starshira

SERIES

Beneath the Bloom of Tainted Hearts (ongoing on ao3) Unwoven Hearts On the Otherside (xoc ongoing on wattpad)

ONESHOTS

Summer Nights of Fireworks and Fireflies

In which a bag full of sparklers, firecrackers, and poorly considered decisions leads to a summer evening with fireflies and a boy who holds a smile he only ever gives to you.

Sienna

In which you meet him again at the place where the sea forgets the shore, and he remembers only you—and the name of your imaginary daughter whispered beneath a sky that won't stop listening.

Ephemeral Hearts

In which, beneath a sky the colour of damasked roses, love became the wound even the stars mourned, as though his embrace alone could hold the flowers safe from withering.

SERIES

Touched by Divinity (on hold)

They say gods do not love the way mortals do. That divinity does not ache, nor does it yearn. That to fall for a mortal was to beckon ruin. It was a sacrifice neither the heavens nor the earth dared to name. But even the divine are not immune to wonder. And the heart—be it mortal or god—forgets its vows when it dares to want something it was never meant to touch.

Based on the Greek mythology of Eros and Psyche.

ONESHOTS

under the influence (wip)

With a firm grip on your hand, Moon Baek led you down a street apart from the path Lee Do and their target had taken.

"How exactly are we going to find him?" you asked, slightly breathless as you tried to match his longer strides.

"Just taking a shortcut," he replied. "Sometimes the best way to catch someone is to get ahead of them instead of chasing behind."

The streets here were quieter, lined with older buildings that cast deeper shadows. You could hear their fast footsteps echoing off the narrow walls, creating a rhythm that felt almost elusive. Whatever moment you'd shared back there had been carefully tucked away, filed under things you would both pretend hadn't shifted something fundamental between you.

"And you know where he's headed because...?"

"Because people are predictable when they're scared."

You wanted to ask how he could possibly know what felt familiar to a stranger, but something in his tone suggested this wasn't his first time reading people's panic patterns. The thought should have been unsettling, but instead, you found yourself impressed by his certainty.

The two of you emerged from the narrow side street onto a wider road, one with better lighting and potentially a late-night pedestrian. Moon Baek positioned you both in the shadow of a bus stop, close enough to see the intersection ahead but far enough back to avoid being spotted.

The sound of rapid footsteps suddenly rushed down from a nearby alley. Seconds later, their target came stumbling into the street, breathing hard and glancing frantically over his shoulder. In the better lighting, you finally caught a better glimpse of him. His hair was styled in a loose perm that must have gotten a little disheveled during the chase, and he wore a red jacket in that oversized streetwear fashion.

"He's here," Moon Baek grinned, looking entirely too pleased with himself. "See? Told you so."

You rolled your eyes, but before you could retort, a motorcycle roared down the street and almost crashed into their target. The rider swerved too fast, and in an instant of a yell and tires screeching, the bike lost balance. It crashed sideways towards Lee Do, just approaching from the same alley as their target.

"You bastard!" the biker shouted as Lee Do leapt back, narrowly avoiding the wreck.

"What the hell was that?" you asked like someone blind would.

"Some guy on a motorcycle fell down," Moon Baek shrugged. He then tightened his grip on your hand and tugged you sharply left down another narrow alley. "This way."

You nearly tripped keeping up. "You're telling me you can predict where he's going? Why don't we just chase him?"

"If we follow him, we'll only ever see his back," he countered. "Better to meet him face-to-face."

"But what if you're wrong?" you fretted breathlessly.

He flashed you a grin. "Then I'll take you out to dinner again to make up for it."

You scoffed as he pulled you even faster, almost making you bump into a wall yet again. "If you keep dragging me into places, I'll end up like that poor biker on the ground."

He let out a low laugh. "Relax, I'd never let you fall."

Just as a retort reached your lips (his words were clearly false, as you fell just today after bumping into a wall), Moon Baek came to another abrupt stop that made you nearly collide with his back.

"What now?" you whispered, trying to peer around him without being too obvious about it.

You could hear the scrape of something being picked up from the ground. You caught sight of him carrying what looked like a chunk of broken concrete that probably had crumbled away from old building foundations. It had that grainy, weathered texture that suggested it would be solid enough to do damage but brittle enough to shatter on impact.

Moon Baek tugged you along again, his pace quickening without acknowledging your question.

You moved through until you reached a wider stretch of road where several pathways converged. Moon Baek positioned you just off to one of the walls, where one of the intersections was right beside.

The man in the red jacket came barreling around the corner a moment after. He didn't even have a single second to register their presence, as Moon Baek immediately shifted his grip, releasing your hand to swing the jagged piece of concrete in the air. The brittle chunk struck the man's temple with a sickening crack, shattering on impact. The red-jacketed stranger crashed to the ground in a crumpled heap.

Footsteps echoed from ahead, and Lee Do appeared, slightly out of breath from his pursuit. He stopped short, taking in the scene before him of Moon Baek standing over the unconscious man and you looking a little shaken right beside him.

"We caught him," Moon Baek announced with a satisfied smile, tossing what remained of the concrete aside and brushing the rust from his palms in quick movements.

Lee Do stared at him for a moment longer before crouching down beside the crumpled figure. He cupped the man's chin, turning his face towards the light to get a better look.

"Wait," Moon Baek began, his brows furrowing as he peered down at the unconscious stranger, "but who's this? He's not the guy who lives there."

Lee Do looked back up at him, and Moon Baek responded with a simple shrug before looking away. His phone buzzed all of a sudden, and he pulled it out of his pocket with a quick glance at the screen.

Moon Baek's attention immediately snapped back to the officer, his neck craning with shameless curiosity as he tried to get a glimpse of the screen. This man had absolutely no concept of personal boundaries when it came to other people's business, leaning forward with a nosiness unmatched that would have been impressive if it weren't so obvious.

Lee Do immediately noticed the blatant eavesdropping attempt and shot Moon Baek a look. Without a word, he stood and walked several paces away, putting enough distance between you that his conversation might remain somewhat private, though not far enough that he wouldn't keep an eye on his two civilian complications.

"Did you find him?" Lee Do asked, his voice carrying just enough for you to catch the question.

There was a pause before he spoke again. "Where is he now?"

Moon Baek strained forward, clearly trying to piece together the other half of the conversation from Lee Do's responses alone. When that proved frustratingly futile, he turned his attention back to you, who was standing with careful stillness beside their impromptu crime scene. You looked like someone trying very hard to appear appropriately shocked by the violence while not revealing just how closely you'd been observing every detail.

"You holding up alright?" he asked, his voice dropping to a murmur that wouldn't carry to Lee Do.

"Am I holding up alright?" you repeated. "You just knocked someone unconscious, and you want to know how I'm doing?"

"Technically, he was fleeing from law enforcement," Moon Baek pointed out with the kind of reasonable tone people used to justify completely unreasonable actions.

He crouched down beside the unconscious man to examine whatever it was that he found so fascinating about him.

You stood there watching Moon Baek and realized with growing unease that you weren't as scared as you should have been. Maybe it was because you'd seen worse and had lived through worse. Or perhaps it was because there was something oddly reassuring about Moon Baek's competence, even when that very competence involved knocking people unconscious with construction debris. You were supposed to be plotting his downfall, supposed to be gathering information to destroy him, but instead you found yourself grudgingly impressed by how smoothly he handled things.

"Actually, I don't have a way to get there," Lee Do spoke to the phone. He glanced back at the two of you, and his brows furrowed.

Moon Baek's head snapped up, his grin unfurling. He slipped a hand into his pocket and produced a car key.

Your mind went blank for a moment. Car keys? You'd taken a taxi to get here—you distinctly remembered Moon Baek's casual conversation with the driver. So where had these keys come from? Had he been planning this entire scenario from the beginning? Was this all a deliberate setup? Every new revelation about Moon Baek seemed to ripple outward, complicating your image of him until you couldn't tell what was foresight, what was luck, and what was manipulation.

"Problem solved," Moon Baek announced as he stood up, tossing the keys in the air and catching them.

Lee Do ignored Moon Baek's grin, his gaze already shifting back to the man sprawled across the pavement. Without a word, he dragged the man towards a nearby pole. He pulled a length of a cord from his jacket pocket and began binding the stranger to it.

"He'll be here when backup arrives," Lee Do said as he turned and walked towards where the car was situated.

"I guess we're leaving," Moon Baek said to you, taking your hand again to direct you to the vehicle.

The car turned out to be a sleek black car—less fancy than the one you had remembered during their first encounter—parked just around the corner. He opened the passenger door for Lee Do with exaggerated courtesy, then helped you into the backseat before sliding into the driver's seat himself.

The engine roared to life, and without a second to waste, Moon Baek drove ahead.

"Hello, Officer Jang," Lee Do greeted on his phone. "I caught a man breaking into Jeon's home and left him secured by the camera at 45-5 gil, Seopyeong-gu. Get there now ... Okay."

"Where to now?" Moon Baek asked as Lee Do ended the call, but the officer was already dialing another number.

"Hello, ma'am. I'm on the move. Update me on his movements."

"Man, I'm nervous," Moon Baek announced suddenly. "Ten."

Ten?

Lee Do placed his phone in the dashboard mount, the voice on the other end still providing updates.

"Nine."

Oh shit. He was counting down again. You'd heard him do this before, just minutes before. And from that, you could positively conclude that whenever he counted down, it never meant anything good was about to happen.

"Eight ... Seven."

Lee Do glanced over curiously.

"What?" Moon Baek asked.

When he realized what he meant, he gestured vaguely towards something in the car that you couldn't see clearly from your angle. "Oh, those? I told you earlier. The box was full of bullets. That's the box."

"We're all set on our end," a voice came through the phone's speaker. "Officer Lee, are you ready?"

"Yes, I'm ready!" Moon Baek called out cheerfully, answering for him.

"Yes, go ahead," Lee Do confirmed.

"From now on, I'll relay Jeon's exact route," the woman's voice continued.

You kept thinking about how the hell you managed here in the first place. You were an ordinary woman until that one night where everything changed. Now you were involved with bullets, chasing down criminals, and some whole operation.

Your thoughts were brutally interrupted as Moon Baek suddenly pressed harder on the accelerator. The car lurched forward with terrifying speed, and you watched in horror as he swerved around pedestrians.

"In two hundred metres, turn right in front of Ssangryong Restaurant," the woman instructed.

"Here we go!" Moon Baek shouted with excitement.

He slammed on the brakes and yanked the steering wheel hard to the right. The car skidded slightly before catching traction and shooting down the side street.

You felt your stomach lurch violently to the left as the motion sickness began to creep up your throat. You pressed your lips together and tried to focus on breathing through your nose, but every sharp movement made it worse.

"He turned right onto Gongwon-ro 409-gil, which is your four o'clock position," the woman continued. "Thirty metres ahead... in ten metres, turn right."

"Turning right!"

Once again, he made another brutal turn that sent your body leaning sideways until you were pressed against the door, the motion sickness continuing to rise at a speed faster than Moon Baek's berserk driving.

You had so many questions burning in your throat. You wanted to ask about the bullets, why you were doing this, and where the hell he learned to drive like this. Was there some secret stunt driving course for lunatics that you didn't know about? But with Lee Do sitting right there, you couldn't bring yourself to ask. The last thing you wanted to say was something that would get you both arrested.

"Keep going straight," the woman's voice instructed through the speaker.

With that simple command, Moon Baek immediately slammed his foot back down on the accelerator. The car shot forward like a bullet, the speedometer climbing to numbers that made your vision blur just by looking at them. When another car appeared ahead, Moon Baek hit the brakes hard. The sudden deceleration threw you forward against your seatbelt, then immediately back against the seat as he swerved around the obstacle.

Your motion sickness, which had been a manageable queasiness before, was now unbearable. Each sudden stop, each sharp turn, and each burst of acceleration made the world spin a little more each time.

This nightmare-fuelled pattern continued for what felt like hours but was probably only minutes. Finally, the woman's voice spoke through the speaker again with an update of Jeon Won-seong having moved to an underpass.

"There's no vehicle access," she reported. "Finding an alternative route. One moment, please."

Your face had now become what you were pretty sure was now a lovely shade of green. Sweat was beading on your forehead despite the air conditioning, and you were genuinely considering whether it would be more embarrassing to throw up in Moon Baek's car or ask him to pull over so you could puke on the side of the road like a carsick child.

"We have no time," Lee Do stated. "Please hurry."

"Let's get going!" Moon Baek declared with an enthusiasm that terrified you beyond measure.

And then—because apparently tonight was the night you learned that traffic laws were merely suggestions—he drove straight through a narrow passageway that had a sign clearly stating in bold letters that no vehicles were permitted to pass through.

You leaned your head back against the car headrest and closed your eyes tightly, trying to block out everything. The sound and the passing scenery around you all started to blur together.

But unfortunately for your stomach and your sanity, Moon Baek's driving somehow managed to get even worse from there.

The moment you burst out of the narrow passageway, he accelerated with a renewed vitality, as if the brief constraint had only made him hungrier for speed. The two orange traffic cones that had been innocently marking this zone went flying as the car barrelled through them.

"Can we handle this?" you managed to catch Moon Baek asking Lee Do.

"We?" Lee Do replied.

"Yeah, 'we'," Moon Baek confirmed, glancing over with that manic grin that never seemed to leave his face during situations like this. "We're a team now."

You let out a groan of nausea and despair at that declaration. A team? You didn't want to be on any team that Moon Baek was leading, especially not one that involved high-speed chases and what you were increasingly sure were multiple traffic violations.

"Stop joking around and focus," Lee Do advised.

Moon Baek just hummed in response. From the back seat, you watched the city lights streak past the windows in nauseating colours. You were pretty sure you were going to need therapy after this. How were Moon Baek and Lee Do so normal about this?

"Hey, by the way," Moon Baek suddenly began, his voice dropping into a whisper as he leaned ever so slightly towards Lee Do, "do I smell like milk tea?"

Lee Do blinked at him as he lifted his brow. "...Milk tea?"

"Shh!" Moon Baek hissed, darting a quick glance at you slumped in the back seat. "She isn't supposed to know that I asked this."

You cracked one eye open, too nauseated to fully engage, but his question was far too humorous for you to ignore. "You do realize I can hear everything you're saying," you managed. "We're in the same car, you absolute—"

"She can't hear us if we whisper," Moon Baek whispered back to Lee Do, completely ignoring your remark. "So, do I? Because she mentioned it a while before, and I've been thinking about it ever since."

You found yourself fighting back a laugh. During a high-speed chase with a police officer in the car while you were actively trying not to vomit, that was what he chose to say. You stared at the back of his head in complete bewilderment, wondering if the adrenaline had finally made him lose what little sense he'd started with.

"Go straight, then turn into Hyeondae Market at the fruit shop."

"Turn right over there," Lee Do directed.

Moon Baek made another abrupt turn, and you closed your eyes and tried to imagine you were anywhere else. Maybe you could be lying on a beach somewhere, or sitting in a quiet café with a book, or literally anywhere that didn't involve Moon Baek's interpretation of what constituted acceptable driving.

"Hold on," the woman's voice came through the speaker again. "There's no CCTV coverage in this area. I'll check the nearby cameras and update you."

"It's a three-way fork," Lee Do explained. "Please check around Dongil-ro 34-gil, 46-gil, and 41-gil."

"Understood."

Once the target's location was confirmed, Moon Baek slammed his foot on what you realized with growing horror was the reverse pedal. The car shot backward with a violence that made your stomach lurch in an entirely new direction as you reversed past the intersection you'd just missed.

You stopped paying attention to everything entirely, their voices becoming distant background noise as you focused entirely on not throwing up. The area was a maze of narrow streets and tight corners, and Moon Baek seemed to take each turn as a personal challenge to see how many G-forces the human body could withstand.

Finally (finally) the car skidded to a grinding halt at a busy square. When you heard the distinctive click of a car door opening and the sound of footsteps hitting the pavement as someone exited the vehicle, you felt a wave of relief so intense it almost brought tears to your eyes. The nightmare was over. You had survived Moon Baek's very loose relationship with both physics and sanity.

You heard another car door open—your side this time—and felt the rush of cool night air spilling in. But you didn't even want to move. You weren't entirely convinced your legs would support you if you tried to stand.

"You're not gonna get out?" Moon Baek's voice drifted in.

"Give me a minute," you groaned.

He let out a low chuckle. "What, my driving was that bad?"

You glared at the back of the headrest. "Bad? I'm shocked we're still alive."

"Hey now," Moon Baek protested. "I got us here in one piece, didn't I? That's gotta count for something."

"Getting us here in one piece while giving me motion sickness severe enough to require therapy is not the flex you think it is," you shot back.

His grin began to creep back. "Come on. Fresh air will help. Plus, if you stay in there much longer, Lee Do is going to think I actually kidnapped you."

"Didn't you?"

"Details," Moon Baek said with a dismissive wave of his free hand while helping you out of the car with the other.

The square was full of life, which was quite the typical energy of Seoul during the night. Neon signs from nearby restaurants and shops cast colourful glares against the night sky. You spotted Lee Do's figure already cutting through the crowd ahead in the pursuit of finding the Jeon Won-seong on the loose.

"It's way too crowded," he muttered, shutting the car door with a click.

Moon Baek's eyes swept the bustling square where people moved in clusters beneath the glowing lights. His hand then slipped around your waist, and he steered you through the press of bodies.

The unexpected touch sent a jolt through your nervous system that had nothing to do with your lingering motion sickness. His touch was protective in a way that made you hyperaware of how close he was walking beside you. After spending the entire car ride under a state of nausea, having him this near—with his hand warm against your side—made your pulse quicken in a way that was definitely not helping your already unsteady equilibrium.

"Baek—" you managed to utter, stiffening in surprise at both the contact and your own reaction to it.

"What?" he asked, his tone deliberately light with mock innocence, as if your sudden tension amused him more than anything else.

You swallowed hard. "What—what are you doing?"

"Hmm?" His wide grin returned bigger and brighter than ever. "Keeping up with the fake act, obviously.

"Yeah, but it doesn't even matter anymore, right? We're clear of suspicion for now."

"Oh, I know," Moon Baek said cheerfully, ducking his head so his words brushed against your ear. "But it's fun watching you like this. And it makes it more convincing, doesn't it?"

Your pulse betrayed you by spiking up again, the traitorous heat blooming in your cheeks. What did he mean by watching you like this? Had he figured out your emotions before you did yourself? You were grateful for at least some dimness from the night, as it cloaked your expression just enough to hide the worst of it. The best thing to do was to ignore that question entirely.

"Convincing," you repeated with a grumble. "So are you going to tell me what you have planned?"

"You're really curious," he hummed with an amused expression.

You kept walking, weaving through the crowd while following Lee Do's figure ahead. He was still pressed to his phone, but his voice was too low to make out over the ambient noise of the bustling square.

Suddenly, he stopped mid-stride. He stood there for a moment, listening intently to whoever was on the end of the line. After a few tense seconds, he immediately started retracing his steps back towards where you'd parked, his pace even more urgent than before.

"Are we going?" Moon Baek called out, though he was already steering you to follow behind the retreating officer.

"Back to the car first," Lee Do said curtly.

You felt your stomach drop. "Please tell me you're not going to drive it this time," you whispered weakly to Moon Baek.

Moon Baek only shrugged. "Sorry, but it looks like the night's not over yet."

"I might actually die this time," you groaned.

"I'll drive slower," he promised, though the grin on his face suggested his definition of 'slower' might not align with yours.

***

"Jeon Won-seong seems to be on his way to the station with a gun."

Lee Do spoke through the phone as Moon Baek took another sharp turn, though more gentle than the ones before.

"Wait, what?" you said aloud before you could stop yourself. "He's going to the police station? With a gun? Isn't that like... counterproductive?"

"Desperate people do desperate things," Moon Baek answered. "Or he's planning to go out with a bang."

Oh. So maybe criminals do seek out the police.

"I'm also heading to the station," Lee Do continued. "Tighten security at the entrance. Meet in the parking lot."

Moon Baek made one last turn to the right, the car easing into the lot of the police station. For once (thankfully), he didn't treat it like a racetrack. The imposing concrete building loomed ahead, its windows glowing with fluorescent light against the darkened sky.

There was a man waiting there, and you assumed that he was the man Lee Do said to meet in the parking lot. The moment Moon Baek brought the car to a stop, Lee Do was already pushing open his door and striding towards the waiting officer.

Moon Baek got out too, quickly moving around to open your door. You stepped out on still-unsteady but grateful legs for solid ground beneath your feet.

"Looks like he's here for revenge," the man explained as Lee Do approached.

"Revenge?" Lee Do repeated.

"I'm the one who arrested him," he explained.

As the two officers exchanged words, Moon Baek leaned closer to you, his voice dropping into that familiar surreptitious whisper. "So. Revenge. Not exactly the bedtime story I was hoping for."

You blinked. "You wanted a bedtime story?"

"Sure. Something with happy endings. With a prince and a princess." His lips twitched as though he was fighting a laugh. "Instead, I get you, motion-sick and pouting like I ruined your whole night."

"You did ruin my whole night," you whispered back.

"Then I guess I owe you one," he shrugged as he leaned forward against the open car door. "Maybe I'll tell you a better story later."

Lee Do suddenly glanced over at the two of you. "Captain, handcuffs, please."

"What for?" the captain asked.

"I'll fill you in later," he replied, walking towards Moon Baek.

