parkerscupcake's fic recs

He wakes up pretty quickly most of the time. After how many of them he’s had by now, his body knows to wake him and get him out of there as soon as possible. It’s the panic that comes afterwards that’s harder to deal with than the nightmare. The crushing darkness of his room, the feeling that everything he’d dreamt might be real. But maybe it’s how comfortable he feels sleeping beside you that keeps him there a little longer tonight, in the world where he lost you too.

You’re used to waking up when you sleep in the same bed as Peter. There have been several times when you’ve slept over at his apartment and he’s gotten an alert on his phone in the middle of the night, causing him to spring out of bed, grab his suit, press a quick kiss to your forehead and go off to do what he does best. But what wakes you up tonight is different.

It’s the sound of whimpers that clue you in to the fact that something isn’t right. Still half asleep, you turn over, blinking your tired eyes to look at Peter. He’s laying beside you, sweat coating his body, head moving side to side. You hear the whimpers for what they are now.  Murmurs of “No, no, no.” 

Dread fills you. “Peter,” you mutter, sitting up in the bed and reaching out a hand to place on his shoulder to try and gently shake him awake. “Peter, wake up. You’re having a nightmare, sweetheart.” 

His eyes fly open, staring up at the ceiling for a split second before looking right at you. He murmurs your name and before you can even think about replying or to ask if he’s okay, he’s wrapping his arms around you and pulling you back down to the bed and into his chest. His body is warm and slick, still coated in sweat that you’re sure would have soaked through a shirt had he been wearing one. 

“Are you real?” Peter whispers against your head. “Please tell me that this is real.”

Your heart cracks. “It’s real, Peter. I’m real.” You don’t even know if he can hear you but you try to make your words as loud as you can through the sudden feeling of thickness in your throat. You’ve never seen him like this before. 

You can feel his heart racing and slowly you become aware of the fact that his breathing is quickening too. 

“Peter, hey,” you gently try and push back from him, though his grip is still tight on you, clearly trying to convince himself that you are real. “Tell me what’s going on.”

His grip loosens enough for you to pull away a little. You reach up a hand to stroke his cheek. His eyes are screwed shut, breathing coming in small bursts. You recognise it for what it is immediately. 

“Can you sit up with me for a second?” You whisper, moving to sit up and feeling immediately relieved when he listens to you and sits up too. “I think you’re having a panic attack, sweetheart. Can you open your eyes for me?”

You move to sit a little closer to him so he can see you in the dark room, only lit by the sliver of moonlight coming through the curtains. You reach up and swipe away a tear as it falls from his eye. 

“Peter, open your eyes, sweetheart,” you try again.

His eyes slowly open and the sight of them so full of tears breaks your heart even more. That, combined with his still heavy breathing and the fact that he hasn’t uttered a word since he first woke up, worry you even more.

You reach down to take his hands in yours, giving them a gentle squeeze. “Can you breathe with me, Peter? In for four, out for four, okay? I’ll do it with you. Ready? One, two, three, four…”

Relief fills you as Peter starts to try breathing with you. It’s difficult at first but the more you count out loud, the more you do it with him, the better he becomes at it. His breathing starts to slow and even though there are still tears streaking down his cheeks, it’s progress. 

You keep counting for a few minutes even after his breathing has slowed and the tears stop falling. Your hands don’t let go of his, though. You still want to keep holding him, anchoring him to the real world for as long as he needs it, even if he hasn’t asked you to. 

“Are you okay?” You eventually ask, voice soft.

Peter nods once and then shakes his head, squeezing his eyes shut again. You can’t help but feel the need to get closer to him so you make the split second decision to move to straddle his lap, letting go of his hands briefly to rest them on the sides of his neck, stroking your thumbs back and forth over his skin. 

“That was a nightmare, wasn’t it?” 

He nods again, hands moving to rest on your waist and pull you a little closer to him. “They’ve been happening for a while,” he replies, voice a little croaky from the tears and the panic attack. In the past, he’s been known to scare himself awake with a scream. Had he done that tonight? No… no, tonight your voice had been what he’d heard when he’d awoken. Your voice and your touch. You had cut through the noise. “And the panic attacks afterwards.”

“You’ve never said anything,” you frown. You’re not disappointed in him. You think you understand why he kept them to himself. But knowing he’s been struggling like this for a while and you’ve been unable to help him hurts a little. 

“I didn’t… I didn’t want to seem weak to you,” he admits, meeting your eyes. His eyes are still full of tears, you notice. “I shouldn’t be having nightmares. Not when it was my choice.”

“Everyone has nightmares, Peter. I’d never think you’re weak for having them.”

Peter shakes his head again. “Not nightmares like these,” he continues. “These ones… they’re different. It’s not just nightmares like I used to have. About the blip or about losing fights or… about Aunt May. These ones…” He drifts off, closing his eyes again.

“You can tell me,” you hum, stroking your thumb over his skin again. 

“In these ones, you forget me too,” he manages. “I wake up one morning and you’re asking who I am, why I’m in your apartment, in your bed. Or I come home and you tell me to get out of your apartment or you’ll call the cops. Or I try and text you and the message bounces back to me because I’m not in your contacts.” 

Tears start streaming down his cheeks again as he tells you about his nightmares. They’re coming too fast for you to stop this time, even though you try. Even though there are similar tears tracking their way down your cheeks too, now. He’s been dreaming about you forgetting him. About Doctor Strange’s spell working on you, like some kind of delay. And you had no idea about it up until now. It’s been over a year since the day that spell worked. Has he been having these nightmares ever since then?

“Peter, I’m not going to forget you,” you sniff, removing one of your hands from him just so you can wipe your own tears from your face this time. “If the spell was going to work on me, it would have worked by now. But it didn’t. It didn’t and I’m still here.”

Peter blinks, finally looking back at you. “How can you be sure of that?”

You wish you could tell him with certainty that you were sure. That there wasn’t a part of you that thought that one day, the spell would take effect. That the delay would finally wear off and you’d forget him entirely. You’d had similar nightmares in the past, but none to the extent that Peter has clearly been having. 

“We can’t be sure of anything, Peter,” you admit softly. “But we can be sure of right now. And right now I’m here, and you’re here and we’re together. And I remember you and I still love you like I have all along. That’s not going to change.”

For a few moments, Peter does nothing but stare at you. Even though in the dark room, he can’t see you that well. He focuses instead on what he can feel. The weight of your body atop his. The warmth of your legs over the top of his. The feeling of your shirt and your skin where his hands sit on your waist. He reaches one of his hands up to cup your cheek, wet with tears like his are too. His thumb moves to trace your lips. He works on calming his breathing again as he takes in the feel of you. You’re here. You’re real. You remember him.

He can’t help but lean forward, then, and capture your lips in his. His hand moves to hold behind your neck as he kisses you, still focusing on how you feel, how warm your lips are, the taste of the salt of both of your tears mixing together, the faint taste of your lip balm, the one you always put on before bed. He memorises feelings like this for the next time he wakes up in a panic from a nightmare like the one he’d just had. Feelings like these to remember what it feels like to have you, to hold you, to love you and to have you love him back just as deeply. 

Eventually, when he needs to breathe again, he pulls away regretfully from your lips. He rests his forehead against yours. “I’m sorry I woke you, love,” he mutters.

“I’m not,” you say. It’s the truth. You’d rather be here with him awake now than sleeping beside him, unaware of everything he was going through and unable to help him. “Wake me up next time it happens, please. Every time it happens.”

Peter knows better than to argue with you. “Okay,” he agrees. “I will.”

The two of you sit there again for a few moments, soaking in the feeling of each other. You feel closer. Things have changed in your relationship tonight. For the better, you think.

“You think you can try and sleep again?” You ask. 

He nods, if only for your benefit. He doesn’t know if sleep will come for him again tonight, but he’ll happily lay with you in his arms, feeling the way you breathe and letting you sleep beside him. “Yeah, I can try.” 

Before you can move off of him to lay down again, he leans forward to kiss you again. The kiss is deep but gentle, soft but firm. It’s another attempt to memorise the way your lips feel against his. Something to think about as he tries to sleep again beside you. Something to hold onto.

He wraps his body around yours as you both lay back down to try and sleep again. He makes sure the blanket is pulled back up around you to keep you warm and presses a soft kiss behind your ear as you snuggle back into him. 

“I love you,” he whispers, needing you to hear the words since he didn’t say them earlier.

"you see the man in the pinstripe jacket."

"yeah got him."

"okay there's two togo cups in front of him. get me?"

"got you lix."

"great, following the pattern minho hyung scoped yesterday, you'll need to find the space next to the open mug."

"copy you." jisung affirmed as began his walk to the pickup counter.

jisung's fingers opened the baggie where it hid in his pocket, he let the sleeve of his oversized hoodie—purposefully picked this morning—fall fully down his right arm as he used a slight of hand, tipping the lid off the togo cup just slightly and dumping the contents into the steaming latte.

"it's done." jisung confirmed as he continued, not breaking his stride. he pushed his sleeves back up his arms and headed toward the exit, no one the wiser.

"what the fuck do you mean it's done?" felix hissed as he zoomed in on his binoculars. "they haven't even made his drink yet."

"what?" jisung sharply turned back around. "but you said the empty space by the open mug in front of the pinstripe man and the togo cups!"

"i wasn't finished. i said FIND IT. i was gonna say, following the pattern, the target cup will be placed there next. how the fuck do you even drug an empty space?!"

"well it wasn't fucking empty now was it?!" jisung whisper yelled.

"the space or your skull?!" felix snapped back and jeongin's laugh rang through the comms.

"felix for God's sake, this isn't one of your fucking tiktok challenges where hahaha i accidentally killed the boss's son because i shot too soon how funny hahaha!" jisung spat.

"okay, should i just knock this idiot out?" changbin asked from the corner booth where he sat behind a large newspaper.

"which idiot?" hyunjin grinned from bangchan's passenger seat across the street.

"yes." changbin replied.

ignoring his brothers, and all their jokes and jabs at his expense, jisung scanned the pickup station for the drink he'd spiked as hyunjin's laughter filled his ears, but it was gone. jisung glanced to the left and-

"shit, some woman picked it up."

"forget it, window's closed. target's got his coffee and he's leaving." changbin was peeking over the top of the newspaper.

"alright, move to plan b han." bangchan ordered.

but all jisung could think was after you finished stirring your sugar and creamer into your cup you were gonna enjoy a nice hot cup of death. and while jisung was no saint, he hadn't woken up today prepared to be your barista reaper...grim barista?? either way, he didn't want you to fucking die okay.

jisung glanced at the target moving out the front door, just as you closed the lid of your cup and moved towards the door too.

"jisung plan b!" bangchan shouted as the target turned right and you turned left.

jisung glanced back and forth for the briefest of seconds, time seemed to slow as he closed his eyes and exhaled. "i'm sorry i can't."

jisung sprinted towards you as your lips touched the opening of your cup and he knocked your shoulder, hard.

you gasped as the cup slipped from your fingers splashing onto your heels and jisung's trainers.

"oh fucking hell." jeongin smacked his forehead from where he was taking in the scene across the street and three cars back.

bangchan sighed and rubbed his temple, his voice tight and monotonous. "minho plan c."

"my pleasure." minho grinned stepping out of the shadows of the alley just as the target passed. the man barely had a chance to yell as minho pressed a gloved hand over his mouth and jabbed a needle in his neck, dragging him back into the darkness.

you were staring at jisung with a confused glare when you heard a muffled yell, your neck craning to find the sound.

"hey!" jisung shouted as he saw you turning. he was in front of you now and desperately trying to keep your attention away from his friend's in progress abduction behind you.

you jumped slightly at jisung's raised voice, turning back to look at him. jisung's eyes were wide as they darted between watching the target's flailing feet just peeking out of the alley and your annoyed expression.

"plan c executed." minho announced into the comms, the ghost of a bone cracking heard just underneath minho's words. jisung watched the feet still and fade backwards into the narrow passageway. "could use some help with the body though."

"on my way to assist with the clean up hyung." changbin said as he left a tip on his table and exited the coffee shop. changbin glanced in the direction of you and jisung. your hands were on your hips and jisung's eyes were in their signature wide position. "amateur." changbin snorted as he ducked into the alley to find minho.

"fucking waste of perfectly good aqua tofana han that's just great, bloody brilliant." felix rolled his eyes from behind his binoculars.

"aqua tofana." hyunjin whispered, choking on his laugh when bangchan shot him a glare. "my bad hyung."

jisung sighed, relaxing as he heard the mission had been completed despite his colossal fuck up and near murder of you which he absolutely blamed on felix and would've said as much if he could tell you any of that without having to go ahead and murder you in the end anyways.

"uhm, not sure what the fuck is your problem, but you owe me a coffee."

"i-yes, yes i do. i'm so sorry. i was- uhm-" jisung was trying to find words but now that he was looking at you, oh my God you were gorgeous. thank God you hadn't mistakenly drank the coffee that he purposely poisoned because what a waste of beauty that would've been.

"hello." you waved your hand in front of his dazed face. "earth to quokka."

at that jisung's hand darted out and gripped your wrist. "how do you know my name?"

"seungmin plan h." bangchan was already zooming in on your face through jisung's button cam and typing in his keyboard.

seungmin ran from one rooftop to the next, swinging one sniper rifle to his back while prepping the other. "i'm on it, 29 seconds."

"answer me." jisung squeezed a little harder tugging you closer, the frame lock knife he had secured to his belt loop felt like it was burning through his pants, ready to be used if necessary.

you gasped slightly as your feet stumbled, your cold and wet pantyhose squished against the soles of your red bottoms. you should've been irate. this absolute lunatic had bumped into you, wasted your espresso, shouted at you, blubbered like an idiot, and then grabbed you like a discount gotham villain. like it was your fault that he resembled an australian woodland creature. still his eyes, squinted at you suspiciously though they were, were so so pretty.

"it's-it's just a nickname."

"yeah, mine. how'd you know that?"

"jisung move a step to the left." seungmin directed as he got into position.

but jisung knew if he did, bangchan would give the order, and you'd be dead. so for the second time that morning, even now that you might be a threat, jisung felt inexplicably drawn to protect you.

he stepped to the right.

"i said the fucking left. nooo, your other left you idiot. would you stop it?! goddammit han jisung put your L's up if you have to!" seungmin was cussing jisung from his sniper's perch.

jisung was pointedly ignoring seungmin, taking subtle steps to the right to shield you from imminent gun fire.

"okay," seungmin threw his hands up, "at this point i'm willing to shoot jisung as well."

"yeobo please channel your inner beyoncé and step to the left, i'm too young to be a widower." hyunjin lamented, pulling out his medical bag just in case seungmin was dead ass about shooting jisung. one could never be too careful with seungmin.

bangchan was at his wit's end with both jisung and hyunjin. "jeongin plan o."

"copy you." jeongin said as he stepped out of the decoy car he was in and ran to the second, more weapon equipped, getaway car down the block. "hannie hyung two minutes to hot extraction."

but two minutes or two hours, jisung wasn't gonna let you go until he got his answers. he pulled you impossibly closer. "how do you know me?" your mouth parted slightly and momentarily distracted jisung's gaze followed the motion before snapping back to your eyes. "the truth."

you put the hand jisung hadn't commandeered on his shoulder to steady yourself. as he put his free hand on your waist he wondered if you could feel the arrowhead strapped to his shoulder, flat under his hoodie and now your fingers. he also wondered why it felt so natural to hold you, and be held by you, this way. because that's what it would've looked like to any passerby, a couple's close embrace. and why, despite the oddity of the situation, did it feel like such an embrace to the both of you?

"i'll protect you." jisung's fingers curled into your side in promise.

and he would protect you. he just needed the truth. even if that truth turned out to be you that were a spy for their target and had intended to kill jisung.

"from what?" you leaned in closer and jisung's breath froze in his throat, God you smelled good. "crazy men who shout and spill coffee?" you ripped your wrist free and dazed by your scent he let you. "i don't know you, and i don't want to."

jisung had asked for the truth so you gave him that...and sprinkled on a lie, but he didn't need to know that part. because it shouldn't've been a lie. you should've wanted to run far and fast. should've meant it.

why didn't you mean it?

bangchan sighed, leaning back in the driver's seat, "she's telling the truth han. she's a firefighter, volunteered to come to seoul. she just got here this week. you've never crossed paths with her. as far as i can tell she has no idea about skz, much less han quokka jisung."

jisung kept an expressionless face as he listened to his leader. his fingers, still curled in your blouse, held tighter; his index slipped under to your bare skin just slightly, before he sighed, stepping back fully. "i'm sorry. i thought-"

"save it." you snapped, knocking his shoulder as you finally freed yourself.

jisung stood there frozen, turning to watch as you walked away. and he might've gone after you if not for jeongin pulling up right at two minutes as he'd promised. jeongin made brief eye contact with you as you stormed down the street and your brows creased for the briefest of moments before you rolled your eyes and continued away from whatever the fuck all that just was.

jeongin's head tilted with something like familiarity just a bit, before he turned his gaze away from you and back to jisung, who had only moved from his spot to turn 180° to watch you walk away. "don't do it hyung, just get in."

jisung glanced at jeongin, or more specifically where jeongin's finger was firm on the slide of the semiautomatic in his lap—no doubt jeongin had been prepared to use it on you if it had come to that—and then jisung looked back at your disappearing figure.

"jisung get in the fucking car or i will plan h you myself." bangchan spat through his teeth.

jisung's shoulders drooped as he slid into the passenger seat and jeongin took off before the door was fully closed.

in the sideview mirror jisung could see felix getting into the decoy car jeongin had left behind. jisung looked out of the passenger side window as they passed the alley and it looked perfectly normal. minho, changbin, and the body of the target were gone as if they were never there. in the rearview, jeongin watched seungmin appear from seemingly nowhere, and hop into the passenger seat right as felix was pulling away from the curb. finally, satisfied that the mission had been wrapped, bangchan put the car in drive, bringing up the rear with hyunjin.

all four cars were taking different routes, but they'd all meet up at the compound within the hour barring any issues. well, any more issues. the drives were silent. nobody speaking on the comms, nobody speaking at all.

when they got back to the compound, they all met in the conference room to debrief.

hyunjin sighed 30 seconds into the crippling silence, steepling his fingers as he spoke. "can we skip this awkward tension, and just get to the part where we discuss how my jagiya's infidelity with a pretty girl derailed the entire goddamn mission."

everyone began speaking over each other then. 

what were you thinking? 

who the fuck gives directions like that? 

to be fair yongbok it was kinda unclear. 

well excuse the fuck outta me for taking an oxford comma pause! 

it was fine, i had the paralytic ready and i haven't snapped a neck in months, missed it. 

you're one sick individ.

thank you.

next time just let me shoot him.

no way, you're not getting brain matter on another one of my fucking gucci suits.

i think we're neglecting to focus on jisung losing his mind over something that isn't shiny, pointy, and lethal.

i don't know, with the spilled aqua tofana coffee on her heels she may qualify as all three.

aqua tofana. 

bangchan slammed his hands down on the table. "enough!"

silence.

"jisung what the fuck was that? when i give a command, you fucking follow it. you put everyone at risk today, including yourself. you disobeyed a direct order and let the fucking target get away. you're lucky minho was ready and that changbin could back him. bin was supposed to be backing you! meanwhile you're getting close to a bogey!! we had no bloody idea who she was, if she worked for someone, if she had secondary eyes. why the fuck would you stand in the way of seungmin's shot? and then i'm having to call a fucking audible to have jeongin abandon his car to run interference for you just in case the firefighter was a fucking assassin. now felix is sprinting from his hideaway with no fucking cover to recover the first decoy car. i mean what in the entire hell were you thinking?"

jisung could feel his face getting hotter with every word bangchan said, because none of it was untrue and all of the chastising was more than deserved. his eyes started to water with the shame and guilt of it all.

"i don't- i don't know." jisung put his head in his hands. he really had no good explanation. "i'm sorry. i know i fucked up. i know that." jisung looked around at his brothers. "i never meant to put any one of you in harm's way i swear, i'd rather die."

everyone's gaze softened at that, the tension gradually dissipating from the room.

after a few beats changbin was the first to move, he patted jisung's back. "we know hanji. no harm no foul."

"speak for yourself, i'll never get over this betrayal." hyunjin gripped his heart.

jisung huffed a laugh and blew hyunjin a kiss. "relax, you know no one compares to my number one jagi." hyunjin winked at jisung with a smirk.

"i think i speak for everyone when i say, eeeeyuhck!" jeongin gagged.

bangchan's jaw unclenched then, uncrossing his arms with an exasperated laugh. "if you all are quite done, i guess i forgive you han. i've just accepted that you're always gonna be my problem child."

"if it's any consolation, i wanna be just like you when i grow up dad," jisung smiled at bangchan then turned to minho. "you too eomma."

minho rolled his eyes and rubbed jisung's hair, "fuck off, you're just lucky i find it's always fun to get tagged in."

jisung swatted minho away from his head, laughing as he turned to seungmin. "speaking of getting tagged in, thanks for having my back seungmo. sorry about blatantly ignoring you."

seungmin shrugged, "i had the shot either way, i'm just glad i don't have to be sorry about blatantly shooting through your clavicle."

jeongin snorted, "remind me to always move left when hyung says left."

felix chuckled at jeongin, prompting jisung to turn to him.

"and i'm really sorry i wasted your mixture yongbokah. i know how long the compounds can take."

felix bumped jisung's shoulder, "s'alright mate, worked out in the end yeah? we'll find another use for the aqua tofana so it was good practice still."

"aqua tofana." hyunjin whispered.

"hwang for God's sake!" bangchan snapped. "no more fucking bailey sarian."

the room burst into laughter and hyunjin crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair with a cheeky smile.

"my bad hyung."

don't be a silent reader. interaction is a writer's life blood. love you, mean it.💋

It’s simple, easy, and fun depending on how everyone is feeling. As soon as you turn on the live, one by one, the viewers and fans start pouring in. By the five minute mark, there were about over ten thousand viewers which was absolutely amazing and surprising. Within the chat, viewers spam their greetings and send out a lot of waving and heart emojis. 

“Hello everyone?” You warmly greeted as you comfortably laid in bed with your phone propped up by your pillow so you could lay on your side. “How is everyone doing?” 

You continue monitoring the chat to read everyone's responses. For now, it seems like everyone is having a good day. After moving on from there, some fans started talking about the latest trailer and update for one of your favorite games, Love and Deepspace. 

“Huh? There’s a new update? Hang on, let me get my tablet…” 

While you left momentarily, you missed the fans spamming a lot of sweating, fire, and wolf emojis into the chat. You opened your tablet, typed whatever you needed to in order to see what they were talking about. When the screen loaded to the trailer, your brian short circuited. 

“... Hello?! Who’s this?!” You exclaimed, totally speechless as your jaw dropped. “Damn, well hello Valko?!” 

You watched the trailer while the viewers keenly observed your reaction. The trailer was short but nevertheless utterly mindblowing. 

“Holy crap?! That trailer was amazing!... Huh?” 

“Doesn’t he remind you a lot about Chan?” You read in the chat and your face started heating up. “He kinda does…” 

You drop your tablet to the side to cover your face, unable to get the comparison out of your head. 

“Ooh, Y/N has a type!” One of the viewers teased. 

“It’s okay Y/N, we’re on the same boat!” Another viewer adds to the chat. 

“We’re all here for you, trust!” A third viewer joked. 

“I’m definitely getting back into the game if that means I get to see this handsome guy!” 

MEANWHILE IN THE NEXT ROOM…

“Hyung… should we be concerned?” Jeongin asked as he stopped scrolling through his phone to hear all that commotion coming from your room. 

“Maybe?” Chan said, trying to brush off what he was hearing. 

“OH MY GOSH?! HE’S A WOLF! AHHHHHHHH!”

“You sure you don’t want to check up on, Noona?” 

“Pretty sure.” Chan spoke, showing a very tight smile being lit up by his laptop’s screen. 

That’s his sign to be quiet. 

Then the two of them hear a knock at their room door. 

“Come in?” Chan permitted, carefully pushing his laptop screen down. 

“Hyung, is Noona okay?” Jisung asks, poking his head in with Felix, Seungmin, and Hyunjin standing beside him. 

“JUST YOU WAIT! WHEN THIS UPDATE RELEASES IT’S GAME OVER! I’LL MAKE HIM MINE MWAHAHAHA!” 

“Should I call the cops, therapist, or a shaman?” Minho joked as they all listened to your unhinged though very excited ramblings. 

“I’ve never heard her scream like that… it’s kinda terrifying…” Changbin utters out. 

“Hyung?” Felix said, but he didn’t need to say anything more than that.

Chan sighs, setting his computer onto his desk to venture to your room. 

“Look at his muscles?! His eyes?! The wolfish features?! Stays, I’m dying!” 

“Y/N?” Chan calls out from nowhere, causing you to hide under your blanket. “Seriously?” 

“C-Chan did you need something?” You nervously ask. 

“Yeah, show me what you’re this excited about?” 

“Ummm, no thanks.” You shuffled out of bed with your phone. 

“No? You really said no to me?” Chan challenges with a playful tone. 

“Yeah, I’m currently busy with Stays so ummm, gotta go!” 

“Get back here Y/N!” 

“Stays, help me!” You shouted, running down the stairs with Chan in hot pursuit.

“Oh, Jungkook!” the scream echoes through the tin walls, clearly letting you know what activities your neighbor is up to.

“Fuck,” you mumble. “Here we go again.”

The bed's headboard hammers against the wall, and damn, you’re about to kill your neighbor. It almost feels like you’re in the bedroom with them. They are loud as fuck. This isn’t new at all, because your cheeky neighbor, Jungkook, is all charming and brings women quite often. The problem here is that he woke you up.

you: bro, it’s fucking 2am

You know you’ll get an answer later—if he doesn’t come after two minutes—but he’s so damn annoying. In four hours, you need to be up for work, and the shitty head is ruining your night of sleep. The urge to knock at his door and cockblock him is like burning you, but as much as you’d love to do that, you still care about your friendship. Jungkook is like the only friend you've made since moving here.

A year ago, you moved into this small apartment, seeking some freedom from your parents, but quickly realized that the building's thin walls would complicate your life. Thankfully, the neighbor sharing your bedroom wall is fun to be around.

Although Jungkook sometimes has some fun with ladies he finds in very questionable bars, he’s very nice and funny. He seems to know every gossip from your neighbors and tells them all to you the second he finds out. He also loves to bother you, as if it were his life mission.  

With your pillow in your head, you try desperately to fall asleep, but the girl’s voice keeps getting higher, her moans piercing through the pillow over your head. Jungkook’s deep voice grunts and says something you can’t understand, but it only makes her moan louder. The bed bangs harder against the wall.

This can’t keep going. As a barista, you need your eight hours of sleep, otherwise there’s no way you’ll survive the rude clients. If anything goes wrong at work after this, you’ll definitely kill Jungkook, who’s the only one to blame for it.

With a deep groan, you leave the warmth of your bed, heading straight to his apartment. The second you bang on his door, everything stops before footsteps are heard. Your heart stammers in your chest, too scared he might hate you.

When the door opens, an almost naked Jungkook stands in front of you. His toned and sweaty chest is on full display while his bottom is hidden in loose grey sweatpants. His chest also moves at a crazy fast pace, and his breathing is all over the place, just like his tousled hair. If he wasn’t your friend, you might have found your way to his bed because he looks devastatingly hot.

His intense dark gaze scares the hell out of you, but you couldn’t care less. “What are you doing here?” he says with clear frustration.

Jungkook takes the time to look down at you, clearly taken aback to see you here, and he can’t help but find you absolutely cute. Your cute and short pajamas leave little to the imagination.

“It’s 2 fucking am, Kook,” you tell him with some anger. “Can’t you both shut up and let me sleep?”

A smirk appears on his face, while a chuckle rumbles in his chest.

“Why would I do that?” he raises an eyebrow. “I’m having fun.”

“I don’t care!” you almost yell at him. “I need to sleep.”

“You never complained before…”

Your eyes dramatically roll, which only makes him chuckle more. Even though you love him, right now you don’t, and he’ll pay for it. You ignore how yet, but you’ll get revenge.

“Please choke her or whatever, but make her shut up,” you say. “Otherwise, I’ll do it myself.”    

“I’d love to see that,” he teasingly says with his damn smirk growing bigger.

“Jungkook,” you warn him, “I’m not joking.”

Your neighbor takes a deep breath, his hand running through his hair while he closes his eyes for a second. When he opens them again, there’s something in them that you can’t quite put your finger on.

“In case you hadn’t noticed, the guy down there is dead,” he gestures to his dick, and your eyes inevitably look down. There’s nothing, just as he mentions. “Somebody decided to ruin all the fun.”

“Ask for a blowjob or something else to wake your little guy,” you reply as if it was damn obvious.

“Are you for real?” he narrows his eyes. “Just go back to your place and sleep. We won’t be bothering you anymore.”

You nod before going back to sleep. As promised, silence follows, allowing you to return to sleep peacefully. When you wake up hours later, you feel so damn exhausted, and somehow, you don’t even find the energy to hate him. Probably, he hates you right now for cockblocking him, but you know it won’t last long.

After getting dressed and ready for work, you head to the elevator. Surprisingly, Jungkook is already waiting for it at the lobby.

“Good morning, Kook,” you smile at him.

“Only good morning to you, Voldemort,” he mumbles.

Anyone would be surprised by the nickname Voldemort, but it always makes you smile like an idiot. At first, Jungkook was saying it to bother you because you’re a mega fan of Harry Potter, but over time, it became a sign of affection.

“You’re mad?” you ask.

“Don’t know yet,” he honestly replies, his eyes finally looking at you.

“Will a super good breakfast prepared by your fantastic neighbor convince you not to be mad?” you try to sway him.

In order for you to get proper revenge, you need first to gain his trust again, so it’ll piss him off when you do it. A sly smile stretches across his face, and you know right there and then that you just won. Jungkook loves your breakfasts.

“Might help,” he smiles.

As promised, his breakfast was served at the coffee shop where you work, and in the blink of an eye, he devoured everything like a starved man. He definitely was starving, and even though you’re preparing your little revenge, it made you smile to see him eating everything.

The next day, Jungkook shows up unannounced at your place when a couple living next to you starts arguing very loudly. Melissa and Carter seem to enjoy arguing over the smallest things. For example, a week ago, it was because he bought the wrong tomatoes, and she made a big deal out of it. It’s funny, honestly.

“What are the popcorns for?” you ask when Jungkook steps inside your apartment.

“Their argument is juicy today,” he says, heading straight to the kitchen to place the popcorn in a bowl. “Apparently, she’s cheating,” he screams.

You laugh, shaking your head as your feet guide you to the kitchen. Jungkook is way too noisy for his own good. The two of you sit at the table, the bowl of popcorn between you, and you listen to Melissa and Carter arguing. Your kitchen connects with theirs.

“I saw you with him,” Carter yells. “How dare you deny it?”

“Because he’s just a friend!” she claps back. “Can’t I speak with friends now? Or are you the only one who gets the right to speak with women?”

This is so childish, even your nieces and nephews have more interesting discussions. But there’s nothing else really to expect from these two; they always argue over the silliest things. If they fight over tomatoes, they can’t possibly have a good conversation.

“A friend you kiss?” Carter’s voice gets incredibly higher.

Both you and Jungkook laugh with popcorn in your mouths.

“Gosh, she’s quite shameless,” you say with your mouth full. “Wouldn’t have expected it from her.”

“Oh, yeah,” Jungkook piles on, his eyes quickly looking at you with a smile on his face. “I wouldn’t have been surprised if the roles were reversed. Melissa left me speechless here.”

For a second, your eyes glance over to the man next to you. The memory of him, all sweaty and almost naked, comes up, and damn, your legs squeeze at the thought. You have to bite your tongue to push those thoughts away. He’s your friend—at least it’s what you’re trying to convince yourself.  

“Stop lying!” Carte yells all over again. “I saw it with my own eyes.”

“Maybe you should consider wearing glasses,” she fights back.

This time, none of you holds back the laughter. This Melissa is really bad at lying or finding excuses. She could have done better.

“She could have found better,” Jungkook says while laughing like an idiot.

“She could just admit it,” you add.

Somehow, this feels like watching a telenovela with him. There’s always something going on with your neighbors, and they quite entertain you a lot. You’ve laughed a lot over them, and the even funnier part is that they totally ignore how everyone is able to hear their silly arguments. Meeting them in the elevator or somewhere in the building makes it hard to hold back.

“For fuck’s sake,” Carter swears before a loud door slams.

“This time, they’ll for sure split,” Jungkook speaks with a mouth full of popcorn. “He can’t stay with a cheater.”

“I wouldn’t stay if I was him.” Who would stay with a cheater? It’ll be like accepting to torture yourself over and over again. Lucky for you, remaining in a relationship is the last of your wishes, which tends to annoy your parents.

Just like Jungkook, you tend to find rather questionable men, but as long as they give you an orgasm, it’s not important. Truth be told, sometimes, they’re absolutely bad at it, which can be frustrating, but it’s very rare.

“Me neither,” he says, his eyes meeting yours. “But first, we’d need to get into a relationship.”

You chuckle, shaking your head and grabbing a handful of popcorn. “That’d be a tragedy.”

Jungkook hates relationships, to say the least. In fact, he runs away from them as if the plague was following him. Hookups are his favorite, which you perfectly understand. The thing is that he might have a tiny little crush on you. How couldn’t he? His entire soul was drawn to you since the very first time he met you.

The thing is that he isn’t fully ready to acknowledge his crush, and he values your friendship way too much. Those moments with you, like this one, are what fill his soul. He always looks forward to being with you, and deep down, he knows he’s always finding an excuse to spend time with you.

For example, two days later, he shows up at your door because he’s absolutely bored, and doesn’t even try to hide it.

“I’m not your personal entertainer,” you tell him, not letting him in.

“Yes, you are,” he replies without even thinking. “So let me in.”

“No,” you shake your head.

The man waiting for you in the living room would clearly not be happy to see another gentleman barging in. Who would? Especially when you’re that close to getting into the warmth of your bedsheets to fuck.

“Please leave,” you tell him with gritted teeth.

“Yn?” the man calls for you while his footsteps get closer.

A bright smile grows on Jungkook’s face as he understands what the matter is here. Can he blame you? No, but man, he also definitely wants to bother you. However, he’s not going to do it because he doesn’t want you to hate him.

“Okay, I’m leaving,” he surrenders before letting you go back to your hookup. Jungkook still takes a peek inside, trying to see who the lucky guy is. “He’s a solid eight, by the way,” he says when he notices the blond man. “Have fun, dearest neighbor.”   

The two of you have this habit of rating your hookups whenever you get a look at them. His choices are sometimes not the best, but they never look too bad—as long as he has whatever he wants, it’s just fine for you.  

What Jungkook ignores is how loud you pretend to be when this blond guy fucks the shit out of you. This might be one of your revenges, and the fact that he’s bored makes it even better. He’ll have to listen to you while you spend a blissful moment with another man.

And man, you got loud. Jungkook even has to play some random video game, with the sound blasting in his ear and almost making him deaf, but at least your moans are lessened. Somehow, he understands why you disturbed him while he was busy with another woman a couple of nights ago.

The next few days are calmer, no hookups, and your neighbors are way too calm, but you still spend some time with Jungkook.

“Love your new haircut,” you tell him when you step inside the elevator next to him.

“Thanks,” he genuinely smiles.

“You’re trying to impress a new girl?” You narrow your eyes playfully.  

A sly smirk appears on his face, and you already know some shit is going to come from his mouth. Nothing good ever leaves his mouth when that smirk shows up. You already mentally prepare yourself to roll your eyes heavily.

“Maybe…” he whispers, shrugging.

Before you can roll your eyes, he steps closer and presses a gentle kiss on your cheek, causing shivers to run down your spine.   

“You’re unbearable,” you mutter, trying to ignore how your body reacts to him.

“And yet,” he says smugly as the elevator doors open, “you keep talking to me.”

This time, you definitely roll your eyes and scoff as you follow him out of the elevator. This man is clearly unbelievable. Sometimes, you even wonder how you manage to keep up with him, as he always acts bratty.

“That can change very quickly if I want to,” you say, crossing your arms.

Jungkook glances over his shoulder, walking backward down the hallway with that stupidly confident grin. The urge to slap his face tickles your hands, and if he keeps going, you might not be able to hold it back.

“You’re going to ignore me now?” he asks once in front of you.

“What if I do?” you stop in front of him, your bodies a breath away from each other.

“Yn,” he lets out a laugh, gently tucking a strand of hair behind your ear. “You always forget half of your groceries every single time and then make me rescue you.”

Well, he’s absolutely right. Without him, you’d spend your time going back and forth between your place and the grocery store. You’ve tried everything to buy all you need, but it’s useless. Luckily for you, Jungkook always has what you need at his place.

“I’ll find a solution…” you say, but it doesn’t sound convincing.

“Looks like Melissa is rubbing off on you,” he begins, his fingers running from your hair to your cheek, making you shiver even more. “You’re starting to lie as badly as her.”

For sure, it’s a lie. You won’t ever be able to find a solution as efficient as Jungkook, but what can you do? If he keeps being this cocky, you might really stop talking to him. There’s no way you’ll feed his ego more.

“It’s not the same, and you know it,” you try to defend yourself. “She cheated on Carter, and this is about me and my shitty memory.”

“Not wrong, but it still doesn’t change the fact that you’re a terrible liar,” he says with that annoying smirk still on his face.

“If you keep going, I’ll really stop talking to you, and you’ll have to find a new personal entertainer.” You push his hand away from your face so you can resume walking to your apartment.

Jungkook sighs before running after you to catch you up. Fuck, he probably messed up.

“Sorry,” he says behind you. “I still need my personal entertainer and my partner in hearing Melissa and Carter’s silly fights.”

A chuckle leaves your lips as you turn around to face him. He looks cute when he apologizes, and to be honest, this new haircut makes him look way too hot for his own good.

“Apologies accepted,” you say. “On one condition.”

“I’m all ears,” he replies.

Your lower lip is caught between your teeth. This is the perfect moment to get revenge for the sleep disruption and for the nonsense he just threw in your face. He’ll probably kill you, but you don’t care. You have to try.

“No girls for a month,” you say with a sly smile.

Jungkook instantly shakes his head, “Absolutely no.”  

His face is absolutely hilarious. His eyes are incredibly wide, his eyebrows are furrowed, and his cheeks are taking on a pink shade. Is he embarrassed or shocked? Good question, but you hope for both.   

“Then, you’ll have to find a new neighbor to bother,” you immediately turn around and walk to your apartment.

“Wait,” he comes after you, his hand grabbing your wrist to prevent you from walking away. “Are you serious?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” you tilt your head. “Did I look like I was joking?”

You definitely are, but you’re trying to see if he’ll just surrender. This will be the biggest cockblock ever.

“You’re asking me to go a full month without sex…” he runs his fingers through his hair. “You know I barely survive a week.”

“I know,” you say with the biggest teasing smile on your face. “But you compared me to Melissa and basically implied I couldn’t survive without you, which is deeply hurtful.” It isn’t, but you’re not going to say it. “It’s either your questionable chicks or me.”

“You can’t be serious,” he mumbles under his breath.

“You still have your hand to help you out,” you suggest, trying to offer him a solution.

“As if my hand could ever be like a pussy,” he shakes his head, completely defeated. You clearly handed him a dilemma, and it’s funny to watch. Even better than Melissa and Carter’s telenovela.  

“Maybe you can find something better at a sex shop,” you offer.

For sure, you’ll be the death of him before the end of the day. How can you just throw things like that as if you weren’t asking him to go without sex for an entire month? There’s no way he’ll survive that much. But he values your friendship way too much. If he has to go a full month without sex to keep hearing your bullshit when he bothers you, so be it.

“Okay,” he agrees with your crazy condition. “I’ll do it.”

To say you’re surprised is an understatement. You were expecting a lot of begging and bargaining, but definitely not him giving up that easily, especially when it comes to his mindblowing sex.

“Really?” A smile stretches on your face. “You’d choose me over your hookups?”  

“Don’t flatter yourself,” he rolls his eyes. “I’d rather use my hand for a month straight than be forever deprived of your stupid comments over our neighbors.”

You shake your head, taking whatever he says while you perfectly know that he cares about you, and even though you don’t want to admit it, it genuinely pleases you that he chooses you.

To both your surprises, you wrap your arms around him, pushing him into a warm embrace. None of you has ever been this close—unless you consider trying to put a drunk Jungkook to bed as closeness.

However, this is just the beginning of your revenge…

In the following days, you make sure to be as loud as possible whenever a man is between your legs. Damn, you’ve probably never moaned that loud, despite it being completely fake. None of the men actually manages to make you properly come.

Jungkook keeps wandering around you, as if nothing ever happened. Carter and Melissa never broke up, but they still argue like kids every day. The two of you playfully listen to their arguments. Now, you also have a new neighbor who’s like the biggest cheater in the world. He brings in multiple girls but keeps sweet-talking with his supposed girlfriend.

This is new entertainment for you and Jungkook.

jk🔥: no man tonight?

A smile appears on your face when you see the message.

you: too exhausted to open my legs 🥱

Through the thin walls, you manage to hear his contagious chuckle.

jk🔥: you sound like a whore

you: learned from the best

That isn’t true—you started long before meeting him. One-night stands have been part of your frequent vocabulary for a long time now. The sad part of it all is that you’re never satisfied. One could think that with all those guys, you’d find a way to be fulfilled, but it’s the opposite.

Sleeping with them only creates a bigger hollow inside you. Most of the time, it feels like you’re chasing after the unknown. You’ve no clue what you want, so sleeping with guys seems to make it easier.

What truly fills your soul is the time spent with your friends and family. There’s no feeling like laughing loudly at a friend’s joke, or playing with your nieces and nephews in your parents’ house, or even bothering Jungkook with the eggs you forgot to buy. Those moments are what truly nurture you.

jk🔥: you might have surpassed your teacher

You genuinely smile, but you don’t know how to feel. Is it a good thing you’ve been having all these men in your bed? Is it even worth it? Well, your body will definitely say yes, but your brain wouldn’t know what to think.

you: i’m the perfect student then 🤗

jk🔥: a tiny bit too loud student

Even though the purpose was to torture him a bit, you somehow feel a bit guilty. You’re not playing fair with him.

you: isn’t it too hard?

The three dots dance on your screen while you patiently wait for his reply.

jk🔥: no, except when you fake it

You gasp at his message. How can he tell that? Then, as you were typing your answer, Jungkook calls you.

“How do you know?” you straightforwardly ask.

“I just know,” he replies.

“You cannot say things like that,” you reply, as you shift onto your side, staring at the wall.

“But it’s true,” his voice lowers, somehow sending shivers down your spine.

“You’re unbelievable.” A little smile makes its way to your face.

“No, you’re the one being unbelievable,” he counters immediately. “Do you have any idea how torturous these past days have been?”

“That’s not what you said on your message,” you say.

He sighs deeply on the other side, and you can tell it’s been hard for him. Well, if it was the other way around, you’d be dying. No sex for a month, and hearing your neighbor going wild would definitely be torture.

“And you agreed to the deal,” you let out a nervous laugh.

“Yeah, and now I’m stuck listening to you through the wall every night while you sound like you’re auditioning for an Oscar,” he teasingly replies.

Honestly, the thought of it being terrible never crossed your mind. For sure, you’ve been faking it a couple of times or exaggerating it to annoy your neighbor, but you thought it was fine.

“Oh my god,” you bury your face into your pillow with some embarrassment. “You’re insane.”

Jungkook chuckles on the other side, amused by your comment. Honestly, since he agreed to this whole no sex for a month, hearing you has definitely been driving him insane. If he’s honest, it actually turns him on. He has even dreamed once of being on top of you and giving you as much pleasure as you want with his mouth, fingers, and cock.

“And you’re a terrible liar,” he adds.

Or maybe Jungkook knows you well enough to be able to say it. Over the past year, he’s hung out with you more than he has with his own friends, so there’s no doubt that he knows you quite well.

“When you fake it, your voice changes,” he says softly.

Sometimes, he wishes he didn’t know when you’re about to come or when you’re faking it. It can be embarrassing to a certain level.

Before you even get the chance to ask him how he knows all of it, he says, “The walls are way too thin, we can hear everything even if we don’t want to. It’s not our fault if we know how the other sounds in bed. I’m absolutely sure you know when I’m about to come.”

Of course you do, and like him, sometimes you wish you didn’t. Those are your most intimate moments, and it’s weird that the person you consider a friend knows about them. Although at this stage, your friendship is taking another turn.

“You’re saying you know me that well?” you whisper.

“I do, even if I don’t want to admit it,” he says softly. “Like I just know that you’re absolutely loving to drive me crazy.”

You try to ignore the warmth spreading through your stomach. He noticed it. He knows you’re doing this all on purpose.

“Maybe you’re just easy to mess with.”

Jungkook laughs quietly, his eyes glued to the ceiling while he runs his free hand through his hair. “You’re too dangerous,” he whispers with the deepest voice you’ve ever heard from him.

Your heart stops beating for a second. What can you even say to that? This is just you trying to get some revenge, but in a certain way, it feels like it’s coming right back at you.

“You’re making it sound like I’m some kind of villain,” you reply.

Jungkook chuckles, his eyes sparkling with amusement. Honestly, he wishes a wall wasn’t separating the two of you right now. It would have been a hundred times better to be with you.

