It was a blurry haze between standing outside the hotel room door with Yuri watching Yujin get ready for the two of you and Yuri digging her fingernails into Yujin’s scalp to hold her in place while Yujin desperately tries to free herself. The symphony is perfect, one you could never tire from: Yujin plays fighting back, of course, though with every attempt at pulling back she makes, Yuri is right behind her to shove her back down again. The clacking of the metal that holds the cuffs together grows louder and louder as Yujin fights, to no avail. The sharp ringing of the bells on her nipple clamps pierce through the deep tones of Yuri violating her throat with your throbbing length. You even hear the tiny saliva bubbles form and pop as the spider gag pries her mouth open, making sure she doesn’t, in Yuri’s words, misbehave.

It’s that beautiful gluck-gluck-gluck of her throat on your cock that you sorely missed. Yujin was half-right that Wonyoung couldn’t do it like she could—Wonyoung’s style is vastly different. Where the sweet, delicate princess would shower you with love and affection, trying to tease you with her cute little pleas for what she wants, the queen would be rough, merciless, only ever obedient to the one who could take it all away. So, as Yuri snakes her fingers through Yujin’s hair, grabbing what she can of those smooth, shiny locks, Yuri pushes down, relishing in the sensation that Yujin gives her: that whatever Yuri puts her through, it’s one step closer to making Yujin thank her.

Using that fistful of hair, Yuri rips her off of your cock, tossing her away like she was nothing more than a toy she’d begun to get bored of. Yujin stumbles onto the floor, hair sticking to her forehead and cheeks, legs folded awkwardly under her as she gasps and retches for breath. It’s music to your ears, each cough that forces its way through her throat, trying like hell to clear her airways of the spit crisscrossing in them. Each violent gag is another thread severed, giving her some much needed space to take in fresh air once more. The bells on her clamps jingle brightly despite the swollen nubs they pinch, leading to more of Yujin's labored breaths.

Once she settles, she shoots you both a look from the corner of her eye: you show her your expression, hungry for what you can take from her, Yuri delighting in her disheveled state. There’s that signature seething hatred in Yujin’s eyes, past the tears that well up and try to run down her cheeks, as she watches Yuri take long, slow strokes of your cock, knowing that you’ll be using her throat again soon. The quiver of her lip betrays her fear, as more and more of her saliva drips uselessly onto the floor where her mouth rests, not even working up the courage to try and get it under control again in anticipation of what her unnie is about to do to her. It’s plain as day on her face—the way she lies on the ground, looking up at you and Yuri, not knowing whether she wants to leave or stay. One thing’s clear: she intends to make you earn her.

You stand, taking Yuri’s sinister smile as permission. It’s slow, deliberate steps towards her position on the floor, and it’s fucking delicious how she squirms. Yujin makes a genuine attempt to sit back up onto her legs, but the way she only looks up at you, still pathetically folded over on the rough, scratchy carpet, as Yuri’s feet come close enough to her face for her to kiss, and the deep and steady exhale she gives out as her throat finally settles down only spurs Yuri on more.

It's all her fault, it has to be. She shouldn't have been so gaudy, so arrogant. “I bet you I can,” as if she could take it back. She even said it with the shit-eatingest grin you've ever seen, let alone on someone like her. Ahn Yujin has always been the haughty type, despite everyone who knows only the idol side of her could argue against, but only rarely has she ever bitten off more than she can chew. You couldn’t deny that small shard of hesitation when you were informed of what Yujin had in store, but when she herself, Yuri, and even Wonyoung signed off on it, not knowing that Yujin would write her out anyway. No, tonight was all about the queen.

Yuri plants her foot firmly into Yujin’s cheek, squishing her face into the soon-ruined carpet. Yujin whimpers as the rough synthetic wool scrapes against her face, no doubt leaving marks on her soft skin, as Yuri pushes harder and harder and harder. “Fucking say something,” she growls, along with another sharp stomp on Yujin’s ear, over and over again, before Yujin finally caves and gasps, “Hloh… I han’h…” Once she’s had her fun, she takes her sole off of Yujin’s face and kicks her over, forcing Yujin to splay on her back, defenseless on the floor. The rise and falls of her chest is mesmerizing, accentuated even further by Yujin having landed unceremoniously onto her cuffed hands. You can tell by the way her brow furrows and her back tries to shift that she’s dying for a less uncomfortable angle, so you help her.

