𝚊𝚜𝚑

“No.”

“Seriously? You’re gatekeeping romance!”

“This is not romance.”

“A man you haven’t spoken to in four years found you in Italy, of all places, and opened with this is either fate or a terrible idea. That is literally a romance novel, Y/N.” Kat snorts in reply, and Y/N has the sudden urge to throw her phone across the bathroom, dropping her forehead against her knees.

The worst part is that Kat isn’t entirely wrong. It is romantic, very Hyunjin-coded, and it has her wanting to scream.

Y/N’s been staring at his message for almost ten minutes now. She had swiped back out to check his profile half of that time just to make sure it was really him. And every time she did that, she’d be greeted with all his posts that she just knows she’ll spend an entire evening immersed in if she didn’t force herself to click out of it.

This just cannot be actually happening right now.

Just as she’s about to swipe out of the conversation again, the typing bubble pops up, and her heart jumps so hard it actually annoys her.

Typing… and then nothing. Typing… and then nothing.

Y/N stares at the little bubble like it personally insulted her.

“He keeps typing and stopping,” She mutters out, the instant shriek from the other line causing her to instantly regret even saying that.

“Oh, he is spiraling! Spi-ral-ing!”

“Kat, please. He is not!”

“Oh, but he absolutely is! And I am loving it, I’ll tell you that.”

Y/N bites the inside of her cheek, trying not to smile, but ultimately failing. Because she can picture it too easily—Hyunjin sitting somewhere in another hotel room across Florence, staring at his phone with his brows furrowed, deleting and re-writing sentences because he thinks too much and feels too much.

That’s the thing people never really understood about him. Everyone saw his stage aura first, beauty second, talent third. Y/N knows that because she was one of those people, softly admiring from a distance. But what ruined her was the softness underneath all of it—the nervousness, the sincerity. The way he’d looked at her four years ago like wanting her made him feel uneasy. The way he opened up to her about his constant battles with anxiety. The way his eyes formed crescents when he laughed and the nervous habit of running his fingers through his hair whenever he’d talk to her about his life.

Y/N blinks, desperately trying to tune back in to reality and comprehend what Kat was currently blabbering about. Just as she was about to interrupt her rant on how this entire situation is giving major K-Drama vibes, another notification catches her attention, her eyes locking down on the new text instantly.

hyunjin: I’m still trying to figure out if messaging you was brave or catastrophically stupid

A laugh escapes her before she can stop it. She could feel the butterflies erupting in her stomach, briefly reminding her of how she felt the first night she met him. She was a little star struck at first, (can you blame her?), but that quickly dissolved once she got to know him as just Hyunjin and not Hyunjin from Stray Kids. And getting to know him, to touch him, to kiss him—he had stopped feeling untouchable and became devastatingly human instead. And somehow, that was worse.

She remembers every detail too vividly. The warm glow of her bedside lamp hitting his face just right. The muffled bass downstairs only growing more faint once his lips finally touched hers. The moment he looked at her and she realized he was nervous, too.

God. She can still remember how his lips felt against hers, how he dominated her so easily, how he fucked her until the only name she knew was his. Her face heats up instantly, her core clenching, the butterflies in her stomach only growing wilder.

“You’re thinking about him right now, aren’t you?”

Y/N blinks, feeling her face heat up even more, “Shut up. I hate you.”

“I love you, too,” Kat sings back. Y/N could just hear the smirk on her lips.

She ignores her, choosing instead to grab ahold of her phone, desperately trying not to drop it in this bathwater from how bad her hands were shaking right now. She exhales loudly, biting her lip slightly as she types back a response.

y/n: depends. should i be concerned?

The typing bubble pops back up almost immediately, and he’s already responding before she can re-evaluate her response.

hyunjin: Probably.

hyunjin: I’ve rewritten every message to you at least four times already

Y/N bites her lip harder. The butterflies are only getting worse.

y/n: that’s a little embarrassing for you

hyunjin: You make me nervous enough to lose basic motor skills, apparently

Y/N can’t help the quiet laugh that escapes her mouth, a giddy smile making its way onto her face as she re-reads his message. Honestly, she’s a little bewildered, because how in the hell does she make him nervous? There is absolutely no world where she’d think that would even happen.

“Are you flirting with him right now or some shit?” Kat’s voice echoes through the speakers, “What’s he saying? What did you say? Don’t be a little bitch and leave me out.”

“He’s not… we’re not flirting,” Y/N replies, eyes still zeroed in on his last text as she re-reads it about five more times.

“Not flirting, my ass,” Kat replies loudly, and Y/N could hear some shuffling over the line, about to ask her what she’s doing to change the subject when she’s speaking again, “You know he hid behind the art columns when he saw you earlier today, right? Or should I say, stalked you.”

“What?” She replies, trying not to laugh but failing, as that doesn’t seem to surprise her at all.

“Yep. Chan told me. I hope you use that against him and never live that down.”

Y/N shakes her head in amusement, a warm feeling blooming in her chest as she adverts her attention back towards her phone.

y/n: nervous enough to hide behind a column, apparently

She watches him type and stop a few times, relaxing her body more in the bath, biting her finger through a grin with one hand while the other holds her phone up.

hyunjin: Okay… not my best moment, I’ll admit.

hyunjin: If I was going to fall over and die from a heart attack, I would have rather done that where you couldn’t see me

y/n: why would that even happen in the first place?

hyunjin: You looked so beautiful I really think my heart would’ve stopped if I saw you up close

Y/N sinks further into the bath, a giddy feeling flowing through her, consuming her entire body. He’s definitely flirting with her right now, and somehow she’s flirting back without even trying. It feels easy, too easy—like there isn’t four years sitting awkwardly between them. And that’s the dangerous part.