“No,” he says gently. “A villain would at least have the decency to kill me quickly.”

Your heart hammers in your chest because you know damn well that he’s flirting with you. Somehow, you’d like to say that this doesn’t affect you, but it’d be a total lie. Fuck, you even want him to keep flirting with you.

“But you?” his voice drops lower. “You just smile, act nice, and take your sweet time killing me. You’re such a dangerous woman.”

His last words send shivers down your spine. 

“I’m not trying to kill you,” you whisper softly.

“No?” he asks while raising an eyebrow. “So, knocking at my door at 2 am while I’m balls-deep in someone, asking me to go a month without sex, and moaning loudly isn’t trying to kill me?”

Well, he might not be wrong, but this has been quite funny so far. 

“And do you want to know the worst part?” he continues.

“Tell me,” you whisper.

A part of you already knows what he’s about to say, but you still want to hear it.

“I don’t even want you to stop.”

Fuck, he definitely knows how to speak to women. For the first time, you’re experiencing the flirty version of him, which is a total turn-on.

“So, is this your way of telling me to keep going?” you ask, a teasing smirk playing on your lips.  

“Maybe,” he replies in a heartbeat.

“Then, brace yourself,” you say, your eyes closing for a second. “I’m not going to go easy on you.”

A bright smile grows on his face at the simple thought of it. He can’t wait to see what you have in store for him. A part of him knows that he shouldn’t be excited because it’d be playing with fire and probably risking your friendship, but his little crush on you speaks louder. He wants to ruin the friendship. Actually, he wants you to ruin him.

The very next day, you meet on the elevator after an intense day at work. Throughout the day, you avoided texting him to tease him a bit. It was also packed at work, but whenever you had five minutes for yourself, you’d leave him on read, which frustrates him.

“You know,” Jungkook says as soon as you step inside the elevator, “most people answer texts.”

A proud smile appears on your face before you turn your face to look at him. Your head tilts a bit to the right, trying to see if he’s angry or frustrated or maybe both.

“Most people aren’t me,” you nonchalantly reply.

“Clearly,” he sighs. “I was starting to think that I needed to file a missing person report.”

You heavily roll your eyes, your smile never once leaving your lips. His eyes admire you for a second, his breath faltering for a second, as he tries to remain composed. It’s been hard not to speak with you for an entire day. He’s not used to it.

“You’re being so dramatic,” you tell him.

“Says the woman who weaponizes read receipts,” he mumbles under his breath.

Even though he doesn’t want you to hear it, you still do, but you don’t react. You warned him yesterday, and you’re definitely going to push him over the edge. He’s clearly not ready for what’s coming, and in no time, he’ll be begging for your mercy.

When the doors open, the two of you leave the small cabin, walking toward your apartments. The sound of life echoing around fills the small silence between you, but your mind is racing with thoughts.  

The moment you both reach your apartment doors, you step closer, barely leaving any space between your bodies. Jungkook’s eyes scan your face, trying to read you.

“Did you miss me?” you teasingly whisper as your fingers run down his chest, sending electricity through both of you.

Jungkook is used to being teased, but man, when it’s you, he barely manages to think. He’s completely under your spell.

“What if I did?” he mumbles, his hot breath caressing the skin of your face. “Would it be terrible?”

“I’m not sure,” you reply with a smirk. “You should be the one telling me.”

For a second, he doesn’t reply, trying to think of a decent answer. The nastiest answer crosses his mind because he desperately wants to have you weak on your knees, but maybe it isn’t the most appropriate, especially not in the building’s hallway. Your neighbors could hear it, just like you can hear everything.

Jungkook leans closer, his lips brushing against your ear, and the feeling of his breath against your skin definitely sends shivers down your spine. Seems like your little game has backfired right at you.  

“You’re lucky I have enough self-control not to answer the way I want to,” he whispers, his husky voice sending a fresh wave of shivers through you.

Fuck, you never imagined yourself being so turned on by your neighbor. Over the past year, you’ve never truly pictured yourself getting freaky with him because being with him is what you've always valued the most. He’s a great friend.

But now, you’d open your legs for him… What kind of friendship is that?

A smirk appears on your face. “Is that so?” you tease him. “What’s holding you back?”

Without any warning, Jungkook licks your ear before kissing the spot right under. A whimper escapes your lips. Now, this is something you didn’t expect or even see coming. His lips leave a couple of more kisses on that spot before moving higher. Your eyes flutter shut while your hand finds its way to his fluffy hair.

This feels fucking good for both of you.

An anticipation builds within you as he slowly reaches your lips. Damn, you're so eager to feel his mouth on yours, to finally know what it's like to be kissed by Jungkook. So far, it's fantastic and thrilling. No wonder every shady girl wants him.

His lips halt at the corner of yours, his eyes moving up to look at you. The nastiest smirk appears on his face, and man, this is a fucking victory for him. Right now, he has you wrapped around his fingers, and he has never desired this much to kiss you as desperately as he wants right now.

Jungkook doesn’t move, his eyes glued to yours as they slowly open again. None of you moves, and it somehow drives you crazy. You need his lips on yours. His breathing tickles your face, but you couldn’t care less. His hand gently cups your cheek, his thumb stroking your skin.

“Can I?” he asks softly.

The simple fact that he asked instead of just rushing his lips on yours makes your heart swell. Never before has a man done that. In the heat of the moment, you wouldn’t have even thought to ask, but he did. You’d like to say that it surprises you coming from him, but it doesn’t. It definitely matches his personality and who he is.

“Absolutely,” you nod with a smile.

Without hesitation, his lips smash against yours, finally kissing you. The kiss is soft and tender, the kind of kiss that feels long overdue. You immediately melt into it, your fingers curling around the front of his shirt as he smiles into the kiss. His hands find their way to your back, pressing you against his body. The world disappears around you while he deepens the kiss.

You’ve kissed many men before him, but none of them were this great. Jungkook is more than a great kisser, and the more you get to see his flirty side, the more you understand the girls he brings home.

Your body leans into his while your fingers hold his shirt as tight as possible. The two of you desperately try to push each other even closer, as if you’ll run away if you let go. The kiss is all tongue and teeth by now, clearly indicating the nasty turn it’s taking.

But let’s not forget the sex ban you put him under.

It’s not because he has you wrapped around his fingers, or should you say, wrapped around his tongue, that he gets to get freaky. So, very delicately, you push him back with your hands, clearly putting an end to this mindblowing kiss.

A deep groan rumbles in his chest, the vibration running straight to your core and making you wet at the same time, as if this simple moment hadn’t already left you desperate for more.

“You’re still forbidden from sex, Kook,” you whisper against his lips. 

Jungkook doesn’t open his eyes, too scared to see your fucked out expression. He hasn’t really forgotten about it, but somehow, he was hopeful that if it involves you, you’d give him a pass. If he sees you, he won’t be able to resist.

You place a gentle peck on his lips before taking a step back, putting some clear distance between the two of you. This is highly frustrating for you both, but you still have your revenge to get on. And this really helps.

“Fuck,” he mumbles before opening his eyes and running a hand through his hair. “You’re such a fucking tease.”

“You can kiss as much as you want, but it can’t go any further than that,” you reply with a victorious smile on your face. “And you were clearly trying to get me into your bed.”

This sight right here could make him come in an instant. Your shiny, swollen lips are mesmerizing, making it impossible to look away, but beyond that, your beauty is breathtaking. He has never desired anyone as much as he does right now. He definitely wants more, but obviously, he won’t get it. Certainly not from you.

Seems like his hand will be his only consolation tonight…

“You’ll have to try harder for that to happen,” you add.

A smirk instantly stretches his lips, leaving no doubt that he’ll do everything in his power to see you contorting with pleasure underneath him.

In the following days, you purposely avoid Jungkook as if he has the plague, but it’s all part of your silly revenge plan. To say that it frustrates him is a rather huge understatement. Even hearing Melissa and Carter get freaky—because believe it or not, that woman is absolutely loud when she gets dicked down—is absolute torture to him. Usually, it’s quite funny, but not this time around.

Whenever you’d see him from afar, you’d devilishly smile and run away or hide from him as fast as you could. Your smile would grow even bigger when you hear him masturbating and moaning like a frenetic at night, totally ignoring that he’s also torturing you back.

Jungkook plays along with your game. You wanted to torture him, so be it, but he has to get back at you. His only plan is to make you hear his despair. And it’s working because he could hear you, too.

The tension is clearly growing, and none of you is preventing it from expanding. As vicious as it might sound, you are actually more than eager to make it unbearable.

And then, a heatwave hits.

Everything suddenly becomes too much. Your name would roll off his tongue at a surprisingly fast pace, your fingers would find their way to your core every time you thought of him, and avoiding him turns out to be almost impossible. You’re craving each other with a tremendous desperation.

Usually, heatwaves make it almost unbearable to think of getting naughty because it’s just too hot, but to the two of you, it’s actually the opposite. You want it. Maybe not as much as Melissa and Carter, because those two are not stopping for a second. It’s almost like he has forgotten she cheated on him not so long ago. Maybe he has selective memory.

The heat between your legs clearly becomes insufferable. You couldn’t do it anymore. So you probably did the most stupid thing and knocked on his door at midnight after you heard him moaning your name like it was some sort of mantra.

“Not avoiding me anymore, huh?” Jungkook says when he opens the door.

Your gaze drops to his sweaty chest, heavy breathing, and tousled hair before settling on the familiar pair of Calvin Klein briefs he always seems to wear. The prominent bulge instantly makes you drool.

“Actually, I wanted to warn you that I’m going to file a noise complaint,” you teasingly reply.

“Oh, yeah?” he kookily asks. “Isn’t it flattering to have a man masturbating at the thought of you?”

You instantly choke on your own saliva at his straightforwardness. He’s not even trying to hide what he was doing, which somehow surprises you while also not surprising you in the slightest. This man is a walking contradiction. And does it turn you on? Absolutely!

 “Maybe,” you reply, pushing him to get inside his place.

Tonight, you won’t be leaving without getting destroyed by him. Jungkook closes the door behind him before slowly making his way toward you.

“What are you doing here?” he asks, even though the answer is rather obvious.

“I told you—” you start speaking, but he cuts you off.

“We both know it isn’t true.” Jungkook now stands right in front of you, his chest almost pressed against yours.

“Who said I was going to file it against you?” You raise an eyebrow. “It could be against our beloved neighbors, and I’d need some backup, or…” your fingertips trail down his damp chest, sending shivers right through his body. “Or it could be against us and the noise we’re about to make.”

Your eyes follow the tip of your fingertip sliding over his body, noticing as well how his breathing picks up. Although it definitely looks like a victory, it doesn’t feel like one. Why? Because you crave him with your entire being, and he hasn’t surrendered just yet.

A smirk rises on his face before he snorts. “What noises?”

“I don’t know,” you shrug, your eyes moving up to meet his gaze. He’s so fucking breathtaking with his tussled hair. “Maybe something similar to what Melissa and Carter have been up to for the past few days.”  

Anyone with two ears could perfectly hear how loud they’ve been fucking lately. This whole cheating thing has excited them even more. You’re sure that you and Jungkook haven’t been the only people turned on.

“May I need to remind you of the sex ban you put me under?”

The two of you know that it doesn’t matter anymore. The ban has long been forgotten. It simply has been the cataclysm of this whole teasing and flirting between you.

You dangerously close the distance between you, your lips brushing against his ear to whisper, “I don’t remember anything of it.”

Shivers appear on his body instantly. He’s fucked. But he perfectly knows it, and he doesn’t care. All he wants is to have you in any possible way, which clearly seems like he’d get it tonight. If he knew, he’d have called a wizard or whatever to create this heatwave sooner.   

In an instant, his arm wraps around your waist, pushing you even closer to his body. Your chest is pressed to his now, his sweatiness straining your large t-shirt. Jungkook leans closer, his face a breath away from yours. His eyes scan yours for a hot second before his lips fall over yours.

This kiss is far from slow and tender. It’s all tongue and teeth and completely desperate. This is the result of days and weeks of teasing, and man, it feels so fucking great. This time, you definitely aren’t going to leave him. You’re certainly going to let him ruin you in every possible way.

When you break apart, Jungkook walks the two of you to his couch and sits on it, spreading his legs wide. Without giving you much time to think about it, he pulls you into his lap, making you straddle one of his thighs. Your knees trap his toned thigh between you while he gently tugs you closer until you’re chest to chest.

He cups your face and kisses you again, and the heat of his body against yours wraps around you. The despair and lust entirely consume you. For sure, you’re not going to survive, especially with this damn heatwave. His tongue slides into your mouth, making you moan softly. His hands move down to rest on your waist, but they don’t stay there long.

Jungkook breaks the kiss before trailing his lips along your jaw and then your neck, which makes you tilt your head to give him free pass to suck you lightly. Very slowly, you start rocking against his thigh, and the friction between your bodies makes the two of you moan. His groan against your neck makes you move a tiny bit faster.

His hands move to your back, holding you against him while your hips desperately sway. For sure, he’ll leave a mark on your skin, but you absolutely don’t give a shit about it. He’s free to do as he pleases.

When his lips finally leave your neck, he takes a proper look at you, and his cock gets hard instantly. That’s a sight he’ll engrave in his brain forever. This is something he never thought he’d ever witness, but man, he’s fucking happy it ever happened.

“Look at you,” he murmurs, his breathing frenetic. “You’re so fucking pretty.”    

You’re both breathing heavily, looking at each other with so much lust you might combust at any given moment. Jungkook pulls you back for another deep kiss, his tongue instantly making its way inside your mouth while his hands slide up and down your spine, leaving tons of goosebumps on the way.

This is all too wild, especially for Jungkook after going through three weeks without sex. He could just come right there and then just from the kiss, and he absolutely doesn’t care if it might make him look like a desperate man. He is desperate and full of hunger.

His lips move once more down to your neck, pressing open-mouthed kisses along your skin. This time, he doesn’t suck your skin; he just wets it with his tongue and lips, causing moans to fall from your mouth. Your eyes close for a moment to savor this special moment.

Jungkook takes your t-shirt off, throwing it somewhere in the living room, and hooks his fingers into the front of your laced bra to tug it down. Before you can even process what he’s doing, his mouth closes around your nipple. A loud whimper leaves your lips as your back arches instantly.

His lips and tongue are gentle at first, but his desperation takes over his body, and then, he sucks harder. All the while, your hips keep rocking against his thigh. The combined feeling of his hot mouth on your nipple, his flexing thigh under you, and his hardness against your body drives you absolutely crazy.

And then, he slips a hand down your stomach, his fingers teasing the waistband of your pants. The motion of your hips increases instantly, your hands moving to his hair to push him even more against your chest, and a trail of moans falls from your mouth.  

“Can I?” his eyes look up at you before his tongue licks your sensitive nipple.

“Absolutely,” you nod.

At this stage, you can’t tell who’s the most desperate. Him or you? You don’t know, but does it really matter? No, because you’re both getting what you want. You’ve been craving this more and more since the kiss, and hearing him masturbating was like the cherry on top.

Jungkook slips his hand inside your shorts, his fingers immediately finding how wet you already are. “Fuck, you’re so wet,” he says, his head resting against your chest while his eyes close at the feeling of your wetness.  

“Hearing you moaning my name turned me on so fucking much,” you mumble before tucking at his hair.

His finger drags slowly through your folds, gathering some wetness before circling your clit lightly. This is honestly too much. He’s so talented, and now, you definitely get why all the women are so fucking desperate for him. He’s so good at giving pleasure.

“I should do that more often, then,” he replies, his gaze shifting up to your face.

Before you even get to reply, he pushes a finger inside you, curling it slightly, and you clench around him, your hips rocking into his hand. Jungkook doesn’t even let you get used to it; he instantly slides another finger. Your mouth hangs open, small whimpers rumbling deep from within your chest. He thrusts them in and out at a steady pace while his thumb rubs your clit.

“Fuck,” you swear, your gaze locked with his as he fucks you with his fingers.

“That’s it,” he whispers. “Ride my fingers.”

The pace of his fingers increases while they curl perfectly inside you with every thrust. His lips find yours again, swallowing every single moan. He shows no mercy to you, torturing you just the way you need it. For a while, his fingers stretch you as his thumb rubs your clit. You’re a complete mess on his lap.  

At some point, the feeling of his fingers inside you becomes too overwhelming, and you just cum with a high-pitched moan. His eyes never leave you, taking the time to admire how you fall apart on his lap. Your orgasm doesn’t stop him. On the contrary, his fingers thrust even faster.

“Kook…” you manage to say in between moans.

Your hands rest on his arm, trying to hold onto something while he keeps pushing you over the edge. Your hips move, your head falls, and your back arches in a way that might break your spine at some point.

“Too much…” you mumble when you feel your orgasm ready to burst again.

“You can take it, sweetheart,” he says against your shoulder, biting it gently.

The way he speaks to you with his deep voice and the nickname sends you right over the edge again. Your second orgasm is just as intense as the first one, if not more. Even with the hot weather, it feels fucking good. Jungkook looks at you, not wanting to miss a thing, and he halts his fingers.

“You look so fucking beautiful when you come,” he smiles at you like a pervert.

When Jungkook finally takes his fingers out, you whine at the loss, and he brings them to his mouth to taste you. Seeing him doing it makes you clench around emptiness. He’s so hot, it might even be a crime to look that fine.

“And you taste like fucking heaven,” he continues.

“No need to exaggerate,” you smile while shaking your head.

“I’m not lying, sweetheart,” he replies while pushing your body against his. “You know I always say what I think,” he whispers against your lips, pressing another kiss.

Jungkook pushes you off his lap and removes every simple piece of clothing still on your body. He shifts you forward on the couch, placing you on your hands and knees. His hands grip your hips from behind, pulling your ass toward him. The feeling of his bulge against your core makes you both groan. In two seconds, he pushes his underwear down, and then, you feel the head of his cock pressing against your soaked entrance.

Jungkook pushes forward, and the stretch is immediately intense. Your hands tighten into a fist, and your teeth bite your lower lip while he slowly sinks into you from behind. His hands almost bruise your hips as he holds you.

Your mouth falls open when he’s fully inside, and he just stops, giving you both the time to adjust to the stretch. He leans down, his chest pressing against your back, and he presses a kiss on your shoulder.

“Breathe, sweetheart,” he whispers against your skin.

For a moment, he peppers the skin of your back and shoulder with kisses, as if he’s worshipping your body. At some point, you turn your head, and he instantly captures your lips for a kiss.   

As he kisses you, his hips slowly start to move into deep thrusts, and he swallows your moans. Your entire body rocks forward with the snap of his hips. Feeling him inside you is devastatingly overwhelming, but in such a good way. Right now, you’re starting to regret not doing this any sooner. He’s good at it. Really good.

Well, somehow it isn’t surprising since he has sex at least once a week. If he didn’t know how to use his dick by now, that would be something to be concerned about. The girls’ moans were definitely justified, even though you wished it never was at 2 am.

“You’re taking me so well,” he whispers against your ear.

“I know,” you tease him.

Jungkook chuckles before straightening his back. You look back at him with a devious smile on your face.

“You’re so full of yourself,” he says while his eyes are inevitably drawn to where your bodies are joined. It’s mesmerizing to see the way his dick disappears inside you and how you coat him with your wetness. He might get addicted to this sight.

“Not as much as you,” you reply.

His legs slightly spread yours a bit more, and his hand pushes your shoulders even more against the couch, making your back arch even more. Now, his shaft touches parts of your insides you never thought existed. Strangled moans fall from your lips instantly. This feels freaking good and overwhelming at the same time.   

“How couldn’t I be when I have you exactly where I wanted you?” He groans behind you.

Involuntarily, your walls squeeze around him, making the two of you moan. Hearing him say it out loud turns you on even more. It’s not a surprise because he was literally masturbating and moaning your name minutes ago, but it doesn’t change the fact that it’s flattering.  

Instead of replying, you push back to meet his deep thrusts. Jungkook’s hands move to your ass, rubbing his fingers over your skin and watching over and over how you suck him in. He even pushes your cheeks apart to take an even better look, as if he wants to make sure this is real.

Slowly but surely, his pace turns faster, harder, and deeper. The wet sound of skin slapping against skin mixed with your moans echoes in his living room. Everything slowly becomes too much, and you know you’re so freaking close. Jungkook hits a special spot inside you, making your eyes roll back.

And then, your third orgasm just hits you intensely.

You squeeze him tightly while your body shakes under him. This one is honestly intense. You’ve never orgasmed that way before, and fuck, you only want more. You don’t care if you’re being overstimulated, as long as you get to come like this.

Jungkook looks at you falling apart under his ministration, and his chest swells with pride. This is all he ever wanted. As you come back down, he slows his thrusts before pulling out with a wet sound. You whine at the sudden loss, but he’s already turning you around to face him.

He sits back on the couch and pulls you into his lap, making you straddle him all over again. His lips find yours for a messy and sloppy kiss, while your hands wrap around his neck.

“Ride me,” he whispers against your lips.

Well, he doesn’t have to tell you twice—you just obey. Your hands move to his shoulder to balance yourself as you sink down onto his cock. Your body is so wet that he slides in so easily. His hands settle on your waist before you start riding him.

At first, the rolls of your hips are slow and shaky, but his hands help you all along. Every time you sink down on him, he groans deeply, which only makes you grow wetter. Slowly, your confidence increases, and your hips move rather faster and deeper. The two of you get completely lost in pleasure, enjoying every bit of this moment.

One of his hands finds your clit, rubbing slick circles while his other hand guides your movements. His face hides for a second in the crook of your neck, gently kissing and biting your skin. His fingers never stop teasing your clit, and it only brings you closer to the edge. If he keeps going, you’ll come at least three more times before this even stops.

Being with him right here feels honestly so good. Your mind is completely drunk on pleasure, your eyes are half-lidded, your lips parted, and your helpless moans keep falling from your mouth.

“This is so good,” he whispers against your skin as his fingers move faster on your clit, the slick sound of it filling the air.

His eyes look up at you, watching just how destroyed you are. He’s so close as well. It’s a matter of seconds before he’s coming deep inside you. Both your bodies are covered in sweat—proof of the damn hot weather and of your steamy activities.  

You whimper at his words, totally agreeing with him, and your head falls on his shoulder as you keep riding him. This is seriously becoming too overwhelming all over again. Jungkook feels it with the way your body starts shaking. He doesn’t want any of this to end any time soon.

The hand on your waist slides up on your back, pressing you even more against him. Your hard and sensitive nipples brush against his chest, which makes you moan against his skin. By now, your entire body is sensitive. He’s torturing you just so perfectly.

“You’re clenching so hard around me, sweetheart,” he whispers in your ear.

His fingers circle your clit even faster, wanting to bring you to orgasm for a fourth time. Without really noticing it, you bounce quicker on him, chasing this upcoming orgasm. Your moans get louder, just like the sound of skin slapping against skin.

For sure, your neighbors are hearing the free show you're giving them. You might as well inspire them to do the same, and you don’t even doubt that Melissa and Carter might follow you, if they aren’t already doing the deed.  

Jungkook is just as desperate as you are, so his hips naturally thrust up to meet your movements. The two of you moan way too loud, but who cares? Well, hopefully, none of your neighbors will file a noise complaint against you.

Before you even realize it, you’re coming hard around him, more of your juices running down his shaft. And he follows you right after, his cock pumping you full of his cum. Feeling it makes you squeeze him even harder, and a strangled sound escapes his pretty lips.

Your head rests on his shoulder as you try to get down from everything that just happened. His fingers trace circles along your spine. Your bodies are completely spent and covered in sweat.

“You definitely know how to use that dick of yours,” you say when you’ve managed to catch your breath.

Jungkook brushes damp strands of hair away from your face. “Who said I didn’t?”

You chuckle while shaking your head. He’s unbelievable. “I did,” you reply.

“Glad I finally got to prove you wrong,” he says before pressing a gentle kiss on your lips. “Maybe we should take a shower.”

You simply nod, and he drags the two of you into his bathroom. It’s supposed to be a simple and quick shower, but in an instant, it turns into another sex session where he completely rearranges your guts against the shower’s wall. Shower sex was a first for you, but you’re definitely going to try it again with him.  

The night turns out to be a long one, and the heatwave definitely seems not to matter at all. If you’re too hot, you ride him all over again. Luckily for you, you don’t have to work the next day, you wouldn’t have been able to present yourself at work.

As of now, let’s just say that whenever you gather to hear your neighbors’ shenanigans, it inevitably ends up with the two of you entwined.

The scent of yeast, burnt sugar, and baked flour always hangs heavy in the midnight air of the kitchen. It's comforting, warm, familiar, and completely separate from the cold, stoned streets of the village beyond these walls, which encompass your life. You wipe a stray smudge of flour from your forehead with the back of your hand, leaning over the heavy wooden workstation to knead the first batch of dough for tomorrow's, well, today's morning rush.

Deep in concentration, you almost don't hear the bell above the back door, which lets out a tiny, muffled chime. But you don't even have to look up to know who it is.

"You're late," you say, keeping your voice flat, still pounding the dough, though a familiar beat of warmth thumps against your ribs. "Shouldn't you be tucked into your silk sheets at the palace by now, Your Royal Highness?"

"A gentleman is never late, sweetheart. He arrives precisely when he means to," Jungkook says, his voice a smooth, playful purr as he slips into the kitchen nestled behind the main bakery area. "And I told you to stop calling me that." He is dressed in his usual disguise, a faded, oversized linen tunic and dark trousers. The entire kingdom knows the face of Prince Jungkook, though few would expect him to be sneaking out of the citadel walls just to loiter in a dusty village bakery. He pushes his hood back, revealing strands of unruly dark hair and those ridiculously large, glittering doe eyes which you can't stare into for too long without feeling heat crawl up your neck.

You sigh, ignoring him as you turn around to face the pantry. You reach for a jar of imported cinnamon, but, of course, it is sitting on the absolute highest shelf, tucked away near the ceiling. You huff, stepping up onto your tiptoes, stretching your arms as high as they can go. Your fingers brush the base of the jar, but you cannot for the life of you get a proper grip. Suddenly, a broad, solid chest flushes directly against your back. All you feel is lean muscle as the heat of him radiates through your apron. Then an arm clad in faded linen reaches up over your head, his large hand wrapping around the jar. You will yourself not to let your eyes linger too long on the prominent veins running across his forearms to his hands.

"Need a hand, love?" Jungkook murmurs right beside your ear, his raspy late-night voice sending a shiver straight down your spine.

You drop back onto your heels, turning around within the small space he has trapped you in. His free hand comes down to rest casually on the edge of the shelf beside your head, effectively boxing you in. He looks down at you, a smug, devastating smirk playing on his lips as he hands you the cinnamon. Your fingers lightly twitch as they brush his.

"I had it under control, Crown Prince," you shoot back, tapping the jar against his chest to force him to take a step back.

"Right, maybe from over there you did, but from here, all I saw was you hopping up and down like a grasshopper," he teases before turning back.

And before you can swat at him, his hand shoots out toward the cooling racks. You attempt to block him with an elbow, but he uses his height advantage, leaning over to snatch a freshly dusted, warm beignet from the tray. Ones you had just made as a test batch, so the recipe was perfect for the morning rush. He pops the entire thing into his mouth in one go.

"Hey!" You glare, swatting at his arm with your flour-covered hand, leaving a stark white handprint on his dark sleeve. "Do you have any idea how early I had to wake up to prep those? The yeast has to rise for hours, Jungkook! Hours!"

Jungkook chews happily, closing his eyes in mock ecstasy. "Mmm. So worth it. You outdid yourself, truly." He leans his hip against your table, entirely too close, invading your space with the scent of the crisp night air and something rich, clean, and faintly expensive. He points a finger at a bowl of glossy chocolate batter. "What do we have here?" His eyes are lit with nothing short of mischief.

"Don't you dare-"

Too late.

He dips his index finger straight into the bowl, swirling it around before sucking the batter off with shameless, slow deliberateness. He locks eyes with you, a wicked, teasing tilt to his lips. "Sweet. " He pauses. "Just like the baker."

You feel the heat rush straight to your cheeks. "You are an absolute menace. I don't know why I keep letting you break into my shop. I really need to invest in a heavier deadbolt. Or tell the royal guards that their beloved prince is a little sugar thief."

"Because you love me," he says instantly, shifting his weight around the table to follow your movements like a shadow, or more like a separation-anxiety ridden puppy. "And because I am excellent company. Who else is going to help you with labour at one in the morning for the low price of sugar? Besides, the guards would never believe you."

"A public nuisance is what you are," you correct, though your lips twitch. You turn to a tray of unadorned cupcakes and sigh, handing him a backup piping bag filled with sweet vanilla buttercream. "If you're going to loiter, at least make yourself useful. Pipe the tops of those. Like this." You demonstrate a perfect, elegant swirl on one, pulling the tip up to create a flawless peak.

Jungkook takes the bag, his chest puffing out with entirely unwarranted confidence. "Easy. Watch a master at work. I've got great hand-eye coordination."

He grips the bag with way too much force, causing an explosion of frosting that lands on the cupcake, tilting precariously to one side like a melting snowman before sliding off the edge completely.

You burst out laughing, a bright, clear sound that echoes in the quiet kitchen. "A master? Jungkook, it looks like a squashed toad!"

"It's abstract! It has personality!" he protests, bumping his shoulder heavily against yours to disrupt your balance. He looks down at your laughing face, his own expression softening into something incredibly tender. His eyes track the way your eyes crinkle at the corners, capturing the exact shade of warmth in your smile. "See? I made you laugh. That’s worth at least three more free pastries tonight."

"In your dreams, thief," you scoff.

After a few minutes and many fails later, he gets the hang of it, leaving you to grab a heavy wooden spoon and begin vigorously beating a massive bowl of thick, stubborn cookie dough. You hate this part the most. After a long day, hours of selling and continuously running through the main shop and the kitchen, creating new batches and noting down special orders, the physical effort of the mixture, especially after the non-stop whipping of the meringues and the kneading of the dough, makes your wrists ache. Your movements slow slightly as you wipe a bead of sweat from your brow.

As Jungkook continues piping, he glances at your figure a few times, as if it's second nature, and tracks the sudden lag in your rhythm. His eyes soften, the playful posture shifting into something much more attentive, which goes unnoticed by you. He steps up right beside you, his hand sliding over yours on the handle of the wooden spoon. His palm is warm, broad, and calloused from sword training.

"Hey," he says softly, his shoulder bumping into yours. "Go check on the hearth. I think I smell burning."

"What? No, it's not, I just put it-"

"Just go check, stubborn," he cuts you off, smoothly applying just enough pressure to slide the bowl away from you.

Before you can protest further, he completely takes over, his muscular forearm flexing beneath his rolled-up sleeves as he beats the heavy dough with absolute, effortless ease. It's only when you reach the hearth, and you find your cake, in fact, not burning, that you realise he invented such a thing so you could rest your tired wrist.

You cross your arms with a small smile, and you lean against the counter, watching him work. "Look at you. Future monarch doing manual labour in a village kitchen. Oh, if the King could see you now, he'd strip you of your title."

"Let him," Jungkook grunts with a grin, not missing a beat as he whips the dough into a perfect, uniform consistency. "I'd make a fantastic baker's assistant. I'm strong, I learn fast, and I look great in an apron."

"You don't even have an apron on," you point out, laughing.

"An oversight you can easily fix," he shoots back, flashing a brilliant bunny-toothed smile that makes your heart do a ridiculous little flip. He stops mixing, sliding the perfect dough toward you. "There. Perfect. What's next, pretty lady?"

You roll your eyes at the name. "We need to pour this batter into the tins," you say, dragging a heavy ceramic bowl of vanilla batter and two circular metal tins toward the centre of the table.

"I've got it," Jungkook volunteers eagerly. He lifts the heavy ceramic bowl, and you try not to pay attention to the way his biceps strain slightly against the linen shirt. He tips it over the first tin, carefully pouring the thick, pale-yellow ribbon of batter into the centre until it fills it perfectly. He moves to the second tin, pouring the remainder.

Once the bowl is mostly empty, he sets it down and picks up a long spatula. He meticulously scrapes the remaining thick batter from the inside walls of the bowl, gathering a massive, delicious glob of it onto the edge of the spatula. He brings it up toward his face, his eyes lighting up as he prepares to lick it clean.

"Ah-ah-ah," you say quickly, swatting his wrist away. "No way. I did all the measuring for that batter. That's mine."

You grab the end of the spatula handle. Jungkook blinks, then a surprised, but competitive spark instantly ignites his doe eyes. He tightens his grip, tugging it back towards himself. "I did the pouring! And the scraping! Royal decree dictates that the scraper gets the reward."

"There is no such royal decree," you laugh, pulling the spatula towards your side. "You're abusing your power, Your Highness!"

"I am a prince, I can make up whatever laws I want to," he gasps dramatically, pulling back.

You step closer, using your leverage to yank on the handle. For a second, you are pulled completely into his space, your hands tangled together on the thin piece of wood, faces inches apart. You can see the faint amber flecks in his eyes and the absolute amusement radiating from him.

Jungkook looks down at your determined face, his gaze dropping to your lips before a wicked, triumphant grin splits across his face.

Suddenly, he completely lets go of the spatula.

Because you were pulling so hard, you stumbled backwards a step, clutching the spatula victoriously to your chest. "Ha! I win!"

"Do you?" Jungkook asks, his voice dripping with amusement.

Before you can answer, he reaches down and grabs the massive, heavy ceramic mixing bowl that still has a generous coating of thick batter stuck to the bottom and sides. He lifts it, completely sticking his face inside the wide rim, using his finger to swipe a massive glob of batter and popping it into his mouth.

"Fine, keep the tiny spatula," he mutters happily from inside the bowl, his voice echoing. "I have the motherlode."

"Jungkook!" You burst out laughing, completely scandalised. "You are a literal child! Get your face out of my bowl!"

He pulls his head out, a tiny dollop of yellow batter sitting right on the tip of his nose. He looks incredibly ridiculous and remarkably cute all at once. He steps closer to you, his eyes locking onto yours with an unbearable amount of playful intensity.

"You have something right..." you start, pointing at your own nose.

"Where? Here?" he asks, deliberately wiping his cheek instead, smearing it further.

"No, you idiot, let me-"

You step in, reaching up with your thumb to gently wipe the batter off the tip of his nose. The moment your skin touches his, Jungkook freezes. The childish playfulness drops away in an instant, replaced by a sudden, heavy stillness. His gaze drops, heavy and unblinking, tracking the movement of your fingers, then the curve of your jaw, and finally resting on your eyes.

The kitchen goes entirely silent. The only sound is the low, rhythmic crackle of the hearth fire. His breath is warm against your skin. You feel your own breath hitch, your thumb lingering against his nose for a second too long.

A slow, devastatingly tender smile stretches across his lips. He reaches up, his large hand gently wrapping around your wrist, his thumb rubbing a slow, comforting circle into your pulse point.

"You know, you're very bossy for a regular citizen," he murmurs, his voice dropping into a raspy, late-night register that makes your heart beat erratically against your ribs.

"And you're very compliant for a future king," you whisper back, trying to maintain your defences, though the proximity is making it impossible to think straight.

"Only for you," he says softly, his thumb continuing to trace your wrist. "I don't let anyone else order me around like this. I think I like it."

You clear your throat, gently pulling your wrist from his grip to hide the bright blush creeping up your neck. You turn away to hide your burning cheeks, reaching for a small plate hidden under a glass dome on the back shelf. "Shut up and try this. I've been working on it all afternoon. Consider it payment for your... impeccable assistant work."

On the plate sits a pastry you’ve been experimenting with: dozens of microscopically thin, crispy layers of golden dough, stacked high with rich, velvety custard and fresh cream sandwiched between them, dusted lightly with powdered sugar.

"What is it?" he asks, leaning over your shoulder, his chest practically pressed against your back again, completely erasing the distance you just tried to create.

"Just shut up and try it," you say, handing him a small fork.

He takes a bite. The audible, delicate crunch of the layers echoes in the quiet room, followed by the smoothness of the cream. Jungkook freezes completely. His eyes widen to twice their size. Without saying a word, he devours the rest of the pastry in two massive bites, nearly groaning out loud.

"Marry me," he says flatly. "I'm serious. Name the day. We can live right here in this kitchen. I will waive the royal dowry, I will fight the council, I don't care. I will do nothing but eat this and look at you for the rest of my days."

You laugh loudly, shoving his shoulder hard to create some space. "So dramatic." You reply back.

"So in love."

"So in need of therapy." You mutter back, turning to grab a handful of loose flour to dust the wooden surface, the fine white powder settling like mist.

The frantic energy of the kitchen slows down, settling into a comfortable, quiet rhythm that has secretly become your favourite part of the day. Jungkook works right beside you, his initial royal clumsiness giving way to a quiet focus as he tries to correct his piping technique, finishing the cupcakes, his tongue poking out slightly between his teeth in pure concentration.

Then, the kitchen goes entirely silent. The only sound left is the low, rhythmic crackle of the hearth fire and the heavy, rhythmic thud of your palms against the dough.

You feel a sudden weight on you, a gaze so intense it feels tangible against your skin. You glance up, a stray lock of hair falling into your eyes, and catch him.

Jungkook isn't looking at the cupcakes anymore. He is leaning his chin in his hand, his elbow propped on the wooden counter, his eyes fixed entirely on you. His gaze is heavy, unblinking, tracking the curve of your jaw, the sweat dampening the nape of your neck, the fierce determination on your brow. There is no trace of the boyish prankster in his expression right now; his eyes are dark, deep, and filled with an intense, quiet gravity that makes your breath hitch completely.

"What?" you ask, your voice dropping to a breathless whisper. You try to sound annoyed, but the slight tremor in your voice betrays you. "Is there flour on my face again?"

Jungkook doesn't blink. A smile stretches across his lips, his voice drops again, sending a shiver straight down your spine. "Nope. Just looking at something beautiful."

You feel the heat rush from your chest all the way to your hairline. You look down at your rough, flour-dusted hands, and a sudden, heavy wave of insecurity twists in your stomach. It’s a reminder that always haunts the back of your mind. He is the Crown Prince. You know his face, you know his title, and you know the vast, impossible chasm that lies between your worlds.

"You are a terrifyingly smooth talker, Your Highness," you say, your voice turning a little hollow as you force yourself to look back up at him. "I suppose this is the exact same poetry you feed to the high-born noble ladies at the palace court."

Jungkook’s smile falters slightly, his doe eyes tracking the subtle drop in your shoulders, his sharp instincts picking up on the sudden shift in your mood. "Noble ladies? Trust me, they don't care about poetry. Just titles and crown jewels."

"I'm serious, Jungkook," you say, huffing a breath but still kneading the dough on the counter. "Why do you even come here? You have an entire court of perfect, beautiful women at your feet. You should be spending your time there with them, not in a drab bakery."

You pause. The next words come out in a whisper you hope he doesn't hear. "You could be with women who actually know how to dance, with titles, who wear silk and velvet instead of aprons caked in dried dough. They don't smell like yeast and sweat."

But he does, and the playful demeanour completely evaporates from Jungkook's face. The silence returns, heavier this time, but thick with an undeniable warmth.

He stands up straight, stepping around the workstation table to face you. He moves with a quiet, deliberate grace. You keep your eyes down, focusing on the dough. Press. Then push. Then fold. Then turn. And repeat. Don't look up.

But he doesn't let you hide. He reaches out, his large, warm hands gently taking your wrists, halting your movements. His palms are warm and incredibly grounding.

"Look at me," he commands softly. You don't.

"Hey…" He trails off, voice unbelievably gentle, "Please?"

How can you say no to him?

When you finally look up into his eyes, you find them swimming with a fierce, profound sincerity.

"None of them." He pauses, "Are you." His voice is a low, intense whisper that rings clearly in the quiet kitchen. He squeezes your hands, his thumbs rubbing soothing circles over your knuckles. "The court ladies are hollow, Y/N. They smile because they were trained to; they speak from rehearsed scripts; and they look at me like I'm a crown to be won, a stepping stone for their families. But you? This?"

He leans closer, head tilting down so your eyes are entirely locked. He wants you to feel how much he means every word.

"I'd rather be no place else. You're real. You're fierce, you're brilliant, and you look at me like I'm just a man. I don't want silk, and I don't care about their perfect poise. I want this. I want the smell of yeast and sugar, and I want to spend my evenings with the pretty little baker who threatens to throw rolling pins at my royal head."

Your heart hammers violently against your ribs, your lungs locking up under the sheer weight of his words. His eyes drop to your lips for a long, agonising second, and you think you might actually combust from the heat spreading through your veins.

Sensing the overwhelming tension and desperate to save your blushing face from melting, a familiar, wicked spark suddenly reignites in Jungkook’s eyes. He lets go of one of your hands and steps to the side.

Before you can even process the emotional whiplash, he blows a sharp puff of air across the workstation. A massive cloud of white flour erupts directly onto your face. You gasp, coughing, your eyelashes completely coated in white powder. Through the white haze, you see him throwing his head back, laughing loudly, looking immensely proud of his childish distraction.

"Oh, it is so on," you hiss.

You scoop up a massive, double handful of flour and throw it straight at his chest. It hits him with a satisfying, heavy thwack, turning his dark tunic completely white from collar to waist. Jungkook’s jaw drops in utter shock, his laughter cutting off. He retaliates by pinching more flour before sprinkling it over your head, coating your hair in white. You squirm, laughing as you grab another handful and go to move around the bench, but your shoes slip on the pile of flour that has accumulated on the floor, and you are sent plummeting to the ground. Jungkook is faster, though, of course, and he manages to hold onto you, one hand on your arm and the other firm against your waist as he manages to pull you back up.

"Falling for me already?" His lips upturn in a playful smirk.

You scoff, already pushing away from him, "You wish, rich boy."

You both laugh. And the next few hours continue like that. You love the back-and-forth; it calms you after a long day and prepares you for the next. You truly relish these moments, that is, until you gaze up and notice the sky outside, the dark midnight lighting slightly.

"You should get going, Jungkook, dawn's coming, and I should rest before prepping for the morning." You explain.

He whines, pouting his bottom lip in a way that makes him look like an oversized puppy, but he relents. He walks to the back door, pausing to look back at you, the playful smirk returning to his face as he pulls his hood back up over his dark hair. "See you tomorrow, my beautiful baker. Try not to miss your prince too much."

"Oh, that won't be difficult at all, Jungkook," you say, and he holds his chest, mocking a dagger struck through his heart, but you’re smiling wide as the door clicks shut, the quiet warmth of his presence lingering long after he’s gone.

The next morning brings a particularly bitter cold. The sun has barely crested the horizon when you set up the outdoor display rack, lining it with fresh, golden loaves of bread and warm rolls.

You return inside to tend to the ovens, glancing out the large front glass window. The village market is starting to wake up. The other store owners are sweeping outside their doors and beating the rugs. The stall owners are setting up their carts with small chatter amongst them, no doubt some high-class gossip they read in the papers this morning.

Through the glass, you also notice three small, shivering figures creeping toward your outdoor display. It’s the children who sleep under the alleyway awnings near the secondary square. They look emaciated, their ribs practically visible through their tattered rags, and your heart cracks slightly at the sight.

One of them, a little boy no older than six, reaches up and snatches a small loaf of bread. But before you can even open the door to tell them they can have it, even come inside for more, a harsh, booming voice echoes through the square.

"Thieves! Drop it!"

Two royal guards, clad in gleaming, heavy iron armour, march out from the shadows. They look bored, angry, and eager for a distraction. The children shriek, dropping the bread into the dirt as they try to scatter, but one guard lunges, grabbing the little boy by his scruff, lifting him completely off the ground. The child wails in terror.

The second guard unclips a heavy, thick leather lash from his belt, a sadistic grin spreading across his face. "A lesson needs to be taught. Stealing from the village market carries a heavy price, brat."

Your blood runs cold. You don't think. You throw the bakery door open, sprinting out into the freezing air.

"Stop! Stop, please!" you shout, throwing yourself into the scene.

The guard with the whip pauses, lowering his weapon slightly, his eyes narrowing. "Move aside, girl. These street rats are breaking the law. They require consequence."

"It's my bread!" you say breathlessly, your heart hammering against your ribs. "It’s my shop! I don't mind. I was giving it to them. They didn't steal anything, I swear."

The guard holding the boy sneers, dropping the child to the dirt, where he scurries behind your skirts, clinging on to them for dear life. "Do not lie to the Crown's authority, baker. We saw them take it. If you harbour thieves, you share their guilt. Now step away before we make an example out of you, too."

These guards are notorious. They are brutes, drunk on the microscopic amount of power the crown grants them over the poor villagers. You look down at the crying child holding onto you, burying his face in your skirts, and a stubborn wave of protectiveness washes over you.

"They are starving children," you say, your voice trembling but resolute. "If you must strike someone to satisfy your pathetic need for power... strike me. Leave them alone."

The guard with the whip cuts a dark, ugly glare toward you. "You want to take the punishment for a bunch of gutter rats? Fine by me. The law demands blood for theft. Now kneel."

You look around the square. A few villagers have stopped to watch, but they immediately look away, hurrying along, terrified of getting involved.

No one is going to help you. You don't expect them to.

You swallow hard, your knees hitting the cold, unforgiving cobblestones. You pull your hair to the side, exposing the back of your thin cotton chemise. You brace yourself, gripping your knees tightly.

Crack.

The first strike tears through the air and slices directly across your upper back.

