. Why is the crowd still watching? Don't they have classes to go to? Midterms to study for? Lives to live that don't involve spectating your public humiliation?

"I wasn't hiding from you specifically," you say, because apparently your mouth has decided to operate independently from your brain. "I was hiding from… the sun. It's very bright in here. I'm photosensitive."

"You're a STEM student hiding from the sun in a basement hallway with no windows," Heeseung says slowly. "That's… a new one."

"It's a medical condition. It's very serious. My doctor says I need to avoid direct fluorescent lighting."

"The fluorescent lighting is what's getting you."

"Absolutely. It's my greatest enemy. Well, second greatest. After-" You stop yourself before you can say after incredibly hot informatics students who keep appearing in my life like a recurring nightmare.

Heeseung waits. When you don't finish the sentence, that smile, the one that's definitely a smirk's second cousin, maybe even its first cousin at this point, spreads across his face.

"Well," he says, "now that I've found you and dragged you out of the shadows, literally, I was wondering if you wanted to grab coffee. With me. Right now."

Every single person in the hallway is looking at you. The secretary is looking at you from the office doorway, her expression one of grandmotherly delight at what she clearly perceives as a romantic overture. The students who stopped to watch are exchanging glances and whispers. One girl gives you an encouraging thumbs up.

You are trapped. You are cornered. You are a mouse being offered coffee by a very tall, very persistent cat.

And just like every other time Heeseung has put you on the spot, you open your mouth and the wrong words come out.

"I love coffee," you say. "Coffee is my favorite liquid. After water. And possibly juice. But it's definitely in the top three."

"Is that a yes?"

"…Yes."

You’re staring at your own reflection in the bathroom mirror, and the girl staring back looks like she’s about to either throw up or ascend to another dimension. Maybe both. In that order.

The letter is clutched so tightly in your hand that the pale lavender envelope is starting to crease, and you force yourself to loosen your grip before you ruin the one thing you’ve spent three weeks perfecting. Three weeks. That’s twenty-one days of drafting, crossing out, rewriting, Googling “how to write a love letter without sounding like a desperate loser,” and then rewriting again. You’ve used up an entire pack of stationery. You’ve watched so many calligraphy tutorials that the YouTube algorithm thinks you’re training to become a medieval scribe. All for this one moment. This one letter. This one massive, terrifying, possibly life-ruining leap of faith.

You are a hopeless romantic. Hopeless being the operative word.

It’s not that you don’t believe in love. You do. Desperately, overwhelmingly, with every fiber of your first-year STEM student soul. You believe in meet-cutes and slow burns and the exact moment when two people look at each other and the entire world goes soft around the edges. You’ve read about it a hundred times. You’ve watched it play out on every screen you own. You’ve composed entire daydreams about it during particularly boring chemistry lectures. Love is your favorite subject, the one you’ve studied with more dedication than calculus or physics combined. There’s just one tiny, inconvenient, absolutely infuriating problem.

You’re terrified of it.

Not the idea of it. The idea is lovely. The idea is safe. The idea lives in your head where everything unfolds exactly the way you want it to, where you always say the right thing, where you never trip over your own feet or laugh too loud at the wrong moment or stand frozen in a doorway like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming truck. But real love? The kind that requires vulnerability and eye contact and actually speaking words out loud with your mouth? That kind of love makes your palms sweat and your heart race in a decidedly unromantic, fight-or-flight kind of way. You are, and this is the most embarrassing part, a coward. A romantic coward. You dream of grand gestures but can barely manage a coherent sentence when an attractive person so much as glances in your direction.

Which brings you back to the letter.

The letter is your loophole. Your workaround. Your way of confessing your feelings without actually having to say them, because writing them down felt manageable in a way that speaking never has. You can be eloquent on paper. On paper, you can say things like “the first time I saw your smile, it felt like someone had turned on all the lights in a room I didn’t even realize was dark” without immediately wanting to crawl into the nearest hole and live out the rest of your days an hermit. On paper, you’re brave. On paper, you’re the kind of person who goes after what she wants.

In reality, you’ve been hiding in this bathroom for fifteen minutes, and your hands are shaking so badly that a passing person would think you are having an epileptic seizure.

“Okay,” you whisper to your reflection. “Okay. You can do this. You are a woman on a mission. You are a warrior. You are-”

A toilet flushes in one of the stalls behind you, and you nearly launch yourself through the ceiling.

A girl you vaguely recognize from your introductory programming class emerges, gives you an odd look as she washes her hands, and leaves without saying anything. You wait until the door swings shut, then press your forehead against the cool glass of the mirror and contemplate every life choice that has led you to this moment.

His name is Jungwon.

Yang Jungwon. Second year. Undeclared major but leaning toward something in the humanities, which you know because you may have done a bit of light, respectful, completely non-creepy research. He has a smile that crinkles the corners of his eyes and a laugh that sounds like sunshine if sunshine could make noise, and he holds doors open for people even when they’re still like ten feet away, which creates that awkward situation where the person has to speed-walk to not seem rude, but he never seems to mind. You first noticed him at the campus library during midterms when he quietly slid a pack of gummy bears across the table toward you at 2 AM, muttering something about glucose being good for brain function, and then went back to his book like he hadn’t just fundamentally altered the trajectory of your entire emotional existence.

That was four months ago. You’ve been pining ever since. Pining, yearning, longing, you’ve run through the entire lexicon of unrequited affection, and you’re exhausted. Today, you’ve decided, is the day it ends. One way or another.

You push yourself off the mirror, square your shoulders, and march out of the bathroom with the determination of someone going to war. The envelope is slightly damp from your grip, but it’s still intact, and the words inside are still true, and somewhere on this campus, Yang Jungwon is about to receive the most heartfelt confession letter ever written by a first-year student who has consumed an unhealthy amount of romance media.

Now you just have to find him.

—————

The hallway is bustling with students, the usual midday chaos of people rushing to classes or huddling in groups to complain about assignments. You scan the crowd, looking for a familiar face that might point you in the right direction, and your eyes land on a guy leaning against the wall, scrolling through his phone with the dead-eyed expression of someone who has just finished a three-hour lab.

“Excuse me,” you say, and your voice comes out about an octave higher than normal. You clear your throat. “Sorry, um, do you know where I can find Yang Jungwon? Second year?”

The guy looks up, blinks slowly, deciding whether or not to acknowledge your presence, and then shrugs. “PC room, I think. Saw him heading there like twenty minutes ago.”

The PC room. Of course. It’s in the engineering and informatics building, a place you’ve rarely ever been to. But you know where it is, roughly, and you thank the guy with what you hope is a normal smile and not the rictus grin of someone rushing toward emotional catastrophe.

The walk across campus takes approximately seven minutes, and you spend every single one of them rehearsing what you’re going to say. You’ve already written the letter, so technically you don’t have to say anything, you can just hand it over and flee but you want to say something. Something cool. Something memorable.

“Hey, Jungwon, this is for you.” Simple. Direct. Good.

“I wrote you something. No pressure, just read it when you have time.” Casual. Low-stakes. Excellent.

“Hi, I’ve been emotionally compromised by your existence for several months, please accept this paper rectangle of feelings.” Okay, maybe not that one.

The engineering building looms in front of you before you’re ready. You push through the main doors and immediately feel out of place. The students here move with a different energy, less frantic, more focused, the kind of people who probably know what a server is and have opinions about programming languages you’ve never heard of.

You follow the signs toward the PC room, your footsteps echoing in the corridor, and with every step, your heart climbs higher up your throat. This is it. This is the moment. You’re going to walk in there, find Jungwon, hand him the letter, and then whatever happens happens. At least you’ll have tried. At least you’ll have been brave, even if it’s only for thirty seconds.

The door to the PC room is slightly ajar, and you can hear voices inside, multiple voices, which gives you pause. You assumed he’d be alone. Or with maybe one other person.

You hesitate. Your hand hovers over the door handle. Every instinct is screaming at you to turn around, go back to your dorm, and spend the rest of your life wondering what could have been. And maybe you would, if not for the small, stubborn voice in the back of your mind that says: You’ve already come this far. Don’t you want to know? Don’t you want to be the kind of person who actually does the thing instead of just dreaming about it?

Yes. Yes, you do.

You squeeze your eyes shut, take a breath so deep it makes you lightheaded, and push the door open with more force than strictly necessary. It slams against the wall with a bang that makes approximately twelve heads swivel in your direction, and for one horrifying moment, you are the center of attention in a room full of strangers.

But you don’t see any of them. You only see the figure sitting at the computer closest to the door, his back half-turned to you, hair falling over his forehead, the exact silhouette you’ve been looking for. Or at least, the exact silhouette you think you’ve been looking for.

You don’t stop to confirm. You don’t let yourself think. You just march forward, thrust the letter out in front of you like a shield, and launch into the speech you’ve been rehearsing for three weeks.

“This is for you. I’m sorry if this is weird or sudden but I’ve liked you for a really long time and I couldn’t keep it to myself anymore. You don’t have to respond right away. You don’t have to respond ever, actually. I just wanted you to know that someone out there thinks you’re wonderful and I wrote it all down because I’m better at writing than talking and honestly I might pass out if I keep standing here so please just take this and I’ll go-”

You finally look up.

And the face staring back at you is absolutely, categorically, one hundred percent not Jungwon.

The boy in front of you is taller than Jungwon. Broader shoulders. Sharper jawline. Different eyes, darker, deeper, currently widened in a mixture of surprise and something you can’t quite read. His lips are parted slightly, as if he was about to say something before you launched into your emotional word-vomit, and he’s holding a half-eaten protein bar that’s now frozen halfway to his mouth.

The room has gone completely, utterly silent.

You can feel the stares of every single person boring into the back of your head. Someone coughs. Someone else whispers something that sounds suspiciously like “did she just-” before being shushed by their neighbor.

And then the boy, the very handsome, very wrong boy, sets down his protein bar, takes the letter gently from your trembling hand, and says in a voice that’s low and smooth and completely unfamiliar: “Wow. Okay. What’s your name?”

This is the worst moment of your entire life. You are going to die right here, in this PC room, surrounded by computer monitors and half-empty energy drink cans and a dozen witnesses who will spread this story to every corner of the university within the next three hours. Your obituary will read: here lies Y/N, the loser who can’t even recognize her ultimate crush.

“Y/N,” you croak, because your mouth is apparently still functioning even though every other part of you has shut down. “L/N Y/N. First year. STEM.”

You don’t know why you said STEM. He didn’t ask for your department. You’re offering information nobody requested. This is a disaster.

But the boy, he’s looking at you with an expression you can’t decipher, his head tilted slightly to the side like you’re a puzzle he’s trying to figure out. He’s wearing a dark hoodie with the informatics department logo on it, and there’s a pair of expensive-looking headphones draped around his neck, and his hair is slightly mussed in a way that suggests he’s been running his fingers through it while concentrating. He’s absurdly good-looking, the kind of good-looking that makes you simultaneously want to stare and look away, and you’re only now noticing the way several girls in the room have been watching him since you entered, not just because of your blunder, but because they’ve been watching him.

“I’m Heeseung,” he says, and there’s a hint of a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Lee Heeseung. Third year. Informatics engineering.”

