simi. !!

jay got married because he loved you, and he couldn’t imagine a future that didn’t have you (or his future child) in it. you got married because it was “the right thing to do.” because you were scared, and because you knew you couldn’t do this without him. (or at least, that was what you thought…)

jay never complained. not even once. not when he had to work long shifts and come home to you already asleep, not when he had to hold your hair back when you’d rush to the bathroom with morning sickness, not when he had to wake up before dawn because the baby was crying and stay with her until she fell back to sleep. 

because the truth was that jay didn’t “have” to do any of those things. he wanted to. he wanted to spend every minute by your side regardless of what state you were in. he wanted to work hard so he could provide for his family. he wanted to be there for his little girl, because the very first time he’d held her, just weeks after his twenty-first birthday, he knew that his new purpose in life was to be a family man. 

the ring on your finger doesn’t feel so heavy anymore, even though it had taken a while at first. it chimes softly against the marble countertop as you wipe it down with a disinfectant wipe, licking a bit of frosting off your other finger. 

“next year, we’re just getting an icing cake,” you hum, collecting the plates smeared with a rainbow array of leftover confectionery. 

jay laughs softly from his place beside you, sleeves rolled up to his forearms where he’s arm-deep in soapy dish water. “i’ll write that down.”

he gingerly takes the plates from you, rinsing and washing each one with care. you smile to yourself at the pop song he’s humming that had been on the radio earlier, eyes wandering the glitter-covered expanse of your living room. 

“you put her to bed already?” jay asks. 

“oh, yeah. she knocked out.”

jay snorts softly. “well, going down every hill in the neighborhood twice will do that to you.”

“i think she really liked that new bike. it was a good call.”

jay’s beaming smile is contagious. it stirs something in your chest even after all these years. even after the turbulence of the first few years of marriage, of parenthood, he could still make you feel like you were in high school with some moronic crush. 

you lean forward, kitchen cleanup forgotten as you wrap your arms around his middle, cheek pressed into the firm muscle of his back. 

“you work early tomorrow?”

despite his valiant attempt, you can still catch the exhaustion behind the “yeah” he sighs out. “but i’ll be off early to meet you for the parent-teacher conference.”

it makes you feel a bit guilty sometimes. like he’s bearing the weight of the world to keep it off your shoulders for just a bit. 

it wasn’t that you didn’t love jay. jay was your world. he’d been your rock, the one person you could always count on for anything, even before you were married and before the baby and before you even dated, he was always there. 

but being a woman in the twenty first century was hard, and even harder was being a wife and a mother before you even knew who you were. 

but then jay turns around after drying off, pulling you in closer to wrap his arms around you as he leans back against the sink. the embrace is so familiar, so safe, and yet every time manages to give you little butterflies in your stomach like it’s the first. 

you let yourself sink into it, stifling a soft laugh into his chest when he rocks you back and forth playfully as he hums, like you’re a baby and he’s singing you to sleep. and then he stills, breathing in deep and slow as he holds you for a long moment, just taking in the feeling of you between his strong arms. 

that’s about when the realization dawns on you, slow and warm and dazed like the sun rising over a spring morning to melt the last of the snow. you’re still so young. you have a beautiful little family and your whole life ahead of you, and a man by your side who would give you the world.

and when he leans down to kiss your forehead, it’s like he’s kissing away every worry you’ve ever had. and that’s when you know that this is exactly where you belong. 

figured i’d try my hand at dad(dy)!jay and i lowkey ateee <33 enjoy as always!!

© mytwinsung ♥︎ do not copy, translate, repost, feed to ai, etc. — comments + reblogs always appreciated!

the uber drops you off at the curb and you nearly forget to close the door behind you, giggling at your own clumsiness as you wave goodbye to the driver who definitely thinks you're a mess.

you are a mess. a happy, warm, spinning mess.

your heels click unevenly against the pavement as you make your way to the front door, fumbling with your keys for a solid three minutes before realizing you never actually locked it this morning.

jungwon is going to lecture you about that tomorrow, you think, but right now you can't bring yourself to care because the door swings open and there he is.

he's on the couch, laptop balanced on his knees, glasses sliding down his nose, hair sticking up in seven different directions from where he's been running his hands through it.

he looks up when you enter, and his face does that thing it always does when you come home, this soft rearranging of features into something like relief, like love.

"hey," he says, closing the laptop. "i was getting worried. it's almost two."

"sorry," you sing song, kicking off your shoes and almost falling over in the process. "lost track of time. soojin kept buying shots."

he stands, approaching you with the kind of caution usually reserved for wild animals, and you realize you must look as disheveled as you feel. your hair is probably escaping its clips and your lipstick is definitely smeared.

"how many shots?" he asks, taking your purse from your shoulder and setting it on the entry table.

"enough," you say, throwing your arms around his neck and burying your face in his collarbone. he smells like fabric softener and the vanilla candle you keep in the bedroom and something uniquely him, something warm and grounding.

"enough to miss you a lot."

his hands settle on your waist, steadying you. "you saw me this morning."

"still missed you," you mumble against his skin. "missed you every second. kept thinking about your face. your stupid pretty face."

he laughs, the sound rumbling through his chest against yours. "come on, let's get you to bed."

"no," you protest, tightening your grip. "want to stay here. want to hold you."

"you can hold me in bed," he reasons, but he's already giving in, wrapping his arms around your back and swaying slightly with you in the entryway "you're going to have a headache tomorrow."

"worth it," you declare, pulling back to look at him. the room tilts a little, so you grip his shoulders harder. "you're so pretty. did i tell you you're pretty?"

"you mentioned my stupid pretty face, yes."

"no but like," you cup his cheeks in your hands, squishing his face until his lips pucker. "you're the prettiest. the prettiest boy. i'm so lucky. how did i get so lucky?"

he tries to speak but your thumbs are pressing against his mouth, so he just makes a muffled sound that you interpret as agreement.

"exactly," you say, nodding solemnly. "exactly. i'm lucky. you're lucky. we're lucky together."

"okay, lightweight," he says, gently extracting your hands from his face and bringing them to his lips to kiss your knuckles.

"let's get you some water and medicine before you declare your undying love to the coat rack."

"the coat rack wishes," you sniff, but you let him guide you toward the kitchen, leaning heavily against his side.

he settles you at the kitchen island and you watch him move around the space, filling a glass with water, finding the ibuprofen in the cabinet, wetting a paper towel. he moves with such intention, such care, and you feel your chest ache with the sheer volume of your affection for him.

"here," he says, pressing the glass into your hands. "drink all of it."

"yes sir," you salute, spilling a little on your shirt.

he sighs, but he's smiling, that gummy smile that makes your heart stutter.

you drink the water because he asked you to, because you would probably drink poison if he looked at you like that, all soft and fond and patient.

"medicine," he says, holding out two pills.

"don't need it," you argue. "feel fine. feel great. feel like i could run a marathon."

"you could barely walk to the kitchen," he points out. "take the medicine. future you will thank me."

you take the pills, chasing them with the rest of your water, and then he's there with the paper towel, wiping at your mouth with the kind of tenderness that makes you want to cry.

"love you," you say, catching his wrist. "love you so much. like, so much. like if love was a thing you could measure, i would have the most. i would win. gold medal in loving jungwon."

"that's very impressive," he says, leaning in to press a kiss to your forehead. "you're definitely winning."

"really?"

"really. no contest."

you beam at him, all loose and happy and full of feelings that the alcohol has made impossible to filter. "good. because you're my favorite. my favorite person. my favorite everything."

he takes your hand, lacing your fingers together, and starts walking toward the bedroom. you follow, unsteady but unwilling to let go of him, your anchor in the spinning room.

"you're going to regret this in the morning," he warns, pulling back the covers and helping you sit on the edge of the bed.