A choked, agonising shriek tears from your throat. It feels like a line of liquid fire has been seared into your flesh. The sheer force of the blow knocks you forward, your palms slamming into the dirt. Tears sting your eyes instantly, blurring your vision.

"That's for the first brat," the guard grunts.

Crack.

The second strike hits, the leather biting into the exact same raw skin. You gasp, your lungs seizing.

"That's for the second."

Crack.

The third blow tears your chemise open at the side, the fabric ripping away as the leather draws blood. You press your forehead against the freezing ground, sobbing silently as you pray for it to end.

"And that's for the third," the guard sneers. He pauses, looking down at your trembling, broken form, but his eyes only gleam with a deeper cruelty. "But you opened your mouth to the Crown's authority, didn't you, girl? You think you can talk back to us?"

Crack.

The fourth strike is harder, delivered with the full weight of his arm. A ragged scream escapes your lips, your vision flashing white. The pain is blinding, radiating across your entire torso.

"And this one..." The guard chuckles, raising the whip one last time just to satisfy his own twisted amusement. "...just because I feel like it." He says low, only for your ears to hear.

Crack.

The fifth strike shatters whatever strength you have left. You collapse entirely onto the cold cobblestones, your chest heaving as deep, agonising tremors wrack your body.

They leave you there, laughing as they walk away. Slowly, agonisingly, you push yourself up. Your vision swims. You stagger back into the bakery, your hands shaking so violently you can barely turn the lock. You flip the sign on the door to CLOSED, then wince as you draw the thick curtains shut.

You stumble up the narrow wooden stairs to your small apartment on the second floor. In the tiny bathroom, you try to peer into the cracked mirror, but you can’t see the damage properly. Reaching behind yourself with a wet cloth, you touch the wounds, and a fresh wave of sobbing breaks out. It hurts too much. You can't reach it properly to clean it. Blindly, you wrap a clean strip of linen around your torso, pinning it clumsily, though you know it's too loose.

Exhausted, broken, and throbbing with a relentless, burning agony, you crawl onto your bed, burying your face in the pillow, letting the tears ruin the sheets.

Hours pass. Eventually, the sheer restlessness of the pain forces you out of bed. You can’t lie down comfortably, and you can’t sit up straight. You're exhausted. But you drag yourself back downstairs into the darkened kitchen. You decide not to open the shop today, you can't bear the thought of standing at the counter, but you need a distraction. You begin mindlessly wiping down the clean surfaces, moving like a ghost in your own home.

Jungkook is practically skipping through the crowded, muddy alleyways of the lower village, keeping the heavy fabric of his dark wool cloak pulled tightly around his face. Thankfully, his royal duties ended earlier today, allowing him more time with you. He did have to dodge three separate royal attendants, lie straight to his personal guard, and scale a crumbling section of the northern citadel wall just to sneak out today, but he didn't care. He would gladly scale the highest mountain in the land if it meant reaching your doorstep a second earlier than usual.

The only thing occupying his mind for the last twelve long, agonising hours has been you.

He is down bad. Mortifyingly, hopelessly, helplessly down bad.

Every time he closes his eyes during council meetings or listens to his father drone on about trade routes, he doesn't see crowns or maps. He sees the way your eyes crinkle into perfect, breathtaking crescents when you laugh at his ridiculous antics. He sees the faint, light dust of white flour that always seems to settle on the bridge of your nose. He wants to taste that layered cream pastry again, sure, but more than that, he just wants to hear the melodic cadence of your voice.

He wants to tease you until your stubborn pride flares up, just so he can witness that fierce, fiery spark in your eyes that makes him feel more alive than any royal decree ever could. He is a prince of the realm, surrounded by high-born court ladies who fawn over his status and offer plastic, practised smiles, but none of them holds a candle to the sharp-tongued, beautiful baker who looks right past his title and treats him like a normal man.

As he navigates the bustling market crowds, his inner monologue takes a heavier, more ache-filled turn. He is growing so tired of the midnight boundaries. He is tired of being the mysterious visitor who has to vanish before the sun crests the horizon. He wants more. He wants to be the one who wakes up next to you, watching the morning light catch your face. He wants to hold your hand in broad daylight, right in the middle of the crowded square, and dare anyone to say a word about it. He wants you to be his, entirely and completely, but he knows how fiercely independent you are, how hard you work for your little shop, and how you probably don't feel the same. So for now, he hoards these secret hours like a dragon guarding gold. And even if he has to keep this boundary with you for the rest of his life, be nothing more, he'll take that sacrifice if it means he gets to be in your presence, in your life, in whatever way you'll have him.

He turns the final corner into the main square, a boyish grin already splitting across his face, his heart does an eager little flip against his ribs. But the moment his eyes land on the bakery, his steps instantly slow to a halt.

The outdoor display racks are completely empty. The heavy linen curtains are drawn tightly across the front windows, blocking out the daylight. The wooden sign dangling from the brass chain reads CLOSED.

Jungkook frowns, a sharp, cold knot of unease tightening in the pit of his stomach. It’s mid-afternoon. The sun is at its peak. You never close the shop at this hour. Even when you were burning up with a fever last winter, you stubbornly dragged yourself down to the counter to sell bread, refusing to lose a single coin.

He hurries up to the heavy front door, his hand trembling slightly as he knocks loudly against the wood. "Y/N? Love? Are you in there? It's me."

Silence. The square carries on around him, completely indifferent to the sudden spike of adrenaline flooding his veins.

Panicking now, his breath catching in his throat, he rushes down the narrow, shadowed side alley toward the back entrance. He grabs the brass handle and turns it, fully expecting it to be locked, but to his surprise, it clicks open. He's going to have a few words with you about that. He slips inside instantly, shutting the heavy door quietly behind him to keep his presence hidden.

The kitchen is cast in deep shadows, completely devoid of the usual roaring hearth fire and bustling energy. The only light comes from a single, lonely candle burning on the centre island.

Then, he spots you.

You are standing by the deep stone sink, your back completely turned to him. Your shoulders are hunched forward, your movements incredibly slow as you mindlessly wipe a copper pot with a rag.

"Hey," he says softly, exhaling a long, ragged breath of relief as he drops his hood. "You scared the absolute hell out of me. Why are the front doors locked? Did you actually sleep in for once?"

You flinch violently at the sound of his voice, your entire body spasming as you drop the rag into the water with a dull splash. You don't turn around to face him. You remain entirely still, staring down into the basin. "Jungkook. What are you doing here? You shouldn't have come. The shop is closed today."

Your voice sounds completely wrong. It is hollow, strained, and entirely stripped of the vibrant, feisty warmth that usually greets him.

Jungkook's playful smile vanishes in an instant, his large doe eyes narrowing with deep, immediate concern. He takes a slow step closer, his boots clicking quietly against the floorboards. "Yeah, I noticed. Are you okay? You sound tired." He tries to inject a tiny bit of his usual playfulness into his tone, trying to coax a smile out of you as he steps up directly behind your frame. "Did you miss me so much this morning that you couldn't even focus on baking today?"

"Not now, Jungkook," you whisper, your voice cracking slightly. Your shoulders hunch even further forward, your head bowing.

You slowly reach up with both hands, attempting to place a copper pot on the drying shelf slightly above your head. The exact moment your arms extend upward, your breath catches violently in your throat. A sharp, ragged, agonising wince escapes your lips, and your entire body shudders as you quickly drop your arms back down, your hands flying to clutch tightly at your own side to brace yourself.

Jungkook's protective instincts flare to a blinding degree. The sight of you in discomfort hits him like a physical blow to the chest. He reaches his hand out, his palm hovering just a millimetre above your trembling shoulder, desperate to touch you but terrified of hurting you. "What's wrong? Y/N, what happened?"

"Nothing," you say quickly, your tone sharp, laced with a desperate, stubborn defensiveness.

You finally force yourself to turn around and face him, but you immediately take two deliberate steps backwards, keeping a wide distance between your bodies. You force a terrible, completely strained smile onto your pale lips, though your lower lip is trembling. "I just... I was moving the heavy wooden grain table earlier, and I bumped into the corner. Hit my side pretty hard. It's just a nasty bruise, Jungkook. I'm fine. Really."

Jungkook doesn't buy it for a single second.

He steps right back into your space, his gaze sweeping over you like a hawk, analysing every single detail of your appearance. His heart aches at the sight of you. You look terribly pale, the healthy flush entirely gone from your skin. Your eyes are heavily red-rimmed and puffy, surrounded by dark circles, making it glaringly obvious that you’ve been crying for hours. And your posture is completely wrong: you are leaning slightly forward, your spine stiff as a board, breathing in tiny, shallow, calculated gasps as if expanding your lungs fully is a luxury you can't afford right now.

Seeing you in this state genuinely, physically hurts him. It feels like a cold blade is turning in his own chest; his stomach drops, and a suffocating wave of anxiety threatens to choke him. He hates seeing you vulnerable, hates the fact that something has stolen your bright energy.

He tries to keep his composure, forcing his voice to remain calm so he doesn't spook you, until you turn slightly to the side, attempting to step away from his intense scrutiny to grab a towel.

That's when he sees it.

Through the torn fabric of your shirt, along the side of your figure, he sees the clumsy linen bandage you had tried to wrap around your own torso, which has slipped completely out of place. A small, dark red stain of fresh, wet blood is seeping heavily through the white cloth, stark and horrifying against your skin.

Jungkook’s breath hitches violently in his throat. His blood runs cold.

"Y/N," he says, his voice dropping into a dangerously low, gravelly register, entirely stripped of all playfulness. "Why is there blood on your back?"

You freeze in your tracks, your hands tightening against the fabric of your apron until your knuckles turn white. You try to let out a casual laugh, but it comes out as a pathetic, broken sob that tears right through his chest. "Blood? Oh, don't be ridiculous. It's probably just cherry jam from the tarts. I am a baker, after all, I'm always covered in-"

"Don't lie to me," he commands. The tone is quiet, but it carries the heavy, unyielding authority of a prince who will not be denied.

Before you can utter another word of deflection, he steps directly into your personal space, erasing the distance between you. His large, warm hand moves around to your back, his fingers hovering just a fraction of a millimetre above the blood-soaked bandage. He barely, infinitesimally brushes the very edge of the cloth to see what lies beneath.

The slight, feather-light pressure is a catalyst for pure agony.

A choked, absolutely agonising groan tears from your throat. Your eyes roll back for a fraction of a second as a white-hot wave of pain flares anew across your nerve endings. Your knees completely buckle beneath you, your strength vanishing instantly as your legs give out entirely.

"Whoa- hey, look at me, I've got you, I've got you!" Jungkook panics, his heart leaping straight into his throat.

His arms shoot out in a blind reflex, catching you securely before your body can slam into the hard floorboards. He pulls you tightly against his chest, cradling you against his solid frame, his large doe eyes widening to twice their size with pure, unadulterated terror. He is hyper-aware of how fragile, how small you feel in his arms right now, your entire body trembling violently against him.

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I've got you," he frantically whispers, his voice shaking as he holds you up. "Talk to me, please. You have to tell me what happened. You're bleeding."

You clutch desperately at the fabric of his faded tunic, your fingernails burying into the cloth as if it's the only anchor keeping you tethered to reality. The blinding pain, the hours of lonely exhaustion, and the sudden, overwhelming comfort of his warm, safe presence break the stubborn dam holding your emotions back.

You snap completely. You bury your face into the solid crook of his neck and break down, sobbing hysterically. Deep, painful, racking wails tear from your chest, echoing loudly in the empty kitchen.

"It hurts," you cry out, your voice breaking entirely into a raw shriek. "Kook, it hurts so bad, please... I can't bear it..."

Hearing you cry like this, hearing the absolute agony in your voice, completely breaks something fundamental inside Jungkook. A wave of sheer fury crashes over his soul. He sees bright, blinding red. He is the Prince of this kingdom, and someone in his village, under his family's rule, had dared to lay their hands on you. Someone had inflicted this kind of barbaric, sickening pain on the sweetest, most selfless person he knew.

He locks that rage away into a dark corner of his mind, storing it for later, because right now, your tears are the only thing that matters.

"Let me see it," he murmurs, his voice shifting into a soothing, incredibly soft contrast to the storm raging in his chest. "Let me help you, sweetheart."

"No, it's fine, just leave it, please go away," you sob, your stubbornness flaring up one last time through the tears. You weakly try to push his chest away, hiding your face from him. "You shouldn't be here. You're a prince, Jungkook. You shouldn't be seeing me like this... it's messy, it's fine..."

"Y/N," he says, his tone leaving absolutely no room for argument, though it is dripping with an unbearable amount of love and panic. He gently but firmly cups your face with both hands, forcing you to look up at him. His own eyes are shiny with unshed tears, wide and desperate as he uses his thumb to wipe a stray tear from your wet cheek. "Look at me. Look into my eyes. I am not going to hurt you. I don't care about being a prince right now. I care about you. Let me see it. Please, don't do this to me. Don't push me away when I know you're hurt."

You look into his frantic, pleading eyes, seeing the genuine agony in his own expression caused purely by your pain, and your stubborn defences finally melt away. You nod weakly, letting your head fall against his chest.

"Let's go upstairs," he whispers against your hair.

He slides one arm securely under your knees and the other firmly behind your shoulders, lifting your body effortlessly into his arms. He carries you up the narrow, creaking wooden stairs as if you weigh absolutely nothing, his movements smooth and careful, ensuring your back never brushes against a single wall or doorframe.

He carries you into your small bedroom, gently setting you down on the very edge of your bed.

The bedroom upstairs is quiet, shadowed by the late afternoon light filtering through the linen curtains. You sit on the very edge of the mattress, your knees pulled slightly toward your chest, your fingers twisting and burying into the worn bedsheets. Every shallow breath you take feels like glass slicing through your skin. Behind you, the quiet rustle of fabric and the soft clink of a ceramic basin tell you that Jungkook is preparing to face whatever horror is hidden beneath your clothes.

"I'm going to pull the fabric down. Is that okay?" Jungkook’s voice is a low, trembling whisper. The playful, cocky boy from last night is completely gone, replaced by a man carrying a heavy gravity.

You nod miserably, dropping your head down.

You feel his large hands settle on the collar of your dress. His touch is so light it’s almost non-existent, his fingers shake slightly as he carefully guides the torn, ruined cotton down your arms. He doesn't pull; he coaxes the fabric away, millimetre by millimetre, ensuring the rough material doesn't catch on the open wounds. As the cloth falls away, exposing your bare back to the cool air of the room, you hear him let out a sharp, ragged intake of breath.

The silence that follows is deafening.

Five jagged, angry lines of destroyed flesh cross your skin. They are swollen, with a deep, bruising purple at the edges, and fresh blood has oozed out where your movement has reopened them. The clumsy linen wrap you had tried to apply is tangled and soaked through with red.

"Who did this to you?" he asks.

The question is delivered in a voice so quiet, so entirely devoid of warmth, that it makes you freeze. If you were to turn around, you would see the menacing glare of a monarch in his eyes. His jaw is clenched so hard the muscles flare against his skin, his knuckles white as he grips a clean cloth.

"The patrol guards," you whisper into the empty room, a fresh tear tracking through the flour dust on your cheek. "In the square this morning. Some of the alley kids... they took a loaf of bread from the display. The guards… they caught them. They pulled out the lash for them. They're just babies, Jungkook. They were hungry. They wouldn't have survived it. I couldn't just watch."

You take a trembling breath, crying out slightly as the movement pulls at your skin. "I told the guards I'd take it instead. Three for each child... one for talking back... and a fifth... because he felt like it."

A suffocating silence fills the room. For a long, agonising moment, he doesn't say a single word. You brace yourself, expecting him to call you foolish, to tell you that a simple villager should never interfere with the Crown's enforcers. Instead, you feel the soft, slow dip of the mattress as he sits down directly behind you, closing the distance between your bodies.

"You are far too good for this world," he murmurs, his voice thick and strained with an emotion so intense it sounds like it’s tearing his throat apart.

Then, you feel the cool, wet cloth touch the very edge of the highest welt.

You flinch violently, a sharp, broken gasp escaping your lips as your hands lock onto the bedsheets. But before you can pull away, Jungkook’s free hand comes around to rest gently on your uninjured hip, holding you steady with an iron-firm but incredibly soft pressure. He rubs gently at the bare skin on your hip.

"Shh, I know, love, I'm sorry. I've got you. I'm being as gentle as I can. Just breathe through it. Focus on my hand," he murmurs, his lips so close to your bare shoulder that his warm breath fans across your skin, offering a fleeting contrast to the stinging cold of the water.

His movements are agonisingly slow but deliberate, focused. He cleans away the dried blood, his fingertips occasionally brushing against your uninjured skin. The sheer intimacy of the act makes your heart hammer in a completely different way. He treats your body like it is made of the rarest, most fragile porcelain, his touch lingering over the curves of your shoulders as if he wishes he could absorb the pain into his own skin.

He reaches into the wooden cabinet on your wall and pulls out a jar of thick, green herbal salve. He rubs a generous amount between his palms, warming it up before he speaks. "This is going to sting at first, Y/N. But it will help the fire go out. Let me know if it's too much."

When his fingers make contact with the raw wounds, a whimper tears from your throat, and without thinking, you lean to the side, your head resting against his solid shoulder. Jungkook doesn't move. He accepts your weight fully, his chest pressing lightly against your side as he leans to the side to get a better angle. His fingertips are unbelievably soft as they smooth the thick ointment over the angry welts, working with a reverent, quiet rhythm.

Every time your body shudders with a sob, he pauses completely. He leans forward, pressing his lips in a soft, comforting breath against the uninjured skin of your neck, whispering broken apologies into your skin until the tremors slow down. It feels intensely, overwhelmingly private, a sanctuary built out of raw pain and an undercurrent of heavy, undeniable devotion.

Finally, he takes a fresh roll of clean white linen bandage. To wrap it around your torso, he has to slide both of his arms completely around your waist. He leans in close, his chest flushing against your uninjured skin, effectively enveloping you in a tight embrace. You can feel the heavy beat of his heart against your shoulder blade as he pulls the cloth snug, securing it with small pins.

"There," he whispers against your ear, his hands lingering on your waist, his thumbs rubbing small circles into your sides before he reluctantly pulls away. "All clean. The fire should start to fade now."

You slowly turn your head, looking at him over your shoulder. His doe eyes are dark, swimming with a profound, aching yearning that terrifies you in their intensity. He looks at you not like a friend, and not like a vagabond, but like a man who has just watched his entire world bleed.

"Lie down," he commands softly, his voice thick, pulling the heavy wool blankets back. "Don't sleep on your back, lie on your stomach. I'm going to go brew some tea for you, okay? Don't move an inch."

You are too exhausted, too thoroughly drained of strength to argue. You crawl into the centre of the bed, resting your cheek against the pillow, and he pulls the blanket over you before leaving.

Within minutes, Jungkook returns, holding a steaming ceramic mug. He sits on the edge of the mattress, his large hand gently lifting your chin to help you take a few sips of the warm, sweet liquid.

The warmth of the tea and the cooling effect of the salve make your eyelids incredibly heavy. Jungkook sets the mug on the nightstand and reaches out, his thumb gently brushing a stray lock of hair away from your face, his touch agonisingly tender.

"Thank you, Jungkook," you slurry, your eyes fluttering shut as darkness tugs at the edges of your mind. "For staying."

He leans down, his lips pressing a soft kiss against your forehead. He lingers there before pulling away and resting a hand over yours on the pillow beside you. "I will always stay," he whispers against your skin, his voice sounding far away. "Sleep now, my beautiful baker."

He stays with you, one hand stroking the back of your head, fingers toying with the strands of your hair, and occasionally massaging your scalp, his other hand firm on top of your own until you drift off. The moment your breathing evens out into a deep, heavy slumber, the lingering softness completely evaporates from Jungkook’s face.

He stands up from the edge of the mattress, his frame expanding to its full, imposing height as his expression hardens into pure, unadulterated ice. The boyish warmth that usually fills his dark eyes is gone, replaced by a vacant stillness. He looks down at you one last time, your pale face resting against the pillow, and leans over to press another gentle, feather-light kiss to your temple.

He quietly moves around the room, his boots making absolutely no sound against the wooden floorboards. He sets a fresh glass of water on your nightstand, along with a small plate of dried fruits and crackers he salvaged from your pantry. Beside it, he leaves a small piece of parchment, scrawling a quick note in his elegant, fluent script.

He writes in his usual playful tone, desperate to lighten your mood when you wake up, even if his own chest feels like it is caving in from pure malice:

Eat all of this. If I come back tonight and find out you haven't eaten, I'm going to steal every single pastry in the kitchen as punishment. Rest up, my pretty girl. I'll be back to cause more trouble soon~

He slips out of the bedroom, guides himself down the narrow stairs, and exits the bakery, locking the back door securely behind him.

The walk back to the palace is a blur of blinding, volcanic rage. He doesn't care about staying hidden anymore; he doesn't slip through the shadows or wait for patrols to pass. He cuts through the upper village like a wraith, his eyes fixed on the towering stone citadel ahead. People stare as he passes them, a path being made before him as people flock to the side, no doubt whispering about the stern look on his face.

He storms through the heavy iron servant entrances, slamming doors on their hinges, tearing off the faded linen tunic and throwing it to the stone floor like trash. Attendants and low-ranking guards rush to him, bowing in absolute terror at the sheer aura of lethal fury radiating from the young prince. They have never seen him like this.

"Get me my royal uniform," Jungkook barks, his voice ringing through the high stone corridors like a crack of thunder. "Now."

Minutes later, he is clad in the official armour of the high crest: a dark, structured jacket lined with heavy gold trim, epaulettes resting on his broad shoulders, heavy leather combat boots, and the royal insignia pinned sharply over his chest. He looks every bit the future ruler he was born to be.

He strides down the western corridor toward the main guard barracks. The heavy oak doors, reinforced with iron bands, don't just open; they slam against the stone walls with a violent, echoing crash as he kicks them through.

Dozens of off-duty guards and captains instantly freeze, dropping their dice and flagons of ale, snapping to absolute attention. The room goes dead silent.

"Who patrolled the main market square in the lower village this morning?" Jungkook demands. His voice isn't loud, but it is dangerously low, vibrating with a lethal, quiet edge that makes the hair on the back of everyone's necks stand up.

Near the back of the room, two guards exchange a nervous, sweating glance. Slowly, their armour clanking in the heavy silence, they step forward and bow deeply.

So these are the brutes who had stood over you on the cobblestones.

"We did, Your Highness," the lead guard stammers, keeping his eyes glued to the floor. "Is there an issue with the sector?"

Jungkook doesn't answer immediately. He walks up to them with a slow, agonisingly measured pace. The air in the barracks becomes completely suffocating, the temperature practically dropping as the prince circles them. He stops directly in front of the guard, who has a heavy leather whip strapped to his belt.

"An issue?" Jungkook echoes, a terrifying, dark smile tilting the left corner of his lips, though his eyes remain dead and vacant. He peers down at the guard, who is half a head shorter than him. He folds his hands behind his back, leaning in slightly. "Tell me about your morning patrol. I want to hear about how efficiently you enforce the King's law."

The lead guard swallows hard, his throat bobbing nervously. "It was... a routine patrol, sir. We apprehended a group of street rats attempting to steal from the market stalls. We administered the standard physical deterrent to ensure compliance with crown regulations."

"A physical deterrent," Jungkook repeats, his tone almost conversational, entirely too calm. "And tell me... did these so-called street rats take the lashes?"

The guard shifts his weight, his iron greaves clanking with the movement. "No, Your Highness. A local villager stepped in. A peasant girl from the bakery. She obstructed our duty and offered to take the penalty in their stead. We accommodated her request to maintain the crown's authority in the square."

"You accommodated her," Jungkook whispers. His jaw clenches so hard the muscles flare violently against his skin. His fingers curl into tight, white-knuckled fists behind his back. "Five lashes. Is that correct?"

The second guard, thinking the prince is merely verifying protocol, chimes in, "Yes, sir. Three for the stolen goods, one for her insolence and talking back to the guard, and... one extra, just to ensure she remembers her place beneath the law."

The mention of the fifth lash, the one delivered purely out of sadistic amusement, shatters the final thread of Jungkook's restraint, leaving behind a monster driven by pure, protective devastation.

Without a single syllable of warning, Jungkook’s right fist shoots forward.

Crack.

His knuckles connect squarely with the lead guard's jaw with an inhuman amount of force. The sheer momentum of the blow rips the heavily armoured man off his feet, sending him flying backwards. His body crashes into a heavy oak table, splintering the thick wood into raw kindling before his armour skids across the stone floor, a spray of dark blood erupting from his shattered mouth.

The second guard gasps in pure shock, his eyes widening in horror as his hand flies to the hilt of his sword in a blind, conditioned reflex.

"Touch that steel," Jungkook roars, stepping into his space instantly, "and I will take your hand off your wrist."

Before the guard can even process the threat, Jungkook's royal combat training takes over. He intercepts the man's arm, his grip clamping down on the wrist like an iron vice. With a brutal, fluid twist of his upper body, he snaps the guard's wrist backwards. The bone pops with a sickening, wet crunch, forcing a loud, piercing shriek of agony from the man's throat.

Jungkook doesn't stop. He drives his knee directly into the guard's stomach, crushing the wind out of his lungs, followed by a heavy kick straight to his chest plate. The metal dents inward with a loud clang, and the guard goes sailing through the air, crashing hard onto the stone floor, coughing up strings of bright blood as he rolls onto his side, clutching his broken arm.

The rest of the barracks stands paralysed. No one moves. No one breathes. To strike a royal guard is treason, but when the attacker is the future King, and a man who can kill with his bare hands, the law belongs entirely to him.

Jungkook turns his gaze back to the first guard, who is desperately scrambling backwards on his hands and knees like a terrified, wounded animal, leaving a trail of blood on the floor.

Jungkook walks over to him, his heavy leather boots thudding rhythmically. He stands over the grovelling man, then reaches down, grabbing the guard by the throat and the collar of his iron breastplate. With a guttural growl of pure, unadulterated rage, Jungkook rips the man completely off the ground, slamming his back against a massive stone pillar.

"Who do you think you are?" Jungkook hoarsely whispers, his face inches from the guard's bleeding, trembling features. He tightens his grip on the man's throat, cutting off his air until the guard's face begins to turn purple. "You wear my family's crest. You carry weapons funded by my treasury. You eat food provided by my citizens. And you use that power to strike an innocent, defenceless woman in the streets?"

"Your Highness- p-please-mercy…" the guard chokes out, tears of genuine, paralysing fright mixing with the dark blood pouring down his chin. "We didn't... we didn't know she was... we didn't know..."

"You didn't know what?" Jungkook roars, slamming him against the stone pillar a second time, cracking the mortar behind his head. "That she has a name? That she feels pain? That her life is worth infinitely more than your pathetic, miserable existences?"

He weakens his grip just enough to let the man gasp for air, only to drive a brutal left hook directly into the guard's ribs. The sound of fracturing bone echoes clearly in the silent room. The guard lets out a strangled sob, his head slumping forward.

Jungkook grabs him by his hair, forcing his head back up so he has to look into his eyes, eyes that are currently completely devoid of mercy, cold and dark as a winter grave.

"Listen to me very carefully," Jungkook whispers, his voice dropping into that lethal, quiet promise that chills everyone in the room to the bone. "If I ever see either of you set foot in the lower village market again... if I ever hear that you so much as look in the direction of that bakery... I will ensure you are stripped of your titles, thrown into the deepest dungeon beneath this palace, and I will personally pick up the leather lash and show you what five strikes feel like when delivered by someone who actually knows how to use it. Do you understand me?"

"Yes... Yes, Your Highness... Forgive us... Forgive us..." the guard weeps, his spirit completely broken, pressed flat against the cold stone.

Jungkook shoves the guard away in utter disgust, letting his limp, groaning body slide down the base of the pillar into a pathetic heap.

The prince stands up straight, slowly adjusting the cuffs of his dark royal jacket, his chest heaving with heavy, deliberate breaths as he reins in his wild adrenaline. The fury still burns hot in his veins, but his composure returns like a heavy curtain falling over a stage. He looks around the barracks at the rest of the silent soldiers who are still locked at attention, none of them daring to even blink.

"Clean this pathetic mess up," Jungkook barks coldly, casting one final, disgusted look at the two broken men on the floor. "And remember exactly whose crest you wear. If any of you forget your duty to protect our people, I will personally remind you."

He turns on his polished leather heel, his golden cape snapping behind him, and storms out of the barracks, his mind already racing out of the palace gates and straight back to your quiet, shadowed bedroom.

The bright, warm rays of the morning sun pierce through your thin linen curtains, casting long, golden bars across your bedroom.

You slowly blink your eyes open, your body instantly tensing as you brace yourself for the white-hot, agonising fire that had consumed your back yesterday. You hold your breath, carefully shifting your weight to test the movement, but to your absolute surprise, the blinding agony has receded into a dull, thoroughly manageable ache. The throbbing is heavy, a reminder of the guards' cruelty, but it no longer cuts your breath short. The cooling herbal salve Jungkook applied worked absolute wonders overnight.

You slowly press your palms into the mattress, pushing yourself up into a sitting position, your eyes immediately darting around the quiet room.

Jungkook.

He is gone. The space beside your bed feels entirely empty, the cool morning air still carrying the faintest, lingering hint of his crisp, rich scent.

A heavy wave of emotion hits you as you sit there in the morning silence, the blankets pooled around your waist. Your mind drifts back to the blurry memories of yesterday. You remember the sheer terror in Jungkook's eyes when your knees had buckled in the kitchen, the way his strong arms had snapped around you before you could even hit the floor. He had held you so tightly against his chest, as if you were something incredibly precious he couldn't bear to see broken.

The memory of his touch makes your skin tingle beneath your bandages. He is the Crown Prince of the realm, a man born to be served, and yet he spent his hours kneeling on your floor, on your bed, cleaning your wounds with trembling hands, and whispering soft, broken apologies against your skin every time you whimpered in pain. The sheer, intoxicating intimacy of him wrapping the linen around your waist, pulling you flush against his solid chest, plays on a loop in your head. It sends a strange, dizzying heat curling deep into your stomach, a mixture of profound gratitude and a budding, terrifyingly deep affection.

You turn your head towards the nightstand. There sits a fresh glass of clear water, a small plate neatly stacked with dried fruits and crackers, and a folded piece of parchment. You reach out, your fingers tracing the crisp edges of the paper before unfolding it. Reading his messy, hurried handwriting, a genuine, breathless laugh bubbles up in your chest.

The ridiculous boyishness of his threat instantly cuts through the lingering shadows of yesterday's trauma. Even when he is trying to be authoritative, he can’t help but be the same teasing menace who steals your cake batter. You smile, dutifully eating every single cracker and dried fruit on the plate, feeling the energy slowly returning to your limbs, before drinking the water down to the very last drop.

Exhaling a long, steady breath, you carefully slide off the bed. You find a loose, lightweight, clean dress in your wardrobe and slip it over your head with meticulous care so the fabric doesn't rub harshly against the fresh dressings. You feel remarkably better; the deep, uninterrupted rest has done wonders for your body and mind.

Marching down the staircase, you are determined to open the bakery today. You refuse to let those guards steal your livelihood or intimidate you out of your own shop, and you certainly can't let your regular village customers down two days in a row.

The kitchen downstairs is dead quiet, smelling faintly of the chamomile tea Jungkook had brewed for you. You walk straight to the front door, unlocking the heavy brass deadbolt, and pull the thick curtains back to let the brilliant morning light flood the room. Bracing yourself, you push the front door open and step onto the threshold to set up the outdoor display.

The moment your boots clear the frame, you freeze completely in your tracks.

Sitting proudly on the wooden bench right beside your shop entrance is an overflowing bouquet. It is massive, easily the size of your entire torso, completely taking over the small wooden bench. But as you take a slow, hesitant step closer, your brow furrows in sheer confusion.

The flowers aren't real.

You lean down, your breath catching completely in your throat as your eyes scan the arrangement. They are meticulously, beautifully handcrafted entirely out of soft, colourful yarn. Dozens upon dozens of intricately crocheted roses, delicate lilies, and bright daisies, amongst others, which are woven together with an unbelievable amount of patience, care, and precision. The bouquet bursts with vibrant, warm shades of pastel pink, sunny yellow, and rich cream, completely immune to the biting morning frost.

Tears instantly spring to your eyes, a sudden, heavy wave of emotion tightening in your chest until it's actually hard to breathe.

You are, unfortunately, severely allergic to real flowers; the pollen makes your eyes swell shut, and your lungs feel heavier within minutes. It is a small, trivial detail you had mentioned to Jungkook months ago, a passing, light-hearted remark made at two in the morning while you both sat on the kitchen floor giggling over a tray of accidentally burnt sugar cookies. You hadn't thought twice about it. You had assumed he forgot it the second the words left your mouth.

Yet here they are. Flowers that will never wither, flowers that can never trigger your allergies, flowers made with a level of dedication that a person can only give when they are entirely, irrevocably devoted to someone. Only a handful of people in the world know that secret about you, and your royal visitor remembered every single syllable.

Tucked precisely into the centre of the soft yarn roses is a small, heavy piece of parchment. You reach out, your fingers trembling violently as you pull the note free from the stitches and unfold it.

I heard real flowers make you sneeze. These will never wither, and they will never hurt you. I'll be there tonight. Don't lock the back door. - J. p.s. leave out some extra cookies, please <3

You press the heavy paper firmly against your chest, right over your thundering heart, staring out into the bustling village square. A silent tear slips down your cheek, cutting through the light dust of flour on your skin, but a bright, genuine smile graces your lips.

Yesterday, you felt completely alone, broken and humiliated on the cold cobblestones while the world looked away in fear. But today, clutching this note, you feel safer, more cherished, and more protected than you have ever felt in your entire life.

“Baby?” You call out, finally slowly approaching your boyfriend after standing in the doorway for the last 10 minutes. The bag on your shoulder slides off to the ground with a soft thud and you take a seat on the bed, next to Hyunjin’s leg. He picks his head up slightly, his eyes narrowed from the tiredness and he whines once again. 

“Don’t even look at me. I look like a giant tomato.” He grunts, his voice raspy and tired, the back of his hand covering his eyes as he tries to hide from you. You chuckle and caress his leg, kicking your shoes off in the process. 

“Aww, did you get sunburnt?” You tease him, ever so slightly scraping his thigh as he squirms under your touch. “Hey,” he cuts you off, pulling his leg away from your hand. “not cool, you know how fast I can get burnt.” 

You choke back a smile and let out a sigh. “I mean…you look so pretty like this. All red and helpless. Laying in the darkness of our room~” 

“I told you it’s not funny!” He turns around to hide from you, laying on his stomach as he groans into the pillow once again as you can’t help but chuckle. Now as his back is on display, you can clearly see the faint lines decorating his back from the sheets pressing against him, his red skin scorching hot when you touch it. “If you find it so hilarious, can’t you at least help me to cool it off?” Hyunjin mumbles into the material, his arms flexing next to his head as he grips the sheets harder. You caress his back slightly, tilting your head to the side as you admire his goosebumps rising on it. “Sure. With what though?” You reply shortly after you leave his skin alone. 

“There’s some aloe vera in the bathroom, I just couldn’t get up and get it. Can you please apply it on my back?” 

The tone in his voice that gets you, really. The way he worded please just got your stomach flip upside down. The way he lifted himself up by his arms to sit in front of you had your head spinning. When all he was able to do was to let out sighs after sighs when you put the cool gel on his sensitive, hot skin. If pain was pleasure, this was heaven. At least for you, but not short after you started pressing kisses on his nape before applying the gel, Hyunjin started to get even more nervous and fidgety. 

“Everything alright?” You whisper, your hand now working its way to his torso. He jumps slightly at the sudden temperature change, clearing his throat slightly. “Poor baby, you’re so sensitive,” you add, hands working the gel into his skin letting your nails scrape him from time to time as you speak. “how can you be so forgetful sometimes?” The moment those words hit his ears he knew he was gone for. That tone reminded him of so many things he felt his cock harden in his trunks, his heart slowly picking up the pace and his hands now more sweatier than they were before. He swallows and straightens up, one of his hands once again gripping the sheets. “I-I’m sorry, I totally forgot today..” He stutters but quickly covers it with a cough, feeling your hand teasing at his sides now. “I guess, you not being here….clearly messed with my head.” He adds on, biting his lips to keep his subtle moans back. 

Hyunjin can hear you let out a sigh, feeling your breath hitting his bare back. “Good thing I’m here now, right?” You press a feather-like kiss under his ear, making him shiver against you. Before he could even answer, you gently turn and push by his shoulders so now he’s laying under you on his back,sitting comfortably directly on his crotch as the sundress you are wearing keeps little to nothing to the eye. The sudden position visibly throws him off as his breath hitches. “Don’t worry, I’ll be gentle here.” 

And as you make that promise you let the cooling gel pour right onto his skin, his body immediately jumping at the coldness and his hands instinctively grip at your waist. He groans when he feels your core pressing against his hard-on, his hips helplessly grinding up into you like his own body is not aching from a different pain. “Shit, baby -” A small moan escapes him, his now bloodshot eyes following your every move against him. 

“It’s okay, I’ll take care of you.” 

You smear the slimy gel all over his stomach and chest, slowly massaging it into his skin, slowing down your movements especially around his chest area just to see the reaction screaming off of his face as you mercilessly tease his sensitive nipples. “I’m - fuck - baby w-what are you - ?” Hyunjin moans shamelessly, now his fully erected cock thrusting up into you from all the squirming and turning he’s doing under your touch. “I told you I would take care of you, didn’t I?” You repeat the same motion, now your fingers shamelessly circling his nipples. “Are they sensitive too?” The purr of your voice nearly brings him over the edge, his knuckles almost white as he grips your hips harder, pressing your own body down against him. 

Hyunjin choked on his own spit, mumbling under his breath. “D-don’t tease me….please, baby.”  

You knew exactly how fucking crazy you were driving him, practically feeling his precum oozing out of his tip as he grinded against you harder and harder. His breathing picked up the faster as you moved against him, rocking hips and circling hands moving together as all he could do was to moan and whimper under you. 

“Fuckfuckfuckfuck - fuuck,” he mumbled when your hands sled down further towards his trunks, now gripping the material to let his fully erected cock hitting the room’s cold air. “Nononono, please not there I-” His helpless pleas go right through you. 

“Shh, don’t you want my help baby? To make the pain go away? To make it all better?” Effortlessly, you lean down and press kisses on his chest, on his collarbones, and on his jaw as your hand wraps around his length. You let out a groan as you feel his girth between your hand, his prominent veins immediately throbbing with need as you continue kissing him. You smear remaining gel on your hands onto his cock, swifting your hand up and down in an agonizingly slow pace. “I swear I’ll make it all better~” 

It's like his own body disobeys him, he tries and tries to keep his voice back as much as he can, keeping his hips in place to not cum too fast but then there you are - alluring voice and hands working wonders on him as you bring him closer to his release. “I-I don’t think I can hold much longer -” He whimpers, his eyebrows scrunched together in concentration. 

His hands cover too much at once, but nothing at the same time, his fingers finding the edge of your dress to pull it over your head just to see your naked body on top of him. “Fuck, no bra?” He questions, his hands cupping your breasts before you could even answer. The breathy moan hits his ears at the same time your clothed pussy grinds down onto his lubed up cock, his sensitive pink tip flushed against his wet stomach. 

“Nghn- baby ~” You moan, the mutual pleasure now getting to your body too as it’s his turn to massage your nipples. All you can see, feel, and hear is him. Him him him. It’s so raw, looking down you see his tip oozing from his precum right onto his wet stomach as you drag your clothed pussy along his shaft, his muscles flexing while trying to keep you on top of him. And oh, his beautiful face shining in pure pain from dragging his climax out so far and his skin feeling everything at once. At every move or breath he feels his skin tighten on him, your hips rubbing together with his as you chase your own release along with him. It hits him all too deep and together - your voice and moans twisting in his stomach when he feels you cum untouched - your panties soaked from all the liquids mixing together. Hyunjin can’t help but whine at this point, feeling his climax approaching incredibly fast as you throw and toss your head in pleasure. 

“That’s it pretty…” he pants, his pubic bone pressing against where you are aching just as the same as him. “take it, take all of me, baby.” 

You loved how sensual it was, going perfectly along with his burning body in the cool set room so he can cool off, - but instead here he finds you moaning his name as you both reach your climax together. Hot white ropes of cum paint your panties and his stomach, his hands now gripping your back and the nape of your neck to bring you down for a deep kiss, moaning into each other's mouth while running out of breath. 

Here you lay with your forgetful boyfriend, sticky and hot skin pressing together under the AC, while you still try to calm and cool his burnt skin off in desperation continuously all night. 

It doesn’t matter how, just somehow :)

a/n: no words. just sending this to my bestie @arunainluv happy nameday

important!: this is pure fiction, the act in this story is by my imagination and not based off true events. please do not copy the work.

@ astrasng 2026

The upside down is back, 3 students have died, Eddie was the lead suspect who you were currently in the process of hiding and now Max had just narrowly escaped a murder attempt from 'Vecna'.

Once Nancy and Robin met up with you all after the incident with Max at the graveyard, everyone decided it was best to recalibrate back at the Wheelers house.

You tried to convince the others to stop at yours on the way- so you, Steve and Dustin could change. You also offered the others clothes and showers and food there too in hopes of them getting onboard with the slight detour.

Luckily, they all agreed.

Everyone pilled into your house, Robin and Lucas going straight for the kitchen, Max settling on the sofa with Nancy and you rushing up to have a quick shower, Steve following behind, Dustin turning into his own room.

Your mom was gone, at the store probably, but it meant you didn't have to explain everything and everyone to her thank god.

You promised to not be long, as the others would need to use the bathroom too, but they were all having a laugh if they thought you could go any longer without a shower and change of clothes.

You were stripping before you'd even got into the bathroom, turning it on and stepping in allowing hot steam to circle you in the small space.

You made quick work at your hair, knowing you were just going to tie it up anyway, and you were almost done with body wash when you heard the door open.

"Shit- I'll be like two minutes"

"Just me princess"

"oh- what do you want?"

"Nuthin.."

You knew exactly what he wanted, and you got confirmation when you heard the shower door open, steps behind you, and the door close again.

You didn't turn round, still facing the stream washing off the rest of the strawberry scented soap from your skin.

"mm smells so good"

Steve's hands landed on your hips, pulling you back into him so he could lean down and kiss at your neck. He walked you forward slightly, so you were both under the warm water as he pulled your hips even closer so your ass pushed up against his very obvious hard on.

"Steve.."

"What?" He said innocently as if he wasn't quite literally grinding into your ass from behind, face buried in your neck kissing and nipping at the damp skin.

"Not the best time.. is it Steve?"

"Please.. I-"

His words cut off, replaced by a soft whine as you moved back against him.

Maybe it wasn't a great time, and no you didn't have this in mind when you suggested stopping but now? Who were you to say no to Steve, especially as he'd asked so nicely and sounded so pretty begging into your neck.

"We'll need to be quick"

"Yes princess, I can.. please just-"

You cut him off by turning around and attacking his lips with yours, pulling him into a messy, desperate kiss.

He responded instantly, pushing you up against the cold wall beside you, making you gasp as he grabbed one of your legs and pulled it up to rest over his hip, clearly taking back all control now he has the green light.

His mouth was still on yours as his other hand slid down your body and into your wet folds, making you moan into the kiss, giving his tongue the perfect opportunity to explore more of your mouth.

His middle finger teased your aching hole for a moment before diving into your wet heat. As he stretches you out ready for him, he swallows loud moans and cries from your mouth. You whimpered as his hand left you feeling empty but he assured you it was soon to be replaced with something a lot more fulfilling.

He pulled away from the kiss, resting his forehead against yours, he looked down as he grabbed his length, lining it up and pushing slowly into you. You both drew a sharp breath as you watched him disappear deep into you, holding still for a moment letting you adjust before pulling almost fully out then thrusting straight back in again.

You let out a choaked moan at this sudden movement, arching your back so your chest pushed against his. His mouth latched onto your neck, sucking hard leaving rich purple marks on the skin as his hips kept up a brutal pace below.

"Fuuuck- Steve-"

Your hands were griped tight on his large biceps, nails digging into the skin leaving their own marks, the pain of the scratches only urging Steve on.

The bubbling heat in your lower stomach was creating quickly but your leg that was holding all your weight was starting to become increasingly unstable.

Steve pulled back to notice you struggle and without changing his rhythm, pushed you harder against the wall and swiftly picked your other leg up. You wrapped your legs tight around his waist, securing you and forcing him deeper as you did, and your arms flew around his neck.

He'd pushed you up slightly, your head above his now, the new angle allowing his cock impossibly deeper, hitting that spot that made stars burst behind your eyelids every time.

"Fuck princess- so good- 'm so close"

You leant your head down, pulling Steve into a deep loving kiss, one of your hands leaving his neck and sliding down between your two bodies to reach your clit to circle the sensitive nerves.

You moaned loud into Steve mouth as you got closer to your climax. The feeling of him repeatedly fucking you at the perfect angle mixed with the tight movements on your small bundle of nerves and his tongue licking against yours.

"Fuck- Steve- I'm- Gonna-"

"cum for me baby girl, cum all over my cock"

That does it. Your orgasm comes crashing over you, you clench hard on Steve, pushing him over the edge. Steve stills, burying his cock deep inside you, you felt him spilling into you, painting your walls white as you bite down on his shoulder crying out as he rides out both your orgasms.