Lee Heeseung. The name registers somewhere in the back of your panic-addled brain. It’s familiar in the way that campus gossip is familiar, attached to words like hot and player and don’t get your hopes up because he’ll charm you and then move on. You’ve heard girls in your dorm talking about him in hushed, giggling tones, trading stories about brief encounters and misinterpreted invitations. And you, in your infinite wisdom, have just handed a love letter meant for someone else directly into his notorious hands.

You have to fix this. You have to tell him it was a mistake. You have to-

“I’m flattered,” Heeseung says, and his smile widens slightly, not quite a smirk but definitely approaching smirk territory. “Really. This is... I mean, no one’s ever confessed to me with an actual letter before. It’s kind of old school.” He turns the envelope over in his hands, examining it with what seems like genuine curiosity. “The handwriting is really pretty. Did you do the calligraphy yourself?”

“Yes,” you say, because you are physically incapable of lying when put on the spot, and also because your brain has apparently decided that the best course of action is to just answer whatever questions he asks like this is a normal conversation and not the emotional equivalent of a tornado.

“Impressive.” He looks at you, really looks at you, and something shifts in his expression. The teasing edge softens just a fraction. “A confession is a lot, though. I mean, I’m honored, but we don’t even know each other.”

This is your opening. This is the moment where you say “actually, that’s because this letter wasn’t meant for you, there’s been a terrible misunderstanding, I’m so sorry, please forget this ever happened.” The words are right there, lined up on your tongue, ready to go.

But the room is still watching. A dozen pairs of eyes. The whispers have stopped, but the staring hasn’t, and you can feel every single gaze like a physical weight pressing down on you. If you correct him now, in front of everyone, you’ll have to explain. You’ll have to admit that you walked into a crowded room and confessed to the wrong person like an absolute buffoon. You’ll become a campus legend for all the wrong reasons: the girl who was too stupid to even identify her own crush. The story will follow you for the rest of your university career. You’ll never live it down.

But if you just... let him believe it... if you just nod and agree and leave as quickly as possible... you can fix this later. Privately. Without an audience. You can find him tomorrow, or send him a message, or do literally anything other than humiliate yourself further in front of all these people.

Your mouth opens. Closes. Opens again.

“I know,” you hear yourself say. “It’s a lot. I know.”

Heeseung nods thoughtfully, like you’ve said something profound. “But I’m not against it. Starting slow, I mean. If you want.”

What.

“What,” you say, but it comes out more like a statement than a question.

“I’m okay with starting slow,” he repeats, and now the smile is definitely back, a little crooked, a little curious. “You’re cute. And clearly brave. I like that. So if you want to, I don’t know, get coffee sometime and see where this goes... I’m open to it.”

Someone in the room lets out a low whistle. Someone else says “Heeseung, are you serious right now?” in a tone of utter disbelief. But Heeseung doesn’t look away from you. He’s waiting for your answer, his gaze steady and warm, and you are standing in the epicenter of a complete and total catastrophe with absolutely no idea how to get out.

Say no. Say it was a mistake. Say the truth.

“Okay,” you whisper.

Okay?! Okay?!

“Okay,” he echoes, and the smile breaks fully across his face, transforming him from handsome to devastating. “Good. I’ll find you. Y/N, first year, STEM, right?”

You nod mutely.

“Cool.” He tucks your letter carefully into the pocket of his hoodie, like it’s something precious, like he’s planning to read it later, and the gesture makes your stomach twist with guilt so intense you think you might actually be sick. “I’ll see you around, Y/N.”

You don’t remember leaving the room. You don’t remember the walk back across campus or the elevator ride to your floor or the moment you collapsed face-first onto your dorm bed. All you know is that one moment you were standing in the PC room, and the next you are here, staring at the ceiling, replaying every single agonizing second on an endless loop.

You confessed to the wrong person.

You confessed to the wrong person.

And for some reason that you absolutely cannot comprehend, he said yes.

Across campus, in a PC room that has finally returned to its normal hum of activity, Lee Heeseung pulls a slightly crumpled lavender envelope out of his hoodie pocket and stares at it for a long moment.

“Dude,” says his friend Jay from the next computer over, not bothering to hide his grin. “What just happened?”

“I don’t know,” Heeseung says honestly. And he doesn’t. He’s used to attention, he knows how to handle it, how to smile and nod and gently redirect without hurting anyone’s feelings. It’s a skill he’s developed over the years, the only way he knows to deal with the unfortunate side effect of his people-pleasing tendencies. He’s nice to someone, he helps them with an assignment, he holds a door open or offers a pen, and suddenly they’re looking at him with stars in their eyes, and he doesn’t know how to tell them that he was just trying to be polite without sounding like an arrogant jerk. So he lets them down easy, or he avoids the situation entirely, and his reputation grows in ways that don’t reflect the truth at all.

But this, this is new. A letter. An actual, physical, handwritten letter, with swooping calligraphy and a lavender envelope and a girl who looked so terrified that he thought she might actually pass out right there on the linoleum floor.

She looked at him like he was a natural disaster. Like she was watching a building collapse in slow motion and couldn’t do anything to stop it.

And then she said okay anyway.

“She’s interesting,” Heeseung murmurs, more to himself than to Jay, and carefully opens the envelope.

“Interesting how?”

He doesn’t answer. He’s too busy reading, his eyes moving slowly across the carefully penned words, the ink slightly smudged in places where the writer’s hand might have trembled. It’s beautiful. It’s earnest. It’s the kind of letter that someone writes when they mean every single word, when they’ve poured their entire heart onto the page without holding anything back.

He’s never received anything like it before.

And he wants to know more about the girl who wrote it, the girl who burst into his afternoon like a hurricane of nerves and feelings.

“Jay,” he says, still staring at the letter, a hint of a smile playing on his lips. “I think something interesting just walked into my life.”

He doesn’t notice the way his friend shakes his head and mutters something about “here we go again.”

He’s too busy wondering when he’ll see Y/N next.

—————

The following forty-eight hours of your life can be accurately described as a masterclass in strategic avoidance and tactical regret.

You skip two classes. Not on purpose, exactly, you just can’t bring yourself to leave your dorm room when every shadow in the hallway might be Lee Heeseung coming to collect on that coffee date you apparently agreed to in a moment of temporary insanity. You survive on instant noodles and the protein bars your friend left on her desk with a sticky note that said “FOR EMERGENCIES ONLY,” which this absolutely qualifies as. You watch three entire seasons of Bridgerton without retaining a single moment because your brain is too busy replaying the PC room incident on a continuous, merciless loop.

“I’m Lee Heeseung. Third year. Informatics engineering.”

“I’m okay with starting slow.”

“You’re cute.”

You bury your face in your pillow and scream, but it comes out muffled and pathetic, like a small animal giving up on life.

By day three, you’ve developed a system. You only leave your room during off-peak hours, skittering through campus, your head on a constant swivel. You’ve memorized the locations of every vending machine in buildings Heeseung is unlikely to frequent. You’ve started taking the long way to your remaining classes, cutting through the art department and the greenhouse and once, memorably, a service corridor that smelled strongly of bleach and soap. You’ve become a ghost. A phantom. A creature of the shadows who survives on granola bars and instant noddles.

But the problem with running away from your problems is that your problems don’t actually go anywhere. They just wait. And think about you. And eventually, when you least expect it, they catch up.

It happens on a Thursday.

You’re crouched behind a potted plant near the science building, scanning the courtyard for any sign of tall, attractive informatics students, when your phone buzzes with a text from your best friend, Yunjin.

Yunjin: heard you’ve been living like a sewer rat. want me to bring you real food?

You: can’t. i’m in the middle of a crisis

Yunjin: You’re executing what we talked about yet?

You: it’s in process

Yunjin: at the end of the day, you will have to tell him

You stare at the message for a long moment. It’s such a simple solution. So elegant. So reasonable. And yet, every time you imagine yourself walking up to Heeseung and saying “actually, I meant to give that letter to someone else,” your entire body physically recoils like you’ve touched a hot stove. The humiliation would be astronomical. The look on his face, surprise, then confusion, then that horrible moment of realization that he was never supposed to be the recipient would haunt you for the rest of your natural life. And you’d still have to explain the Jungwon part. And Jungwon would find out. And then you’d be the weird girl who couldn’t even confess to the right person, and Heeseung would be the guy who got accidentally confessed to, and everyone would laugh about it for weeks, and-

Your phone buzzes again.

Yunjin: i can hear you overthinking from across campus. just rip off the bandaid. what’s the worst that could happen

You type back a single message: he could tell everyone and i’d have to transfer schools and change my name and become a farmer in New Zeland

Yunjin: dramatic. but valid. good luck with your plant hiding

You shove your phone back into your pocket and peek around the potted plant again. The courtyard is clear. This is your window. You take a deep breath, steel your nerves, and scuttle out from behind the foliage.

The plan for today is simple: find Heeseung, explain the misunderstanding, and disappear forever. You’ve spent the entire morning psyching yourself up for this. You’ve practiced the speech in the mirror seventeen times. You’ve even written a script on your phone that you can refer to in case of emergency. It’s thorough, it’s clear, it leaves absolutely no room for misinterpretation, and it ends with a sincere apology and a polite request that you both pretend this never happened. It’s perfect. It’s foolproof. All you have to do is locate the target.

Easier said than done. You’ve been looking for him since yesterday, not to talk to, but to observe from a safe distance so you could plan your approach and the universe, in its infinite comedic wisdom, has made him completely unfindable. It’s like he vanished off the face of the earth the moment you actually wanted to see him. Three days ago, you couldn’t walk three feet without catching a glimpse of him, but now? Now he’s a ghost. A myth. A concept rather than a physical entity.

You’re going to have to ask for help.

This is, objectively, a terrible idea. Asking for help means talking to people, and talking to people about Heeseung means potentially revealing that you’re looking for him, which means potentially revealing why you’re looking for him, which means the whole campus could know about the letter situation by lunchtime. But you’re running out of options, and you’re running out of granola bars, and you can’t live behind potted plants forever.

You find your informant near the engineering building, a girl with neon green headphones and a laptop covered in stickers, sitting on a bench and typing furiously at something that looks like code. She seems approachable. She seems like she won’t ask too many questions. You approach with what you hope is casual confidence and not the desperate energy of someone who has been living on protein bars.

“Excuse me,” you say, and your voice comes out surprisingly normal. Points for you. “Do you know where I can find Lee Heeseung? Third year, informatics?”

The girl looks up, her eyes flicking over you with mild curiosity. She doesn’t ask why you’re looking for him, which makes you want to hug her. “Heeseung? Yeah, I think I saw him heading to the quad about ten minutes ago. Something about meeting up with some people before his next class.”

The quad. Of course. The most open, public, exposed location on the entire campus. The place where literally everyone congregates. The absolute last place you want to have a conversation about accidental love confessions.

“Great,” you say, and your voice is definitely an octave higher now. “Great. Thank you. Thanks. So much.”

The girl gives you a weird look, shrugs, and goes back to her coding.