Her fingers move before she can overthink it.

y/n: you’ve survived performing in front of stadiums but seeing me up close is where you fall apart?

There’s a pause this time, long enough for her to notice. The seen underneath her reply almost seems like it’s taunting her, and her stomach twists unexpectedly. Did she say too much? Should she have said something else?

She stares at the screen longer than necessary. Kat notices the shift, because of course she does.

“Okay, what happened?”

“He left me on read.”

“Oh my god,” Kat laughs in slight disbelief, and Y/N narrows her eyes at her phone even though she can’t see her.

“I’m serious! He was replying fast before, and now he’s just left me on read. He isn’t even typing.”

“Well, I wouldn’t know what to even tell you, considering you won’t tell me what the hell you’ve been saying.”

Before she can reply, the typing bubble appears, causing her breath to hitch in her throat. She watches it for a second before it disappears completely, and her chest tightens.

She feels bad. Maybe she made him uncomfortable somehow. Maybe bringing up his career reminded him of the imbalance between them once again. Because back then, even though she’d tried to not to show it before she painfully admitted he was her bias, she knew what she was to him.

A fan. A girl who already knew his face before he knew hers.

But somewhere during that night, that dynamic had dissolved into something else, something frighteningly real.

Her phone buzzes in her hand, knocking her out of her thoughts. She glances down immediately.

hyunjin: Performing is easier. I know what I’m doing there

hyunjin: You’ve always made me feel a little out of control, though

Y/N’s breath catches in her throat, heat rushing through her instantly despite the now cool bathwater, because she remembers. God, she remembers.

The way his hands tightened on her waist when she kissed him back harder. The way he looked at her after he fucked her, slightly dazed, like he hadn’t expected her to affect him that much.

Her heart pounds violently in her chest as she re-reads his texts over and over again.

“Come on, Y/N! What did he say? What’s happening?”

Y/N stares at the messages for another second before clearing her throat slightly, shifting a little in the bathwater before quietly reading them out loud. Saying it out loud seems worse than reading it inside her own head, yet that giddy feeling inside her stays the same nonetheless.

“Holy shit,” Kat makes a wounded noise, “That is disgusting.”

“What?”

“In a romantic way. Disgusting. I hate him.”

Y/N laughs softly, but her chest aches a little now, too. She’s thinking about that night she spent with him again—how every emotion seemed to live visibly in his eyes no matter how hard he tried hiding it, how he kissed her like he was afraid wanting her too much might ruin him.

Kat lets out an annoyed groan on the line, “Are you thinking about him again?”

“No,” She replies quickly, defensively.

“Yeah right. I can smell your arousal from here.”

“Kat!” Y/N groans out, a modified look on her face as she glares at the phone, “That’s literally disgusting! Would you just shut up?”

Her phone lights up with another notification.

hyunjin: Can I see you while you’re here?

And there it is—the question that’s she’s been slowly anticipating since he first messaged her. Her pulse jumps immediately, and she stares at the words for a long moment before typing back.

y/n: what, like in public?

hyunjin: Yeah. I was thinking maybe we could go to dinner? There’s this nice place by the river I was thinking we could go to

hyunjin: Or we could walk around the city a bit, maybe go to another museum

hyunjin: I could pretend to know things about art and impress you

She can already picture it clearly. Hyunjin walking beside her through Florence at night with his hands in his pockets, his hair falling into his eyes while he says something completely off the wall about paintings just to make her laugh. It sounds dangerously nice, too nice, and that’s exactly why panic starts to creep in.

Being out in public with him makes it seem real, allows them to be seen. Public means people recognizing him, approaching him, taking pictures of him—doing anything to get his attention. And underneath all of that is the much scarier truth where she doesn’t trust herself around him, not when one conversation already has her feeling like this.

She doesn’t know if she’s ready for that.

Her fingers hesitate before typing.

y/n: i don’t know if being in public is a good idea

The typing bubble appears instantly, then disappears. It comes back, then disappears again. And Y/N is immediately regretting everything.

“Shit,” She mumbles to herself, scooting up a little in the bathtub.

“What happened now?” Kat asks quickly.

“I think I hurt his feelings.”

Kat snorts in amusement, “What? You did not.”

“I did,” Y/N strains out, eyes focused on the fact that he’s not typing again, “He left me on read again. And he isn’t typing.”

Kat calls her name in brief annoyance, and Y/N’s mind starts spiraling. What if he thinks she’s embarrassed of him, or doesn’t want to be seen with him? What if he thinks she actually doesn’t want to see him at all?

Does she want to see him?

He’s finally replying before she can form another thought, and her chest squeezes tight.

hyunjin: Yeah.

hyunjin: Sorry. That was probably selfish of me to ask

Y/N’s eyes widened immediately, panic flooding through her body, because that’s not what she meant. That’s not what she meant at all.

y/n: no, that’s not what i meant

y/n: i want to see you.

hyunjin: You do?

The vulnerability in those two words wrecks her instantly.

y/n: yes

y/n: i do

hyunjin: You could come here instead

Suddenly, her mind is back there again. It’s back to her white sheets, the soft lighting, his hands sliding carefully over her waist, the feeling of him pulling her closer like he couldn’t stop himself. She can still feel him on her, all over her.