Lee Do grabbed Moon Baek's wrist and clicked the handcuffs into place, securing him to the car's grab handle.

"Hey, what are you doing? Come on!" Moon Baek protested, tugging against the restraints. "Hey, that hurts!"

"Stay here and be quiet," Lee Do commanded.

Moon Baek opened his mouth for a retort, but the words died in his throat as a gunshot cracked through the air from somewhere deep inside the station. The sound ricocheted through the night air, sharp enough to make you flinch.

Lee Do's head whipped towards the building, and without hesitation, he broke into a sprint with the captain.

"Hey! Uncuff me!" Moon Baek called out after him. "Take me with you! Take me with you!"

The two of them then vanished into the fluorescent-lit entrance without providing a response, all while more gunshots shattered the night.

"At least handcuff her too! What's the point of leaving me here while she's free?!"

You let out a scoff of disbelief. "Seriously? Your first concern is that I'm not handcuffed like you are?"

"It's about fairness," Moon Baek huffed, rattling the handcuffs against the grab handle for emphasis. "Why should you get to wander around while I'm stuck here like a criminal?"

"Maybe because you've been acting like one all night?" you shot back. "Breaking traffic laws, driving far beyond the speed limits, carrying boxes of ammunition—"

"Those were for legitimate purposes!"

"Were they, though?" you tilted your head. "And speaking of legitimate purposes, where the hell did this car even come from?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, we took a taxi from the restaurant," you explained. "So why was there suddenly a random car that so conveniently belonged to you? Complete with mysterious boxes of bullets?"

His lips curled into a smug little smirk. "Don't you worry about it."

"That's not a proper answer."

"It's the only answer you're getting." He rattled the cuffs once again. "Now, instead of interrogating me, how about you be useful and help me out of these?"

"Oh, now you want my help?" you said sweetly, deciding that two could play at this game. You started walking, deliberately heading in the wrong direction away from him.

"No, not that way!" Moon Baek called out urgently. "Turn one hundred eighty degrees!"

Instead, you turned a good two hundred and seventy degrees and began walking in yet another completely unhelpful direction, moving even further from where he was chained to the car.

"[Name]! That's even worse!" His voice was getting more panicked. "Where are you going? I said turn around, not—stop! You're walking towards the street!"

You paused, pretending to be confused by his directions. "I thought you said turn?"

"Not that much! Just turn back towards me! You know, where I'm currently stuck and unable to follow you!"

"Oh, sorry, I can't see," you said with fake understanding, then promptly started walking in yet another wrong direction. "Am I getting warmer?"

"Just—just stop moving!" Moon Baek called out desperately as you began to walk into the open road. "Stop! Don't take another step!"

You froze mid-stride, and Moon Baek let out a long, frustrated sigh. "Okay, this is payback, isn't it? For the car ride."

"I have no idea what you're talking about," you said innocently. "I'm just having trouble with directions. You know, the disadvantages of blindness."

"Blindness that's suddenly gotten much worse since I got handcuffed?"

"Vision problems can be unpredictable," you replied solemnly.

Moon Baek let out a sigh of defeat. "Fine. Just listen to where I am, and navigate like that."

"Yeah, but that doesn't make up for the fact that I can't see where you are," you remarked, turning your head slightly as if trying to locate him by sound.

"I'm right here! Just follow my voice!"

"Your voice is echoing. I think there might be two of you."

"There's only one of me, unfortunately for both of us," he muttered. "Look, [Name], please. I'm sorry about the driving, okay? I didn't know your car sickness was that terrible."

You blinked, almost wanting to turn and finally face his direction. "You really didn't know?"

"No, I swear. If I had known, I would have..." He trailed off, seeming to think about it. "Okay, I probably still would have driven the same way because it was an emergency, but I would have felt bad about it the entire time."

Despite yourself, you found his honesty oddly endearing. "That's surprisingly self-aware of you."

"I have my moments," he grinned. "Now will you please come help me? Or at least step out of the road."

"Okay, okay," you sighed, taking a careful step back from the street. "I'll try."

"Good, now turn right—no, wait, my right, so your left!"

You dutifully turned right.

"[Name], wait, no, turn left instead!"

"Oh," you said, then turned so far left you were practically facing backwards.

"Not that much! Just... okay, there you go. Now walk straight towards my voice."

You took three steps in what was definitely not a straight line, veering off at an impressive angle.

"Straight, [Name]. Straight means straight."

"I am walking straight," you protested, continuing your zigzag pattern across the parking lot.

"No, you're walking like you're dodging invisible obstacles."

You paused, tilting your head thoughtfully. "Maybe there are invisible obstacles. You never know."

"There aren't any invisible obstacles in an almost-empty parking lot!"

"That's what makes them so dangerous," you bit back a smile, then walked directly into the side of a completely different car with a soft thud.

"Oh! I found it!" you announced triumphantly, patting the vehicle's surface and then feeling around dramatically. "Wait... where are you? You're not here. Are you on the other side?"

From somewhere behind you—quite far behind you, actually—you heard Moon Baek's voice, hollow with defeat and exhaustion. "This is going to be a very long night."

Whatever had happened between Moon Baek and the stranger, it hadn't ended in blood. That was the first thing you pieced together afterwards. The shouts and heavy thuds had dulled, and before long, the two men had reached some sort of uneasy truce.

Moon Baek finally returned for you, only to find you helplessly lying on the ground. There had been no bruises blooming across his face, nor blood trailing from his mouth. Only a sheen of sweat at his temples and a restless glint in his eyes.

He stopped in the doorway, taking in the sight of you sprawled on the floor like a discarded rag doll. His brows rose slowly.

"Well," he began, his voice carrying that familiar hint of amusement despite everything that had happened. "You really can't see, can you?"

You glared at the ceiling from your position on the cold floor. "Don't start with me right now."

"I leave you alone for a few minutes, and you manage to assault yourself with a wall?" He crouched down beside you but made no move to help you up. "Should I be impressed by your dedication to finding trouble or concerned about your navigation skills?"

"The wall came out of nowhere," you muttered.

"Ah yes, those sneaky walls. Always lurking around corners, waiting to attack innocent blind women." His hand finally found your arm. "Are you hurt, though?"

"My pride," you mumbled, letting him pull you to your feet. "And my face. Definitely my face."

"Let me see." His fingers brushed carefully along your cheekbone, checking for damage. "You're going to have a bruise, but nothing's broken. I suppose I should be impressed you only sustained minor injuries."

"You're enjoying this way too much."

"Can you blame me? It's not every day I get to witness someone lose a fight with architecture."

He steadied you with one last tug before guiding you towards the main room. When the two of you entered, the stranger was already there, standing with an almost soldierly stillness. He didn't even turn his head at their arrival, only watched you with that same cold intensity as before. And he appeared to be holding... a hammer?

Moon Baek pulled out a chair for you, and you lowered yourself cautiously, your palms still prickling from the fall earlier. Only after you were settled did he slide into the seat beside you, relaxed as though this were all nothing more than an oddly staged dinner invitation.

The man shifted his gaze away from the two of you and began to rummage through something nearby. You could hear rustling and a dull thud as he threw what looked like a brown box to the side before continuing his search.

Your eyes lingered on the scattered cardboard. Cardboard boxes? Packages? Were these the ones Moon Baek was talking about from the day before? But what mattered more was who this man was. Who was he? Why did Moon Baek seem so intent on crossing paths with him? Or was this even the right person at all?

Beside you, Moon Baek let a soft sound escape from his pursed lips.

"A police officer should say 'Police!' before coming in," he remarked with a playfulness in his tone you hadn't heard before.

Ah. So he's a police officer.

The realization suddenly hit you. If this man was law enforcement, then he couldn't possibly be the man Moon Baek was looking for, right? Because why on earth would a criminal seek out a policeman? Your pulse quickened as the implications crashed over you. If he really was the police, then hadn't you both just broken into someone's house? Wouldn't that mean he could arrest you both right here, right now?

Moon Baek leaned back in his chair, watching the officer sift through boxes as though none of this bothered him in the slightest. "And what kind of police officer carries a hammer?" he added. "Don't you have a taser?"

You tried to piece together what was happening. The way Moon Baek spoke so casually suggested he wasn't worried at all about being arrested, which either meant he had some kind of immunity or he was incredibly good at bluffing. Neither possibility was particularly comforting.

"How do you know Jeon Won-seong?" the officer finally spoke.

Jeon Won-seong? Was that the man Moon Baek had been planning to meet?

"Jeon Won-seong?" Moon Baek repeated. "I don't know who that is."

Never mind. Unless he was lying. He probably was.

The officer stopped rummaging and looked up, staring at him coldly. "You came to check a package at a stranger's house?"

"I really don't know him!" Moon Baek protested.

You felt your stomach clench. If Moon Baek genuinely didn't know whose apartment this was, then what were you both doing here? Had he just broken into a random place? And if this Jeon Won-seong was connected to some kind of crime, then sitting here was possibly the worst position you could be in. And if the officer didn't believe him (why would he?), what then? Arrest, handcuffs, interrogation (if it wasn't already happening), and the sharp click of a cell door slamming shut. You weren't ready for that. You hadn't even finished piecing together your plan for revenge.

"And you, miss?"

You froze. Your mind scrambled for a response that wouldn't incriminate you further. You opened your mouth, then closed it, panic making your thoughts scatter. It was a simple answer. Just say "no" and get it over with. But what if he asks for more? What if you stuttered? What if—

"I told you already!" Moon Baek exhaled, with just enough irritation to sound genuine. He leaned back against his chair with a shrug. "God forbids a man takes his girlfriend on a little adventure."

...Huh?

The word shot through you like a bullet. Girlfriend? Heat flooded your face as you went completely rigid in the chair. Your mind blanked, panic and confusion tangling together until you could barely keep your expression steady. When had the two of you discussed this story?

The officer's brow twitched as he considered this. "Why would you bring your girlfriend with you to something like this?"

"She's blind!" Moon Baek exclaimed. "How was I supposed to leave her alone when I didn't know how long this would take or if something might happen? Where's the chivalry?"

The officer stared at you for what felt like an eternity. Your pulse stumbled as you fought to keep your gaze distant. Hadn't you met eyes earlier? Hadn't you moved too fast for someone who was supposed to be sightless? You could only hope that he would be generous enough to not call you out for it.

Moon Baek, however, filled the silence with his newfound brand of a higher extent of arrogance. He lounged back in his chair as though this were his very house.

"Look, I understand this looks suspicious," Moon Baek continued. "But think about this. Leaving someone who can't see alone while I potentially walk into danger alone is a worse option. Sue me for being considerate."

You barely kept yourself from groaning aloud.

The officer's gaze shifted between the two of you before he turned his attention directly to you. "Miss, is this man bothering you or putting you in any kind of uncomfortable situation?"

You almost choked on the question, coughing out a laugh before you could stop yourself. Uncomfortable? That was one word for it.

"Putting her in an uncomfortable situation?" Moon Baek barked before you could answer. "I've been nothing but a gentleman all evening! I paid for dinner, I helped her with the stairs, and I even made sure her food wasn't too hot because I was concerned about her! If that's not the definition of treating someone well, I don't know what is."

"You made me bump into doorframes every chance you got," you muttered, unable to help yourself.

Moon Baek's mouth fell open in betrayal. "That happened only four times! And two of the times were your fault because you weren't listening when I said, 'Watch out!'."

"You said those words after I already hit it."

"I have excellent timing, so your reflexes must be the problem here."

The officer's eyes narrowed slightly as he studied you both. "And you thought bringing your girlfriend to break into an apartment was appropriate relationship bonding?"

"When you put it like that, it sounds much worse than it actually is," Moon Baek admitted with a sheepish grin.

The officer went back to rummaging through the various cardboard boxes. "So, why are you here?"

"A courier delivered a package to me a few days ago," Moon Baek explained. "The box was full of bullets. All kinds of them."

What a liar, you thought. You had no idea what Moon Baek's real story was, but you were certain it wasn't this elaborate tale he was spinning.

The officer stopped mid-search and glanced back at you both. Slowly, he stood up and crossed the space between until he reached Moon Baek.

"Just bullets?" he asked. "What about a gun?"

Moon Baek's brows lifted. "What gun? Mine just had bullets in it."

"So you came here to find a gun?"

"Why is a police officer waving around a hammer and—"

"Tell me the truth," the officer demanded. "Now."

"That's what I'm doing now," Moon Baek insisted. "The package I received had some bullets and an address list."

Your brows furrowed. That was the thing he was talking about with his subordinates the day before, wasn't it?

"An address list?" the officer repeated.

"Yeah, a well-organized address list with names, addresses, and phone numbers," Moon Baek clarified. "I got curious and got my girlfriend to come here with me, but once I arrived, I felt a bit scared."

Scared? you almost snorted. Moon Baek didn't seem like the type to be scared of anything, least of all whatever situation had brought you here.

Moon Baek went on almost cheerfully with his ramble of lies. "So we were just hanging around when the guy who lives here suddenly rushed out."

Was that a lie too? You hadn't seen anyone or even noticed footsteps or a door. Then again, you'd been too busy stumbling around, pretending to be blind.

The officer reached into his pocket, pulled out his phone, and tapped at the screen before holding it up. A photograph glowed on display, showing a middle-aged man with ruffled hair and a faint beard. Was this Jeon Won-seong?

"Was it this guy?"

"Yeah, that's him," Moon Baek confirmed. "He must've been in a hurry. He didn't even close the door. So we came in and saw the box, only to find it empty."

Then, he pointed a finger directly at the officer. "And then you came in."

The officer stared at Moon Baek for a second longer before retreating back and calling someone on his phone.

Your pulse hammered against your ribs. He could be calling for backup right now, and then what? Handcuffs, police vans, and your plan of revenge gone before it even had the chance to bloom. You couldn't decide what was worse: that you were actively participating in whatever this was, or that part of you was actually impressed by how smoothly Moon Baek was handling this situation. Just a few days ago, your biggest concern was planning your revenge, and now, you were pretending to be the girlfriend of someone who apparently received a mysterious package full of bullets.

"Hey, it's me," you heard the officer whisper. "Did you find Jeon Won-seong?"

Moon Baek leaned closer to you, his voice barely a breath against your ear. "Just keep playing along."

"Playing along with what exactly?" you whispered back.

"The girlfriend thing. You're doing great, by the way."

"I didn't agree to be your fake girlfriend."

"You didn't disagree either," he murmured. "Besides, you said I wasn't putting you in an uncomfortable situation."

"That was before I knew we were lying about bullets and criminals on the loose!" you hissed under your breath. "What the actual hell did you drag me into?"

"Relax," he whispered back. "We're fine. If we were in actual trouble, he'd already have us on the floor in handcuffs."

"That's supposed to comfort me?"

"Think of it as quality bonding time."

When the officer—Lee Do?—finished his call, he looked back at you. Moon Baek grinned and put two hands in the air, palms wide in mock surrender. He immediately dropped them again, the smirk lingering on his face.

Lee Do stared at him, unamused, before turning back around and dialling another number.

"Hello, this is Officer Lee Do from Domyeong Police Station," he began. "Could you check security footage in the alley 45-2 Jeongil-ro? We've got a report that Jeon Won-seong left his house. Please verify this."

"Please verify this," Moon Baek mimicked under his breath.

"Okay, thank you," Lee Do said before hanging up.

Through your peripheral, you caught a subtle shadow from the translucent pane of the door.

Someone was outside.

Moon Baek must have seen it too. Right away, his hand reached over your shoulder and flicked off the light, throwing the room into sudden darkness save for the dim, warm light seeping through the window.

Lee Do's head snapped towards Moon Baek, then followed his gaze to the door where the shadow had paused. And without a word, Moon Baek pressed his index finger to his lips, then wrapped his arm around your shoulder. He guided you down until you were crouched beneath the table with him.

"Don't do anything on your own," he whispered, his lips barely brushing your ear. "Whatever happens, I'll stay with you."

Your pulse ricocheted inside your chest, and you hoped that the only cause for it was the stranger at the door rather than the sudden contact.

From under the table's cover, Moon Baek peeked towards the door. The door creaked open with excruciating slowness.

"Jeon Won-seong?" Moon Baek whispered, just loud enough for Lee Do to catch, but soft enough to remain undetected. "He must have a gun, right?"

Blood drained from your face as the implications crashed over you. If that man had a gun, then what chance did you all have? Lee Do didn't have a good weapon to defend you all, because why else would he have been waving around a hammer? And Moon Baek? You were absolutely certain he carried no weapons or backups from the hundreds he probably had. So there was nothing that could protect you all if this went wrong. The three of you were essentially defenceless, huddled under furniture like children playing hide-and-seek, except the stakes were potentially fatal.

"We will help you," Moon Baek whispered to Lee Do.

"We?" you hissed, only for Moon Baek to hear. "Who's we?"

"Don't move," Lee Do commanded.

"One," Moon Baek murmured.

"Stay still."

"Two." Moon Baek's grin widened in the dark.

Your mind went blank with terror. Was he counting down to something? What was it? You had no idea what. You felt Moon Baek's grip on your hand tighten.

"Three!"

Before you could even think, Moon Baek yanked you upright, launching you towards the door.

The figure at the entrance immediately bolted, fleeing after hearing the sudden sound. Moon Baek continued to pull you along as the two of you gave chase, your feet barely keeping up with his longer strides.

"Baek!" you gasped as they crossed the threshold.

"What?" he called back without slowing down.

"What the hell are you doing?!"

"Catching him!"

"And then what?" You stumbled slightly but managed to keep pace, your hand still locked in his grip.

"I'll figure that out when we get there!"

Behind the two of you, you could hear Lee Do's footsteps joining the pursuit.

"This is insane!" you panted. "We're chasing someone who might be armed!"

"You have any better ideas?" Moon Baek shot back, taking a sharp left turn that nearly sent you careening into a wall.

"Any idea is better than this!"

"Where's your sense of adventure?"

"Where's your common sense?!"

"I left it back in that apartment!"

When you reached the stairwell, Moon Baek didn't even pause. Without warning, he swept you up in his arms, one arm beneath your knees and the other supporting your back.

"What are you—!" you started, but he was already taking the stairs two at a time.

"You can't see where you're going," he said. "This is faster."

Your heart hammered against your ribs for an entirely different reason now. Being carried like this, pressed against his chest as he navigated the stairs with surprising grace, made you acutely aware of how solid he felt and how his grip on you was both protective and sure. You had to remind yourself to keep your gaze unfocused, to maintain the illusion of your blindness even as every instinct told you to look around and assess their situation.

"I can walk, you know," you protested weakly.

"Not fast enough," he replied, taking another flight of stairs. "Besides, what kind of boyfriend would I be if I let my blind girlfriend stumble down stairs while chasing criminals?"

"We're still doing that?"

"The fake relationship? Absolutely. It's working."

Something had shifted in Moon Baek tonight, though you couldn't pinpoint exactly when it had happened. He'd grown startlingly playful, as though he'd decided that somewhere along the way, he would amplify his sense of contentment.

When you'd first crossed paths with him, you remembered he'd been quite cold and calculating. Now, his teasing had grown bolder, his smiles came easier, and there was a lightness in his voice that made your stomach do odd little flips. The change felt a little... disorienting. You couldn't decide if this was his way of coping with stress or if this playful, almost reckless version of him had always been lurking beneath the surface, just waiting for the right circumstances to emerge.

And what bothered you most was how easily you'd fallen into step with this new dynamic between you. You absolutely hated that. You pushed the thought away, annoyed with yourself for even entertaining it. You had a purpose here, a reason for everything you were doing. After all, you couldn't afford to forget that the moon's glow was borrowed, stolen from the very light it pretended to reflect.

Moon Baek reached the bottom of the stairwell, finally setting you down. The chase continued for several more blocks, their footsteps pounding against uneven pavement. You could hear Lee Do somewhere behind you, the sound of his rapid footsteps mixing with the quiet hum of night.

Moon Baek suddenly jerked to a halt, nearly causing you to stumble. Without explanation, he made a sharp turn to the right, pulling you down a completely different street that led away from where their target had fled.

Your mouth opened with questions burning on your tongue. Why had he turned? Why weren't you following the man anymore? But asking any of those questions would completely blow your cover.

"Where—" you started, then caught yourself. "Where is he heading to? Who even is he?"

"Don't worry about it," Moon Baek brushed off, his pace slowing down just a fraction.

You pressed your lips into a thin line. "Don't worry about it? We just chased a random man, and now I can't even hear his footsteps anymore. Did we lose him? Did we turn in a different direction?"

"Would you prefer we kept running blindly after him?"

"Well, no, but—"

"Then let me handle it."

You huffed in frustration. "That's easy for you to say. I mean, I can't see a thing. I don't know where we're running, what's in front of us, or even who we're chasing. All I've got is whatever you choose to tell me. And right now, that isn't much.

Moon Baek slowed to a complete stop, his hand still clasped around yours. You almost stumbled yet again from the abruptness, but his grip steadied you. You could feel his gaze on you even before you noticed it in your periphery—that unrelenting attention of his pressing against you, like the moonlight that lingers no matter how stubbornly you try to hide from it.

"[Name]."

He said your name in a way that seemed to make all playfulness from earlier cease. Your heart began pounding with a ferocity that had nothing to do with their chase through the streets, and you were certain he could hear it in the quietness of the empty street. You found yourself analyzing every interaction you'd had tonight and every moment where you might have slipped up.