You’re already moving, your feet carrying you toward the quad before your brain can catch up and talk you out of it. This is fine. This is progress. You’ll find him, you’ll pull him aside, you’ll give him the speech, and then you’ll be free. You’ll be a normal person again. You’ll be able to walk through campus without checking every corner for a tall informatics student who thinks you’re cute and brave and worthy of a coffee date.

The quad is bustling when you arrive, clusters of students sprawled across the grass and gathered around the stone benches near the fountain. The afternoon sun is bright and warm, the kind of weather that makes everyone want to be outside, which is lovely and picturesque and deeply inconvenient for your purposes. You squint against the glare, scanning the crowd for a familiar dark-haired figure.

No Heeseung.

You circle the perimeter, weaving between groups of friends and dodging a frisbee that comes sailing dangerously close to your head. You check near the fountain, near the big oak tree, near the cluster of food trucks that’s set up along the east edge. Still no Heeseung. Your informant said ten minutes ago, he should be here. Unless he already left. Unless you missed him. Unless this is a sign from the universe that you should give up and commit to the farmer life plan after all.

You’re so focused on your search that you don’t notice someone approaching until a shadow falls across your path, and a voice, warm, familiar, the exact voice you’ve been daydreaming about for four months, says:

“Y/N? Hey, it is you!”

You look up.

Yang Jungwon is standing right in front of you, smiling like the sun just came out from behind a cloud, and every single coherent thought in your brain immediately evaporates.

He’s wearing a soft-looking cream sweater with the sleeves pushed up to his elbows, and his dark hair is slightly windswept, and there’s a tiny mole near his chin that you’ve never noticed before but is now seared into your memory forever. He’s holding a book, something with a cracked spine and a title in a language you don’t recognize and he’s looking at you with genuine, undiluted pleasure, like running into you is the best thing that’s happened to him all day.

“It’s me,” you say, because you are a conversational genius. “I mean. Yes. Hi. Hello.”

Smooth. Flawless execution. Ten out of ten.

Jungwon doesn’t seem to notice your complete lack of verbal grace. His smile widens, crinkling the corners of his eyes in exactly the way you’ve catalogued in your mental Jungwon database. “I thought I recognized you. You’re in my philosophy elective, right? Front row, near the window?”

He knows where you sit. He knows where you sit. This is both the best and worst information you’ve ever received, because on one hand, Yang Jungwon has noticed your existence, but on the other hand, Yang Jungwon has noticed your existence, and now you have to be a normal human being and not the disaster you currently are.

“Front row near the window,” you confirm, nodding a little too vigorously. “That’s me. I like the natural light. For... note-taking purposes.”

“Makes sense.” He shifts his weight, tucking the book under his arm. “You take really detailed notes, by the way. I sat behind you once, and I was honestly impressed. Your color-coding system is no joke.”

Jungwon has looked at your notes. Jungwon has been impressed by your notes. Your brain is short-circuiting at approximately the speed of light, and you have to physically resist the urge to fist-pump in the middle of the quad.

“Thank you,” you manage. “I have a lot of highlighters. Maybe too many. Is there such a thing as too many highlighters? I don’t think so, but I’ve been told my stationery collection is concerning.”

Oh no. Why are you talking about stationery? You need to say something charming. Something witty. Something that will make him see you as more than the girl with the aggressive color-coding system.

“I don’t think it’s concerning,” Jungwon says, and there’s a teasing lilt to his voice that makes your knees go weak. “Passionate, maybe. Dedicated. I respect it.”

“Passionate and dedicated,” you repeat faintly. “That’s... yeah. That’s my brand.”

He laughs, and it’s exactly like you remember, bright and warm, the kind of laugh that makes you want to do whatever you just did again and again just to hear it on repeat. “I like it. Passion is underrated.” He tilts his head, studying you with an expression you can’t quite read. “So what brings you to the quad? You usually eat lunch in the science building courtyard, don’t you?”

Your heart stutters. He knows where you eat lunch. He’s observed your habits. This is either a sign of mutual interest or you’ve accidentally become the subject of a sociological case study, and at this point you’re willing to accept either outcome.

“I’m, um, looking for someone,” you say, and the confession letter debacle comes crashing back into your consciousness like a wrecking ball through a glass window. Right. You’re supposed to be finding Heeseung. You’re supposed to be fixing the misunderstanding. That’s why you’re here. Not to bask in the radiant warmth of Jungwon’s attention like a lizard on a sunny rock.

“Anyone I know?” Jungwon asks, and there’s something in his tone, curiosity, maybe.

“Probably not,” you say quickly. “Just a... just a person. A random person. Not important.”

Jungwon raises an eyebrow, clearly unconvinced, but before he can press further, a new voice cuts through the afternoon air like a knife through butter.

“There you are.”

You freeze. Your blood turns to ice. Every cell in your body screams in unison: run.

Lee Heeseung is walking toward you across the quad, his headphones hanging around his neck and his hands tucked casually into the pockets of his jacket. He looks exactly as devastatingly attractive as he did three days ago, which is deeply unfair. His expression is a mixture of curiosity and amusement, and when his eyes meet yours, that slight smile, the one that’s not quite a smirk but definitely is a smirk’s second cousin, curves across his lips.

“I heard you’ve been looking for me,” he says, coming to a stop beside Jungwon like this is the most natural gathering in the world. “You know, if you wanted to see me, you could have just messaged. I would have given you my number at the PC room.”

Jungwon looks between you and Heeseung with visible confusion, his earlier smile fading into something more guarded. “Wait. You two know each other?”

This is it. This is the moment the universe has been building toward. Every terrible decision, every act of cowardice, every misguided attempt to avoid embarrassment, it’s all led here, to this exact spot on the quad, with the wrong guy standing next to the right guy and your entire romantic future hanging in the balance.

“I wouldn’t say know,” you begin, but Heeseung is already talking over you, apparently immune to the desperate telepathic signals you’re trying to beam directly into his brain.

“She confessed to me two days ago,” Heeseung says, and his tone is so casual, so conversational, like he’s discussing the weather or what he had for lunch. “Walked right into the PC room, handed me a letter, told me she’d liked me for a long time. It was very romantic. Very old-school. I was impressed.”

Silence. Jungwon stares at Heeseung. Then at you. Then back at Heeseung.

“She... confessed to you,” Jungwon repeats slowly, and his voice has gone flat in a way that makes your heart splinter into approximately seven thousand pieces.

“Full confession,” Heeseung confirms, still smiling. “I’m thinking we’ll start with coffee. Keep it simple, you know? She’s shy. I don’t want to overwhelm her.”

This is a nightmare. This is a waking, breathing, actively-unfolding nightmare, and you are trapped in it like a fly in amber, unable to move or speak or do anything except watch as every possible future with Jungwon crumbles to dust before your eyes.

Because here’s the thing you realize in that horrible, crystal-clear moment: you can’t correct Heeseung now. Not in front of Jungwon. Not when Jungwon has just been told, in no uncertain terms, that you confessed to someone else. If you explain the truth, that the letter was actually meant for Jungwon, that the whole thing was a catastrophic mistake, then what? Jungwon would know you’d been planning to confess to him, but he’d also know that you somehow managed to mess it up so spectacularly that you confessed to his friend instead. You’d look incompetent at best and completely unhinged at worst. And Heeseung would be humiliated, and Jungwon would be awkward, and you’d be the epicenter of a social catastrophe so immense that all three of you would have to avoid each other for the rest of your academic careers.

You are trapped. Completely, utterly, irreversibly trapped.

“Interesting,” Jungwon says, and the word is so neutral that it cuts deeper than any insult ever could. “I didn’t realize you two ran in the same circles.”

“We don’t,” you croak. “We really, really don’t.”

“We’re just getting started,” Heeseung says cheerfully, and he has the audacity to wink at you. Like this is some kind of adorable inside joke instead of the emotional apocalypse it actually is.

You have to get out of here. You have to escape before the sob building in your chest forces its way out and makes everything infinitely worse. You can feel it pressing against your ribs, hot and insistent, and if you don’t leave right now, you’re going to burst into tears in the middle of the quad in front of both of them, and then the disaster will be complete.

“I have to go,” you blurt out, and you’re already backing away, your feet moving before your brain can issue any kind of warning. “I have… a thing. A class. A lab. A lab class. It’s very important. I can’t miss it. I have to go.”

Heeseung’s brow furrows slightly. “Wait, I thought you wanted to talk to-”

“Nope! No talking! We’re good! Everything’s fine! Bye!”

You spin around and power-walk toward the nearest exit, which happens to be in the direction of the fountain, which you only realize when your foot catches on the low stone ledge and you go sprawling forward with all the grace of a newborn giraffe.

Your knee hits the ground. Your dignity hits the ground approximately three feet to the left. Several people turn to look.

“Y/N!” That’s Jungwon’s voice, concerned and moving closer, and you absolutely cannot handle that right now.

“I’m fine!” you shriek, scrambling to your feet with adrenaline-fueled desperation. “Totally fine! Happens all the time! I’m very clumsy! It’s part of my charm!”

You don’t look back. You can’t look back. If you look back, you’ll see Jungwon’s worried expression and Heeseung’s confused one, and you’ll have to confront the full magnitude of what just happened, and your fragile emotional state simply cannot withstand that kind of pressure. So you run. Not jog, not power-walk…run. Across the quad, past the food trucks, through a gap between two buildings, and out onto the main campus pathway like the hounds of hell are snapping at your heels.

You don’t stop until you reach the arts building, and you don’t start breathing normally until you’ve locked yourself in a practice room on the third floor, surrounded by soundproof walls and a piano that’s seen better days. You slide down against the door, pull your knees up to your chest, and let out a sound that’s halfway between a groan and a wail.

Everything is ruined. Everything. You had one chance, one single, solitary chance to fix the misunderstanding and salvage your dignity and maybe, just maybe, preserve the possibility of something with Jungwon somewhere down the line. And instead, you let your hopeless romantic heart get distracted by a five-minute conversation about philosophy notes and highlighters, and now you’re the girl who confessed to Lee Heeseung, and Jungwon thinks you’re interested in someone else, and there is no conceivable way to untangle this mess without making everything exponentially worse.

You’re going to have to transfer schools. You’re going to have to move to another country. You’re going to have to fake your own death and start a new identity as a goat farmer in New Zeland.

The door handle jiggles behind you. “Occupied!” you yell, your voice cracking.

“Y/N? Is that you?”

Your best friend Yunjin’s voice filters through the door, muffled but unmistakable, and the sound of it is enough to crack the dam you’ve been desperately trying to hold together. You scramble to your feet, fumble with the lock, and yank the door open to reveal Yunjin standing in the hallway with a cup of bubble tea in each hand and an expression of profound concern on her face.

“I saw you running,” she says, her eyes scanning your disheveled appearance. “Like, truly running. I’ve never seen you run before. You once told me running was for people who don’t appreciate the journey.”

“Yunjin,” you crumble, and your voice is so pitiful that she immediately sets down both drinks and pulls you into a hug.

“Okay,” she says, steering you back into the practice room and closing the door behind her. “Okay. Sit down. Tell me everything. What happened? Did you talk to Heeseung? Did you fix it?”