"Fuuuuck-"

His movements finally slow and he kisses your forehead as he pulls out, setting your weak legs on the floor of the shower. He doesn't let go, holding on tight as you let the shower wash away the signs of sex lingering on your skin

"did so well princess, so good for me"

You respond with one last kiss before remembering where you guys were.

"Shit. Cmon, I told them all I wouldn't be too long"

You shut off the shower and take his hand, guiding him out into the bathroom and hand him a spare towel after covering yourself in your own. As you squeeze out some of the water from your hair into the shower you hear a knock at the door.

Both of you freeze, worried about who was on the other side, how long they'd been there, if they heard. Out of all the people in the house you hoped it would be Robin as that would definitely be the least awkward.

"Uh- I'll be just a second"

"Oh it's okay, just was checking if someone was in here before I tried to walk in"

It was Nancy. Fuck.

You turn to Steve who's face is slowly turning red, his ex girlfriend, your oldest friend, is standing outside of the door to the place where you just loudly fucked, all while the world is like ending too.

"Think she heard us?" You whispered.

"Well she sounded normal so?"

"Think she's still there?"

"Most likely"

"What do we do?"

The idea of having to both walk out the bathroom at the same time, past Nancy, with a slight limp and many new un-hideable hickeys / scratches, was short of mortifying.

"Just- walk out, and you know, don't look at her- head held high" Steve moved his hand to the bottom of your chin as he spoke, lifting it to face him as he nodded uncertainly.

You nodded back slowly before taking his hand in one of yours and opening the bathroom door with the other. As you anticipated you were met with Nancy right outside who went to say something but hesitated then retreated at the sight of both of you.

She didn't say anything as you passed but she obviously realised what you guys had been up to, and when your eyes met hers the smile she gave you said it all. You gave a weak, embarrassed smile back, Steve keeping his gaze firm on the back of your head as he trailed behind you and into the safety of your room.

As he stepped into your room he shut and locked the door behind him, the sound causing you to spin around from your drawers. You met his gaze and the mischievous look in his eyes told you he wasn't quite done with you.

You both stepped closer at the same time, meeting in the middle of your room with a deep kiss, picking straight back up where you left off in the bathroom. His hands pawed at your ass over the fabric of your towel as your hands ran through the damp hair on his chest.

Unfortunately, a loud banging on your door ripped you both from your moment before it got too far as you walked over and unlock the door. This time it was Robin who was standing there, already half way through asking you to borrow clothes.

You open the door to let her in, guiding her to the chest of drawers where Steve is currently knelt down, fishing through his drawer at the bottom for clothes.

"Wait Steve when did you shower?" Robin had noticed his wet hair and towel skirt.

"Oh, just now" he said matter of factly.

"But [y/n] didn't you just shower-"

"Oh uh yeah- uh"

"Oh don't tell me you guys-" she cut off her words as she moved your hair back off your neck revealing the obvious truth.

“ew you guys there literally people dying?!”

The room erupted into defensive pleas and laughter as you picked out clothes for yourself and Robin.

She took herself back out to change leaving you and Steve alone again, who was already reaching out for you.

"Steve-"

"No I know, not the time"

"Yeah.."

His lips met yours again in a deep but not as intense kiss before he pulled away turning his attention to the pile of clothes you'd gotten out for yourself, taking them piece by piece and helping you get dressed.

Robin and Nancy had clearly discussed what you guys had done, the awkwardness becoming apparent with everyone when the both of you finally emerged from upstairs and Robin burst straight into laughter.

  “This is what you called me for?” Hyunjin’s voice filtered through the phone, tinged with an amused disbelief that made it difficult to tell whether he was genuinely concerned or simply entertained by your latest crisis.

  You balanced the phone against your shoulder, a damp dish towel in one hand and a half-soaked roll of paper towels in the other, glaring at the mess spreading across your kitchen floor. The sink had been making strange noises for weeks, a low gurgle that seemed harmless enough until it finally turned on you, sending water pooling across the counter with a mocking drip that no amount of frantic plunging could stop. The pipes—the stubborn, stubborn pipes—had defeated every attempt you’d made, leaving you knee-deep in irritation and suds.

  “Unless you know a better way to keep my apartment from turning into an indoor pool, yes, this is what I called you for,” you said, trying and failing to keep the exasperation out of your voice. “It’s either you or I start charging admission at the door.”

  A low chuckle resonated through the line, warm and infuriatingly self-satisfied. “You know, most people would just call maintenance. That’s literally what they’re paid for.”

  “I did call maintenance,” you muttered, squeezing the damp towel until droplets slipped between your fingers. “They said someone could come by next Tuesday. Unless I plan on living off takeout for the next week, that’s not exactly helpful.”

  “Ah,” Hyunjin replied, dragging the syllable out with a smugness that made your stomach tighten. “So I’m not just your first call… I’m your only option.”

  “You’re the only option that doesn’t involve my entire kitchen rotting.”

  He hummed, the sound low and thoughtful, as though he was weighing the gravity of the situation. “I just showered, doll. You trying to get me dirty again?”

  Your mouth opened, but words failed to spill out from over your lips. You stood still, pushing at the way his causal tone made your cheeks heat and heart thump, trying to conjure a quip back, or yell at him, perchance.

  “I’ll be there in ten minutes. Try not to cry without me.”

  The line went dead before the curses you had lined up rolled off your tongue, leaving you alone with the gurgling of the faucet and the uncomfortable quickening of your heartbeat.

  Hyunjin had a way of slipping beneath your skin without even trying, weaving himself into moments that should have been mundane and turning them into something you thought about long after they ended. You had lived next door to him for nearly a year, long enough to know he was the sort of neighbour who always seemed to appear when you least expected it—carrying groceries into the elevator at the exact moment you struggled with your own, lounging in his work clothes against the railing of the stairwell when you came home late, dress shirt rumpled and hair in a messy state no amount of intentional styling could replicate. He was helpful in an infuriatingly smug way that made it impossible to thank him without also wanting to throttle him.

  And he was handsome, although “handsome” felt like too simple a word for someone who could make you lose track of what you were saying in the middle of a sentence just by pushing his unkempt fringe off his forehead. Hyunjin had a way of existing that demanded your attention; tall and loose-limbed, all lazy grace and deep contours dwindled by the warmth of his stupid grin.

  You had told yourself, repeatedly, that this attraction was nothing but a harmless nuisance, an unfortunate side effect of close proximity and his vexing habit of showing up in your space like it belonged to him. You had convinced yourself the butterflies in your stomach were merely a byproduct of his teasing, the kind of thing anyone would feel when faced with a neighbour who always seemed to know how to get under your skin. Yet, every time you caught yourself watching him tighten a screw with those long fingers, or when his voice curled around your name in his low, unhurried drawl, you wondered how much longer you could keep up the act.

  A sharp knock at your door jolted you from your thoughts.

  When you opened it, Hyunjin leaned against the frame with an infuriating ease, his battered red toolbox hanging from one hand, the other tucked into the pocket of his jeans, a dark wash you had grown accustomed to because these jeans were his handyman jeans—he wore them whenever he came over to help you fix up your kitchen cabinets, or install new tiles on the floor of your bathroom, or screw in a lightbulb you truly could’ve done yourself. The denim was littered with wood dust and gorilla glue and dried paint, tiny rips clawing into the fabric across his knees. 

  His white t-shirt clung to his arms and chest, and it felt deeply unfair—did he have to be so well sculpted?—and his hair was still damp from his shower, the strands spiking slightly as they dried. A warm, woody scent drifted past you as he stepped inside without waiting for an invitation, leaving you momentarily caught between irritation and the embarrassing awareness of how your heart had quickened.

  “Your knight in shining denim,” he announced, setting the toolbox on your counter with a dull clang before towering in front of the sink, his eyes sweeping over the small flood. “Wow. You weren’t kidding. You’ve really outdone yourself this time.”

  “I told you it was bad,” you mumbled, crossing your arms.

  “You undersold it,” he said, sleeves already shoved up, biceps already pulling the fabric taut as he examined the pipes. “This is a full-scale anarchy.”

  You leaned against the counter, trying to bluff indifference even though your eyes travelled with a mind of their own, skimming over the line of his shoulders, the sharp angle of his jaw as he focused. “Do you actually know hwo to fix it, or are you just here to gloat while I drown?”

  “Both,” he admitted without looking up, his mouth twitching at the corners. “But don’t worry, I’ve got this. You can trust me.”

  The words were casual, tossed out without thought, but the way they landed with unexpected weight, pulling at something in your chest, had forced your gaze to the dripping faucet, to the water-stained towels scattered across the floor, to anything that wasn’t him.

  “Tell me how it started,” he said, his words softened by the scrape of metal as he retrieved a wrench from the box, glancing up at you with a calm gaze that had the infuriating ability to both irritate and disarm you at the same time. “Did the water stop draining all at once, or has it been slow for a while?”

  You tucked a strand of hair behind your ear, shifting your weight against the counter, carefully positioning yourself far enough from the watery mess that you refused to step into it again, though you knew he would never let it touch you even if it spread. 

  “It was gurgling for days, but I thought it would work itself out. Tonight, though, I washed a pan and suddenly the whole thing just… rebelled.” Hyunjin snorted. You continued, “I tried the plunger, I tried pouring boiling water, I even tried vinegar and baking soda. Nothing worked.”

  Hyunjin shook his head, his damp strands of hair falling forward until he brushed them back with his wrist, leaving a subtle streak of water against his temple that gleamed in the dim kitchen light. “You’re lucky it didn’t explode on you. Pipes don’t like being ignored, sweetheart.”

  Your heart tripped at the word, though you masked it with a curt roll of your eyes. “You say that like I had any other choice.”

  “You had one.” He turned back to the pipes, his voice rich with a smugness that fizzled beneath your skin. “Calling me before it turned into a flood.”

  The wrench twisted in his grip, veins straining against the skin of his forearm, his long fingers gripping deftly as he loosened one of the joints. A thin stream of water spat out at him, splattering across his shirt and streaking down the column of his throat, catching the faint sheen of sweat already gathering along his skin. He didn’t flinch, only muttered something under his breath as he reached for a rag and wiped his hands, the damp cotton of his t-shirt sticking more closely to his chest with each movement.

  That damn white t-shirt. He knew what he was doing wearing a white t-shirt to a job involving water.

  You tried not to stare, but when you catch the way his chest looks under the wet ghost-like fabric, your eyes started dragging down the lines of his body, tracing the subtle dip of muscle beneath the shirt, the stretch of denim housing dampened splotches across his thighs where he balanced on his heels.

  “Stop hovering,” he quipped tauntingly, breaking your trance. “You’re making me nervous.”

  “You’re not nervous,” you replied too quickly, the flush creeping up your neck exposing you far more than your voice did.

  A slow grin spread across his face, but his eyes stayed fixed on the pipes. “You’re right. I’m not.”

  The water hissed as he twisted another piece free, the sound filling the silence between you, punctuated only by the occasional clink of metal against tile. You stood with your arms crossed, feigning indifference even as your stomach fluttered, his voice threading through the space with an easy confidence making you want to lean closer just to hear more.

  “Honestly,” Hyunjin continued, “you’re lucky I like you. Anyone else, I’d have told them to call a plumber and left them to figure it out. But you–” He finally looked up, his canines cutting sharp against the dim light. “You get VIP treatment.”

  Your throat went dry, though you managed to roll your eyes, clinging to the veneer of irritation that had always been your armor with him. “VIP? Do you mean free labor?”

  “Free for now,” he corrected, tightening one final joint before leaning back to test the faucet. The water sputtered, then flowed smoothly sans restraint, the pool in the sink beginning to drain away in a whirl. He wiped his hands on the rag and pushed himself to his feet, his height crowding the space between you as he leaned close enough for you to catch the scent of his woody cologne on his skin again, mingling with the freshness of his shower and, now, the spray of pipe water. “But I’m starting to reconsider my rates.”

  You exhaled, both relieved and annoyed, watching the sink clear itself as though he had worked some sort of miracle. “So you’re done? That’s it?”

  “That’s it.” He tilted his head, water still dripping from the ends of his hair, sliding down the side of his neck in thin rivulets. “Good as new. No more indoor swimming pool.”

  You hesitated, then said, “Well… I suppose I should compensate you somehow.”

  A smirk found solace on his lips, entirely too knowing. He took a step closer, dropping his voice just enough to make your pulse stumble. 

  “You could always offer me a shower.” He let the pause hang and added, “Preferably one I don’t have to take alone. I did get all dirty fixing your sink, after all."

  Your lips parted, words failing to stitch along the tip of your tongue as heat surged through your chest, your body discarding the veil you typically hid behind. You tried your very best to hold his gaze, to avoid peeking at the sag of his damp clothes across his chest and torso.

  Hyunjin reached for his toolbox, his smirk loitering on his lips like he had said nothing at all out of the ordinary. “Call me if you need anything else,” he said, his tone smoothing back into something deceptively neutral as his lips curved. “And try not to wait until it’s an emergency next time.”

You could get him as wet as you wanted him, thought Hyunjin. And although a shower with you sounded like the epitome of all his wettest dreams (literally!), he really just wanted to take you out to dinner.

Hyunjin thinks he’ll ask you the next time he’s over to help you, his pretty doll.

THE BOOKSHELF was so desperately needed, it was almost incredulous that you hadn’t bought a new one already.

  The old one leaned in the corner of your bedroom like a tired old man, its frame straining under the weight of years of collecting, every shelf sagging, buckling under the burden of your affection for the written word. Books were piled not only vertically, but in sideways towers that grew dangerously tall, forming stacks on your bedside table and even finding refuge on the floor. There were just too many, some that had been well-cherished, others you hadn't even gotten a chance to indulge in yet. 

  You had laughed the first time you found yourself stepping over novels on the way to bed, but last weekend, when one had tipped over and startled you awake with a sharp thud against the hardwood, you had sworn it was finally time.

  The new bookshelf arrived that morning in a flat pack box, heavy with wooden panels and plastic-wrapped screws and a thick manual with all the information you needed to get it set up. You could have assembled it yourself, but the thought of untangling the fat manual with its poorly written instructions, tiny print and all, made you groan. 

  And, truthfully, when you had Hyunjin—a neighbor who had become both your rescuer and tormentor, a man whose hands could fix just about anything—why would you deny yourself the pleasure of watching him work?

  He knocked at your door just after six, right on the heels of his workday. You opened it to find him in a pressed white shirt, the sleeves pushed up hastily to his elbows, his tie tugged loose as if he had only just pulled it free on the walk over. The slacks he wore hung perfectly, his hair a little mussed from his hand raking through it, strands falling his forehead before he brushed them away absentmindedly. 

  There was something wildly attractive about the juxtaposition of him in work attire holding a toolbox, his frame filling your doorway and lips surrendering as the home to a lazy smirk.

  “You didn’t even change?” you questioned, stepping back to let him in, though the words came out lighter than you intended, possibly thanks to the sudden upbringing of your pulse.

  “You sounded desperate,” he replied, his mouth curving into a knowing grin that made you want to roll your eyes and melt all at once. “Besides, you think I can’t build a bookshelf in slacks?”

  “I think you shouldn’t risk ruining them.”

  “If I thought I’d ruin them, I would have come in those raggedy jeans you love so much,” he said with a wink, walking over to your bedroom and setting the toolbox down with a thud against the wall. “Tonight, though, you get the deluxe service. Tie and everything.”

  You exhaled slowly, half-annoyed by his cockiness and half enlivened by the way the undone buttons of his shirt revealed just enough skin to tempt the imagination. He was unfair in that way, managing to look immaculate while doing something as unglamorous as kneeling on your bedroom floor, sorting wooden panels into organized piles.

  The two of you began unpacking the box together. You crouched beside him, pulling out pieces of hardware, the brush of your hand against his every time you handed him a screw or a dowel bolt sending little ripples through your chest. Hyunjin worked calmly, his long fingers moving with practice, his veins flexing subtly under his skin whenever he twisted the screwdriver. He concentrated in bursts, brows pinching together whenever his tools called for focus, then broke the silence with a comment that made you laugh.

  “You know,” he said, aligning two boards and tightening a joint, his words laid-back and devoid of any uncertainty in his efforts, “you could have done this yourself if you wanted to. It’s practically foolproof.”

  You gave him a pointed look, steadying a side panel he’d asked you to hold. “I could have. But then I’d miss out on your charming company.”

  His head tipped to the side, a slow grin spreading across his face, and although he didn’t directly look at you, you caught the glimmer of satisfaction in his eyes. “So you admit it—you just like having me around.”

  “I admit nothing,” you countered, ignoring how your heartbeat said otherwise, racing at the proximity of him. He had leaned close to reach for a screw, his chest brushing your shoulder, the fabric of his shirt warm against your skin, his scent wrapping itself around you, still woody, but mixing with his natural musk. He lingered, not inappropriately, but long enough for the moment to feel longer than necessary—not that you were complaining—and your hands wavered on the board you were supposed to be holding still.

  Hyunjin smirked, speaking low but teasingly, “Careful. If this collapses on us, I’m blaming your distraction.”

  You huffed, shifting your grip along the panel.

  The two of you had established a good workflow—him tightening, you holding, passing tools back and forth. Once, you fumbled a screw, and he caught it mid-air, flashing you a grin that made you scoff. Another time, he reached around you to adjust a joint, his arm caging you in without warning, body brushing behind yours and radiating a palpable heat you felt all over your back and arms. His breath ghosted over your temple when he spoke. “That’s it—hold it still. You’re good at this.”

  “I’m literally just standing here,” you muttered, but your voice was thin, affected by how his closeness coiled inside you.

  “That’s all it takes sometimes,” he said, and whether he meant building or something else entirely, you didn’t dare ask.

  By the time the final screw slid into place, the bookshelf stood tall and flawless, a sturdy replacement for the leaning disaster it succeeded. You stood with your hands on your hips, surveying it proudly, Hyunjin’s presence at your side stealing more of your attention than the new piece of furniture did.

  “Perfect,” you said, exhaling with satisfaction.

  “No shit,” he chortled, brushing his palms off on his slacks. “It was built by a professional.”

  “You are not a professional.”

  “Not by trade,” he agreed, turning toward you with his deviled smile.

  You rolled your eyes, trying to swat away the butterflies fluttering in your stomach. “You’ve earned a drink.”

  “I won’t argue.”

  You led him to the kitchen, where he leaned casually against the counter, peeking at the crevice of the sink he’d fixed just days ago. His tie hung loosely, the unbuttoned collar framing his throat, and you found your eyes drifting there before you forced them away. He touched the faucet lightly, testing it. “Still running smooth? No disasters to report?”

  “None.” You pulled open the fridge, sighing at the empty shelf where your favourite bottle of wine usually waited. “Although I did run out of wine.”

  He gasped, his voice theatrical. “A tragedy. How do you survive without it?”

  “Barely,” you admitted, holding up a bottle of peach juice instead. “This is all I’ve got. I’ve been too tired from work to stop at the store.”

  His gaze washed over you as you poured, something soft creeping into his expression beneath the usual teasing glint. He didn’t make any comical remarks about your back-up choice of drink, but rather watched you fill both the glasses in silence.

  “You’ve been working too hard.”

  You shrugged, handing him a glass. “It’s nothing. Everyone’s tired.”

  “You’re not everyone.” His words were quiet, but they landed firmly. For a moment, he didn’t look away, didn’t cloak the care in witty remarks or smirks. Then, as if sensing the air had grown too heavy, he tipped his glass toward you, his lips quirking again. “That’s why I come running, even when all you need me to do is change a lightbulb.” You blush at this and giggle, reminiscing upon the memory. “What’s next? The batteries in your remote?”

  You laughed. “Don’t jinx it.”

  “Don’t worry,” he mused, setting his empty glass down in the sink he fixed just days ago. “If it does, you’ll call me. I’ll come, just for you.”

Hyunjin did want to come for you. 

Or, cum, more specifically. Perhaps he would, after he finally grew the balls to ask you out to dinner, since there were clearly none between his legs given his lack of proactivity.

YOU were surprised to find Hyunjin outside your apartment door in his tattered handyman jeans, holding his trusty red toolbox in his right hand, a brown bag scrunched around the neck of a bottle in his left. His hair was disheveled, strands spiking out in random, and he wore a black t-shirt that stretched over his shoulders and chest. You hadn’t called him, yet there he was, leaning against—

  “The doorframe?”

  He nodded, shifting the weight of the toolbox against his thigh, his eyes running down the line of your satin dress with such intent focus, you felt your breath lodge in your throat. “Yeah, I noticed it when I came over to put up your bookshelf,” he began casually. His gaze dragged up again, loitering across the neckline of your dress, “I didn’t know you’d be going out, though.”

  The words carried a neutrality, but you knew him well enough to hear the subtle edge thumbing beneath them. The thought of you dressed up for someone else unsettled him.

  “It’s nothing,” you said quickly, brushing your hands over the fabric, smoothing it out along your hips. “Just a work dinner. A little celebration with my team.”

  Hyunjin’s shoulders drew down very subtly, his fingers flexing around the handle of his toolbox. “A work dinner,” he repeated, solidifying it in his mind. He gave a few slow nods before his chin tipped toward the brown bag in his other hand, a playful spark resurfacing in his eyes.

  “What’s in there?” you asked, nodding at it.

  “Your favourite,” he replied simply, lifting the bag just enough for the neck of the bottle to peek out. “I picked it up on my way home from work yesterday. I figured you’d eventually run out of excuses not to let me drink it with you, peach juice could only redeem me so much.” He smirked crookedly, his mischievous glimmering eyes crinkling into a squint.

  The thought of him walking past the shop, remembering the name of the exact wine you’d offhandedly mentioned, and buying it without knowing when he’d even give it to you, sent your stomach tumbling. “You remembered?”

  His smirk softened. “Of course I did.”

  The corners of your mouth tugged upward, a warmth blossoming in your chest that you thought best to ignore. “You really didn’t have to.”

  “Maybe not,” he said with a shrug, “but I wanted to.”

  The honesty in his tone was disarming, and before you could let it mess with your mind, you stepped aside, gesturing him in. “Come on. You’re already here.”

  He hesitated just enough to look at your dress again, his mouth pressing into a line that tried to be light but did nil to hide his interest. “I don’t want you to be late, though. If this takes too long–”

  “It won’t,” you interrupted, a lilt in your voice. “Besides, I’d rather spend my time with you than my crew at work.”

  His eyebrows rose, lips parting as if to confirm whether you meant it, but a determined glint overcame the look in his eyes, as though he’d taken your words as a challenge. “In that case,” he said, stepping inside with exaggerated seriousness, “this doorframe is about to receive the most meticulous repair of my career.”

  You laughed, shaking your head as you returned to the vanity in your bedroom, sliding into the seat you’d abandoned in your rush to answer the door. 

  The mirror reflected the sight of Hyunjin setting the bottle on your kitchen counter, returning to place his toolbox on your bedroom floor, and stretching his arms up to push at the panel lifting off the jamb of your doorframe, doing his own mister fix it investigation. He leans down into his open toolbox, hands getting busy pulling out screws and the drill.

  The panel itself wasn’t much—it was just a strip of wood peeling away from where it had once been flush—but Hyunjin treated it as though it were the most intricate repair he’d ever been asked to do. Every whir of his drill was unhurried, every lift of a screw rid of haste. He had decided keeping himself perched in your door was preferable to letting you walk out of it.

  He drilled in the first screw, the sound sharp in the air, his arm flexing with each turn of the tool. You caught his reflection in the mirror, the way the veins colonized his forearm and swelled with the effort, the subtle stretch of his shirt over the top of his back when he pushed and drilled at the panel. He paused between each screw, peeking over at you as though to check your progress, though the look in his eyes mused over you longer than necessary.

  What should have been a five-minute fix stretched languidly, his movements akin to a tortoise. He measured twice before driving in a screw, wiped his hands on his thighs even though they weren’t dirty, and spent a long time running his fingers along the wooden frame as if searching for invisible imperfections.

  You pressed a brush to your cheekbones, pretending not to notice, but your heart had long deceived you, thudding rampantly against the confines of your ribs. His shirt had ridden up slightly when he had to stretch further up to reach the end of the panel—his height could only do so much for him. The lack of fabric revealed the sharp cut of his waist, the shadow of his v-line dipping into the waistband of his boxers. You bit down gently on your lip, sliding gloss across it and pretending your sudden distraction was entirely the fault of your reflection.

  Hyunjin shifted again, kneeling lower, one hand braced against the frame while the other steadied the drill. His head tipped just enough for his hair to fall into his eyes, and he blew it away with a quick puff of air, his lips parting, the softest bite against the bottom one when the screw met more resistance than he’d expected.

  “You’re awfully quiet over there,” he said suddenly, in a low voice that travelled easily in the few feet separating you.

  “I’m trying not to distract you,” you consoled, your cheeks warming as you spoke.

  He glanced up at you through your vanity mirror from his crouch, the corner of his lips quirking, his gaze so direct it sent an icy bullet up your spine. “Too late for that.”

  You exhaled slowly, feigning nonchalance as you twirled an absentminded finger through the ends of your hair. Still, you couldn’t help sneaking glances, at the flex of his biceps when he leaned into the drill, at the way his jeans sagged just enough for the band of his boxers to peek through, at the lines of muscle carved into him even in the simplest of motions.

  The panel should have been fixed in five minutes flat.

  So why was it that twenty had passed, and he was still crouched there, examining his work, adjusting, pausing to wipe his palm against his denim-clad thigh, taking every opportunity to look up at you in the mirror?

  With one last turn of the drill, he leaned back on his heels, wiping a speck of dust from his forearm with the back of his hand. 

  “There,” he said, his voice casual, though the smug curve at the corners of his lips told you he was proud of his unnecessary patience. “Door closes smooth as butter now.”

  You twisted in your seat, eyeing him where he knelt on the floor, sweat beading faintly along his temple. “You made that take three times longer than it should have.”

  He shrugged, setting the drill back in the toolbox, the muscles in his arm flexing with the movement. “Maybe I just like fixing things for you.”

  The words landed heavy in your chest and echoed in your head longer than they should have, and you found your throat tightening because you weren’t sure how to respond. 

  With Hyunjin on your bedroom floor, his back pressed against the wall just beside the mended doorframe, the sight of him danced in your vision longer than it should have. The shadows of evening and dim light threw half of his face in a mellow shade. The sheen of sweat gathered along his temples caught the last strands of light, giving him a glow one only ever noticed when they were already looking too closely. 

  He sat with his legs stretched, denim tugged taut along his thighs, and even though he’d finished fixing what he came to mend, his body still held the languid tautness of a man in the midst of work, chest rising with each deep breath, fingers twitching as if reluctant to stash his tools away.

  You hesitated only a moment before speaking. “We should open the wine,” you kept your voice casual through your shallow breaths, smiling through a raging heart, “it would be a waste if I drank it alone, and after all your effort today, you deserve it more than anyone.”

  His mouth quirked, the curl of amusement playing at the commissures of his lips, but his eyes softened when they met yours. “You sure about that?” His voice was smooth, teasing. He knew you would never say no, but he wanted to hear you insist anyway.

  “I’m sure,” you replied, pushing yourself to your feet, walking across your room, stepping over his long limbs stretched out in front of the door, and moving toward the kitchen, acutely aware of his gaze trailing behind you. It was almost too much, the weight of it pressing against your back as you retrieved the bottle, found two glasses, and returned to the room where he remained on the floor, waiting quietly with patience and two twinkling eyes.

  You sank down beside him, close enough that your bare knees brushed against the denim stretched over his thighs. The cork slid free with a soft pop, the sound strangely intimate in the otherwise quiet room, and you poured the wine carefully into each glass, the liquid catching a blush of red as it swirled. When you offered his glass forward, his fingers grazed yours in the exchange, resting in their lingering, and the simple touch made your stomach clench far tighter than it had any right to.

  He lifted his glass, eyes never leaving yours. “Cheers, doll,” he said, the nickname slipping off his tongue with ease, the way it always had, and when the glasses clinked, the sound seemed more stark than it should have, echoing in the space between you.

  The first sip was warm, rich, and melted along your tongue. He leaned his head back against the wall, glancing at you sidelong with a smug, careless expression doing little to hide the intent in his pupils. “You’re not going to be late to that dinner of yours?”

  You shook your head, swirling the wine in your glass, watching the surface slant before peeking at him again. “I wasn’t really looking forward to going. Honestly, I’d much rather stay here.”

  Something flickered in his expression, a spark he smothered quickly under a chuckle. “What were you celebrating, anyway? Must’ve been something big if it meant dragging you out of the apartment in a dress that–” his eyes dropped briefly, unapologetically, before rising to meet yours again, “–looks like it was tailored onto you.”

  You smiled, suppressing a scoff. “It was just a deal we signed with another company. Nothing I was strictly required to attend.”

  “So you g’na tell them you were sick?” His lips curled around the words.

  “I could,” you admitted, tilting your head, “and I probably will.”

  The sound of his laugh rumbled in his chest. He turned his glass in his hands before taking another sip, then leaned his head back again, exhaling through his nose. “Shame for them, though,” he murmured, grinning, “they won’t get to see my doll all dolled up.”

  Your breath caught, but you narrowed your eyes and matched his tone easily. “That’s fine. At least you got to see me.”

  His grin dampened on his lips but not in his eyes. He paused, a flash of surprise quickly hidden, his jaw clenching briefly before he looked away, taking his time with his next sip. “Dangerous thing to say to me,” he said. He spoke in a mellow tone, even through the grit of his loitering wit.

  You smirked into your glass. “You’ll live.”

  His eyes snapped back to yours, and the air between you stilled almost imperceptibly. “You’re trouble,” he muttered, his gaze flicking down to your lips before returning to your eyes, “and you don’t even try to hide it.”

  “You’re still here, so it doesn’t seem like you mind,” you countered, lifting an eyebrow.

  His grin returned lazily. “I don’t,” he admitted, almost thoughtful, before his lips tugged further. “When it’s you, I think I like trouble.”

  The words sank into you faster than the wine. For a heartbeat, you forgot how to breathe, your pulse tripping unevenly, and it felt as if your body didn’t quite know what to do with the sudden weight of his admission, playful though it was. You shifted slightly where you sat, the hem of your dress brushing against your thighs, and you tried to focus on the swirl of red at the bottom of your glass rather than the man watching you so intently beside you.

  Perhaps it was the gentle buzz of alcohol, but you found yourself speaking before you could stop yourself. 

  “You know,” you said quietly, softer than your usual banter, “I really am grateful. For everything you do for me. You don’t have to, but you still always show up.”

  He tilted his head, his lashes lowering as though he was trying to decide whether to make light of it, but you didn’t give him the chance. You placed your now-empty glass down on the floor on the other side of you, reached out, and let your fingers graze the ends of the hair at the nape of his neck.

  The touch was simple, almost innocent, but the effect was anything but. His breath caught in the most imperceptible of ways, throat bobbing as he swallowed, and though he tried to mask the sudden tension in his body, you felt it waver under your hand.

  “I feel like I should pay you somehow,” you added, fingertips skimming from the ends of his hair to the warm skin just at the base of his neck.

  Hyunjin stilled, the glass halfway lifted to his lips before he finally tipped it back, draining the last sip as if it were needed armor. When he lowered it, his voice was firm. “I don’t want anything from you.”

  “That's not fair–”

  “No.”

  “But–”

  “No.”

  Your hand might have retreated if not for the way he leaned into it, surrendering himself into your touch as though he’d been waiting for it all along. The strength of him, the sharpness of his jaw, the unruly softness of his hair between your fingers—it all came together with a kind of inevitability that made your chest ache in built-up anticipation. Encouraged, you threaded your fingers deeper into the strands, scratching your nails lightly at his scalp.

  He closed his eyes briefly, his mouth parting, and when he opened them again, his pupils were wide, swallowing the warm brown into a dark chocolate. He looked at you with awe, as if the mere weight of your hand in his hair was liberating him, his lips tugging faintly between his usual grin and something far more vulnerable.

  The silence sprawled on, until his voice broke it with a confession so plain, so unguarded, it sent a shock straight through you. 

  “Haven’t you ever considered that maybe I just want you?”

  Your fingers froze mid-scratch. The words landed with the force of a blow, leaving your face blank as you scrambled to compose your inner self, to not let him see the way your chest had tightened or the way your breath had retreated from its post.

  Hyunjin opened his mouth to add more, but you didn’t give him the chance.

  For a fleeting second, he thought you might laugh, or scoff, or even slap him, the flash of your eyes unreadable, but when you leaned in, his breath left no room for comprehension as your lips molded upon his.

  He carefully placed his emptied glass down beside him—he almost would’ve let it slip from his fingers from how off-guard you had caught him with your lips, but he wasn’t going to ruin your pretty drinkware. His hands immediately sought you, almost desperately, one sliding beneath the soft fabric of your dress to cup your thigh, the other reaching for your waist to drag you  closer to him.

  His biceps bulged when he shifted you over his lap, your dress slipping against the denim stretched over his thighs as you settled onto him in a straddle. He groaned into your mouth, the sound vibrating against your lips.

  You hummed in response, your lips moving hungrily against his, and he matched you without hesitation, kissing you with eyebrows pinched painfully together. One calloused palm rubbed up your side to your back, rough fingers leaving trails of fire as he found the back of your neck, threading through your hair, urging you closer until there was no space left to close.

  This should feel absurd, kissing your neighbour, your own personal handyman, but it was exhilarating. You had no idea just how bad you had wanted him—how bad your body longed for him—until your lips slotted against each other and hands gripped each other, whatever they could touch and hold.

  You were soft, warm, intoxicating, and he wanted all of you, every inch and sound and breath. He pulled you flush against him, his other hand tightening at your waist until your chest pressed against his and—fuck, you’re not wearing a bra?

  You shivered and broke the kiss to moan against his lips. He was hard beneath you, there was no mistaking it, the rough denim straining as he pulled you down onto him, greedy for the heat radiating through the thin barrier of your dress. The pressure made you arch and bite back a cry, his groan rumbling into your mouth as if the very sound was welded to your pulse.

  His hands dragged you closer, sliding up from your waist until his palms cupped your breasts, squeezing them with a hunger that made your blood beat harder. The fabric of your dress was ruffled now, bunched beneath his fingers, and the lack of a bra—a reckless decision you had barely thought about—was driving him mad. His thumb pressed over your nipple through the cloth, and the sharp friction made your lips part with a gasp he swallowed, his tongue catching yours in a kiss both messy and deliberate.

  He pulled back suddenly, lips glistening and breathing deeper. “Do you have any idea,” he murmured against your cheek, “what you’ve been doing to me all this time?”

  The words made you shiver again, though he didn’t wait for your answer. His mouth found your neck, wet and hot, kissing, sucking, biting in quick succession as if he couldn’t decide which sensation he wanted you to suffer through more. Your head tipped back, helpless, giving him room, and the moan that spilled out was involuntary, humiliating in its rawness.

  Your fingers threaded into his hair without thought, tugging lightly, guiding him, but he hardly needed encouragement. He licked a slow path down your throat to the swell of your breasts, pausing only to drag his teeth along your collarbone in a mark you already knew would bloom later. You felt his smirk against your skin as if he was entirely aware of the claim he was leaving behind.

  Your dress slipped lower with each kiss until his mouth pressed over your breast, heat seeping through the thin fabric, his tongue circling your nipple until it peaked against the damp spot his lips left behind. You whimpered, tightening your hold on his hair as he drew you deeper into his mouth, sucking hard enough that your back arched further into him.

  Your body had utterly surrendered to his touch. You were putty in his arms, his big, bulging arms that caged you to his front so perfectly. His big arms that had you wondering whether he’d lift and toss you on the bed, manhandling you into whatever position his dick was yearning for.

  Hyunjin groaned in frustration because it wasn’t enough. The friction was mocking him rather than giving him what he wanted. He writhed in discontent beneath you, jerking up his hips, and the pressure of his cock through his jeans against your core made you cry out, rolling your hips down in response.

  “Fuck,” he groaned, the sound ripped from his chest. His eyes peered up at you from where his mouth was still latched to your breast, pupils blown wide, gleaming with unrestraint. His grip on you tightened, fingers dipping into your spine as though daring you to move again.

  You did. You slowly rocked your hips, dragging your core from the base of his denim-covered cock to the tip, feeling how hard he was even through layers of fabric. His entire body shuddered, his groan breaking into something darker, almost pained, and you knew you had undone him.

  “Do you have any idea how long you’ve had me bricked up?” he muttered, smirking at his own confession and pulling away from your chest only long enough to speak before biting lightly over the other breast, sucking your nipple through the dress until you swore your body would combust.

  Your head spun, blood beating rampantly in your veins, and still he wasn’t satisfied. He pulled away entirely, panting, hair messy from your fists in it, and peeked at the floor beneath you with contempt. “Not here,” he murmured hoarsely, “I– shit, can’t have you how I want here.”

  Before you could process, his arms were wrapping around you, strong and determined, lifting you up with him. Your legs wrapped around his waist instinctively, your breath hitching at the sheer effortlessness of it, at the sensation of his cock pressing directly against your core in the new position. He grinned at your reaction, lips brushing yours in a kiss too brief and taunting.

  He dropped you onto the mattress with a carelessness that was not cruel but desperate, his body already covering yours before you had time to adjust. His mouth returned to yours in a kiss that tasted of urgency and hunger, his hands sliding up your thighs, over your hips, until they cupped your breasts again, as though he couldn’t bear to let go of them for even a moment.

  Your dress was pulled higher, your thighs bare to the cool air of the room, and his hips pressed down, denim rough against your soaked core. He rolled into you once, then over and over, his teeth sucking at your bottom lip as he groaned into your mouth and cursed softly against your neck, every sound from him making you ache from exactly where he needed you.

  His restraint was fraying, you could feel it in the tremor of his hands and desperate way he pressed his hips harder against you. Yet, even now, he took his time, his tongue circling, teasing, claiming, leaving you on the verge of begging. And still, all you could do was hold him closer, your fists tangled in his hair, eyelashes fluttering, body arching into every touch, every kiss, every grind of his hips that promised more than either of you could stand to wait for.

  “Hyunjin–”

  “Yeah?” he answered back, breathing heavily and pressing his forehead to yours.

  You whined, tugging at his t-shirt.

  Hyunjin let out a ragged breath, his chest heaving. “Ah, shit.” He reeled back from you, his hair mussed, lips kiss-bruised, eyes dark and wild, and tried to ignore the way his cock jerked at the sight of you sprawled on the bed, your dress sliding dangerously low over your shoulders.

  His fingers gripped the back collar of his shirt, tugging it over his head in one smooth pull that left his torso bare, lean muscle stretching and flexing in a way that made your thighs squeeze together without you meaning to. Your legs felt weak just looking at him, your stomach flipping with every inch of golden skin he revealed. His jeans hung low, riding down his hips, boxers peeking just enough to tease before he shoved both down in one go.

  His cock sprang free, flushed and hard and glistening along the tip, thick veins straining, the sheer sight of it enough to send heat pooling at your core. Hyunjin caught your eyes flickering down, and his tongue darted across his lips—he knew exactly what the sight did to you.

  “Fuck,” he muttered, more to himself than you, his voice husky from having been slotting his tongue against yours not too long ago, before he leaned forward again and hooked his fingers under the straps of your dress, sliding it down your body.

  He tried not to show how his cock twitched at the sight of your breasts bared, but the sharp exhale that escaped him had braced all the hot pressure that was building at the pit of his stomach. He didn’t dawdle, tugging the dress away until you lay there in nothing but your panties, blushed and messy-haired, your pouty lips parted to let the quick string of breaths out from the confines beneath your heaving breasts.

  Hyunjin froze for a moment, swallowing hard, eyes roving over you and trying to control the way the sight was making him almost feral. His chest rose and fell like he was composing himself, but it was already useless; he was wrecked beyond repair.

  “You don’t even know,” he whispered, leaning down again, brushing his lips across yours in a kiss that was soft despite the frantic hunger of moments before. His hand slid across your stomach, fingers toying with the waistband of your panties, tracing the elastic. “Tell me what you want.”

  You writhed, clutching at his broad shoulders. “Anything, Hyunjin– just anything. I’m so wet for you, I can’t–”

  His forehead dropped to your shoulder, and he let out a broken, desperate groan, the sound so raw it nearly had you cumming right then and there. 

  “Fuck, don’t say that,” He whispered, his hand slid down further, the pads of his fingers pressing against the soaked cotton of your panties. He felt the damp heat immediately and nearly lost it. 

  But he had lost it. 

  He had. He was so far gone, so taken by you, he was convinced the night would never end and he’d have you like this until time fizzled into oblivion.

  His voice cracked when he spoke again. “Shit, you’re– soaked.” He breathed slowly for a few beats. “You know how many times I’ve thought about you like this? And now…” His sentence dissolved into another curse, whispered into your skin.

  You whimpered against his temple, the ends of his hair tickling your cheek, squirming your hips against his palm. “Take it off, Hyune.”

  He wastes no time hooking his fingers into the waistband of your soaked panties, tugging slowly, dragging them down your legs until it was discarded ball of fabric with a wet splotch, leaving you utterly naked before him. 

  The sight confiscated the air from his lungs. His cock throbbed so fucking hard at the vision of your slick pooling between your thighs, proof of just how badly you wanted him too, and his jaw clenched as though the sheer need pained him.

  “Fuck, baby,” he groaned, rubbing his lips along your knee, your inner thigh. God, he’d thought of you like this so many times. He’d thought of you, his pretty neighbour, his doll in distress, sprawled atop the sheets of a bed, legs spread for no one but him, your core slick-sheened and dampening the sheets for no one but him. 

  When he sank between your legs and pulled your thighs over his shoulders, the scent of your arousal hit him so hard, he nearly whimpered and salivated like a Pavlovian dog, dragging in a breath through his nose as if your heady scent was the only oxygen he’d need for the rest of his damned life.

  “Need’a taste you,” he mumbled, lips fluttering over your folds and making you squirm at the lack of contact. 

  “Jinnie,” you whimpered.

  And whimpered once again, after you felt the chaste kiss he gifted your clit.

  “Taste so google, doll,” he panted between licks, his voice shaking. “Do you know how many nights I’ve fucked my fist thinking about sucking on this pretty cunt? About making you feel good, hearing you moan for me?” His words spilled hotly, desperate—the wit had left him. “I’d do anything for this, anything for you. Just let me make you come on my tongue.”

  Hyunjin’s mouth moved with a hunger that was nothing short of feral, his lips sealing against you in a messy kiss that had your thighs trembling against his shoulders. He licked at your folds, sliding his tongue between them, tasting you with greed, tongue dipping and circling before laving flat against your nub, doing everything to draw little gasps from your lips because they kept pushing him further.

  The only sounds filling your room were your whines and whimpers, Hyunjin’s groans muffled in your heat, and the wet, slick squelches of his tongue burning itself in you, his lips sealing over your bud and sucking, the kisses and licks he gave your clit.

  “God, you’re unreal,” he muttered, dragging his tongue over you again before sucking hard at your clit, his cheeks hollowing with the effort.

  Your fingers threaded into his hair, gripping onto his messy strands when his tongue pressed firmer. The sound that tore from his chest was a groan-turned-whine, his hips rutting into the bed as if even the friction of his cock against the duvet wasn’t enough. He ground himself down again and again, his cock leaking against the fabric.

  One long finger flit against your entrance, sliding in easily through the slick mess he had already made of you. You clenched helplessly around him, and he moaned so loudly it almost startled you, pulling away from your clit to mutter against your skin. “Tight– fuck, you’re so tight around my finger, I might– aah, I might cum before I even get inside you.” 

  He kissed your thigh, nipped at it, then sucked at your clit again, his finger curling deep inside until you were gasping.

  “Hyunjin–”

  “Yeah, baby, I’ve got you,” he said quickly, voice rough, before sucking harder, the obscene sounds of his mouth slurping at you filling the room. His hips rutted down against the sheets in frantic rhythm with his tongue, his need consuming him whole. 

  He slid in another finger, stretching you, filling you, working them both in time with his mouth until you were writhing, grinding up into his face and messing his hair with your fists.

  “N-nngh—Hyune, need you.”

  “Yeah? Need me?” He smirked against you. “You need me?”

  When he looked up at you, he thought he might cum from the sight alone.

  You’re panting, breasts heaving with each breath that escapes you. Your lips are glazed over and still puffy from your makeout. Your eyebrows are knotted together, cheeks flushed, temples sheening with sweat, and your eyes—gosh, your angel eyes are so, so fucked-out.

  “What do you need, baby?” he taunted, finger pushing at the gummy end of your hole, making you roll your hips and give him a desperate look.

  “Need you inside,” you whined.

  Hyunjin’s smirk widened, his fingers still relentless inside your walls. “Hmm, I think you’ll need to be a little more specific, doll.”

  You whimpered a bratty hmph, scrunching your eyebrows together and rolling your head back before you peered down at him again.

  He gazed at you, amused, fingers pumping. His thumb came up to rub at your clit just to tease you a little more. When you didn't say anything, he raised his eyebrows, and you mewled in defeat.

  “I– fuck, Hyunjin, put your dick in me. Fuck me, please.”

  Hyunjin ripped his fingers from your core, grabbed your hips, and flipped you onto your stomach, pulling at your hips until they lifted over the edge of your bed and your toes pressed into the floor.

  His thumbs slid up the insides of your thighs and pulled at the glistening lips surrounding your cunt.