Had you been too responsive? Too quick to follow his lead? Had you looked at something you shouldn't have been able to see? Your mind raced through a dozen possibilities, each more damning than the last. Maybe that was why he'd suddenly changed direction, why he'd led you away from Lee Do and down this isolated side street. Maybe he'd figured out your deception and was taking you somewhere private to deal with it.

The thought almost made your heart stop. You were alone with him now, with no police officer nearby and no witnesses. If he'd discovered you'd been lying about your blindness, what would stop him from simply getting rid of the problem? Lee Do was busy chasing the man in the opposite direction, so there was no way you could rely on him.

"Yes?" you managed, trying to keep your voice steady.

"Do you trust me?"

Your breath caught, and you felt the urge to look up at him. You wanted to meet that gaze you could feel searing into your skin, but you forced your eyes to remain distant just as they always became. Your role demanded it. Your revenge too. And yet, your heart hammered too recklessly, betraying you in ways your carefully practiced act could not.

"That's..." you started, "That's not really fair to ask right now."

"Why not?"

"Because you dragged me into whatever this is without explaining anything," you breathed. "I don't even know what we're running towards, or why we were in that apartment in the first place, or—"

"[Name]."

The way he said your name again made you fall silent. There was something different in his tone now that made your heart bruise against your ribs so much that you thought it might tear itself out of your chest altogether.

"I'm not asking if you understand what's happening," he said quietly. "I'm asking if you trust me."

"Those feel like the same thing right now."

"They're not."

His hand was still holding yours, while his other rose slowly until his fingers brushed beneath your chin. With a gentle pressure, he tilted your face upwards, leaving your eyes no choice but to align with his once again.

"Understanding comes from your head," he said. "Trust comes from somewhere else entirely."

The heart.

That wild, untamed thing that had spent so long locked away behind walls of logic and pretending. It beat now with a rhythm you had almost forgotten until you had met him.

It was just an organ. It was nothing more than muscle and chambers designed to push blood through your veins, serving as a mechanical pump keeping you alive with its rhythm. Yet somehow this simple collection of tissue had become the cathedral of all your forbidden emotions. It spoke in languages the mind could never fully translate, finding safety in the very vulnerability that terrified every rational thought.

"I know I asked for your loyalty before," he continued, his voice softer now. "But now, I'm asking for your trust."

You remembered that moment vividly. It was the day you had first encountered him, when you first arrived at his pretentious penthouse. You remembered feeling like a caged bird pretending to have clipped wings, smiling politely all while imagining the perfect moment of revenge. That loyalty had been a lie wrapped in necessity.

But trust? This felt different.

Technically, you didn't need to trust him the way a truly blind person would. You could see every expression that crossed his face and could watch his body language for signs of deception or danger. You had the advantage of sight that he didn't know you possessed, which should have made trust irrelevant. But that wasn't what he was asking for, was it?

"Will you put your trust in me?" he asked. "Even just for a moment?"

You opened your mouth, but nothing came out. You thought of your brother's body collapsing in front of you, of the oath you'd sworn in the ashes of that night—to carve vengeance into Moon Baek's very heart. But tangled among those vows of retribution were threads you had not anticipated. The way Moon Baek had steadied you, how he'd carried you down the stairs without hesitation, and the gentle way he'd always touch your face as if you were something precious rather than a burden.

His playful teasing had never failed to make you forget, just for moments at a time, why you were supposed to hate him. It infuriated you. It softened you. It confused you until you didn't know if the pounding in your chest came from rage or something far more treacherous. Trust him? The idea felt like betrayal, not of yourself, but of your brother's memory. The monster who had killed you had somehow become the boy who soothed the scorching blaze in your heart.

You took a shaky breath. "Yes," you said finally. "I trust you."

Moon Baek's eyes softened, that glint dimming into something quieter. His hand lingered at your chin for a moment longer, as though memorizing the truth of your answer. Then, slowly, he released you, though his other hand never let go of yours.

"Good," he murmured, a faint smile tugging at his lips. "That's all I needed."

Your chest tightened. Just like that, he carried your vow as though it were a promise made not in desperation, but in devotion. And you especially hated how your heart leapt at his approval and how warmth pooled where only fire should have lived.

Moon Baek then tugged your hand and eased into a run, drawing you with him as though he'd known the path forward.

"Come on," he said lightly, his playful tone slipping back into place. "We've got someone to catch."

"Do you think fish ever get thirsty?"

Ever since yesterday's breakfast, Moon Baek had been bombarding you with questions. At first, they had been kind of meaningful. What kind of job did you have? How long had you been with your boyfriend before he left you? Questions that made sense for someone trying to understand the person they had supposedly rescued or kidnapped, depending on the perspective of the situation. But then they had transitioned into topics that seemed to be grabbed from the top of his head. What was your favourite drink? What was your favourite snack? Did you prefer going outside or staying indoors?

And now they had devolved into this. Random hypotheticals that somehow involved the inner lives of fish.

You sighed. "I don't think I've ever considered the hydration needs of fish."

"But think about it," he frowned. "They're surrounded by water, but they can't even drink it. Salt water would dehydrate them. So do they ever feel thirsty? Do they even understand the concept of thirst?"

You let out another long exhale of all your accumulated exhaustion.

The marathon of questions seemed to have no end. After the fish inquiry, there came the speculation of whether plants could feel loneliness or not. Then, a debate over whether the chicken or the egg came first. Between the philosophical musings that never failed to drain you out even further, he had peppered in more questions that you had to navigate carefully. Each answer had to match with your fabricated identity, which made it far too difficult for a tired day like this.

"You know what?" Moon Baek said suddenly. "Let's go outside."

The suggestion caught you off guard after hours of random hypotheticals.

"Outside?" you asked. "What time is it? It has to be late, right?"

Where you were sitting, you could see perfectly well that the sun was setting through the large windows, painting the room in soft golden hues. It made your stomach sink, as this was the exact sight before everything went downhill.

"It's almost evening," he responded. "The sun's starting to set, but it's summer, so it shouldn't be too cold."

You nodded slowly. "That sounds nice. I haven't been outside since we met."

"Exactly," Moon Baek grinned. "And we can get something at a restaurant together. I'm craving grilled food."

You tilted your head. "Grilled food? You mean, at like, a barbecue?"

He smirked as if you had just asked if the ocean was made out of water. "What else would I mean?"

You opened your mouth, then closed it. You weren't sure how you would act in public. In front of hundreds of people, pretending to be blind. It wasn't something you had thought of yet.

Your silence seemed stretched for a moment too long, and Moon Baek noticed. His grin softened. "What? You're afraid I'll feed you to the fish you don't care about?"

You huffed. "You're not as funny as you think you are."

"Wrong again," he said, the wide grin returning.

Before you could reply, he stood up.

"Wait for me here," he instructed. "I'll be back in a moment. Don't go anywhere."

As if you had anywhere to go.

When he left, you sank back into your chair, finally allowing yourself to process the absurdity of the situation. For some reason, Moon Baek was always wandering around his own estate in these expensive-looking clothes like he was perpetually ready for a business meeting, all while you were stuck in the most casual clothes imaginable.

You sighed. This would be the perfect time to think through your plan. You were here for a reason, weren't you? Revenge for what he had done to your brother. Every smile, every casual conversation, every moment of seeming normalcy was just building toward that ultimate goal. You needed to stay focused, gather information, and find his weaknesses.

But lately, the plan felt... hazier. Less urgent.

You clenched your hands in your lap, trying to summon that burning rage that had driven you here in the first place. Moon Baek had killed your brother. That was the truth that should be guiding every decision, every fake smile, and every careful response to his endless questions.

So why did you find yourself genuinely laughing at his ridiculous fish hypotheticals? Why did all of his gestures make your heart skip instead of your stomach turn with disgust?

Lost in your thoughts, something poked your shoulder, your heart leaping into your throat as you spun around in the direction of where it came from.

Moon Baek was standing behind you, now dressed in something far more casual. He wore a denim jacket with a white shirt underneath and pants in a deep, reddish-brown hue.

And then there was his hair—still dark, but falling in unkempt strands that framed his face—that differed from the way you had seen it before. Back then, it had hung longer somehow, with slight waves. Now, the strands parted neatly down the middle, baring more of the softness in his face.

But it was the change in his eyes that caught your attention the most. Both were now the same warm, deep brown that was rich like dark coffee or autumn leaves. The unsettling heterochromia you had grown used to was gone, replaced by this unified gaze that somehow made him look a little younger and less intimidating. Whether he had added a brown contact to match his natural eye or removed the blue one, you couldn't tell. But the change softened his appearance in a way that made your chest tighten.

"Did I scare you?" he asked, though his grin suggested he already knew the answer.

"You could have made some noise walking back," you muttered.

"I did make noise. You were just completely lost in thought." He tilted his head, studying you with curiosity. "What were you thinking about so intensely? You looked like you were planning to kill someone."

If only he knew how close to the truth that was.

"Nothing important," you said quickly, standing up from the chair. "I was just wondering how the dinner would be."

"It will definitely be the good kind." His grin widened as he wrapped his arm around your shoulder. "Ready to go? I promise the food will be worth whatever crisis you were having."

"I wasn't having a crisis."

"Sure you weren't."

***

"Could I start you both off with some water?"

You and Moon Baek were at a small table near the back of the filled restaurant. He seemed completely at ease in the chaotic environment, which was quite the stark contrast to his usual surroundings that you had seen him in. The casual clothes made him blend in with the other diners—young couples, office workers grabbing a late dinner, and groups of friends sharing bottles of soju.

Moon Baek nodded at the server. "But no lemons in the water, please."

The server then headed back towards the kitchen area, the restaurant continuing to buzz with the sound of sizzling meat on tabletop grills, the clatter of metal tongs against grill grates, and conversations mixing with the occasional bursts of laughter. Smoke drifted up from nearby tables where groups were grilling bulgogi, the rich smell making your stomach growl.

"No lemons?" you asked, watching him scan the menu even though he seemed to already know what he wanted.

"I'm allergic," he sighed. "Quite the misfortune."

You blinked. "Allergic? How severe is it?"

"Deathly allergic. As in my throat closes up and I stop breathing." He looked up from the menu with that ever-so-familiar casual expression. "Do you think we can eat enough to make the all-you-can-eat option worth it? Or should we just stick to the standard?"

Lemons? Something as simple as a lemon wedge could take down the person who took your brother's life?

Your mind immediately began racing through possibilities. You could slip lemon juice into his drink or find a way to contaminate his food. But how would you even get access to lemons without raising suspicion? You couldn't even go outside without someone accompanying you, so how would you get your hands on some? And what about his subordinates? They'd be watching, definitely knowing his allergy already. Any sudden move toward citrus would be noticed immediately.

Still, knowing his weakness felt like holding a loaded gun. The only question was whether you would ever get the chance to use it. But something in your chest twisted uncomfortably. It felt heavy and complicated in a way that made your stomach churn.

You pushed the feeling aside. This was what you'd come here for, wasn't it? An opportunity. You just hadn't expected it to be handed to you so easily, or for it to feel so wrong when it was.

The sound of sizzling in front of you suddenly filled the air in front of you, snapping you back to reality. You hadn't even realized how quiet you'd been, how lost in your own thoughts, while Moon Baek had apparently ordered and the server had brought the food.

He flipped a slice of meat, sizzling as it kissed the grill. "You're missing out by not watching me work," he declared.

You snorted. "Missing out?"

"Such a shame," he sighed. "You can't see the perfection I'm creating over here. You just have to take my word for it."

"Mm. For all I can tell, you're burning everything."

He shot a look that wasn't reciprocated by an expression at all. "You're blind, so I'm working twice as hard to make this meal more memorable."

You leaned back, lips curving faintly. "Or you're just making excuses in case it tastes terrible."

He grinned. "Want to test that theory?"

Before you could answer, you heard the scrape of chopsticks and then felt the heat of food hovering close to your lips. The suddenness made your heart skip, but you forced it right back down.

"You really think hand-feeding me is necessary?" you asked.

"Yes," he replied simply. "Unless you'd rather fumble around the grill and burn your fingers."

Reluctantly, you leaned forward, letting him place the piece between your lips. The flavour melted on your tongue, unfairly delicious. You chewed slowly, trying not to give away how much you liked it.

"Well?" he pressed.

You kept your expression flat. "It's edible."

Moon Baek made a noise that was somewhere between outrage and disbelief. "Edible? That's the best you can give me?"

"Do you want a medal for cooking meat that was already prepared?"

"Yes. In fact, I expect one." He slid another perfectly seared piece onto your plate. "Here. Maybe the second one will open your eyes."

You huffed at his choice of words but picked it up anyway, careful to fumble it just slightly the way you always did when "finding" food. You popped it into your mouth and then gave the same mild shrug. "Still just edible."

Moon Baek grumbled, muttering something about being ungrateful under his breath. He dropped a few more sizzling pieces onto your plate before rewarding himself with a massive pile of his own. You watched him pick one up, wrapping it in crisp lettuce before popping it into his mouth.

His eyes lit up instantly, and you had to bite down a smile.

"You need to try this," Moon Baek remarked around a satisfied chew.

"Try what?" you asked, tilting your head as if you hadn't just witnessed him devour it whole.

Instead of answering, he grabbed another leaf, layering it exactly as before. When the process was complete, he reached across the table, pressing the edge of the lettuce against your lips.

"This," he grinned.

You stiffened, drawing back slightly. "I'm fine. The meat alone is enough."

"What a bummer," he sighed. "Don't be boring."

"Do you always bully people into eating vegetables?"

"Only when they're missing out." He nudged the wrap forward again until it brushed your mouth once more. "Now come on. Open up. Eat it in one big bite."

You hesitated once more before parting your lips. Moon Baek then slipped the wrap into your mouth, watching closely as you chewed in an attempt to not let your reaction show.

"Well?" he smirked, leaning forward eagerly.

"It's... alright," you lied, shrugging to hide your smile.

His eyes narrowed. "Fine?"

"Mm." You could no longer suppress the spark of joy blooming, the smiling slipping free. "It's not terrible. But not life-changing either."

He scoffed. Even though he noticed your smile forming, he decided to play along with you. "Unbelievable. You're sitting here eating something I made, and you call it just alright?"

You shrugged again. "Maybe my standards are higher."

That drew out a laugh. "Or maybe you're just too proud to admit I'm right."

"About what?"

"That you liked it," he grinned, chopsticks already in hand and reaching for another lettuce leaf. "And I'm going to keep making you these until you say it out loud."

***

The night air pressed cool as they stepped out of the restaurant. As usual, the neon signs cast fractured light across the city, their colours bleeding into watercolour smears against the darkness.

You pulled your sweater tighter around yourself. "So do we head back to your fortress of doom now?"

Moon Baek laughed under his breath. "Fortress of doom? That's how you see my home?"

"That's how anyone would see it," you countered. "It's way too big and way too quiet. You don't even have neighbours to eavesdrop on when you get bored."

He shot you a sidelong glance, his lips twitching. "Ah, so you like people close enough to hear everything you say?"

"I prefer knowing there are other people existing in the world." The taxi pulled to a stop, and Moon Baek helped you into the leather seats. "Your house is so quiet I sometimes wonder if I've gone deaf."

The engine started with barely a whisper, and Seoul began to slide past the windows in ribbons of gold and amber. You let your head rest against the cool glass, watching the city blur into abstract patterns of light.

You then leaned your head back against the seat. "So we're going back, right?"

"Nope."

You turned towards his voice. "What?"

"I need to stop somewhere first," he explained. "It's just a small errand. It won't take long."

Your brows furrowed. "An errand? What kind of errand happens at—" you stopped yourself, as you were about to give away the exact time that you noticed on the dashboard clock, "—happens so late at night?"

"The important kind," he yawned. "And it's not even that late. It's only eight-thirty, so don't worry. You'll survive."

"That's reassuring," you muttered. "Dragging a blind woman around Seoul on mysterious errands. Very considerate of you."

"Dragging?" he laughed. "If you were really being dragged, trust me, you'd know it."

The car had begun moving through narrower streets, the towering buildings giving way to something older and narrower residential streets.

"Where exactly is 'somewhere'?" you asked with suspicion.

Moon Baek only grinned. "You'll find out."

Not long after, the taxi rolled to a stop in a neighbourhood with dim yellow light. Moon Baek paid the driver quickly, then helped you out onto uneven pavement.

"So can you tell me now?" you pressed.

He sipped on a juice box he had somehow acquired from God knows where. "Mm... let's just say I might run into someone tonight. If I'm lucky, that is."

"Run into, or meet on purpose?" you asked. "And who the hell would be here at this hour?"

"Does it matter?"

"It matters if I'm being part of it."

Moon Baek chuckled, guiding you forward. "Relax. You're not the one they're here for."

"Fine. Then tell me, who are we meeting?"

"A certain someone."

You scoffed. "That's not an answer. A certain someone could mean a friend, a business partner, a girlfriend—" you paused, your heart twinging slightly for whatever reason. "—or someone you're planning to fight."

"Someone I'm planning to fight?" he repeated with a laugh. "Do I really seem like the type to bring someone blind along to fight someone?"

"Who knows," you muttered. "For all I know, you're taking me to fight someone in some underground club."

That earned you another grin. "I can promise you, it's not someone I plan on fighting."

"Then who?"

His expression softened, but he shook his head. "Someone who needs convincing. Let's leave it at that."

You frowned, frustration prickling your heart. Convincing? Convincing about what? And why bring you along?

A little while later, the two of you stopped at last in front of a compact, worn-down apartment with small flights of stairs leading to the doors.

Moon Baek's gaze lifted, seeming to be fixated towards one particular door on the second floor.

"Here," he murmured as you approached the stairs. "Careful. There are stairs here."

You nodded, placing your hand on the metal railing. As the two of you began to ascend, you deliberately let your foot catch slightly on the steps, stumbling forward just enough for it to look genuine.

Moon Baek's grip tightened immediately, steadying you. "You okay?"

"I'm fine," you said, regaining your balance. "Just wasn't expecting it to be so steep."

When you reached the second-floor landing, Moon Baek led you towards the door his eyes had fixed on earlier. Without hesitation, he wrapped his fingers around the handle and pushed it open.

Your brows pinched slightly. No lock? No knock? Just like that? You expected someone inside to shout or for a dog to bark, but the room stayed utterly silent. The stale air carried only the faint scent of dust and something metallic beneath it. And for whatever reason, he didn't bother turning on the lights, which meant the only source illuminating the interior was from the dim yellow lights spilling in through the translucent window on the door.

"So," you began, "where's this person you're supposed to be meeting?"

Moon Baek didn't answer immediately. You could hear him moving around the small space.

"They're not here yet," he said finally. "But they will be."

You tilted your head. "Wait, so it's... empty?"

"For now," he replied. "Now come on."

You couldn't even ask anything without breaking character; the thoughts were relentless in your mind. Why here? Why this place? And who was the "someone" he had mentioned?

"You seem awfully comfortable breaking into other people's homes," you remarked, attempting levity.

He chuckled under his breath. "You make it sound so crude."

"Well, if you think about it—"

Before you could finish, his hand suddenly clamped over your mouth. Your words smothered into a startled, muffled "What?!" as your eyes widened.

"Quiet," Moon Baek hissed, his voice close to your ear. He didn't bother waiting for any reaction, as he just tightened his grip on your wrist and pulled you through the house.

You stumbled after him, bumping your shoulder against a wall before he stopped in a small side room. It was only then that his palm slid away from your lips.

"Stay here," he ordered, his gaze locked on yours as though warning you not to argue.

And with that, he was gone.

You stood rigid for a moment, heat prickling across your skin. Your heart thrummed wildly, and you were uncertain whether it beat in panic at whatever the hell he was planning to do or from the ghost of his hand still lingering on your mouth and wrist. The imprint of his touch burned, leaving your breath uneven as though your body hadn't yet realized he was gone.

"Stay here," you muttered under your breath, mocking his tone. "As if I'm just dying to wander around your shady little hideout."

But you knew better than to move, though. Doing anything now—peeking or moving—would crack your act in an instant. So with nothing else to do, you sank down onto what you guessed was the edge of a bed or a couch.

Seconds later, from the front of the apartment, the door creaked open. Slowly. Painfully slow. Like someone trying not to be heard.

Your ears sharpened. Nothing but quiet footsteps followed, the floor slightly creaking from the shift of weight on the floorboards.

You held your breath, straining to listen. The footsteps were different from Moon Baek's—lighter and much more cautious. He was definitely trying to move quietly, which meant they suspected that someone may already be here.

You could hear your own heartbeat in your ears, wondering what exactly you'd been pulled into.

In your attempt to press yourself further against the wall, your elbow knocked against what felt like a wooden drawer. The piece of furniture shifted with a soft scraping sound that was deafeningly loud in the silence.

Your stomach dropped.

Fuck.

The footsteps outside the room stopped for a brief second before resuming deeper into the apartment. Closer to where you were hidden.

You swallowed hard, your throat dry. What is going on out there? Who is that? And where the hell is Moon Baek?

You pressed your back against the wall, trying to make yourself as small as possible in the dark room. You may or may not have dug your own grave. Because whatever Moon Baek was planning, and whoever this person was, you had the distinct feeling you were about to witness something messy.

A thin line of light suddenly sliced into the darkness as the door opened, a narrow beam that you assumed came from a flashlight. It swept lazily across the floor, illuminating corners and furniture.

A man stepped through, his silhouette dark and indistinct against the backlight. You couldn't make out his features, but it was enough for every instinct in you to scream at you to break free of the paralysis and run away. After all, he hadn't noticed you yet. This was your chance. While he was focused on sweeping the room with his light, you could slip past him through the doorway.

