For as long as he could remember, Theo had been Jiung’s best friend. The right hand man by his side through thick and thin. His other (platonic) half. His future best man. 

That all changed when he met you on a Wednesday afternoon at the beginning of second semester.

You were a gravitational force that pulled his heart the moment he laid eyes on your glittering ones and that sonic smile. He could hear the smile in your voice as you greeted him— warm, musical, siren-like— and he knew he was done for. 

As it was, he wasn’t the only one. 

“It’s nice to meet you,” you chirped, placing your application down on the desk. “I’m at the right place, right? For the band?”

Theo had jumped in before Jiung could, answering you with that devastating smile of his. 

“Yes you are, sweetheart,” he drawled, leaning forward on his chair in a rare show of actual interest in the happenings around him. “You’re right where you need to be.”

Jiung watched the way you bit down on your lip to smother your shy smile. But then your eyes had landed on his and Jiung’s heart nearly gave out when you aimed that smile at him instead. 

“Cool,” you said, voice an octave lower from your fluster. “I’ll see you guys soon then?”

Jiung found his voice faster than he’d expected, stumbling out a hurried, “Of course.” He felt warm under your intent stare, the way you were hanging on to each of his words. “Uh— I mean, yeah, yes. We’ll see you at the auditions for sure.”

“After that too, I hope,” Theo chimed in and Jiung immediately mourned when your gaze fell back to Theo. 

In a ridiculous, childless realization, Jiung found that he didn’t want that grin of yours to be pointed at anyone other than himself. 

“Me too,” you’d admitted softly, before leaving them with a meek wave and their hearts in array. 

It was quiet in the following moment as Jiung recovered from his world being tilted on its axis. 

“She seems nice,” Theo murmured after the silent stretch. “Did you see the callouses on her fingers?”

Jiung had to blink himself back to reality, turning to his best friend with a puzzled stare. “Huh?”

Theo looked back at him with a raised brow and amused smirk. “Got you too huh?” He chuckled, leaning back on his chair with his arms crossed. 

“I—“ Jiung started, then stopped and swallowed around the tightness in his throat. He turned back to the pile of applications in front of them, at the one on top with the characters of your name. “Yeah,” he breathed. “Yeah.”

𓆩⟡𓆪

Auditions were a mess of trigger happy idiots who thought they had what it took just because they could pick up a bass guitar or a pair of drumsticks or memorize the lyrics to an Ariana Grande song. 

It wasn’t all entirely in vain though; they’d found their lead vocalist by the name of Yoon Keeho and a drummer called Hwang Intak.

All that was left was a bassist, and by the end, Theo was left to bang his clipboard repeatedly against his head while Jiung stared hopelessly at the stage. 

“My ears are bleeding,” Theo grunted, dropping his clipboard onto his lap. 

Jiung glanced at him to find only a red spot on his forehead. “No they’re not.”

“How many more left?”

Jiung looked down at his binder and his heart nearly gave out at the familiar characters that had burned itself into his retinas the first time he’d laid eyes on them. 

When Jiung failed to find the words, Theo hovered over his shoulder to peer at what had gotten his tongue. 

“Ah!” He yelled, and Jiung flinched at the sound, immediately shoving Theo back in his chair. 

“Not in my ear!”

Theo just giggled— giggled— and curled into his chair with a dazed look in his eye. “Our angel.”

And their angel, you were, because it had taken about ten seconds into the start of your audition for Theo and Jiung to look at each other and subliminally communicate that yes, you were indeed their angel. 

Plus One had formed shortly after that, and with that you had solidified your place in their lives.

You’d fit in seamlessly, all five of you had, like puzzle pieces to form the university band.

And so every Wednesday, in room 777, Jiung would get to have you in his orbit while the band prepared for the end of the year showcase with their original song, Pandemonium. 

As it seemed, Theo looked forward to that day of the week as much as Jiung did. 

It went unspoken between them though, the tension when it came to you, but it was present nonetheless. 

It was a simple crush, Jiung had told himself. Harmless. Two lovesick idiots pining for a girl way beyond their league. It wouldn’t be anything more than that. 

But that didn’t stop Jiung from trying. Two Wednesday’s after their formation, he ditched his Econ class so he could arrive early to practice after learning that you were always the first one in.

His knees nearly gave out when he walked in and saw you perched at the keyboard— his keyboard— with your brows pinched in concentration while you stared at the sheets propped up in front of you. 