"never," you say, watching him unbutton your jeans and slide them down your legs. "could never regret you."

he pauses, hands on your calves, and looks up at you. his eyes are dark in the dim light of the bedroom, serious in a way that sobers you slightly.

"you say the nicest things when you're drunk," he murmurs.

"mean them," you insist. "mean them all the time. just say them more when i'm tipsy."

he finishes helping you out of your clothes, replacing them with one of his oversized tshirts that smells like him, and then he's guiding you under the covers, tucking you in like you're something precious.

"stay," you say, catching his hand as he moves to stand. "please. want to sleep with you holding me."

he doesn't hesitate, just kicks off his sweatpants and climbs in beside you, pulling you against his chest. you curl into him immediately, leg thrown over his hip, arm draped across his waist, face buried in the hollow of his throat.

"this okay?" he asks, stroking your hair.

"perfect," you sigh. "you're perfect. did i say that? you're perfect."

"you might have mentioned it."

"good. because you are. take such good care of me. always taking care of me."

"want to," he says quietly, lips brushing your hairline. "love taking care of you."

"even when i'm messy?"

"especially when you're messy," he admits, and you can hear the smile in his voice. "you're cute when you're messy. all soft and honest. tell me everything you're thinking."

"embarrassing," you groan.

"never," he promises. "never embarrassing. i like knowing what you're feeling. even if it's just that you think i'm pretty."

"stupid pretty," you correct, yawning.

"stupid pretty," he agrees.

the room is still spinning but it's slower now, gentler, like you're floating on a lazy river instead of being tossed in waves. his hand is tracing patterns on your back, up and down, circles and figure eights, and you feel yourself drifting, anchored by his heartbeat against your palm.

"jungwon?" you whisper.

"yeah?"

"thank you for waiting up."

"nowhere else i'd be," he says simply.

"love you," you say again, because it bears repeating, because you want him to know it in every cell of his body, because you're tipsy and sentimental and he deserves to hear it a thousand times.

"love you too," he says, and you feel the words vibrate through his chest. "go to sleep, baby. i'll be right here."

"promise?"

"promise."

you believe him. you always believe him. he's never given you a reason not to.

⋆˚✿˖°

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The third time that week, you received a text from your boyfriend.

jakey: i forgot my wallet

You stared at the message. Then at the coffee you had just bought. Then back at the message.

You: ur kidding.

jakey: i wish i wasss

You: where are u???

jakey: um im at the store

You: the one thats 10 min away from home??

jakey: unfortunately

You groaned dramatically, grabbed your keys, and headed back out.

When you arrived, Jake was already standing by the register looking completely unbothered.

“You know,” you said as you handed him his wallet, “most adults remember to bring this with them. It's like essential for everyday life…”

He blinked slowly. “I remembered it.”

“You clearly didn’t.”

“I remembered it existed.”

You rolled your eyes.

Jake grinned.

Fifteen minutes later, after a long discussion about the importance of wallets, you guys finally headed home. 

Or you would have been.

Except Jake suddenly sat up right in the passenger seat.

“Oh no.”

You immediately knew.

“Oh my god, what did you forget now?”

“The groceries.”

You slammed your forehead against the steering wheel, while Jake smiled sheepishly beside you.

“Jake.”

“They’re still in the cart.”

“Jake.”

“We have to go back.”

“Jake.”

By the time you got home, the ice cream had already started to melt. You carried the bags inside while Jake followed behind you.

“I think,” you announce, “that you are physically incapable of functioning on your own.”

“That’s mean.”

“You forgot your wallet.”

“It was one time!”

You raised your eyebrows. “Three times this week actually.”

“Who’s counting?”

“I am.”

Jake set the grocery bags on the counter and walked over to you. Then wrapped his arms around your waist, his chest hitting your back softly. The annoyance on your face immediately weakened.

“Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“That thing where you distract me.”

“I’m not distracting you.”

“You are literally hugging me.”

“Maybe I just wanted a hug?”

You tried to stay annoyed, you really did. But Jake was warm, and familiar, and smiling in that way that always had your words faltering and losing the argument.

After a moment you sighed, “You are so inconvenient.”

“That’s not very nice— I thought we were having a romantic moment.”

“No, seriously.”

You turned around and poked his chest.

“You leave your hoodies everywhere. You steal my charger. You ask me to taste your food even though we ordered the exact same thing. You lose everything. You literally can’t find things that are directly in front of you.”

“The ketchup was hidden..”

“It was on the table.”

“It blended in.”

You laughed despite yourself, and Jake’s smile softened. For a second neither of you spoke. Then, Jake suddenly squeezed your hand.

“Sorry you had to come save me.”

You looked at him. At his messy hair. At his stupid grin that he was always trying to hide. At the same boy you’d spent years teasing and loving and rescuing from his own forgetfulness.

And suddenly the car ride, the wallet, the melted ice cream— none of it felt annoying anymore. Because if there was one thing you knew, it was this:

If Jake texted you tomorrow saying he had forgotten his wallet again, you’d probably complain. You’d definitely roll your eyes. Might even call him hopeless. 

But then you’d grab your keys and go.

Every single time.

Jake tilted his head.

“What are you thinking about?”

You smiled and reached up to cup his cheeks to lay a soft kiss against them.

“Just that I’d love to be inconvenienced by you.”

His eyebrows lifted.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

You rested your head against his chest.

“I don’t think I’d ever get tired of it.”

His smile grew wider.

“Thank god, I was starting to think you’ve grown sick of me.”

“Why?”

“Because I forgot my keys in your car.”

You tilted your chin up to stare at him.

“Jake.”

“Yeah, I’m pretty sure I did.”

And despite yourself, you started laughing.

Jaeyun knew he was slipping away st the age of ten, long before he had the language to describe it. When it first sank , it did in the quiet, resigned way he pushed foam earplugs into his ears to drown out the nightly circus happening in the living room. His parents were at it again shouting, crashing into furniture, hurling insults like broken plates. It was strangely ironic, both of them screamed about how much they hated each other, yet somehow the accusations always curved back to him.

“It’s because of that boy—your boy—”

“He takes after you, that’s why everything is a mess—”

Eventually, after hours of noise, after the neighbors stopped knocking on the wall to ask for peace, the arguments always settled on a single conclusion, Jaeyun was the problem. He was the reason the house was unhappy. He was the reason they were stuck with each other. He was the reason nothing turned out right. He sat on the bedroom floor, small hands trembling as he tugged the earplugs deeper.

At school, Jaeyun pretended everything was fine, he laughed when others laughed, nodded when they nodded, let himself be pulled around like a puppet on invisible strings. His friends said they liked him. They patted his back, threw their arms around his shoulder, called him “one of us.” But when they got poor grades, when the teacher scolded them, when one of them got caught cheating, they all seemed to remember a different version of him.

“Why didn’t you warn us the questions would be hard?”

“You knew Miss was already angry—why’d you talk to her first?”

“Why do you always make things worse?”

It confused him. Hurt him. But affection was affection, even when wrapped in bruises. So when they shoved him into lockers or punched his arm until it stung red, he told himself it wasn’t because they disliked him. They were his friends. They gave him attention, more than anyone else in the twenty-four hours that made up his world. And if he had to hide the marks from teachers and his parents, if he had to smile and pretend nothing happened, he would do it again. Because the alternative, being alone terrified him more than pain did.

At sixteen, he learned there were worse forms of loneliness. The day his mother died was quiet, almost unnervingly so. He had returned from school expecting to hear yelling, expecting to hear glass shattering or the TV turned up too loud. Instead, there was only silence thst pressed against his ribs until it hurt to breathe. The police came. The neighbors whispered. Someone held his shoulder as if offering comfort, but he felt nothing.His father didn’t even stay long enough for a funeral. By sunrise the next day, the man had disappeared with a woman Jaeyun had only seen once, leaving behind an empty wallet, a half-written note, and a grief that felt too big to belong to a boy his age.