Moving as quietly as possible, you started to rise from your crouch, inching toward the door.

The floor creaked beneath your weight.

Shit.

Well, you were absolutely dead.

It had been good while it lasted. A decent run, really. Nothing spectacular, but respectable enough. You'd eaten good food, had a few laughs. Sure, your life had gone off the rails after that one disastrous reunion with your brother—him getting shot, you scrambling to play the helpless blind girl so you wouldn't be next, only for the shooter to decide you were pathetic enough to pity and drag into his pretentiously luxurious estate. And now, apparently, your grand finale was blowing your cover with a squeaky floorboard. A standing ovation for your career in survival, ladies and gentlemen. It was over.

The man spun towards you, the flashlight beam slicing across the darkness until it landed on your face.

You flinched back instinctively, and behind the light, you caught a glimpse of him. His hair was cropped short, his jaw was sharp, and his expression was rather unreadable but tense. It was the kind of face that looked carved from stone.

Your eyes met, and yours widened with panic, his narrowing with suspicion and severity.

Your body moved before your brain could catch up. You scrambled upright, nearly tripping over your own feet in the process, and bolted for the hall. The air tore in your lungs as you ran, the sound of your heartbeat drowning out everything else. You didn't even care if Moon Baek was watching. At least you would gain a few extra seconds before your impending doom.

Two seconds—that was all you got. Two seconds of desperate freedom before your shoulder clipped hard against a jutting corner and your face slammed into the cold plaster wall. Pain burst across your cheekbone, the impact knocking you backwards.

You crumpled to the ground with a sharp gasp, palms scraping against the rough floor as you tried to steady yourself. Your head still rang from the impact, but before you could gather your breath, another sound cut through the air.

The man's flashlight beam snapped away from you, redirecting it instantly towards the noise. A cold clatter followed, which you assumed was the something sliding across the floor. You glanced to the side and saw his phone. The glow of its screen threw strange shadows across the hallway, illuminating nothing and everything at once.

You froze as his steps receded towards the source of the disturbance. And then came the chaos. A scuffle. A hard grunt. The crash of something heavy against a wall. Your stomach dropped.

"Who are you?" an unfamiliar voice demanded, taut with authority.

"That hurts," Moon Baek's voice shot back, ragged with strained humour.

Could this be the certain someone he'd hinted about earlier? you thought. The one he'd refused to explain?

"Wait!" Moon Baek gasped, breathless. "My name is Moon Baek. Moon Baek."

There was the briefest pause before the stranger's voice came again. "What are you doing here?"

"Well, I..." Moon Baek began, still panting, "...I came to pick something up."

Pick something up? You bit the inside of your cheek.

"A package."

A package?

You were visiting Kuina at the hospital for the last time.

She had officially been declared fully recovered and ready to leave. Physically stable and mentally coherent, give or take the fact that she was still very much Kuina. The doctors had run their last set of scans, signed their forms, and scheduled her discharge for the following morning. Her room no longer smelled like antiseptic and other alcoholic scents. Now it smelled like overly sweet bubblegum and the last bag of chips you had shared.

"I'm getting out of this sterile hellhole," she declared, dramatically throwing her arms out. "They said my leg is 'functional enough', which I personally find rude, because they've always been functional enough."

You laughed with relief that your best friend would finally be able to be free from her hospital bed. However, the knowledge that this would be the last time you'd visit her here struck something within you. That after this, the daily walks down pale hallways would stop. So would the vending machine runs and going up the gloomy elevator. So would—

Chishiya.

You shook the thought off immediately. You would see him again. It just wouldn't be often. And who were you to care? He was only a friend to you, after all.

Kuina tilted her head at you. "You okay?"

You jolted out of your thoughts immediately. "Huh? Oh, yeah! I'm fine."

She raised an eyebrow. "Are you sad because you're realizing your hospital crush is about to vanish from your daily routine?"

You flopped onto the chair beside her bed. "Don't start."

"I'm continuing," she grinned.

You sighed. "Well, the thing is that we went to the aquarium together yesterday. And he bought matching jellyfish keychains for us."

"What?!" she cried out. "You went on a date with him?! Why didn't you text me this! Why didn't you tell me sooner? Why—"

You groaned. "It wasn't a date."

"Oh?" she said, all innocence. "Just two people spending quality time together among marine creatures while probably making accidental eye contact over jellyfish tanks? Totally not a date."

You shot her a half-hearted glare, which was returned by one of her wider grins.

"But I think I started to actually fall for him," you mumbled.

The words came out quieter and softer than you intended, as if saying them aloud made them impossible to ignore any longer. You stared down at your hands, fingers fiddling with the edge of your sleeves. "It's not even just the aquarium. Or the keychain. Or any moment. It's... everything. It's who he is, even with all the dry and sarcastic remarks. And I just feel like I'm being pulled towards something I don't understand."

"But I can't. I don't know if I should," you continued, your voice cracking a little. "Because what if I'm wrong? What if I'm the only one feeling this? What if there's no string at all?"

She blinked. "You mean the Red String of Fate?"

You swallowed. "It's stupid, I know. But I've always believed in it, like there'd be this sign. This moment where everything aligned. And now that I'm actually feeling something like this, I keep waiting for the confirmation. That it's safe for me to fall. Because if I fall for someone the universe didn't choose for me, then it'll ruin me forever." You fixed your eyes to the floor. "I don't want to be the only one reaching. I don't want to love someone and find out I was never meant to."

For a while, Kuina didn't say anything. Then she reached out and held your hand. "Screw the string."

You stared at her, not sure how to respond.

She squeezed your hand. "Who cares if there's a thread or a sign or a green light? You're here, and he's here. And if your heart is pulling towards him, maybe that's enough. Besides, since when did you let the universe boss you around? You're not a prophecy, you're a person. You get to choose who you love."

You let out a shaky breath. "What if he doesn't choose me?"

"I don't think he would have given you that little jellyfish if he didn't already start to," she grinned.

Your lips twitched, somewhere between a laugh and a sob. Without thinking, you leaned over and pulled her into a hug. She squeaked at the suddenness of it, but her arms came around you quickly.

"Thanks, Kuina," you murmured into her shoulder.

She gave you one last squeeze before letting go. "Anytime. Now go before we both cry."

You rolled your eyes and grabbed your bag. "You're the worst."

"Tell me something I don't know," she called after you, her smile warm.

You stepped into the hallway, and there was a strange lightness in your chest. You began to walk towards the elevator, but as you turned the corner, you nearly collided with someone.

You jolted back a step. "Oh, sorry—"

Your words froze midair.

Chishiya blinked down at you, his brows lifting in that unimpressed way that somehow always made your stomach flip.

"Well," he said dryly. "I didn't think I was that easy to bump into."

Your heart immediately began to take on the role of a traitor again. "I—uh. Sorry. I wasn't looking."

"Clearly," he said, his eyes flicking down to your bag where your jellyfish keychain was, then back to your face. "Leaving already?"

You nodded, trying not to look too long at his mouth when he spoke. "Yeah, I just finished seeing Kuina. She's officially leaving tomorrow."

His expression shifted so imperceptibly that you could barely tell. "Good for her."

You nodded again, mostly because your brain had stalled. But he didn't move to leave, and neither did you. The two of you just stood there as nurses and other doctors passed by, giving the two of you a glance of smugness.

After a moment, he tilted his head towards the hallway. "Follow me."

You blinked. "Huh? Where?"

He was already walking, hands shoved into the pockets of his coat. "Just follow me."

You hesitated, mostly out of habit, but your legs moved before your doubts could catch up. You trailed after him until he led you through a door marked 'Authorized Staff Only'. When the two of you walked in, he led you to his office that was tucked away in a quiet corridor. You stood in the doorway, awkwardly shifting your weight, while he crossed to the desk without looking back.

"Are you going to perform surgery on me?" you asked.

"No," he said, reaching for something on his desk. "Though if you keep talking, I might consider it."

You were about to retort when he turned, but he placed something soft in your hands.

You stared down and saw that it was a small stuffed penguin. Its fabric was slightly different from the one you had admired at the aquarium, but the resemblance was uncanny. Same little beak, same stubby wings, and same soft weight cradled in your hands.

"You kept holding it," he said flatly. "At the aquarium. You looked like you wanted it badly."

You opened your mouth, but nothing came out.

"I found it on my way here," he added. "You're welcome."

He shoved his hands deeper into his coat pockets, as if he didn't know what to do with them now.

You ran your thumb over the little plush flipper, the faintest smile tugging at your lips before you could help it. "Thank you, Shuntaro," you said sincerely with a blooming smile that lived in the space between two heartbeats.

He glanced at you sideways, then looked away just as quickly.

You held up the penguin a little. "He needs a name."

"You're naming it?"

"Of course I'm naming it," you said. "Just look at that face."

He gave the penguin a skeptical once-over as you cradled it protectively. "Then what are you naming it?"

You hesitated, then looked back at the toy. "Hmm. I don't know. How about... Yentaro?"

He arched a brow. "Yentaro?"

"Shuntaro and Yen combined," you explained. "He was overpriced at the aquarium. I want him to remember that."

He scoffed, but you caught the faintest trace of a genuine smile in the corner of his mouth. You clutched Yentaro to your chest and smiled, quiet and real and a little stunned by the soft chaos this boy kept bringing into your life.

౨ৎ

Back at home, you lay on your bed with the penguin tucked loosely between your hands.

Yentaro stared at you with its beady, judgmentaless eyes. You stared back like he held all the answers to your feelings, and he didn't. He was just a stuffed penguin with an uneven beak, but he had been chosen for you by someone who had said that he didn't believe in love.

Which was exactly the problem.

Because now that you were alone, the feelings returned louder and clearer. They curled around your heart like strings, pulling tight each time you thought of Chishiya. You didn't know what to make of it, and that was exactly the part that scared you the most. Because you were falling in love with someone whose heart was a locked room. And the only thing worse than loving someone who didn't feel the same was loving someone who might, because hope was more dangerous than certainty.

But the truth was, you didn't know if he would ever show it. Or even understand it. And your heart wasn't a place you could offer lightly, no. Not when you had spent so long convincing yourself love needed to have a sign to it. Not when you had built your entire mindset on the idea that fate would tell you when it was safe.

But fate had been far too quiet lately.

It hadn't sent you a sign. It hadn't tugged you forward with a gentle pulse of knowing. There was no dream, no red thread, and no whispered feeling in your heart that said "Yes, this is the one". There was only you, lying here with a penguin on your stomach and a storm behind your ribs, caught between what you felt and what you feared. Because if you let yourself truly love him, you would be gambling with no guarantee. And after everything, after all you've been through and all the grief, wasn't that the one thing you had sworn you'd never do again? To fall without certainty?

You thought about his silence. His distance. His maddening ambiguity. But you also thought about the way his eyes had softened when he noticed the jellyfish keychain on your bag. The way he had bought you the penguin you hadn't even asked for. The way his voice was dry as always but began to sound different when he handed it to you.

But what if this was all a temporary illusion and you were mistaking warmth for fate again?

You sighed, letting your head fall back against the pillow.

You thought about what Kuina had said. About not letting the universe control who you love. About how sometimes you have to choose your heart over a hunch. And yet, it still felt like a gamble you weren't sure you were brave enough to make. Because you didn't know if fate would approve. If the gods were watching, string in hand and ready to tie or snip it at will.

It wasn't just about liking someone anymore. Not when your feelings had grown real and rooted themselves somewhere deep and terrifying. You hadn't meant to let them in, and you had tried not to, but somehow, they'd taken root all the same.

And Chishiya... he had said he didn't believe in love. He was apathetic. Elusive. But there were those fleeting moments. Those were things no one else would notice unless they were trying to listen for him.

You clutched the stuffed penguin a little tighter in your arms.

Maybe he didn't know what love was supposed to look like, but he was trying to speak it in your language. And so were you.

Because what if love wasn't supposed to be something you found at the end of a divine thread? What if it wasn't supposed to be a perfectly timed confession beneath falling stars? What if it was just a slow undoing and a slow becoming?

So what if you were the only one feeling it this loudly? So what if his heart was a quiet room and yours was knocking too hard at the door? You'd rather be honest about the chaos in your chest than pretend it wasn't there. You were tired of holding it back. Tired of waiting for a sign when maybe your feelings were the sign.

You loved Chishiya Shuntaro.

౨ৎ

You picked Kuina up from the hospital the next morning.

However, there was no cryptic doctor with a peculiar hairstyle in sight. Not that you were looking, though. (You were absolutely looking).

But Kuina was free now. Fully healed and already threatening to do a cartwheel down the sidewalk. She hobbled slightly through the discharge doors with a triumphant glint in her eye and a paper bag full of vitamin supplements.

Fifteen minutes later, you were standing in the doorway of her apartment. And three seconds after that, her scream echoed through the room.

"What did you do?!"

You blinked. "Good morning to you, too."

She spun towards you, wild-eyed, with one arm flung dramatically towards the now-empty pantry. "You ate all my snacks?! All of them?!"

You tried to defend yourself. "In my defence, I thought you were going to die. And I paid you back with more, didn't I?"

"That doesn't explain my limited edition Oreos!"

"Grief manifests in strange ways."

You stayed for a little while. You helped her unpack her things, refold her towels, and argue over whether penguin plushies should be displayed upright or lounging with dread. She kicked you out eventually, citing a sacred reunion with her newly restocked pantry.

The afternoon sun cast long shadows that stretched across the sidewalk. You walked with your hands in your pockets and your mind elsewhere. And that has been the problem lately. Your mind was always elsewhere. It was always with him.

Not that you'd tell him that. You'd rather eat the remaining contents of Kuina's cupboard.

Still, there was something about walking through the city that made you feel like you were moving towards something, even when you weren't sure what. The streets were familiar, but every corner made you hope that he would appear again with that stupidly perfect hair and a new sarcastic remark to mock you with. He didn't, but the thought continued to linger.

You glanced at Yentaro poking out of your tote bag. You didn't even remember putting him in there. His nonjudgmental beady eyes seemed to judge you at this very moment.

You sighed. "Don't start."

He said nothing. Well, you couldn't really blame him.

Yentaro continued to bob lightly in your bag as you walked. He was quite the ridiculous companion for someone currently spiralling about metaphysical signs and emotional unavailability. But there he was, serving as proof that some part of Chishiya had thought of you, which made everything worse.

You stared at the concrete ahead, trying not to read into every memory, every pause in his voice, and every look that lasted a second too long. Trying not to crave something that hadn't been promised.

Halfway down your street, you noticed something. Well, it wasn't really noticed but more like acknowledged the strange little thread that had been curling around your pinky for the past several blocks.

At first you thought it was lint or maybe an old bracelet fray. You had even tried to flick it off earlier while crossing the crosswalk, annoyed at how it served as a petty reminder of how disheveled you probably looked. You squinted at it now in the late afternoon light, the thread gleaming faintly and almost translucent, as if not there at all. It extended forward, drifting lazily toward the corner ahead, as though it had been leading you somewhere this whole time.

You blinked.

It couldn't be it. Right?

You stared at it harder, your heart thudding. The thread was barely there, no brighter than a sunbeam caught in a spider's web, and about as fragile-looking too. It certainly wasn't the dramatic blood-red string you had read about in stories. The ones tied bold around pinkies like a declaration. No, this one shimmered faintly, like it wasn't fully convinced of its own existence.

You twisted your hand in the light, and it moved with you. Why now? Why did it come at this moment? It should've come at a time when the two of you were together, right?

Your breath caught, suddenly remembering something your grandmother used to say.

"The red string only shows itself when both hearts have already reached for it."

Your fingers trembled as your heart crescendoed up a tempo. You remained still on the sidewalk as the pedestrians and even the buildings around blurred into motion.

If your grandmother had been right, then it meant the ache you felt wasn't one-sided after all.

You immediately ran towards the nearest subway entrance as if your bones had made the decision before your brain did. You needed to see Chishiya. If you guessed right, the threat would grow more visible the closer you came to him. Then the hospital would be proof. You dashed down the stairs, weaving past commuters, and taking the platform steps two at a time. You barely even realized that as the train screeched to a halt, you hopped on just before the doors slid shut.

The train lurched forward, and so did your heart, thudding wild and breathless against your ribs like it, too, knew how close you were. The world around you turned into colours, but the thread didn't. It burned faintly at first, then it became clearer and bolder and clearer, red as every unspoken thing you had ever wanted to believe in. You were right. The closer you were to them, the more visible it would become.

You stood near the door with your bag clenched to your side, legs taut with impatience and hope. And this time, it was actual hope. Not the skeptical kind you used to ration in your chest. This was louder. Stupidly loud and daring to believe. You watched the string brighten with every stop, as if it were feeding on the proximity.

And so when the train doors finally opened at the station near the hospital, you immediately ran. You ran through the platform, up the stairs two at a time. Your lungs burned, but your smile bloomed wider than it had in weeks. You imagined how he'd look when he saw you. Surprised, maybe. Soft, even. You imagined his voice, dry and teasing as ever, cracking just slightly when you told him what you needed to say. Because you were going to say it. All of it. How much you felt. How much he meant. How afraid you had been.

You wanted to see him. You just wanted to stand in front of him with this thread wrapped around your finger and say, "Look! Look, I was right!"

 You thought about how often you had dismissed it. How often you had doubted the way your heart stuttered when he spoke. But love wasn't always loud or obvious, was it? And now, it was all making sense. Because all this time, the little things—the penguin, the keychain, the way his eyes lingered just a moment too long on yours, and those deep conversations—had all been leading up to this moment.

Your breath was caught halfway between a sob and a laugh. The string glowed brighter than it ever had, and it almost seemed as though it was tugging at you now, guiding you forward like it wanted to be found. And you let it lead you.

The thread continued its way down the sterile hallway, bright as a heartbeat and just as stubborn. You followed it past the patient rooms, up the elevator that started this all, and past the rows of worn chairs until it veered quietly towards the corridor that only authorized staff could enter. You paused at the threshold from the confirmation that this was it. You peeked down the hallway to make sure no nurses or interns were loitering nearby, and there was no one in sight. And so, you slipped in silently, your heart ricocheting inside your ribs.

You couldn't help the way your hands started shaking because he was inside. What if one look from him made you forget every word you had rehearsed on the train ride over and over? What if you stammered and cried or laughed or said the wrong thing entirely?

You shook off the thought. It didn't matter. It didn't have to be perfect. It just had to be real. Because this was finally the moment. The right place, the right time, and the right version of both of you.

You knocked once. You frowned slightly when you were met with silence. But you tried again, a little firmer this time.

"Shuntaro?" you called out.

Still nothing.

Maybe he was asleep. After all, he had pulled shifts so long they blurred the line between night and day. You tried to imagine him with his head resting on his desk, and you smiled at that.

But you couldn't exactly wait here in the hallway, twiddling your soul between your thumbs, with the chance of other doctors strolling by and telling you to leave immediately. You had one shred of dignity left, and you planned to keep it, at least until your inevitable confession to him.

So you opened the door and let yourself in.

"Shuntaro?" you called out again, softer now.

Still, no response.

The room was quiet. The last strands of the sunlight filtered in through the blinds, slicing sunlight into thin lines across the floor. It painted over shelves, and sterile counters, and it stretched across a coat flung over the back of a chair. His coat.

Your heart leapt.

You moved quickly now, the red string still tugging forward and sure towards the desk ahead. You were smiling without realizing. He was here.

But once your eyes dropped to the desk, the smile froze on your lips.

There it was. The red string.

It lay coiled and limp like a discarded ribbon, no longer tugging towards anything at all.

And right beside it was a pair of scissors.

౨ৎ

The thread had always been so quiet in its guidance. You had followed it like a dreamer chasing the tail end of a story, half-believing it would lead you to something—anything—that might prove you weren't alone in this. And now, here you were, standing with tears unable to fall.

You had followed it all this way. You had believed. You had let yourself believe.

And he? He had seen the thread too. That much was clear. He had reached for it. Held it. Knew exactly what it meant. And then, he cut it. And it wasn't fate this time. Nor timing. Nor a misunderstanding.

It was a choice.

Your knees nearly gave out. You reached for the edge of the desk, fingers curling against the wood as if you could steady yourself against the weight of it. The room, warm just moments ago, turned cavernous. Every light became a lie. Every second leading up to this unraveled behind your eyes like ribbon torn at the seam.

Why?

The hurt came all at once. Like breath knocking out of lungs. Like slipping beneath ice. Your throat clenched. Your vision blurred. You had run so far. You had believed.

Your gaze dropped again to the string. You hadn't realized you were still holding your end. It clung to your finger, frayed now at the middle, while its other half was severed so cleanly that even grief felt like an afterthought. You wondered if he had done it slowly. If his hand had trembled. If he had hesitated. Or if he had looked at it, expressionless.

You didn't even hear the door open behind you until a voice came.

"What are you doing here?"

The voice broke something in you. You spun around and saw him. Chishiya Shuntaro.

The blue hour had settled into the room, casting everything in that melancholic sapphire. It painted his figure too, as if it had drained all the other colours from him entirely, leaving behind only the hollow of him. As though the sun had tried and failed to love him.

You stood there, barely able to breathe. Your throat was locked as your hands clenched at your sides. Every version of this moment you had played out in your mind so many times collapsed in on itself. None had accounted for how useless they'd all become when you were faced with this.

"What am I doing here?" you managed to say at last.