“Hey,” he heaved, trying to settle his breaths after running through campus. You looked up from the sheets, taken aback by the sudden voice. “Didn’t think you’d be here so early.”

You broke out into the smile that never failed to make his heart flip. “Hey!”

He looked down to see your hands draped over the keys and he had to bite down on his lip to reel himself in from completely losing it. He could not be losing his mind over you just touching his instrument. He wasn’t that ridiculous. 

Except he was, because when you called him over to show you how he played, he wobbled over on jelly legs and stuttered his way through an impromptu lesson. 

But you seemed all for it, brows furrowed in concentration as he explained, then laughing all endeared whenever he stumbled over a word. 

“I swear I’m not this pathetic,” he sighed midway through a sentence that he’d failed to get out after stumbling on one word four times. 

But his worries absolved when you giggled behind your hand, telling him, “You’re cute,” with a bump of your shoulder against his. 

Jiung swore he could die right there, face burning with heat and heart stumbling dangerously in his chest. He was glad for the distraction when the door barged open right after, letting in Keeho, Intak, their hovering friends Jongseob and Soul who only ever visited for the ‘vibes’, and Theo, who took one look at you practically glued to Jiung’s side before tucking himself away in the other side of the room. 

Jiung thought nothing of it, his attention immediately pulled to get practice going. But maybe he should have, because as he was packing up to go home at the end, he noticed you and Theo sitting idle. Theo was hovering over where you were sat, leaning into your space with a hand on the back of your chair as he compared hand callouses with you. 

Jiung stared at the display as he shouldered on his bag. “You guys coming?”

Theo looked up at him while you busied yourself with poking at Theo’s hand. “Nah, we’re gonna stay back to practice,” he said before immediately turning his attention back to you.

Jiung’s chest tightened when he looked down to see your hand connected with Theo’s. But he pushed away the juvenile feeling and straightened. 

“Make sure to lock up,” he’d said stiffly before turning to the door. “Night.”

“Night Jiung!” Your voice called but he didn’t let himself linger to hear Theo’s before he shut the door behind him. 

𓆩⟡𓆪

None of it was malice, Jiung figured after a month and a half in. But it was always hard to read Theo, even though he’d known him his entire life. And yet around you, Theo was an open book. Jiung could read everything on his face when he was near you, every emotion raw and true whenever he looked at you. 

Maybe Jiung should have backed off. But he couldn’t  help that his heart called for you.

“Jongseob was showing me some costume designs,” you said from across the cafe booth, twirling a fry between your fingers. “They’re pretty cool. Kind of a dark vibe but it fits our song well I think.”

Jiung hummed along but he was too focused on the way your lips wrapped around the fry as you bit into it.

“I can send them to you. I already showed Tae and he’s on board for them.”

Jiung was snapped out of his reverie when he heard the nickname. “Tae?” He asked, brows raising. 

You took one look at him and giggled, leaning forward to take a sip from your milkshake and narrow your eyes mischievously over the glass cup. “Mhm,” you hummed as you sipped. He traced the way your tongue licked along your lower lip. “Jealous I didn’t give you a nickname?”

Jiung flushed at the blunt accusation, but he didn’t back down at your challenge. He was used to you poking around at him to get a reaction. And he would play right into it to get a reaction back from you. 

He leaned forward with his elbows on the table, stopping just as his face neared inches from yours. “Maybe I am,” he answered in that low voice you once told him you’d liked. 

He didn’t imagine that way your eyes flicked down to his lips for a split second, your smile mellowing into a shier one. “Are you, Ji?” You asked, lowering your voice into something low and sweet. 

Jiung could drown right there under the blue and red neon lights, leave himself good and dead on the floor of the retro cafe he’d managed to drag you to after Wednesday practice. 

Maybe it was the rush of adrenaline from the sound of your voice around a name no one else called him that drove him to say it. He can’t quite remember why, but he recalls how his heart had risen up to his throat right after. 

“Will you go on a date with me?”

He remembers the way his breaths had gotten stuck in the silent moment that followed right before you’d said, 

“I thought I already was on a date with you?”

He remembers the sound of your laugh when he’d dropped his head on the table, nearly missing his abandoned bowl of nachos, and groaned in both relief and exasperation at your little mind games. He remembers ignoring the guilt that started festering in his chest, tiny but surely there. 

𓆩⟡𓆪

But it wasn’t just a mind game. When he’d asked you out on a proper date after dropping you home that Wednesday night, you’d accepted him with a kiss to his cheek and an inadvertent shot to his heart. 