They told him he would be placed in an orphanage. But a long distance aunt, someone he barely remembered from a vague childhood festival, showed up instead. She signed a few papers, nodded at the officers, squeezed his arm, and took him home. Jaeyun had stared at her profile through the car window, wondering if this was what being saved felt like. For the first few weeks, he tried to believe it was. His aunt fed him warm meals and gave him clean clothes. She even gave him a room of his own, a small, dusty thing at the end of the hall, but to him, it might as well have been a sanctuary. He spent most of his time inside it, only stepping out when she called him for dinner. She didn’t ask him too many questions, didn’t force him into conversations, didn’t stare at him with pity like the social workers did. He appreciated that.

But the house had a different kind of noise.

Men came and went at odd hours. They arrived late at night, left before dawn, always with the same rehearsed smiles and hurried steps. Jaeyun didn’t ask anything, didn’t open doors he wasn’t supposed to, didn’t make comments even when he heard muffled conversations through thin walls. He understood enough. Adults did what they needed to survive. His aunt was giving him food, shelter, some version of safety and he was grateful. It wasn’t his place to judge how she earned money.

Or at least, that’s what he convinced himself. Then her eyes began to linger too long. Not in a loving way, not in a maternal way but in a strange, unsettling way that made him curl deeper into himself. Her hand occasionally brushed his arm a little too slowly. She started appearing in doorways without knocking. She stared. She watched. And a sickening dread crawled under his skin. He told himself he was imagining it. That she was tired. That she was stressed. That she simply didn’t know how to behave around someone who suddenly returned to her life. But the unease grew. The looks sharpened. The touches changed.

One evening, when she placed a hand on his shoulder and let her fingers trail where they didn’t belong, a wave of revulsion seized him. Her breath hovered too close. Her voice dropped too low.

Something in him broke. Quietly—like a candle finally snuffed in a draft. That night, Jaeyun locked his door and pressed his forehead against the cold wood. His heartbeat thundered in his ears. He felt fourteen, and ten, and five all at once. Small. Powerless. Wrong.

He did not know who to tell. Or if he could. Or if anyone would believe him. More than anything, he wanted to forget, his parents, his childhood, his fears, the house, his aunt, the touch.

Forget every version of care that felt more like captivity. He wanted to forget he ever had a guardian. Forget the world that kept shaping him into someone breakable. Forget everything except the small voice inside him whispering that loneliness was safer than the wrong kind of love.

Jaeyun was twenty when he finally walked out of his aunt’s house with a single duffel bag and a quiet determination not to look back. College had accepted him. That felt like acceptance in itself, rare, unexpected. He worked two part-time jobs during the first semester, scrubbing tables in a café and shelving books in the library until he saved enough for a rented hostel near campus. The room was small, the walls too thin, the water heater unreliable, but it was his. His first space that felt neither borrowed nor owed. For the first time since childhood, he didn’t immediately lock the door out of fear. He left the window open at night. The breeze felt like permission. And somehow, despite being an atheist all his life, the little church next to the college caught his heart the way nothing else ever had.

It wasn’t religion he found comforting. It was the quiet. The soft hum of old hymns on Sundays. The smell of polished wood. The golden glow through stained-glass windows that painted the entire hall in fractured light. Most days, he slipped inside when no one was around. The statue of the crucified Christ stood at the center, serene in his suffering, expression gentle despite the nails. Jaeyun would sit in the back pew and stare at that face for hours. Did it hurt? he wanted to ask. Or does pain lose meaning when you carry it long enough? He never prayed. He didn’t know how. Instead, he sat and let silence fill the cracks inside him. The statue reminded him of his own stillness, wounded, suspended, quiet.

One afternoon, when he lingered too long, a grandmother approached him. Her back was bent, her hands trembling slightly as she pressed something into his palm.

A cross.

she said softly “You should wear it. There’s a shadow on you, son. I can feel it.”

He almost laughed, but her eyes were warm, worried in a way he didn’t recognize. So he simply smiled and slipped the chain around his neck. It rested cold against his skin.

If it was meant to protect him, if it could help him forget—then so be it.

By his sophomore year, Jaeyun had a girlfriend. Then another one, after the first one dumped him. Then another one, while he was still with the second. Then another. And another. He didn’t set out to hurt anyone. He just didn’t know how to be wanted without being used. And he didn’t know how to say no to attention, not when he’d grown up believing he deserved none. Each relationship began the same way,

someone saw him across the room, smiled, told him he was handsome or sweet or quiet in a way they found intriguing. He let them in because he wanted warmth. He wanted noise that didn’t bruise him. He wanted someone to choose him, even briefly. But want was always hunger. Affection always came with expectation. And he didn’t know how to give what people demanded, not when his past still clung to him like a second skin.

“You’re so hard to read,” one girl had said, frustrated. “You never open up,” another complained. “Why do you look at me like I’m going to hurt you?” whispered the third.

He didn’t have answers. He didn’t know how to explain the way people’s eyes shifted over time, how affection turned sharp, how their hands felt like they were mapping out ownership rather than intimacy. They always started with gentle kisses and “babe, you’re so careful and sweet,” and always ended with

“what is wrong with you?”

“why are you so distant?”

“do you even like me?”

He tried. God He really did. But every time lips pressed too hungrily against his skin, every time fingers clenched too tightly, every time someone insisted first and asked later, his body remembered things he had spent years trying to forget. So he pushed them away. Or he froze. Or he retreated into silence until they stormed out, accusing him of being cold, broken, or worse. He didn’t stop them. They were right in a way.

He was drowning, and this time there were no earplugs to save him. He accepted the water. Let it rise around him, filling his chest, numbing his thoughts. Maybe this was easier than fighting. Maybe letting people come and go was better than being truly alone.

Until his fifth girlfriend lost her patience entirely. She stood in the doorway of his hostel room, breathing hard, mascara slightly smudged, eyes blazing with a frustration he’d grown used to. “You’re such a shitshow,” she snapped, jabbing a finger toward him. “Take off that cross before it’s too late. You wear it like it means something, but you don’t believe in anything—not even yourself.”

The door slammed so loudly behind her that dust drifted from the ceiling. Silence fell. Jaeyun sat on the edge of his bed, fingers brushing the small silver cross resting above his heart. He didn’t know why he kept it. Maybe because losing it felt like losing the only thing ever handed to him with gentleness. Maybe because it reminded him of the church pews, the soft light, the stillness that made breathing easier.He loved quiet. It was the only place he didn’t have to perform, didn’t have to apologize, didn’t have to pretend he was normal.

But he feared silence too, because silence meant no one was there. It meant emptiness. It meant remembering that he was alone again. So he kept letting people into his life, even when he knew how it would end. They wanted pieces of him he didn’t know how to give. They wanted his body, his vulnerability, his worship. And when he didn’t give it the way they imagined, he saw it in their eyes,

the disappointment, the irritation, the growing detachment. It was always the same cycle of warmth, hunger, resentment, abandonment. Every relationship peeled away another layer of him.

Every goodbye turned another piece of his reflection grey.

And still, despite everything Jaeyun remained afraid to stop trying. Afraid to shut the door and choose solitude. Afraid that without someone else’s presence, he would crumble into the very shadow the old woman warned him about.

He wasn’t afraid of drowning. He was afraid of the ocean going silent.

Because Jaeyun had grown up inside chaos, born in it, shaped by it, stitched into it, peace became the only thing he ever wanted for himself. Not happiness. Not love. Just peace. Something soft enough that he could finally unclench the parts of himself that had been tense since childhood. So when he secured a job teaching at a kindergarten, he saved every penny he could until he finally afforded a small house in the neighborhood near the school. It wasn’t big. It wasn’t fancy. It wasn’t anything special to anyone but him.

But it was quiet.