She bites her lip, leaning her head back against the bathtub, debating on what she should do. Does she want to see him again? Yes. There’s zero hesitation there. But does she think this is a good idea? Probably not.

But right now, she can’t bring herself to care that much.

“He invited me to his hotel,” Y/N chokes out quietly, interrupting another rant that Kat was in the middle of. It’s quiet for a minute, and then—

“Wait, hold the fuck up!”

Y/N barely hears her, because she’s staring at the screen while another message appears.

hyunjin: Only if you want to

hyunjin: If it’s too much, you don’t have to. I just want you to be comfortable

y/n: you’re very bad at trying to be casual

hyunjin: Only with you

“Bitch, I’m about to hang up if you don’t tell me what’s happening!” Kat’s voice shrieks through the room. And before she can lose her nerve, before she can remember every reason that this is dangerous territory, she’s already sending back a reply.

y/n: send me the hotel name

By the time Y/N reaches the St. Regis, she’s already reconsidered every decision that led her here twice. Well, maybe three times. Okay, five.

The hotel glows softly against the Florence night, all old world elegance, expensive in the kind of understated way that makes her suddenly hyperaware of herself the second she walks through the front doors. Her heels click way too loudly against the floor, and she instantly regrets wearing them. Kat had convinced her to wear them, as it made her look more classy and elegant, (her words), fitting right up Hyunjin’s vibe. Y/N genuinely doesn’t think Hyunjin would care what she showed up in, but she does admit that she wants to look nice for him, even if that means wearing a pair of heels.

She spent almost two hours getting ready. And within those two hours, she had changed outfits four different times. Everything either felt too dressy, too casual, or too I’m trying to look hot for the guy I used to be emotionally obsessed with, until she finally settled on something simple enough to seem accidental, but flattering enough to make her feel pretty. Dark jeans, a low-cut black top, and lip gloss she reapplied three separate times in the taxi over here. Not because she wanted to impress him, but because she absolutely wanted to impress him.

She pauses once she walks a little further inside, fingers tightening slightly around the strap on her purse as she glances around the lobby. Everything is polished wood and velvet seating, quiet piano music somewhere in the distance. Of course Hyunjin would stay somewhere beautiful enough to feel completely unreal.

Her phones buzzes in her back pocket, and she pulls it out quickly.

hyunjin: You made it?

It’s ridiculous how easily he still affects her, even through a text. She’s a twenty-six year old woman with a career and a lease and student loans and enough trauma bay experience to function during literal emergencies. And yet, somehow, one text from him still makes her nervous system collapse.

“Miss Y/N?” A voice startles her, causing her to jump slightly. She glances up to see a man in a dark suit standing in front of her, his hands clasped behind his back.

“Yes?” She replies, although it comes out more so of a squeak than an actual response.

“Good evening,” He smiles at her politely, ignoring her embarrassment, “You may follow me.”

Y/N blinks at him, “Excuse me?”

For a second, she wonders if he’s nicely escorting her back outside, seeing as in she definitely doesn’t belong here. But when he takes a step forward towards the elevators on the right, her eyes light up in realization.

“We’ve been expecting you,” He states calmly, still polite as ever, and Y/N feels a little embarrassed all of a sudden, “Mr. Hwang asked me to bring you to his room. Would you like me to carry your purse for you?”

“Oh, no, I’m okay! Thank you,” She manages to get out without embarrassing herself again, and he nods once before gesturing over towards the elevator doors that are now open and waiting on them to step inside.

She tries very hard not to look visibly panicked as he closes the doors and the elevator begins moving up. They ride in silence, save for the constant thumping of her heartbeat blaring in her ears from how nervous she is. Her getting escorted to his room only intensifies that feeling, because it’s a clear reminder that Hyunjin can’t exactly have random people wandering around his hotel. She knows it’s for security reasons, but it doesn’t make it any less nerve-wracking.

The thought does something strange to her chest. Not because he’s famous, but because he had prepared for her, expected her, wanted her here enough to arrange this all in advance.

This is crazy. This is so, so crazy. And suddenly, she’s becoming consumed with the same feeling she had whenever he followed her up to her room four years ago.

The elevator doors opening again catches her attention, and she gulps nervously once the employee gestures her out into a hallway that’s way too quiet for how loud her mind is right now.

“He’s in room 417,” He speaks quietly, still ever so polite, gesturing towards the door that was towards his right.

“Thank you,” Y/N manages to force out, tightening her grip on her purse strap ever so slightly. He smiles at her one more time before getting back onto the elevator, and then she’s left alone.

Suddenly, everything feels too real, and she’s painfully aware of where she is and what she’s doing. And what is she doing, exactly? What is she doing standing inside a luxury hotel in Italy when her entire outfit was bought on sale? What is she doing standing right outside Hyunjin’s hotel room?

She should turn around. She should turn around, take the elevator back down to the lobby, walk out like nothing happened, and then block his account. She thinks about it for a half a second before deciding against it, taking in a deep breath before stepping closer to his door, giving it two, shaky, barely there knocks.

Immediately, she hears movement inside, which weirdly makes her feel slightly better, like maybe he’s nervous too. There’s a brief pause, and then the door opens, and then everything in her brain stops working for a second.

He’s beautiful. That thought hits her with humiliating force. Four years somehow made him worse for her. Much worse.