You took a shaky breath and stepped forward.

"You don't get to ask me that. Not after you did this—" You pointed at the desk, towards the thread lying limp like a corpse. "I followed this thing all the way here like a fool, only to see that you cut it?"

Chishiya stood there, still with that same maddening indifferent look stretched across his face, like the thread meant as little to him as a strand of hair.

"I told you before," he finally said. "It doesn't mean anything."

You stared at him, stunned. "Doesn't matter? It was the Red String, Shuntaro. Ours. It was fate. It chose us."

"And it doesn't matter."

Your heart cracked at that.

"No, it does," you whispered. "You and I—we're—we're soulmates."

The word hung fragile and humiliating. He said nothing as apathy stitched deeper into every line of his face. It only made your own fractures across your heart deepen.

"Don't just stand there and pretend like none of this meant anything," you said, your voice shaking, furious, and breaking all at once. "If it was just a story, if it didn't matter, then why? Why did you give me that stupid penguin?"

Chishiya blinked at that. But his expression didn't change. Not even a bit. It was just that same indifferent look that made you want to scream.

"Why did you buy it just for me?" you went on. "Why did you smile when I named it after you? Why did you get me those keychains, huh? The ones that matched, and you hooked yours to your bag like you cared."

His jaw tensed so briefly you almost missed it. His eyes flicked toward the string. Regret? No. He shut it down too fast.

"And don't tell me it was meaningless. Don't tell me it was convenient, or a coincidence, or you just felt like it." Your voice was rising now. "You looked at me. Shuntaro, you looked at me like I was something soft in a world that never offered softness to you."

Still, he said nothing.

"You cared," you breathed. "Even if you didn't want to. Even if you won't admit it. You felt something."

"I didn't."

"You're lying!"

Your vision blurred as tears pricked your eyes.

"You asked me how I viewed the heart," you began hoarsely. "In the aquarium. You don't ask something like that unless part of you wants to understand it. Unless part of you already does."

He looked away for a moment, towards the far wall. It was as if he, too, couldn't bear the hurt behind all your words.

"They don't have hearts," you quoted, softer now. "That's what you said. But you kept looking at them like you envied that. Like you wanted that for yourself."

You tried blinking your tears away. "And if I told you that if I didn't have a heart, I'd float through everything. Including the happy moments. Like that one. And you answered me like you agreed, or at least wished to."

You pointed at the thread again.

"Did all of this mean nothing to you?"

He finally met your gaze again, and this time, there was something behind it. It wasn't warmth nor guilt, but it infuriated you in how tightly he locked it away.

"What this means doesn't change anything," he said, each word carving even more fractures in your heart. "It won't change the truth."

"What truth?" you demanded, hating how your voice trembled and how small you started to sound. "That you're too scared to try? That it's easier to pretend you're some kind of machine who doesn't want anyone to admit you've already let someone in? I know you felt it too. The pull. I've seen the way you look at me, Shuntaro. You felt it too. I know you did!"

"I told you," he said quieter, but no less brutal. "I don't believe in whatever this is."

"You think you don't believe in it," you spat, eyes burning. "You just think you're incapable of it. That's not true. You are. You're just too much of a coward to admit it."

Chishiya didn't even move.

Why didn't he? Why wasn't he fighting for you? Why wasn't he—

"I don't want to love anyone."

You froze.

"I don't want it," he said again, slower this time. "It complicates things."

Something inside you both shattered and wilted.

It wasn't in the way flowers did when the season ended, but in the way stars collapsed until only the ruins remained. His words weren't sharp, but they were delivered with the kind of apathy that made them cruel. "I don't want to love anyone," he had said. As if love were a disease. That the very idea of it was a burden he never asked for. A variable to be erased from his life in the name of simplicity. As if yours was a thing to be avoided and unwanted, even in its gentlest form.

You had prepared yourself for a hundred different outcomes, but not this. The cruelty of his honesty was spoken without hesitation. His words felt like a scalpel instead of a blade, designed not to kill but to carve something out of you and leave you living with the absence.

You looked at the thread on the desk again. Red. Frayed. Lifeless. A thread that once felt divine had now been reduced to something discarded.

It had chosen you both.

You exhaled shakily, trying everything in your will to not let your tears fall. Your breath came out in a hollow whisper that didn't even sound like you anymore.

"Fine."

Just that one word.

You didn't trust yourself to say anything else. Not when everything inside you that had been broken open was spilling out, flooding every fragile corner you had tried so hard to protect. You had already laid everything bare, so what more could be said?

You turned before your heart could change its mind.

Chishiya didn't move. He didn't call out or stop you. So you didn't either.

Your hand reached for the door, and still, nothing.

Even in the silence, you waited a moment longer. Just in case. Just in case he said your name. Just in case he whispered, "Don't go". Just in case anything inside him fractured the way everything inside you had.

But the stillness stayed.

And so, like a fool made of hope and endings, you stepped through it.

౨ৎ

It had been a while since you left the hospital.

Time moved strangely now, as though the hours were waterlogged and too heavy to hold shape. You walked without really knowing where your feet were going, like your body had been handed a script your heart hadn't read. The world around you blurred beneath the glow of signs, and yet everything felt too clear. It was like grief had sharpened your senses instead of dulling them.

You had found a pair of scissors on the hospital cart outside, abandoned, as if someone had left them there just for you. Metal catching the light and soft as breath, you held them in your palm. For a moment, all you had heard was your pulse as you had looked down at your hand. The thread still clung to your pinky like a memory of a promise you hadn't been ready to bury. You had angled the blade gently, and then came the clean, surgical sound of something ending. The thread had slipped from your hand, and something in you followed it.

You kept walking, but the thoughts kept chasing you.

What were you expecting? That he'd follow? That he'd change his mind? That love would crack him open like sunlight? The sheer audacity of it all made your chest tighten. You had let yourself believe. You had given your heart the benefit of the doubt.

You thought about his desk again. That ruined thread. Still red and bright. Still something sacred, reduced to something left behind. You pictured the way his scissors must have hovered for a moment. Or maybe they didn't. But how cleanly he had cut it and how gentle the violence had been stayed with you the way all the worst moments do.

Through the muted light of vending machines and past shuttered storefronts, your limbs felt far away from you. Your thoughts too, as if they were dragged behind, unable to keep up.

You tried to rewrite it all in your head. You tried to tell yourself it didn't matter. That it was all convenience. That he never meant any of it. That you were foolish and desperate for inventing stories out of silence.

But you couldn't.

Because you had seen the way he looked at you. Like you were an anomaly he hadn't accounted for. You had seen that tilt in his head whenever you spoke of peculiar topics again. You had been his exception. You knew it.

But he, himself, couldn't see it. He wouldn't let himself to.

Eventually, you made your way home.

You moved without thought until your body found your bed. Face buried in the sheets and breath stuttering out of your chest, it was then that the tears finally came.

They were sudden and humiliating. They scalded as they fell, tracing every inch of your face like they meant to carve the pain into something permanent. Your chest ached in ways you didn't know were possible, as if your ribs were splintering under the weight of everything that had happened. You had held that threat like a promise. You let it lead you like a star across the sky. And now, it became the unraveling of a belief you had built your world around. The hurt of it bloomed like a wound that would never close.

You sat up, trying to wipe your tears away with your shaking fingers. And that's when you saw it dangling. The jellyfish keychain.

You stared at it, your heart breaking even more from the sight of it.

Your hands moved before your thoughts did. You ripped it off your bag, the metal clasp snapping with a small, pitiful sound before you hurled it across the room. It hit the wall hard and bounced to the floor, breaking apart on impact. A small crack split its plastic body, and the little beads of the tentacles scattered everywhere. You stared at the broken shape of it, your chest burning with the kind of ache that grief could only hope to imitate.

He had never planned to love you back.

And your memory had become a gallery of all the ways he almost did.

౨ৎ

Chishiya stared at the empty desk for so long. The outline of you stayed burned into his vision long after you were gone, like the memory of warmth on cold skin.

The only thing left behind was the string. Crumpled and discarded, like a blood-red thread bleeding out on the woodgrain. It almost looked like a wound that not even he had the skill to treat.

He told himself it didn't matter. That this was always going to happen.

It was better this way. He had spared you from a promise he didn't know how to keep. From the slow dismantling of a person who had never learned how to give. From loving someone whose instinct was to always retreat. He protected the things most fragile to him by keeping them unreachable.

That's at least what he told himself. Again and again.

He didn't know where you had gone. You didn't say anything. Not even the polite formality of a goodbye. You had simply disappeared, the same way he thought his emotions did a long time ago.

But he also told himself it wasn't his concern. Because if he had cared, wouldn't he have shown it? If it all meant anything, wouldn't he have held on? Wouldn't he have run after you?

He didn't, but the unfamiliar yet unbearable ache in his chest said otherwise.

For whatever reason, he pulled out his phone. Maybe he wanted to feel foolish. Maybe he just needed a reason to. Or maybe he didn't know what else to do. Because your presence had long gone, but the feeling hadn't left. And for a man who had made a life of disassociating emotion from logic, it terrified him. This feeling that refused to be dissected. This ache that didn't respond to reason.

His thumbs hesitated over the keyboard as he typed in the Red String of Fate into his search bar.

He skimmed past the romanticized versions. The articles with red hearts and the poorly written metaphors with idle hopes. And then he found something tucked into the footnotes of a text less inclined to lie.

It described what the Red String was. It was a belief that said to connect two people destined to be lovers, regardless of place, time, or lifetime. The physical string was only meant to guide the bearer, but not the bond itself. The real thread is unseen and irrevocable. Beyond touch or interference. And while the string may stretch or tangle, it would never break.

And in that moment, a single crack formed in the dam Chishiya had built around his heart.

It was small. Barely a fracture. But something slipped through. It stung in a way he had never felt before. Even as a doctor, he wasn't able to figure out how to treat it. There was no prescription for guilt. No cure for a goodbye. No name for the feeling of wanting to rewind time and do something differently.

He still remembered the look on your face when he dismissed the string. The way your fingers tightened. The way your breath caught. The way your eyes, with so much pain in them, had searched his, as if hoping he'd change his mind. He wasn't able to empathize with your emotions back then. He hadn't known how.

But oh, how he wished you were still here so he could learn from you.

Now, with only silence left in your place, he found himself thinking about things he never used to. All of your little interactions, since the beginning. The little glances in the elevator. The way your shoulders would angle just slightly towards each other, as if you both were pulled by something neither of you could name back then. The day at the aquarium, when the world had felt unusually soft between you, filtered in the glow of blue water and drifting lights. The jellyfish keychains he had bought.

He had teased you then, saying that it would serve as a reminder that you didn't have a brain. He remembered the way you smiled and how you had rolled your eyes. But now? It felt like it was reminding him that he was the one who lacked something vital. Because you had a heart, though foolish, open, and unguarded. And all he had was the absence of where one should've been.

And somewhere in those thoughts, he remembered the first and last song the two of you ever shared. But now, he would live in the echo of a chorus, in the hush of a bridge, in the lines he once never paid attention to.

He had been playing it in the elevator, and you had heard it through the faint bleed of his earbuds.

"Is that...Motion Picture Soundtrack?" you had asked.

He hadn't forgotten that. He hadn't forgotten the way you smiled, either. It was soft, like you didn't want him to see how happy it made you that he liked the same songs you did. He told himself that you were merely a curiosity to him. A passing impulse. But now, there was a line in that very song that stood out to him. One that hadn't meant anything then.

"I will see you, in the next life."

And now, paired with what he had just read—the idea that the Red String connected people across lifetimes—he could only hope that in the next life, he would be a little less unfortunate. A little braver. A little softer. Perhaps then, fate would bring the two of you back together one day, as it must have known how loving someone had been so difficult for him.

But even if he weren't, he could only hope that wherever you were, you'd still find your way to him like in this one.

    ৎ

masterlist

The morning light filtered through the pretentiously tall windows as you made your way down the corridor. You had deliberately chosen a path that you hoped would avoid Moon Baek entirely. Taking the longer route would raise your chances, as he would definitely be occupied elsewhere.

Coward, you thought bitterly. Running from him like some frightened child.

But after last afternoon's encounter, the memory of his thumb against your pulse and that knowing smirk still burned fresh in your mind. You needed space to think. To think and remember why you were here and what you were supposed to be doing instead of melting under his touch like some lovesick fool.

The revenge you had been orchestrating so meticulously was dissolving. It became secondary to simply enduring his proximity without your facade crumbling to ashes. Each interaction felt like navigating through a labyrinth blindfolded. Well, ironically, that was exactly what you were pretending to do.

You paused at the junction where two hallways met, listening attentively for any signs of approaching footsteps or murmured conversations. There was only silence that felt promising. Perfect. Maybe you could actually make it through breakfast without—

"Running away from me already?"

Your heart lurched at the sound of Moon Baek's irritating voice that had somehow come from behind you. You hadn't heard him approach nor sensed his presence until he spoke as if he chose only now to materialize in your reality. You turned slowly, arranging your features into what you hoped would pass for gentle bewilderment rather than panic.

"Oh, good morning," you greeted. "I didn't hear you coming."

"I noticed." His footsteps moved closer, and you could practically feel his scrutiny. "You seemed quite focused on listening and navigating around."

"Well, yes," you confirmed, allowing a small, self-deprecating smile to cross your lips. "I've found it's better to be cautious in unfamiliar places. These hallways all sound the same to me."

"Do they?" He moved even closer now, close enough that you could catch the faint scent of whatever cologne he wore and that familiar milk tea flavour. "And here I thought you were getting quite comfortable with the layout."

That comment struck a note that was dissonant with the rest in your mind. You couldn't tell if it was an innocent observation or just another one of his little tests.

"I guess there's just a lot to learn," you said carefully.

"Hmm," he hummed. "And where exactly were you planning to learn your way to this morning?"

"I was just exploring," you answered. "I thought I'd try a different route today. You know, to... familiarize myself with more of the building."

Which wasn't a complete lie. After all, you were trying to figure out where things were to use to your advantage.

"A different route," he repeated. "That's quite ambitious of you."

"I like to be independent," you muttered. "I don't want to rely on others more than necessary."

"Yet here you are," he sighed, "lost in a hallway junction."

Damn him. You weren't lost. You knew exactly where you were and where you were going. But admitting that would only raise more questions you couldn't answer.

You exhaled. "I guess you caught me."

"Of course." His footsteps circled around you slightly, forcing you to resist the urge to track his movement. "Well, since I don't have anything planned today, perhaps you'd allow me to escort you? I'd hate for you to take another wrong turn."

The offer sounded perfectly polite and even considerate. But something in his tone that you caught made it feel more like a challenge than courtesy.

"That's very kind of you, but that's... that's really not necessary." You smiled, trying to sound gracious. "I'm sure you have better things to do than follow me around while I bump into walls."

"Better things?" He sounded genuinely amused now. "Like what?"

"I don't know. Important estate owner things? Maybe intimidating your subordinates?"

A soft laugh escaped him. "Intimidating my subordinates is more of an afternoon activity," he explained. "My morning schedule is surprisingly free."

"Are you sure?" you frowned. "I don't want to impose at all. I'm most confident that you have much more important things to do than babysit me."

"Babysit?" Moon Baek tilted his head. "Is that what you think this is?"

"I just meant—"

"I know what you meant," he yawned. "But I find myself curious about your exploration methods. Call it a personal interest."

"Right. Because I'm such a fascinating specimen."

"Oh, you have no idea."

You sighed, having completely given up. "I guess you can come, if you really don't mind."

"Not at all," he sang. "After all, I did promise to find new ways to pass time with you today."

And so, the two of them began moving forward together, with Moon Baek's footsteps remaining perfectly measured beside yours. Every few steps, you could sense him glancing your way, and you found yourself hyperaware of the space between them.

This was ridiculous. You gritted your teeth behind your neutral expression as frustration settled in your chest. Here you were, your careful planning reduced to this awkward morning, tripping over conversations rather than hallways like an actual blind person. You felt like a moth caught in a web, with each struggle only tangling you deeper while the spider watched with amusement.

The worst part wasn't even that. It was the traitorous flutter in your stomach every time he spoke. The way your pulse quickened not just from panic, but from something you didn't dare to name. Your brother's memory deserved better than this fumbling performance. It deserved justice delivered by steadier hands than yours were proving to be.

You tried to tell yourself to focus, but it was getting harder to hold onto that righteous anger when he was standing so close. How could you, when his voice held that mix of amusement and something that sounded almost like genuine interest? Was it even possible when each interaction felt less like revenge against your enemy and more like some twisted form of flirtation?

No. You wouldn't let it get to you. Whatever game he thought he was playing, whatever entertainment he thought you were providing, you would find a way to turn it to your advantage.

The next hour was him guiding you through the estate, his hand occasionally brushing your elbow to steer you around corners you could have navigated perfectly well on your own. You bumped into far too many walls and objects than you could count (half of the times, they were truly accidental). He watched you with obvious amusement as you forced yourself to walk straight into a decorative table. Then, he made you bump your shoulder against a doorframe hard enough to bruise and had the audacity to say it was a simple miscalculation.

"Oh, sorry there," he said with a barely contained snicker. "I should have mentioned that you were a bit off from the path."

You rubbed your throbbing shoulder, glaring in his general direction, as he sounded as sorry as a cat who had just knocked over an expensive vase. "Your concern is really exceptional."

"Why, thank you, darling." His voice was so innocent you wanted to strangle him. "Though I have to say, your coordination needs some work."

"My coordination?" You scoffed. "Is that what we're calling your poor navigation skills?"

"My navigation skills are flawless," he smirked. "It's your spatial awareness that seems to be the issue."

"Funny how my spatial awareness only becomes a problem when you're the one giving directions."

"Pure coincidence, I'm sure." The amusement in Moon Baek's voice was practically tangible. "Though I have to admit, watching you bump into inanimate objects every other minute is pretty entertaining."

"I'm so glad I can provide you with quality entertainment," you muttered. "Should I start charging admission?"

"Oh, this is complimentary. Consider it part of the estate's hospitality package."

You let out a frustrated breath. "Some hospitality. Most hosts try to keep their guests from sustaining injuries."

"Where would be the fun in that?" he raised a brow. "Besides, didn't you say yourself that you were getting better at sensing your surroundings?"

"Walking into furniture is a sign of improvement to you?"

"Well, you did manage to avoid knocking down any glass objects on the tables," he pointed out. "That's progress."

"Oh, wonderful. At this rate, I'll only have minor injuries and a concussion by the end of the week."

He chuckled, making you want to both smile and scream. "Don't worry. I'm sure you'll get used to it."

"Or you could just be a decent human being and tell me when there's a door."

"But then how would you learn?"

You scoffed at that, shaking your head in disbelief. The entire situation was absolutely ridiculous. No, even beyond that. Because here you were, supposedly seeking revenge against the man who had killed your very own brother. And instead, you were bantering about bumping into furniture and injuries.

As you fell into step beside him, you muttered under your breath about his questionable definition of hospitality. It should have been infuriating. It was infuriating. But the way he seemed to be genuinely entertained by your responses made a traitorous part of you enjoy it.

The little tour of the estate stretched longer than you had expected. You lost track of how many times he steered you around corners and how often you both deliberately and accidentally tripped. By the end of it, your shoulder still throbbed from that doorframe, and your patience had worn thin.

What unsettled you more was how natural it began to feel. The safety you felt from the proximity between them, his gentle touch when helping you navigate (if you disregarded the times he purposefully made you bump into something), and the warmth of his laugh. It was all too easy to forget why you were here in the first place.

After a while, Moon Baek tilted his head towards you. "Wait, have you eaten yet?"

You blinked at the sudden question, caught off guard by the sudden shift to such a mundane topic.

"No," you answered, a little wary of it all. "Why?"

He stopped abruptly and turned to face you, clicking his tongue. "You should have told me that earlier. You shouldn't go on your day without eating anything."

Before you could protest or point out the absurdity of your captor lecturing you about proper meal habits, he was already steering you in a different direction. "Come on."

"I would've found something eventually," you mumbled.

"Eventually," he hummed. "I'll make you something instead."

"You?" you asked, raising an eyebrow. "I thought you had your subordinates cook for you. It seems kind of beneath you."

"Beneath me?" Moon Baek scoffed. "I'll have you know I'm perfectly capable."

You pressed your lips into a thin line as you let him guide you. Of all things for Moon Baek to fuss over, it was breakfast? The same man who had pulled the trigger without hesitation was now scolding you like some doting caretaker. You stared at him, wondering if this was really the same man you were supposed to be seeking vengeance against.

Still, you played your part. Let him believe you were helpless. The more he lowered his guard, the easier it would be for you when the time came.

He helped you settle into one of the bar stools. You sank into the chair with a sigh, tilting your head in his direction. "You know, you don't have to—"

The words slipped out before you realized that you could use this to your advantage. Playing helpless meant accepting help, even when every fibre of your being wanted to reject it.

He glanced over his shoulder as he pulled ingredients from the refrigerator, one eyebrow raised in question. "I don't have to what?"

"Nothing," you muttered, folding your hands in your lap.

He hummed, rummaging through drawers and cabinets. "Did anyone tell you that you're awfully ungrateful?"

"Huh?"

"For someone who's being taken care of, you do retort a lot of remarks."

You wanted to scoff at that. He was the one who kidnapped you in a way, and he was here complaining that you were complaining? But despite that, you did feel a twinge of gratitude in your throat that you so desperately wanted to swallow down.