Quiet in his way. The house consisted only of him and the furniture he kept rearranging every few weeks. He hated seeing things stay the same for too long, the sameness reminded him too much of being trapped. So the couch moved from the left wall to the right. The dining table shifted angles. The bed rotated to face a different window. Everything kept changing, except him. Slowly, his life began to find a rhythm. A soft one, gentle like the morning light through sheer curtains. Wake up early, walk to work, listen to toddlers scream and laugh and cry, come home, rearrange something, make tea, sit in silence.

For once, routine felt like comfort.

Until life forgot how to reach him again.

And then,

there was you. The first memory he ever had of you was strange, unusual enough that it refused to leave him.

Jaeyun had stepped outside for a smoke break with a colleague. The night air was sharp, carrying the faint scent of rain and alcohol-soaked pavement. His coworker complained about workload, Jaeyun nodded absently, letting the smoke curl upward.

Then he noticed something behind the vending machine. A shoe. A stillness. A shape that didn’t belong to the night. “Hold on,” he muttered, stepping closer.

At first he thought it was a mannequin, bars sometimes used props for promotions. But then he saw the slight rise and fall of your chest, the messy fall of your hair, the cold sweat on your skin. “Hey… are you—?” he knelt down beside you, his voice soft but urgent. “Miss? Can you hear me?”

You didn’t respond. Something in him shifted. A tug, sharp, unwelcome, undeniable. He wasn’t used to feeling anything this sudden. But he lifted you carefully anyway, brushing your hair from your face as he checked for injuries. You looked fragile in a way that scared him. Not weak, but fragile, like someone who had fallen too many times and finally had no strength left to brace for the next one.

Jaeyun didn’t plan to stay in the hospital for three nights. He brought you there because it was the right thing to do. He signed the forms because no one else was around. He waited for the doctor because someone had to. And he sat beside your bed because leaving felt wrong. He told himself he would go home soon, sleep, shower, return to his normal quiet life.

But he didn’t leave.

Not that night. Not the next. Not even the third. Something about you—your rough state, the fatigue etched into the small lines beside your eyes, the dirt at the hem of your jeans made it impossible for him to walk away. You looked like a person who had been running, or falling, for far too long. Something in him recognized that kind of exhaustion. So he stayed.

He slept sitting up, spine aching, chin resting on his chest. Nurses whispered about him in the hallway, wondering whether he was your boyfriend or your brother. He ignored all of it. He didn’t even know your name. But he knew you’d been alone when he found you. And that was enough.

When you finally woke up, the world came back to you in fragments. The sharp smell of disinfectant. The soft beeping of a machine somewhere near your head. The weight of a blanket tucked too neatly. The soreness behind your eyes. And then...Warmth.

You blinked until your vision steadied.

A pair of hands rested on top of yours,

broad, gentle, calloused from work. A warmth that didn’t belong to a stranger, not in the way you felt it. Your gaze trailed up the arm, past the wrinkled sleeve, to the man slumped in the chair beside your bed. His head was bowed, dark hair falling over his eyes as he slept. You didn’t know his name. He didn’t know yours.

But something about him felt… steady. For a moment, your instinct was to pull away. But your body was tired, bone-deep tired and the warmth felt like an anchor you didn’t want to lose. So instead of moving his hand, you let your fingers shift slightly underneath it. He stirred.

His eyes fluttered open, hazy with sleep. When he realized you were awake, his posture straightened immediately. “You’re up,” he said softly, voice rough from speaking too little. “How… how do you feel?”

You tried to answer, but your throat felt like sandpaper. He reached for a cup of water without hesitation, held the straw to your lips, patient, quiet. When you finished, he set the cup aside. His brows furrowed with worry he didn’t try to hide.“You were unconscious for a while,” he continued gently. “Do you remember… anything?” You opened your mouth. Then froze. Something tugged at you

a name, a memory, a presence that felt important. Someone warm. Someone familiar. Someone whose absence felt like a missing heartbeat.

You swallowed hard. “I… I miss him,” you whispered. Jaeyun stilled. Your brows knit as a sudden chill crawled up your spine.

“Heeseung,” you repeated softly. “I miss him so much.”

And then, a beat of silence. Your fingers trembled beneath Jaeyun’s hand as the realization hit you like cold water. Wait… who is Heeseung?

You didn’t know. You didn’t remember. You only felt the echo of a name that slipped away as soon as it surfaced.

Jaeyun had no idea what he was getting himself into. He told himself he was only helping. Only being decent. Only doing what any responsible adult should do. But responsibility didn’t explain the knot twisting in his chest every time you whispered the name Heeseung in your sleep. He didn’t know who that was. He didn’t know what that man meant to you. But the way the name slipped from your lips, soft, fragile, like you were calling out to a ghost, made something dark and unwelcome rise in him. Disdain? Jealousy? Fear?

He didn’t know. And that scared him more.

He had questions he didn’t dare voice. Who was Heeseung? Why did your voice tremble when you said his name? Why did you look like someone mourning something you couldn’t remember?

But every time he opened his mouth to ask, he remembered the expression on your face when you first woke up, the terror, the confusion, the way your fingers shook as you grabbed his wrist.

“Please… don’t call anyone. Please. Please don’t.”

You didn’t just ask. You pleaded. Your voice broke on the words. And the pleading, the desperation in it hit him like a blunt, violent memory of his own past. Running away. Hiding bruises. Begging strangers for a little more time before reality found him again. It was too familiar.

Painfully familiar.

You told him you would find a place soon. That you only needed somewhere temporary. Just a few days. Just enough time for your head to stop spinning and your heart to stop hurting. It was stupid. It was reckless. It made no sense. A random woman, barely conscious, barely remembering her own life, begging him, a stranger to let her stay.

Jaeyun should’ve shut it down immediately. He should’ve told a nurse. He should’ve called a friend, or the police, or anyone who would take proper responsibility. Instead, he found himself clearing his throat and muttering,

“You can… stay for a little while. Until you figure things out.”

You looked up at him then, tired, lost, but grateful and something in his chest loosened in a way he didn’t like. Because it felt soft. Too soft. A warmth bloomed under his ribs, tender and dangerous, like the beginnings of a flame he had spent his whole life trying to avoid.

He tried to press it down, to smother it, to tell himself this wasn’t his problem. You weren’t his responsibility. You were just someone he found collapsed in the dark behind a vending machine. But when you leaned back against the hospital pillows, finally relaxing, finally breathing easier, he knew he wasn’t turning you away. He couldn’t. Even if it was dangerous. Even if it was reckless. Even if this softness rising in him felt like a fire he couldn’t control. You didn’t know it. But in the quiet of that hospital room, while you drifted back into uneasy sleep, Jaeyun sat beside you

already burning.

For Jaeyun, remembrance had always been a curse, an inheritance he never asked for, yet carried anyway. He spent years outrunning it, leaving behind anyone and anything that reminded him of the person he used to be.

But now, in that cramped one-bedroom apartment with peeling wallpaper and a stranger who reminded him too much of his own grief, running felt impossible. Every corner of the small home echoed with your memories… or your attempts at keeping them. You mumbled to yourself often. Soft, slurred syllables slipping from your mouth like prayers. Names. Places. Fragments of moments you were terrified of losing. At first, he tried to ignore it. He told himself it wasn’t his business. You were just someone he found on the road, someone who clung to consciousness by a thread.

But living with you meant hearing you whisper those same half-formed sentences every night, like mantras meant to tether you to the world.

“Don’t forget… don’t forget him…”

“Please remember…”

“His tie… blue or grey…?”

The words burned him more than he ever expected. Because you weren’t trying to remember yourself. You were trying to remember someone else. Someone who wasn’t him. That alone should have given him relief. Distance. Perspective. But instead, it dragged something ugly and unnameable out of him. Your memories were slipping away like sand through your fingers. And you clung to them with a desperation he envied.