You laugh, but it comes out wrong, high and wobbly, on the edge of hysteria. “Fix it? Fix it? Yunjin, I made it so much worse. I made it so much worse that I think I actually created new dimensions of worse. Scientists are going to have to invent new words to describe how badly I messed this up.”

“That’s... improbable,” Yunjin says carefully. “But I’m listening.”

She settles onto the piano bench, and you collapse onto the floor in front of her, crossing your legs and burying your face in your hands. The story spills out of you in a torrent, the quad, the search for Heeseung, the unexpected appearance of Jungwon, the conversation that made your heart soar, and then the moment Heeseung appeared like a harbinger of doom and casually announced your confession to the one person you never wanted to know about it.

“And then I fell,” you finish miserably. “In front of both of them. And I ran away. And now Jungwon thinks I like Heeseung, and Heeseung thinks I like Heeseung, and I can’t correct either of them without making everything even weirder, and my life is a romantic comedy written by a petty incel.”

Yunjin is quiet for a moment. Then she lets out a long, slow breath. “Okay. That’s... that’s a lot.”

“I know.”

“And you’re telling me you couldn’t just say, hey Heeseung, sorry for the mix-up, the letter wasn’t for you, my bad?”

You look up at her, your eyes rimmed with red. “In front of Jungwon? After Heeseung already told him I confessed? What would Jungwon think of me?”

Yunjin considers this. “That you’re a disaster, probably.”

“Exactly!”

“But a lovable disaster,” she adds. “Disasters can be endearing.”

“Yunjin, please focus.”

She holds up her hands in surrender, but there’s a glint in her eye that you recognize, the one that means she’s about to drop some wisdom on you whether you’re ready for it or not. Yunjin has been your best friend since orientation week, when you both accidentally joined the wrong club meeting and ended up spending two hours in a competitive gardening seminar before realizing your mistake. She’s practical where you’re dreamy, decisive where you’re hesitant, and she’s talked you down from approximately four hundred anxiety spirals since the semester started. If anyone can find a way out of this mess, it’s her.

“Okay,” she says, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees. “Let me present you with an alternative perspective.”

“I’m listening.”

“Lee Heeseung,” she says, ticking off points on her fingers, “has a reputation. A big one. Everyone knows it. He’s the guy who’s super nice to everyone, especially girls, and then they fall for him and he gets all surprised when they expect something more, and then things fizzle out because he wasn’t looking for anything serious.” She makes air quotes with her fingers. “Sound familiar?”

You blink. “I mean... I’ve heard things. But he didn’t seem like-”

“That’s his whole thing,” Yunjin interrupts. “He doesn’t seem like it. That’s why it works. He likes when everyone is after him. But nice doesn’t equal interested, so girls get the wrong idea and then they get hurt. It’s a cycle.” She pops a tapioca pearl into her mouth and chews thoughtfully. “My point is, you don’t need to do anything. You don’t need to fix this. You just need to wait.”

“Wait for what?”

“For him to get bored.” She says it like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “Think about it. You’re not actually interested in him, right? You’re not going to fall all over yourself trying to get his attention. You’re not going to be waiting outside his classes or accidentally showing up wherever he hangs out. You’re not going to be like every other girl who’s chased after him.”

You frown. “So... what, I just... do nothing?”

“No, you do the opposite of chasing.” Yunjin grins, and it’s slightly wicked. “You make yourself as uninteresting to him as possible. You’re awkward, you’re weird, you’re clearly not trying to impress him. You don’t dress up when you know you might see him. You talk about boring things. You mention, I don’t know, your extensive collection of vintage stamps or whatever nerdy hobby you can think of. You make yourself boring.”

“I don’t have a stamp collection.”

“Then make one up! The point is, Heeseung is used to girls who want him. If you clearly don’t want him, his interest is going to fizzle out faster than a cheap sparkler. He’ll move on to the next girl who bats her eyelashes at him, and you’ll be free. No confrontation necessary.”

You turn this over in your mind. It’s... not the worst idea you’ve ever heard. In fact, compared to your current strategy of blind panic and tactical fleeing, it’s practically genius. If you can’t correct the misunderstanding without making everything worse, maybe you can just... let it die on its own. Let Heeseung’s fabled short attention span work in your favor. Become so aggressively unappealing that he loses interest within a week and never thinks about you again.

And once he’s out of the picture, once enough time has passed, maybe you can try again with Jungwon. Properly. With better aim.

“You’re a genius,” you tell Yunjin, the hope creeping back into your voice. “An absolute genius. I could kiss you.”

“Please don’t, you’re covered in grass stains.” She nudges one of the bubble teas toward you with her foot. “Drink your tea. Hydrate. And then we’re going to brainstorm all the ways you can make yourself seem as unappealing as possible to a hot third-year informatics student.”

You grab the drink and take a long sip, the sweetness settling something in your chest. For the first time in three days, you feel something other than panic. You feel strategic. You feel determined. Lee Heeseung might think you’re cute and brave and worthy of a coffee date, but he hasn’t met the version of you that’s about to emerge, a version so bland, so uninteresting, so aggressively mediocre that he’ll run in the opposite direction before the week is out.

“Okay,” you say, wiping your mouth with the back of your hand. “Okay. Let’s do this. Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested starts now.”

Yunjin raises her bubble tea in a toast. “To being boring.”

You clink your cup against hers. “To being boring.”

Somewhere across campus Heeseung is still standing in the quad with a confused expression on his face and a lavender envelope in his pocket, wondering why the girl who supposedly has a crush on him just sprinted away like she was being chased by bears.

He’s not used to this. He’s not used to any of this.

And that, he realizes with a small, bemused shake of his head, is exactly what makes it so interesting.

—————

Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested lasted exactly four days before it encountered its first major obstacle.

That obstacle is approximately six feet tall, has flowing hair that falls perfectly across his forehead, and is currently walking directly toward your table in the cafeteria with a tray in his hands and a smile on his face that suggests he has absolutely no idea he's supposed to be losing interest in you.

You spot him approximately 2.3 seconds too late. By the time your brain registers the approaching danger, you are already mid-bite into a sad cafeteria sandwich, your mouth full of bread and lettuce and the dawning realization that you are trapped. There is no escape route. Your table is in the corner, surrounded on three sides by walls and on the fourth side by Heeseung's rapidly approaching form. You are a cornered animal. A very stupid, very panicked cornered animal with mayonnaise on her chin.

"Y/N!" Heeseung says your name like it's his favorite word, bright and warm and entirely too enthusiastic for someone who's supposed to be a notorious womanizer with a short attention span. "I was hoping I'd run into you. Mind if I sit?"

Mind if he sits? Of course you mind. You mind immensely. You mind with every fiber of your being. Sitting with Heeseung is the exact opposite of what Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested is supposed to accomplish. Sitting with Heeseung means talking to Heeseung, and talking to Heeseung means opportunities to accidentally charm him, and charming him is categorically Not The Goal.

But Heeseung is already pulling out the chair across from you, and his smile is so genuine, and there's a tiny bit of what looks like grease on his cheekbone that suggests he's just come from some kind of engineering lab, and you are weak. You are so, so weak.

"Go ahead," you hear yourself say, and then immediately want to punch yourself in the face.

Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested, Day Four, 12:34 PM: catastrophic failure already in progress.

Heeseung settles into the chair with an easy grace, setting his tray down and immediately stealing one of your fries like you're old friends who share food on a regular basis. You watch the fry disappear into his mouth and feel a small part of your soul leave your body.

"So," he says, leaning back and studying you with those dark, unreadable eyes. "You ran away from me pretty fast the other day. Should I be worried? Do I have something on my face?"

He doesn't. He absolutely doesn't. He has the kind of face that belongs on a billboard, all sharp angles and soft edges and that one little mole on his forehead that you are definitely not noticing because noticing things about Heeseung's face is counterproductive to the mission.

"No," you say quickly. "No, you're fine. Your face is fine. I mean, you don't have anything on your face. I just remembered I had somewhere to be. Very suddenly. It was urgent."

"An urgent… lab class?" Heeseung's lips twitch. "That's what you said, right? An urgent lab class on a Thursday afternoon?"

Your face heats. "Yes. Exactly. Lab class. Very urgent. Science doesn't wait."

"Mmm." He pops another one of your fries into his mouth. "Well, the good news is, you don't look like you're in a hurry right now. So we can actually talk. You know, like normal people who are supposedly getting to know each other?"

Right. Getting to know each other. Because you confessed to him. Because he thinks you like him. Because you're living in an elaborate lie of your own making.

This is your chance, though. This is the perfect opportunity to implement Phase One of the Make Him Uninterested plan: Be Weird and Off-Putting. You just have to be the most boring, strange, unappealing version of yourself that you can possibly imagine. How hard can it be?

Pretty hard, as it turns out, because your brain chooses this exact moment to go completely blank.

"So," Heeseung says, apparently unbothered by your silence, "tell me about yourself. What do you like to do for fun? Besides writing beautiful love letters and then running away from the recipient?"

You choke on your own saliva. Just… straight up choke on nothing, like a cartoon character. "I don't…that wasn't…I do normal things. Normal fun things. Like… watching paint dry. And counting ceiling tiles. Very relaxing. You should try it."

Heeseung's expression flickers, confusion, amusement, something in between. "Counting ceiling tiles?"

"There are forty-seven in this cafeteria," you say, doubling down with the desperate energy of someone who has already committed to the bit. "Forty-eight if you count the one that's partially covered by that vent over there. But some people don't count partial tiles. It's a philosophical debate, really."

"Fascinating," Heeseung says, and the worst part is that he sounds like he actually means it. "What else?"

What else? What else can you say that will make you sound completely unappealing? You cast around for inspiration, your eyes landing on your sandwich. Okay. Fine. If words can't do the job, maybe actions can.

You pick up your sandwich with both hands and take the weirdest bite you can physically manage, mouth open slightly too wide, chewing with exaggerated jaw movements, making an unfortunate amount of noise in the process. You feel like a cow. You look like a cow. You are embodying the spirit of a cow, and surely, surely, this is enough to make any self-respecting hot informatics student run for the hills.

Heeseung watches you chew. His expression doesn't change.

"Good sandwich?" he asks mildly.

"Mmf," you say, still chewing, still being a cow. "Very good. I love-"

And then the lettuce hits the back of your throat.

You don't know how it happens. One moment you're chewing normally, well, abnormally, but in a controlled way and the next moment a piece of lettuce stages a rebellion and lodges itself directly in your windpipe. Your eyes go wide. Your hand flies to your throat. You make a sound that is somewhere between a wheeze and a honk.

"Y/N?" Heeseung's amused expression shifts to concern. "Are you okay?"

You are not okay. You are choking. You are choking on lettuce in front of Lee Heeseung in the middle of the cafeteria, and this is how you're going to die.

Heeseung is on his feet now, moving around the table with surprising speed. "Hey, hey, can you breathe? Do you need me to-"

You shake your head frantically, still making dying cow noises, and grab your water bottle with shaking hands. The first gulp does nothing. The second gulp, by some miracle, dislodges the lettuce just enough for you to cough it up into a napkin with all the grace and dignity of a cat hacking up a hairball.

Silence.