He’d planned the date for the next Wednesday after practice at a nearby beach that he frequented. 

When Theo had seen you both breaking away from the rest of the group in the parking lot to Jiung’s car, he’d interjected.

“Where are you two heading off?” Theo asked as he paused on the way to his bike, turning to face the both of you. 

Jiung didn’t have to respond because you’d done it for him with a bright grin as he tossed his bag in the backseat. “On a date. See you next week, Tae!”

The guilt sank its sharp tendrils in the deeper crevices of his ribs when Theo’s eyes landed on Jiung’s. And the soulless smile Theo gave him did nothing to soothe it away. 

“Cool,” Theo had said before continuing on his way. “Have fun.”

𓆩⟡𓆪

Jiung couldn’t have fun. Even as he’d watched you scramble around clumsily in the water, even as you’d pulled him in and bombarded him with splashes, even as you’d kissed him in the water under the late setting summer sun. 

The guilt had gnawed its merry way up to his brain and Jiung was already a Grade A overthinker. But he pushed it all aside in favour of attending to you, because he had the girl he was falling for in his arms and he couldn’t do anything to fumble that. 

But he knew he’d have to face Theo at some point. Sooner rather than later, because he could already feel Theo slipping away in unanswered phone calls and ignored texts. 

When next Wednesday rolled around, Jiung intercepted Theo just before he could leave.

“Hey.” Jiung grabbed Theo’s elbow on his way out, letting go when Theo stopped and looked at him over his shoulder. “Can we talk?”

Theo looked at him, a distance present in his gaze that Jiung hadn’t ever seen from him before. “…Sure.” Hesitation. Theo was never one to hesitate.

Before Jiung could start, your voice called from the door. “Ji?” You peaked your head in through the doorway. “You coming?”

Jiung had to hold back a wince when Theo’s eyes averted, his jaw gritting at the sound of your voice. 

“Just give me a few, I’ll meet you outside,” Jiung said quickly.

He let out a breath when you nodded and shut the door, leaving him alone with Theo. 

The silence that followed made his skin itch. 

“Taeyang—“ Jiung started, then stopped. The words caught in his throat when Theo looked back at him, a solemn look in his eyes. A look that made Jiung nauseous and sweaty at his palms. “…Are we okay?” He finally asked, sure that the plea for his best friend to stay was clear in his eyes. 

Theo was silent for another excruciating moment, before he pulled on another one of those smiles that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “We’re okay man,” he’d said with a pat on Jiung’s back. When Jiung’s frown only deepened with disbelief, Theo laughed. “Seriously. I’ll get over it. She chose you… And I hate to say it, but you guys look good together.”

With just those few simple words, Jiung could feel the guilt slowly dislodge itself from his being, though it didn’t subside fully. “Thank god,” he breathed, before pulling Theo into a hug. 

Theo froze, no doubt in shock from the unusual display of affection from Jiung, but was quick to hug him back. “We’re good, Ung,” he mumbled, ruffling his hair. “We’re good.”

𓆩⟡𓆪

Except they weren’t, apparently. Because Theo was still pulling away from him. He’d bail out on plans Jiung made for game night at the last minute claiming that assignments were due soon (Theo was never one to leave things until the last minute), responses to his texts would always come a day late, and their phone line had become metaphorically rusted. Even in person, conversations with him were short and clipped. 

Things were different. Jiung felt it in his soul, no matter how much Theo would try to smile and pretend to be normal around him. 

But the one thing that remained the same for Theo was you. He’d still smile the same way at you, joke the same way with you, linger the same way around you— as if nothing at all had changed between him and you even after you’d made it official with Jiung.

Jiung hated that he was the jealous type. He also hated that you let yourself be subject to Theo’s hovering, but he told himself he wouldn’t be the possessive, controlling type. 

And he couldn’t push Theo back because he didn't want to chase him away. He just hated that Theo only seemed to hang around Jiung now for you.

And you… Jiung saw the way your eyes would linger on Theo’s back as he drifted away when Jiung entered the scene. The way you always asked for Theo’s whereabouts when he wasn’t present for a group gathering. The way you’d bring up Theo every chance you’d get when the conversation had nothing to do with him. 

But with the showcase nearing and finals piling up, Jiung had become otherwise occupied. 

He had to leave practices on time to stay on top of his studies even if you wanted to stay back. Then Theo would jump at the opportunity to keep you company instead and while Jiung wanted to scowl and protest otherwise, he kept himself sane. 