He wished he had ever wanted someone, anything that fiercely.

He was a kindergarten teacher with stacks of unused exercise books left untouched for years. Pages meant for children’s clumsy handwritings, abandoned like everything else in his life. But suddenly, those pages weren’t collecting dust anymore. You filled them, slowly, painstakingly, your pen hovering above the paper as if scared of writing the wrong thing, as if saying something untrue would erase you further.

He never asked what you wrote. He never tried to peek. Not because he wasn’t curious, he was, but because he was afraid the truth would devastate him. Or worse, that it wouldn’t.

He often found himself staring at the notebook lying half open on the table. One small corner of the page curled up as if inviting him. Calling him. He shouldn’t read it. He knew that. “I won’t look,” he whispered to himself, as if you were awake to hear him. But then he heard your voice from earlier

“I don’t want to lose him”

and something inside him snapped. His fingers reached before his conscience could pull them back. He read. And his heart burned. Burned like it had never burned before. Not with jealousy. Not exactly. More with a devastating mixture of longing and resentment directed at himself, at you, at the man whose name you scribbled over and over even though half the letters were smudged. Heeseung.

You wrote about the way he held your hand like it was a promise. The way he tied his tie wrong on purpose so you would fix it for him. The way his voice felt like home even on days you forgot home. The way he looked at you when you laughed. You wrote him like he was a universe, and you were afraid of forgetting the stars.

Jaeyun’s throat tightened. Why? Why were you so deliberate in remembering someone who wasn’t here? Someone who didn’t come for you? Someone you were terrified of calling?

Why couldn’t you just give up? Why cling so stubbornly to memories that brought you pain? Why treat heartbreak like it was holy? He pressed the heel of his palm to his eyes, letting out a shaky breath.

“What’s so beautiful about remembering someone who left you?” he muttered. He didn’t know if he was asking you or himself.

Jaeyun sometimes woke with an unnatural amount of warmth around him, soft, gentle warmth that settled in the corners of his chest and made him feel things he worked very hard not to feel. For years he’d craved that warmth, begged the world for it in quiet, small ways. And then, when he finally received it, when he realized how dangerous longing could become, he ran from it. He chose solitude over the possibility of breaking again.

Yet somehow, without permission or intention, the warmth returned. In the form of you. It didn’t happen all at once. It came slowly, like sunlight sneaking past a cracked curtain. One day his bookshelf, once a collection of leaning piles and dust, stood neatly arranged. Another day, the dishes he left soaking were washed and drying by the sink. His bedsheets smelled like lavender instead of forgotten laundry. And his clothes folded.

The change was gradual but sudden all the same, so abrupt that it startled him when he finally noticed. He found you on a quiet morning, standing on the tiny balcony watering a shriveled money plant he had nearly killed months ago.

“You… don’t have to do this,” he muttered. He didn’t mean it harshly. If anything, he meant it helplessly. Afraid. Grateful. Terrified of being grateful.

You did not turn at him. “Yes, I have to.” Your voice was lightly scolding, not unkind. “You’re always busy. You don’t even look at your own reflection most days. Go shave. Don’t you know your stubble irritates my cheeks? I love them, but let’s keep it maintained.”

The words hit him like a strike to the ribs. You spoke like someone who had known him forever. Like someone who remembered all the little things, things he didn’t even remember caring about.

And he went. Not because he cared about shaving. Not because he cared about appearances. But because you asked. Because your voice had slipped into the cracks of his routines like water filling a broken cup.

He shaved. He wore the shirt you had laid out on his bed. He even packed the tiffin you made, the one sitting on the counter with a post-it note that read Eat properly today.

For the first time in his two years of teaching, he didn’t buy the cheap cafeteria lunch. He sat in the empty staff room during break and ate food that tasted like a memory he didn’t have, warmth, comfort, care. Things he’d forgotten belonged to him too, once.

He didn’t tell you how it made his throat tighten. How he stared at the food longer than he ate it. He just cleaned the tiffin and brought it home.

You took it from him without looking up. “You ate everything.”

“I did.”

“Good.”

He should have said thank you. He didn’t.

Jaeyun never complained. Not when you asked why he didn’t stock basic medicines. Not when you tugged his wrist lightly and opened the windows, insisting the apartment needed sunlight and so did he.

“You’ll get sick if you stay like this,” you said, tugging the curtains aside with more force than necessary. “Do you even know how pale you look?”

“I’m naturally pale,” he mumbled. “You’re naturally careless,” you corrected, clicking your tongue. He laughed under his breath, soft, fond. And that scared him more than anything.Every day he felt himself sinking. Deeper. Further. He knew it was wrong. He knew he wasn’t supposed to feel this way. He knew you weren’t his. And he wasn’t yours.

You were a storm he willingly stepped into, even knowing it might destroy him. You were a drug, addictive, intoxicating, and destined to leave him in ruin. He knew. God, he knew. That’s why the guilt gnawed at him like an open wound. He was taking advantage of your presence, your vulnerability, the way you unconsciously reached for him when you were dizzy or forgetful. He hated himself for letting you care for him, for letting you fill the hollow spaces inside him that weren’t meant for you.

He hated how easily you touched him. The first time you fixed a button on his shirt, he forgot how to breathe. Your fingers were light, barely brushing his chest, yet he felt it like a jolt straight through him. He tried not to look at you, not to memorize the way your brows squeezed together in concentration. But he did. The second time, you plucked lint from his hair like it was the most normal thing in the world. He froze, utterly still, terrified you’d feel how fast his heart was beating.

“Hold still,” you murmured. He did. He always did. Because how could he not?

“This isn’t fair,” Not fair to you. Not fair to the man you were trying so desperately to remember. Not fair to him because he was falling, and he had no right to.

He dragged a hand through his hair, breathing shakily. “You’re going to break me,” he whispered to no one.And the warmth you brought into his life, unasked, unexpected, undeserved and continued filling the spaces he had long abandoned.

There was so much warmth in that small apartment, too much warmth for someone like Jaeyun. Too much care he never asked for, too much love he did not deserve, too much tenderness he was terrified to receive. And yet, night after night, it lingered in the air like an unspoken confession neither of you dared to voice.

Tonight was no different. You had fallen asleep on the living room sofa again, curled on your side, knees drawn up, the blanket half slipping off your hip. Your breathing was slow, steady, that made the entire room feel softer. Beside you lay your diary

pages still damp where your pen had paused mid-sentence. Another memory you were trying desperately to preserve. Another echo of someone he did not know but was beginning to fear.

Jaeyun watched from the threshold, his breath trembling. He approached you slowly, as though a single step too loud would shatter whatever fragile dream you’d slipped into. His fingers shook when he reached out, brushing the corner of your diary. The ink smudged lightly under his touch. Everything inside him collapsed.

Those gaze, those feelings, those words, those longing… they were never for him. He knew that. He had known it from the first night you whispered a name he had no right to hear.

There was someone else. Someone beautiful enough to live inside your fading memory. Someone strong enough to anchor you even as your mind frayed at its seams. Someone who had once held you so tightly, so completely, that even oblivion had failed to pry you away from him. Someone you were still waiting for.

And even though Jaeyun did not know him, he could picture him, the silhouette of a man carved into your bones, your smile shaped around his existence, your tears falling for him even when you couldn’t remember his face.

It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fucking fair how gentle you looked sleeping there. How soft your features were. How desperately you clung to memories that only ever hurt you. It wasn’t fair that he was the one who held your trembling body during your worst nights… while you whispered another man’s name.

You stirred suddenly, brow furrowing. Your hand moved across the cushions, fingers searching. Searching for someone. Searching for him. Jaeyun’s mind screamed at him to step back, to leave the room, to give you the space you were reaching for. But his heart—reckless, selfish, starved stepped forward. Before he knew it, his hand was in yours. Your fingers curled around his like instinct, like habit, like memory. Your eyes fluttered open, and tears streamed down your cheeks even before you were fully awake.