The entire cafeteria, you're convinced, is staring at you. In reality, probably only a few nearby tables have noticed, but it feels apocalyptic. You sit there, red-faced and teary-eyed, clutching a napkin full of your own near-death experience, and want the floor to open up and swallow you whole.

Heeseung kneels beside your chair, one hand hovering near your shoulder like he isn't sure if touching you would be welcome. "Hey. You're okay. You're okay, right? Do you need me to get you anything? More water? A doctor? A new sandwich without lettuce?"

His voice is gentle. Genuinely gentle. Not the smooth, charming tone you expect from someone with his reputation, but something softer, something that sounds almost like real concern.

"I'm fine," you croak, your voice ravaged. "I'm fine. That happens. All the time. I'm very bad at eating. It's one of my traits."

"One of your traits," Heeseung repeats, and the corner of his mouth twitches despite his obvious worry. "Being bad at eating?"

"It's a lifestyle choice."

He laughs. Not a polite chuckle or a mocking snicker, but a real laugh, surprised and bright and completely unguarded. He sits back down in his chair, shaking his head, and looks at you with something that is definitely not boredom or disinterest.

"You're really something else, you know that?"

You don't know how to respond to that, so you don't. You just sit there, still clutching your napkin of shame, and wonder how Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested has somehow resulted in him laughing at your jokes and looking at you like you're the most entertaining thing he's encountered all week.

"So," Heeseung says, propping his chin on his hand, "I've been wondering. What made you decide to confess to me? Was there a specific moment? Something I did?"

Oh no.

Oh no, oh no, oh no.

This is the worst possible question he could ask. You can't tell him the truth…I didn't mean to confess to you, I meant to confess to your friend, you just happened to be sitting in the wrong place at the wrong time, please don't hate me…but you also can't just… not answer. He's looking at you expectantly, his dark eyes curious and open, and you have approximately three seconds to come up with a convincing lie before the silence becomes too awkward to recover from.

"Your… kindness," you say, grasping at straws. "You're very… kind. To everyone. I noticed."

Heeseung tilts his head. "My kindness?"

"Very kind," you repeat, nodding vigorously. "So kind. The kindest. I saw you… hold a door open for someone once. It was… inspiring."

"I held a door open."

"A door. Yes. It was a very heavy door. And you held it. For a long time. Multiple people went through. It was very impressive."

Heeseung stares at you for a moment, and you stare back, your face burning, your soul evacuating your body. This is it. This is the moment he realizes you are completely unhinged and decides to never speak to you again. This is the victory of Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested.

"That's…" Heeseung starts, and then pauses. "That's the first time anyone's ever confessed to me because I held a door open. Usually I get compliments about my face. Or my voice. One girl told me I had a nose made to be sat on, which I still don't fully understand."

"Your node is… fine," you say weakly. "I didn't notice your nose. Or your face at all. Just the door. The door was the important part."

"A door," Heeseung says, and that smile is spreading across his face again, the one that makes him look less like a notorious player and more like someone who has just found a particularly entertaining puzzle. "You wrote me a three-page love letter because I held a door open."

"The calligraphy alone took a week," you say, and immediately regret it.

Heeseung laughs again, and this time it's softer, almost wondering. "You're not what I expected," he says. "At all."

"Is that… good or bad?"

"I haven't decided yet." But he's still smiling, and his eyes are still fixed on you with that curious intensity, and you're starting to get the sinking feeling that everything you do, no matter how strange or off-putting you try to be, is having the exact opposite effect of what you intend.

You need a new strategy. Something foolproof. Something so aggressively unappealing that even the most determined people-pleaser can't pretend to be interested.

And then, like a gift from the gods of social awkwardness, the topic of video games comes up.

Heeseung mentions something about blowing off steam after a tough assignment by playing a few rounds of something, and the question slips out before you can stop it: "Wait, do you play League of Legends?"

He raises an eyebrow. "Sometimes. You?"

And that's it. That's the moment the dam breaks.

You don't mean to start geeking out. It just happens. One moment you're thinking be boring, be uninteresting, be bland, and the next moment you're fifteen minutes deep into an impassioned monologue about the current meta, the problems with the jungle role, and why Riot Games needs to nerf a specific champion into the ground before she single-handedly destroys the competitive scene.

"-and don't even get me started on the new items, because the balance team clearly doesn't play their own game, which is fine, whatever, it's not like I have strong opinions about it except I absolutely do, and I wrote an entire essay about it on the subreddit that got like two thousand upvotes, so clearly I'm not the only one who thinks the armor penetration scaling is completely broken-"

You stop.

You stop because you have just realized, with dawning horror, that you have been talking for an incredibly long time without letting Heeseung get a single word in. You have been gesticulating. You have been making sound effects. At one point, you're pretty sure you drew a diagram on a napkin to illustrate the optimal jungle pathing route.

This is it. This is definitely, absolutely it. There is no way a hot third-year informatics student wants to listen to a first-year STEM girl rant about video game balance for fifteen straight minutes. Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested has just achieved its first genuine success.

You brace yourself for the polite excuse, the awkward glance at his phone, the slow backing away.

Instead, Heeseung leans forward, resting his elbows on the table, and says: "Okay, but hear me out, what if the armor penetration scaling isn't the problem, and it's actually the base damage values that need to be adjusted? Because if you look at the win rate data across different elos, the issue isn't consistent at all levels of play."

You blink.

"I main ADC," he adds, as if this is a perfectly normal confession. "So trust me, I feel your pain about the jungle situation. Do you know how many times I've been left to solo dragon because my jungler was AFK farming? Too many. Too many times."

"You… main ADC?"

"Vayne and Kai'Sa mostly. Sometimes Jhin if I'm feeling dramatic."

You have no response to this. Your brain has short-circuited somewhere around the phrase "win rate data across different elos," and it's still rebooting.

"Your essay on the subreddit," Heeseung continues, pulling out his phone. "What was the title? I want to read it. I love seeing well-reasoned arguments about game balance, and honestly, most of what gets posted is just people complaining without any actual data to back it up."

"It was… it was called The Current State of Armor Penetration: A Statistical Analysis and Why I'm Losing My Mind," you say faintly.

Heeseung types something into his phone, scrolls for a moment, and then his face lights up. "Found it. Two thousand three hundred upvotes and fourteen awards? That's impressive. Wait, you made graphs? You made graphs?"

"I was very passionate about the subject."

"Passionate," Heeseung repeats, looking up from his phone with an expression you can't quite read. "Yeah. I'm starting to get that about you."

He tucks his phone away and smiles at you, and it isn't the smooth, practiced smile you expect from the campus womanizer. It's something smaller. Something realer. Something that makes your stomach do a weird, traitorous flip that you immediately try to suppress.

"You know," he says, tilting his head as he studies you, "you remind me of a mouse."

Your brain screeches to a halt. "A… mouse?"

"Yeah. A little field mouse. The way your nose scrunches up when you're thinking, and how you get all twitchy and skittish when you're nervous. It's cute. It's really cute."

Cute. He calls you cute. He compares you to a rodent and somehow makes it sound like a compliment, and worst of all, worst of all, you can feel a traitorous blush spreading across your cheeks like wildfire.

"I'm not…I don't…mice are not cute. Mice are pests. They carry diseases. I'm basically a health hazard."

Heeseung laughs, and it's the same genuine laugh from before, and he's looking at you like you're the most entertaining thing he's seen in years. "A health hazard. Right. Well, consider me warned."

He stands up, gathering his tray, and for one beautiful, hopeful moment, you think the ordeal is over. But then he pauses, looking down at you with that unreadable expression, and says the words that haunt you for the rest of the day:

"I was interested before, but now?" He shakes his head, still smiling. "Now I'm really interested. See you around, little mouse."

And then he walks away, leaving you alone at your corner table with a half-eaten sandwich, a napkin full of regurgitated lettuce, and the sinking realization that Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested is not only failing, it's backfiring spectacularly.

You try to be weird, and he calls you cute.

You try to be boring, and he engages with your niche gaming opinions.

You try to choke to death in front of him, and he kneels beside your chair with genuine concern in his eyes.

You bang your forehead against the cafeteria table once, twice, three times, not caring who sees. This is a disaster. This is an unmitigated, unprecedented, absolutely catastrophic disaster. Hana's plan was supposed to work. Heeseung was supposed to get bored. He was supposed to move on. He was not supposed to look at you like you're a puzzle he wants to solve, or call you a mouse in a tone of voice that makes your heart do gymnastics, or read your League of Legends essay and compliment your graphs.

You need to regroup. You need to call an emergency meeting with Yunjin. You need to figure out a new strategy before this situation spirals even further out of control.

But first, you need to go to the library and return the books that are due today before you accrue another fine, because no matter how catastrophic your love life becomes, the university library shows no mercy.

—————

The library is your sanctuary. It always has been, a quiet, climate-controlled haven where the smell of old paper and the soft hum of fluorescent lights can soothe even the most tensed of nerves. After the cafeteria incident, you need sanctuary more than ever. You slip through the main doors with your stack of books clutched to your chest, inhaling the familiar scent of knowledge and dust, and feel some of the tension begin to ease from your shoulders.

Everything is fine. Everything is going to be fine. You return your books, you find Yunjin, you regroup, and you figure out a way to-

"Y/N?"

The voice comes from somewhere to your left, and you know that voice. You know it the way a flower knows the sun, the way a compass knows north, the way a hopeless romantic knows the exact cadence of her crush's greeting.

Jungwon is sitting at a table near the history section, surrounded by a fortress of textbooks and loose papers. He's wearing glasses…glasses…and his hair is slightly mussed from what you assume is hours of intense studying, and he's looking at you with that smile, the one that crinkles the corners of his eyes and makes your entire nervous system short-circuit.

"Hey," he says, waving you over. "What are you doing here?"

Existing in the same space as you, you think. Breathing the same air. Trying not to spontaneously combust.

"Returning books," you say, holding up your stack as evidence. "I have some overdue ones. The library fines are no joke."

"Tell me about it. I had to pay fifteen thousand won last semester because I forgot about a book I'd checked out for a research paper." Jungwon winces at the memory. "My wallet still hasn't recovered."

"That's brutal."

"The library giveth, and the library taketh away."

You laugh, and it comes out surprisingly normal, not too loud, not too high-pitched, just a regular human laugh from a regular human person who is definitely not having an internal meltdown about how good Jungwon looks in glasses.

"Hey," Jungwon says, glancing at the empty chair across from him, "if you're not in a hurry, do you want to study together? I've been here for three hours and my brain is starting to melt. It would be nice to have some company."

Your heart stops.

Yang Jungwon, the Yang Jungwon, the owner of the smile and the laugh and the gummy bears at 2 AM is asking you to study with him. This is the kind of moment you've daydreamed about for months. This is a meet-cute in progress. This is the universe throwing you a lifeline after the cafeteria disaster, a chance to actually spend time with the boy you've been pining over since midterms.

"Yes," you say, before your brain can remind you of all the reasons this is a terrible idea. "Yes, I'd…I'd love to. Let me just return these first."