"Thanks," you whispered softly.

You didn't even mean to say it. Your tongue stilled, shocked at your own betrayal. Gratitude? For him, of all people? You wanted to erase the softness that had slipped past your guard. But they lingered, hanging in the air like the faint warmth of a candle's flame. You tried to tell yourself that it meant nothing. It was politeness, after all, which had become a reflex. Yet, beneath all your bitterness, you felt the tiniest spark of relief at being cared for. Because maybe you hated him, but you hadn't realized how starved you were for even the smallest gesture of kindness.

"Hmm, that's better," he said. "Gratitude suits you far more than stubbornness."

His words sent an unwelcome flutter through your chest that you quickly suppressed. You kept your eyes down as he moved around the kitchen, the sounds of cooking filling the space between them.

When he finally placed a steaming bowl of rice, a golden rolled omelet cut into bite-sized pieces, and small plates of kimchi and pickled radish in front of you, you took a bite, and it was better than you had expected.

Who had Moon Baek been before this? What had shaped him into the man who could kill without hesitation yet worry about whether you'd eaten breakfast?

You pushed the thoughts away. It didn't matter. It couldn't matter.

The moment was interrupted by footsteps in the hallway, followed by a sharp knock on the kitchen doorframe. One of Moon Baek's men stepped inside, bowing his head slightly.

"Boss," he addressed, barely glancing at you before focusing entirely on Moon Baek. "We've got a problem with one of the citizens we shipped to."

Your chopsticks stilled halfway to your mouth. Shipment? What do they work for? You forced yourself to keep chewing to maintain the appearance of disinterest.

Moon Baek's expression darkened. It was the same one that was on his face on your first encounter. All traces of the gentle man who had worried about your breakfast vanished completely.

"Who is it?" Moon Baek asked.

"Jeong-tae," the man replied. "From Yeongseong Gosiwon building. The police found all the..."

He glanced at you and cleared his throat, "...all the equipment. He told them that more people have them, and now they've launched a full investigation."

You noticed the pause immediately. Why had he stopped mid-sentence when he talked about the 'equipment'? What could warrant such secrecy unless it was something illegal?

Your mind raced. It had to be firearms, right? They did somehow possess them for whatever reason, after all. And what else would require such careful wording around a supposed innocent captive?

Yet, some part of it didn't make sense. Why were they giving them out to others? Were they not hoarding them all to themselves? What exactly were they planning? What kind of operation was Moon Baek running that involved supplying others with weapons? And now someone named Jeong-tae had apparently been caught and was talking to the police about others having guns too.

Moon Baek exhaled slowly. "That idiot," he muttered under his breath. "Unable to keep his mouth shut."

He pushed away from the counter, pacing a few steps before turning back to his subordinate. "Did the police find the address list?"

The man shook his head. "No, sir. He must have thrown it out. Along with the package."

Moon Baek let out another heavy exhale, pressing his fingers to his temples as if fighting off a headache. "Then it's still at the location," he muttered. "That list is going to be found eventually."

The silence stretched before Moon Baek straightened again.

"Just continue with the plan," he let out a frustrated exhale. "I'll go to the next location myself and retrieve what needs to be retrieved."

"Sir, is that wise? If you're seen there—"

Moon Baek waved him off. "I'll be fine. Just worry about your own job."

The man bowed quickly. "Will do, sir."

Without another word, he turned and left.

"Sorry about the interruption," Moon Baek said, the frustration in his voice completely gone. "Work never stops, unfortunately."

You offered what you hoped looked like an understanding smile. "It's okay. It sounded important."

Suddenly, that gentle expression returned to his features. His jaw softened, and the tension around his eyes melted away like frost under morning sunlight.

"What kind of work do you do?" you asked, watching his face carefully and wondering what lie he would make up. What sanitized version of his criminal empire would he present to maintain the facade of normalcy?

Moon Baek leaned back against the counter. "Import and export."

Technically, not untrue, you supposed. If you considered illegal firearms as imports, that is.

"There must be a lot of regulations and paperwork," you mumbled, pressing your lips into a thin line.

Moon Baek only hummed at that, neither correcting nor denying that. He was being careful, you realized. Smart. Frustratingly so.

Your mind began to race with possibilities. You could somehow get word to the police about what you had overheard. But again, how? You had no access to communication, no allies, and any attempt to reach out would blow your cover entirely. You didn't even know where you were, and with your supposed vision problems, you would be easy to track down. Plus, running would only confirm his suspicions about your true identity. After all, no innocent victim would flee from their supposed rescuer.

No, you needed actual revenge. Personal vengeance that would make him feel every ounce of pain you were experiencing. The police might arrest him and put him in prison, but that wasn't exactly enough. That wouldn't give you the satisfaction of watching him crumble, of seeing the exact moment his world fell apart the way yours had. You wanted him to suffer the way you had suffered, to lose everything that mattered to him the way you had lost your brother.

You wanted to be the one to pull the trigger, metaphorically or otherwise. To watch the light leave his eyes and know that you had been the cause. To have him understand, in his final moments, exactly why he was being destroyed and by whose hand. The police could have his corpse afterward—but his death, his pain, and his reckoning belonged to you.

"You look like you're thinking very hard about something," Moon Baek observed, tilting his head slightly. "Are you that interested in the thrilling world of imports and exports?"

You blinked, shaking off the thoughts to focus on the moment.

"I suppose it is better than not being able to see," you muttered.

A smirk formed on his lips. His eyes gleamed with something that looked like fondness. It was the kind of expression that could make someone forget why they should be afraid, forget what they were meant to do, and forget everything but him.

Before you could chase the treacherous thought of how much you longed to see it with your own eyes, his fingers found your jaw once more. He tilted your face upwards, angling you just so to guide you into the gravity of his gaze. And there, caught in the warmth of eyes impossibly gentle, you felt the ache of wanting for a clearer glimpse of him heave.

"It's such a misfortune that you can't see," Moon Baek remarked. "You can't see yourself the way I do. You'd finally understand just how pretty you are."

Your breath caught in fragility. This close, you could see the subtle flecks of amber glimmering in his eyes. The way his gaze seemed to map every detail of your face as if committing them to memory. His voice carried a sincerity, as if each word was drawn straight from his heart to his tongue. And the way he looked at you, like you were something precious he had never expected to find, made your chest tighten with emotions you could not afford to feel. It would have been so simple to lean into his touch, to surrender to the gentleness he was offering.

But you couldn't forget what those same hands had done. What he had taken from you.

"How can you say that?" you whispered, the question slipping out before you could stop it. "How can you be so... gentle?"

The words were loaded with meaning you hadn't intended to reveal, forming a crack in your constructed facade. You saw something flicker across his expression—surprise, perhaps, or recognition of the pain bleeding through your question.

Moon Baek's thumb stilled against your jaw, his eyes searching your face. "What do you mean?"

"I just..." you stammered. "I don't understand why you're being kind to me."

He paused, and that flicker across his expression solidified into something resolute and unmistakable, but it was something you couldn't quite decipher. Was it sorrow? Resentment? Pain so deeply buried it had crystallized into something harder? The warmth in his eyes didn't disappear entirely, but it dimmed, like clouds passing over sunlight.

His hand shifted, moving his fingers to your hair to brush a loose strand back behind your ear.

He exhaled slowly. "I see my younger self in you."

Confusion flickered across your features. "Younger self?"

He leaned back against the counter, tilting his head up to stare at the ceiling as if the memories were written there in invisible ink. "I was abandoned by my own mother."

You felt something twist in your chest despite yourself.

"I suppose she thought she was doing the right thing," he continued. "Maybe she couldn't take care of me."

Moon Baek looked back at you. "When we first met, it was like seeing myself all over again."

You tilted your head. "How so?"

"That same helplessness, that same vulnerability..." Moon Baek exhaled once more. "Left behind when you needed someone most. I know what it's like to be forgotten by the world. To have no one come looking for you when you're in trouble. I couldn't let that happen to you too."

The parallel he was drawing made your stomach clench. He thought your boyfriend had abandoned you because of your blindness. Moon Baek thought he had left you helpless and alone when you needed protection most.

The way he had said it too made something inside your chest begin to fracture. The empathy in his voice was devastating in its sincerity. Here was a man who genuinely understood abandonment, who recognized the particular cruelty of being left behind when you were at your most vulnerable.

And yet, these were the same hands that had pulled the trigger.

How could that be possible? How could someone who understood pain so intimately choose to inflict it? How could the man who worried about you eating breakfast and touched your face like you were made of precious glass have looked your brother in the eye and pulled the trigger? How could such profound empathy coexist with such devastating cruelty?

The internal war was tearing you apart, piece by piece. You had built your entire identity around hating him and the clean simplicity of revenge. But nothing about this was simple. Nothing about him was the monster you'd needed him to be. He was complicated, contradictory, and heartbreakingly human in ways that made you want to scream.

"[Name]?"

Moon Baek's voice cut through, pulling you back from the drowning depths of your thoughts and memories. You almost turned towards him instinctively, but you caught yourself just in time to maintain your supposed blindness.

He leaned closer and softly pressed his thumb against your cheek. From there, he moved upwards and traced the path your tear had carved, as if the sorrow you felt was something he could take upon himself. When he reached the corner of your eye, he brushed the last remnant away, the gentleness of it all making your heart clench.

You hadn't even realized your vision had blurred with unshed tears or that the one who had betrayed you had slipped down your cheek. The trace of your heartache lay exposed upon your skin, and it was his hand—that very hand that had shattered everything you once held dear—that reached to erase it.

"You alright?" he asked with a frown.

How could three simple words hold so much care? How could someone you were supposed to hate sound like he hated to see whatever pain had brought tears to your eyes? It made the dam you had built around your heart tremble, daring to crack.

"I'm okay," you finally answered, an exhale of a laugh escaping your lips because of the absurdity of it all. "I'm just... I'm not used to someone caring about what happened to me."

It wasn't entirely a lie, which made it hurt even more.

Because you had been seen as nothing more than a monthly check when you were a child. The foster family that had taken you and Seo-joon in had used the two of you for government checks that would fulfill their own desires, and nothing more. They had fed them the bare minimum and treated them like unwelcome guests in their own home. They faced cruel words and gestures, as if they were the constant reminder that the two were burdens to be endured. Love had been a foreign concept and something they couldn't afford to waste on two broken children who had already been discarded by the world once before.

Only Seo-joon had cared and loved. Only your brother had seen your tears and wiped them away when everything became too much to bear. He had held you when their voices got too loud and when the indifference grew too much. He had been parenting a young girl when he was barely more than a child himself.

And now this man, a complete stranger who you should have hated, was now touching your face with the same softness Seo-joon had. He was speaking to you with more gentleness than anyone except your brother ever had, with the same instinctive need to shield you from pain.

So even knowing what he had done, even planning for taking revenge, you couldn't stop the traitorous residual of gratitude blooming in your chest.

"Thank you, Baek."

The words slipped out before you could even think to stop them. There was no performance in your voice now. Just genuine gratitude that felt like betraying everything you'd sworn to accomplish.

Moon Baek's expression changed slightly. His eyes widened for just a second—a flash of surprise, perhaps.

Gone was the frown that spoke of constant vigilance, and gone too was that infuriating smirk that never failed to ignite your urge to flee or fight. In their place bloomed something startling in its raw simplicity. His features softened like ice touched by spring sunlight, warm as dusk settling over restless waters. His lips curved into the gentlest of smiles that seemed almost to seek you out.

It was breathtaking. Like watching the moon and the sun lean towards each other—two celestial bodies destined to circle one another, distant yet inescapably entwined—as if the pull was written into the fabric of the skies themselves.

Moon Baek then let out an exhale of laughter. His smile widened into something radiant, teeth flashing white against his soft lips. The sound was like music you hadn't realized you had been desperate to hear. All of it was far too infectious for you to handle.

You bit down on your own traitorous smile, fighting against the warmth blooming in your chest like spring flowers breaking through winter ground. How you wanted to smile back. You wanted so desperately to let your own lips curve upwards in a grin and to memorize every line of his face when it was lit with such beautiful joy. You wanted to remember every detail of this moment before it vanished. But your act was a prison you could not step out of, holding you captive even as your heart strained towards him. To look at him now would be to shatter everything.

"Well," he began, "I never thought of you as the sentimental type."

You blinked, a little stunned by the remark.

"Sentimental," you scoffed. "Please. I could never. Don't let it get to your head."

"Ah, there's the stubbornness I found in the alley," Moon Baek laughed. "I was starting to worry you'd been replaced by someone actually grateful."

You scoffed again, but your lips twitched upwards in a smile despite your will. The expression felt foreign on your face after so much careful control, like muscles remembering how to move after being held rigid for too long.

He must have caught it, because his own laughter grew softer. Then followed the gentle clink of chopsticks being picked up, followed by the soft scrape of ceramic.

"Here," he said gently, moving closer. "Let me help you with the rest."

You blinked, forgetting that you were supposed to be blind for a split second.

"Oh—no, it's okay," you said quickly, deliberately moving your hands as if trying to locate your chopsticks. "I'm fine, really. I can manage."

"[Name]." There was a gentle amusement in his tone when he said your name. "You can't see where anything is. You've been eating the same corner this entire time."

Heat rose to your cheeks as you realized he was right. You hadn't realized that you stuck to only one area. Well, you supposed that it did give your facade more authenticity.

Before you could object further, you felt the chopsticks near your lips with a small bite of rice and egg positioned carefully at your mouth.

"I insist."

"Baek—" you said quickly, turning your head away slightly.

"Nope," he grinned. "Stop being stubborn and just open your mouth."

"I am not being—"

But before you could finish, he shoved the food in your mouth, taking advantage of your mid-sentence objection.

Your eyes widened in surprise at his audacity, and you made a small sound of protest.

"See?" Moon Baek snickered, barely containing his laughter. "That wasn't so hard, was it?"

You swallowed the bite and gave him what you hoped was an appropriately reproachful look, though you had to fight to keep the corners of your mouth from forming into a smile.

"Don't even think about arguing with the next one," he muttered, already preparing another bite for you.

Despite yourself, despite everything, you felt happiness bubble up in your chest. Maybe you could forget why you were really here, just for today.

Good lighting was quite the mysterious phenomenon.

It took the ordinary and spun them into gold. It turned skin into something luminous, shaping features like a sculptor's careful hands. It softened where it should soften, deepened where it should deepen, and left eyes glimmering as if they had stolen light from the stars themselves. In it, one becomes art. Framed and effortlessly breathtaking.

You had never been really lucky with it, while others seemed born to bask in it. A stray beam found them in the aisles of a grocery store, presenting them as ethereal. A café lamp spilled warmth over their hair like a portrait. They walked through the day as though the light favoured them, immortalized by every passing glance. It clung to them in the most unassuming places. The backseat of a taxi, where the city's glow painted their profile in beautiful strokes. A quiet park bench, where sunlight sifted through leaves just to rest on their face. The threshold of a doorway, where they stood under the gleam of a setting sun. Even shadows bent in their favour, framing them like an artist's fine lines meant only to sharpen their brilliance. It was like beauty sought them, following like a faithful companion and eager to unveil their radiance to the world. It seemed to understand the architecture of their features, memorizing the slope of their cheeks, the arch of their brows, and the exact shade of their irises when kissed by gold.

This was what you learned about Moon Baek.

Good lighting found him without fail. It pooled across the planes of his face, sliding down the slope of his nose while sharpening the edge of his jaw until he looked like something chiseled from marble. In his beyond pretentious, luxurious apartment—with its towering windows and curated glow—he seemed less like a man and more like the subject of a portrait the light itself was desperate to paint.

Every encounter since the first was the same. Morning sun would drape him in gold as he leaned lazily against the counter, while the deep amber of evening cast shadows that made his gaze even more penetrating. Even in the aftermath of violence, light always seemed to capture all his best angles. It was like he was the spotlight. Be it the fractured sunlight through blinds or the sterile white of a flickering bulb, they always found him and held on, like they refused to let him fade into anonymity.

And his eyes. Oh, don't get started on his eyes.

One eye was the pale, clear blue of early morning skies. They caught every shard of light and reflected it back like glass kissed by frost. It was unfathomable in a way that made you find yourself staring too long. You had learned that it wasn't a contact lens, but his real eye. It only made the effect more intoxicating, to the point where it became indistinguishable if you were staring because of wonder or admiration.

The older was a deep, molten brown, warm like the rich earth after rain. Together, they contrasted one another but coexisted on a single face with maddening symmetry. You found yourself wondering if the contrast had been intentional. You wondered if he had somehow orchestrated the perfection of it all. Every gradient was sitting exactly where it should, as though the universe and every ray of light had taken painstaking care to make it so.

You couldn't stop thinking about how impossibly perfect he was.

Which was awful. Beyond awful. There was absolutely no way you just called your brother's murderer perfect.

Every fragment of admiration you felt twisted inside you. How could your body, your mind, and your very senses betray you like this?

Every thought of him was a betrayal. Every stolen glance was a stab at your own morality. And still, you caught yourself tracing the outline of his shoulders with your eyes when no one was watching. You found yourself unable to look away from the way his hair fell over the curve of his temple. You realized that you had memorized the gradient of colours in his mismatched eyes, as though it could somehow absolve him, even though it couldn't.

It was enraging. It was maddening. And worst of all, it was utterly inescapable.

It also made it harder to stare. Not because you didn't want to—gosh, you did, even though you knew it was betraying your sense of justice—but because you were supposed to make him believe that your eyes were nothing more than ornaments. They were supposed to be dull and useless, completely incapable of tracing the curve of his silhouette or catching the flicker of light in his iris. That lie was the only thing keeping you alive, and you couldn't afford slipping up even once.

But to your fortune, you had always been careful since the first encounter. You always angled your head just so, as though lost in blindness. You timed your glances just right, when his attention was hooked elsewhere. Whether that be signing boring papers, lighting a cigarette, or swirling an amber beer in a glass like liquid gold, you always studied him in the stolen fragments. You told yourself that the mere purpose of doing so was to find his weakness, but now? Now you weren't so sure. The dissonance of knowing that the man who ended your brother's life could look like this was baffling.

The estate was awash in the early afternoon light. You were standing by the grand windows that overlooked the city, your face angled towards the warmth and lashes lowered in practiced serenity. To anyone else, you were simply staring at nothing.

"Boo."

Your heart lurched painfully against your ribs, a violent jolt that shot straight to your throat. Your breath hitched, and before you could remember that you needed to act, you instinctively jerked your head to Moon Baek's face, eyes meeting his.

Fuck. He must have caught it.

Immediately, you fluttered your lashes frantically, scrambling for cover. You forced your head to tilt slightly off-centre to slacken your features into the blank serenity of someone who hadn't really seen anything at all. Every muscle screamed with the effort to appear natural.

"Did I scare you?" Moon Baek asked, his tone carrying a hint of amusement and playfulness.

"Yeah," you breathed, pitching your voice as slightly shaky. "You startled me quite a bit there."

Your eyes drifted as you spoke, your words faltering as your thoughts wandered elsewhere. He had moved closer, and the afternoon light brushed across him in a way that made your heartbeat stumble.

The black, blazer-like top hung open at his chest. Without a shirt beneath, more of his skin was revealed than you had ever seen before. The fabric clung to his shoulders with elegance, emphasizing the lean strength underneath. The light caught along in the perfect angles that accentuated the curve of his collarbones and the plane of his chest, until the sight of him felt almost sculpted from shadow and sun alike.

Your cheeks burned their confession, completely betraying you. Still, your gaze lingered despite your will, wavering beneath fascination and guilt. The smooth expanse of his chest, the taut curve of muscle, and the allure of every detail were enough to send your pulse spiking and your composure scattering.

It was then that you first caught sight of a tattoo. A sun, inked in precise lines across the centre of his chest, partially hidden beneath the fabric. The rays fanned outwards in twisting strokes. They spread as though the shadows were seeping from some hidden depth, consuming him through all the secrets and danger he was carrying. Yet in the middle of it all, directly above where the human heart lay, there was only absence. A bare circle left untouched by ink—fragile, unblemished, and achingly pure.

The sight of it kept your eyes riveted. You could not look away from the fragile duality, caught in the paradox of it. Darkness and light, danger and vulnerability, and beauty and ruin entwined in one. You were drawn inexplicably to the beauty of his presence, as if to stare at him was to glimpse something sacred.

"Should I be worried?" Moon Baek asked. "You've been standing there so still I almost thought you had merged with the floor."

"You'll have to forgive me," you murmured. "I didn't realize stillness was a crime."

He continued to watch you, tilting his head slightly. "You know, you don't have to stand or wander around aimlessly. You can just call one of my subordinates to guide you to wherever you need to go."

Your lips curved in a smile. "And where would the fun be in that? Getting there safely takes all the thrill out of it."

He leaned just an inch closer, a faint smirk lingering on his lips. "Fun, huh?"

You nodded, despite the startled flutter in your chest as the space between the two of you shrunk. "I suppose you could say that," you muttered. "It does—"

But before your words could fall, his hand rose. His fingers glided along the slope of your jaw, a touch so feather-light it seemed to vanish as it came. At last, after tracing a path with a tenderness that felt almost reverent, they came to rest in the hollow of your chin. With the gentlest command, he coaxed your face, guiding your gaze upwards until it was caught in the inevitability of his own.

"Y'know..." Moon Baek murmured, his voice low, "I don't like when people don't meet my eyes when I'm talking to them."