He inhaled sharply. He shouldn’t have done this. He knew he shouldn’t have.

He tried to pull away.

He shouldn’t steal a moment that didn’t belong to him.

But your grip tightened

desperate, shaking, terrified.

“Don’t leave me… please…” you choked.

Your voice cracked somewhere between a cry and a plea, and Jaeyun froze. He knew that sound. He knew those eyes, the way they looked at him like the entire world was slipping away and he was the last thing left to hold onto.

He had seen that same gaze in too many different places, too many different people.

In his mother’s eyes when she begged his father to stay after another night of screaming and tears. In his aunt’s eyes, hollow and exhausted, when men left her room with only silence in their wake.

In his own reflection in the cracked mirror of his high school’s bathroom, when his friends walked away one by one, leaving him clinging to nothing but the ache of being unwanted.

Don’t leave me....Please. Someone stay. Just once.

He didn’t think. He just acted.

He pulled you gently toward him, slow enough that you could have stopped him, quick enough that he could pretend it was instinct and not selfishness. His arms wrapped around your torso, careful but firm. Your forehead pressed against his chest, right over his heartbeat.

His breath hitched. It was wrong. So painfully wrong. But for once in his life, Jaeyun was greedy. He wanted this moment, he wanted you.

Wanted the softness of your weight against him, the trembling in your shoulders, the silent plea in your fingers gripping his shirt. In a life full of people who left, he held onto you like you were the last remaining light. You stayed in his arms, your breathing uneven, your tears dampening the fabric of his shirt. His hand hovered at your back before settling there, hesitant but warm.

He closed his eyes.

Maybe just for a moment he could pretend.

Pretend that the warmth was meant for him. Pretend that the hand clutching him wasn’t searching for someone else. Pretend that he wasn’t a temporary shelter on your way back to a man whose name tasted like longing on your tongue.

But then you whispered. So soft. So fragile. So devastating.

“Heeseung…”

Jaeyun’s throat closed.

“I love you so much,” you breathed, voice breaking. “Please don’t leave me…”

The words sliced through him like a blade. He felt you curl closer into him, seeking comfort from a ghost he could never compete with. A memory he could never replace.

His arms tightened around you, even though he knew they shouldn’t. Even though every word you whispered was meant for someone else. And in that moment, holding you against his beating heart while you cried for another man, Jaeyun realized with a crushing, terrifying certainty, he wasn’t just falling for you.

He had already fallen. And there was no saving himself now.

The air castle Jaeyun had built delicate, trembling, made of wishful softness and borrowed moments collapsed the moment you began fainting without warning.

You would be standing one moment… and then folding into the floor the next, collapsing like your body had forgotten how to hold you upright. And even though he always caught you, always

Jaeyun felt the truth carve itself deeper into him each time you slipped through his fingers. You were falling, and he wasn’t the place you should fall into. He wasn’t safe for you. And you weren’t safe for him.

You would ruin him with your desperate devotion to memories that were never his. He would ruin you with his instinct to run, to erase, to turn every wound into silence and every fear into distance.

Tonight was the worst. Your knees buckled in the kitchen. The glass you had been holding shattered at your feet, but you didn’t even register it. You crumpled, breath hitching, eyes unfocused. Before your shoulder could hit the tiles, Jaeyun lunged forward, catching you by the waist.

“Hey—hey, stay with me,” he whispered, voice cracking as he lowered you gently to the floor. But then you began panicking clawing at his shirt, trembling so violently he feared you would break apart in his hands. “Please don’t go… I’m scared,” you sobbed, breath stuttering, nails digging into his skin. “Please—I’ll do anything—just don’t leave me! Please!”

The desperation in your voice hollowed him out. He tried to steady you, palms cupping your cheeks even as his own hands trembled uncontrollably.

“Shhh… I’m right here,” he whispered. “I’m not going anywhere, Y/n. Look at me. Look at me.”

But you couldn’t look at him. You weren’t even seeing him. Your gaze was unfocused, your mind reaching for someone else entirely,

someone who lived in the spaces behind your eyelids, someone whose name you cried out in your sleep, someone whose shadow loomed over every corner of your fading world.

Heeseung.

Jaeyun held you to his chest, trying to keep your shaking body from spiraling out of control. But the longer he held you, the more breathless he became, not because of effort, but because of fear. Fear that you were slipping beyond him. Fear that he was becoming a wall you broke yourself against. Fear that he was holding onto someone who didn’t belong to him.

“No…” he choked, pressing his forehead against yours, desperate to steady at least one of you. “Y/N, you can’t keep doing this. You can’t keep—” His voice broke. “I can’t keep watching you drown like this.”

He knew this couldn’t go on. Not like this.

Not with you falling apart in his arms. Not with him falling apart beside you. So when your body finally stilled and when exhaustion pulled you into a fragile, trembling sleep on the kitchen floor, Jaeyun made the decision he had been running from. He carried you to the sofa, tucking a blanket around your shaking frame. You curled into it instinctively, gripping the fabric like it was a lifeline.

He watched you for a long moment. The rise and fall of your chest. The dried tears on your cheeks. The faint whisper of a name on your lips. Not his. Never his. He exhaled shakily and stood. Then he walked to the drawer where you kept the notebooks he had pretended not to notice. The ones you filled every day with fragments of your unraveling memory. The ones that anchored you when your past slipped through your fingers.

He shouldn’t read them. He knew that. But he also knew he had no choice anymore.

With trembling hands, he opened the first notebook. Then the second. Then the third. Page after page of confessions. Memories. Pleas. Frayed thoughts tied together by the same person, the same name, the same desperate longing.

You had been trying so hard not to forget.And buried in the middle of one of the later entries, your handwriting suddenly steadied shaky, but readable.

An address. A place you had written down on a day when your memory had been kinder to you. A place meant for you to return to when your mind began losing the path back to him.

Jaeyun stared at the ink until the letters blurred. This was where you needed to go.

Not here. Not with him.

Not in the arms of a man who wasn’t yours, who could never be yours.

He closed the notebook gently, as though afraid the ink might bleed further. Then he looked at you again.You didn’t belong in this apartment full of echoes and running. You belonged with the person your heart still remembered. Jaeyun swallowed the ache in his chest.

He would take you home.

“She was the home I searched for but never had, but to her… I was never a home. Maybe, I was just a shadow. A place to rest for a moment. A… cruel twist of fate. A temporary peace of mind.”

“I knew it even then. This—me...this was never where she belonged. Heeseung. He’s pristine. Clear. He’s everything I’m not. And I swear… he’s as beautiful as she remembered him. As lovely as the way she wrote about him—those pages… but It wasn’t the way he looked, or the way he spoke to me that night. Or even the way he held my hand when… when my Y/n walked into his arms.”

“It was her memory of him that made him unforgettable. The strength of her love, that’s what made him so beautiful.”

“I think I’m obsessed with Heeseung a little bit,” he whispered with a shaky laugh. “All thanks to her. But what I received from her… what she gave me…there’s no way I can repay that. Not in this lifetime.”

Jaeyun inhaled deeply, as if gathering the courage to say the words he feared.

“I think I loved her, yeah… maybe I still do. I’m not a good person, I’ve never done anything good enough to deserve her. I don’t even have the right to… to wish for her. Not when she was never mine.”

The confession spilled out like a wound reopening. He stared at the crucifix. At the stillness carved into its face.

“Whatever blessings I have left…” His voice trembled. “I want to give them to her.”

“I wish she never has to forget him again, I wish she never has to run away. Never has to fall into the arms of a man who isn’t him.” The tears he’d been suppressing slipped down his cheeks, slow at first, then all at once, pooling onto the cold wooden floor beneath him.

“I wish…” He tried again, but grief fractured the words. “I wish she gets to know how loved she is.”