His dark hair falls softly over his forehead, slightly messy like he’s been running his hands through it. He’s dressed casually in black dress pants and a navy sweater that hangs loosely off his body, his rings on his fingers glinting under the hotel light. And his face… god, his face… is just as soft, just as intense as she remembers. It’s truly unfair how perfect he looks standing barefoot in a hotel doorway, and for a moment, it stuns her. But what gets her the most is how his entire expression changes at once, like he almost forgot what she actually looked like and now regrets every second of that.

For a second, neither of them says anything. Y/N suddenly becomes painfully aware of herself—her hair, her makeup, her heartbeat, the fact that she suddenly cannot remember how human interaction works. And how could she when the one man who has taken up every single thought in her brain for years is standing directly in front of her?

“Hi.” He breathes out suddenly, his voice sending shivers down her spine.

“Hi.” She says back, quieter than intended, feeling like she’s struggling to breathe.

His eyes move over her slowly, carefully, almost like he’s trying to memorize her again. His gaze is so intense that it has her visibly shivering, the movement causing his eyes to flicker back up to her face, “You came.”

“Well,” She replies lightly, desperately trying to sound normal, “You did send a very persuasive series of messages.”

He smiles, and it tugs at her chest in a way that instantly has her thinking back to that night in her bedroom when he looked at her the same exact way.

“Yeah, sorry about the multiple text messages,” He rubs the back of his neck, the tip of his ears reddening slightly, “You almost didn’t answer me.”

“Very true. I’m surprised you noticed that.”

“I notice many things when it comes to you, Y/N.”

The words land softly, too softly, like he didn’t even realize how intimate they sounded. Or maybe he did. Either way, it does something embarrassing to her body.

“Very smooth.” She tries to ease the tension that keeps brewing between them, her face only heating up even more once he smiles at her.

“It’s true, though. Kind of hard to not notice.”

Her stomach tightens instantly, because there’s something about the way he says it. The dark glint in his eyes doesn’t go unnoticed as he briefly drops his gaze down her body before focusing back on her face, his eyes widening slightly.

“Sorry,” He says quickly, stepping away from the door, “Please, come in.”

Y/N walks inside carefully, her eyes instantly drawn towards the interior of the suite. It’s gorgeous, expensive, and doesn’t do a great job at easing her nerves. If anything, it only intensifies the feeling, as she’s, once again, reminded of how completely their lives are and why she’s even here in the first place.

She tries to ignore that feeling, the soft click of the door closing behind her catching her attention, but only for a second before her focus shifts towards the perfectly made bed towards her right. There’s an expensive looking bottle of red wine sitting beside two glasses on the small table near it, and suddenly, all she can think about is the last time she saw him in a room with a bed—the last time she was this close to him, the last time his hands were on her.

Heats floods straight to her neck, and she swallows thickly, desperately trying to focus on anything else. Anything but him.

Although that’s very difficult to do, considering she’s inside his hotel room right now.

What is she doing here?

“You look nervous.” Hyunjin’s voice startles her, and she quickly turns her head towards him, her pulse thumping loudly against her skin.

“I’m not nervous.”

Lie.

“Really?” Hyunjin raises an eyebrow, a hint of a smirk ghosting his lips, “Hm. I beg to differ. You’re shaking like a leaf right now.”

“I am not,” She says a little more defensively, his smirk only widening, “If anything, you’re the nervous one.”

Another lie.

“I won’t deny that,” He laughs softly, the sound easing the tension in her shoulders slowly, “I guess I’m just better at hiding it than you are.”

He must be, because right now, he looks completely unaffected by her presence, while she’s currently trying not to pass out on this floor.

She doesn’t reply, choosing instead to stand awkwardly in his suite, trying not to visibly stare at him while also failing completely.

Four years ago, Hyunjin had been famous in the kind of way that felt unreal to her. He was successful, easily recognizable, and intimidatingly pretty. And although he’s still those things now, he’s also something else entirely.

He’s global campaigns. Sold out stadiums. Millions upon millions of people obsessed with him. And somehow, none of that compares to the simple reality of him standing six feet away in a hotel room looking at her like this, like he already knows she’s affected by him and is absolutely delighted by that fact.

“You can stop looking at me like I’m going to disappear, you know,” He says lightly, his voice a lot closer to her than she thought.

Y/N blinks hard, “I wasn’t.”

“You were,” He says quickly, knowingly, standing a little closer to her. She could smell the sweet scent of his cologne, and it was starting to make her feel dizzy.

She watches him as he walks towards the table, her grip tightening even more on the strap of her purse once he begins to pop the cork open on the bottle of wine. He glances at her, holding the bottle in his hand, and Y/N tries not to focus on how his hand fits around the entire bottle.

“Do you want some wine?” He asks suddenly, flicking his head down to gesture towards the bottle he’s holding, “It’s a Chianti. One of my favorites I’ve tried here.”

“Oh, yes, I’d love some wine.”

Truthfully, she needs the whole bottle to make it through this night. But a glass will do.

He pours her a glass, and Y/N feels her mouth going dry at the sight of him. God, it’s so unfair how pretty he is—how pretty he still is. His hair is lightly falling across his face, his lips slightly parted, his gaze completely focused as he watches the red liquid fill half-way in the glass. His sweater is rolled up to his elbows, his skin lightly tanned from what she assumes is the Italian sun, his veins bulging out on his arm as he steadies the bottle in his hand.

“You can put your purse down anywhere, and sit wherever you’d like,” His voice interrupts her staring, and she quickly glances up, his expression causing her face to flush instantly, “Make yourself comfortable.”