You practically skip to the returns desk, your heart doing a full backflip in your chest. By the time you make it back to Jungwon's table, your philosophy textbook and notebook spread out in front of you, you've convinced yourself that this is exactly what you need. Some time with Jungwon. Some time to remember why you wrote that letter in the first place. Some time to reconnect with the feelings that got buried under the chaos of the Heeseung situation.

The only problem is that you can't focus on studying at all.

You try. You really, genuinely try. You open your textbook to the assigned chapter. You uncap your highlighter. You fix your eyes on the page and attempt to absorb information about ethical frameworks and moral philosophy. But your eyes keep drifting up, against your will, over the top of your book, to the boy sitting across from you.

Jungwon is studying. Actually studying, not fake studying, not pretending to study while secretly watching you the way you're watching him. His brow is furrowed in concentration, his pen moving steadily across his notebook as he takes notes. Every so often, he pauses, taps the end of his pen against his chin, and then resumes writing with renewed focus. The late afternoon light slants through the window behind him, catching the highlights in his dark hair and making him look like he's stepped out of a painting.

He is beautiful. He's so beautiful that it makes your chest ache, a soft, sweet ache that you've been carrying around since the moment you first saw him in this very library. You watch the way his fingers curl around his pen, the way he bites his lower lip when he's thinking, the way his glasses slide down his nose and he pushes them back up with an absent gesture.

"I can feel you looking at me," Jungwon says, not glancing up from his notebook.

Your entire body jolts like you've been electrocuted. "I wasn't…I was just…there's a clock behind you. I was checking the time."

Jungwon looks up then, and there's a knowing glint in his eyes that makes your stomach do a slow, somersaulting flip. "The clock is to your right, Y/N. Not behind me."

You look to your right. Sure enough, there's the clock, hanging on the wall in plain view, which you would have noticed if you'd spent even one second actually looking for it instead of gazing at Jungwon's face like a Renaissance painter studying their muse.

"I'm… directionally challenged," you say weakly.

"Uh-huh." Jungwon sets down his pen, and the smile playing at the corners of his mouth is soft and teasing and absolutely devastating. "Come here for a second."

"What?"

"Just come here. Lean forward a little."

Your body obeys before your brain can intervene. You lean across the table, your heart hammering so loudly you're certain the entire library can hear it. Jungwon leans forward too, closing the distance between you, and you catch a faint whiff of something clean and subtle, laundry detergent, maybe, or the kind of fragrance that just smells like him.

His hand reaches out, and before you can process what's happening, his index finger gently pokes your cheek.

"Boop," he says.

You make a sound. You don't know what the sound is supposed to be. Maybe a laugh, maybe a question, maybe a plea for mercy. What comes out is something closer to a squeak, a small, strangled, completely undignified squeak that would be embarrassing if you had any brain cells left to feel embarrassment.

Jungwon's smile widens, and his finger lingers on your cheek for just a moment longer than necessary. "You had an eyelash," he says. "Right there. But also, you just looked really cute staring at me like that. I couldn't resist."

Cute. He calls you cute. That's twice in one day that a devastatingly attractive boy has called you cute, and your hopeless romantic heart doesn't know whether to celebrate or go into cardiac arrest.

"I wasn't staring," you whisper, but it comes out completely unconvincing.

"You were absolutely staring." Jungwon withdraws his hand, but his smile stays, warm and fond and knowing. "It's okay. I don't mind. It's kind of nice, actually. Being looked at like that."

"Like what?"

"Like I'm something worth looking at."

The words settle into your chest like a stone dropping into still water, sending ripples through your entire body. He thinks it's nice. He thinks you're nice or at least your staring is nice and he pokes your cheek and calls you cute and now he's going back to his studying like he hasn't just fundamentally altered your brain chemistry.

You try to return to your textbook. The words swim in front of your eyes, meaningless and blurry. You highlight a sentence at random, realize you have no idea what it says, and highlight it again for good measure. The page is now approximately forty percent highlighter ink.

"You're going to run out of highlighter at that rate," Jungwon observes, not looking up.

"I have backups," you say. "I always have backups."

"Of course you do."

The studying session continues for another hour, and you absorb approximately zero information about ethical frameworks. What you do absorb is a comprehensive catalogue of Jungwon's study habits: the way he organizes his notes with color-coded tabs, the way he mutters to himself when he's working through a difficult concept, the way he absentmindedly drums his fingers against the table when he's thinking. Every detail is another entry in your mental Jungwon database, another thread in the tapestry of your affection.

By the time you pack up your things and say goodbye, "See you in philosophy," Jungwon says, and you respond with something that might be words or might be a series of enthusiastic nods, you are floating. You are literally, physically floating, your feet barely touching the ground as you drift out of the library and across campus toward your dorm.

Jungwon pokes your cheek. Jungwon calls you cute. Jungwon says he likes being looked at by you.

You are winning. Despite the Heeseung disaster, despite the cafeteria catastrophe, despite everything, you are winning.

By the time you reach your dorm room, you are a mess of giddy energy with nowhere to go. You close the door behind you, throw your backpack onto your desk chair, and then proceed to wriggle across your bed like an ecstatic worm, kicking your feet and muffling your squeals into your pillow.

"He called me cute," you whisper to your empty room, your voice muffled by fabric. "He poked my cheek. He did the boop thing. The boop thing, you guys. Who does the boop thing? Adorable people, that's who. Perfect people. People with beautiful smiles and kind eyes and-"

You roll onto your back, staring at the ceiling with a dreamy expression. The ceiling has forty-three tiles in your room. You counted them on your first night in the dorm. But right now, all you can see is Jungwon's face, the way he looked at you across the library table, the way his finger felt against your cheek, the way his voice went soft when he said like I'm something worth looking at.

You are going to marry him. You are going to marry Yang Jungwon and have a beautiful wedding with string lights and wildflowers and a three-tier cake, and you will tell the story of how you stared at him in the library and he poked your cheek and-

You stop wriggling.

Wait.

Wait, wait, wait.

You can't marry Jungwon. You can't even confess to Jungwon, because Jungwon thinks you confessed to Heeseung. Jungwon thinks you're interested in someone else. Jungwon was sweet and friendly and maybe a little bit flirty, but that's just his personality. He's nice to everyone. He gives you gummy bears at 2 AM; he probably gives gummy bears to everyone who looks tired. You aren't special. You are just… there.

The giddiness begins to drain out of you, replaced by the familiar weight of reality. You are still trapped in the Heeseung situation. You are still the girl who confessed to the wrong person. And no matter how many times Jungwon pokes your cheek, that fundamental fact isn't going to change.

With a heavy sigh, you drag yourself through your evening routine: shower, skincare, the episode of the baking show you're halfway through and finally crawl into bed around midnight, your emotions a tangled knot of hope and despair.

Sleep comes slowly, a gradual descent into darkness, and then-

—————

You are in the PC room again.

But this time it's different. The lights are dimmer, the computers all dark, the chairs empty. It's just you, and the door is swinging shut behind you, and there's someone waiting at the computer closest to the door.

Heeseung.

He's sitting in the chair, facing away from you, his headphones around his neck and his shoulders relaxed. When he hears your footsteps, he turns, and his expression isn't surprised or amused or curious. It's something else entirely. Something darker. Something that makes your breath catch in your throat.

"You're here," he says, and his voice is lower than you've ever heard it, a rumble that vibrates through your bones. "I've been waiting for you, little mouse."

"I'm not-" you start, but he's already standing, already moving toward you, and you can't seem to make your feet work. You're rooted to the spot, watching him approach with a mixture of fear and something else, something you don't want to name.

He stops inches away from you, close enough that you can feel the warmth radiating from his body, close enough that you can see the individual strands of his hair and the curve of his lips and the way his eyes, God, his eyes are fixed on your mouth.

"You know what I've been thinking about?" he murmurs, and one of his hands comes up to brush a strand of hair away from your face, his fingers lingering against your temple. "I've been thinking about that letter. The way you said you only had eyes for me. The way you said you couldn't stop thinking about me."

"That wasn't-" you try, but your voice comes out as barely a whisper, and Heeseung's thumb is tracing along your jawline now, feather-light and devastating.

"I can't stop thinking about you either," he says, and his face is getting closer, closer, and you can feel his breath against your lips. "Do you want to know what I think about?"

Your heart is hammering. Your skin is on fire. You can't move, can't speak, can't do anything except stare up at him with wide eyes as his other hand settles on your waist, warm and solid and pulling you closer.

"I think about this," he whispers, and then his mouth is on yours.

The kiss is…it's…

It's intense. It's consuming. It's the kind of kiss that erases every rational thought from your brain and replaces it with pure, unfiltered sensation. His lips are soft but insistent, moving against yours with a confidence that makes your knees weak. His hand tightens on your waist, pulling you flush against him, and you make a sound against his mouth, something small and breathless and completely involuntary.

When he finally pulls back, his forehead resting against yours, his voice is rough. "You’re what I’ve been looking for my whole life, Y/N. You’re my miracle."

And then his lips are on your neck, trailing fire down to your collarbone, and your head falls back, and his name escapes your mouth in a way you've never said it before-

He kneels before you, his movements fluid and deliberate. His eyes never leave yours as he unzips his jeans, freeing his already hard cock. It stands proud and thick, the tip glistening with pre-cum. He takes your foot in his warm hand, bringing it to his shaft.

"Look what you do to me," he murmurs, his voice husky with desire. He wraps your foot around his length, his thumb pressing against your arch as he begins to move your foot up and down his cock. His eyes flutter closed for a moment, a low groan escaping his lips.

The sensation of his hot skin against your sole sends shivers through your body. You watch, mesmerized, as he uses your foot to pleasure himself, his hips thrusting in rhythm with the movements of your foot. His other hand moves to your ankle, his grip firm but gentle, his fingers stroking your sensitive skin.

His eyes open, locking with yours again, and the intensity in his gaze makes your breath catch. "You're so beautiful," he breathes, his movements becoming faster, more urgent. "You’re perfect the way you are."

His breathing grows ragged, his muscles tensing. With a guttural moan, he comes, his hot release spilling over your foot and his hand. He leans forward, his tongue darting out to taste his own cum from your skin, his movements slow and sensual. He licks your foot clean, his tongue tracing patterns on your arch, between your toes, sending waves of pleasure through your body.

Then he shifts, positioning himself between your legs. He looks up at you, his eyes dark with desire. "I need to taste you," he says, his voice rough with need.

He hooks his fingers into the waistband of your panties, pulling them down slowly, his eyes never leaving yours. He tosses them aside, then leans in, his breath hot against your most sensitive flesh.

His tongue flicks out, teasing your clit, and you gasp, your hands flying to his hair. He chuckles, the vibration sending another jolt of pleasure through you. "Patience, little mouse," he murmurs against your skin.

His tongue moves in slow, deliberate circles, building your pleasure gradually. He alternates between broad, flat strokes and quick, precise flicks of his tongue against your clit. His fingers join in, one, then two, sliding inside you, curling to hit that spot that makes you cry.

Your hips buck against his face, your breath coming in ragged gasps. "Heeseung," you moan, your fingers tightening in his hair.

He responds with increased enthusiasm, his tongue working faster, his fingers pumping in and out of you. The pressure builds inside you, a coil of pleasure winding tighter and tighter until it snaps.