His fingers gripped the cross so tightly it left faint marks on his palm.

“How precious her little habits are, how adorable her handwriting is. How… how beautiful she is as a person.”

His breath hitched. He exhaled, long and trembling.

“I’m sorry,” he sighed quietly. “I’m wasting your time.”

The church didn’t answer. The statue remained still, serene, bathed in dim candlelight.

But the silence wasn’t empty, it held him, quietly, gently, the way you had on the nights when the past clawed at his throat. Jaeyun’s shoulders fell. He knew, without any divine sign, without any supernatural whisper, that his moment here was almost over. That there was no comfort waiting for him, only truth.

Truth and acceptance.

And the faint warmth of the cross he still held. He stood slowly. His legs felt weak, as if his body understood the finality before his mind did. He slipped the cross into his pocket, letting its weight anchor him one last time.

He looked up at the statue, the unmoving figure that had once reminded him of his own pain. But this time, it reminded him of you. Of the way you tried to piece together your life with trembling hands. Of the way you whispered Heeseung’s name like it was a map back home. Of the way your memory clung to him even when your mind began slipping away.

He stepped back, letting the air settle around him.

No, this time… he won’t erase the memory. Try to run away from it, from you.

His fingers brushed the outline of the cross in his pocket.

“Even if it hurts,” he whispered. “Even if it lasts for years.” He took one last look at the altar. “This,” he whispered, “this is the memory I’ll keep. My everything.”

Then he turned and walked out of the church, step by step, into the cold air, toward the place where he would return you to, where you truly belonged.

THE END

a dull ache settling right behind your ribs, waiting for a shift, closure, something that you knew deep down would never come. yet hoping for the best anyway. you’ve been together for four years, long enough to know the exact shift in his posture when he was pulling away, long enough to know that the sigh he just let out meant he was building a wall. "are you going to bed soon?" you asked. you hated how thin your voice sounded.

he didn't look up from the screen. "in a bit. just need to finish this arrangement."

it was the same answer he gave yesterday.

and the night before that.

and the entire week before that.

every repetitive response felt like a door closing in your face with such gentleness you couldn't even be angry. you felt a familiar knot twisting in your stomach. that quiet panic that told you you're slowly becoming invisible to the person who used to see you clearest.

used to.

you prayed not. not your hee.

he was the only one who saw you at your lowest, who held you when the rest of the world felt too loud. that one rare constant in a life that felt like an unpredictable maze.

he was the person who knew exactly how you took your tea when your chest felt too tight to breathe, the one who would silently drive you around the city for hours without demanding an explanation for your tears.

you had survived so much loss, left holding so many broken pieces of a life you were still trying to glue back together to this day, and he had been the glue.

the constant.

you pulled the blanket tighter around your shoulders, looking at the space between the couch and the kitchen island. it felt like an ocean. the disagreement hadn't started with a shout; it had started three weeks ago with a missed dinner, a forgotten anniversary plan, and a quiet, "it's fine, you're busy," that you didn't really mean. you said it because you loved him.

since then it had been a slow painful slide into miscommunication. your mind had spent the last 21 days spinning in circles, replaying old conversations. trying to pinpoint the exact moment the warmth drained out of the room.

you thought he was pulling away because he was losing interest; he thought you were being distant because you were tired of his schedule.

neither of you asked.

the uncertainty felt like a constant fever, leaving you ultimately exhausted and raw.

you stood up, the friction of the blanket against the fabric of the couch making a soft sound.

heeseung’s hand froze on his mouse, but he still didn't turn around.

the urge to say something, anything to make him snap out of it fought with the utter dread of hearing him confirm your worst fears. your heart thumped harshly against your ribs. a frantic rhythm that made you feel dizzy.

"i'm going to sleep," you said softly. waiting for just a second to see if he'd ask you to stay.

"okay. goodnight," he murmured, his tone level. completely unreadable.

the utter lack of emotion in his voice made something break inside you. you walked into the bedroom, closing the door just loud enough for him to hear the click of the latch.

it was 2:14 am when the bedroom door finally opened.

the light from the hallway cut a sharp line across the bed before disappearing as heeseung closed the door behind him. he moved in the dark with the familiarity of someone who knew every square inch of this space. but he hesitated before getting into bed. you caught it.

when he did lie down, he stayed on the absolute edge of his side. the mattress barely dipping under his weight. you were awake. staring at the wall, listening to the uneven rhythm of his breathing.

your throat felt dry, and your eyes burned from staring into the dark. for four years, your bodies used to find each other automatically in the dark. now, the space between you felt deliberate. the emptiness of the mattress between your bodies felt massive, like a barrier you weren't allowed to cross. your chest hurt with the sheer amount of effort of keeping your breathing steady so he wouldn't know you were crying.

"hee?" you whispered into the dark, unable to take the quiet anymore.

a long pause. you thought he might pretend to be asleep, but then he cleared his throat. "yeah?"

"are we okay?"

the question hung in the air. your stomach dropped, waiting for his answer.

heeseung shifted, the fabric of the sheets rustling. "why wouldn't we be?"

it was the wrong answer. it was the safe, defensive answer that closed the door before the conversation could even start. its the reason this started in the first place. "because you haven't even looked at me in three days," you said, your voice cracking slightly. the built up frustration of the last month finally leaking through. "because you're here, but you're not actually here. you're just..." you trailed off. you were at a loss for words.

he let out a sharp, frustrated breath, sitting up in the dark. "i'm working. you know how important this comeback is. i thought you understood that. you said you were fine with it."

"i'm fine with the work, hee... i'm not fine with the absolute silence," you turned around to face him, though you could only see the silhouette of his shoulders against the window light. "you don't talk to me. you just assume i'm angry, so you stay away, which makes me think you don't care anymore. it feels like you're just waiting for me to leave."

"waiting for you to leave?" he repeated. his voice dropping to a strained whisper. "is that really what you think? i stay away because every time i walk into the room, you look like you want to be anywhere else. it's like you're unhappy. i'm trying to give you space because i don't know what else to do. i feel like everything i do right now is just... wrong. i'm watching you look more and more distant, and i'm just trying not to make it worse."

the raw honesty of his words echoed through the room, cutting through weeks of built up hatred.

he thought you wanted space. you thought he was abandoning you.

you looked at his slumped outline, the weight of the last month finally crashing down on both of you. the miscommunication had dug a trench so deep between you that you'd both given up trying to reach across it. ultimately assuming the other had already let go.

"i'm not tired of you," you said, the tears finally slipping down your cheeks, silent and hot. you were far too exhausted to fight it. "i was just lonely, hee. i missed you so much, and you felt so far away." the silence returned. but it was a different kind of silence.

heeseung dropped his head into his hands, his fingers tangling in his dark hair. his shoulders were tense. shaking slightly with the weight of everything he’d been keeping inside. "four years," he muttered into his palms, his voice thick with a sudden exhaustion. "we've been together for four years, and i still managed to completely mess this up."

you sat up, the anger draining out of you just as quickly as it had arrived. leaving behind nothing but an aching need to be close to him again.

"you didn't mess it up," you said softly, breaking the distance between you and crawling across the mattress.

your fingers brushed his wrist and he flinched slightly before completely giving in. he caught your hand, his grip almost painfully tight. he pulled your hand up, pressing his cheek against your knuckles.

"i'm just... so tired," he whispered, and you could hear the absolute sincerity, the sheer terror of losing what you’ve built, vibrating in his chest. "im just so tired of everything...but not you. never you."

he shifted closer, sliding across the deliberate distance he had kept all night until his forehead was resting against your shoulder delicately. "i'm sorry," he murmured against your skin. his hands wrapping completely around your waist now, pulling you into his lap until there was no space left between you at all. "i'm sorry for being stubborn. for hiding behind my computer because it was easier than admitting i was overwhelmed. im so sorry for everything. please don't look at me like that again." you slid your fingers through his hair, untangling the knots. simultaneously feeling the tension slowly melt out of him as you held him close.