His touch made you freeze. Your breath seized, your body betraying you with a startled jolt that rattled clear to your chest. For a terrifying second, you wondered if he had noticed—if he had seen right through your act. Was this teasing? Or had he finally figured you out? The thought sent panic coursing through your veins, your heart slamming so violently against your ribs.

You should not be here, locked in his gaze. And yet you were caught, drowning in the contradiction of his mismatched eyes: one cold as new frost, the other warm as the earth after rain. Together, they bored into you with such piercing intensity it made your heart stammer wildly, as though it wanted to escape.

Anyone watching would have noticed how stiff you had gone, how unnatural your reaction was. Fear was insistent, choking your heart tight in your chest.

You forced a shaky laugh to escape your lips. "Meet your eyes? I can't even see them."

He leaned just a fraction closer, a glint of amusement in his gaze. "That's fine. I'll just make this a habit every time I speak to you."

You swallowed, forcing your voice into calm neutrality. "Is this your way of saying I have terrible manners?"

Moon Baek chuckled lightly, the sound brushing against you. His thumb continued to brush the edge of your jaw, guiding you just enough to hold your attention.

"You really are the fun one," he said, a faint smirk tugging at his lips.

You scoffed. "Fun? Is that what we're calling this?"

"What would you call it then?" His voice carried that same dangerous amusement, like he was enjoying watching every little reaction from you.

"Invasive," you shot back, though your voice wavered slightly despite your best efforts. "Most people ask before they—"

"Before they what?" Moon Baek interrupted. "Help someone who seems a little... distracted?"

The way he said "distracted" made your stomach clench. Did he suspect your act? You tried to pull back slightly, but his touch remained gentle yet insistent.

"I wasn't distracted," you managed. "I was listening perfectly well."

"Mmm," he hummed, his voice almost mocking. "Were you now?"

Your heart hammered against your ribs. "Of course I was. Just because I can't see you doesn't mean I'm not paying attention."

"No," he agreed, his thumb still tracing that maddening path along your jaw. "But it does make things interesting, doesn't it?"

You tilted your head just a fraction. "Interesting? How?"

"Well," he began, voice dropping into that teasing, almost predatory cadence you had come to recognize, "I do enjoy seeing just how flustered you can get, even without seeing me."

Relief and nausea both hit you in equal measure. For one, your act of blindness had not worn off. He still believed you couldn't see him. But the way he had phrased it? That deliberate emphasis on seeing how flustered you got? That shot a ray of panic through your entire nervous system.

You tried to keep your expression the same, but you could feel the unmistakable heat creeping up your neck, the very reaction he claimed to enjoy watching.

"You have a rather odd sense of entertainment," you muttered, voice laced with a mix of exasperation and forced composure.

"Do I?" Moon Baek's thumb traced along your jawline once more. "I find it fascinating, actually. The way your pulse quickens right... here." His fingers shifted slightly, pressing against the rapid flutter at your throat. "The way your breathing changes. All those little tells that most people miss."

Your breath caught, caught as if he had plucked it from your very chest and held it in his hand before it rushed back all at once—a fragile gasp that felt stolen from your own lips. Heat rippled beneath your skin where his fingers pressed, scattering every thought and every defence you had clung to. You felt exposed, not in body but in soul, which was laid bare beneath the weight of his gaze and the precision of his touch. It was as if it had pressed not against your throat, but the very centre of your being. In that suspended heartbeat, you were nothing but the fragile music of your pulse and the devastating beauty of being seen.

No. No matter how your body betrayed you, no matter how your pulse leapt beneath his touch as though it longed to answer him, there was no universe in which you could allow yourself to fall for this man.

He was your brother's murderer, and nothing more than that.

It tried to burn away the fragile bloom that had almost taken root. How could you be swayed by the very hands that had stolen your brother's life? How could your heart dare to stutter for the man who had stained it in blood?

So why did the feeling refuse to fade?

"What are you saying?" you denied, your voice a little strained. "My pulse and breathing are perfectly normal, thank you very much."

"Really?" The knowing amusement in his tone sent a shiver down your spine, like the brush of cold wind against a flame struggling to hold its shape. "Your body language is quite expressive. Even for someone who supposedly can't see the person causing such reactions." He leaned forward slightly. "After all, you were the one who said that when one of your senses is taken away, the others get stronger."

The words fell upon you like shards of glass wrapped in silk, wounding softly but undeniably. They struck you with the quiet devastation of inevitability, like a Cupid's arrow finding its match no matter how carefully you tried to shield yourself. Your own reasoning, once spoken with such clever pride, was now turned against you and honed into a blade in his hands.

"That doesn't mean—" you started, but the words caught in your throat.

"Doesn't mean what?" Moon Baek pressed gently, his voice silk over steel. "That you can sense my proximity? Feel the shift in air when I move closer? Notice the way I'm watching you?"

Watching. There it was again, that loaded word that made your skin crawl with implications.

Your lips parted as though to answer, but the words betrayed like a fragile bloom of sound that never fully opened. The words slipped away before they could form, like grains of sand through your fingers. You started, then faltered, caught in the snare of your own hesitation. What could you possibly say? That he was too close? That the burn of his touch stole the air from your lungs? That every thread of composure you had so painstakingly spun was now coming undone beneath the unyielding gravity of his gaze?

You swallowed it down, forcing the tremor in your chest into something resembling wit. "Well then, I hope you enjoyed your form of entertainment for the day. Happy now?"

Your attempt at deflection only seemed to please him further. His thumb traced one last fleeting arc against your jaw before retreating, his smile widening.

"Very," he replied, his voice rich with satisfaction.

Moon Baek turned, beginning to drift away. Relief began to wash over you, but it was short-lived. He paused in the doorway and glanced back with that insufferable smirk still carved on his lips, instantly making you stiffen.

"Tomorrow," he began, with such maddening casualty, "I think I'll have to find new ways to entertain myself with you."

His words sent your pulse into a violent riot against your throat. Even after his footsteps faded down the hallway, you remained frozen in place.

Infuriating. That was what he was. Infuriatingly handsome with those mismatched eyes that seemed to see everything. Infuriatingly intelligent in the way he chose his words, teasing as though every reaction belonged to him. Infuriatingly and unfairly handsome, with those mismatched eyes and slightly tousled hair. And worst of all, he was infuriating in the way you could feel how his sharp-edged personality threaded so naturally against yours, like two puzzle pieces that fit together despite being completely different pictures. As if the universe, in its cruelty, had decided to make resisting him nearly impossible. Under any other circumstances, falling for someone like him would have been inevitable.

But these weren't other circumstances. You weren't here for him. You were here for your brother—the brother whose last breath was stolen by the very man now finding amusement in your flustered silences. You had come here with hatred in your veins and vengeance as your north star. After all, that bullet was a promise, and you would return it.

Yet somehow, somewhere along the way, his word—entertain—had lodged itself under your skin. As if you were some amusing diversion for him to toy with when boredom struck. As if your carefully constructed plans for revenge had devolved into nothing more than elaborate performances for his amusement.

It seemed as though instead of becoming his downfall, you had somehow transformed into his personal court jester, dancing to a tune only he could hear.

That night, you sent Chishiya a text.

You were a restless thing. You paced around your room as if the walls were too tight for your thoughts, which they quite were. You didn't know why a text to him mattered. You barely knew him. You didn't even know his favourite colour, or how he liked his coffee, or whether he even liked coffee at all.

Your fingers hovered above your screen as if there was an invisible line between two people who didn't owe each other anything. However, that could be argued, as he did need to answer your friend too.

So you ended up writing a simple, "hiii".

You collapsed backwards onto your bed the moment you pressed send, as if the effort of vulnerability had physically exhausted you. Gosh, you were acting like a high school teenager who had just texted their crush.

Minutes passed. You didn't breathe so much as stare at your phone.

And once the symbol of the 'Read' sign appeared, you jolted upright.

He'd seen it. He'd opened it. He was there, behind on the other side of that glowing screen. You could almost picture him staring at it with eyes full of annoyance.

But the minutes that followed were long and silent.

Maybe this was his idea of what a joke was. To leave you suspended in silence just to see how long you'd wait before giving up.

But just before you could toss your phone into the abyss of your laundry pile, it lit up again.

"Hello."

You stared at it. That was it? That was what he typed after leaving you on read for a good while?

"Gosh," you muttered to yourself. "I texted a houseplant."

Still, your fingers moved.

"you know, texting your friends isn't the same as your coworkers"

This time, the reply came sooner.

"Good thing we're not friends yet."

Yet.

A small, inconsequential word that made your lips curve into a soft smile.

"yet?"

Once again, he took his sweet time replying.

"Is that your way of negotiation?"

"you're rather exhausting, i must admit"

"And you're rather persistent, I must admit."

You thought about a rather interesting thought, which resulted in you tossing your phone on your bed. You then picked it up again and bit the inside of your cheek as you typed your thought into words.

"wanna hang out?????"

There was a longer pause than usual. You stared at the screen with your heart hammering behind your ribs. And when the three dots finally showed up, it nearly jumped out.

"That's bold of you."

"please, it'll be fun!!!!"

"Fun as in the kind that includes tormenting me?"

"c'mon, what else are you gonna do? perform surgery on me?"

"Perhaps."

"wow, ok."

And with that, the read receipt blinked back at you for a good twenty minutes.

You slumped back down into your bed in defeat.

"Unbelievable," you grumbled, dragging your blanket over your face.

But you told yourself that the next day, you'd find the words to make him say yes.

౨ৎ

You had timed your arrival with near-scientific precision, hovering by the elevator. All the while, you kept glancing for his familiar hair.

And as if summoned by thought alone, you caught a flash of silver walking by.

"Stalking is a concerning escalation from texting," he said flatly, not bothering to glance your way.

You huffed as you pressed the elevator button. "Stalking implies I don't have purpose. This is our fate."

The elevator dinged open.

His eyes flicked up. "So, fate brought you to this particular elevator at this particular time?"

"Yes," you answered solemnly. "And also because I figured you wouldn't answer my texts."

Another silence stretched between you as the two of you stepped inside.

You glanced over. "So, can we hang out?"

He blinked at that.

You grinned. "I figured it's harder to leave someone on read in person."

"I'm working."

"I'm walking."

"Walking isn't a job."

"It is if I declare it with enough confidence."

The elevator dinged, and the doors opened on his floor. He stepped out and started walking.

You caught up to walk beside him. "So? What do you say?"

Chishiya kept walking with his hands in his pocket and his gaze forward. "Don't you already have Kuina? She's going to be able to leave in a few days."

"Yeah, but," you started, "how else am I supposed to see my favourite doctor?"

"Are you that lonely that Kuina is your only friend?"

You frowned.

Kuina was quite the social butterfly. She made friends the way some people caught colds—frequently and with no warning. She collected hearts like it was a competitive sport. Charismatic, warm, and unafraid of embarrassment. You had seen her befriend an entire table of grumpy old people at a ramen shop.

You, on the other hand?

Well. You were lucky to have her.

When he noticed you weren't answering, Chishiya finally looked at you.

"...Was that not a joke?"

You smiled briefly. "Well... kind of? You are my second friend after all."

He stopped in front of a patient room, finally turning to face you fully after a long exhale.

"I'm free Saturday afternoon," he said. "Briefly."

Your eyes lit up. "So you do want to hang out!"

"I stated a window of availability."

"That's basically the same thing."

He let out a sound that might've been a sigh or a very sophisticated form of suffering.

"I'll text you," you smiled. "Don't leave me on read this time."

Then you turned on your heel and walked off without waiting for a goodbye because you were too excited and partly because you knew he wouldn't give one.

Behind you, the corridor returned to its usualness. Machines beeped. Nurses talked to the patients. And somewhere down that hall, a doctor stood for a moment longer than necessary, watching your figure turn the corner before finally heading into the patient's room.

౨ৎ

Was this what rock bottom looked like?

Your room looked like it had been ransacked by someone on the verge of a crisis, which, to be fair, wasn't entirely inaccurate.

Your bed had vanished beneath a sea of discarded outfits. Pants were flung over your headboard while shirts clung to your desk lamp. Somewhere in the chaos, your sense of dignity was buried under another outfit you tried on but quickly discarded.

And you? You were standing in front of your mirror with the unsettling realization that this was ridiculous.

Because it wasn't a date. Chishiya had never even said the words "hang out". He had simply announced a window of availability, and you, foolishly and tragically, had interpreted that as permission to spiral like a teenager choosing which side of their face was better for taking their school photo.

You dragged a hand down your face and exhaled like it might deflate the embarrassment poisoning your bloodstream.

After finally (finally) settling on an outfit, you started to fix your hair again in front of your vanity, but your phone buzzed with a short message.

"I'm here."

Your heart immediately betrayed you. You grabbed your bag, nearly tripping over a pair of shoes you had rejected earlier, and stepped out into the crisp, early afternoon air.

The spot you two had agreed on wasn't far—a quiet café near the hospital, tucked between a laundromat and a flower shop that always smelled vaguely like honeysuckle. Kuina had once joked that it looked like the kind of place where someone might fall in love by accident. You had rolled your eyes and said she was over-romanticizing everything back then.

Now you weren't so sure.

When you arrived, you spotted him immediately. And for a moment, you just looked at him. You stood there for a second too long, caught somewhere between admiration and crisis. Because this wasn't supposed to feel like anything. It was only your attempt to make another friend. And yet there he was, looking like the universe had sketched him in fine lines and painted him in watercolours while you were still figuring out how to hold a pencil.

Then, as if tugged by some invisible thread, his head turned and his eyes found yours.

You froze for a moment, if you weren't already frozen in the first place, before breaking into an awkward half-run towards him.

"You're late," Chishiya said flatly when you finally skidded to a halt in front of him.

You rolled your eyes. "What can I say? I like to make an entrance."

"Hmm," he murmured. "You look... different."

You blinked.

That was all you could do, really. Because different was a suspicious word. It could mean a change worth complimenting or the kind of change people politely nod at before gossiping about it behind your back. In the long-standing tradition of cryptic individuals and their one-word assessments, he offered no elaboration.

"Did you have anywhere in mind?" he asked.

"Oh," you said stupidly. "Right. Um. I didn't really plan that far."

He raised an eyebrow, mildly intrigued but mostly concerned. "So you invited me out and didn't bother to figure out what we're actually doing?"

"Well, I was hoping you'd figure that out," you admitted. "Do you have any suggestions?"

"I work six days a week," he replied. "You think I use my free time to curate walking tours?"

You shoved your hands in your pockets and glanced around, looking for inspirations in the various awnings and windows. However, you only noticed the far too many couples wandering by with too much affection. Had there always been this many?

As your eyes scanned the street, you finally spotted a flyer taped to a lamppost. It was bright blue with cartoon jellyfish.

"What about the aquarium?" you asked.

Chishiya tilted his head. "The aquarium?"

"It's pretty close by," you grinned. "And you seem like the type of person who likes fish."

Shockingly, he agreed. "Alright. Lead the way."

And so you did. For approximately seven minutes.

Which, to be fair, was about six minutes longer than Chishiya probably expected you to last. But you kept taking the wrong turns. And then somehow, you ended up at a blind alley with a dead rat near the waste.

You glanced at Chishiya.

"So," you said.

He raised an eyebrow. "You're lost in your own city?"

You chose not to dignify that with a response. Instead, you pulled out your phone and spun in a slow, semi-panicked circle while pretending to know which direction north was. Chishiya, to his credit, waited precisely twelve seconds before sighing and stepping ahead of you.

"This way."

You blinked. "Wait, how do you—"

"Because unlike you, I can remember where buildings are and function."

You scoffed. "I was just trying to take the scenic route."

"You let us into an alley with a dead rat and no exit."

"It was a scenic rat."

You didn't want to admit it, but walking behind Chishiya felt weirdly safe. Even if his expression was unreadable and his patient felt like a rapidly depleting resource, you still felt at ease.

Eventually, the aquarium came into view with all its glass and afternoon shimmer.

"Told you I'd get us here," you grinned, stepping just a little too proudly through the aquarium doors.

Chishiya scoffed behind you. "Sure."

The moment you stepped inside, the air changed. Everything was tinged blue. Blue lighting, blue glass, and blue signs pointing toward jellyfish, penguins, and "deep sea wonders".

As the two of you headed into a domed hallway, light filtered from all sides, casting watery shadows over your faces. Fish swam past, their scales flickering like scattered coins under a sun. You slowed just slightly, your steps falling into rhythm with the hush of filtered water and the gentle hum of distant filtration systems. It felt less like a public exhibit and more like you had stumbled into some dream wrapped in glass, seawater, and the occasional muffled shriek of a toddler.

You pressed your hands against the glass as you admired a blue fish passing by. "Do you think fish ever get bored?"

"Do you?"

You looked over. "What, get bored?"

He stepped next to you. "No, swim in circles."

"Oh, absolutely."

That earned you a faint huff. If you didn't know better, that could have been his laugh, or maybe just him exhaling through his nose like he had suddenly remembered how absurd you really were.

The two of you wandered further in, the quiet hum of the filtration system following you like white noise. The next room was darker, lit only by the soft glow of a cylindrical tank filled with jellyfish. They pulsed like slow, glowing lungs.

You leaned your head back, mesmerized. "Did you know that they don't have brains?"

Chishiya stepped beside you, hands in his pockets. "Then you should get along great."

You snorted and laughed a little too loud. It accidentally echoed in the quiet room and drew a couple glances from nearby strangers. You ducked your head in embarrassment.

"Wow," you said, still grinning. "Is that how we're doing this now? I took you out, paid for your ticket—"

"You didn't."

"—I paid for your ticket in my eyes," you amended, "and you insult me in front of the jellyfish?"

He hummed, the barest tilt of his head suggesting amusement. "I'm just making sure you feel seen."

"Well, I feel something," you muttered, still staring up at the jellyfish drifting in slow motion.

Chishiya's voice came after a moment, softer this time. "They don't have hearts, either."

You tilted your head. "Yeah. I guess that really distinguishes jellyfish from us humans."

For a moment, the two of you just stood there, watching the glowing creatures float around like dreams with no destination.

"How do you view it?" he asked eventually. "The heart. In your eyes."

You blinked, a little startled by the sudden question.

"Well... biologically, it keeps us alive," you began. "Emotionally, it kind of ruins us. Metaphorically, it's where we keep all our unspoken words and feelings."

You watched as they pulsed through the water like slow, luminous heartbeats, trailing ribbons of light behind them.

"Things like longing or grief," you went on, almost to yourself. "And maybe that's why it hurts so much sometimes. Because the heart isn't built for storage, but we keep trying to fill it anyway."

You turned to face the tank more directly. "I used to wish I didn't have one. Thought life would be easier if I just didn't care so much. Or feel everything all the time." You exhaled. "But if I didn't have a heart, I think I'd just float through everything, including all the happy moments. Like those little things."

You glanced at Chishiya, and he continued to stare at the jellyfish like they were mocking him with their complete lack of cardiovascular activity.

"They don't have hearts," he repeated.

"Nope."

"Or brains."

"Which explains your affinity."

That earned you a glance, and you smiled softly.

"I think that we all feel as much as anyone else," you said quietly. "It's just our brains that decide how much we hold and the parts to lock away."

He didn't say anything for a while. The water filtered through the room with a low, constant hum. Somewhere in the distance, a child laughed. Somewhere closer, your chest ached in that slow, familiar way it did ever since you first met him.

"Maybe," he eventually murmured.

And it felt like a mix of a confession and understanding to you.

౨ৎ

The two of you continued your little adventure through the aquarium.

Around you, tanks stretched in long glass corridors. One held a riot of coral reefs with fish darting like shards of stained glass caught in sunlight. Another was a dim cave where creatures lingered in the shadows.

Finally, you stepped into a large open space where the ceiling soared and a massive tank dominated the room. It was a cathedral of water alive with swirling shapes. Schools of fish moved in synchronized patterns, their silver scales catching the bluish light.

You nudged him gently and pointed towards a creature. "That one looks like you."

Chishiya followed your finger to a round, slow-moving pufferfish.

He gave you a bland look. "You think I'm bloated and easily startled?"

"Well, your hair certainly does hold a similar colour to it," you replied, nodding solemnly.

He pointed at a little, orange figure in the sand. "I suppose that makes you the one that gets eaten alive in the first ten seconds of a nature documentary."

"A shrimp?!"

One corner of his mouth was twitching like he was trying to repress a smile. "I thought you liked honesty, no?"

"You're lucky this place is a public facility, or I'd throw you in there and see who really gets eaten alive in the first ten seconds."

You were in the middle of describing, in great detail, why another strange-looking fish resembled Chishiya when you noticed a small figure standing near the edge of the tank.

Specifically, a small human child crying.

You stepped forward cautiously, trying not to scare him. "Hey, what's wrong? Are you lost?"

He looked up, and his crying stopped. However, he immediately burst into even more tears.

You had never been rejected by a child so fast in your life.

"Hey, don't cry," you panicked, crouching down. "We can help! What happened? Is there anyone who I can call?"

The kid sobbed even harder, as if you had just flushed his goldfish down the toilet.

You shot a desperate look over your shoulder. Chishiya hadn't moved from his position near the tank, but he looked like he deeply regretted every decision that had led him to this moment, especially not walking straight into the jellyfish exhibit when he had the chance.

"Chishiya," you hissed, gesturing him to come over with one hand while trying not to scare the child even more with the other. "A little help?"

He blinked at you.

"Come on," you whispered, a little more frantic now. "You're a doctor or something. Don't you have a license to deal with humans in distress?"