Ball up her hair in your fist again, make sure no loose strands can escape. You’re everything but gentle with how you yank her back up onto her knees, and Yuri takes the sickest pleasure in the grunt that escapes from Yujin’s sorry throat. Yuri kneels in front of her, eye to eye, grabbing her face and forcing all of Yujin’s attention on her and her alone. “What are you?” she demands of Yujin, while the exhaustion and fear swirl and clash in Yujin’s eyes. When Yujin takes more than four seconds to answer, a sharp slap lands on her cheek, causing her to sway harshly against your hand. She moans as the red palmprint blooms on her face, and the handcuffs clatter behind her as she remembers they were there at all.

Yuri teases, “What are you,” she growls right in Yujin’s face, never mind the usual height difference between them or the typical lovey-dovey gaze they used to offer each other all the time. Yuri takes a wicked sort of pleasure seeing her beloved dongsaeng, all grown up into a charming leader of a new generation girl group of her own, on her knees and shivering with fear or anticipation or both of what she’s about to say. “What,” she takes Yujin’s face in her hand, squishing her cheeks, “are,” looks her straight in the eye, sending off a wave that only sends more of that tantalizing fear into the pit of Yujin’s stomach, “you?” nose-to-nose with her now, making it so that they’re exchanging every other breath between one another, depriving each other of fresh oxygen that would have allowed either gain back any semblance of calm.

Past the lump in her throat, through the suffocating strands of spit and precum in her airway, paying no mind to the ache that wraps all around the inside of her neck, “H-hour hluhh,” Yujin chokes out, having surrendered her will to whatever her unnie wants. Yet her brow betrays her, creasing as she braces herself when Yuri raises her hand again. Her shoulders square despite not seeing it held up high, raring to descend on some random, poor, sorry spot of already-aching skin. Yujin tries to shrink down as best she can, leaning away from Yuri’s hand even though she knows she has to take it.

“Yujin,” Yuri finally says, while watching Yujin’s lip quiver as she holds back fearful sobs, “have a little dignity. Show me that pretty smile of yours,” yet you know it’s all a lie. The moment Yujin rights herself, presents her face, chest, neck for Yuri’s hand, her unnie will snatch the opportunity to hurt her again. A simple click of a button somewhere on the back of Yujin’s head, and the spider gag snaps apart and releases all tension. It sends Yujin sputtering past her aching jaw, trying to whine at the same time her tears fall in relief of her poor mouth—that sort of relief is the most vile promise Yuri could have possibly made to her.

You know this. Yuri knows this. And worst of all, Yujin herself knows this.

“I f-fucking hate you.” Yujin spits, followed by a deep breath, Yuri having finally taken the first chip away at her psyche. Yujin’s shoulders drop, her jaw slacks ever so slightly, a long line of spit falls from her bottom lip to her lap with nothing but skin to catch it. She’s learning, Yuri signals with a tilt of her head to show you, showing off how proud she is of her lovely Yujin finally giving in. To the rest of the world, she’s a queen: regal, alluring, dangerous. But to you and especially to Yuri, nothing more than a simple set of holes to have fun with only to get bored of eventually. But not yet.

The sight enthralls you: Ahn Yujin, legs folded underneath and stained red in spots and bruises that you know will take ages to heal properly. Breasts on full display, bells chiming merrily with each labored rise and fall of her chest. The marks around her mouth from the spider gag's silicone hooks pulling her lips wide apart.