You come with a cry, your body convulsing as waves of pleasure wash over you. But Heeseung doesn't stop. He continues his assault on your senses, his tongue and fingers working in perfect harmony to bring you to the edge again.

And then you are squirting, your release flooding his mouth and chin as he drinks you in, his movements never faltering. He looks up at you, his eyes gleaming with satisfaction as he laps up every drop.

When he finally pulls away, his face glistening with your juices, he crawls up your body, capturing your lips in a searing kiss. You can taste yourself on his tongue, and the intimacy of it sends another wave of desire through you.

"Tell me you’re only thinking of me," he whispers against your lips, his hands roaming your body. "and not Jungwon."

You wake up.

You wake up in your dorm room, in your bed, at 7:43 AM on a Tuesday morning, with your heart pounding and your skin flushed, your panties soaked and your sheets twisted around your legs like they've been through a battle.

For a long moment, you just lie there, staring at the ceiling, trying to remember how to breathe.

Did you just… did you just dream about… did Lee Heeseung, the guy you're supposed to be making uninterested in you, the guy you've been trying to avoid and ignore and repel, just star in what can only be described as an extremely obscene dream? The virgin you are just cringed at the memory.

You press your hands to your burning cheeks and let out a sound that is somewhere between a groan and a scream.

"No," you whisper to the empty room. "No, no, no. This isn't, this can't…I don't even like him. I like Jungwon. Jungwon! I've liked Jungwon for four months. I wrote a letter to Jungwon. I have a color-coded mental database of Jungwon's habits. I want to marry Jungwon and have a three-tier wedding cake with wildflowers!"

But your brain, traitorous and unhelpful, keeps replaying fragments of the dream, the way Heeseung's eyes go dark, the way his voice rumbles against your ear, the way his hand feels on your waist, the way his tongue is warm and-

You grab your pillow and press it over your face, screaming into it with all the force your lungs can muster.

This is wrong. This is so, so wrong. You are a Jungwon girl. You've always been a Jungwon girl. You don't think about Heeseung like that. You don't think about Heeseung like anything. Heeseung is an obstacle. Heeseung is a problem to be solved. Heeseung is the guy you're actively trying to repel, not the guy who shows up in your subconscious and does things that make you blush in the privacy of your own bed.

"I'm a psychopath," you say to your pillow. "I'm a complete and utter psychopath. Who dreams about this with a guy they're supposed to be making uninterested? A psychopath, that's who. A deranged lunatic. A person with a broken brain."

Your pillow, predictably, does not respond.

You drag yourself out of bed and into the bathroom, splashing cold water on your face and avoiding your own reflection in the mirror. You don't want to look at yourself. You don't want to see the evidence of the dream still lingering in your flushed cheeks…and between your legs.

This is a problem. This is a Major Problem with capital letters and possibly a warning siren. You can't afford to be having dreams about Lee Heeseung. You can't afford to be thinking about Lee Heeseung at all. Your entire strategy, Operation Make Heeseung Uninterested depends on you being able to keep a clear head and a steady heart, and neither of those things is going to be possible if your subconscious keeps ambushing you with extremely vivid, extremely inappropriate content.

You need to talk to Yunjin. Immediately. Before your brain can conjure up any more unauthorized imagery.

But as you grab your phone and type out a frantic message, EMERGENCY MEETING REQUIRED IMMEDIATELY CODE RED REPEAT CODE RED, you can't quite shake the lingering sensation from the dream.

The way Heeseung's thumb traces along your jawline.

The way he calls you little mouse in that low, rumbling voice.

The way he says you were perfect the way you were like he means it, like it's true, like he's been into you his whole life and hasn't even known it.

You shake your head violently, flinging droplets of water across the bathroom mirror.

"Nope," you say out loud. "Nope, nope, nope. We're not doing this. We're not thinking about this. We're going to go to class and eat lunch and avoid all tall informatics students, and we're going to get our brain back on the Jungwon track where it belongs."

But even as you say it, even as you try to mean it, a small, treacherous part of you wonders if maybe, just maybe, the Jungwon track isn't the only track worth following anymore.

You shove that thought into a mental box, lock it, and throw away the key.

You have a plan. You have a strategy. You are going to make Heeseung uninterested, and you are going to figure out a way to untangle the misunderstanding, and you are going to end up with Jungwon like you were always supposed to.

The dream is just a dream. It doesn't mean anything. It can't mean anything.

You refuse to let it mean anything.

(But when you catch yourself glancing toward the informatics building on your way to class, you walk a little faster, and you definitely, absolutely, one hundred percent do not wonder what Lee Heeseung is doing right now.)

—————

The dream haunts you for three days.

Not in a supernatural, ghost-in-the-corner kind of way. More in an I-can't-make-eye-contact-with-my-own-reflection kind of way. Every time you close your eyes, fragments of it flicker behind your eyelids like a movie you hadn't asked to watch. The dark PC room. The way Heeseung's voice drops to a rumble. The phantom sensation of his tongue on your clit, his hand on your ankle, his look-

You physically convulse every time the memory resurfaces, which is approximately every forty-five minutes. Your philosophy notes become a graveyard of distracted doodles, half of which look suspiciously like the curve of someone's jaw. You have to throw away an entire page because you accidentally write "little mouse" in the margin instead of "moral relativism."

Yunjin is no help whatsoever.

"So you had a wet dream about the hot guy who you’re supposedly getting bored of," she says over bubble tea the day after the incident, her expression thoroughly unimpressed. "This is a problem because…?"

"Because I don't like him, Yunjin! I like Jungwon! I've liked Jungwon since midterms! Jungwon is the goal! Jungwon is the three-tier wedding cake!"

"And Heeseung is…?"

"A temporary obstacle! A misunderstanding with legs! A very tall, very inconvenient plot twist!"

Yunjin sucks on her tapioca pearls with the air of a therapist who has heard it all before and is no longer surprised by anything. "You know what they say about protesting too much."

"I am not protesting too much. I am protesting exactly the right amount. I am protesting a perfectly calibrated quantity."

"Sure." She pats your hand with condescending sympathy. "Whatever helps you sleep at night. Oh wait-"

You throw a tapioca pearl at her face. It sticks to her cheek for a solid three seconds before falling off, and the look of absolute betrayal on her face is the only bright spot in your otherwise nightmare-plagued week.

But now it's Thursday. Thursday, 2:15 PM. You're stationed in the science building's main hallway, crouched behind a bulletin board that is absolutely not wide enough to hide your entire body, waiting for the coast to clear so you can sprint to your next class without encountering any tall informatics students.

Your system has evolved since the early days of the crisis. You now have a color-coded schedule of Heeseung's known movements, courtesy of some light reconnaissance work that Yunjin calls "stalking" and you call "strategic intelligence gathering." You know his class schedule. You know his preferred study spots. You know that he tends to grab coffee from the campus café at exactly 3 PM on Tuesdays and Thursdays, which means the science building hallway should, theoretically, be a Heeseung-free zone at 2:15.

Theoretically.

You're just about to make your move, a quick dash to the stairwell, then up two flights, then a straight shot to classroom 307, when you hear it.

"Hey, is Y/N L/N in there?"

Your blood freezes. Your muscles lock. Your soul briefly departs your body and then slams back into it with force.

That's Heeseung's voice. That's unmistakably, undeniably, catastrophically Lee Heeseung's voice, and it's coming from approximately ten feet to your left, where the door to your department's main office stands open.

You press yourself harder against the bulletin board, praying for invisibility, praying for a sudden power outage, praying for the ground to open up and swallow you into its merciful embrace. None of these things happen. Instead, you hear the department secretary respond with cheerful obliviousness.

"Y/N L/N? First year, STEM? I think I saw her in the hallway just a minute ago. Let me check, oh, there she is! Y/N! You have a visitor!"

The secretary is pointing directly at your bulletin board. Your bulletin board that is not hiding you at all. Your bulletin board that is, in fact, leaving approximately seventy percent of your body completely visible to anyone who happens to look in that direction.

Heeseung turns.

Your eyes meet.

Time stops.

There are moments in life that feel like they stretch into eternity, moments so profoundly awkward, so cosmically embarrassing, that the universe itself seems to pause and take notice. This is one of those moments. You are frozen in a half-crouch behind a bulletin board, your backpack dangling from one shoulder, your hair escaping from the ponytail you threw it into this morning, your expression one of pure, unfiltered terror. Heeseung is standing in the doorway of the department office, looking unfairly attractive in a simple black hoodie and jeans, his eyebrows rising slowly toward his hairline.

A small crowd of students has paused in the hallway to watch. You can feel their eyes on you like a physical weight. Someone whispers something to their friend. Someone else pulls out their phone.

You are going to die. You are going to perish right here in the science building hallway, and your ghost will be doomed to haunt this bulletin board for all eternity.

"Y/N?" Heeseung's voice is a mixture of confusion and amusement. He takes a step toward you, and you instinctively take a step back, which results in you bumping directly into the bulletin board and causing several flyers to flutter dramatically to the ground. "Were you… hiding behind that?"

"No," you say, too quickly. "No, I was…I dropped something. A contact lens. I was looking for my contact lens."

"You don't wear contacts."

"I might! You don't know my life!"

"Your glasses are literally on your face right now."

You reach up and touch your glasses, which are indeed sitting on your nose, clearly visible, doing their job of correcting your vision. You have no response to this. There is no response to this. You have been caught in a lie so transparent it's essentially a window.

Heeseung's lips twitch. "You know, most people who have a crush on me don't run away and hide behind furniture. This is very confusing for my ego."

The crowd is still watching. Why is the crowd still watching? Don't they have classes to go to? Midterms to study for? Lives to live that don't involve spectating your public humiliation?

"I wasn't hiding from you specifically," you say, because apparently your mouth has decided to operate independently from your brain. "I was hiding from… the sun. It's very bright in here. I'm photosensitive."

"You're a STEM student hiding from the sun in a basement hallway with no windows," Heeseung says slowly. "That's… a new one."

"It's a medical condition. It's very serious. My doctor says I need to avoid direct fluorescent lighting."

"The fluorescent lighting is what's getting you."

"Absolutely. It's my greatest enemy. Well, second greatest. After-" You stop yourself before you can say after incredibly hot informatics students who keep appearing in my life like a recurring nightmare.

Heeseung waits. When you don't finish the sentence, that smile, the one that's definitely a smirk's second cousin, maybe even its first cousin at this point, spreads across his face.

"Well," he says, "now that I've found you and dragged you out of the shadows, literally, I was wondering if you wanted to grab coffee. With me. Right now."

Every single person in the hallway is looking at you. The secretary is looking at you from the office doorway, her expression one of grandmotherly delight at what she clearly perceives as a romantic overture. The students who stopped to watch are exchanging glances and whispers. One girl gives you an encouraging thumbs up.

You are trapped. You are cornered. You are a mouse being offered coffee by a very tall, very persistent cat.

And just like every other time Heeseung has put you on the spot, you open your mouth and the wrong words come out.

"I love coffee," you say. "Coffee is my favorite liquid. After water. And possibly juice. But it's definitely in the top three."

"Is that a yes?"

"…Yes."