  “Fuck, you’re a mess,” he marveled, voice shaking, catching some of your slick on his thumb and dragging it over the swollen tip of his cock. He smeared it over himself with a hiss through his teeth, gaping at the way it shined along his length. “So pretty like this, bent over for me, soaked for me.”

  He hoisted your hips further up when you arched back into him with a moan. You rolled your hips in his hands and peeked back at him over your shoulder.

  “Fuck me hard, Jinnie.”

  He snapped his eyes to yours, his chest heaving, his tongue darting out to wet his slick-coated lips, trying his best not to cum at the sound of those words in your voice.

  “Say it again.”

  “Fuck me, Hyunjin.”

  “Again.”

  “Fuck me, please. Fuck me so hard, Jinnie, I’ll–”

  Hyunjin slammed into you, cutting your words short. Your mouth hung open in a broken moan, and your cheek fell against the sheets of your bed. It mattered not whether your makeup smudged along the comforter. In fact, nothing mattered, apart from the hard, veiny drag of Hyunjin’s cock along your tight, hot walls.

  “Mmm, shit,” he choked out. “Fucking tight– God.”

  It took everything in Hyunjin to pull out, watching his cock glisten with your wetness, before rutting back into you harder, rubbing at your hip with one hand while sliding the other down your back to grip your waist.

  He thrusted in and out of you, his cock squelching along your wet walls. Little gasps and whimpers slipped from your lips and buried into the sheets, his groans filling the room with each drag of his cock.

  The hand on your waist slid up your back, his fingers running through your hair before he leaned down, chest flush to your spine, and kissed along your neck, wet open-mouthed kisses smearing heat into your skin. The grip on your waist never dimmed in strength, pulling you back into each thrust, rutting harder, deeper, until you were squirming beneath him

  “How long have you wanted this?” He mumbled into your neck, thrusting deep into you and clasping his fingers along the base of your skull. “Is this why you kept calling me over, hm? Wanted to see what I looked like all hot and sweaty for you, yeah?”

  You whined and jerked your hips back into him, nodding pathetically with the will of half your mind—the other half had long been sucked out of you.

  He rubbed the nape of your neck with so much delicacy it was almost a contradiction, at odds with the way his cock kept battering into you with ruthless precision. The hand in your hair snaked along your back, around your torso, sliding up the front of your warm body to grab the base of your neck. He drilled into you again and again, his words dirty against your neck and seemingly never ending.

  “Taking me so well, baby, fuck. You’re so good for me, my pretty doll.”

  “Feel that? Feel how hard you made me? It’s all for you, just for you.”

  “G’na fuck you full with my load. You want that? Want me to fuck a baby in you?”

  “Yes, Jinnie—mmph, please,” you whimpered into the sheets at his last words, your reply so fast and frantic it had Hyunjin’s eyes rolling back into his head, his jaw flexing as he groaned.

  “Yeah?”

  He needed to see you. He needed to see your face, your lips parted in an oh, eyes glazing over with a coat of tears that might spill at any given thrust. He wanted to see what he was doing for you, wanted so desperately—yearned—to watch you beautiful you looking breaking apart under him.

  He reeled back from you, slid his hand down your back, and gripped your hips with both hands before pulling out of your cunt with a wet drag and flipping you onto your back again, your body pliant beneath his grip.

  He wasted no time filling you full with his cock again, watching your face at the exact moment the head slipped back in, almost shaking at seeing how good it made you feel. Your legs wrapped him closer to you when he leaned down and smashed his lips to yours. He tasted of your arousal and nothing but.

  He flattened his hand against your back, curving you into his chest, groaning when your breasts pressed into him, the feeling of your hardened nipples rubbing along his chest making him rut harder. Then, he grabbed onto your hip so he could really start pounding into you.

  The squelch of your walls around his pumping cock filled the room, and your little sounds serenaded the fibres in his ears. His hot, open mouth rested against the base of your neck, his wreaked moans sinking into your warm skin. Your hands were in his already unkempt hair, nails digging into his neck and scraping over his upper back. 

  He snapped his hips, squeezed onto yours, and ground his dick deeper into you. His tip grazed your g-spot, and you clenched around him, trying to keep him in, trying to make him stay there and rut into your spot over and over until you were coming undone for him and only him. You squeezed your legs around him, attempting to bury him further into you.

  “Big.”

  He looked at you, into your half-open eyes, the way your lips part after weakly moaning out the singular syllable.

  “Yeah? It’s big?” He panted, a curl in the corner of his lips, adoration submerging his eyes. You nodded at him, a knot deepening between your eyebrows. “You’re taking it so good, though, baby. Taking me so fucking good.”

  His fingers wreathed through your hair, the pad of his thumb is circling over your hip bone, and he mumbled incoherent praises against the supple skin of your neck.

  The hand on your hip smoothed over your lower stomach, his palm pressing into it when he pounded into your g-spot again. You whimpered at the friction of his tip against your sweet spot, gripping whatever part of him you could get your hands on—his shoulders, his biceps, anything. 

  He slid his hand further down, his fingers pushing your swollen clit out from under its hood, and rubbed a languid circle down into your nub.

  That was all it took for you to feel the pressure rippling in the core of your being.

  “You’re clenching down so hard on me, baby, shit,” he groaned, pulling his head back to watch your face. “You’re cumming? You gonna cream on my dick?”

  “Yes—yeah,” you moaned, your eyebrows scrunching tight, staring into his dark, chasmic, heavy-lidded gaze.

  “Cum, baby. Cum for me, and I’ll fill you up so good. I’ll fuck my seed so far into you, I promise– shit.”

  His words were all it took to have you clenching down onto his dick rhythmically, the pressure exploding in your core and ripping through you until you spasmed against his frame and dug your head back into the pillow.

  Hyunjin plastered his forehead along your bare neck when his own orgasm threw him over the edge just after yours, after feeling the way your walls tightly hugged along his length over and over again, abs tightening and spurting his seed deep into you, coating your walls white hot, adhering to the promise he’d made just moments ago. He groaned the most beautiful, broken sound against your skin before his muscles relaxed and he hovered his face above yours, panting heavily against your lips.

  You could feel how hot his cum was inside you, how full you were with his seed and slowly softening dick still buried deep inside you, plugging you full with everything he’d given you.

  Your breaths leveled out together, Hyunjin giving you the softest kisses as you both calmed down.

  Your hands drifted along his bulging biceps that caged you in, along the contours of his shoulders until you had a hand wrapping along his neck, the other pushing at the messied hair that spiked over his forehead.

  He gazed at you with the warmest of eyes before a boyish grin lit up his face. You couldn’t help but smile back up at him, still full with his cum and softened dick.

  “You should come fix things spontaneously more often,” your voice wisped against his cheeks, so soft and hoarse. He laughed, eyes twinkling, crinkling at the angel beneath him.

  “I should keep you from work dinners more often.”

  In the comfortable silence that passed with the both of you smiling at each other, Hyunjin decided he was going to stay buried in you like this for the rest of his life. Then, you wouldn’t need him to fix anything ever again. He wouldn't need to show up with his bitchass toolbox and tattered jeans, hoping to see you smile at him, pleased at the work he did for his doll. Although, to his dismay, he knew he couldn’t stay buried in you forever, because—

  “Can I take you out to dinner sometime?"

Hyunjin finally grew a pair. He even felt them slap against the backs of your thighs.

Maybe all he needed was to work his doll in a different way.

৬ৎ  𝑙𝑒𝑒'𝑠 𝑝𝘰𝑠𝘵𝑙𝑢𝑑𝑒  ࿐  reblog, comment, slide into my inbox !! please let me how i did, it'll make me happy :D (i have a praise kink)

── thank you for reading ❝ work, doll ❞ ᝰ.ᐟ

The sun was too bright. It bounced off the water in sharp white flashes, glinting over the packed resort pool until it looked less like a place to cool off and more like something hostile—loud and shimmering and endless. Children shrieked as they cannonballed into the deep end, inflatable toys drifted past in a lazy parade of neon colour, and the smell of chlorine clung to the air so thickly it sat in the back of your throat.

You sat on the edge of your lounger with your sandals still on, fingers curled so tightly around the towel in your lap that your knuckles had gone pale.

“Come on,” your boyfriend groaned for what had to be the fifth time in ten minutes. He stood in front of you in damp swim shorts, hair slicked back from where he’d already gone under once. “You’re seriously not getting in?”

You forced a smile that felt as brittle as it probably looked, stating, “I said I’d sit here.”

His sister was already waist-deep in the water, waving toward you. His dad floated nearby with a drink balanced on the side of the pool, and his mum offered you a soft little smile, like she was trying to smooth over the awkwardness with politeness alone.

Your boyfriend, on the other hand, just huffed, refusing to drop the matter.

“You can’t even stand in the shallow end?” he asked, incredulous, like you’d announced you were afraid of air. “It’s a pool, not the Atlantic.”

Your stomach turned at his words, anxiety creeping up your throat.

“I don’t want to,” you said quietly, eyes fixed on the tiled floor beneath your feet.

He laughed. Not a kind laugh, not even a disbelieving one. It was mean around the edges, sharpened by embarrassment because his family was watching and you weren’t doing what he wanted.

“God, you’re such hard work sometimes.” He dragged a hand over his face and looked over his shoulder toward the others as if inviting them in on the joke. “She’s acting like she’s gonna drown in four feet of water.”

The words hit harder than they should have, because that was exactly it, wasn’t it? Not the four feet of water, not really, but the way your lungs still seized at the sight of water and the echo of screaming and the memory of your mother’s hand slipping from yours beneath dark water when you were too young to understand why she wasn’t coming back up.

But your boyfriend already knew all of that.

He knew because one night, months into your relationship, you’d cried in his arms and told him the truth. About the lake and about the panic attacks. About how your mother had dived in after you and never made it back to shore. About the guilt that still lived inside your chest like something rotten and permanent.

Yet he still smiled now, cruel and careless.

“Babe,” he said in a mocking, syrupy voice, crouching in front of you, “it’s not deep-water trauma if you’re literally sat next to a kiddie pool.”

His sister went still, and his parents shifted awkwardly where they now sat side by side on the pool's edge. Even other families were starting to look over.

You felt your face burn with humiliation, the sting so sudden it made your eyes ache. “Stop.”

“What?” He shrugged. “I’m trying to help you get over it.”

“No, you’re not.”

“Oh my god,” he scoffed. “Do you know how dramatic you sound? You’ve made the whole thing weird.”

His mum murmured his name under her breath—sharp, warning—but he ignored her.

“You can’t avoid water forever just because of some childhood thing with your mum,” he said. “It happened years ago.”

Some childhood thing.

The world seemed to narrow around those three words, and you felt your throat close over the lump in it. You looked down at the towel in your lap because if you looked at him, you were going to cry, and you would rather die than do that in front of his family, in front of a hundred strangers, in front of everyone.

Before you could think of a reply, movement came from the lifeguard chair.

You’d noticed him earlier, of course. It was impossible not to. Tall, broad-shouldered, sun-browned skin, dark curls damp at the temples from the heat. He wore the red resort lifeguard shirt with the sleeves pushed up, mirrored sunglasses hooked into the collar, and a whistle resting against his chest. He’d spent the last half hour scanning the water with practised focus, occasionally blowing a sharp blast at children who ran too close to the slippery edge.

Now he was looking directly at you, no - your boyfriend- and he’d clearly heard enough. Your boyfriend, however, either didn’t notice or didn’t care as he carried on with his verbal assault.

“Seriously,” he said, straightening up again. “My little cousins are braver than you.”

You stood too quickly, nearly tripping over the lounger in the process. “I’m going back to the room.”

He rolled his eyes. “There she goes.”

The words chased after you like waves crashing onto the shore in a storm – brutal and unforgiving.

“Are you kidding?” he called, loud enough that several people turned to look. “You’re actually sulking now?”

Your vision blurred. You kept walking, heart hammering, pulse roaring so loudly in your ears it almost drowned out the pool noise behind you. You made it halfway across the pool deck before your breathing started to go wrong. It was too fast, too shallow, panic rising in a wave so familiar it was almost mechanical.

Not here. Please, not here.

You veered toward the quieter side of the resort, past a line of sun loungers and potted palms, and ducked behind a low wall near the outdoor showers where fewer people passed. The second you were out of sight, your knees buckled, and you sat down hard on the warm tile, pressing the heels of your hands to your eyes.

Breathe.

In for four. Hold. Out for four.

It didn’t work. Your chest kept tightening, each breath snagging before it could fully fill your lungs. All you could smell was chlorine, suncream, and hot concrete. All you could hear was water slapping against tile, your boyfriend’s voice in your head, and underneath it all that old memory—cold black water, your own childish screaming, your mother disappearing beneath the surface.

“Hey.”

The voice was low and careful, close enough to make you flinch, and you looked up, eyes wide.

It was him. The lifeguard.

Without the chair between you, he seemed even broader. The red shirt clung slightly to his chest from the heat, and he’d crouched down a few feet away instead of looming over you, forearms resting on his knees. Up close, his face was softer than you’d expected—strong jaw, tired eyes, an expression pulled tight with concern and something that looked a lot like anger on your behalf.

“Sorry,” he said quickly, his hands lifting a little, as if he didn’t want to spook you. “I know I’m probably overstepping. I just—” He exhaled through his nose. “You looked like you needed a minute.”

You swiped at your face, mortified. “I’m fine.”

He gave you a look that made it clear he didn’t believe you for a second, but he didn’t call you on it.

“Okay,” he said gently. “Then I’m just sitting here while you’re ‘fine.’”

Despite everything, your laugh came out broken and unwilling, more of a watery exhale than anything else. He reached into the pocket of his shorts and held out a small paper cup of water—probably grabbed from the station on his way over.

“You don’t have to take it,” he said, “but it might help.”

Your fingers shook when you accepted it. “Thanks.”

For a few seconds, neither of you spoke. The sounds of the resort felt muted here, softened by the wall and the hum of cicadas in the palms.

“I heard some of what he said,” the lifeguard admitted at last, voice tight. “Enough to know he shouldn’t have.”

Heat flooded your face again, this time with shame. “It’s embarrassing.”

“No,” he said immediately. “It’s not.”

You stared at the rippling surface of the water in the paper cup as you muttered, “It is when everyone’s looking at you like you’re insane for not getting in a pool.”

“You’re not insane.”

His voice was firm in a way that made you finally look at him. He’d shifted slightly at some point, one forearm draped over a raised knee, expression steady and open. There was no pity in it, which somehow made your chest ache more.

“People are scared of water for all sorts of reasons,” he said. “And even if you weren’t— even if you just didn’t feel like swimming—that should’ve been the end of the conversation.”

Your throat tightened, finally feeling understood in a way that you hadn’t all holiday.

“He knows why,” you whispered. “That’s the worst part.”

Something flickered across his face—anger, unmistakable this time, gone almost as quickly as it appeared. “I guessed.”

You laughed once, bitterly. “He thinks if he mocks me enough, I’ll magically get over it.”

“That’s not how trauma works.”

“No?”

“No.” His mouth tipped into the faintest, humourless smile. “I spend all day stopping drunk tourists from doing stupid things in water. Trust me, I know fear when I see it. Yours isn’t ridiculous. It’s real.”

The simple certainty of it nearly undid you, and you looked away quickly, blinking hard, but not before he noticed.

“Hey,” he said, softer now. “Look at me a second?”

You didn’t know why, but you did as he asked.

“If you don’t want to go anywhere near that pool,” he said, “then don’t. You don’t owe anyone a performance because they bought a family holiday package.”

A tiny, hysterical laugh escaped you at that, and his expression warmed a little, like he’d been aiming for exactly that.

“I’m Chan, by the way,” he added. “In case I’m going to be the weird resort employee giving pep talks behind the showers.”

You almost smiled properly this time. “That’s a very specific job title.”

“It’s seasonal.”

That did it. A real laugh slipped out, small and surprised, and Chan’s shoulders relaxed like he’d won something.

“There you go,” he murmured.

Your pulse was finally slowing, breaths evening out one by one. You took a sip of water, the paper cup cool against your mouth.

“I’m sorry,” you said after a moment. “You probably have actual emergencies to deal with.”

“I’m off duty in ten.” He glanced toward the pool through the gap in the wall, then back at you. “And unless someone’s actively drowning, I think this counts as more important.”

The words landed somewhere deep in your chest, too deep for someone you’d only met five minutes ago.

You looked down at your hands. “I don’t know what to do. I’m stuck here with his family for another week.”

Chan was quiet for a beat. “Are they all like him?”

You thought of his mother’s expression, the way she’d said his name in warning. His sister going awkwardly silent. His dad pretending not to hear.

“No,” you said. “I don’t think so.”

He nodded slowly, as if filing that away. “Then maybe talk to the ones who aren’t.”

“And say what?”

“The truth.” His jaw tightened. “That he’s using the worst thing that ever happened to you as a punchline.”

The bluntness of it made you flinch—not because it was wrong, but because it was exactly right. Footsteps sounded from somewhere nearby before you could reply, and both of you looked up instinctively. You were relieved that it wasn’t your boyfriend, just random holidayers passing without stopping.

Chan stood, then hesitated.

“I should get back before my boss notices I’ve disappeared to bully guests into hydration.” He rubbed the back of his neck, then glanced down at you with a look you couldn’t quite read. “But if you want…” He gestured vaguely toward the quieter end of the resort. “There’s a little cove beach about five minutes down the path past the tennis courts. Hardly anyone uses it this time of day. No pool noise, no crowds. You can still sit near the water without feeling like you’re in the middle of a circus.”

Your brows lifted. “You tell all the crying girls behind the showers about your secret beach?”

His mouth curved, slow and crooked and devastatingly kind. “Only the ones whose boyfriends are idiots.”

The laugh that escaped you this time felt almost normal, and Chan’s gaze dipped to your face for half a second, as if to check whether you were really okay now, before he met your eyes again.

“You don’t have to be brave for anyone today,” he said quietly. “Just get through it.”

Something about the way he said it—as if getting through it was enough, as if surviving counted—made your chest ache.

“Thanks,” you said, and this time you meant much more than the paper cup of water.

He gave a short nod, then started to step away before pausing.

“And for what it’s worth?” he added, looking back over his shoulder. “I don’t think your mum would want the person she loves most in the world to spend her life being ashamed of being scared.”

Your breath caught. Before you could answer, before you could explain, he was already walking back toward the pool, whistle bouncing lightly against his chest, shoulders squared with purpose.

You sat there for a long time after he left, staring at the sliver of bright blue sky between the palms and trying not to cry all over again—this time for an entirely different reason. When you finally stood and made your way back around the wall, the pool came into view again in a riot of sunlight and noise. Your boyfriend was in the water, laughing with his sister like nothing had happened, but the second he saw you, his grin twisted.

“Well?” he called. “Finished having your little tantrum?”

Across the pool, Chan’s head snapped up from where he stood by the lifeguard chair. This time, he didn’t look away, eyes tracking your movement back towards your boyfriend, whose question had been loud enough for a few people to glance over. Not everyone, but enough. Enough to make your skin prickle all over again.

You stop when you get to your chair. Your boyfriend is leaning against the edge of the pool, forearms braced on the hot tile, water dripping from his hair into his eyes. His sister is hovering awkwardly beside him, and his mum has gone very still in her sun lounger, sunglasses lowered just enough that you can feel her watching over the rim. Across the pool, Chan is back by the lifeguard chair, one hand resting on the rail, attention fixed squarely on you.

You don’t know if it’s the panic still clawing at the inside of your ribs, or the humiliation, or the simple fact that you’re tired—so tired—of being made to feel small, but something in you finally snaps.

“No,” you say.

Your boyfriend blinks. “What?”

“No, I’m not done sulking, if that’s what you want to call it.” Your voice shakes at first, but only for a second. “I’m upset because you’re being cruel.”

His expression changes instantly—half surprise, half irritation. “Oh my god, I was joking.”

“You were mocking me.”

“Babe—”

“In front of your family,” you cut in, louder now. “About something you know is traumatic for me.”

The word hangs there – traumatic – and his sister’s face drains of colour as his mother sits up straighter. Your boyfriend—who clearly didn’t think you’d actually say it out loud—looks around like maybe if he pretends hard enough, no one will have heard.

“Can we not do this here?” he mutters.

“No, actually, I think here is fine, seeing as you didn’t have any issue doing it here five minutes ago.”

A tiny silence falls over the people nearest to you. It’s not enough to draw the whole pool’s attention, but enough that your boyfriend’s ears start to go pink.

“I wasn’t trying to upset you,” he says, but there’s still an edge of defensiveness there, as if your hurt is inconvenient to him. “I just thought if I pushed you a little—”

“You don’t get to push me about this.” Your hands are trembling, but now it’s anger rather than panic. “You know exactly what happened to my mum. You know why I hate deep water. And you still stood there and laughed at me for it because you wanted me to get in a pool.”

His mum closes her eyes for half a second, like she physically cannot bear to hear the rest.

Your boyfriend straightens, water sloshing around his waist. “Okay, that’s not—”

“It is,” you say. “And I’m not going to stand here and let you act like I’m overreacting because you decided to turn the worst thing that’s ever happened to me into a joke.”

That lands, and it lands hard enough that his whole posture changes. The irritation drains from his face, replaced by something more uncertain. His sister is looking at him like she doesn’t recognise him, and his mum has now taken her sunglasses off entirely, staring at him with open disappointment.

He notices their expressions, and suddenly, all that swagger collapses into something smaller, uglier, embarrassingly boyish.

“Okay,” he says, climbing out of the pool in a rush that sends water splattering over the tiles. “Okay, shit. I— I’m sorry.”

You just stare at him, and he rakes both hands through his wet hair, glancing quickly at his family, then back at you, his face flushing darker by the second.

“No, seriously, I’m sorry,” he says, voice dropping. “I was being a dick. I know I was. I just…” He gives a weird, awkward laugh that makes your stomach turn. “I thought if I made it less serious, maybe it would help? Which—yeah, obviously that sounds stupid now.”

It sounds stupid because it is stupid, you think to yourself, resisting the urge to show your thoughts on your face.

He’s standing there dripping pool water at your feet, visibly embarrassed, trying very hard to salvage the moment now that he’s realised everyone thinks he’s an arsehole.

“I shouldn’t have said any of that,” he adds quickly. “I know what happened. I know it’s serious. I’m sorry.”

The deck feels too hot under your sandals, your skin too tight. You can feel Chan still watching, can feel the weight of his disappointment before you’ve even made your decision because if you’re being honest with yourself, you don’t want a dramatic fight. You don’t want his family to spend the next week walking on eggshells around you, or looking at you with pity, or whispering about the argument over dinner. You don’t want to be the reason the holiday curdles on day one.

So, you swallow everything that still wants to scream and say, quietly, “Okay.”

Your boyfriend blinks. “Okay?”

“I accept your apology.”

Relief floods his face so fast it makes something in your chest go cold.

“Right,” he says, laughing once under his breath as if the worst has passed. “Right. Good. Thank you.”

Thank you, as though you’ve done him a favour.

He reaches for your hand, maybe to smooth it over, maybe to project normalcy in front of his family, and after a brief hesitation, you let him take it. His fingers are damp and cool from the pool. You hate how natural it probably looks from a distance—your silence, his hand in yours, the neat little ending to something that doesn’t feel ended at all.

His mum gives you a small, apologetic look from her lounger but says nothing, and when you glance up, across the bright expanse of water, noise, and bodies, Chan is still there by the lifeguard stand. His expression doesn’t change, but there’s something unmistakable in his face now—something shuttered and disappointed and maybe a little resigned, like he’d hoped for something different from you and hates himself for hoping in the first place.

Heat rushes to your face, the colour of shame, and you look away first.

That night, you can’t sleep. The room is too warm despite the air conditioning, and every time you close your eyes you’re back at the pool—your boyfriend’s voice, your own anger, Chan watching from across the water with that look on his face when you accepted the apology. Your boyfriend is asleep beside you, one arm flung over the pillow, breathing slow and even like nothing happened at all.

You stare at the ceiling for a long time before you carefully slip out of bed.

The resort is quiet at night in a way it never is during the day. Most of the families have retreated to their rooms, and the pathways are lit only by low golden lamps set into the stone walls, moths circling lazily around them. Somewhere in the distance you can hear the muted thump of music from the hotel bar, softened by sea air and palm trees.

You follow the path Chan mentioned, almost without thinking, past the tennis courts, then farther, past a row of shuttered beach kiosks, and down a narrow stone walkway half-hidden by overgrown plants until the resort opens up into a tiny cove tucked away from everything else. It’s beautiful - smaller than the main beach, hemmed in by dark rocks and silvered under moonlight, the sea stretching out in soft black ripples that catch the light every time they fold toward shore. The best part is that there are no children. There’s no shouting or splashing, just the hush of waves and the salt-heavy breeze lifting your hair from your neck.

You kick off your sandals and sit in the cool sand. For a while, you just watch the water, thinking. At night it looks nothing like a swimming pool - nothing like the lake - and yet your body still doesn’t know the difference. Even from here, dry and safely on shore, your chest tightens at the thought of going in. Of sinking. Of not being able to feel the bottom beneath your feet. Of the sudden drop into dark water and the cold panic of a child who didn’t understand why everyone was screaming.

You hug your knees to your chest and stare at the tide. Your mother loved the sea. That’s the part that always hurts the most—the unfairness of it. She loved water in all its forms. The beach, lakes, swimming on holiday. She used to drag you in with her, laughing when you clung to her shoulders, promising she wouldn’t let go.

And she hadn’t.

She’d held on as long as she could.

Your throat burns at the memory, eyes watering with unshed tears even years later.

“I’m sorry,” you whisper into the dark, not even sure what you’re apologising for anymore. For surviving. For being scared. For not trying harder. For the years you’ve spent avoiding every body of water deeper than your knees because the idea of learning how to trust it again feels like a betrayal somehow—as if being less afraid would mean losing the last proof of what happened.

A wave crawls up the shore and retreats again. You wipe your face with the heel of your hand and let yourself think the thought you’ve been refusing to think all evening:

Maybe you don’t want to be afraid forever.

Not because your boyfriend mocked you, not because anyone thinks you should be over it, and not because you owe anyone bravery. Because you’re tired. You’re tired of panic and shame and rearranging your life around the possibility of water, tired of feeling like twelve years old every time someone says "pool".

You look out at the black line of the horizon and think of Chan’s voice—steady, patient, unflinching.

You don’t owe anyone a performance.

Maybe not, but maybe you do owe yourself a chance.

By the time you make it back to the room later that night, your mind is made up.

The next morning, you linger by the pool until you spot him.

Chan is crouched near the shallow end, speaking to a little boy with bright orange armbands who seems determined to launch himself headfirst into the water without waiting for his dad. Chan says something that makes the kid giggle, taps the top of his floatie in warning, then straightens with a smile that fades the second he notices you standing there.  

Maybe not fades, just shifts.

His expression goes a little cautious, like he’s not sure whether you’re about to thank him, ignore him, or tell him to mind his own business forever. You almost do turn around, but then he walks over anyway, towel slung over one shoulder, whistle catching in the sun.

“Hey,” he says.

“Hi.”

For a second, neither of you says anything. The pool behind him is busy again—children shrieking, adults talking too loudly, someone dropping a plastic cup—but somehow the space right around the two of you feels strangely still.

Chan tips his head. “You okay?”

The question is simple, but there’s no judgement in it. No pointed reference to yesterday. Just quiet concern.

You nod. “Yeah. I mean—mostly.” You tuck a loose strand of hair behind your ear and immediately wish you had something better to do with your hands. “I wanted to ask you something, actually.”

His brows lift a fraction. “Sure.”

You glance at the water, shifting away slightly when some of it splashes up and over the edge, then back at him before you can lose your nerve.

“Would you…” Your throat tightens. “This is going to sound stupid.”

“It won’t.”

You give a tiny, humourless laugh. “You don’t know that yet.”

The corner of his mouth twitches. “Fair point.”

You draw in a breath. “Would you maybe teach me?”

He stills, not enough for anyone else to notice, but you see it. The tiny shift in his face, and the way his attention sharpens all at once.

“Teach you what?” he asks gently, though you think he already knows.

“How to…” You gesture vaguely at the pool, mortified. “Be in the water without completely losing my mind.”

Understanding settles over his features, and then, because the universe clearly enjoys humiliating you, he glances over his shoulder toward the lifeguard stand and says, “I work late tonight.”

The embarrassment is instant and brutal.

What were you thinking?

He’s working. He’s being polite. You’ve just cornered a resort employee and asked him to fix years of trauma because he was nice to you for ten minutes behind a wall.

“Oh my god, no, forget it,” you say quickly, stepping back. “Sorry. That was weird of me. I didn’t mean—”

You turn before he can see the heat flooding your face, but you only get one step because his fingers close lightly around your arm. It’s not enough to trap you, just enough to stop you from bolting.

“Hey,” Chan says.

You freeze, eyes wide, and his hand drops away almost immediately, like he only wanted to catch your attention. When you look back at him, his expression is somewhere between apologetic and amused.

“That’s not what I meant.”

You blink. “What?”

“I’m not saying no.” His voice softens. “I’m saying I work late, so if we do it, it’d have to be after hours when the pool’s closed.”

You stare at him, mouth slightly ajar in embarrassed understanding, and Chan’s mouth curves, small and warm when he adds, “Which, honestly, is probably better, isn’t it? The pool’s quiet at night - no kids jumping on you, no audience, no one getting in the way. Just you, me, and the shallow end. We can take it as slow as you need.”

Something in your chest loosens so suddenly it almost hurts.

“Oh.”

His smile deepens just a little, like he knows exactly how ridiculous that sounded coming out of your mouth.

“Yeah,” he says. “Oh.”

“I thought you were trying to let me down gently.”

“I gathered.”

You cover your face with one hand for half a second. “Please pretend that didn’t happen.”

“Absolutely not,” he says, far too pleased with himself.

A laugh escapes you before you can stop it, and the sound seems to soften him all over again.

“I’d be happy to help,” he says more quietly. “Really.”

You lower your hand slightly, just enough to see him from above your fingers, and your cheeks warm again. This time, it’s from the gentle, kind smile on his face as he watches you freak out.

“Only if you’re sure,” you say. “I don’t want to make your life harder just because I had some dramatic moment on a beach last night.”

His expression changes at that, the smile dropping into something more serious.

“This isn’t dramatic,” he says. “And it’s not making my life harder.”

He glances toward the water, noting the way you subconsciously edge away when it crests the pool's side, then back at you.

“If you want to try,” he says, “I’ll be there. We’ll start with sitting on the edge if that’s all you can do. Or standing in the shallow end for thirty seconds. Or just putting your feet in. Doesn’t matter. We go at your pace.”

Your eyes sting unexpectedly; you hadn't expected this level of understanding from a practical stranger. You nod once because you don’t trust your voice, but Chan notices anyway.

“So,” he says lightly, as if you haven’t just handed him something fragile and terrifying. “Meet me here at nine tonight? After my shift?”

“Okay.”

“Okay,” he echoes.

He takes a step backwards toward the lifeguard stand, then pauses, gaze flicking briefly to where your boyfriend is laughing with his dad near the far side of the pool. When he looks back at you, there’s a tiny crease between his brows.

“Does he know?” he asks.

You follow his glance and immediately understand what he’s asking.

“That I asked you for lessons?” you say.

Chan nods, and you hesitate before you decide on the truth. “No.”

He’s quiet for a moment, weighing something, then he just says, “All right.”

You didn’t get a lecture, nor did you get his opinion. Just that one steady answer, like whatever mess that might create is your choice to navigate.

“I’ll see you tonight, then,” he says.

As he walks back to his post, shoulders broad in the morning sun, whistle bouncing softly against his chest, you realise two things at once:

The first is that you’re terrified.

The second is that, for the first time in years, being terrified doesn’t feel exactly the same as wanting to run.

You spend the whole day trying not to think about nine o’clock.

It doesn’t work.

Everything seems to bend around it—the hours at breakfast, the heat-heavy afternoon by the pool, the strained politeness from your boyfriend that somehow feels worse than another argument would have. He acts as though yesterday has been neatly folded away and packed up, with all apologies and easy smiles and occasional squeezes to your knee, as if he’s owed forgiveness simply because he asked for it.

You give him nothing he can call rude, nothing he can use to start another scene, but your mind is elsewhere all day. It’s focused on nine o’clock, when the pool will be quiet. Nine o’clock, when you’ll have to stand in front of Chan and admit that despite all your brave words on the beach last night, you’re still terrified. Nine o’clock, when you’ll have to find out whether you can actually do this.

By the time the evening drags itself toward sunset, your stomach is in knots.

You tell your boyfriend you’re tired after dinner and want an early night. He doesn’t question it—just kisses your temple and says he might stay for another drink with his parents. The ease of it makes guilt prick at you, even though you’re not doing anything wrong. Even though all you’re planning to do is stand near a pool and try not to panic. Still, your pulse is racing by the time you slip out of the room in shorts and an oversized T-shirt, hair still damp from the shower you took mostly to give your hands something to do.

The resort is quiet again, soft with night and warm salt air. The pathways glow amber under the low lights, and by the time you reach the pool, the noise of the day is gone entirely. Like the rest of the resort, it looks different at night. Bigger, somehow. The floodlights underwater cast wavering ribbons of pale blue over the empty pool floor, and without the chaos of children, splashing, and voices, the silence makes every ripple seem louder. Deck chairs sit abandoned in neat rows. A maintenance cart is parked near the far fence. Somewhere in the distance, music drifts faintly from the bar, but here it’s mostly just the hum of insects and the occasional slap of water against tile.

You stop at the gate, suddenly unsure if you can do this after all.

“Thought you might bail.”

You turn. Chan is leaning against the fence a few feet away, arms folded loosely across his chest, dark hair still damp from what was probably a post-shift shower. He’s changed out of the red lifeguard shirt and into a faded grey T-shirt and black shorts, but there’s still a whistle hanging from his fingers, spinning idly on its cord.

Your heart gives one stupid, disloyal kick that you choose to ignore.

“I nearly did,” you admit.

His mouth curves. “Yeah?”

“Three times on the walk here.”

“That all?”

You huff out a laugh, more nerves than amusement, and his expression softens immediately.

“Hey,” he says, pushing off the fence. “You came. That’s enough for tonight already.”

The words settle something in you, if only by a fraction.

Chan unlatches the gate and holds it open for you. “No pressure, okay? We’re not trying to achieve anything miraculous. We’re just seeing what feels manageable.”

You nod, though your throat is already tight with panic.

He seems to notice, eyeing the pool for a second before asking, “You want to sit first?”

“Probably.”

“Good call.”

He leads you to the shallow end, where the steps slope gently into the water rather than drop straight in. There are two towels folded on the ground nearby and a pair of resort pool floats stacked against the wall, like he’d prepared for several possibilities and didn’t want to overwhelm you by mentioning any of them.

That realisation does something strange to your chest.

Chan sits on the edge first, feet in the water, then pats the tile beside him. “Come here.”

You lower yourself down carefully, close enough that your shoulders almost brush but not quite. The water gleams below you, soft and blue and deceptively calm, and your stomach flips. Chan doesn’t say anything for a minute. He just lets you look in silence.

“Tell me what’s happening in your head,” he says eventually.

You let out a slow breath through your nose. “That feels like a dangerous question.”

“Mm. Lucky for you, I’m very qualified in dangerous poolside conversations.”

You glance at him, and he’s smiling a little, but not enough to make it feel like a joke at your expense. Just enough to take the edge off. You look back at the water.

“It’s stupid,” you murmur. “I know it’s a pool. I know I can stand up. I know you’re here. I know nothing bad is going to happen.”

“But your body doesn’t care what you know.”

You nod.

He bumps his shoulder lightly against yours. “Then we listen to your body, not the part of your brain trying to bully it into behaving.”

Your eyes sting unexpectedly, and you stare harder at the water so he won’t see.

“My chest feels tight,” you say after a moment. “And my hands are sweaty. And I keep thinking if I put my feet in, I’m going to panic and make an idiot of myself.”

“You’re allowed to panic.”

You frown. “That doesn’t sound very encouraging.”

“It’s not meant to be encouraging.” He turns slightly toward you, one knee drawn up onto the tile, voice gentle and matter-of-fact. “It’s meant to take the pressure off. If you panic, you panic. Nothing terrible happens because you panic. We stop, we breathe, we try again another day if you want to. That’s it.”

It sounds so simple when he says it. Not easy, but simple. Maybe even manageable… eventually.

You swallow. “Okay.”

“Okay.” He nods toward your legs. “First task: no water yet. Just move closer to the edge.”

You glance at him. “That’s the task?”

“That’s the task.”

A laugh slips out before you can stop it. “You’re setting the bar very low.”

“I’m a generous teacher.”

You shift carefully until your thighs are almost flush with the edge, calves hovering just over the surface. The water glows under your feet, close enough now that you can feel the coolness rising off it. Your pulse jumps, heart leaping into your throat, and Chan notices your breathing change instantly.

“Look at me.”

You do, eyes fixing determinedly on his face.

“Good,” he says softly. “Don’t look at the water for a second. Just me.”

There’s something dangerously easy about that - about the steadiness of his face in the dim pool lights, the calm certainty in his expression, the way he says things like he’s already decided he can hold this together for both of you if he has to.

“Take a breath in,” he says quietly.

You do.

“And out.”

Again.

He keeps talking you through it until your shoulders start to loosen, until the hard thud of your heartbeat eases enough that you can hear the crickets again, the distant hush of the sea beyond the resort walls.

“Better?” he asks.

“A bit.”

“That’s enough.” His gaze flicks down toward the water and back. “Want to try dipping your toes in?”

You look at the pool like it’s personally offended you. “No.”

His mouth twitches. “Fair.”

You hug your arms around yourself. “I hate that I’m like this.”

Chan’s expression changes immediately. “Well… Don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

“Talk about yourself like that.”

The firmness of it catches you off guard. You glance at him, and he’s already looking back at you with that same quiet intensity he had behind the showers yesterday.

“You’re not difficult for being scared,” he says. “You’re not weak, or pathetic, or ridiculous, or whatever else you’ve been telling yourself.” His jaw tightens slightly. “And if someone else has been telling you that, they’re wrong.”

The silence that follows feels strangely fragile, strangely healing to the week you’re having.

You drop your eyes to your hands. “You make it sound very simple.”

“It isn’t simple.” His voice softens again. “It’s just true.”

Something in your chest twists painfully, but before you can say anything, he nudges your ankle lightly with his knuckles. “Come on. Toes.”

You let out a breath that’s half laugh, half groan. “You’re bossy.”

“I’m right, though.”

“That’s debatable.”

“Mm. Feet in the water.”

You glare at him weakly, but he only lifts his brows and waits. So, you brace your hands on the warm tile, inch your hips a little closer to the edge, and lower one foot. The second your toes break the surface, your whole body locks. The water is cool – not freezing or shocking - just cool enough to make your skin tighten. Your breath catches anyway, a hard, involuntary jerk in your chest, and you snatch your foot back so quickly that droplets scatter across the tiles.

Chan doesn’t react except to say, very calmly, “Okay.”

“I can’t.”

“Yes, you can.”

“No, I literally just proved that I can’t.”

He smiles, infuriatingly patient. “You touched the water.”

“For half a second.”

“That still counts.”

You stare at him, but he just stares back, entirely unbothered.

“Again,” he says.

You make a face. “You’re enjoying this.”

“A little.”

“Chan.”

“One foot. Three seconds this time.”

You want to tell him no. You want to get up and walk away and tell yourself you tried, which is more than anyone could have expected, and go back to your room and hide under the covers with your pride in tatters. Instead, you lower your foot again, counting the seconds, pulse pounding in your throat. When you reach three, you yank it back up and suck in a breath so sharp it almost hurts.

“There,” Chan says immediately, before you can spiral. “Three seconds. You’re still alive. Very inconvenient for your dramatic exit plan.”

A startled laugh escapes you. It’s ridiculous, really, how much easier it is not to fall apart when he says things like that—when he lets you keep your dignity and your fear at the same time.

“Again?” he asks.

You close your eyes. “You’re not going to stop asking, are you?”

“Nope.”

“You’re awful.”

“I’ve heard worse.”

This time, when you put your foot in, you leave it. Your muscles stay tense, but the panic doesn’t spike quite as hard. The cool water laps around your toes and the ball of your foot, harmless and gentle and entirely unlike the memory your body keeps trying to drag over it.

“Good,” Chan murmurs. “That’s good.”

You don’t know why the praise makes your face warm, but it does. It also gives you the confidence to slowly and carefully lower your other foot in, too. The pool ripples around your ankles, and your hands clench against the tile, knuckles turning white. Your breathing is shallow again, but both feet are in the water now. You haven’t bolted, and Chan is sitting close enough that if you turned your head even slightly, your shoulder would press into his.

“You okay?” he asks.

“No.”

His laugh is quiet and fond. “Honest. I like it.”

“I feel like I might throw up.”

“Also useful information.”

You shoot him a look, and he grins outright this time, all warmth and teeth and moonlit amusement, before softening again when he sees you shiver.

“Here,” he says.

Before you can ask what he means, his hand closes gently around your wrist. It’s not tight or sudden, just enough to make sure you’re with him before he moves your hand from the tile to his forearm instead. Your breath catches. His skin is warm from the night air, solid under your fingers, and the gesture is so matter-of-fact—so practical, really—that it takes your brain a second to catch up to the fact that you’re touching him.

“If you need to anchor yourself, use me,” he says quietly. “Not hard enough to bruise, but hard enough that you feel something real.”

You swallow. “Okay.”

His gaze flicks over your face, checking, before he nods toward the water. “Can you keep your feet there for ten seconds?”

You tighten your fingers around his forearm and nod.

“Good girl,” he says absentmindedly, like the words are only encouragement, only instinct, only a soft reward for cooperation. The effect is catastrophic, though. Heat rushes up your throat so fast it almost knocks the air from your lungs, and Chan realises what he’s said a second too late.

His eyes widen, just slightly. “Sorry.”

You stare fixedly at the opposite side of the pool. “It’s fine.”

His mouth twitches like he’s trying not to smile. “Wasn’t meant weirdly.”

“That’s making it worse.”

That does it—he laughs, quiet and helpless, and the sound cracks the tension just enough that you laugh too, horrified and breathless and still gripping his arm like it’s the only stable thing in the world.

“Ten seconds,” he says, recovering.

You somehow make it to twelve, and by the end of the hour, you’re still only on the steps. But your feet are in, then your ankles. Then, after nearly ten minutes of talking and breathing, and one brief, humiliating wobble that has you clutching both his arm and his shoulder while he steadies you with warm hands at your elbows, you manage to sit on the second step, the water reaching just below your knees.

It feels impossible, until slowly, it doesn’t. It’s still not easy, but it feels more possible than an hour ago.

You sit there, trembling from the effort of it, staring down at your own legs beneath the wavering waterline as if they belong to someone else.

“I’m in,” you whisper.

Chan, who is crouched in the water beside you with his shorts soaked to mid-thigh because at some point he stepped in without making a big deal of it, looks up with a grin so bright it almost undoes you.

“You are.”

You laugh shakily, somewhere between delighted and on the verge of tears. “I’m actually in.”

“You’re doing really well.”

You scrub at your face with your free hand before any tears can escape. “Don’t be nice to me right now. I’m trying very hard not to have a breakdown.”

“Who says I’m being nice?” he asks. “I’m just being accurate.”

You make a strangled sound that might be a laugh.

The water shifts around your calves as you adjust your footing on the step. You’re still scared—your pulse hasn’t dropped below mildly alarming all night—but it’s no longer the kind of fear that owns you completely. It sits beside something else now. Pride, maybe. Relief. The dizzy disbelief of discovering you can survive something you were certain would destroy you.

Chan leans his forearms on the edge of the step beside you, close enough that your shoulders nearly touch again.

“Same time tomorrow?” he asks lightly.

You turn to look at him. His hair has fallen into his eyes, damp from where he’s been splashed, and there’s a smear of water along one cheek catching the pool light. He looks tired in the soft, late-night way people do after long shifts and too much heat, but his attention is still fixed entirely on you, patient and warm and steady as ever.

Your chest does something inconvenient once again.

“Tomorrow?” you echo.

“If you want.” He lifts one shoulder. “No pressure. But you’ve done the hardest part now.”

“I have not.”

“You came back.”

The simple certainty of it hits harder than it should, and you look down at the water before he can see too much on your face.

“Yeah,” you say quietly. “I did.”

For a moment neither of you moves. The night air wraps warm around your damp skin, the water lapping softly against the step. Somewhere beyond the fence, a burst of laughter drifts from the hotel bar and fades again, leaving only the hush of the pool and the strange, suspended feeling of being tucked outside the rest of the world.

Chan shifts first, pushing to his feet and offering you his hand.

“Come on,” he says softly. “Let’s get you out before your legs stop working, and I have to explain to resort management why I drowned a guest in six inches of water.”

You laugh and take his hand. His fingers close around yours—warm, firm, callused in a way that makes your pulse stumble for reasons that have absolutely nothing to do with fear—and he steadies you as you stand. The water slides off your skin as you step onto the tile, leaving your legs cold and goose-bumped in the night air. For a second, you don’t let go, and neither does he. It lasts only a heartbeat before Chan clears his throat and releases your hand, bending to grab a towel from the ground. He holds it out to you without comment, but there’s a faint pinkness high on his cheekbones that wasn’t there before.

“Thanks,” you murmur.