“Wonyoung would have taken this,” Yuri teases, “She would have taken this so well. No crying, no choking, no nothing.” The horrid smile never leaves her lips as she leads Yujin’s face back to your cock, panic once again rising in her eyes despite knowing this is exactly what she asked for. “Wonyoung would just,” stopping two millimeters short of your tip, so close that Yujin could almost taste you, “just take it. She’d thank us. Thank me. Such a sweet princess,” and she finally, fully, dangerously shoves her face right into your lap again. You feel Yujin’s nose on your pelvic area even before you register the warmth of her throat again. She tightens and constricts, desperately trying her hardest to take you longer and longer. And through it all, Yuri uses that sweet singsong voice of hers in the most twisted way: screaming into Yujin’s ear “You don’t deserve this,” as she holds her down. Yujin thrashes against her handcuffs, trying to kick herself up onto her feet at the very least, all the while the ringing in her ears fights against the ringing of the bells on her nipples. “Wonyoung is the farthest thing from you,” now on Yujin’s other ear, quietly now, “Wonyoung is good.”

It was true. More than just good, Wonyoung is an angel. Depraved, sure, “I can’t wait for our next session” and “No condoms, unnie, I’ll be on the pill” whenever the topic had come up. After all, she needed it the most—the prim and proper princess, the nation’s granddaughter, the apple of every brand’s eye needs some way to let off the steam. And her beloved Yuri unnie was ever so gracious to share you with her, with them. But not now. Wonyoung had to wait.

It was just bad timing, needing to leave Yujin alone like that. It’s not like she could just leave Paris and come back home just for something like this. Yujin was more than generous, letting Wonyoung in on the details and setup, including her “I bet you I can take him deeper” gossiped through a video call between the two of them in some off hour in the middle of the night. What was she supposed to say back, “No, wait for me, I wanna take him too,” sounding like the needy, whiny princess Yujin has always teased her for being? No, Wonyoung had to wait.

Right now, Yuri is in love with the control, keeping the pace of Yujin’s head steady and fast on your length. You revel in the sight: Yujin’s mascara mixed with neverending tears runs down her cheeks, the snot that drips from her nose and falls onto the base of your cock that Yujin can’t bring herself of swallow, the forceful gluck-gluck-gluck her throat makes as the bulge near her Adam’s apple comes and goes with every thrust.

Yujin is just about turning blue, gagging sounds filling the room, Yuri purring at her beloved dongsaeng as she makes attempt after sorry attempt to pleasure you. Yujin tries her hardest to shake her head no, but with the way her unnie holds her ponytail only allows her so much wiggle room before Yujin herself is asking to have her hair pulled whichever way. The moment Yuri finally lets her breathe, yanking her off of your length, has Yujin gasping desperately for air. Her throat throbs like never before. “You’re not good like Wonyoung is. You’ll never even compare.”

“F-Fuck y—” is all Yujin can manage before she’s kicked back against the nearby wall. It knocks her hard-earned breath straight out of her lungs, and before she slumps to the side, Yuri catches her. “Un-nie, I—”

“One last chance,” Yuri interrupts. She raises Yujin’s face by the chin with nothing but her finger, forcing eye contact. There was no escape for her—Yujin is staying because she wants to. “What are you?”

It’s plain as day that the panic that once spread through her features was beginning to fade. Where there was fear, now there’s just stark, glaring nothingness. “I-I’m…” voice shaking, fear laced through every pause she tries to overcome. Yujin’s expression softens to a blank, and Yuri loves it. “I’m y-your slut, unnie…”

Satisfied, Yuri leads her along, finger still hooked under Yujin’s chin, as Yujin crawls back towards you. Her knees drag on the carpet, but she’s past caring. Her eyes lock onto your tip, licking her lips at the bead of precum that forms, wanting nothing more than to take it for herself. The only thing keeping her from taking you to the back of her throat again is that one singular slender finger Yuri keeps on her chin, and the way Yujin looks up at her, like the puppy she knows she is, makes Yuri fall ever so deeper in love with what she is.

Yuri’s finger leaves Yujin’s chin, slowly, gently. The momentary relief has Yujin dropping her head for just a split second, before promptly slobbering all over your cock again. You almost don’t mind her full, plump lips peppering your shaft with wet kisses and light sucks, nearly failing to register the little smooches and whimpers she makes with every drop of precum she laps right up. And once she feels a familiar pressure on the back of her head, Yujin knows she finally has permission.