"like what?"

"like you think i dont love you anymore," he said softly, his voice muffled against your neck.

he stayed like that for a long time, just breathing you in, his arms locked around you. the cold vibes that had filled the apartment for weeks finally began to dissolve; replaced by the familiar warmth of his skin.

"i missed you too, baby," he murmured after a while, his voice gentle and full of relief. "so,so much."

he pulled back just enough to look at you, his thumb brushing away the damp trail of tears on your cheek before he leaned in to press a soft kiss to your forehead, then your cheeks, not minding the slight dampness. his fingers locked tightly with yours between your pillows. he didn't let go of you for the rest of the night.

a dull ache settling right behind your ribs, waiting for a shift, closure, something that you knew deep down would never come. yet hoping for the best anyway. you’ve been together for four years, long enough to know the exact shift in his posture when he was pulling away, long enough to know that the sigh he just let out meant he was building a wall. "are you going to bed soon?" you asked. you hated how thin your voice sounded.

he didn't look up from the screen. "in a bit. just need to finish this arrangement."

it was the same answer he gave yesterday.

and the night before that.

and the entire week before that.

every repetitive response felt like a door closing in your face with such gentleness you couldn't even be angry. you felt a familiar knot twisting in your stomach. that quiet panic that told you you're slowly becoming invisible to the person who used to see you clearest.

used to.

you prayed not. not your hee.

he was the only one who saw you at your lowest, who held you when the rest of the world felt too loud. that one rare constant in a life that felt like an unpredictable maze.

he was the person who knew exactly how you took your tea when your chest felt too tight to breathe, the one who would silently drive you around the city for hours without demanding an explanation for your tears.

you had survived so much loss, left holding so many broken pieces of a life you were still trying to glue back together to this day, and he had been the glue.

the constant.

you pulled the blanket tighter around your shoulders, looking at the space between the couch and the kitchen island. it felt like an ocean. the disagreement hadn't started with a shout; it had started three weeks ago with a missed dinner, a forgotten anniversary plan, and a quiet, "it's fine, you're busy," that you didn't really mean. you said it because you loved him.

since then it had been a slow painful slide into miscommunication. your mind had spent the last 21 days spinning in circles, replaying old conversations. trying to pinpoint the exact moment the warmth drained out of the room.

you thought he was pulling away because he was losing interest; he thought you were being distant because you were tired of his schedule.

neither of you asked.

the uncertainty felt like a constant fever, leaving you ultimately exhausted and raw.

you stood up, the friction of the blanket against the fabric of the couch making a soft sound.

heeseung’s hand froze on his mouse, but he still didn't turn around.

the urge to say something, anything to make him snap out of it fought with the utter dread of hearing him confirm your worst fears. your heart thumped harshly against your ribs. a frantic rhythm that made you feel dizzy.

"i'm going to sleep," you said softly. waiting for just a second to see if he'd ask you to stay.

"okay. goodnight," he murmured, his tone level. completely unreadable.

the utter lack of emotion in his voice made something break inside you. you walked into the bedroom, closing the door just loud enough for him to hear the click of the latch.

it was 2:14 am when the bedroom door finally opened.

the light from the hallway cut a sharp line across the bed before disappearing as heeseung closed the door behind him. he moved in the dark with the familiarity of someone who knew every square inch of this space. but he hesitated before getting into bed. you caught it.

when he did lie down, he stayed on the absolute edge of his side. the mattress barely dipping under his weight. you were awake. staring at the wall, listening to the uneven rhythm of his breathing.

your throat felt dry, and your eyes burned from staring into the dark. for four years, your bodies used to find each other automatically in the dark. now, the space between you felt deliberate. the emptiness of the mattress between your bodies felt massive, like a barrier you weren't allowed to cross. your chest hurt with the sheer amount of effort of keeping your breathing steady so he wouldn't know you were crying.

"hee?" you whispered into the dark, unable to take the quiet anymore.

a long pause. you thought he might pretend to be asleep, but then he cleared his throat. "yeah?"

"are we okay?"

the question hung in the air. your stomach dropped, waiting for his answer.

heeseung shifted, the fabric of the sheets rustling. "why wouldn't we be?"

it was the wrong answer. it was the safe, defensive answer that closed the door before the conversation could even start. its the reason this started in the first place. "because you haven't even looked at me in three days," you said, your voice cracking slightly. the built up frustration of the last month finally leaking through. "because you're here, but you're not actually here. you're just..." you trailed off. you were at a loss for words.

he let out a sharp, frustrated breath, sitting up in the dark. "i'm working. you know how important this comeback is. i thought you understood that. you said you were fine with it."

"i'm fine with the work, hee... i'm not fine with the absolute silence," you turned around to face him, though you could only see the silhouette of his shoulders against the window light. "you don't talk to me. you just assume i'm angry, so you stay away, which makes me think you don't care anymore. it feels like you're just waiting for me to leave."

"waiting for you to leave?" he repeated. his voice dropping to a strained whisper. "is that really what you think? i stay away because every time i walk into the room, you look like you want to be anywhere else. it's like you're unhappy. i'm trying to give you space because i don't know what else to do. i feel like everything i do right now is just... wrong. i'm watching you look more and more distant, and i'm just trying not to make it worse."

the raw honesty of his words echoed through the room, cutting through weeks of built up hatred.

he thought you wanted space. you thought he was abandoning you.

you looked at his slumped outline, the weight of the last month finally crashing down on both of you. the miscommunication had dug a trench so deep between you that you'd both given up trying to reach across it. ultimately assuming the other had already let go.

"i'm not tired of you," you said, the tears finally slipping down your cheeks, silent and hot. you were far too exhausted to fight it. "i was just lonely, hee. i missed you so much, and you felt so far away." the silence returned. but it was a different kind of silence.

heeseung dropped his head into his hands, his fingers tangling in his dark hair. his shoulders were tense. shaking slightly with the weight of everything he’d been keeping inside. "four years," he muttered into his palms, his voice thick with a sudden exhaustion. "we've been together for four years, and i still managed to completely mess this up."

you sat up, the anger draining out of you just as quickly as it had arrived. leaving behind nothing but an aching need to be close to him again.

"you didn't mess it up," you said softly, breaking the distance between you and crawling across the mattress.

your fingers brushed his wrist and he flinched slightly before completely giving in. he caught your hand, his grip almost painfully tight. he pulled your hand up, pressing his cheek against your knuckles.

"i'm just... so tired," he whispered, and you could hear the absolute sincerity, the sheer terror of losing what you’ve built, vibrating in his chest. "im just so tired of everything...but not you. never you."

he shifted closer, sliding across the deliberate distance he had kept all night until his forehead was resting against your shoulder delicately. "i'm sorry," he murmured against your skin. his hands wrapping completely around your waist now, pulling you into his lap until there was no space left between you at all. "i'm sorry for being stubborn. for hiding behind my computer because it was easier than admitting i was overwhelmed. im so sorry for everything. please don't look at me like that again." you slid your fingers through his hair, untangling the knots. simultaneously feeling the tension slowly melt out of him as you held him close.

"like what?"

"like you think i dont love you anymore," he said softly, his voice muffled against your neck.

he stayed like that for a long time, just breathing you in, his arms locked around you. the cold vibes that had filled the apartment for weeks finally began to dissolve; replaced by the familiar warmth of his skin.

"i missed you too, baby," he murmured after a while, his voice gentle and full of relief. "so,so much."

he pulled back just enough to look at you, his thumb brushing away the damp trail of tears on your cheek before he leaned in to press a soft kiss to your forehead, then your cheeks, not minding the slight dampness. his fingers locked tightly with yours between your pillows. he didn't let go of you for the rest of the night.