“Right. Thank you,” She clears her throat, awkwardly walking towards the couch near his bed and taking a seat before she can overthink herself into leaving entirely, almost dropping her purse while trying to slide it off her shoulder.

He notices her struggling, his mouth twitching like he’s trying not to smile too much as he walks over towards her. She holds her breath, his eyes seeming to captivate her.

“You okay there?”

“Perfectly fine.” She replies quickly, placing her purse beside her on the couch. Why is she so embarrassing?

“Hm,” He hums lowly, looking at her like he doesn’t believe her at all.

Besides his painfully good looks, another thing Y/N has come to notice is how he’s much more confident now. Back then, he was a little nervous, a little awkward, until he completely switched personalities and fucked her into the mattress. Now, he’s more bold, openly flirting with her without any hesitation, and she can’t say she hates it.

He’s not necessarily arrogant in the way he’s now carrying himself around her, but more so just aware. He’s more aware of the effect he has on people, and on her, specifically.

And the worst part of it is that she gets the horrible feeling that he likes seeing her unravel a little.

“Here,” He says softly, handing her a glass. She slowly reaches out, their fingers brushing against each other, and immediate warmth shoots straight up her arm. She snatches it from his grip quickly, instantly taking a large gulp, the slightly bitter taste dripping down her throat.

He watches her in slight amusement, taking a sip of his own glass. His eyes stay on her as he takes a long sip, and she matches his gaze, pulling the glass away from her mouth. He does the same, licking his lips ever so slightly, and her eyes are instantly drawn towards the action. Suddenly, she’s thinking of how soft his lips felt against her own, how he bit and sucked on her skin when he drove his cock inside her over and over again.

She shifts a little on the couch, crossing her legs and clearing her throat lightly. This is a bad time to be thinking of this. She shouldn’t be thinking about this, and she shouldn’t still be looking at how wet and plump his lips look.

“Thank you for the wine,” She lets out softly, shifting on the couch again once she forces herself to look away from his mouth.

“No problem,” He replies, his lips quirking as he takes a seat beside her on the couch, far enough that there’s an obvious amount of space between them.

The air around them feels intense. Not awkward or uncomfortable, but there’s way too much tension sitting between them that it almost feels suffocating. And Hyunjin intentionally choosing to sit all the way on the other side of the couch only adds to that feeling, because why is he sitting so far away from her? And why does she feel a little disappointed that he didn’t want to sit right beside her?

“Do you like it?”

“Oh, yeah. It’s very good. I actually prefer reds over whites, so you made a good choice.” She replies, trying not to seem so butthurt over him sitting two seats over on the couch.

“Yeah, I also prefer reds,” He says casually, slouching back into the couch more, “I ordered this bottle at dinner and thought the flavor was really nice. I normally prefer dryer wines over sweeter wines, and this one was a good mix of both. I’m glad you like it.”

“Me too,” She smiles, fingers lightly tracing the stem of the glass, “Sweet wines give me a headache. I can only have maybe two sips before I’m cringing.”

“Yeah, that happens to me, too,” He smiles knowingly, leaning back into the couch, the wine glass resting loosely in his hands.

Y/N’s eyes flicker down again before she can stop herself. His hands, the rings on his fingers, the veins in his wrist, the long fingers wrapped around the stem of the glass—the exact same hands she had spent an embarrassing amount of time thinking about after that party four years ago.

Stop. She needs to get ahold of herself. This is second time she’s been staring at his hands, and it hasn’t even been ten minutes since she’s walked in here. She tears her gaze away before he notices, focusing on her own hands that are now tightly gripping her own glass.

“How have you been?” He asks carefully, his voice causing her to glance back over towards him. The question feels genuine, and it catches her off guard a little.

“I’ve been doing well. Super busy, but well,” She replies lightly, “I’ve just been working in the ER as a PA the past two years, so lots of chaos.”

“Oh, that’s awesome, Y/N. I’d never be able to do that,” He shakes his head slightly.

Y/N laughs nervously, “That reaction makes it sound fake.”

“No, I’m just trying to imagine you doing that everyday.”

“What, yelling in trauma bays?”

“No, saving lives.”

She feels a nervous pit forming in her stomach, suddenly feeling super shy under his gaze. She shrugs her shoulders lightly, “Yeah, I guess. It’s not as dramatic as that, though.”

“I think it is.”

His tone is so sincere that she has to look away. There’s something deeply disorienting about someone like Hyunjin sounding genuinely impressed by her, especially when a small part of her still sees him through twenty-two year old eyes—the same eyes that used to stay up until 2am watching interviews and performances and edits of him online, the same eyes that remembered what it felt like when her celebrity crush suddenly became real and fucked her upstairs in her sorority house.

The fact that he’s looking at her like she’s the impressive one feels psychologically destabilizing.

“You work a lot harder than I do,” He says quietly, and Y/N scoffs instantly.

“I absolutely do not.”

“Yes, you do,” He replies, taking another sip of his wine, “You literally have someone’s life in your hands. I just dance around and sing for a living.”

“That is not true,” She looks back at him now, turning her body to face him a little better, “You know that’s not true. Don’t get me started, Hyunjin.”

He smiles teasingly into his wine glass, and Y/N’s gaze flickers down automatically once he lowers his glass, watching him lick the faintest drop of red wine off his bottom lip. She clears her throat quickly before redirecting the conversation.

“What about you?”

Hyunjin raises an eyebrow, “What about me?”

“How are you?”