He sighed, but eventually, he peeled himself off the wall and walked over. He then crouched beside you.

"What's your name?" he asked.

The boy hiccupped through another sob. "Haru."

Chishiya tilted his head slightly. "How did you end up here, Haru?"

He sniffled, wiping his nose on his sleeve. "I was watching the sharks with my brother, Riku. And—and I looked away for just a second, and he was gone."

His lip trembled, and you braced yourself for another wave of tears. But then Chishiya pointed at a fish floating sideways near the glass.

"See that one?" he said. "That's Riku. He's probably just as lost."

The kid blinked. Then, slowly, a small laugh escaped him.

You gawked. "What—how did you do that?"

"I guess the kid just likes me more."

"You have the warmth of an ice cube!"

The child tugged at Chishiya's sleeve. "Can you help me find them?"

Chishiya nodded without a word.

The boy took Chishiya's hand, and you caught yourself staring a moment longer than you wanted. You felt a twinge of jealousy fluttering somewhere in your heart, and you could only hope it was because the kid liked him more than you.

You glanced at Chishiya, who was staring ahead with his usual unreadable expression, but you thought you caught something softer in his eyes. And you couldn't help your heart soften too in a way you didn't expect.

The three of you moved towards the shark exhibit. The slumbering ocean inside the wall of glass held sharks drifting through the water. You pressed your hands to the glass, watching as the sharks circled in lazy loops.

"They say rich people eat sharks," you muttered. "I wonder what's so good about them."

In your peripheral, you watched as the boy's eyes grew wider. His shock bloomed so suddenly it was almost funny. Then the tears came again.

You blinked in regret. "Oh—sorry. That was a bad thing to say..."

Chishiya glanced at you, then back down at the boy. He crouched once more.

"It's fine," he said dryly. "The sharks will eat them before they even get close."

The boy's tears stopped immediately, and he burst into laughter. You gawked, a little stunned, and caught Chishiya's smirk, clearly all too pleased with himself.

Before you could say anything else, a woman hurried over, breathless and relieved.

"Haru! I've been so worried!" she cried, pulling the boy close.

Haru waved her off with a little grin. "It's okay, Mom. These two found me."

The mother looked between the two of you, her eyes shining with gratitude.

"Thank you both so much," she said, still holding her son close. "I was beginning to panic."

You smiled awkwardly, tucking your hands behind your back. "Oh, it's no problem. We're happy to help!"

It was a generic answer, the kind you gave to strangers and flight attendants, but she seemed touched by it anyway. She looked at you for a moment longer before turning to Chishiya, who was still crouched at Haru's height. He nodded once in acknowledgement.

"You two," the mother began, "would make great parents together."

You blinked hard at that. Chishiya offered no reaction while you malfunctioned instantly.

You coughed into your sleeve. "Oh—um. We're not— that is—we're not... together. Or, like, parenting. Together. Or parenting at all. That would be weird. I mean, it's not weird if others are, but weird if... we are. Anyways, we're not. Together, that is."

It seemed as though all the eloquence in your body had left.

The woman chuckled, waving a hand. "I didn't mean it like that. You two just have a really sweet dynamic."

You shot Chishiya a sideways look. He was staring straight ahead, utterly expressionless except for the barest twitch at the corner of his mouth, like he was deeply entertained by your slow implosion.

Haru beamed up at him. "Can I see you again sometime?"

Chishiya raised an eyebrow. "If you get lost again, maybe."

"Chishiya," you hissed, scandalized.

"What?" he said. "I'm teaching him accountability."

The mother gave another laugh, shaking her head fondly. "Alright, we'll let you both get back to your day. Thank you again. Truly."

The mother gave one final smile, bowed slightly in thanks, and took Haru's hand to disappear into the crowd.

"She must have suffered your oxygen deprivation," he remarked, eyes lazily tracking a stingray passing overhead.

"You didn't even say anything!"

"I figured your meltdown was comprehensive enough for both of us."

You resumed walking. "Whatever. Doesn't matter.

"He cried less around me," Chishiya smirked, walking beside. "That's what matters."

You scoffed, bumping his shoulder half in protest, half because you couldn't think of anything else to do with all the strange, residual warmth building in your chest and your cheeks. And when he glanced at you again, you could have sworn something in his expression softened so faintly that it was almost imperceptible.

Eventually, the two of you wandered into the penguin exhibit. The little animals waddled and flopped around the ice. You watched as one particularly spirited penguin let out a sharp, high-pitched squawk loud enough to startle the others.

"There," Chishiya said. "Your long-lost twin."

You looked at him with a mock-offended look. "You're calling me loud?"

"Obnoxiously."

Your jaw dropped. "Excuse me, I am the embodiment of peace. That penguin is the equivalent of a trumpet."

"And yet, I rest my case."

You narrowed your eyes and turned your attention back to the exhibit, scanning for retaliation.

It came waddling into view thirty seconds later—another penguin, this one less confident, limbs flailing as it attempted to march across a slick patch of ice. It slipped. Recovered. Slipped again. Recovered. Then slipped a third time.

You pointed at it immediately. "Oh yeah? That one is you."

He stared at the penguin, who was currently trying to slide backwards with dignity and failing. The silence stretched as you both watched the bird attempt another slippery pirouette and immediately fall face-flat onto the ice.

The rest of the aquarium passed with occasional comments, long stretches of companionable silence, and the occasional elbow jab when one of you spotted a fish that bore a resemblance to the other.

Eventually, like all good things corrupted by capitalism, the two of you ended up in the gift shop.

You wandered off towards a display of overpriced stuffed animals of whales, rays, and other sea creatures. The price tags alone were enough to give you a small aneurysm, but you still picked up a soft penguin plush and held it up to inspect it.

Definitely too expensive.

You heard footsteps behind you. You turned and saw Chishiya with his hands in his pockets. Except this time, he wasn't empty-handed.

He took out two small, translucent jellyfish keychains and held one out to you. "Here."

You blinked. "What's this?"

He placed it in your palm without much ceremony. "A constant reminder that you have no brain."

You stared at the jellyfish. Then at him. Then back at the jellyfish. It bobbed gently in its little plastic dome, soft blue and stupidly adorable, like it had no idea it was being used as a weaponized insult. You opened your mouth to say something. Maybe to defend yourself, or maybe to retaliate against his remarks, but then you realized that he had kept the matching one for himself.

You shook your head, lips curving up into a soft smile despite yourself.

You stepped out into the fading afternoon, the doors of the aquarium sliding closed behind you. The air outside was cooler now, with the sun beginning to relinquish, leaving the sky melting into that soft bluish-grey where the day blurred gently into evening. The street hummed with distant traffic, kids trailing behind their parents, and someone laughing far off near a bus stop.

Chishiya walked beside you for a few blocks, his gait unhurried, his hands stuffed in his pockets as usual. Eventually, you reached the fork in the road that would take you to your apartment. He slowed and glanced at you.

"Well," he began. "That went a little better than I expected."

You rolled your eyes. "It was fun. Admit it."

He just gave a small shrug and surprisingly, a little wave as he walked off down the street. You watched him go for a small moment before you headed off into your own direction. It wasn't until you were halfway up the stairs to your apartment that you realized your hand had drifted to your pocket.

You pulled out the keychain. It glowed faintly in your palm, blue and dumb and a little too endearing for something so cheap. It swung gently from your fingers, like it had something to say.

And maybe it did.

You stared at it for a long moment.

The light flickered softly, casting ripples of gold against the cheap plastic dome. And for a second, the jellyfish almost looked alive, pulsing gently in its little capsule while suspended in something weightless. You just stood there under the dim light, caught in the ache of something you didn't dare to feel. As your heart, for reasons it had no business entertaining, felt as if it had been woven.

You tried to tell yourself it was just a keychain. Just a souvenir. Just a joke he made at your expense. But your fingers curled around it too tightly for that to be the truth. Because there was something so stupidly gentle about it. This tiny, weightless thing he had handed you like it meant nothing and yet, not quite nothing. Chishiya didn't do things without reason. He didn't care enough to. So why this? Why now? Why you? Why did you want to be around him? Why were you drawn towards him? Why did your heart flutter every time he was near?

Had you fallen for him?

You shook your head. You didn't want to be thinking about him like this. You didn't want to be standing here wondering if those small, offhand gestures and words had meant more than they were allowed to. You had spent so long convincing yourself that feelings needed permission. That unless something cosmic intervened or unless fate itself handed you a sign, you weren't allowed to hope. You weren't allowed to want. Because how do you let yourself fall when you've spent your whole life fearing that you'll hit the ground?

You swallowed, the ache in your chest blooming sharp. You couldn't afford to fall unless you were certain. Because if you did, there was no one to catch you. No string to pull you back. That wouldn't just hurt. It would destroy you. Because if you let yourself believe in it, then you were risking everything.

But no matter how much you tried shaking off the thought, it wouldn't leave you. If anything, it clung tighter as if it had been waiting for you to notice it.

Because try as you might, you couldn't stop remembering. The moments you had brushed off before. Those fleeing coincidences. The way your feet had stopped on their own in front of his hospital room that day as if something held you there. Or the elevator when he would always show up at the same place at the same time. And that time standing with him under the awning when the water poured from the sky. You told yourself it was timing and nothing more. But how many coincidences could you write off before they stopped feeling like a coincidence?

So no. They couldn't have all been by chance, could they?

You wanted to believe they weren't.

Because if they weren't, then maybe your heart wasn't lying to you. Maybe this ache, this warmth blooming in your chest, was something real. And maybe, he felt the same too.

౨ৎ

masterlist

He wasn't a stranger.

No, not at all. Strangers don't put bullets into your brother's chest and leave him to bleed out in the street. Strangers don't watch the light go out of someone you love without a flicker of remorse. Strangers don't make your life revolve around the taste of vengeance.

And now here he was, close enough to smell like expensive cologne. And shockingly, like milk tea too?

That detail jarred you. It was too human and casual for the man who had just reduced your life to rubble. It was almost insulting that he could smell like something as harmless as your favourite drink you had once shared with Seo-joon, when laughter came easily and death wasn't part of your vocabulary.

Your thoughts churned with a desperation for a plan. Not one that would get you killed in the next five minutes, but one that would put you in a position to exact retribution.

You weren't even sure why he brought you here. Maybe it was because he was doubtful that you were actually blind. Or maybe he felt pity. But from what you had witnessed just an hour ago, where your brother's pleas remained unheard, you were unsure if pity was a concept that had been introduced to him.

Since you had encountered him, you kept your eyes fixed on nothing to maintain the facade that had become your lifeline. When he guided you out with a careful touch, every fibre of your being wanted to recoil—to tear away from the hands that held the very gun that killed your brother. But despite your wants, you forced yourself to lean into his guidance like someone truly dependent would.

You watched him move through your peripheral vision, daring not even a single glance at him in order to not crack your performance in any way, all while your mind raced, each thought more desperate than the last. How long could you keep this up? The constant vigilance was exhausting. You had to control every micro-expression, every instinct to not flinch, and every moment your eyes wanted to track movement or focus on something interesting.

The worst part was that there was even a room prepared. Why had he brought you here instead of just finishing what he started with your brother? Even though you were 'blind', why didn't he kill you off? There had been opportunities, like in the car, when you were vulnerable and alone with him and the men who must work for him. And even now. He could have driven you somewhere remote and dealt with this witness problem permanently. Instead, he had brought you to his luxurious apartment with a pretentious number of floors. His home, with its marble floors and expensive cologne lingering in the air. It was like you were some kind of guest rather than... what were you exactly? A witness he couldn't afford to let go? A pet project who would serve him later on for whatever he had planned in mind?

Fine. That just meant you had the chance to study him back.

You would learn everything about him and this place. You would learn his routine, his indulgences, and most importantly, his weaknesses. That way, you would find the perfect time to take revenge.

However, that didn't stop the fact that the uncertainty was worse than fear. Fear, at least, had a clear object. But this ape—not knowing if you were prey being fattened for slaughter or if this was some elaborate psychological game—made everything feel like a test, as every word and movement felt like it could be your last if you chose wrong.

And underneath it all, the grief threatened to pull you under. Seo-joon's face kept flashing behind your eyes, and the sound of gunshots kept echoing in your ears. Your brother, who used to make terrible jokes and worry about you walking home alone at night, was now gone. Because the man now in the same room as you was probably studying your face for any hint that you could see him.

"There are things you need to understand about staying here," he stated, his footsteps circling you slowly. "So we need to establish some rules."

You forced your voice to stay steady. "What kind of rules?"

"Don't cause problems. Don't ask stupid questions." He stopped moving. "And if I need information from you, you give it to me without hesitation."

You could only nod in return, unwilling to give him the satisfaction of a reaction.

He then moved past you and sank into the couch. He lounged back, draping one arm over the top of the cushions while his gaze continued to pin you in place.

"I also expect something in return," he added.

You raised a brow. "And that is?"

"I need your loyalty."

The words were insulting in their arrogance. Your loyalty. The same loyalty that had once been tied, without question, to your sense of justice. To serve justice to Seo-joon, who had been gunned down in the street because of this man sitting so comfortably in front of you. It was laughable, really. That this man could kill the person you had trusted most in the world and then have the audacity to speak of loyalty like it was something you could hand over at will. As if it wasn't something built over years and shattered in a single gunshot.

You could feel the heat blooming in your chest. Every instinct screamed to tell him exactly where he could shove his request. To spit it in his face and to throw his so-called rules back at him. But you knew you couldn't. Not yet.

His eyes narrowed slightly, his voice dropping just a fraction. "Can you give me that?"

You kept your face turned towards the sound of his voice, deliberately still. In that pause, you imagined all of it. The perfect moment, the recoil of a gun in your palms, and the startled look in his mismatched eyes right before it all ended.

But instead of giving him the truth, the corners of your lips twitched upwards in a polite smile.

"I suppose I don't have much of a choice," you said. "But gladly. I am grateful to you, after all."

The man's sharp and deliberate gaze never stopped lingering on you, like he was cataloguing every flicker of expression. You knew that he was weighing and assessing you with each passing second.

"Good," he said simply, as though the matter were settled.

His fingers tapped once against the back of the couch before finally leaning back on the couch. He leaned back with an air of satisfaction, though not entirely. The motion was deceptively relaxed, but you could feel the current of suspicion beneath his composure.

"So," he began, his voice breaking the silence. "What should I call you?"

You blinked. "Call me?"

"I'd like to know what to call you," he smirked. "Unless you prefer 'hey you'."

You almost wanted to roll your eyes at his tone. "It's..." You paused slightly, debating if you should lie about it too. "It's [Name]."

"[Name]," he repeated, as if he were tasting the sound of it with a little hum. "Mm. Sounds nice. It suits you."

You tilted your head slightly. "And what does that mean?"

He let out a low chuckle, the sound warm but edged with something else. "Nothing," he answered. "Just... fits. Rolls off the tongue pretty nice."

He then leaned forward. "I'm Moon Baek."

He extended his hand towards you. You were about to move your own in reciprocation from the years of social conditioning kicking in, but you stopped it just in time, keeping both hands folded in your lap instead.

"Nice to meet you, Moon Baek," you smiled.

Moon Baek let his hand linger in the air for a moment longer than necessary before pulling it back with another soft chuckle. It seemed as though the test of deciding if you were really blind or not had already begun.

"So you really can't see me, hm?" he said lightly, as though the question were just an idle thought.

You kept your expression neutral, forcing the corners of your lips into that faint, placid smile. "That's what I've been saying."

The rage in your chest kept fighting your restraint. It demanded you take him down here and now, no matter the cost. It screamed that every second you stayed still was a betrayal to your brother. And yet, you knew if you gave in, it would all end in a single, messy instant. You would never get to make him suffer the way he deserved.

You quickly smothered that fire. Even though every instinct in you wanted to meet his mismatched gaze and burn your hate into him, the facade of blindness was the only thing keeping you alive. As long as he believed you couldn't see, you had a chance.

"Must be hard," he said, settling back into his seat. "Navigating a world you can't see."

"I guess so," you shrugged. "But your other senses get stronger, I suppose."

Which wasn't entirely a lie in your case. You always have had an exceptional sense of hearing, which you have been planning to put to use one way or another in this situation.

He raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"

"Yeah," you exhaled. "Like you probably smoke expensive cigarettes, and your cologne probably costs more than most people's rent. And did you by any chance have milk tea recently?"

"Milk tea?" he repeated.

You laughed softly. "You smell vaguely like milk tea for some reason."

His smirk deepened. It was the kind that made it hard to tell if he was amused or plotting something.

"Milk tea," he echoed once more, almost tasting the words the same way he had tasted your name. "That's new."

"You don't smell it?" you asked, this time with genuine curiosity.

"I'm not in the habit of sniffing myself," he yawned, though he adjusted his blazer, definitely subconsciously checking.

Seconds later, Moon Baek gave a small wave of his fingers, and almost immediately, a man in a sharp suit appeared at his side. Without a word, he motioned the man to lean down slightly, his voice dropping to a whisper. The man bent down, but Moon Baek clicked his tongue and signalled him to lower even further.

You suppressed a laugh as the man obediently leaned closer, clearly terrified of whatever Moon Baek had threatened him to do. Though Moon Baek's voice was low and quiet, you could make out all of his words from your exceptional sense of hearing.

"Do I smell like milk tea?" Moon Baek whispered.

"Milk tea, sir?" the man blinked in surprise, his expression rather dazed.

"Shh!" Moon Baek hissed, wagging a finger to hush him. "Milk tea. Yes or no?"

The man in the suit, still in the awkward position, blinked in confusion this time. "Um. Sir? Is everything okay?"

Moon Baek's gaze flicked to you, as if he knew damn well you were eavesdropping on every word. He rolled his eyes, realizing the absurdity of the situation, and motioned at the suited man impatiently.

You watched the two with a mix of disbelief and amusement. It was hard to believe that someone who could command a room with a single glare and send grown men running in fear was now sitting here, bickering about whether he did smell like milk tea or not.

He shot you another look. One mixed annoyance and something else, which, of course, was not acknowledged at all as you were 'blind'. It was almost as if he was embarrassed to be caught in such a trivial argument.

The suited man, still in his awkward position, looked more and more uncomfortable as the conversation continued. He was probably itching to escape, but knowing Moon Baek, he wouldn't be dismissed until this little dispute was resolved.

You, on the other hand, were finding this whole situation hilariously entertaining.

The suited man finally straightened up, clearing his throat nervously. "I... I suppose there might be a faint scent of something sweet, sir?"

Moon Baek's eye twitched. "Sweet?"

The poor man looked like he wanted to disappear into the floor. "Like... tea? Maybe? Milk tea?"

"Get out," Moon Baek muttered, waving him away with obvious irritation.

The man practically fled the room, and you had to bite the inside of your cheek to keep from smiling. The silence that followed was almost deafening.

"Well," Moon Baek remarked. "That was enlightening."

"Who was that?" you asked innocently, unable to resist.

"He's an idiot," Moon Baek replied curtly, but you caught him subtly lifting his sleeve to his nose. "An idiot who has no sense of smell and intelligence whatsoever."

You nodded. "That must be it."

There was another pause. You could practically feel his glare boring into you, though of course you couldn't acknowledge it. The tension in the room had shifted from dangerous to almost... petulant. There was no way this was real. This was the same man who had murdered your brother in cold blood, and now he was sulking because you had pointed out he smelled like milk tea. You must have died long ago, and this was hell.

"Are you always this observant about people's scents?" he asked.

"Only when they're unusual," you answered honestly. "Most people smell like scented soap, perfume, cigarettes, and the usual things. But milk tea?" You shrugged. "That's a first."

He scoffed, grumbling under his breath as he slumped back into his chair. He was annoyed. Annoyed at the incompetent idiot who couldn't even identify a scent, and annoyed at you for suggesting the scent in the first place. And worst of all, your sense of humour for finding this entire situation amusing. He was not about to admit that he had spent the entire time wondering if he really did smell like milk tea. He wasn't that vain, right?

He continued to watch you, trying to gauge your expression. But you just sat there, looking unfazed by the entire absurdity. It only irritated him further, which you definitely noticed.

You smiled at that. A small, almost imperceptible curl of your lips.

It wasn't genuine, you told yourself. It wasn't the way a smile was supposed to be. It was only something to lower his guard. To chip away at the distance between you until the moment came when you could bury a bullet in him he had once given to your brother.

But even as you thought about it, something about the smile betrayed you. You told yourself it was nothing. It was just a momentary lapse and a reflex of politeness you hadn't yet killed. Your fingers curled against your knee, nails pressing just enough to ground yourself. No, this was not comfort, and it was certainly not connection. And yet, there was a trace of softness in it.

The audacity of it all almost broke your composure. Why were you smiling as if he hadn't been the one to pull the trigger? Sure, he was funny. Sure, the two of you seemed to slip into conversation quite easily, but that shouldn't justify anything.

Your chest tightened. Not with grief this time, but the sharp bite of self-disgust. You couldn't let this turn into something it wasn't. You couldn't allow him to become anything other than what he was: your brother's murderer. Every word exchanged, every look, and every stupid joke was all a trick, whether intentional or not. He wasn't supposed to be your friend. He would never be close to one.

You fixed your gaze somewhere over his shoulder, refusing to give him the satisfaction of accidentally meeting his eyes again. And so, you sat there with your lips curved in that careful, meaningless smile until the silence between you felt heavy enough to crush bone.