It starts with a well-placed kiss on your tip. Then another. And another still. Before either of you know it, Yuri has already increased the pressure on Yujin’s nape, guiding her along, guiding her down. With every passing moment, more and more of your length disappears into Yujin’s mouth. Her cheeks hollow, her tongue strokes the underside of your cock, fresh tears start welling up in the corners of her eyes as it gets progressively tighter the deeper into her mouth you go. The heat from her breath, the sickly sweet smell of her drying saliva clinging to her, and the sight—Ahn Yujin, not even two hours ago, sitting on the bed with her arms crossed, hair done up in a high ponytail, in a stage outfit you already know has thousands of men pining for even just a taste of her—now on her knees, in nothing but a pair of handcuffs, bells jingling brightly on her nipples, and taking your cock as deep into her mouth-pussy as Yuri wants. The black streaks grow wider with every tear that runs down her face. You would ruin her right now if you could, but tonight this isn’t about you. Hell, it’s barely about Yujin. All she is now is a toy to be used, and not even by you.

In one fell swoop, Yuri forces Yujin’s head down all the way, meeting her nose to your pelvic area once more. A resounding “Glhhkk” escapes past your cock, while you feel the searing warmth of her throat muscles wrapping around you in sporadic jerks, massaging your entire length. Yujin’s hair is wrought into a messy, frazzled ponytail, and Yuri decides it’s time to finish up.

She pulls back, so quickly and so far, that in half a second only your tip stays in Yujin’s mouth. She gags and gasps at the sudden jerk of motion, barely registering being made to go down again. And again. And again still. It’s that signature gluck-gluck-gluck that Yuri absolutely loves hearing, and by God will she use Yujin to hear it. With every thrust, more of Yujin’s slobber flies away from her mouth, from her face, and poor Yujin could beg for mercy or more, you could never know. You go along Yuri, humping Yujin’s face in time, and with the way Yujin looks up at the pair of you: eyes blank yet loving, the light of consciousness seemingly fading in and out inside them, brings you ever closer to climax.

And finally, with one last kiss from Yuri, you’re pushed over the edge. Your hand meets Yuri’s on the back of Yujin’s head, helping her push Yujin’s face down further than all three of you would ever think possible. Your warm seed floods her throat, slithering down into her stomach without any regard for her. Yuri moans as you give her a particularly harsh bite on her lower lip, and with it still between your teeth, “Fucking give it to her, oppa. Make sure she drowns.” Her arm tightens around your neck, pulling you even closer, as you shoot rope after rope of cum down Yujin’s sorry throat. Through it all, Yuri bobs Yujin’s head onto your cock, making sure that she wrings out every single drop from you, past all of Yujin’s grunts, moans, and would-be pleas for mercy.

Then, Yuri grabs Yujin’s hair, throws her onto her back on the floor again. A nasty cough here, a horrid gag there, all the while Yujin struggles to recover from the brutal skullfucking her unnie subjected her to. She thrashes and folds on the carpet, desperate for any air to make its way into her lungs past the massive load you planted right in her throat. She retches deep in her chest, sputtering out spit and cum and everything else, and Yuri only spares her a moment of attention before pushing you backwards onto the bed again.

She licks her lips, sucks on your neck, breathes a warm exhale right in front of your face, “My turn.”

Breathlessly, “Yuri, please, five minutes—”

“Shut the fuck up,” she breathes, already snuggling up to you, squishing her breasts against your chest, making sure you feel her tits on your skin even past the thick, obtrusive top she’s still fucking wearing. She wraps her arms around your neck and smiles one of the sweetest smiles ever—the ones she reserves only for you—as if she didn’t just force the Ahn Yujin to take your load down her throat and then throw her away like nothing. “I love you, Oppa. Now, won’t you let me have my turn?”