“Mm.”

You dry your legs slowly, trying very hard not to think about his hand or the way he’d said "good girl" like it meant nothing, while Chan gathers the rest of his things with suspicious focus. When you’re done, he walks you back to the gate. You pause there, towel still clutched in your hands.

“I really did think you were going to say no this morning,” you admit.

Chan huffs a laugh. “I know.”

“That was humiliating.”

“It was a little funny.”

You narrow your eyes. “You’re the worst.”

“Yet here you are, voluntarily scheduling more time with me.”

You open your mouth, then close it again, because annoyingly, he has a point.

His smile softens at whatever expression crosses your face. “Get some sleep,” he says. “Your body’s going to feel all of this tomorrow.”

“Oh, good. Something to look forward to.”

“Absolutely.”

You hesitate. “Chan?”

“Yeah?”

The words catch in your throat for a second, before you clear it, murmuring, “Thank you. For… not making me feel stupid.”

Something shifts in his expression—something quieter than teasing, more careful.

“You never were,” he says.

Your chest aches, but before you can embarrass yourself by reacting too visibly, you nod and step back through the gate, asking, “I’ll see you tomorrow?”

He leans one arm against the fence, looking at you through the bars with a smile that’s small and tired and unfairly lovely.

“Tomorrow,” he agrees.

And as you walk back through the sleeping resort with damp hair at your neck and chlorine still clinging faintly to your skin, you realise you’re smiling. It’s not because you aren’t scared anymore or because everything is suddenly fixed. It’s because for the first time in years, the water doesn’t feel like something that only takes from you.

Tonight, it gave something back.

The next day, everything hurts, and not in the dramatic sense. It’s more in that faintly humiliating way that reminds you just how tense your body had been the night before. Your calves ache. Your shoulders ache. Even your hands ache from how hard you’d clung to the pool edge, to Chan’s arm, to anything that felt solid enough to trust.

You catch yourself smiling about it over breakfast and immediately wipe the expression off your face when your boyfriend looks up. He’s in an irritatingly good mood. Maybe because yesterday at the pool ended without a proper fight, or maybe because he thinks his apology fixed everything. Maybe it’s because he has no idea that while he was asleep, you were sitting on the second step of the resort pool with water up to your knees and Chan’s hand warm around your wrist, learning how to breathe through panic.

Whatever the reason, he’s all easy affection that morning—nudging your foot under the table, stealing fruit from your plate, draping an arm around the back of your chair while he talks to his dad. The version of him other people like. The version that makes you feel slightly insane for being hurt at all. But now that you’ve seen the other version—that sharp, mocking cruelty he slips into when you’re vulnerable—it’s impossible to fully relax into this one.

The difference is there all day in ways you can’t stop noticing.

Your boyfriend reaches for you because he assumes you’ll meet him halfway, whereas Chan reached for you because he could see you were struggling. Your boyfriend teases you when you’re uncomfortable and calls it helping, but Chan lowers his voice, slows his movements, and watches your face as if your fear is something to handle carefully rather than something to laugh at. Your boyfriend touches you as if affection is automatic, casual, and expected whilst Chan touches you like he’s asking a question every time, even when he doesn’t say a word.

By the time the sun starts to set, you feel raw from the comparison and guilty for even noticing the differences. And worse yet, guilty for looking forward to nine o’clock with the kind of nervous anticipation you should not be feeling for another man.

Dinner drags. Your boyfriend’s mum asks you if you slept better, and there’s enough kindness in the question that it almost makes you feel worse. Your boyfriend squeezes your thigh under the table while he tells some story about a man at the beach bar spilling beer down himself, and everyone laughs, and you smile when you’re supposed to, and all the while the clock above the restaurant entrance keeps inching forward.

At eight-forty, you tell them you’re exhausted and heading up.

Your boyfriend catches your wrist before you can stand. “You okay?”

The concern in his voice is just convincing enough to make you hesitate, your guilt increasing slightly.

“Yeah,” you say. “Just tired.”

He searches your face for a second before he lets go. “Come find me if you can’t sleep?”

You nod because it’s easier than doing anything else, mind already elsewhere.

Chan is already poolside when you arrive. Tonight he’s in a black sleeveless top and dark swim shorts, one hand resting on the metal handrail at the shallow end as he tests the water with his foot. He glances up at the sound of the gate and his whole face changes when he sees you— a quiet easing of his shoulders, a warmth settling into his expression that makes your stomach flip.

“Hey.”

“Hi.”

His eyes drop briefly to the oversized T-shirt hanging off one shoulder, then to the towel in your arms, then back to your face. “You came back.”

You huff a laugh. “You say that like you were taking bets.”

“I was.” He reaches down to pick something up from the ground. “Won twenty euros off myself.”

You snort, and the grin he gives you in return is soft and immediate, there and gone in a blink before he gestures with the thing in his hand.

A pool noodle.

You stop walking. “No.”

Chan looks down at it, then back at you. “Yes.”

“No.”

He moves until he’s in front of you. “It’s not even an embarrassing one. It’s blue.”

“That doesn’t make it better.”

“It kind of does.”

You stare at him, scandalised, but he just lifts his brows and twirls the noodle once like this is an entirely reasonable way to greet someone you are trying to coax through years of trauma.

“Be nice,” he says. “I’m a professional.”

“You are a lifeguard bullying me with flotation devices.”

“Exactly. Professional.”

The laugh that escapes you loosens something in your chest before you’ve even reached the edge. He notices, his expression softening as he falls into step beside you.

“How’re you feeling?” he asks. “Body okay after last night?”

The question catches you off guard a little. “You mean emotionally or physically?”

“Dealer’s choice.”

You think about it. “Physically, I think I pulled a muscle in my hand from grabbing you like you were a rescue buoy.”

Chan’s mouth twitches. “That’s fair.”

“And emotionally…” You glance toward the water, then away again. “I’ve been trying not to think about this all day.”

“Mm.” He doesn’t sound surprised. “Scale of one to ten?”

“Right now?”

“Right now.”

“Six,” you say. “Maybe seven.”

“Okay.” He nods once, as if six or seven is perfectly workable. “That’s fine.”

The ease of it makes your chest tighten unexpectedly, brain drawing yet another comparison before you can stop it. Because your boyfriend would have laughed at a number like that. Would have told you that you were psyching yourself out, that you needed to stop overthinking and just get in. He would have turned your fear into a challenge, something to conquer quickly or be embarrassed by. Chan just takes the number and builds around it.

“Same rules as yesterday,” he says as you reach the shallow end. “Nothing heroic. We stop whenever you need. If all we do tonight is sit on the step and swear at me for an hour, I’ll count it as quality time.”

You glance at him. “Quality time?”

His mouth curves. “Poor phrasing.”

You smile despite yourself. He sets the noodle aside and crouches to unroll two towels, one close to the steps and one a little farther back.

“You thought ahead again,” you say quietly.

Chan glances up. “I like options.”

No fuss, no big deal made of it, but you can see the evidence anyway—he’d brought extra towels, a bottle of water, the stupid noodle, all arranged as though he’d been thinking about what might help you long before you got here. Your throat goes tight at his consideration.

“Hey,” he says, catching your expression. “Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Look at me like I’ve just solved world peace because I remembered towels.”

A laugh slips out of you, damp around the edges. “Sorry.”

“Don’t apologise either. Annoying habit.”

He says it lightly, but it still lands somewhere deep. You shake your head slightly as you lower yourself to sit on the edge, and he drops down beside you with easy familiarity, close enough that your thighs nearly touch. The pool glows softly beneath your feet, still and blue and deceptively harmless.

Your stomach knots, your breath coming quicker than it had moments ago. Chan notices the shift in your breathing almost immediately.

“Okay,” he says softly. “Look at me.”

You do.

“Different plan tonight.” He angles his body toward you, forearm braced over one bent knee. “We’re not just doing feet and knees. I want to get you standing in the shallow end.” Every muscle in your body locks in panic, and your face must give you away because he adds, quickly, “Not straight away. Not without warning. And not without me right there.”

You stare at him. “Standing.”

“In water that barely comes above your thighs.”

“That’s still standing.”

“Very observant.”

“Chan.”

He grins, but it’s gentler than teasing. “I know. We’ll build to it.”

You look back at the water. The steps are wide and shallow, descending in soft blue stripes until the floor levels out. You made it to the second step last night. Below that, the third step. Then the flat, shallow end.

It doesn’t look far, but that’s almost the worst part. The most humiliating.

“I don’t know if I can.”

“You can.” His voice is calm and certain. “The question is whether tonight is the night you want to try.”

There’s no challenge in it, no pressure. Just a question, placed carefully in your hands. You take a breath, and then another, forcing yourself into some semblance of calm. You were doing this for your mum, but also to prove something to yourself.

“…Okay.”

“Okay,” he echoes.

You ease your feet into the water, and this time the cold barely makes you flinch. Chan watches your face rather than the pool, tracking every reaction with that same quiet focus that made you trust him last night.

“Good,” he murmurs. “That was easier.”

“A little.”

“A little counts.”

He moves first, sliding into the pool with a soft splash and turning to face you from the second step, water soaking the hem of his top and darkening it where it clings to his chest. He braces one hand on the edge beside your hip and offers you the other.

“Come here.”

Your eyes drop to his hand, cataloguing the warm skin, long fingers, palm up and waiting. Something inside you twists, but you ignore it as you place your hand in his. His fingers close carefully, not too tight, just enough to anchor you, and he steps back one pace so you can lower yourself onto the second step like you did last night. Water laps around your knees, then your thighs. Your pulse jumps, but not enough to tip you over the edge.

Chan’s thumb’s stroking once over the side of your hand before he seems to realise he’s doing it, automatically reacting to the changes in your body’s posture. He stops his thumb’s path immediately, but your breath catches anyway.

“Sorry,” he says, voice low.

“It’s okay.”

The words come out too fast. He glances up at your face, and for one strange second the air between you feels warmer than the night should allow, but then he clears his throat and shifts into something more practical.

“Right. Next part.” He turns and braces both hands under your elbows. “I’m going to help you stand. You’re not doing it alone.”

Your stomach drops. You look down at his hands where they wrap around your arms—solid, warm, impossibly steady. Even through the thin cotton of your T-shirt, you can feel the heat of his palms.

“Chan…”

“I know.” His voice softens. “I’ve got you.”

Three words – simple, quiet, and certain.

Another difference supplied by your brain: Your boyfriend says things like relax, stop overthinking, don’t be dramatic. Chan says I’ve got you.

Somehow it makes all the difference.

“Okay,” you whisper.

“Good girl.”

The words slip out so naturally that you see the moment he realises. His eyes widen a fraction; yours do too.

Chan exhales sharply through his nose. “I need to stop saying that.”

“Yes,” you say faintly.

He bites back a smile. “Probably.”

You’re blushing so hard you can feel it in your ears, which is honestly almost useful because it distracts you from the panic for half a second.

“Ready?” he asks.

No. You nod anyway.

“On three. One… two… three.”

He doesn’t pull you up so much as guide you through it, his hands firm at your elbows, body close enough that if you lose balance you’ll go straight into him instead of the water. You push to your feet on shaking legs, water sliding down your thighs as you rise from the step to the shallow floor.

The second you’re fully upright, your body goes rigid. Your hands fly to his arms, and Chan catches you immediately, one hand leaving your elbow to settle at your waist while the other stays braced around your forearm.

“Breathe,” he says.

“I hate this, I hate this, I hate this—”

“I know.”

“I really hate this.”

“I know.”

The water only comes to the top of your thighs. You can feel the pool floor solid under both feet. Chan is right in front of you, close enough that your knuckles are digging into his biceps, close enough that if you lean forward even a little, your forehead would hit his collarbone. None of it matters to the panic trying to claw its way up your throat.

Your breathing goes sharp and ragged, your vision narrowing, but you still feel the moment Chan’s hand tightens very slightly at your waist—not restraining, just grounding.

“Look at me.”

You can’t, eyes fixed on the water lapping at your thighs, mind racing with ‘what ifs’.

“Hey.” His voice drops, gentler. “Look at me.”

Somehow, you do. The world narrows to his face. Dark eyes steady on yours, wet hair curling at his forehead, mouth set in soft concentration.

“Good,” he murmurs. “There you are.”

Your fingers tighten on his arms, unable to speak through the panic that has you in a chokehold.

“Can you feel the floor?”

You nod jerkily.

“Good. Push your feet into it for me.”

You try, and your legs tremble so hard you’re sure he can feel it.

“That’s it.” His thumb presses once into your side through your shirt, grounding. “You’re safe.”

You shake your head, tears springing to your eyes before you can stop them, barely choking out, “It doesn’t feel like it.”

“I know.” He doesn’t hesitate. “But you are.”

The tears spill over. It’s mortifying, really, how hot and immediate and impossible to hide they are.

“I’m sorry,” you choke out.

Chan’s whole expression softens at your words, at the sight of tears running down your face.

“No,” he says quietly. “None of that.”

He shifts closer without thinking, one hand sliding more securely around your waist while the other comes up to cradle the back of your head for a second—not forcing, just resting there, his palm warm against your hair like he’s shielding you from the world.

“Breathe with me,” he says.

Your boyfriend gets uncomfortable when you cry. He goes stiff, impatient, embarrassed. Tells you not to or asks what’s wrong in a tone that makes it clear he wishes you’d stop before anyone notices.

Chan doesn’t flinch. He doesn’t pull away or make your tears feel ugly. He just keeps one hand steady at your waist and the other warm at the back of your head and breathes in slowly until your body starts to follow.

“In,” he murmurs.

You drag in a shaky breath.

“Good. Hold it.”

You do.

“And out.”

Again, and again.

He stays with you through every awful, splintering second of it, voice low and even, until the panic ebbs from something catastrophic to something survivable. Your grip on his arms loosens by degrees as your breathing steadies. The tears stop falling, though your face is still damp and your chest still aches with the effort of holding yourself together.

“There you go,” Chan says softly.

You sniff, humiliated. “This is so embarrassing.”

“It isn’t.”

“I’m crying on you in a resort pool.”

“Would it help if I cried too?”

A startled laugh escapes you, wet and broken and ridiculous. Chan smiles immediately, relief flickering over his face like he’s been waiting for exactly that sound.

“See?” he murmurs. “Much better.”

You become abruptly aware that one of your hands has slid from his bicep to the front of his shirt, clutching a fistful of damp fabric right over his ribs. His other hand is still on your waist, fingers spread wide and warm through the cling of your soaked T-shirt. You’re even more aware that you’re standing very, very close to him. Too close, probably. Close enough that your next breath brushes the hollow of his throat. Heat floods your face at the proximity, and Chan seems to realise it at the same moment. His hand at the back of your head drops first, then the one at your waist loosens a fraction, not leaving, just giving you room to decide what you want.

“Still okay?” he asks quietly.

You should step back. Instead, you nod, eyes fixed on the hollow of his throat. You can feel his gaze linger on your face for one dangerous second before he forces his attention downward, toward your legs in the water.

“Right,” he says, voice a little rougher than before. “You’re standing. That’s huge.”

You look down too, almost startled to find your body still upright in the pool.

“I’m standing,” you echo.

“Mm.”

“And I didn’t die.”

“Proud of you for that, actually. Makes my job easier.”

You laugh, wiping clumsily at your cheeks with the back of your hand.

Chan catches your wrist before you can smear chlorinated tears all over your face. “Here.”

He lets go of your waist long enough to swipe a towel from the edge and dab carefully under one of your eyes, then the other. The gesture is so unexpectedly gentle it nearly undoes you all over again.

“You don’t have to do that,” you mumble.

“I know.”

“But you are.”

“Also true.”

His thumb brushes once beneath your eye as he lowers the towel, catching the last dampness at the corner. He pauses there, just for a heartbeat, and your breath snags, but then he’s stepping back. It’s just enough for you to feel the loss of his warmth immediately.

It shouldn’t bother you as much as it does.

“Okay,” he says, all business again in a way that feels suspiciously deliberate. “New challenge.”

You blink. “There’s more?”

“You’re doing great. I’m capitalising on it.”

“That sounds evil.”

“It’s motivational.”

He reaches for the abandoned pool noodle and holds it out to you.

You stare at it, refusing to reach for it on principle. “I hate that thing.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“I absolutely do.”

He grins. “Hold it under your arms.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“Chan—”

He waits you out, like he knows you’ll give in if he stares at you long enough. He’s right, anyway, because you’re glaring as not even a minute later, you’re reaching out to take the noodle. He’s smiling as he helps position it behind your back and under your arms, his fingers brushing your sides as he adjusts it. The touch is brief, practical, but your whole body still goes hyperaware.

“There,” he says, stepping in close again. “Now all I want is one foot off the floor.”

You look at him like he’s insane. “One foot?”

“One.”

“That feels like a gateway drug to drowning.”

“It’s literally not possible to drown in water up to your thighs while I’m standing right here.”

You glance pointedly at the noodle. “Feels patronising.”

“It’s adorable, actually.”

“I’m leaving.”

“You’re not leaving.”

He’s smiling when he says it, but his hands settle lightly at your waist anyway, thumbs resting just above the line where your soaked T-shirt clings to your hips. He’s not holding you in place. He’s just there - warm and steady and impossible not to notice.

Your pulse jumps. “Chan.”

“Mm?”

“Your hands.”

He glances down as if he’s only just realised. “Would you prefer I moved them?”

The answer should be yes, and it should be immediate. Instead, you say, far too quietly, “No. I think it’s helping.”

Something flickers across his face, gone too quickly to name.

“Okay,” he says just as quietly, keeping them there.

“Lift your right foot,” he says after a moment.

You do, just an inch off the pool floor, and immediately lurch. Chan catches you before the panic can spike, hands firming at your waist, body stepping closer until the noodle presses awkwardly between you and his chest.

“There,” he murmurs. “I’ve got you.”

Your fingers clutch at his shoulders on instinct. “You really do say that a lot.”

“Because it’s true.”

You don’t know what to do with the way that lands.

“Again,” he says.

This time, you lift your foot and hold it for 2 seconds. Then three. Then, after several increasingly incredulous attempts, you manage five full seconds balancing with the noodle under your arms and Chan’s hands steady at your waist, his body close enough to catch every wobble before it turns into panic.

By the time he coaxes you into lifting both feet—just for a breath, just enough for the noodle to take your weight while he keeps one arm locked around your middle—you’re shaking with effort and fear and adrenaline.

“I can’t, I can’t—”

“You can. It’s one second. I’ve got you.”

His forearm tightens around your waist as both your feet leave the floor for the briefest moment. The world tilts as water presses higher against your body. Your stomach flips, your hands clutching at him so hard your nails must be digging through his shirt. But then your feet are touching down again.

You gasp, and Chan’s face breaks into a grin so bright it steals the breath you were trying to recover.

“You floated.”

“I did not.”

“You absolutely did.”

“For one second!”

“That is still floating.”

You stare at him, chest heaving. Then, helplessly, you start to laugh. The sound comes out half-hysterical, half-disbelieving, but it’s real. Chan laughs too, his hands still on your waist, your fingers still hooked around his shoulders, both of you standing too close in the softly lit shallow end while the water ripples around your thighs.

“I hate you,” you tell him breathlessly.

“No, you don’t.”

“No,” you admit, still laughing, “I really don’t.”

The words slip out before you can stop them, and silence falls. Not total silence—the pool still hums softly around you, water licking at the tile, insects singing in the hedges—but the kind of silence that feels suddenly full. Chan stills, his grin fading. It doesn’t fade into anything bad, just into something smaller and more careful. His eyes search your face for a second too long.

You hear what you said, and heat floods every inch of you.

“I didn’t mean— not like— I mean obviously I don’t hate you, but—”

“I know,” he says quickly, though he sounds a little wrecked around the edges himself.

“Right.”

“Right.”

Neither of you moves. His hands are still on your waist, your hands are still on his shoulders, and for one impossible second, all you can think about is how easy it would be to close the tiny space left between you.

Chan seems to think it, too.

You see it in the flick of his gaze to your mouth. The sudden tension in his jaw. The way his fingers flex once, involuntarily, against your sides before he steps back so abruptly the water splashes around his knees.

“Okay,” he says, a little too briskly. “I think that’s enough for tonight.”

You blink, disoriented. “Oh.”

Not because you disagree. Your legs are trembling, and your nerves are frayed raw. You probably couldn’t do another minute even if you wanted to. Something in your chest sinks at his words, though, and Chan seems to hear it in your voice because his expression softens instantly.

“Not because you did anything wrong,” he says, gentler now. “You did really well. Better than really well. But you’re exhausted.”

He’s right. Of course he’s right.

You nod and try to smile. “Yeah. Okay.”

The distance between you feels strange now as he helps you back toward the steps. Strange and too noticeable. He keeps a hand at your elbow, then your back as you climb out, steady and careful as always, but there’s a new restraint in him that wasn’t there before—as though he’s suddenly very aware of every place he touches you.

It makes you ache in ways you do not want to examine.

Once you’re sitting on the edge wrapped in a towel, Chan hauls himself out beside you, water streaming from his clothes. He pushes his wet hair back from his forehead and exhales.

“Proud of you,” he says quietly.

The simple sincerity of it nearly hurts. Your boyfriend says nice things when he wants something. When he’s smoothing something over. When he needs you to stop being upset. Chan says them like they’re facts.

“Thank you,” you murmur.

He glances over. “You don’t have to thank me every five minutes, you know.”

“I know. But I want to.”

His mouth twitches. “Annoying.”

You smile into your towel.

For a minute, you just sit there shoulder to shoulder, the silence between you softer now, less charged than it was in the water but no less intimate for it. Your damp arm brushes his every now and then, and each accidental touch feels louder than it should. Finally, Chan tips his head back to look at the stars above the pool enclosure.

“Can I ask you something?”

You hesitate. “Depends on what it is.”

He turns to look at you. “Why are you doing this?”

The question lands somewhere tender. You know what he means. Not why are you in the pool tonight, exactly, but why now. Why him. Why after years of refusing even the shallow end, you’ve suddenly decided to try.

You stare at your wrung-out towel for a long moment, trying to find the right words, before settling on, “I’m tired of being scared. When I came to the cove the other night, I kept thinking about my mum.” Chan says nothing, just waits. “She used to love swimming,” you continue quietly. “Loved the sea, loved lakes, all of it. She was always trying to get me into the water with her.” Your throat tightens. “And after she died trying to save me from the one thing she loved so much, I think I started treating being afraid like… I don’t know. Like it was proof that it mattered. Proof that I hadn’t forgotten what happened.”

The words sound childish out loud - shameful, almost - but Chan doesn’t laugh. He doesn’t tell you it’s irrational, doesn’t rush to fix it. He just turns a little more toward you, forearm resting against the tile behind your back, and listens like every word matters.

“I know that doesn’t make sense,” you say.

“It makes perfect sense.”

You look at him. His face is open in the low light, eyes steady and unbearably kind.

“Trauma isn’t logical,” he says. “Half the time healing feels like betraying it. Like if you let yourself get better, you’re saying it wasn’t that bad, or that the person you lost matters less now.”

Your chest squeezes because, finally, someone understands.

“Yes,” you whisper. “Exactly.”

Chan nods once, slow. “But that’s not what it is.”

“No?”

“No.” His voice is quiet, certain. “Learning to be okay in water doesn’t erase your mum. It doesn’t cheapen what happened. It just means the worst day of your life doesn’t get to own every day after it.”

The tears come back so suddenly you laugh under your breath at your own hopelessness, but Chan doesn’t tease this time. He just takes the towel from your hands, folds it over once, and presses it gently into your lap before opening his arms a little. The gesture is so small, so careful, that it takes you a second to understand what he’s offering.

Your breath catches as soon as your brain catches up.

“You don’t have to,” he says softly. “Only if you want to.”

Your boyfriend hates when you cry. He’ll pat your shoulder awkwardly, or kiss your forehead, or tell you it’s okay in a tone that clearly means please stop. Comfort from him always comes with a trace of impatience, as though your feelings are a problem to solve quickly before they become inconvenient. Chan just waits - no pressure, no embarrassment, no expectation.

You move before you can overthink it. He catches you easily, one arm wrapping around your shoulders, the other around your waist, pulling you carefully into his chest as if he’s done it a hundred times and still knows enough to be gentle. The damp cotton of his shirt is cool against your cheek. Under it, he’s all solid warmth and steady breathing and the slow, grounding thud of his heartbeat.

And the second he tightens his arms around you, something in you gives way. A sort of soft, exhausted sort of breaking open as you let your forehead rest against his shoulder and breathe. Chan’s hand slides up your back in long, slow strokes.

“That’s it,” he murmurs into your hair. “You’re okay.”

Your fingers curl in the fabric at his side. No one has held you through this in years, not properly. Not without rushing you, talking over you, or trying to make you feel less messy than you are.

Chan doesn’t seem bothered by messy at all. He just holds you, warm hand moving steadily over your back, chin resting lightly against your hair for one brief second before he seems to think better of it. His body curved around yours in a way that makes the world feel small and safe and frighteningly easy to stay in.

You don’t know how long he lets you sit there tucked against him. It’s long enough for your breathing to slow, for the tightness in your chest to loosen. Long enough that when you finally pull back, blinking at the damp patch you’ve probably left on his shirt, you feel wrung out and strangely weightless all at once.

“Sorry,” you mumble.

Chan looks down at you, one arm still around your waist as though he hasn’t quite noticed it’s there. “You have got to stop apologising to me.”

You laugh weakly. “I cry on you a lot.”

“You’ve cried on me twice.”

“In two days.”

“Mm. At this rate I’ll have to start charging.”

You snort weakly at that, wiping at your cheeks where you can feel your tears finally drying. Chan smiles, and only then seems to realise he’s still holding you. His arm slips away slowly, reluctantly enough that you’re not sure whether you imagined it.

“You should get some sleep,” he says quietly. “Your boyfriend will wonder where you are.”

The reminder hits like a bucket of cold water.

Your boyfriend.

The person waiting back in your room. The person whose hand you still hold at dinner. The person you are, technically, very much still here with.

Guilt twists low in your stomach, and Chan must see something change in your face because his own expression shutters a little—not cold, not unkind, just careful again. Professional, almost.

“Yeah,” you say, voice suddenly thin. “I should go.”

He nods and stands, offering you a hand up from the tiles. You take it, and he steadies you like always, palm warm around yours, but neither of you lingers this time.

At the gate, you pause.

“Tomorrow?” you ask before you can stop yourself.

Chan’s eyes lift to yours, but there’s a beat of silence this time where there’s usually certainty.

He recovers quickly, softly murmuring, “If you want.”

You nod quickly, certain.

“Yeah,” you whisper. “I want.”

Something flickers across his face at that—something bright and dangerous and gone too quickly to name.

“Then tomorrow,” he says.

You walk back through the sleeping resort with your hair damp at the ends and your chest aching in two entirely different ways. One for the girl you were in the water tonight, crying and shaking and brave anyway, and one for the boy waiting by the pool after hours with towels and patience and open arms, who holds you like your fear is something precious enough to protect instead of something ugly to be embarrassed by.

By the time you reach your room, you already know this is becoming dangerous, but not because of the water.

Because of Chan.

The next morning, your boyfriend notices before you do - not the lessons, obviously, and not Chan - just the distance.

It starts over breakfast when he reaches for your hand across the table and you give it to him a second too late, your mind somewhere else entirely—still caught on the memory of cool water at your thighs and Chan’s arms around you on the poolside, the steady weight of him, the quiet certainty in his voice when he told you that the worst day of your life didn’t get to own every day after it.

Your boyfriend frowns at your lack of reaction, your lack of response.

“You okay?” he asks, thumb brushing over your knuckles.

The question should feel kind, and it almost does, except there’s something searching in it now, something newly attentive in a way that makes you instinctively want to hide.

“Just tired,” you say, because that’s become your answer for everything.

He hums like he doesn’t fully believe you but drops it for the rest of breakfast.

Later, by the pool, he tries again, though.

You’re lying on your lounger with a book open in your lap, not really reading, when he appears dripping wet at your side and leans over to blot cold water across your bare stomach with one hand.

You jerk hard enough that the book slips from your fingers. “Jesus—”

He laughs. “Relax, baby, it’s just water.”

Your whole body is suddenly tense, heart thudding from the shock of it, but he notices too late.

The grin fades a little. “Hey. I was messing around.”

“I know.” You sit up, forcing your shoulders to unclench. “Can you not do that?”

He rubs the back of his neck, awkward. “Right. Sorry.” There’s an awkward pause before he says, “You’ve been weird with me.”

The bluntness of it catches you off guard, and you look up. He’s still standing there in damp swim shorts, hair dripping onto the tile, expression caught somewhere between concern and irritation—as if he hasn’t yet decided whether your distance is something to be patient about or something to take personally.

“I haven’t,” you say, and hate how unconvincing it sounds.

He lets out a quiet breath through his nose. “You have.”

You close the book in your lap. “I’m just tired.”

“That’s not all it is.”

His voice is softer than it was the other day. There’s no mockery or edge, just a kind of restless frustration, like he knows he did something wrong and now doesn’t know how to fix it because you won’t tell him how.

You should probably feel sorrier for him than you do. Instead, all you can think about is the way Chan notices things. The way he clocks every shift in your breathing, every tightening of your fingers, every flicker of panic before you’ve even found the words for it. The way he doesn’t wait until you’re flinching to ask what’s wrong. Your boyfriend only notices once the distance affects him.

That thought is so sharp and unfair and true that guilt immediately follows on its heels.

“I said I’m fine,” you murmur.

His jaw tightens at your words before he argues, “You’re not, though.”

The words land between you with surprising force, and before you know it, he’s crouching in front of your lounger, forearms resting on his knees. For a second, you can see the boy you first fell for—the one who was all warmth and charm and easy confidence, the one who made you laugh until your ribs hurt and kissed you like you were precious. The version of him you keep trying to reconcile with the one who stood at the edge of the pool and laughed at your grief.

“I know I was a dick the other day,” he says, quieter now. “I do know that. And I’m sorry. But you’ve barely looked at me since.” Your throat tightens, and he reaches out and tucks a strand of hair behind your ear, the gesture familiar enough to ache. “Talk to me.”

You almost laugh, because now he’s asking for honesty, after proving what he does with your vulnerability when it’s inconvenient to him. Still, you can’t exactly say that, not without tearing the whole week open.

Instead, you settle for, “I’m trying.”

His expression softens immediately, relief flickering through it. “Okay.”

It shouldn’t be enough - it isn’t enough - but he smiles like it is, like this is progress. Like if he’s gentle now, if he watches his tone and keeps his hands soft and his jokes harmless, then the damage might quietly unmake itself.

And maybe he’s right.

Maybe, if Chan didn’t exist, you would let it.

By evening, you’re so wound tight with guilt and anticipation that you feel vaguely ill.

Your boyfriend keeps touching you - not in a way that’s aggressive, or even unusual. It’s a hand at the small of your back as you walk into dinner, fingers brushing your thigh under the table, a kiss pressed to your temple when you excuse yourself to get another drink. Normal, affectionate things. The kind of touches that once would have soothed you without thought.

Now they just make you aware of every difference.

Your boyfriend touches like he assumes access, but Chan touches like he’s asking permission even when his hands are already on you. Your boyfriend apologises and then expects your warmth back as proof he’s been forgiven, whereas Chan comforts you like there’s nothing for you to prove at all. Your boyfriend notices when you go cold, unlike Chan, who notices before you freeze.

It’s unbearable, really, how impossible it is to stop measuring them against each other.

At eight-fifty, you stand from the table and murmur something about needing the loo before bed.

Your boyfriend glances up. “Want me to come with you?”

The question makes you blink. “To the bathroom?”

He laughs. “No, idiot. I mean after. We could go for a walk or something.”

The easy affection in his voice twists the guilt deeper into your ribs.

“I’m really tired,” you say. “I think I’m just going to sleep.”

He looks disappointed, but only for a second. “Okay.”

Then, because apparently the universe isn’t done punishing you, he catches your hand and pulls you down just enough to kiss you. It’s soft, familiar. Perfectly normal. But all you can think about is how wrong it feels to be kissed by him while your pulse is already racing for someone else.

You pull away first, and your boyfriend searches your face for a beat, brows drawing together.

“You sure you’re okay?”

“Yeah.” The lie tastes awful. “Just tired.”

Always tired, but you just don’t want to admit what you’re tired of yet.

He lets you go, and you leave before he can ask anything else.

Chan is in the water when you arrive. He’s waist-deep in the shallow end, dark swim shorts hanging low on his hips, one hand braced on the edge as he stretches the other shoulder across his chest. His hair is damp and curling at the ends, and when he hears the gate open he looks up with a smile that starts small and then warms all the way through when he realises it’s you.

“Hey.”

You stop dead at the edge. It’s not fair, really, that someone should look so at home in water. He’s not just comfortable in it, but part of it somehow, like it answers to him. Like it knows him. The pool lights ripple silver-blue over the planes of his shoulders and chest, catching in the droplets running down his neck, and for one awful second your brain offers up the deeply unhelpful thought that drowning in him might actually be worth it.

You clear your throat. “Hi.”

Chan’s smile turns suspiciously amused. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“Liar.”

You narrow your eyes. “You don’t know what I was thinking.”

“No,” he agrees, pushing off the wall and wading toward the steps. “But whatever it was, it made you go pink.”

Heat floods your face immediately, proving his point, and he grins at your reaction.

“Cruel,” you mutter.

“Says the girl who stared at me like I’d just risen dramatically from the sea.”

You make a strangled noise of horror. “I did not.”

“You absolutely did.”

“I hate you.”

“No, you don’t,” he says lightly, and the words hit with enough force that you have to look away.

He notices that too, and his expression shifts, some of the teasing falling away as he climbs out of the pool and grabs a towel from the lounger. He rubs it briskly through his hair, then drapes it around his neck and comes to stand in front of you.

“You okay?”

The gentleness in the question almost undoes you on the spot.

“Yeah.” You hesitate. “Maybe.”

Chan’s brows lift a little. “Boyfriend?”

Your laugh is short and humourless. “Am I that obvious?”

“Only to me.”

The answer is so soft, so immediate, that your chest squeezes. You stare at him, and Chan seems to realise how that sounded a second too late. His mouth opens, then closes again, and he glances down at the towel around his neck like it’s suddenly become very interesting.

“Come here,” he says instead, stepping aside to let you through the gate.

You follow him to the shallow end in silence. Tonight the towels are already laid out, but so is the stupid blue noodle, floating innocently near the steps like it has every intention of ruining your dignity for a third consecutive night. There’s a bottle of water waiting by the edge too, beads of condensation shining on the plastic.

“You did all this before I got here?” you ask.

Chan shrugs one shoulder. “I had time.”

The understatement of it makes something ache under your ribs. He had time, so he spent it getting things ready for you. No one has ever prepared for your fear before. Managed it, maybe. Tolerated it. Worked around it. But prepared for it?

Never.

You swallow hard and look away before your face gives you up, but Chan notices anyway. He doesn’t comment; instead, he crouches in front of you and says, “Tell me where we’re starting tonight.”

You blink. “What?”

“Anxiety level. Body stuff. Head stuff. Give me the report.”

There’s something so absurdly tender about the matter-of-fact way he says it that you almost laugh.

“Uh.” You think about it. “Head stuff is bad.”

“Define bad.”

“I spent most of dinner feeling guilty.”

His expression stills. “About this?”

You nod, and Chan sits back on his heels, eyes on your face. You rush on before he can say anything. “I know I’m not doing anything wrong. I know it’s just swimming lessons, technically, and I know my boyfriend doesn’t own every minute of my time, but I also know if he knew I was sneaking off every night to be in a pool with another guy he would absolutely not be thrilled, and—”

“Hey.”

Your mouth snaps shut; Chan’s voice is quiet, but it cuts through the spiral instantly. “You don’t have to justify it to me.” You look at him, and his jaw is tight in a way that tells you he’s choosing his words carefully when he says, “If you want to stop because it feels wrong, that’s your call. I mean that. I’ll respect it.” His gaze holds yours. “But if the only reason you feel guilty is that he’d be upset you’re doing something kind for yourself with somebody who isn’t him… I don’t think that’s the same thing.”

The air leaves your lungs in a shaky rush, and you sink down onto the edge of the pool and stare at your knees as you say, “I don’t know what I’m doing.”

Chan sits beside you, close enough that your shoulders brush. “You’re learning to swim.”

You huff out a laugh despite yourself. “You’re impossible.”

“Correct.”

He waits a beat, then adds more softly, “Do you want to be here?”

The answer is immediate enough to startle you.

“Yes.”

His shoulder nudges yours. “Then be here.”

Your eyes sting, but you nod anyway.

“Good.” He stands and offers you his hand. “In we go.”

Tonight, he gets you farther than you think is possible.

He doesn’t rush you, and you quickly realise that Chan has a gift for making progress feel accidental, like he’s tricking your body into trust one tiny choice at a time. First it’s the steps again, just to settle you. Then the second step. Then standing, his hands braced warm and steady at your waist before you’ve even fully risen, like he knows exactly which second your fear will peak and intends to be there before it does.

“Breathe,” he murmurs as your fingers clamp onto his shoulders.

“I am breathing.”

“You’re hyperventilating prettily. Different thing.”

You glare at him, panicked and scandalised all at once. “Did you just call me pretty?”

Chan’s eyes widen. “I—” The flush that climbs up his throat is almost enough to make you forget you’re in a pool. “I meant— no, I mean, yes, obviously, but that’s not—” He drags a hand over his face. “Can we pretend I’m better at words than this?”

A startled laugh breaks out of you, sharp enough to shake your shoulders, and just like that, the panic ebbs.

Chan points at you accusingly. “You’re evil. You did that on purpose.”

“I absolutely did not.”

“Mm. Sure.”

Still blushing, he slides one hand more securely around your waist and steadies you while you stand in the shallow end, water kissing the tops of your thighs.

The contact is immediate and electric.

You’ve been here before, in this exact position, but tonight you’re too aware of it - of his palm spread warm against your side, of the wet cling of your shirt where his fingers press through it, of how close he has to stand to keep you balanced, chest almost brushing yours every time you wobble.

And you do wobble.

A lot.

Each time, Chan catches you without hesitation, one hand at your waist. The other finds its place on your arm, your back, your hip—wherever you’re tipping, wherever your body reaches for help before your mind can stop it. There’s no awkwardness in it from him, no self-conscious pause, just immediate support. Like it’s the most natural thing in the world to gather you back in every time the water scares you.

“Okay,” he says after a while, once your breathing has settled. “Tonight I want to try floating properly.”

You stare at him in horror. “Properly?”

“Mm-hm.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“Chan, I only just stopped crying on you every five minutes.”

“And I’m very proud of your growth.”

You splash him weakly, but he just grins and catches your wrist before you can do it again, fingers wrapping around it with an ease that makes your stomach flip.

“Listen to me,” he says, gentling immediately when he sees your face change. “I’m not letting go of you.”

The words land low and deep.

You swallow. “At all?”

“Not unless you ask me to.”

He steps closer as he says it, hand sliding from your wrist to your waist, thumb pressing lightly into the damp cotton at your side. His other hand comes up to cup just beneath your shoulder blade. Your pulse jumps.

“We’re doing it on your back,” he says. “You’ll keep one arm around my neck if you want to, and I’ll hold the rest of you. All you have to do is lean.”

You laugh once, hollow with nerves. “That sounds like a terrible plan.”

“It’s a great plan.”

“It sounds like drowning while hugging you.”

“Very rude way to describe my teaching methods.”

Despite yourself, you smile, and Chan’s gaze flicks to your mouth for the briefest second, before he’s clearing his throat and saying, a little more roughly, “Come on. Trust me?”

The question cracks something open in your chest when you realise that you do trust him - maybe more than you should when you barely know him. Sometimes, though, it doesn’t matter how long you’ve known someone when your soul recognises them.

“…Okay,” you whisper.

Chan nods once, slow and serious, like he understands the weight of what you’ve just given him.

“Arm around my neck,” he says softly.

You obey before you can think too hard about it. Your hand slides over the damp slope of his shoulder, then around the back of his neck. His skin is warm and slick under your palm. You can feel the wet curls at his nape, the flex of muscle when your fingers tighten.

Chan’s breath catches - only for a second – before his hand settles more securely at the middle of your back, spanning almost the full width of it, while the other hooks under your knees.

Your eyes widen. “Chan.”

“I know,” he murmurs. “I’ve got you.”

There it is again: I’ve got you. No impatience, or embarrassment, or challenge. Just him, gathering your fear into his hands and holding it steady.

“Lean back,” he says.

Every instinct in your body screams no. Your fingers knot tighter at the back of his neck, your free hand grabbing his shoulder. Chan shifts closer until your chest is nearly flush with his, giving you nowhere to fall but into him.

“That’s it,” he murmurs. “I’m not letting you go.”

Your breathing turns shallow.

“Look at me.”

You do, taking in the closeness of dark eyes, wet lashes. Pool light catches silver-blue over his cheekbones. Every bit of his attention is fixed on you as if there’s nowhere else in the world he’d rather be.

“Just me,” he says softly.

And somehow, impossibly, you lean.

At first it’s barely anything. Just a hesitant angle backwards, your body rigid with resistance. Chan follows every inch of it, one arm supporting your back, the other still under your knees, keeping you half-curled against him as the water rises higher around you.

“Good,” he says immediately. “That’s good.”

“It doesn’t feel good.”

He smiles. “I know.”

“Everything in me is screaming.”

“Mm. Mine too.”

Your eyes snap to his, and Chan looks horrified at himself for about half a second. “I meant because I’m worried about you.”

“Right.”

“Shut up and float.”

You laugh, which ruins your concentration completely, and the sound turns into a startled gasp when your shoulders touch the water. Panic flares, but Chan tightens his hold at once, his forearm firm under your back, his hand sliding up between your shoulder blades so your head never gets close to the surface.

“Hey, hey.” His voice drops low. “You’re okay. Stay with me.”

Your body is trembling now, stretched awkwardly between wanting to curl back upright and the support of his arms keeping you open. Your arm around his neck is practically strangling him. Your legs are still half-bent over his supporting arm.

“I can’t do it.”

“You are doing it.”

“I’m literally clinging to you.”

“Excellent instinct.”

“Chan—”

“You’re floating.”

You stare at him. The water cradles more of your weight now than his arms do. Not all of it, not yet, but enough that you can feel the difference—the strange buoyancy under your back, the way the pool holds you instead of swallowing you.

Your mouth parts, breathing, “Oh.”

Chan’s smile is immediate and soft and so stupidly proud it makes your chest hurt. “Yeah. Oh.”

You’re still gripping him like a life raft, but for one suspended, impossible second you become aware of everything all at once: the water under you, the arm around his neck, his palm spread broad and warm between your shoulders, the other braced securely beneath your knees, his face so close above yours that if you tipped your chin up even slightly your nose would brush his jaw.

“I’m floating,” you whisper.

His voice comes out quieter than before - reverent, almost – when he murmurs, “You are.”

You don’t know how long you stay like that. It could just be ten seconds, or it could be an entire lifetime compressed into the shape of one trembling moment in a dark resort pool.

Eventually Chan says, “Think you can try straightening your legs?”

You laugh weakly. “Absolutely not.”

“Fair.”

He helps you sit up slowly, carefully, drawing you back against his chest until your feet find the pool floor again. For a second your back is pressed to the front of him, his arm still curved around your middle from where he’s been supporting you, your wet hair catching against his jaw.

Neither of you moves for a minute before you turn your head to look at him and realise just how close he is. His mouth is barely inches from yours, and your breath catches. Chan’s eyes drop to your lips, the hand around your waist tightening—just once, involuntarily.

But then footsteps sound somewhere beyond the fence.

You both jerk apart, your heart slamming against your ribs. Chan turns first, scanning the dark pathway beyond the pool with the quick alertness of someone used to checking for trouble, but the sound is already fading again—just a couple passing by on the path outside, laughing quietly to themselves, oblivious.

Still, the moment is broken.

You swallow hard and look anywhere but at him.

“Sorry,” you murmur, because apparently humiliation has not cured you of apologising for things that aren’t your fault.

Chan scrubs a hand over his wet hair. “Don’t.” His voice is rough. You glance up, and he looks as rattled as you feel. “Maybe,” he says after a second, forcing some steadiness back into his tone, “we stick to less romantic-looking teaching positions.”

The laugh that escapes you is breathless and mortified. “Was that romantic-looking?”

“I was literally carrying you in a moonlit pool.”

Well, when he puts it like that—

You cover your face with both hands. “Oh, my god.”

Chan laughs too, quieter this time, but there’s something fragile underneath it. Something almost relieved.

“Come here,” he says gently, and reaches for you again before the embarrassment can swallow you whole.

This time he doesn’t pull you into his arms; he just takes your hands. He threads his fingers carefully through yours and steps backwards through the water until your arms are stretched between you, your bodies a safe distance apart.

“Better?” he asks.

“No,” you admit.

His mouth twitches. “Honest.”

“Always.”

“Good.”

He squeezes your hands once, grounding. “Try floating again. This time with me in front of you instead of under you. I’ll hold your hands the whole time.”

You stare at him. “That sounds fake.”

“It’s not fake.”

“It sounds fake.”

“Do you trust me?”

The question still does something dangerous to your pulse.

“Yes,” you say, too quickly.

Something flickers across his face before he nods. “Then let me show you.”