Fate is a power believed to predetermine events, some unavoidable bullshit that people love to hold onto when things go wrong. A little explanation so they don't have to admit that sometimes things just fall apart because people make stupid choices, or because shit just happens for no good reason at all.

And right now? You think fate is complete fucking nonsense.

If fate was real, then maybe you wouldn't have been dumb enough to let things spiral the way they did. Maybe you would've stopped yourself before crossing the line.

Maybe if people weren't idiots, if they just paid attention for one goddamn second, things wouldn't end up worse than they needed to be. Like, for example—if someone didn't decide to throw a basketball straight to your fucking face like they had zero brain cells to work with.

Geez. Fate. Luck. Doom. What kind of bullshit logic even ties those things together? The more you think about it, the more it just pisses you off. People are so fucking dumb sometimes, acting like everything is written in the stars when half of it is just bad decisions stacked on top of each other.

"Hehe... I'm so sorry."

You glance at Karina from where you're sitting on the bench, an ice pack pressed against your already bruised nose, your face still sore from everything that's happened over the past few days. Her hand hovers mid-air, like she wants to check on you but isn't sure if you'll snap at her or brush her off.

She just got back from Japan and of course, Ryujin had already filled her in. Not just about how, three days into recovery of your accident, some dumbass from the basketball team managed to add another bruise to your already fucked-up nose during practice like it was some kind of sick joke.

But also that you got your heart broken. Well. You didn't want to tell her. You didn't want to tell anyone, if you were being honest. Saying it out loud makes it real in a way that just thinking about it doesn't. It turns it into something people can react to, something they can pity, something they can talk about. And you're not in the mood for that shit.

So you just exhale slowly, leaning back a bit, eyes drifting away from her. "It's fine," you mutter. Karina doesn't look convinced. She's not stupid. But for once, she doesn't push immediately. Thankfully.

She lowers her hand slowly, sitting down beside you, her shoulder brushing lightly against yours and you know exactly what she's trying to do—comfort, soften the edges, make it easier for you to crack open and talk. But you don't. You just let out a quiet sigh, leaning back slightly as if nothing about this is affecting you. You let her stay there because it's easier than pushing her away and dealing with the questions that would follow. You've always been good at this anyway—pretending. Acting like you're fine.

And weeks pass like that. Quietly. You make it a point—no, a fucking mission—that you and that man-who-shouldn't-be-named never cross paths.

You adjust your schedule, leaving earlier, coming home later, avoiding the living room at certain hours, listening for any sign that he's around before stepping out of your room. It's exhausting, honestly, but you do it anyway because the alternative—seeing him, talking to him, pretending like nothing happened or worse, acknowledging it—feels ten times worse.

You even considered moving out at one point, scrolling through listings late at night, checking dorm prices, calculating your budget over and over again like maybe the numbers would magically change.

They didn't.

Because you're broke. Like, actually fucking broke. Rent is insane, dorms are worse, and on top of that, your training for regionals has been eating up your time and energy like crazy. Your appetite has doubled—no, tripled—and now you can't go a day without stuffing yourself full or you start feeling like shit. And all your money? Gone. Straight into food. Food, food, and more fucking food.

You click your tongue in annoyance just thinking about it, dragging a hand down your face. Fuck this. Why did that man even cook for you so much before? Why did he set that stupid standard? Now your body's used to actual meals, and you can't even go back to your old habits without feeling like you're dying. It's irritating. It's inconvenient. It's— NO. You cut the thought off before it goes somewhere else.

You swore you wouldn't like anyone anymore. That shit is done. Over! Finished!

And honestly? All those stupid things people made you believe in? Complete bullshit. The grapes you ate during New Year's for luck? Fucking scam. The bracelet they made you wear in February because it's supposed to bring love or whatever the hell? Garbage. You should've thrown it away the moment you got it. And that horoscope reading? "2026 will be your year"—yeah, right. Biggest scam of them all!

"I miss you, please don't be angry at me!"

Karina wraps herself around you from behind, her arms locking tight around your shoulders. The impact makes you jolt forward slightly, your whole body stiffening as irritation immediately flashes across your face. You try to pry her off, fingers digging into her forearms.

"What's with you? I'm not angry, the hell?" you scoff, twisting your shoulder and swatting at her arm, but it does nothing. If anything, she tightens her hold, pressing her cheek against yours.

"I know you would say that," she whines, dragging every word out dramatically, completely unfazed by your resistance. Her voice softens just a little as she nuzzles closer. "But there's some kind of tension you have with me. I can feel it. I promise I'm not gonna push you with some other guy again, just talk to meeee."

"Karina!" you snap. You twist harder this time, trying to break free, your voice rising with both annoyance and disbelief. "I am not angry, what the—?!"

But she doesn't let go. "Really?" she shoots back immediately, her tone shifting to show she's not buying your shit. Her arms stay locked around you as she leans her chin on your shoulder, peeking at your face. "Then why won't you talk to me?"

"I'm not talking to anyone because I'm broken-hearted!" you fire back with sarcasm. You stop struggling for a second, your hands dropping uselessly to her arms as you huff out a breath. "Of course it's normal to be this way! You're the one who pushed me, remember?"

"Huhuhu, I'm so sorry!" Karina immediately wails, completely switching gears as she stomps her foot against the ground while still hugging you. The movement jostles both of you, but she doesn't loosen her grip. "Promise, I'll help you get over him. God, I hate him!" Her voice sharpens, her real irritation slipping through. "Do you want me to sabotage his project?! I heard his club is organizing some event with Architecture. Just say it. I'll definitely do it!"

You finally manage to grab her wrists and yank her arms off you, turning around to face her fully with a look that screams what the fuck is wrong with you. "No—what the fuck?" you snap, staring at her like she just suggested arson instead of whatever the hell that was. You roll your eyes, dragging a hand through your hair as you try to calm yourself again. "I just want to focus on Regionals. Just... don't mention him anymore." Your voice drops a little. "It's better to move on when I don't have updates or news."

Karina watches you for a second, her expression softening as she processes that, then she nods slowly. "Soooo... are we good?" she asks, immediately looping her arm around yours again.

You click your tongue, glancing at her from the corner of your eye. "Of course we are always good. What's with you?"

"You sure?" she presses, squinting at you like she's trying to catch you slipping.

"Yes."

"Then I have a gift for ya!" Her mood flips instantly again, energy shooting back up as she lets go and starts digging through one of her paper bags.

You watch her with mild suspicion, arms crossing over your chest as you wait—and then your expression completely breaks when she pulls out a clear plastic bag filled with water... and a tiny fish swimming inside.

"What the—"

"My guppy gave birth and I don't have a tanks anymore!" she beams proudly, holding it up like it's the best gift in the world. The fish wiggles inside the bag. "Take this as a gift for ya. It will help you clear your mind!"

"No. What the fuck?!" you hiss immediately, recoiling slightly. Your brows knit together in pure disbelief, staring at the tiny creature. "Karina, I'm not taking responsibility for a living thing right now—are you insane?!"

But she just grins wider, already trying to shove the bag toward you anyway.

And that was how you ended up bringing a fish

You are absolutely, undeniably, one hundred percent going to fucking kill Karina.

You stand in the middle of the kitchen, one hand gripping the plastic bag with a tiny fish inside, while your phone is awkwardly wedged between your shoulder and your ear. You open cabinets with your free hand, shoving things aside in search of anything that could pass as a container. It's 3:00 in the fucking afternoon, the heat pressing down on you like you are in hell, sweat already forming at the back of your neck. The aircon hums uselessly somewhere behind you, doing absolutely nothing. Why the hell is it not cooling? Is it broken? Did someone mess with it? Did he— NO.

"The fuck?!" you snap out loud when the call suddenly drops, the silence hitting immediately after Karina's last words—calm down, guppy don't need oxygen——before cutting off completely. You pull the phone away, glaring at the screen. No signal nor an Internet.

Of course! Jake is the one assigned to the internet payment. You remember clearly—you left the damn money on the center table days ago where he couldn't miss it. And now this? No connection, no help, no fucking instructions on how to keep this tiny living thing alive.

"God! The worst roommate ever!" you mutter under your breath, shoving your phone onto the counter with more force than necessary. Worst roommate! Worst fucking roommage! Not paying that damn internet, overheating the air conditioner since he was the one who is staying so damn long in the living room, rejecting your feelings— Hold on. Stop. Moving on remember?

You exhale sharply, like you're physically pushing the thought out of your system, and look back down at the plastic bag in your hands. The tiny fish wiggles inside, completely unbothered by your internal crisis, its small body flicking through the water.

"How am I supposed to know how to build your environment?!" you hiss at it. You let out a long breath, shoulders dropping slightly. "Okay... okay..." you mutter to yourself, trying to calm the fuck down. It's just a fish. A tiny, stupid fish. People take care of these things all the time. You can't be that incompetent.

You finally grab a glass jar from the cabinet, a clean one, at least, and set it down on the counter. It's not ideal, probably, but it's better than leaving it in a plastic bag forever like some kind of moving takeout.

Your eyes wander, and they land on that stupid little robot sitting lifelessly on the edge of the table. An idea sparks, ask Bumble for help! Of course! Jake's little tech toy could totally—well, theoretically—make this easier. You lean down, plastic bag in one hand, glass jar in the other, carefully lowering the fish into the water. The liquid sloshes around, tiny ripples forming, and the fish flicks its tail nervously.

Your fingers hover over the robot, hesitating a moment because the thing looks impossibly flat and dumb, and yet... Jake had somehow made it work before. How? How the fuck did he do that?

"Bumble, open," you command. The robot doesn't move. Not a single servo whir, not even a twitch. You frown, crouching lower to get a better look at it, poking at the flat surface with your fingertip. Nothing. You blink at it, confusion mixing with irritation as the anger starts to simmer back up again, fueled by the memory of that stupid, infuriating boy who made it work so effortlessly. His stupid braces flashing whenever he smiled, that crooked, perfect grin, his stupid, clueless, nerdy self who somehow made everything look so easy. Stupid boy.

You can't help it. You shake the robot lightly, as if your rage can transfer through it, make it activate, make it do something other than sit there mocking you.

"Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!" you hiss under your breath, frustration bubbling past the point of reason.

You can almost feel the heat of your blood rising in your cheeks, your heart hammering faster than it should over a stupid fish and a stupid robot. And yet, beneath all that —why are you this bitter? NoOOo! It's valid! He's a fucking idiot. That robot is a fucking idiot. And yet—and yet—you can't stop thinking about him, about the way he made you laugh, the way he made you feel, the way he lingered in your thoughts like a permanent ghost.

"Stupid, useless robot," you mutter under your breath, your grip tightening around Bumble. You shake it again. "Why the fuck won't you open? What, are you trying to act like your owner too? Just shut down and ignore people?"

The sudden creak of the door makes your whole body jolt. You stiffen instantly, your heart jumping straight to your throat as your head snaps toward the entrance. Jake was frozen in place, just a few steps inside, like he didn't expect to see you either. His hand is still on the doorknob, the other clutching his bag loosely. His eyes flicker—first to Bumble in your hands, then to the jar on the counter with the fish awkwardly floating inside, then finally to you. And when his gaze settles on your face, it stays.