He trusted you. He trusted Theo. You were friends with Theo too before Jiung started dating you, so he couldn’t let his brain spiral into unsightly depths. 

He just couldn’t help it but feel all of this. He was in love. You had him completely at your mercy and it drove him mad that it might not be the same for you.

And Jiung would tell you that after the showcase, when everything settled down to make space for something of that grandeur. 

The showcase happened on Wednesday, April 23rd, 2025 and it was a raging success. Pandemonium was a hit. But none of it mattered because when Plus One won first place for best performance, you had jumped into Theo’s arms instead of his.

The pure, unadulterated joy wasn’t directed at Jiung, your boyfriend, but at Theo. Maybe it was a stupid thing to get worked up over especially with their victory, but Jiung was nothing if not someone who took everything to heart.

He didn’t waste time waiting for the next day. He’d pulled you aside after they finished hauling their instruments back and kissed you, smothering your yelp of surprise and ignoring the others’ hooting and hollering as they filtered out of the room to head home. 

“Impromptu date night?” He asked you as he pulled away, relishing the dazed look he left behind in your eye, lips parted in breathless shock. He didn’t miss the way Theo lingered for a moment in the corner of his eye. “The beach?”

You had blinked out of your stupor and smiled. “Yeah.”

Jiung wishes you had said no, that you were tired. Maybe then things would have ended differently.

𓆩⟡𓆪

Jiung remembers the familiar cold of the water lapping at his bare feet as he walked hand in hand with you, the moon and the stars keeping you both company as you walked along the shoreline, shoes held in your free hands.

Even though he was attached to you, listening to you recounting the story of how Soul almost inadvertently sabotaged your performance by locking the practice room and misplacing the keys, he couldn’t feel more distant from you.

There was a demon rattling around in his head, nagging at him that you weren’t his. At least, not fully. 

“And then Tae came in and—“ 

He stopped in his tracks, cutting you off when you felt your hand, still in his grip, snag behind you.

You stopped in front of him, turning and frowning at the pensive look on his face. 

“Ji? What’s wrong?”

He felt helpless. He didn’t know how to do this, if he even should. 

“You really don’t know?” He asked instead, not with anger, but with defeat.

You stepped towards him, entering his space. And where he would normally seek out the heat of your body against his, he stepped back to evade its suffocating presence. But he didn’t let go of your hand, desperately clinging on like it was his last tether to you.

Your face fell when he dodged you, and Jiung wished that the hurt in your eyes wasn’t caused by him. 

“Jiung,” you started slowly, and he remembers wishing it didn’t hurt less to hear that instead of the familiar ‘Ji’. “What is it?”

The admission didn’t come warm like he’d planned for it to. 

“I’m in love with you.”

It came cold and scared, if a little hopeful. 

He remembers the way your eyes had widened. How your lips had parted to speak but nothing came out. How your hand had slipped from his grasp. 

His hand was left lonely at his side, clenched around nothing.

“Ji,” you whispered and he wished you’d never called him that. He still wishes you hadn’t ruined the name for him.

Jiung couldn’t look away from the war of emotions flitting through your eyes. He couldn’t look away from the sight of you— hair fluttering in salt-licked winds, your moon-soaked skin shimmering like the sea at his side. 

He didn’t interrupt. He waited for you to drop the knife and split his heart in two. 

“It’s difficult—“

“Is it?” He asked. What could be so difficult about loving him back?

You lowered your gaze, shoulders shaking with the steadying breaths you took. “I-I can’t…” You started quietly. “I can’t say it yet.”

“Why not?”

When you stayed silent, he knew. Jiung didn’t want to skirt around it anymore. 

“It’s because of him, isn’t it?”

Panic flashed through your eyes, snapping up to him at the insinuation his words entailed. “It’s not like that!” You tried to step forward, he only moved back. 

“Be honest with me,” he begged. “Do you have feelings for him?”

You wouldn’t answer him directly. “Ji, please—“

A surge of fury sifted through him, sudden and unannounced. “Don’t call me that,” he snapped.

You faltered back, and Jiung no longer cared that your hurt was because of him. “Jiung,” you whispered carefully. “I care about you, you have to believe that.”

“But what, you care about him too?” His breaths were uneven, shaky as they stumbled through his lips. “You care about him so much you’d put our relationship in jeopardy?" His voice rose with the anger that cracked through his carefully crafted restraint. “He’s my best friend!”