The teasing fades from his expression slightly, and she finds herself instantly regretting her question. This is the part she’s been trying not to think about since she saw him again. The hiatus. The sudden disappearance from schedules that sent the entire fandom spiraling online.

She remembers reading the statement in her apartment after a long twelve hour shift, exhausted and half asleep, staring at her phone with this strange ache in her chest. Even after all of these years, some part of her still cared about him, still worried about him.

His gaze drops briefly to the wine glass in his hands before lifting back to hers. He looks tired in a way she hadn’t noticed earlier, and she fights the urge to pull him towards her.

“You don’t have to answer that if you don’t want to,” She says quickly, quietly, hoping that she didn’t ruin anything.

“No, it’s okay,” He replies, his voice a little softer than before. Silence stretches for a second, and then he breathes softly through his nose, “I’m… okay. I think I just forgot how to stop for a while.”

He traces the stem on his wine glass, seemingly deep in thought. “I guess I just kept thinking if I pushed through everything, eventually I would feel normal again,” He gives a small, humorless laugh, “Turns out that’s not really how people work.”

“I’m glad you stopped, then.”

His eyes lift to hers immediately, his expression softening. And for one dangerous second, the tension between them disappears completely beneath something far more intimate.

“You were worried about me?”

Something in the way he asks that question has her heart stumbling in her chest. “I think everyone was worried about you.”

“Hm,” His gaze stays fixed on her, “But you were, too.”

Y/N can’t even deny it, she was worried about him—she’s still worried about him. And how could she not be when she hears what’s been said about him online, or how his body language comes across in interviews, or how tired he looks performing?

She tries to shrug it off lightly, “Well, you disappearing from the internet was unsettling, you know.”

He breaks out into another smile, laughing softly. It’s warm, it’s beautiful, and it has her doing the same as she watches him in a daze.

Her crush on him never really stood a chance. And right now, she doesn’t think it ever fully went away.

“Are you still in New York?”

His next question catches her off guard for a second, and she clears her throat lightly, “Yeah, I am. I decided to stay once I graduated.”

“Are you still living with Kat?”

She smiles at the mention of Kat’s name, “Surprisingly, no. We just got our own places last year. We live in the same apartment complex, though, so I haven’t really escaped her fully.”

“I don’t think you ever could,” Hyunjin laughs lightly, and Y/N’s really glad to see his smile again.

“I’m stuck with her forever, it seems.”

“Yeah. That’s how I feel about the members,” He runs a hand through his hair, shifting on the couch, “Even if I wanted to, I wouldn’t be able to escape them. I’d move to the other side of the world and they’d be knocking on my front door the next day.”

“They love you.” She laughs, taking another sip of his wine.

His eyes soften, “Yeah, I know.”

It’s quiet again. He’s still looking at her, the smile slowly fading from his lips. His eyes narrow in on her, piercing into her soul, her body, her everything. She shifts slightly on the couch, her skin hot from his gaze, and suddenly, the space between them feels strangely noticeable now. Especially because Hyunjin hasn’t moved any closer, not once.

“You can sit closer if you want.”

Hyunjin goes still for half a second. His eyes widen just slightly before he changes his expression completely. There’s something deeply pleased in his expression now, the same dark glint she had seen in her dreams for months after he left her four years ago. He looks wholly satisfied, like he’d just been waiting for her to crack first.

“Are you sure?” He asks lowly, his voice dripping down her body like honey. Sweet, sticky, thick.

She nods once before she loses her sanity. He studies her for another second before he leans down to place his wine glass against the table sitting in front of them. He’s still watching her, still daring her to stop him or look away first, but she doesn’t.

He moves towards her slowly, carefully, until his thigh is resting right beside hers. He’s close enough now that warmth radiates off him immediately, close enough that his knee brushes hers lightly when he settles back. The contact shoots heat up her entire body. Neither of them acknowledge it, which somehow makes it infinitely more intimate.

She finds herself shifting closer to him automatically. Suddenly, she’s entirely consumed of everything about him—his smell, the tiny mole sitting underneath his eye, the slight warmth of his breath fanning against her lips. It’s distracting, consuming, and she feels herself falling into him once again.

“Why are you so tense?” He whispers lowly.

She glances down, noticing that her legs were tightly clenched together and her hand was gripping the stem of her wine glass so tight her knuckles were almost completely white. Instantly, embarrassingly, she relaxes, and his gaze is drawn towards her thighs as she spreads them apart just slightly.

“I’m not tense.”

He glances back at her face, raising an eyebrow, “You are. You’re thinking too much.”

She is, and she hates how he notices that.

He grabs ahold of her wine glass gently, and she lets him, her eyes following the movement as he shifts down to place it beside hers on the table. She swallows thickly, and her mind is instantly reminded of how similar this all feels—about how he did the exact same thing in her dorm room four years ago right before he kissed her.

She wonders for a second if he’s thinking about it, too.

He straightens up, but he’s a lot closer now, close enough that if she were to tilt her head up just slightly, she’d brush her lips against his. She hates that she wants that.

“What are you thinking about, Y/N?”

She’s thinking about how dangerous this feels. She’s thinking about the difference between them now. She’s thinking about cameras and fans and headlines and the fact that she used to have posters of him on her wall. And worst of all, she’s thinking that despite everything, she wants so badly to kiss him, anyway.

Hyunjin shifts closer without seeming to realize it. Or maybe he realizes it completely.

“You keep looking at my mouth.”

Her eyes shoot up towards his own, slightly embarrassed, yet she doesn’t pull back, “You’re looking at mine, too.”