It’s somehow harder and easier all at once. Harder because you don’t have the full support of his arms around you anymore. Easier because he doesn’t ask for much—just a small lean back, just enough for the water to take some of your weight while his fingers stay locked around yours, his voice guiding you through every awful inch of uncertainty.

“I’m right here,” he says when your eyes squeeze shut. “I’m not going anywhere.”

You make a shaky sound that could be a laugh or a cry. “Chan.”

“Mm?”

“If I drown in three feet of water, I’m haunting you.”

“Bit unfair, considering I’d be the one doing CPR.”

You snort, and your body loosens by a fraction.

“That’s it,” he murmurs. “Good.”

He praises you constantly in that low, warm voice—every tiny success, every extra second you manage, every time you don’t bolt. And each time he does, something in you glows a little brighter with it. Not because you need approval, exactly. But because Chan never makes praise feel conditional. He gives it freely and sincerely, like he wants you to know he sees every inch of the effort it costs.

By the end of the lesson, you can float for a few seconds at a time while holding his hands. It’s not graceful, but it’s enough. Enough that when you finally stand upright again, shaking and breathless and stupidly proud, Chan actually laughs and scoops you into a quick, impulsive hug before he seems to think better of it. It lasts maybe two seconds, but it’s long enough for his wet chest to press against yours. For your arms to come up around him automatically, and for both of you to freeze when you realise what’s happening.

Chan pulls back first.

“Sorry,” he says immediately, though he’s smiling too hard for it to sound convincing. “That was— you just looked really pleased with yourself.”

“I am pleased with myself,” you say, still dazed.

“You should be.”

His hands are still on your upper arms, and your fingers are still resting against his ribs where they caught on his shirt during the hug. But then, beyond the fence—

Movement.

Not loud enough to break the moment, and not close enough for Chan to notice, but it’s close enough that when your gaze lifts over his shoulder, your stomach drops clean through the floor.

Your boyfriend is standing on the path outside the pool gate.

He must have come looking for you, and for one horrible second, he just stares. He can’t hear what you’re saying through the fence and the water and the distance, but he can definitely see enough. You in the pool after hours. Chan’s hands on your arms. The two of you standing too close in the dark, wrapped up in your own little world.

Your pulse spikes so violently you nearly flinch.

He doesn’t call out, doesn’t storm in or even make a face. His expression just shifts—confusion first, then something flatter and harder to read—and then he turns and walks away. He’s gone before you can do anything but stare.

“Hey.” Chan’s voice pulls you back, and you blink and look at him too quickly. His brows knit together at once as he asks, “What happened?”

You realise, dimly, that your face must have changed. You force your eyes away from the empty path beyond his shoulder and back to him. “Nothing.”

Chan doesn’t believe you for a second, but he doesn’t push either. At least, not immediately. Instead, he glances once over his shoulder, sees only darkness and the empty walkway, and looks back at you with that quiet, searching concern that always makes lying feel impossible.

“Talk to me.”

Your throat tightens. You know you should tell him, but the thought of saying it out loud—my boyfriend just saw us, my boyfriend thinks I’m cheating, my boyfriend might be hurt, angry, suspicious, all because I came here, because I wanted this, because I wanted you—makes panic rise too fast to handle.

Instead, you shake your head, voice coming out thin when you ask, “Can we just… Can we not do this right now?”

Chan stills. The concern in his face softens into something gentler, more careful. “Yeah,” he says quietly. “Yeah, okay.”

You look down at the water, ashamed. Chan’s fingers tighten very slightly around your upper arms, just once, before he lets go and steps back enough to give you air.

“We don’t have to talk about anything you don’t want to,” he says. “But you’re not leaving this pool looking like that without at least letting me know if you’re okay.”

The tenderness of it nearly breaks you all over again.

You laugh once, unsteady. “You’re really annoying.”

“I know.”

“I’m serious.”

“Me too.”

That drags a real laugh out of you, small and shaky and grateful. Chan smiles, relieved enough that it makes your chest hurt.

“Come on,” he says softly. “Out you get.”

He helps you back to the steps with a hand at your back and another around your wrist, steady as ever, like he can feel the tremor that’s worked its way through you and has already decided you won’t have to carry it alone. As he walks you to the gate a few minutes later, shoulders brushing under the warm night air, you can feel the shape of the problem waiting for you back in your room.

Your boyfriend knows something now - maybe not everything, maybe not even enough - but enough to ask questions. Enough to look at you differently. Enough to make tomorrow impossible to avoid.

Chan pauses at the gate and studies your face for a moment. “You sure you’re okay to go back?”

No, you think. Not even slightly.

You nod anyway, but he doesn’t believe it for a second.

“Liar,” he says softly.

Your eyes sting. Before you can stop yourself, you reach for him. Your fingers catch lightly around his wrist for half a second, as if touching him might hold you together long enough to make it back to your room. Chan stills instantly, his gaze dropping to your hand, then lifts to your face.

Something in his expression goes warm and helpless all at once.

“You can text me through reception if you need me,” he says quietly.

You blink. “You can do that?”

“One of the perks of being criminally charming with the night staff.” A laugh escapes you despite everything. He turns his hand beneath yours until your fingers slide into his palm instead, squeezing once—firm and grounding and far too intimate for something so small.

“Go,” he says softly. “Before I decide you’re not going back at all.”

Your breath catches. Chan seems to hear the way it changes because his eyes drop to your mouth. Again. The space between you narrows without either of you moving. You can feel it—the pull of it, heavy and electric and terrifying in its inevitability.

The near-kiss arrives so slowly it almost doesn’t feel real.

Your fingers tighten in his, his thumb drags once over your knuckles, your chin lifts before you’ve consciously decided to move. Chan’s free hand comes up, not quite touching your face, just hovering at your jaw like he’s one second away from crossing a line neither of you can uncross.

But then he stops.

His eyes close briefly. When he opens them again, the heat is still there, but now buried under restraint so obvious it makes your chest ache.

“You should go,” he says, voice low and wrecked.

You can’t tell whether he’s talking to you or to himself, but you let go and turn and walk back through the sleeping resort with your heart somewhere in your throat and your boyfriend waiting at the other end of the path.

When you get back to the room, it’s empty.

For one disorienting second, you think maybe he’s asleep in the bathroom or out on the balcony with the door shut, but then you hear voices drifting from the little seating area outside and step back into the corridor to find his parents there instead.

His mum looks up from her book first. “Oh, sweetheart. There you are.”

You force a smile that feels brittle around the edges. “Hi.”

“Have you seen him?” his dad asks casually. “He said he needed a walk.”

Your stomach drops, but you try very hard not to let it show.

“No,” you say, and it comes out thinner than you want it to. “I thought he was here.”

His mum gives you a sympathetic little frown. “He seemed upset about something.”

Guilt slices through you so quickly it steals your breath as you say, “Oh.” You tuck your arms around yourself, suddenly cold despite the warm night air. “I’m sure he’s fine. Maybe he just needed to clear his head.”

“Probably,” she says kindly. “Try not to worry.”

You nod, murmur goodnight, and slip into the room before your face can give you away.

But worry is exactly what you do.

You sit on the edge of the bed for ten full minutes, still damp at the ends of your hair, staring at your phone in your lap and trying to decide what to do. Text him? Call him? Pretend to be asleep when he gets back? Pretend you don’t know he saw you?

In the end, cowardice wins, and you send one single message: Are you okay?

It sits there undelivered for so long your chest tightens before it eventually goes through. You wait for his reply, but it never comes.

You don’t sleep properly. Every time footsteps sound in the corridor outside, you jolt awake thinking it might be him. Every time a door slams somewhere in the resort, your heart leaps into your throat. You keep imagining him drunk at a bar, furious and hurt and humiliated, replaying the sight of you in the pool with Chan over and over until it becomes something uglier than it was.

And the worst part—the part you can’t escape—is that you don’t even know how to defend yourself against it, because even if nothing happened, you wanted it to. You wanted Chan’s hands on you, wanted the way he looked at you. You wanted that almost-kiss at the gate enough that your whole body still aches with the absence of it.

You fall asleep sometime close to dawn with your phone clutched in one hand and dread sitting like a stone in your stomach. When you wake, the other side of the bed is still untouched. For one long second you just stare at it. The pillow still plumped, the duvet smooth. There’s no sign that he ever came back at all.

Panic rushes through you so quickly you nearly drop your phone in your scramble to check it. Nothing - no messages, no missed calls. You call him, and it goes straight to voicemail. The next attempt yields the same result, and your pulse starts to race.

By the time you’ve washed your face and thrown on a sundress over your swimsuit, you’ve convinced yourself of six different disasters. That he’s passed out somewhere. That he’s been in a fight. That he’s gone home without telling anyone. That he hates you. That this is all your fault. That somehow, impossibly, you’ve ruined everything in the span of a few nights by wanting the wrong person to hold you in a swimming pool.

His mum is already downstairs at breakfast when you arrive, and one look at the empty chair beside his dad tells you what you need to know. He’s still not back.

“You heard from him?” you ask, trying and failing to sound casual.

His dad shakes his head, but he doesn’t seem especially alarmed. “He’s twenty-four, not twelve. Probably crashed in one of the lads’ rooms after too many drinks.”

His mum gives him a look. “He could have let someone know.”

“Yes, he could,” he agrees, and then turns to you with a gentleness that makes your throat tighten. “But I really wouldn’t panic yet, sweetheart.”

Too late.

You spend breakfast barely tasting anything, picking at fruit and toast while your phone sits face-up beside your plate like an accusation. Every time it lights up with some useless notification, your stomach lurches. Nothing from him. When his younger sister suggests heading down to the pool after breakfast, you hear yourself say yes before you’ve really thought about it - maybe because sitting still feels impossible, or because your nerves are already so frayed that fear has nowhere left to land.

Maybe because some reckless, aching part of you knows Chan will be there.

The thought steadies you in a way you don’t want to examine too closely.

By the time you reach the pool, the sun is already hot enough to turn the tiles warm under your sandals. Families fill the loungers. Children shriek in the shallows. Music drifts faintly from the bar. And there, high on the lifeguard chair with sunglasses on and one knee drawn up, is Chan.

Your breath catches as he spots you almost immediately. Even from a distance, even with the sunglasses hiding his eyes, you see the exact moment he recognises you. His posture changes – straightens, sharpens. His gaze follows you all the way to the loungers with a kind of quiet focus that makes your skin hum. He doesn’t wave, doesn’t smile. Not with your boyfriend’s family right there.

But when you glance up again a minute later, he’s still watching, and somehow, absurdly, that’s enough.

a/n: *whispers* reader's boyfriend is a prick, pass it on. Also, I am not condoning cheating in any way, shape, or form. And no, I don't think Chan would pursue someone who's taken irl, either. This is fiction. Part Two coming soon xo

with his help you picked up your things fast “here.” he handed you your things when you stood up “thank you” you said as he put them between your arms, when you looked up at him you saw a boy your age, he had a guitar suitcase on his back which seemed to be the thing you hit your shoulder into, beside him was another boy who had a few papers from yours, he gave them to the one in front of you who returned them with an apologetic smile “I'm really sorry, are you okay?” he asked softly, you nodded at him “it's okay, i wasn't looking in front of me” you said in reassurance, followed by an awkward laugh, just then the bell rang for the next lecture, his friend signaled for him to go, he nodded quickly and looked at you in a hurry “if anything is damaged come to me, name's han jisung” he said fast and then ran behind his friend.

you stood there stunned, looking at him as he rushed away, you started walking to your next class still thinking about the interaction and repeating the boy's name in your mind. you entered the class and went to your usual spot, your friend was sitting there already, who gave you a confused look at the things you were holding “are these your stuff? why are you holding them?” your friend asked, standing up. you put your stuff at the desk with a tired sigh “My bag got torn.” “what?” your friend started laughing, muffling it with their hand “how did you get it torn?!” “i was rushing to my lecture!” You said in defense “anyway, can you put them in your bag for now? I'll come get a book when we have different lectures.”, your friend nodded, lifting their bag up on the desk while still giggling. You two started stuffing the things in the bag before a professor comes.

“oh right, i bumped into a boy on the way to here.” you said as you put another book in the bag, your friend shook their head “you should be more careful....are you hurt?” they asked, “no, but the boy was so nice, he helped me pick them up and kept apologizing” you said, admiration filled your voice, your friend smiled “awh, that's so cute.”

even when the lecture started and the professor was deep in explaining you couldn't stop thinking about han, replaying the interaction over and over again in your mind, it made you feel giddy everytime you remembered it, you wonder when you'll see him again. at lunch break you and your friend went to eat outside at the university field instead of the cafeteria, you two were chatting and laughing loudly, drowning in your own world, yet you couldn't stop your eyes from wandering around every second, looking over the neatly cut grass, few students were walking around or having their lunch there as well, the football field–that was on your right–was completely empty, then you look at your left, there are some trees near the walls that made it difficult to see everyone who was sitting there, “what are you looking for?” your friend suddenly asked, cutting your chain of thoughts, you looked at them startled “hm?”, they gave you a weird look “what are you searching for?” you fidgeted with the lunch box in front of you before answering in a low voice “you remember the boy i told you about?”, your friend hummed “mhm?”, “well, i was wondering if I'd see him here..” you looked closely at your friend’s expressions that slowly widened in shock “don't tell me you crushed on him just because he helped you?” they asked in disbelief, “no! he was just so sweet i can't help but be curious about him” you said in defense, your voice raising a bit “you don't even know him!” your friend said in a complaining tone “i know his name!” you argued, they looked at you with a questioning look, “it's han jisung” you said proudly which made them sigh in defeat, and with alot of begging and nagging you got them to help you look more into him.

you arrived early at the campus, it was quite chilly, the wind blowing softly. the mostly empty campus was one of your favorite places, you get to sit quietly in a spot you can choose carefully while reading a book without any noises or interruption, but today as you were looking for a good spot you heard a soft instrument playing in the distance, it was oddly familiar like you've heard it somewhere, so your curiosity got the best of you and you walked in the melody's direction, the sound guided you behind the building, a place rarely people go to because of how small of a space it is. you looked from the corner to see a boy playing the guitar alone, he doesn't seem to notice you standing there, too deep into his instrument to feel his surroundings, you know it's a mistake to eavesdrop on him but the music is really pulling you in with how good his playing is, you take a step to try and get a better look at him but something beneath you cracked–startling you both, he quickly stopped playing and looked at you, you didn't know what to do as you two looked at eachother, the “sorry” word stuck in your mouth when you realized the boy that was in front of you was han jisung, the same boy that you were trying to bump into again, fate really has its way to play with people.

“uh..I'm sorry i just, i heard you play and..um” you stammer and feel your whole body heat up “it was really good.” you barely got the words out of your mouth, you said it so low you thought he didn't hear you, but he smiled at you and thanked you in the most softest voice you have ever heard, he looked equally as embarrassed as you and the atmosphere between you two started to become really awkward, you cleared your throat asked carefully “um..you're majoring in music or is it just a hobby? I'm just asking because your playing was really good!” you quickly clarified at the end, “it's my major as well as my hobby” he said with a nervous chuckle “um…what about you?”, you started fidgeting with the hem of your sleeve “..I'm an art major” you said nervously, as soon as he heard you his eyes lit up “i have a friend in that major as well! his name is hyunjin do you know him?” you looked at the way he spoke so excitedly, it was really warming–dare you say adorable, and suddenly all the nervousness vanished replaced with a comfortable flowing in the conversation “yes, he's quite popular in there” you sat down beside him as you answered, “i wouldn't be surprised, he's very talented” he said and set his guitar to the side, his eyes trailed down to the book in your hands “you read?” he asked curiously–trying to get a look at the cover. you nodded and lift the book from your lap, showing it to him “i was looking for a spot to sit and continue reading it”, he made an ’oooh’ sound “it looks interesting” he took the book from your hands and examined it, “i do like it so far” you said, watching him flip through the pages, then he suddenly looked up at you again “ah! by the way I'm han jisung” he said quickly, you looked at him in silence for a few seconds before speaking again “i know, we met yesterday, you know when we bumped into eachother”, now he was the one who was looking at you in silence. his mouth opened slowly in realization “that explains why you seemed familiar” he smiled sheepishly “sorry, I'm kind of forgetful” “no it's okay, it was a small interaction anyway. I'm y/n l/n” “nice to meet you, y/n” “same here”

you smiled to eachother without a word then his phone started ringing startling you both, he started looking for it in his pocket frantically “excuse me” he said apologetically as he answered it, it didn't take him long until he finished, he put his phone back in his pocket “my friend just arrived, he called for me to meet him..so i have to go” you felt a little disappointed that he'll go already but you maintained the same smile on your face and nodded “sure”, he put his guitar back in it suitcase–he stood up swinging the suitcase on his shoulder then handed your book back to you, as you took it from him your fingers brushed faintly, and for a minute you just stood there looking at eachother, you could hear your heartbeat clearly in this silence, you noticed the tips of his ears getting red, his throat flexed as he gulped–he looked away in embarrassment, searching for something he can focus on instead of the increasing heat in his body, “uh um, I'll-I'll see you around?” he said nervously, you nodded quickly “y-yeah see you around”, he gave you one last smile before walking away, when he disappeared from your sight you let out the biggest breath you were holding, you hugged the book to your chest as you got lost in your daydreams.

you went to your lecture with a wide smile planted on your face, just thinking about him made your heart flutter, you sat down on your desk with a dreamy sigh.

the second time you met you were in the library reading alone, and so happen for han to be there too–looking around for an interesting book to read when he saw you. he paused, debating if he should approach you or not, but as he saw that you were completely alone he walked to you. “hey” he leaned against the table and greeted you with a smile, as soon as you looked up at him you felt yourself getting nervous “hi” you let out a nervous laugh “what brought you here?”, he sat down in front of you, the smile not leaving his face–he looked so warm like this, the sun light from the window behind you crossing him, making him look like he was shining, he shifted to get comfortable “i was searching for something to read in my free time before i saw you” his soft voice echoed in the silence of the library “so, you don't have a lecture at this time?” “no,” you shook your head no “i always use this free time to read here.” you swear that you saw his eyes lit up when he heard you “me too! i always spend this time alone walking around, maybe we can hang out together from now on?” he said excitedly, leaning over the table before he caught himself ”ah, i mean if you want to.” you chuckled at his nervousness, he looked just so adorable–you felt your face heat up at your thoughts and you quickly snapped out of them “yeah!..s-sure.”

and so, for the past three months you've been hanging out together in every free period, sometimes you'd read at the library and exchange books you've finished, at some point you two started a little playful thing of leaving eachother little notes inside the books you'd exchange–funny commentary on specific scenes or random thoughts and reminders. other times you'd hang out outside the campus talking about your lectures and complain about your professions.

he got comfortable enough to play his guitar in front of you and show you a few lyrics he has written, which made {you} more comfortable to share your art with him, you two became a support source for one another.

today you were sitting under the shadow of a tree, the breeze was soft enough to not blow the papers away, you were doodling absentmindedly while he was writing notes and trying them on the guitar, you created a calm peaceful bubble around you.

han lifted his head up from his notebook looking at you then back at his notebook nervously, he straightened up–clearing his throat to gain your attention “..i have been thinking,” you looked up at him waiting for him to continue “would you like to go to the river with me?” suddenly the air felt like it froze, you stared at eachother in silence for at least three minutes before his face noticeably got redder and redder “i-i meant as hanging out! like–like how we're doing here but like..by the river” he looked down back at his notebook chewing on his lips in embarrassment, now it was your turn to feel your face heat up, you looked away feeling a little awkward for assuming something else, and maybe a little disappointed as well that it wasn't what you hoped for.

“...i think it'd be fun,” you said softly–smiling at him, he looked up at you with those wide boba eyes of his “we can hang out by the river.” he smiled in return but it didn't reach his eyes “cool..”

after the university hours he went on a walk alone, then returned to the dorm, he entered with his head down and looked like he was dragging himself to walk, as soon as he was in the living room he threw himself on the first soft surface that was in his way, startling minho who was leaning against the kitchen counter, he looked back at him in confusion “what's wrong?”, han let out a muffled groan before turning his head to the side staring at the empty wall “i have tried, hyung,” he said in a helpless way “i asked her out and i was met with a silent stare, maybe i really was just seeing things.”he paused for a second before letting out another whine and burying his face in the cushion.

“you got rejected?” minho asked with a hint of surprise in his voice, after all he saw how grossly you two were in love. He didn't have any doubt that you'll return han's feelings. “not directly,” jisung replied, his voice muffled by the cushion–he lift his head up, looking at minho with a pout “when i didn't get a reply i got nervous so i said i meant it as friends.” he emphasis on the friends part like it hurt him to say it, minho dragged his hands down in his face “han-ah you're an idiot, how could you back down?” minho scolded him “i don't know, i was nervous!” han said defensively, his shoulders tensing as he sat up. “then you just blew up your chance for nothing” minho shook his head in disappointment “how do you want to get in this relationship if you can't even stand your ground while asking her out?” han pressed his lips together and looked down at his lap–fidgeting with his fingers as he thought about minho's words in his head, he was right, how is he supposed to get with you like that? it will only take longer the more he fusses about it and not act “I'll try tomorrow, this time I'll ask her out definitely” he clenched his hands and nodded to himself persistently.

there was a sliver of light from the rising sun in the sky when the birds started chipping, for the first time in his life han jisung woke up way too early and didn't feel tired at all as he did his morning routine, by the time minho woke up jisung was already dressed completely and eating his breakfast in a hurry.

minho wasn't the kind to have a conversation when he just woke up, but jisung couldn't miss the weird look he gave him when he saw him all ready already. stuffing the last bite into his mouth han took his bag and went to put his shoes on “I'm ’onna ’o” his voice was muffled, minho let out a hum nodding without looking at him, and so jisung walked out.

even with how early he was he didn't arrive quickly to the campus, there was already a fair amount of students there while he hoped to be one of the firsts there just to catch up to you, still nothing could ruin his mood today, as he was going to gather the courage and confess today no matter what happened or what would appear in his way.

he searched every spot that you usually go to, he even waited a few minutes to see if you were in the bathroom but you were nowhere to be seen, it was strange–you have never changed where you sit all the time he has known you in, jisung started to get anxious that you didn't come today, he was biting his lips in helplessness–losing hope, as he continued searching he spotted your friend from afar and didn't waste a second in running in their direction–stumbling across the crowds and apologizing when he bumped into people, “wait!” he called out when he got close enough, they stopped in their steps and looked back at him in confusion, han stopped in front of them panting “wait..i..” he struggled to talk as he caught his breath, leaning against his knees.

“are you okay?” they asked him in concern, looking down at him catching his breath, he nodded and straightened up “yeah, I'm..I'm okay” he said breathlessly, “i um..do you know where y/n is?” he could feel his face heat up a little as he asked, they gave him a questioning look before answering “in chemistry lab..doing a project” jisung could feel the relief flooding him at the fact that you're here “chemistry lab?” they nodded at his question “yes because it's empty at this time, she sit there so no one disturb her” “thank you!” he shouted and sprinted in the lab direction leaving your friend stunned and confused at his hurry.

along the way jisung slowed down gradually, he didn't want to arrive there disheveled from running, and maybe he was a little nervous to reach you, but he'll be damned if he let his fear get him again.

as he grew closer to the lab’s door he could hear your voice from inside followed by a laugh that made him smile to himself, but that smile faded as quickly as it appeared because the next thing he heard was another laugh that didn't sound like yours, it sounded like…a boy's laugh? he stopped in front of the door, his heart beating loudly in his ears and the world got slower around him as he reached for the door handle to open it–slowly, as to not make a sound.

he opened it enough to peek inside and every hope he had shattered in that moment, in the corner of the lab you were sitting on the ground on a mat beside a boy that looked slightly older, you two were sharing a sketchbook, you two were sitting so so close to eachother, shoulder against shoulder, knees touching and still you're leaning even more closer looking into the sketchbook, jisung felt his stomach twisting, and his chest tightened at the sight.

frowning, he bit his lips and looked away, struggling to suppress his tears–and just as slowly he closed the door without making a sound and walked away, he felt stupid with all the hope he had, you two didn't know eachother for long, it was foolish of him to think you'd return his feelings, he scoffed at himself and went to his lecture.

“thank you for helping me with this, kevin.” you thanked the boy beside you—kevin—as you stood up, “don't mention it, I'm happy to help anytime.” he smiled at you and stood up as well, “I'm always here in case you need anything else okay?” you nodded, grateful for his offer “I'll keep that in mind, thank you.” you waved goodbye to him and went to your lecture.

your eyes were glued to the clock on the wall, leg bouncing in anticipating for the lecture to end, the professor was talking about something that you didn't pay any attention to–you couldn't anyway because all that was on your mind is getting out of here and meeting with jisung, your heart skipped a beat just thinking about it.

as soon as the professor let you go, you were the first out of the room, smiling widely as you walked fast to your meeting spot. you looked around the corner quickly, eyes full of excitement and the same smile, but the place was empty and he wasn't anywhere around, so you decided to wait for him, maybe he's just a little late?

before you realize it, the next lecture was about to start and he didn't show up, you feel a little disappointed and worried at the same time “something must have happened with him…yeah, I'll go check on him later” you think to yourself as you pick up your things. you sent him a message on your way that you kept checking the entire time, but still..no reply, you frowned looking at your screen one more time–now you're really starting to get worried, he wasn't the kind to not reply for too long.

“what's wrong?” you hear your friend whisper beside you, you look at them with the same worried look “it's just..” you show them your phone screen “i haven't seen jisung all day and he's not responding, I'm kinda worried..” they looked at your phone screen in confusion “..but he came looking for you this morning” your eyebrows shot up in surprise and you leaned up closer to them “what? what did he say??” your friend looked taken aback “um..he asked where you were and i told him you were in chemistry lab..” your frowned in confusion “that's it? then why..” you hear someone clear their throat and look up to see your professor looking at you two, you apologize and sit back.

you wonder back to the early morning, if jisung was already here why hadn't you seen him anywhere….or was he avoiding you? have you done something this morning..forgot something..you started remembering your time at chemistry lab, you were with kevin and then– then what? you don't remember anything happened after that…you need to clear things up with him

half an hour has gone by when you finally found han jisung, he was heading out, head down and his guitar on his back, you ran to catch up to him “jisung!” you yelled, putting your hand on his shoulder and turning him around, he looked at you startled–almost nervous “i- can we talk?” you hesitantly took your hand off of his shoulder looking at him with a worried look. he looked away, fidgeting with his guitar strap “i don't–i have to go, i don't have time I'm sorry” he said quickly before walking away without waiting for you to say something, you ended up just standing there watching him disappear with the sea of people.

that night you two returned home with too many thoughts and broken hearts, both of you couldn't sleep – overthinking every little thing that happened that day, he had your chat open wondering what went wrong or had he read every signal wrong? tears started to build up in his eyes making his vision blurry, he took a deep breath and wiped his eyes as he locked his phone “fuck why am i crying” he whisper to himself trying to suppress his tears “we didn't know eachother thay long i…there's no reason to be sad i didn't even ask her if —” he turned around burying his face in the pillow, shoulders shaking slightly as he tried to go to sleep and forget everything.

the next day he tried to avoid you again, whenever he saw you he would change his way or walked faster out of there, he didn't show up anywhere he knew you would be in, never walked in front of any room you might have a lecture in, he just..wasn't ready to see you again, just the image of you feels like a fresh cut in his heart, it might be dramatic but he can't help it, he still has strong feelings for you and he can't help it

but that doesn't mean you'll back up either, you won't let his idiocity make him slip out of your hands, you're going to make things right even if it means chasing him everytime he ran away, until you get an opportunity, until —

“have you heard? they say there's going to be a talent show in our university” you stopped in your tracks when you heard some students talking, “really? what kind of talent show?” “i don't know but i heard theater and music majors are participating…” you stopped listening as soon as you heard music major, jisung would definitely be in it, so he must be busy practicing somewhere, this is your chance to corner him and finally clear things up!

good thing you have a free period at this time because this searching mission is taking too long, you have looked through every empty room and asked around until someone finally helped you find him, now you were standing in the doorway watching him fiddle with his guitar and writing something down. you slowly walk in, trying not to startle him until you were a few feets away from him “um..jisung?” you said in a low voice, yet he still jumped a little before turning to look at you with wide eyes, you gave him an awkward smile trying to soften the tension between you.

jisung turned away immediately, going back to what he was doing minutes ago, your smile dropped and you felt a bit guilty for ruining his mood, but alas you need to talk with him. you sat down next to him “um..are you preparing for the talent show?” you asked, looking at what he was scribbling down in his notes, he gave you a silent nod and you looked up at his face, he didn't…look annoyed..more so..nervous?

you let out a sigh “jisung look we need to talk” his hand flatter on the guitar strings as he miss a note “about what?” he didn't look up at you, instead trying to focus on whatever he can focus on in front of him, “why are you avoiding me?” you frown, finally losing your patience, “I'm not —” “you are! i have been chasing after you for days” you voice raises a bit and he finally looks up at you “why?!” he yelled, eyes wide and filled with hurt? confusion? or both.

he picked up his things quickly and tried to walk away “there's nothing to talk about” but you were quick to grab his arm “you're not running away again, what is wrong with you? why are you acting like that?” why is he acting like that?..right, why is he even doing all of that? it's not like he told you how he feels, not like you did anything wrong, yet he couldn't stop himself from blurting it out “you should have told me” he murmured but it was loud enough for you to hear “told you? what?” he bit his lips for a second before answering “that you had someone” confusion filled you “what?” “in the chemistry lab i saw you with someone and before you say anything you were too close for casual friends” he explained quickly and you had to take a minute to understand what he meant, until it suddenly clicked for you.

“that– no what? do you mean kevin? he's my sister’s boyfriend and he helps me with art projects since he's an intern under one of the professors” in contrast to your frustrated look, jisung had a dumbfounded look on his face “..huh?” he couldn't say anything else, how something like that didn't cross his mind?

your anger deepened at his struck expressions “and what if he was someone close to me? do you just throw our friendship out the window because there's another boy in my life?” you waited for him to say anything else, anything that might excuse his behavior, maybe you were waiting for something specific but he kept looking surprised and tripping over his words until your patience ran out “ah really, forget it” you quickly turned around walking out the room and that woke jisung from his trance “no-wait! y/n!” he threw everything he was holding and ran behind you, not caring what happened to them.

you feel his hand wrap around your wrist and you don't know if you should feel relieved or more angry, you look back at him, meeting his frantic stare with a frown “wait please, I'm sorry i didn't mean for it to look like that, i wasn't going to break our friendship..” you raise an eyebrow in question “then what?” he looks down at your wrist in his hand and you can see his ears turning red “it's because i…” “you what?” as you speak he looks up and meets your eyes, now you can see his face turning red clearly, his grip tightening around your wrist and you couldn't help the softening of your eyes as you step closer to him “what is it jisung?” you feel your heart skip a beat when you look in his eyes, you two keep the eye contact for what felt like hours, and he finally *finally* opens his mouth “y/n, i…i l-”

“watch out!” someone yelled from afar before a ball hit the wall beside you, you looked at the source in shock and you see someone running in your direction “I'm sorry” they said quickly as they took the ball and ran away with their friends, you two kept looking at their direction for a few minutes before you realize you had jumped way too close to jisung. you both stammer at the same time as you step away from eachother “uh, are you okay?” he asked nervously and you nod fast at him “yeah it..it wasn't that close…um i guess I'll go? my lecture start soon so..” you take a step back “yeah, yeah of course, i uh..I'll see you later”, you give him a quick smile and turn in the opposite direction but you didn't take a few steps away before you hear him call out to you “wait!” you turn around eyes full of hope “yes?” “will you..will you be there at the show?” “oh, yes..yes I'll try to be there and….cheer for you” he gave you a quick nod as you gave a little smile and walked in your way. jisung has his heart beating in his ears *cheer for me? she said she'll cheer for me?* he repeated your words over and over again in his mind until it became weird on his tongue.

jisung has spent his next week of practicing working day and night on his song and instrument, because you'll be there, he can't get anything wrong if you'll be there, he needs to impress you, you'll go through the trouble of being there for him, cheer for him, so he'll try his best for you.

you push through the crowd of students trying to secure a first row seat, you didn't think a lot of people would be this interested in the show. “i should have come earlier” you think to yourself, but still you got a seat at the front even if it was….way into the corner.

the show started with the theater students, you wouldn't lie their performance was kind of good but you weren't here for it so you didn't bother to pay much attention to it, all you were waiting for is for han's performance to start, you have seen him play the guitar but never sing – you were excited to see how he'll do, not that you doubted him but still you didn't know what to expect.

the lights went off, leaving only one singular light focusing on the center of the stage, your heart stops when you see jisung stepping out into the light, he looked confident, seriou, unlike his usual nervous playful self. with one push on the guitar strings a backtrack started playing, he adjusted the mic in front of him before starting singing as well as playing his guitar, his voice was soft, you'd dare say even ethereal, it got you in a trance…like you were seeing a superstar.

he glanced your way and you felt your entire being get hotter, since when can he look like this? he wasn't anything like his wide-eyed self, this is a new han you're seeing and it's playing with your feelings, you could sit here and watch him sing for eternity.

after the show ended you went backstage to meet with jisung, after a few minutes of searching you hear someone calling your name and you look excitedly in its direction as you recognize the voice “jisung!” you ran up to him “you were amazing!!” you yell immediately, not giving him any space to talk “your singing, the lyrics, the instrument, everything was perfect” jisung look at you taken aback for a minute and he started getting embarrassed little by little “ah..you think so?” he asked with a shy smile, you looked at him like he was insane “what do you mean do i think so? did you not hear yourself? it was ethereal!” you took his hands in yours and look into his eyes “han, this was amazing” he couldn't help getting redder at your genuine compliments and..well, this closeness.

you hear the host getting everyone ready for the winners announcement “this fast?” you question with yourself as you let go of jisung's hands “I'll go sit back and wait-” “wait,” he instantly grab your hand “we can…we can wait together and see the winners?” he looked at you sheepishly and you wasted no time in nodding “of course! i mean I'd love to”

you stood at the side of the stage together listening the host announcing the winners, you can feel jisung's nervousness radiating from him – slowly, hesitantly you reach for his hand and take it in yours, holding it firmly, he looked at you a bit surprised and you smiled softly at him “everything is going to be okay” you whispered in reassurance, he let out a breath and looked at the host again nodding firmly to himself.

“and the winner from the music major is….from the second year, han jisung!” you two hold your breath as the name was announced, and then at the same time you look at eachother with a shocked expression that slowly turn into a wide smile of joy, then in a matter of seconds, neither of you was thinking before acting, jisung pulled you by the hand into him and placed a quick kiss on your lips before leaving you to go get his trophy.

you stood there stunned, touching your lips softly, you doubt he realized what he did. It must have been a moment of joy yet you couldn't just brush it off, you slowly looked at jisung on the stage, all happy and excited thanking everyone. you don't know how to feel when you see him coming toward you down from the stage, he gave you a big smile as he showed you his trophy, but you couldn't process anything he said, your mind still replaying what just happened between you two.

as jisung calmed down he noticed the surprised look on your face “are you okay?” he looked at you in confusion and let out a little chuckle “i mean yeah me winning is definitely something big but…you're kind of too surprised? was it this unexpected?” you blinked a few times before replying “n-no but…you,” you pointed at him “you just…we-you just kissed..me..” it was like a slow motion how jisung's face fell and turned red at your sentence “wha..what? i-uh i didn't..i mean,” he started stammering and tripping over his words as he tried to come up with an excuse, you almost pitied him at how embarrassed he looked and as you saw that he wasn't going to stop anytime soon you slowly walked up closer to him, took his face in your hands and kissed him to shut him up, which worked…instantly

you didn't linger much before you broke it off, and now it was his turn to be stunned like a fish, you let a giggle at his cute surprised face, he quickly pulled himself together as he heard you, smiling shyly instead “um..” you gave him a teasing look as he started to talk “does that mean…?..would you like to..go out with me?” he almost whispered, like he was afraid to say it out loud, that it might break a fragile moment between you two.

your hands trailed down his arms until you intertwined your fingers with his “I'd love that, han jisung.”

the breeze and the shadow was perfect as you sat down under a big tree in the campus reading your book silently, immersed in your own world until something covered your eyes suddenly “guess who am i”...or someone. you let out a sigh “i know it's you ji” you tried to suppress your smile yet you couldn't when he uncovered your eyes and leaned his head in front of you “tsk, wrong!” jisung exclaimed loudly as moved your book away and laid down on your lap “it's ’baby’ ” you laughed at how seriously he said it “hmm sure, my baby” you leaned down and put a kiss on his forehead which he looked very happy to receive, “yes, i don't know any ji” he said, narrowing his eyes at you, “that's a terrible mistake on my part” you took your book from where jisung moved it to, “right!” he said in a scolding tone, pouting a little.

“I'm sorry baby”

“okay I'll forgive you for now….what are you reading?”

“oh that…..”

and so, you spent this entire period explaining the book to jisung while he dozed off on your lap….like every other day.

I'm a "stuttering—nervous mess jisung" believer

How would he react? Would he ignore you as if he never knew you? Would he run into your arms, like you knew you'd feel the urge to do as soon as your eyes land on his? Would he just greet you politely, like you haven't already exchanged your breaths, your innocence, whispers of love, tangled your tongues and your hearts?

Did he move on?

You wouldn't blame him if he did, after all, you were the one who left him when you had promised to always stay by his side.

You called your grandparents earlier to let them know you'll be visiting, finally after so many years, you had to be there to celebrate their 60th wedding anniversary, you wouldn't miss it for anything in the world. They practically raised you while your parents worked out of the village and you always admired the tender love they had for each other, spending so many years together and going through so much that just made their bond stronger.

You were tempted to ask your grandmother about Hyunjin, what he was doing now or if he had a significant other. But, you had bitten your tongue, too scared to find out the answer to your question.

You only hoped he didn't hate you.

Hyunjin. The boy that smiled shyly at you when you were just five years old, when his mother had brought him to your house for a play date while the parents have some 'grown up time'. You returned the shy smile, playing with the fabric of your nice dress, the one your mom made you wear, saying something about a 'good impression'. The awkwardness between you disappeared pretty quickly, as soon as you showed him your favorite toys, the two of you started playing together in your yard, between all the dirt and the flowers. Your mother had scolded you later for ruining your dress but your grandmother calmed her down, telling her how the dress paled in comparison to having a good time with a new friend.

Hyunjin and you had at least two play dates a week which turned into three, then four, soon you became inseparable; especially when you started going to school together. Both of you were pretty frightened about that change, standing in front of the school gate so Hyunjin reached out to hold your hand, squeezing it reassuringly as your little cheeks became rosy.

He was your best friend, your first and last crush.

Years of being by his side, watching him grow and growing with him, you couldn't imagine your life without him. Hyunjin knew almost everything about you as you did with him and when both of you started high school, something changed.

He was growing up, he was different than before and you started looking at him differently. Before, you were used to the feeling you got when he touched your hand but now it seemed more electrifying. Hyunjin felt the same, suddenly becoming a stuttering mess next to you, staring at you with shiny eyes and a dumb smile on his face while you'd come home from school every day with butterflies in your stomach and a new diary entry to write.

You noticed how pretty his smile was, how gentle his voice sounded when he spoke your name, how his eyes were trained on your lips one too many times. Hyunjin noticed how your silky hair fell over your shoulders, the way you'd flip it back when he called out to you, how you'd smile at him with rosy cheeks.

Then one night while you were sleeping, Hyunjin couldn't hold back anymore. He sneaked out of his room, stalking down the road quietly to your house, you were only a few minutes away from his place. He stood beneath your window, his palms clammy, heart pounding against his chest, his throat completely dry. There was no going back now. You were awakened by the sounds of little stones hitting your window and confusedly you sat up, squinting towards the direction where the sound was coming from.

"What the-" you started as you stood up. You quietly walked over to your window and peeked down.

"Hyunjin?" you wondered to yourself before opening the window abruptly just as he lifted his hand up and threw another little rock, almost hitting you straight in the face but you dodged with a gasp as it landed behind you.

"Bunny! I'm so sorry!" he panicked immediately, flailing his long arms, the nickname he always used for you making your stomach flutter.

"What are you doing here? It's 2am." you asked confusedly.

"Let me come up please. I need to talk to you." Hyunjin looked nervous, shifting from one foot to the other, chewing on his lip and playing with his fingers.

"Can't this wait until the morning?" your brain was still half asleep and the chilly air from the outside made you shiver in the little nightgown you had on.

"I mean... I guess it can. It's just I don't know if I will have courage tomorrow." he mumbled, looking down and kicking around the little rocks with his foot.

"Fine. Come on up." you said and Hyunjin climbed quickly even though you scolded him, reminding him to be careful and quiet.

"Sorry." he sheepishly smiled at you when you grabbed his wrists and pulled him inside, but his foot got stuck which ended in you falling backwards on your butt and him sprawled on the floor on his hands and knees, hovering over you.

"Hyunjin!" you grunted in pain. "If my grandparents find you here-"

"I know, I know, I'm sorry!" he whispered and the two of you just sat there quietly, trying to hear if there was any indication that someone was coming to your door.

But it was dead quiet, except for the crickets outside of your house and the loud thumping of your heart so both of you let out a breath of relief.

"What did you need to tell me?" you asked after the two of you sat down, you on your bed and Hyunjin on the chair. He stood up abruptly, a shaky breath leaving his lips. Hyunjin rubbed his hands together as he looked away from you. You were suddenly worried, knowing he rarely gets this serious.

"I've been hiding this from you for a while but I can't hold it back anymore, even if you don't feel the same about me I need you to know how I feel because otherwise my chest will burst." he babbled, looking at you nervously.

"Jinnie, what are you talking about?" you asked with brows furrowed, your heartbeat picking up speed.

"I like you. More than friends. As in I'd like to kiss you and hold your hand and have it mean something more than just 'best friends'. I want to be your boyfriend." he blurted out, heart wilding in his chest as he scanned your face, looking for a reaction.

Your lips parted as you stared at him quietly for a moment, trying to process what he was saying. Your dear, sweet Jinnie who you were in love with for years was confessing to you? Looking so nervous and adorable, telling you he wants to kiss you and be yours?

You wished you could scream. So, you did just that. You grabbed your pillow and muffled your excited scream with it as Hyunjin stared at you with wide eyes.

"Um. Are you okay?" he chuckled awkwardly.

"Not really." you shook your head. "Sorry, it's just... I like you too, Jinnie. And I'd love to kiss you and be yours."

"Oh." he stood awkwardly in place like he wasn't expecting a positive answer.

"Are you gonna kiss me now?" you asked sheepishly after a moment of silence.

"Can I?" he looked excited and nervous as he came closer to you and you stood up slowly, nodding at him.

"I- You know I've never kissed anyone before." he said quietly.

"Me neither. It's okay." you gently took his hand in yours and Hyunjin felt the familiar comfort you always gave to him, reaching into his soul even now.

You stared into each other's eyes for a moment, letting the dust settle and the reality sink in, smiles creeping up on your faces as you slowly leaned in. Lips against lips pressed together and your eyes fluttered shut, your entire body buzzing.

Hyunjin squeezed your hand, his other hand tentatively touching the side of your waist as you placed your hand on his chest, feeling his rapid heartbeat underneath your fingers.

Everything fell into place then, you were his and he was yours-

"Miss? Miss, we're here." you snapped out of your reminiscing session as the driver pulled up to your grandparents house. You almost forgot how tiny the village is, how cozy and familiar all of it is. The dirt roads you walked on, mostly with Hyunjin by your side, the little forest that led to a clearing you used for picnic dates and stargazing, your grandmother's colorful garden, the porch she always sat on, admiring the flowers she helped grow. Even the air smelled familiar and it was almost as if you had never left.

"Let me help with your bags." the man said as you walked out of the car, taking a deep breath of fresh air into your lungs.

"Thank you." you said as he pulled out your suitcase. "Careful with those, please!" you added as the driver struggled, finally managing to put both of your suitcases down.

You missed the annoyed look he gave you while you put on your lipgloss, making sure your lips were nice and plump as you checked yourself out in the little pocket mirror.

"Oh, right." you remembered. "Here." you opened your wallet and grabbed some bills, paying the driver and leaving him a nice tip.

Before you could close your wallet, something caught your eye. A little picture of you and Hyunjin, where he was holding you from behind, both of your faces rosy with big smiles as you were chuckling together. You sighed and closed your wallet quickly, shoving it into your bag.

"Thanks for the tip, miss. Have a nice day." the man rounded his car.

"You too." you waved and he turned on his car while you stepped back as the screeching tires lifted up the dirt.

"Ugh." you made a disgusted face, turning around to pull your suitcases with you. After a struggle with the luggage, you managed to finally make the little wheels roll as you walked into the driveway of your childhood home.

"Shit!" your heart leaped out of your chest when your foot got stuck and you pulled, gasping once again when you realized your heel broke.

"Great. Just what I need." you rolled your eyes. Not a good beginning to this visit, you thought.

"Oh, she's here!" you heard the warm, familiar voice belonging to your grandma.

"Nana!" you called out to your grandma as she made her way to you, surprisingly agile for her age. "Oh!" you gasped when she gave you a bone crushing hug.

"Oh, how I missed you my child!" she was already pinching your cheeks as you groaned, noticing your grandfather had just walked out on the porch.

"There's my favorite grandchild." he said with a wink and you shook your, chuckling.

"Of course I'm your favorite when I'm the only one." you laughed quietly and grandma shushed you.