The tears in your eyes glittered like the stars. “Is he?” You asked, and Jiung felt his heart tear right out of his chest. 

He grit his teeth, willing back his own tears. “Does it matter?”

You went silent again, eyes falling from his hold. You had stopped fighting for him.

Jiung scoffed, holding together his anger to drown out his insurmountable grief. “Whatever. You don’t have to worry about me anymore. Clearly I was the one who got in the way.”

He didn’t fall for your sobs, for the way you called his name as he turned and left you at the beach. Theo would come running to you if you called. 

And come running he must have, because Jiung remembers the moment he saw you leave room 777 the next day, bass slung across your back with Theo’s hand in yours. 

𓆩⟡𓆪

Jiung knows he isn’t absolved of all blame for what happened. He should never have gotten involved with you when he learned Theo was falling for you the same as him. It would have saved him the heartache, and his best friend.

Because now he walks the same beach at sunset, barefoot along the shoreline with his shoes in his hand, all in his lonesome as he recalls the memory of you and of the man he considered his brother at one point. 

Thursday, April 23rd, 2026. 

One year since you’d broken his heart on that fateful Wednesday night. One year since you’d chosen his best friend over him. One year since his best friend had chosen you over him. 

One year, and he still can’t get the sound of your laugh out of his mind. It echoes around him like he’s being haunted by a past ghost. 

Only, it’s not just a sound that he’s mourning in his head. 

It’s real, because when he looks up from the sand, you’re there, stumbling around at the shoreline with the water at your ankles. 

It feels like watching a frame-by-frame showing of his first date with you, the scene before him carved right out of his memories and projected before him like a live replay of moments that haunt him in his dreams. Except instead of him with you, there was Theo right by your side, keeping you from falling. 

The emotion that rushes through him is too complicated for him to dissect. All he can focus on is that you’re here— one year later, at the very same spot that he’d shown you as something dear to him, the same one that you’d shattered his heart at— with him. 

And Theo was there with you, laughing without a care in the world like he hadn’t taken a lifelong friendship and buried it like it was nothing just for you. 

The ocean calls his name. He considers following its voice right into churning ceruleans and never resurfacing. 

“Ji?”

He feels hollow. Carved out to a shell, a vessel fit for nothing but misery.

You look just as beautiful as he remembers under golden rays, just like that very first day he’d brought you here.

Theo looks like he’s seen a ghost.

The moment lays standstill, charged and shock-laden, as Jiung stands before you and Theo.

His own voice sounds distant, faraway as he finally breaks the silence. 

“I see you two are doing well.” 

It pulls the scene back in motion. Theo takes your hand and tugs you behind his arm in a protective manner, and Jiung nearly laughs. 

“Jiung,” Theo says, voice low like he’s approaching a volatile beast. “It’s been a while.”

Jiung actually does laugh this time, cold and sharp. “Has it? I couldn’t tell.”

You peer over Theo’s shoulder to look at Jiung, eyes wide and disbelieving. You hesitate a moment before you speak. “Jiung. I’ve been meaning to—“

Jiung doesn’t care what you’ve been meaning to do. 

“Does he know I brought you here first?”

He sees Theo’s face shift with something unspoken, but he keeps his gaze locked on your glassy one. 

Jiung looks away when neither you nor Theo speak up, peering out at the horizon and squinting his eyes at the direct view of the sun. 

“April 23rd,” he says, fingers digging harder into the heels of his sneakers. “It’s your one year anniversary, no?”

“How’d you—“

Jiung doesn’t let Theo finish. “Ah, you don’t remember,” he chuckles, turning back to look at Theo. “It was the same day I broke up with her. Night of the showcase.” He pauses, lets the realization sink into Theo’s face. “I’m just assuming that’s when things kicked off for you two since I saw you together the next day.”

He pretends the silence after doesn’t hurt.

No sorry’s, no regrets. Just unspoken acceptance that you’d given him a world of pain and there was nothing that can be done about it. 

Jiung takes that acceptance and uses it to lock up his aching heart. He steps back. 

“Enjoy it,” he says before he turns and leaves. 

He ignores your call of his name, just like he’d done that night a year ago, and vows to never step foot on this wretched beach again.

blame @lilacs4ung (prompter) @jsshu (nominater) and @liliesonthego (plot inducer) jk i actually loved writing this thank you for leading me to 🫶

and thank you lily for beta-reading <3

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