“That’s different.”

“How?”

The corner of his mouth lifts slowly, “Because I’ve been thinking about kissing you ever since I opened my door for you.”

Every coherent thought Y/N thought she had instantly disappears. Her breath catches in her throat, and he smirks lightly once he notices. His own breathing looks uneven now, his breath brushing against her mouth, begging for her to claim him.

Good. At least she knows she’s not suffering alone.

“I probably shouldn’t have said that.” He says quietly, yet he’s still looking at her lips. She licks them slowly, and his gaze darkens.

“No?” She breathes out.

“No.” He replies just as breathlessly, his hand twitching, fingers lightly brushing against the side of her thigh.

“Why not?”

“Because now I’m just thinking about it even more,” He laughs, the sound soft and entirely unamused, his fingers inching a little closer, “And if you keep looking at me like that, I might not be able to hold myself back much longer.”

Neither of them moves. Neither of them looks away. The distance between them feels completely impossible, and Y/N’s grabbing ahold of his wrist, bringing his hand to rest fully on her thigh without even thinking about it.

He grips her thigh harder, moving his hand higher as he leans his body more into her. For a second, Y/N thinks he’s going to finally kiss her. But then he shakes his head once, like he’s trying to regain control, trying and failing.

“You have no idea what you’ve been doing to me all night.”

Her heart pounds harder, her hand still lying on top of his, “What am I doing?”

His gaze drifts across her face, slow, painfully slow, painfully antagonizing. “Looking so beautiful,” He mumbles, his hand dipping in-between her thighs, the other coming up to rest gently against her neck, “Testing me. Teasing me. Ruining me.”

A quiet moan escapes her mouth at his confession, and his expression shifts when he hears it. The last thread of restraint snaps in half, and he’s pulling her closer to him by her neck, his lips brushing over hers hesitantly.

“If I kiss you, I don’t want it to be because I assumed,” He admits quietly. His eyes stay locked on hers, patient, waiting, giving her every opportunity to step away.

She doesn’t. Not even a little.

“Hyunjin,” She says his name breathlessly, desperately.

“Tell me what you want.”

A rush of heat floods straight between her legs. It’s embarrassing how easily he affects her, and her body is reacting to him the exact same way it did years ago. She can only sit here being looked at like that for so long before something in her snaps, and she’s torn between an internal battle of giving in or stopping it before it can turn into anything messy.

Y/N wants him. She still wants him. Maybe she’s always wanted him.

And suddenly, she’s moving before she thinks about that fact too hard.

Her hands slides into the front of his sweater, fingers curling lightly in the soft fabric near his chest before pulling him towards her. Her pulse pounds violently as she closes the distance between them, and then she kisses him. It’s soft at first, almost tentative. Yet, the second their mouths touch, something in both of them gives out completely.

Hyunjin makes the quietest broken sound against her lips and kisses her back with an unfound urgency. His grip on her neck tightens, his other hand wanders aimlessly all around her thighs and up towards her waist. Her hands come up to rest on his shoulders in attempt to steady herself because her entire body feels dizzy all of a sudden.

He still kisses the same. It’s slow enough to feel intentional, but deep enough to make her feel insane, and she melts into it, just as she did last time.

A soft sound escapes her mouth before she can stop it, and Hyunjin reacts to it immediately, pulling her closer, kissing her even harder. His mouth moves against her desperately, his hand wandering towards her back and pushing her towards him like he needs her even closer, even though she’s already halfway in his lap.

“Fuck,” He whispers shakily against her mouth, the sound sending a jolt of electricity straight to her pussy, “You have no idea how much I’ve thought about this.”

His mouth is back on hers before she can comprehend what he said, his tongue prodding and poking inside her mouth. He swallows another moan, and she shifts her body to sit on his lap completely, her hands trailing up towards the back of his head, entangling her fingers in his long hair.

She didn’t realize how much she missed this feeling—the warmth, the intensity, the way he kissed her like he meant it. Y/N had been with only three other guys after Hyunjin, and none of them had kissed her like this, had touched her like this, had made her feel like this. Maybe it’s because it’s Hyunjin, or maybe it’s because of something else entirely. But whatever the reason, she can’t get enough of it.

He grunts into her mouth once she rocks her hips against him ever so lightly. He’s hard, and she smiles into his mouth, loving the fact that he seems to be suffering, too.

She wants more. She needs more.

She rocks into him again more forcefully this time, and he throws his head back, a light string of spit following the movement as their lips break apart. She does it again, over and over until he’s moaning underneath her, his hands guiding her movements on his dick. Even through his pants she can feel how hard he is, and her mouth waters at what he’s hiding underneath.

“Fuck,” He curses again, tilting his head back down towards her, his eyes instantly drawn to where her breasts are peaking out under her top. He’s reaching out instantly, squeezing them in his hands, causing her back to arch more into him, “Fuck.”

She’s kissing him again, her tongue sliding against his so desperately, and she moans loudly once he pinches her nipple through her shirt. “Hyunjin,” She says his name in between kisses, and he grunts into her, thrusting his hips up to meet the movements of her own.

A zap of pleasure shoots up her core once he rocks right against her clit. She whimpers loudly, pulling at the hair on the back of his head, kissing him harder. He lets out a pleased hum, repeating the same movement over and over again, causing her head to spin.

Fuck, he feels so good. He feels so big and thick and hard against her that it doesn’t even feel real.