"Don't ruin his jokes, it makes him happy." she nudged you with a wink and you nodded.

"Come here." your grandpa kissed your cheeks, taking a moment to look at you.

"You look all serious and business-y." he said and you chuckled, looking down at your attire.

You were still wearing the suit you'd usually wear to work and the heels that were now broken.

"My heel broke." you remembered and you grandma started laughing.

"Honey, you can forget about heels here. I hope you brought some comfortable shoes that are dirt friendly." she joked as your grandpa helped with your luggage.

As soon as you walked into the house, you were hit with an even bigger wave of nostalgia than the one slowly building in your soul while you drove towards the village. They haven't changed almost anything, all the decoration was the same, everything smelled the same and familiar, like the home you grew up in never changed.

Like you never changed.

"Are you hungry, my child?"

"Oh yes." you nodded at your grandma eagerly, happy to be eating her home-cooked food.

"Good, wash your hands and join us for dinner."

She gave you some house slippers as you threw your poor broken heels aside and after washing your hands, you joined them at the table.

"So, how is the big city treating you?" your grandpa asked and you caught them up on your work, friends, your apartment, anything about the city you thought was worth mentioning.

"How are things here?" you asked after they listened to you, interested in your new experiences.

"Oh, you know. There is always something to do here. We have the house, the garden, the chickens, the goats. We are not as young and strong as we were once before but we are used to working. Plus, someone always comes to help out." nana explained.

"Like who?" you asked absentmindedly, chewing on the salad.

"Well, do you remember Chan? He was always a nice boy, that one. He got married recently but he still comes to help out with some repairs the house needs."

"Chan got married? Wow." you chuckled, it made sense. He had the same girlfriend for years and he was older than you so you weren't that surprised.

"And of course, Hyunjin." you grandma gave you a knowing smile as your entire body froze and you almost choked on your salad.

"Hyunjin got married?!" you spat out and your grandma gasped and then started laughing.

"No, dear, no." she chuckled at your reaction. "I meant Hyunjin comes here to help a lot. He repainted the entire kitchen and living room. Helps out with the animals and the garden when he isn't working on his farm. Or working around with other people, helping them build their houses and things like that."

"Oh..." you swallowed. "So, you see him a lot?"

"Yeah, almost every day!" grandpa chuckled. "He even joined us for breakfast this morning."

You suddenly felt a knot forming in your stomach. Hyunjin spent more time in your home, with your family than you did.

"Does he... does he have someone? You know. A partner." your voice broke a little as you blinked your tears away. You hated how you always cried easily, especially when it's about Hyunjin.

"No, he only works." your grandma frowned. "That boy never stops from early in the morning until late night hours. He just works and works his days away."

Somehow, that made you feel a little more at ease even though your heart still hurt.

"He asks about you, you know." grandma added.

You almost choked on your food again.

"He does?" you swallowed quickly, deciding that your appetite is now gone.

"Yeah. He asks if you're healthy, if you're doing good."

"Oh."

The weight of your grandma's words settled in your heart, heavy like a rock even as you tried to distract yourself with washing dishes and helping her clean up.

"Your room is the same as it was always. We never touched or removed anything." your grandma smiled at you, her hand gentle on your cheek.

"You should go see Hyunjin." she added.

"I- Maybe later." your throat dried up and you needed a moment to yourself, a moment to gather your thoughts. You walked up the stairs to your room as soon as you finished cleaning up, pulling your suitcases up with you. When the door creaked open, you were greeted by your past.

Your grandparents really left everything intact.

You stopped in your tracks after closing the door, too scared to move so you wouldn't disrupt the memories you were witnessing in your mind. Countless times Hyunjin and you spent here, ever since you were kids all the way up to the end of high school and the summer before you left for good. He was everywhere in that room. He sat on your windowsill, he paced around the floor, he swayed backwards on your chair (falling on his butt one too many times), he laid on your bed, kissing you and telling you how much he loves you.

There were polaroid pictures of you on the left side of your table, the drawings he gave you as a gift, your favorite teddy bear he got you for your one year anniversary still propped up against your pillows... You opened your drawer and found your diaries, his name scribbled on the pages, on your heart. You picked up one of the polaroids as your other hand automatically went to your chest. The couple necklaces you shared, one half of a heart was still around your neck, hidden under your shirt and close to your heart, the other one was still with him or maybe it wasn't. Maybe he threw it away after you left and never came back, not even returning his calls or texts.

"Hyunjin..." you whispered as you smiled at the picture, him with his hair over his eyes trying to make a scary face and you in the back, your hands on his shoulders as you stood on your tippy toes and put your tongue out, making a silly face.

Suddenly, you were overcome by emotions and tears spilled from your eyes. You loved him your entire life. And even if you tried to escape that feeling, you never really could. Hyunjin grew roots inside your heart and he wasn't going anywhere any time soon. You let yourself cry for a moment, hugging the teddy bear as you sat on your bed.

Should you go see him?

He has every right to be mad at you and you were scared of him turning a cold shoulder. But then again, your grandma said he asks for you. Maybe he is just curious?

Either way, you weren't ready to face him yet.

You decided to unpack and shower, change into something more comfortable and hopefully catch up on sleep.

But as soon as you got into your bed, sleep wouldn't come to you, no matter how quiet and peaceful the village was in comparison to the city and how comfortable your old bed was. Your mind drifted off to that night when Hyunjin snuck in, right before your prom.

Six years ago

"Hey, little bunny." Hyunjin had climbed through the window that you left open for him, knocking down one of your books from the shelf next to it in the process.

"Hyun!" you scolded him with a chuckle.

"I know, I know. I'm trying to be quiet." he whispered, lifting his arms up in defeat.

"Come here, clumsy." you giggled and he practically skipped to you, his long arms wrapping around your smaller frame and pulling you into him.

"I'm so excited for tomorrow." your voice was muffled by his chest and he chuckled.

"Me too. I hope I don't step on your toes." he grimaced and you looked up at him, your fingers tangled in his long dark hair.

"You won't. You're a great dancer and we practiced a lot." you smiled, caressing the back of his neck and Hyunjin melted, his arms tightening around you.

"Yes, but when I'm nervous I can't control my body." he whined with a pout. "There will be other people there, looking at us and-"

"You'll do fine, trust me." you interrupted his nervous babbling. "Just imagine it's the two of us, like right now." you swayed slowly and he followed you, exhaling and pressing his forehead against yours.

"I love you, little bunny." he whispered.

"I love you too, Jinnie." you whispered back and his lips were on yours instantly. Hands explored awkwardly as you were backed into your bed, falling down with Hyunjin on top of you. You had messed around like this before, his hands under your nightgown, fingers dipping into your underwear, your hand wrapped around his length.

"H-Hyunjin?" you whimpered as he slowly pumped his fingers inside you, kissing your neck.

"Yes, doll?" he whispered back, the nickname giving you shivers.

"I'm ready. For... you know. I wanna go all the way with you." you bit on your lip as his eyes widened.

"Are you- are you sure? I can wait for you for however long you need. You don't have to feel pressured." he shook his head, pulling his fingers out.

"No, no. I am sure. I love you and I want to be yours completely." you gripped at his shoulders and Hyunjin's heart leaped out of his chest as he smiled sweetly at you.

"I want to be yours completely too. Be your first and your last. And you mine."

"Jinnie." you almost started crying from the overwhelming feelings, your lips quickly finding his. Hyunjin was a little awkward, unsure of himself and scared that he'll hurt you or do something wrong but he was still gentle, trying to put you first even though he was more excited than ever to have you like this and be connected with you.

"I have condoms in the drawer." you pointed at the nightstand and he narrowed his eyes at you.

"You were planning this?" his face became as red as a tomato.

"I mean, yeah." you nodded, the color of your cheeks matching his. "I've wanted this with you for some time but I was nervous to tell you." you admitted.

"You're so cute, bunny." Hyunjin giggled, caressing your cheek gently with his knuckles.

"Ugh." you groaned in embarrassment while he kept chuckling, reaching for the drawer.

The moment he started pushing in, the world around you disappeared and you were concentrated only on him.

"Does it hurt?" Hyunjin asked as he kept filling you up gently.

"A little." you gasped, it was definitely a bigger stretch than his fingers.

"I'm sorry." he looked guilty immediately. "Do you want me to stop?"

"N-no. Keep going." you whispered, holding onto his upper back.

Hyunjin's eyes fluttered shut when he bottomed out inside you, his entire body was buzzing, his heart was beating fast and he was trying to gather all the mental and physical strength not to finish too quickly.

"Y/n." he gasped when he finally opened his eyes and looked at you, a sweet lovestruck expression on your face, your eyes sparkling, all for him, all his.

"Hyunjin." you moaned at the way he felt inside you and the way he looked at you, like you hung all the stars in the sky just for him.

"I adore you, bunny." Hyunjin said gently and your heart bursted right then and there.

"I adore you too." you whispered back.

He slowly started moving inside you, whispering words of love and praise the entire time as you clutched onto him and returned his praises.

You've never felt like that before, completely and utterly loved by him, connected with him.

Which made it harder for you to give him the news you were supposed to tomorrow after prom.

Present time

You were rudely awakened at 5am when the rooster in your nana's backyard started crowing loudly.

"Ugh!" you forgot about all the charms of living in a village as you grabbed the pillow and put it over your face, a muffled 'shut up' pressed into it. You waited for a few moments, throwing the pillow aside and turning to your left, coming face to face with the teddy bear Hyunjin gave you, which of course you named 'Jinnie' back then, making your boyfriend laugh adoringly at you.

"Good morning, Jinnie." you said to the teddy, pulling the plushie closer to you as you hugged it and sighed. "Guess I should get up." you added with a shrug before stretching and then getting up.

You opened up your wardrobe, choosing to wear a red dress with a dainty floral print on it and got ready in your room, listening to music just like you did every day before school or a date with your boyfriend years ago. You opened up another drawer in your table and gasped when you saw the corsage that Hyunjin gave to you when he came to pick you up before prom.

You clutched it in your hand and thought back to that night, when Hyunjin came to pick you up.

Six years ago

To say Hyunjin was nervous was an understatement. He felt as if every atom of his being was about to burst into little pieces when he rang your doorbell. He was a wreck as he kept wiping his sweaty palms against his jacket, annoyed at the fact that no matter how many deep breaths he took, his heart was still hammering against his chest, ready to burst. Why was he so nervous? It was just you, his little bunny.

Oh, but he wasn't ready and he was right to be so nervous because as soon as your grandma opened the door with a smile, ushering him in, his eyes landed on you and they widened. Hyunjin felt as if the world stopped spinning, all the clocks stopped ticking, his heart quit beating and his breath got stuck in his throat. You became the only center of gravity, pulling him in towards you and nothing else around the two of you mattered.

He was completely and utterly floored and whipped for you.

Hyunjin finally understood the meaning of the word 'breathtaking' because that was the only thing that came to mind as you smiled at him so beautifully, so in love, so happy, wearing the most gorgeous dress he'd ever seen you in.

"Y/n." was the only thing he managed to say and you chuckled, your heart swelling at his reaction.

It was your turn to gawk as he came closer to you, you'd never seen him wearing a suit before and he looked even more handsome than he ever did. Your knees buckled when he stood close to you, the smell of his cologne was intoxicating but his lovestruck smile was even more mesmerizing.

Your grandparents smiled lovingly at the two of you before glancing at each other knowingly as Hyunjin gave you your corsage, gently putting it on your wrist. So many pictures were taken before you had to rush out so you wouldn't be late to the dance.

The night was magical and everything seemed possible under the fairy lights as Hyunjin and you swayed to the gentle melody of the familiar song coming from the speakers.

"Do you want to slip out after our song?" Hyunjin's plump lips brushed against your ear as he pulled you tighter into his heated body.

"Won't the chaperones notice?" you asked as you looked up at him only to find him smirking.

"We'll be stealthy." he said and you giggled.

"Right, stealthy."

"Yes, see I didn't even step on your foot!"

"Not yet." you teased him and Hyunjin pouted, whining and burying his face in your shoulder.

"Mean bunny." he tickled your sides, making you squirm and squeal.

"Fine, sorry." you giggled, knowing he wasn't actually offended. "You did a great job." you added and Hyunjin looked up at you with a sweet smile, his cheeks rosy.

"Thank you, doll. You did too." he smirked, brushing his lips against yours.

You managed to sneak out somehow while everyone was dancing to a quicker beat and you knew exactly where you were going; to your favorite spot with Hyunjin, the path to it so familiar that you could walk through it blind, the soil remembering all your footsteps.

"Hyune, um... I'm wearing heels." you whispered as he shined the path ahead with a little pocket flashlight.

"Oh, right." he thought for a moment before kneeling down. "Get on my back, doll."

"Are you sure?" you asked and he chuckled.

"Of course." he nodded eagerly and you climbed up on his back, feeling light and happy, giggles spilling from both of your lips. "Hold this." Hyunjin gave you the light and you shined it ahead as he gripped the back of your thighs and carried you.

Being a little tease, Hyunjin pretended he was going to drop you a few times only to have you almost scream as your arms wrapped tighter around him.

"Stop that!" you whined.

"Sorry, sorry bunny. I'll stop. You're just so cute." he smirked.

"If you weren't carrying me right now, you'd be in big trouble." you scolded and Hyunjin let out a laugh, your favorite tree coming into view.

"Yes, I know. Biiiig trouble." he kept chuckling and you were this close to biting his shoulder.

"Here we are, bunny." he gently put you down and wrapped his arm around you as the two of you stared at the carving in the trunk.

Hyunjin + Y/n.

Both of you laughed then, you had carved your names in when you were barely 16 and seeing it now was equally as embarrassing as it was sweet.

"Y/n?"

"Yeah?" you looked up at Hyunjin and he smiled sweetly at you.

"I promise I'll love you forever." he whispered, lifting his pinky and you giggled.

"I promise I'll love you forever too, my sweet Jinnie." you whispered back, your pinky curling around his.

Hyunjin chuckled in delight and pulled you into a sweet kiss.

You didn't have the heart to tell him you got into uni and would be leaving the village in September.

Present time

You had to go visit the tree.

"Fuck." you cursed, angrily wiping your tears away, before putting the corsage back into the drawer and slamming it shut.

Too many memories.

You quickly made your way downstairs where your nana was already serving breakfast.

"Oh, I thought you'd be sleeping more, dear." she lifted her brows in surprise.

"I thought so too." you joked, giving her a pointed look and she laughed.

"I see you forgot how it is here." nana shook her head. "When you haven't been around for so long."

"I'm sorry." you grimaced, sitting down to eat with her. "I know I should've visited more. I got caught up in studies and work and-"

"Breathe, dear." your grandma squeezed your hand with a chuckle. "It's not me who you should be explaining this to."

You gulped, knowing she was referring to Hyunjin.

"Where's grandpa?" you asked.

"He's out back, working."

"I was thinking of going for a walk before lunch. I'll make sure to come back though to help out."

"Sure, dear. You haven't been here for so long, you should catch up with the place and the people." grandma nodded with a wink and that was exactly what you planned to do.

It was around 7am when you finally walked out of the house, inhaling the fresh air you were deprived of in the big city. It was a bit chilly in the morning so you draped a light jacket over your shoulders and let your legs lead you through the familiar streets.

You still didn't want to see Hyunjin so you went the opposite direction of his house, trying to stick to the shadows for now, just to have a little more peace to yourself and mentally prepare for the inevitable encounters of everyone you grew up with.

It was painful. Walking all the familiar paths you walked through before with him, it was as if you could hear his laughter echoing down the street. Your heart squeezed in your chest when you realized just where your legs had taken you.

The tree.

It was still there, as tall as ever, its branches familiar as you and Hyunjin had laid under them multiple times, kissing, talking, laughing, holding each other close. You walked closer, your eyes brimming with tears when you saw the carving. Hyunjin + Y/n. Forever.

The word you had added that night after prom.

You cursed yourself mentally for crying again and being so overcome with emotions. You couldn't stand there for too long and were about to leave when something caught your eye. Another carving, smaller and almost unnoticeable on the right side of yours. You leaned in closer to inspect it and your heart almost stopped.

Hyunjin.

Nothing else, just his name was carved into the wood and you felt fresh tears forming in your eyes. Leaving was definitely a mistake, maybe the biggest mistake you ever made, especially after the let down you experienced in the city. You wiped your tears away again and decided to leave the tree be, your heart hurting at the thought of Hyunjin sitting under the branches alone, carving his name and wondering why you had never called back or came to see him. You walked away, back down the path and into the village, deep in your thoughts. Lost in the memories of what once was you didn't even realize where you came, as your legs walked on autopilot.

Only when the familiar light blue house came into view, you snapped from your thoughts, eyes wide and heart dropping into your stomach.

"Shit!" you whisper-yelled. This was the only house you wanted to avoid and yet you were standing right in front of it. As far as you knew, Hyunjin's parents didn't live there anymore, he was living in the big house completely alone, his only companions his animals.

Your knees almost gave out as you stared, before getting spooked when you heard barking. A big black dog ran to the fence, barking at you in warning. You had never seen it before so Hyunjin must've gotten it after you went to the city. You backed away as the dog kept barking at you in a not-so-friendly manner. You turned and started walking away, hoping Hyunjin didn't hear that or wasn't home because you still weren't ready to see him let alone talk to him.

Then, you heard a familiar voice.

"Easy girl, easy." you assumed he was talking to the dog as the barking subsided immediately and you stopped in your tracks.

"Well, well." you heard then. "If it isn't little bunny."

Your heart leaped out of your chest. You hadn't heard that nickname in years.

"Don't even wanna say hi?" Hyunjin continued and you heard the sound of the little fence door opening. Slowly, you turned around and basically almost fainted.

This wasn't your sweet, shy and little Jinnie. You almost didn't recognize him as you stared at him with eyes wide and mouth agape.

His long hair was gone, replaced by a neat buzzcut that was also bleached, he had piercings on his ears, his arms were big and muscular, a few tattoos here and there, visible in the tanktop he wore. He looked taller, bigger, more manly. Your knees buckled and the more you looked at him the more you felt lightheaded.

Hyunjin smirked, noticing how you were salivating and a little chuckle escaped his lips.

"Gonna catch flies like that." he teased and you closed your mouth, attempting to compose yourself as you stood up straighter. His eyes then traveled all over your frame, the teasing glint inside them turning into something softer until they fell on the necklace and he felt as if the ground underneath his feet almost gave out.

You were still wearing it. Just like he was, his half heart hidden under his top.

"Hi." you said quietly. "You look different."

"A lot can change in six years." he stated, still keeping a good distance away from you.

"It can." you stepped back, feeling suffocated by his presence as you tried to read his face and tone of voice. Was there anger? Regret? Did he resent you?

"You're different too." a small smile appeared on his lips.

"How so?" you tilted your head to the left, thinking how you pretty much looked the same since the end of high school.

"You've gotten even more beautiful." Hyunjin said like it was nothing and you were sure you were having a heart attack in that moment.

"I- That- Thank you." you had no idea what to say. "I have to go... Help nana with lunch. And stuff."

Hyunjin smiled wider.

"I'll see you later then, bunny."

"Sure." you turned around so quickly that you almost snapped your neck. Hyunjin watched with bathed breath as you scurried away from him.

You finally came back.

-

"Did you see Hyunjin?" nana asked as you helped her clean around the kitchen after lunch.

"Accidentally, yes." you said and she chuckled.

"I never understood why you broke up, you two are made for each other." she said and you almost dropped the plate you were holding.

"We didn't... actually break up. I just left."

"I thought you were still together back then, I was wondering why he never went to visit you or you him. I only realized you weren't together once he asked me if I knew where you lived in the city. Which I forgot the address, dear, so I hope I didn't do anything wrong by not telling him."

"No, no, nana. You did nothing wrong. It was my fault. I thought I was doing the right thing. But I'm not so sure anymore." your eyes welled up with tears as you clutched onto the counter.

"Oh, honey." your grandma was instantly by your side.

"I told him I would come back. I wouldn't be surprised if he hated me now and wanted nothing to do with me." you sniffled as nana wiped your tears away.

"Oh dear, Hyunjin doesn't hate you. He talks very fondly of you always. That boy still loves you."

"He- He does?" you thought back to your encounter today.

"A love like that doesn't disappear overnight. Or over the span of six years." your grandma teased, making you chuckle through your tears.

"If you say so."

"Talk to him. He is coming to dinner tonight anyways." she announced.

"He is what?!" you almost yelled.

"He usually joins us for dinner. At least a few days in the week."

You panicked immediately.

"I have to go get ready then!"

Nana bursted into laughter as she watched you frantically run up the stairs.

"What was that about?" grandpa came in, looking up at the metaphorical dust that you left behind after running.

"Oh you know. Love." grandma winked at him and he shook his head with a smile.

Shit.

Hyunjin is coming over for dinner. You had to look your best.

You've gotten even more beautiful.

His words rang in your head and your cheeks became red instantly, heart beating hard in your chest. You quickly opened your wardrobe and began throwing clothes everywhere, your room soon looking as if a tornado had passed through it. You tried on multiple outfits but with every single one you found something wrong. The color was too bright, the shirt was too big, the pants looked weird...

So you settled on another dress, a pretty and white flowy one with yellow flowers on it, the shape of it accentuating your frame, your bare legs on display. You decided to wear heels too and put on some makeup. You were so nervous as if you hadn't already been his.

While you were doing your hair, you stared into your reflection and remembered that warm summer night when you told Hyunjin you were leaving.

Six years ago

Hyunjin and you sat on a blanket, staring up at the stars shimmering in the dark sky.

"Jinnie." you swallowed nervously.

"Yes, bunny?" he smiled, playing with your fingers.

"I have something to tell you."

"Oh? Okay." he nodded, sitting up.

"Um. It's been weighing on me since prom."

"You sound serious." Hyunjin's expression turned into one of worry.

"It is serious. And I didn't tell you earlier because I was afraid of how you'd react." your heart started beating fast. "I got into my uni of choice."

"Bunny! You did?" he smiled wide. "Why didn't you tell me that? You know I support you and I'm proud of you."

"I know. It's just that... I'm leaving and I don't know when I'll be back." you said. "We talked about this briefly before but... I don't want to stay in the village. There is nothing for me here, I mean career wise. Meanwhile... You decided to work with your father and build your life here."

Hyunjin's smile dropped.

"What are you saying?" his voice sounded strained.

"Are we... Are we breaking up?" he asked, tears forming in his eyes.

"No. No. I don't want to. I don't know." you bit your lip and looked away from him.

"Y/n. Please, don't do this. I've known no one but you my whole life. You're the one I love and the one I promised forever to. We even talked about building a life together, getting married, having kids."

"I know, I know. You're my first love, Jinnie. And those were all nice daydreams but there comes a time when you need to grow up."

"Daydreams? Bunny. Those were plans." his bottom lip trembled and he frowned. "This really sounds like you're breaking up with me."

"No, no." tears started spilling down your cheeks when you saw the hurt in his eyes and realized how harsh your words sounded. "Just... I'm confused. I don't know what to do." you put your hands over your face, a sob escaping your lips.

Hyunjin's eyes softened and he put his hand on your upper back, gently caressing you.

"Hey, look. I know you're scared now, this is a big change. But, we'll figure it out together. You go finish your studies, do what you always wanted to. But please don't throw away what we have. I'll always wait for you, I'll wait until you come visit or I can visit you. We can call each other, we don't have to grow apart in order for you to grow."

"I guess not." his words hit you hard as you looked up at him.

"Don't cry, baby. I love you and I'm so happy for you. I'm so proud of my little bunny." he talked, wiping your tears away.

"Jinnie. I love you too." you clutched onto his shirt and cried into his chest.

Oh, how you were going to miss him.

Present time

But after you left, you never even contacted him.

You knew how cruel that was but you thought it was for the best. If you were going to build a life in the city and he was going to stay behind in the village, it was better off like this.

Childhood crushes and high school sweethearts don't always last, do they?

But, your heart hurt so badly every day you were away from Hyunjin. You wanted to forget him, stop loving him but you couldn't no matter how hard you tried. Every time you thought you were ready to take off the couple necklace, your hands would stop functioning. You couldn't bring yourself to do that, the necklace felt as if it was a part of you and despite being away from Hyunjin you knew your heart would always belong to him.

With a sigh, you finished getting ready, wondering if he could really still love you after you'd hurt him like that.

Before you could come down, you heard voices under your window and you stalked towards it curiously. It was closed so you couldn't understand what they were saying but Hyunjin stood there with your grandpa, his back turned to you. You gasped a little, noticing then how his shoulders and upper back also got wider, the black shirt he wore almost ripping at the seams.

"Give me strength." you prayed to whoever was listening before you decided to stop hiding and finally made your way downstairs.

"Yes, I'll definitely ask Chan to help out with the fence, I think he won't be busy this weekend." Hyunjin said to your grandpa as they walked into the kitchen.

"Great! That's settled then!" grandpa clapped his hands with a satisfied smile. Hyunjin looked up at you then and stopped walking, giving you the elevator eyes.

"Good evening." he smirked a little.

"Evening." you said breathlessly and you grandma chuckled.

"Why are you two acting so formal?" grandpa asked as you sat down.

"Leave them be. They just encountered each other after a long time." nana scolded him and he gave a little shrug.

Hyunjin was sitting right across from you and you felt as if there was nowhere to hide. He kept looking at you curiously and you felt so awkward, trying to avoid his eyes as all of you started taking food out on the plates and eating.

Hyunjin couldn't calm his heart down. All the feelings that he carried inside of him every single day, from dawn to late night, were now amplified a thousand times. All those nights he had thought about you and seen you in his dreams couldn't compare to you actually being in front of him. He couldn't tear his eyes away from you, he missed you deeply. The love he always had for you never subsided, it only grew more even while you were apart.

Though, he knew that there were things the two of you needed to talk about, he decided not to think about the hurtful side of it, tossing it in the back of his mind as he continued to bask in your presence. Your hair, your eyes, your smile, your hands, the way your brows creased when you asked a question to your nana, the way you looked up at him timidly only to look away, the way you nervously chewed on your bottom lip, the way that necklace he gave you laid on your skin, still there, as if you had never left, a sign that you perhaps still loved him as much as he loved you.

"So, how is the city treating ya?" Hyunjin asked you suddenly, eyes trained on you as they have been the entire evening.

"It's... okay." you answered but Hyunjin knew you were lying. He knew when you wore a fake smile and he knew the tone of your voice once you tried to convince yourself you're fine.

"Oh yeah? Got that job you always wanted, hm?" he asked and you looked up at him, trying to see if he was mocking you or resenting you but he looked genuinely curious.

"I did." you answered shortly, a knot forming in your stomach. "I got what I wanted." you forced another smile.

"I'm glad you did." he smiled and you felt the urge to cry again. You wondered what was wrong with you and shook your head, trying to will yourself to smile back at him.

"I always thought the two of you would get married." your nana chimed in, making you almost choke on a piece of bread. Hyunjin chuckled and looked at you.

"We're still young." he smirked a little and you started praying that the floor opens up and swallows you whole.

"You two remind me of us when we were younger." grandpa nodded with a smile.

No, you thought, please stop.

You were really going to start crying.

"Excuse me. I need some air." you stood up abruptly, the chair almost falling over behind you.

Hyunjin watched as you ran out of the front door and he stood up too, excusing himself and following you.

You stood on the porch, hugging yourself and sniffling.

"Y/n?" Hyunjin approached you cautiously. You quickly wiped your tears away with the sleeve of your cardigan before turning to look at him.

"You okay?" he asked.

"Sure." you nodded but he knew you were crying.

"You wanna take a walk?" Hyunjin asked, biting on his lip and you chuckled, shaking your head.

"Yeah, why not." you nodded, maybe it was time to stop avoiding him.

You didn't even discuss where you were going to go, you just started walking together in the same direction you always did while you grew up here. It was quiet for a while, only the song of the crickets filling up your ears, a few distant barks and the breeze rustling through the leaves.

"So, what have you been doing?" you asked, trying to break the ice. You couldn't believe you felt so awkward with someone you could talk to the easiest with, out of anyone in your entire life.

"Me? Oh, you know... Working around the farm. I repaired the entire house with some of my mates. It was in a really bad shape, if you remember. We re-did everything, even the roofing and the pipes. Repainted the entire place, changed the furniture... So, it's now like a new house. And I have horses and chickens. A garden. I mean, I work all day, help out others too." he chuckled. "My parents are in the city, they visit sometimes. But, mostly I'm here with Rina, she has been my best friend for three years now."

"Rina?" your stomach dropped instantly.

"Yes, that overprotective black dog that barked at you." Hyunjin smirked at your expression.

"Oh... That's Rina." you said absentmindedly, finally glancing at him.

Your heart stopped.

The necklace. He must've unbuttoned one more button while you were walking, making the other half of the heart visible under his collarbone. He never stopped wearing it either. Suddenly, your stomach filled up with butterflies.

"She's wary of strangers coming near me."

Ouch.

"Yeah." you turned away, the butterflies turning into a feeling of nausea.

"I mean, strangers to her." Hyunjin clarified, realizing how he sounded.

"Yeah, I understand." you gave him a smile you hoped looked real, because you were seconds away from crying. "You still paint?" you decided to change the subject.

"Oh yeah, all the time." he smiled. "Enough about me. What about you?"

"Me? I also work all day. In the office. It's... interesting, I guess. I bought an apartment recently, it's really modern." you talked, realizing how empty your words sounded then. You had no idea what to tell Hyunjin. He had all these projects and people who care about him, animals he cares for and his hobbies. Meanwhile, all you had was a job you ended up hating and no one to come home to.

"I travel a lot." you added, trying to fill up the silence. "For work but also for fun, with some of my coworkers. We went all the way to Bali last year. It was a fun trip, you know. Stuff like that."

"Sounds exhilarating." Hyunjin said, sounding anything but. "Anyone special in your life?"

Why did he ask that.

"No, nobody." you quickly answered.

Hyunjin was hoping you'd say that.

"Good. I mean- Me neither." he coughed awkwardly and stopped walking. You were about to ask why he stopped when you noticed where you were.

"Oh." you let out a chuckle, your face warming up.

You hadn't even realized you came to the only park in the village, and not just that, you were standing in front of your and Hyunjin's bench, where you used to sit after school, talking and kissing.

And well, you sat here on many evenings just like this one, making out. Your face started burning suddenly.

"Shall we sit?" Hyunjin asked and you nodded reluctantly as you felt like you were going to throw up from nerves. The two of you sat down, the silence stretching between you again.

"I-" Hyunjin opened his mouth, then closed them, repeating the action a few times, his brows furrowing and cheeks rosy, his hands gripping the edge of the bench like he was struggling to get his words out. You were almost swallowed by the nerves you felt in that moment, you were scared that he was going to tell you off, just what you deserve.

"I tried to find you." he let out a shaky exhale. "You covered up your tracks pretty well." he scoffed. "I mean, I got the message. You didn't want to see me ever again. And I'd be fine with that if only you gave me a reason, told me why you just disappeared from my life when you've been a part of it since forever. I thought for some time that you have completely abandoned me. But, somewhere deep in my soul I knew you'd be back one day, Y/n."

"Hyunjin..." your bottom lip trembled as your eyes watered. "I'm sorry. I'm really sorry. I made a huge mistake. And I would totally understand if you hated me or resented me and never wanted to forgive me. Just know I felt bad the entire time and I still do." you were full on crying and feeling embarrassed, you looked away from Hyunjin.

"I could never hate you, little bunny." his voice sounded soft and you willed yourself to look at him while you wiped your tears away even though they kept coming. "And I forgave you a long time ago." he whispered. You noticed he was sitting closer to you and your body trembled.

"You did? Why?" you asked quietly.

"Because it's you." he answered simply and you felt annoyed, wanting to hear more. But, before you could ask Hyunjin stood up abruptly.

"Let's meet up tomorrow. Have a picnic like we always used to." he said and you stood up too.

You stared at him and kept thinking, could things go back to how they were before?

You felt as if there was something he wasn't telling you yet, there was no way he forgave you so easily for abandoning him.

"What do you say?" Hyunjin looked at you hopefully.

"Sure. Yeah." you nodded, your body swirling with feelings of confusion, excitement, nostalgia, happiness, sadness... You had no idea how to explain it.

"Great. I'll come to your house around 10am."

"Sounds good."

"Let me walk you home." he added, the two of you walking and talking about the village, who stayed and who moved, which new stores opened and all the other insignificant little things just to avoid the big elephant that needed to be addressed.

"I'll see you tomorrow, bunny." Hyunjin put his hands in his jeans pockets, trying to look nonchalant.

"See you." you hurried inside.

"And that smile?" your nana's voice scared you.

"Oh, nana! Ugh, nothing. I'm just going to see Hyunjin tomorrow." you answered quickly.

"Oh. Hyunjin." she smirked knowingly. "Well, have a good night." she winked before leaving to her room.

You hoped you were going to be able to sleep tonight.

You managed to sleep through the rooster's wake up call, opening your eyes just in time to get ready for your picnic date.

Was it a date? You had no idea what was going to happen but still you wore another pretty dress and put on your makeup. You decided to wear extra shiny lipgloss to make your lips stand out, hopefully get Hyunjin's attention. You felt giddy, like you were that same school girl meeting up her boyfriend, the love of her life.

"Oh, dear you look so pretty." your grandma noted when you came downstairs.

"Thank you, nana." you smiled.

"Are you gonna eat anything?"

"No, Hyunjin told me not to worry and that he'd bring everything."

"Okay, well have fun you two!" she winked at you and you kissed her cheek before skipping out of the house and towards the street where Hyunjin said he'd wait for you.

He wasn't there yet so you stood in place, shifting from foot to foot and wondering why he is late since he'd always been punctual. It was already almost 10:15 and you were beginning to think he had played a cruel joke on you. You were already tearing up at the thought of that but maybe you deserved it after the way you treated him.

You were about to turn around and leave but you heard heavy footsteps running towards you.

"Y/n! I'm so sorry for being late!" it was a breathless Hyunjin, leaning his palms against his knees as he scrunched his face up and tried to calm his heart. "I ran into Chan on the way and he needed help carrying some things, I couldn't say no." he swallowed, straightening up.

Just then you noticed the backpack on his shoulders and the thin sheen of sweat forming on his forehead, the tanktop was there again and your eyes followed all the veins popping out.

"Oh, it's okay." you shook your head, feeling stupid.

"Shall we?" he smiled and you nodded, letting him lead the way. His eyes lingered on your lips for a while as he bit on his, before starting to walk. It was clear to you where you were going, the tree was your picnic and stargazing spot for years.

"I saw you by the tree the other day." Hyunjin said, putting his backpack down and opening it.

"Oh? You did?" your heart climbed up your throat.

"Yeah." he smiled. " I thought I was hallucinating."

You chuckled, feeling the need to smack his arm like you always did when he made you laugh but you refrained from doing so.

"Nope, I'm here." you said, helping him put the blanket down.

"I'm glad you are." he said and the two of you sat down, Hyunjin taking everything that he had packed out; fruit salad, sandwiches, coffee. You didn't feel like you deserved this. You wanted to ask him so many things. Like why did he carve his name alone in the tree trunk, why did he seem so normal about all of this, why didn't he just yell at you, like any other person would after being hurt.

"Hyunjin?" you gulped, poking around the plastic container with the fruit. He gave you an unreadable look, his brows furrowing.

"Why do you keep calling me that?" he said and you chuckled nervously.

"Well, that's your name."

"Yeah but you always called me nicknames. Like Jinnie or Hyune. And other things." he looked at the field of flowers swaying in front of you.

You hadn't answered so he turned to look at you.

"Why aren't you yelling at me or cursing me out?" you asked and Hyunjin's eyes widened a little.

"Why would I do that?" he tilted his head.

"Because I promised I'd love you forever and I left. I didn't even come back for six years, I thought I was doing a good thing. That I'd be better off in the city and you'd be better off without me. That I'd be able to move on and forget you. I thought I'd never come back here but after what happened-" your shut your lips tightly, eyes watering. "After being disappointed with everything I thought I wanted in my life, I came back here and expected to see that you moved on or even gotten married. I expected you to hate me, yell at me, curse at me. But here we are, sitting under our tree, having a picnic like I never broke your heart and mine." you were now full on crying, your bottom lip trembling and hands shaking.

Hyunjin observed you with a wistful look in his eyes before smiling softly.

"You wanna know why I'm not yelling or cursing at you?" he said, leaning closer to you.

"W-why?" you stuttered, he got into your private space and even though he changed and grew, he still had that comforting scent of Hyunjin, the one that brought you so much comfort and nostalgia.

"Because of this." he reached towards you and gently gripped the pendant of your necklace between his fingertips. "You're still wearing our necklace. And that tells me everything I need to know. Bunny, I've known you my whole life, I've loved you my whole life. I knew you wouldn't be happy in the city and I knew you'd come back here to me one day. I know that because we were made for each other and because I could feel you inside me every day. I just knew our story wasn't over, it was just beginning."

You were at a loss of words, crying and sobbing as Hyunjin talked, feeling embarrassed and also like you wanted to roll down the hill from excitement. You wiped at your face, trying not to screw up the makeup you worked so hard on while letting his words settle inside your head.

"Oh my god, Hyunjin!" you shrieked suddenly, grabbing onto his arm on accident.

"Y/n." he laughed as you kept squealing and gripping at his bicep while a little bee flew around your body. "It's just a bee, don't be scared."

"Please, make it go away." you whined.

"What can I do, a bee found a pretty flower." Hyunjin smirked at you then and you looked up at him with your eyes squinted before slapping his arm. The loud sound made you jolt a little and you looked down at the muscle, something fluttering inside you. Your cheeks warmed up instantly. Hyunjin smirked, his other hand cupping your jaw gently as he made you look at him.

"You didn't break your promise, doll. You still love me." he smiled.

"I do." you confessed quietly and his eyes sparkled a little as he leaned in closer. His eyes fluttered, his cheeks became rosy and his warm breath caressed your lips. You jolted away suddenly, afraid and you had no idea why.

"I'm sorry!" you said quickly, placing your palm over your heart. Hyunjin looked a little confused, his fingers twitching as his hands longed to comfort you in any way they could.

"I got nervous." you said and Hyunjin laughed.

"Don't laugh at me!" you whined with a pout, kicking your feet a little and that made him laugh even harder. "Stop it." you crossed your arms over your chest with a little huff escaping your lips.

"You're just so cute, bunny." how many times has he told you that and it still made your heart flutter. "It's okay. I waited for you for six years, I can wait a little more."

"I just didn't expect things to go like this." you swallowed and Hyunjin scooted closer to you, tentatively touching your fingertips with his. That was enough for you to feel the electricity running through your body.

"I understand. We'll fall back into us in no time."

"You think so?" you asked, inching closer to him, your fingers now playing with his.

"I know so." he smiled confidently. "Just have to ask one question."

"Anything." you nodded.

"Are you back for good or just the anniversary?"

You looked down and took in a deep breath.

"Please don't tell this to my grandparents yet. But I am back for good. I quit my job and sold my apartment, I didn't tell them anything because I am just waiting for the right moment." your voice trembled.

"Didn't something happen?" Hyunjin asked, leaning down to look at your face.

"Just... People were disgusting. The job was depressing. The apartment was cold. The city was lonely. And maybe a part of me hoped you'd be here waiting for me no matter how selfish that is. Because, I don't think I could ever stop loving you, Jinnie. Even if someone wiped away my entire memory I would still have you engraved inside my heart."

"Bunny." Hyunjin cupped your cheeks. "Don't worry, I won't tell anyone anything. I'm sad you went through all of that but it brought you back here, didn't it?"

You nodded.

"And I am glad it did." he leaned in again.

"Ack! The bee!" you squealed as the little creature came back to buzzing around you.

"Silly." Hyunjin chuckled under his breath, 'shielding' you from the scary bee.

You felt as if a stone has been lifted off of your heart as the two of you continued catching up and reminiscing of the good old days. Hours passed by so quickly that you almost didn't realize it was lunch time.

"Nana is expecting me at home for lunch. Do you wanna join us?" you asked with a timid smile.

"I'd love to but Chan invited me to his house for lunch today. We'll come to you tomorrow, he is also excited to see you again, you know that you were always like a little sister to him."

"Oh, I'm excited to see him too." you chuckled.

You couldn't believe that everyone has welcomed you with open arms after you left like that and you were still trying to come to terms that you won't be going back to the city ever again.

When Hyunjin said him and Chan would come around to help your grandpa repair the fence out back, you totally forgot about the fact that Hyunjin would be in a sleeveless top, flexing his muscles and wiping away his sweat constantly. Summer was knocking at the door and the sun was high in the sky. You wore the red dress from the first day, the one Hyunjin stared at so intently when you stood outside of his house. When Chan saw you he made a funny squealing noise, running up to you and picking you up as if you were paper doll, spinning you around as you screamed at him to put you down.

"Aww little Y/n is back!" he pinched your cheeks and you smacked his hands away with a pout.

"I'm only three years younger than you, bro." you emphasized and he laughed.

"I'm glad to see you here. I was beginning to think our Hyunjinnie would die alone." he smirked and Hyunjin punched his side with his fist mumbling a 'shut up or else' and you let out a laugh.

"Congrats on getting married, old man." you smirked and Hyunjin was glad you teased Chan back, a snicker escaping his lips.

"Didn't you say a moment ago it was only three years difference?" he smirked back and you exhaled, rolling your eyes playfully.

"Enough chit-chat. Time to work, boys." you chuckled, sitting at the table your granparents put in the backyard. It was placed under a tree that gave a good shade to it, so it wasn't as hot as it would be but for you it felt like you were enveloped by the sun itself.

Hyunjin was working in the sunlight, his soft skin glistening with sweat almost making him look ethereal and unreal. His muscles were flexing constantly as he moved and lifted stuff up, the veins popping out and now visible everywhere on his arms, hands and even his neck. You were feeling very hot and bothered, feeling like you couldn't breathe properly as your legs pressed together. He glanced at you a few times and you saw the little smirk on his face.

He was provoking you on purpose, the little tease.

Two can play this game, you thought and got up, entering the house so you could find a little towel. You took that time to put on more lipgloss and adjust your dress so your cleavage was more visible.

"There." you nodded to yourself with a smirk before walking back outside and straight towards Hyunjin.

"It's hot, isn't it?" your voice sounded sweet, dripping with honey as you hovered over him where he kneeled, working on the fence. He looked up at you, covering his forehead with his hand so the sun doesn't get into his eyes. His mouth went dry instantly, your bare thighs were right in front of his eyes and your chest on display as you leaned over him.

"Hot. Yes." he managed to say.

"Let me help you with that, Jinnie." you smirked, leaning down a little more as you started gently patting at his forehead, wiping the sweat off and he just sat there breathing heavily as you kept going lower, patting his neck now, noticing how he leaned into your touch, how his eyes fluttered and his breath hitched.

"Better?" you moved away suddenly and he snapped from his trance.

"Y-Yeah."

"Thirsty?" you asked, louder so Chan hears it too.

"Yes!" Chan yelled, his back turned to you thankfully.

You smirked as Hyunjin gulped, staring after you as you turned around towards the house to make some lemonade for the boys. Hyunjin couldn't stop staring at you when they took a break, munching on some cookies your nana made and drinking the fresh lemonade. His eyes fixated on your shiny lips and he longed to taste you once again. Chan kept yapping about his wife and farm enthusiastically and you kept nodding and chuckling all the while Hyunjin didn't even hear a word that came out of Chan's mouth.

It was almost sundown when the boys were done and nana invited them to stay over for dinner, ushering them both to first wash their hands thoroughly before touching any food. The atmosphere was warm and homely, a happy feeling swelling inside your chest. You were home, where you were always supposed to be, where you belonged, with Hyunjin.

"I'll be right back." you stood up after dinner, running upstairs to fix your makeup.

Hyunjin waited for a moment before he followed you to your room. You walked out of the bathroom when he appeared on the doorway, leaning there with a fond smile on his face.

"It looks like a time capsule in here." he looked around in wonder, taking a tentative step inside.

"You haven't been up here?" you asked, eyebrows raised as he looked around, taking in all the memories you two had created together.

"No, your grandparents kept it closed. There was no need for me to be here." Hyunjin's eyes lit up when he looked at your bed. "Jinnie! You kept him!" he pointed to your teddy bear, walking in and picking it up.

"Of course I did. I kept everything."

"Even those cute diaries?" Hyunjin smirked. "Dear diary, today Jinnie and I held hands for the first time as boyfriend and girlfriend. Everyone saw us walking to school together-"

"Shut up!" you squealed, ripping the teddy away from him and smacking him with it multiple times as he laughed at your red cheeks.

"What? It was cute." he giggled, slinking away from your attack.

"It's embarrassing. Even more because you still remember what I wrote. Are you sure you haven't been up here?" you teased, putting Jinnie back on the bed and walking to your table.

"I haven't since the last time we were here together." Hyunjin was behind you suddenly, his voice low as his lips brushed against your ear. You gasped, remembering the last night you spent here with him, on top of him as he guided your hips against his slowly, wanting to make it last as long as possible so you never forget how he feels.

"Right." you turned abruptly, the back of your thighs colliding with the table as he hovered over you, so close you could feel the warmth radiating off of his body.

He smelled so good even after working in the sun almost all day and his skin looked like it needed to be touched, kissed, bitten. A zap of electricity ran through your body as Hyunjin leaned in even closer, his breath mingling with yours. Your eyes fluttered shut and then-