He pulls back slightly, a soft groan falling off his lips, “Fuck, you’re killing me.”

Then he’s kissing her again before she can even reply, before she can even tell him that he makes her feel the exact same way.

His hand sneaks around her back and underneath her top, her knees digging into the couch as she practically bounces on his dick. He reaches a hand between them, lightly toying with the button on her jeans, the other moving around to graze against the bottom of her bare breast inside her top.

Something inside her snaps, and she freezes. One second she’s wrapped up into the feeling of being wanted so intensely that it makes her dizzy, and the next second her brain catches up with her.

This is Hyunjin. Someone whose life belongs, at least partially, to millions of strangers. And she just can’t stop thinking about that.

What exactly is this? Why did he suddenly reach out after years of silence? Why now?

Was it because he missed her? Because he was lonely? Because she was simply convenient? Maybe he wanted to meet up with her because they had history, so it’s easier to ease into it.

The thought hurts more than she’d like to admit. Back then, she would have accepted almost anything from him. And as much as she wants him, she doesn’t know if she can survive being someone’s temporary distraction—being his temporary distraction. Not when she spent months trying to get over him the first time.

“Hyunjin,” She says weakly, and he breaks the kiss, pulling away slowly.

His expression softens immediately at the sound of his name in her mouth. “What?” He asks quietly, voice slightly raspy.

She doesn’t even know what she was going to say.

Slow down? Stop looking at me like that? Please kiss me again before I lose my mind?

She should tell him what she’s really thinking. That she’s scared to take this further just to have another repeat of four years ago. That she doesn’t know if she can handle the aftermath of fucking him again, of growing attached to someone so unreachable. That she’s scared that even if he wants more than just to sleep with her again, she doesn’t know if she’s ready for everything that comes with that.

But instead, she just kisses him again. He makes a low sound against her mouth that nearly destroys her on the spot. And then suddenly, his hands are everywhere again—her waist, her back, one sliding into her hair as he kisses her back with immediate desperation.

He pulls back after awhile, tugging her bottom lip with his teeth, and she whines softly as she slowly opens her eyes, which is a bad decision. Because now, she has to look at him, and he looks completely gone. His hair is falling into his eyes, his lips are so pink and swollen, his chest is rising unevenly beneath her hands.

He’s so pretty that it hurts.

“Spend the day with me tomorrow.”

The words catch her completely off guard, and she feels her body tense up ever so slightly. “What?”

“Tomorrow,” He repeats himself, resting his hands on her thighs, rubbing them softly, “Come somewhere with me tomorrow.”

“Where?” She asks, a nervous feeling bubbling in her stomach.

“The beach. It’s supposed to be nice tomorrow. I was thinking we could spend the day there, and then come back here for dinner later. I can order us room service, if you want.”

Y/N blinks, imagining all the reasons that’s a bad idea. A full day. Sunshine. Conversation. No distractions. No hiding behind flirting. It’s just them, and that seems much scarier than sitting in his hotel room.

Hyunjin notices the hesitation immediately, a sheepish expression on his face as he glances at her, “You don’t have to say yes. I’m sure you have other plans already. I don't want to ruin your trip.”

Y/N studies him for a moment. He looks so nervous, pretending not to care while obviously caring a lot. And what seems to stick with her the most is the fact that he isn’t asking for another night with her, but he’s asking to spend an entire day with her. That answers a question she hadn’t known how to ask, and her expression eases instantly.

“The beach?” She asks again.

“Yeah,” A hopeful smile falls on his face, his hand still rubbing against her thighs, “I know someone who can help us get there without being bothered by anyone. It’s a private beach. We won’t be near anyone.”

“Okay.” She finds herself smiling, nodding her head slightly as she places her hands on top of his on her thigh.

The relief on his face is immediate, “Yeah?”

“Yeah, I’d love to go with you. It’ll be fun.”

i’ve been writing since i was in middle school. i had a wattpad account where i wrote & read harry styles fanfiction religiously. my writing style back then was a lot different to how it is now, for obvious reasons. 1) my sentence structure was super choppy, 2) i was writing based on experiences i have only read about, and 3) i matured intellectually.

i’m not a professional writer by any means, but this is how i go about writing:

1) don’t force it. it can be difficult to form an entire story in your head, and even more difficult to convey that story in words. if you have ideas, write them down. think about them, reflect on them, and run it through your head before just writing it out.

2) ask for opinions when you get writers block. if you have a close friend, ask them what they’re into and what they like to read about. i have a friend who’s also into k-pop and i lay out my ideas for the plot of my stories when i feel stuck and need another opinion. it can help give you an idea, and maybe even tailor to a difference audience (kind of like, if this person suggests this/wants to see this, then other people might, too).

3) have a support system. when people interact with my works, it gives me a huge boost of energy and confidence. i always look forward to hearing what people think about a specific chapter or what they think might happen in the next one, etc. i truly believe having people verbally support you makes a huge difference in writing.

4) find inspiration. sometimes i find myself zoning out or doing something and then think “hm… this would be a good plot for a fanfic,” or “i could totally see hyunjin in a dark academia fic” (literally have this in my drafts rn as we speak for a oneshot… grumpy, older, hyunjin who is a chemistry prof at a prestigious university would not leave my head… but this is what i MEAN).

as for your second question, i focus more on emotion than anything else. when i’m writing a scene, i try to place myself in the reader’s shoes, try to feel what they would feel, and then convey that into words. i’m not sure if it sounds good to others, but it’s what helps me finish chapters, nonetheless.