Yuri stops, mid-slurp of what looks to be a much more savory bowl of noodles and broth than it is, and eyes you with a warning shot. She chews hastily, swallows ungracefully, clears her throat, “We were never together,” with that uneasiness in her eyes you know means nothing good. “We didn't even kiss in the drama, you know.” She reaches down, kneads her calf, and you just let her. 

“I know,” because of course you did, “but you had really good chemistry. On the show, off the show, maybe even behind the cameras?” You pick at your California roll—a soy sauce-soaked grain of rice here, a loose sesame seed there—trying but obviously, laughably failing at laughing and passing it off as a mere observation. Her eyes are still hell to avoid: soft, or piercing, or mysterious on command, and today is no exception. Her phone isn’t a valid target either, just sitting there on the table, screen locked but facing up so it reflects your gaze every time it falls within. You have to look up, and once you do, those hellishly gorgeous eyes find yours in no time at all. She looks at you with a weird flavor of amusement, like entertaining the most ridiculous thought you’ve ever had. 

“He was nice. Tall, handsome, sweet too, at least that's what I'm told,” she huffs, trying just as hard with that smirk to keep the situation light. “Now I'll bite. Tell me, oppa, why do you ask?” Yuri leans back on her chair, arms crossing and her smirk growing just the slightest bit wider, testing the limits of what she can let herself get away with saying.

You had the nerve to ask her to this random New York noodle house for lunch, thousands of miles away from both your homes and jobs, while you’re both on vacation for Christ's sake, and ask her that as a shameful last ditch attempt at petty conversation you knew you couldn’t keep up with. “Just,” you concede with a pause that’s definitely, maybe a bit too pregnant, “just curious.” Not that it was a lie, but it’s a grave understatement—you did miss her, it looks like she missed you too, overreading the situation be damned. 

She laughs, which, mission accomplished for you. “You can’t fault me for wanting our breakup to have been worth something,” mirror her crossed arms with yours, throw back a pointed stare of your own. “You were giving up a real catch, so I didn’t want you regretting it.”

“Right, right. Sorry.” She clears her throat and wipes away the stray broth from her lips, throwing down the napkin like she was right back at home. With that same tone she always took with you, only you, “Well, if you must know, it was not worth it. At all. I mean, seriously, do you really think that he could compare?”

And there it is. It stops you both in your tracks, the tension of meeting up with an ex in a weird place after an ambiguous breakup immediately replaced by the realization that, for lack of a better term, “I don’t wanna compare,” rubbing your neck out of embarrassment more than humility, “I don’t wanna say ‘worth it.’”

Different this time, “Right, sorry. You know what I meant.” Yuri’s eyes cast down just as quick, and you find your respectfully waiting sushi on the plate right across from her gently cooling bowl of noodles. The clatter and chatter of sounds around you comforts you in a way you can’t explicitly understand, but the way her smile creeps back into her cheeks and her honest attempt at checking if what she said was okay with you means more than anything else. 

“Yeah, I know.”

Her phone lights up, breaking the ice better than you ever could, but Yuri’s face all but sours when she reads the notification. She wills the screen back to black, and flips it over this time. No more distractions. She turns back to you, hiding all the emotions from her face. Continues on, like nothing happened.

~~~

There's really no good way to describe the feeling again. It’s some parts anxious, other parts offended, yet other parts just plain relieved. Confusing is another word you’d love to use, but you’ve long accepted that everything was confusing in the face of one Jo Yuri, even if it was the last thing she wanted. She grips your arm tighter as her glasses fog up with a puff of breath gone awry. There’s a slight shiver in her fingers, dreadfully obvious even through her winter gloves, that makes its way up your sleeve and onto the arm she’s gripping onto. It’s confusing, anxious, offensive, just plain relieving, to have her on your arm like this again. 

“How’s work?” Again, not the best icebreaker, though by now you’ve gotten quite used to the awkward silences since her. What you’re not used to, unfortunately, is having her there with you. She grips tighter, not to any considerable degree, but enough for you to notice the flex of her fingers against the thick fabric of your coat. But you can feel, even without seeing the corners of her lips curve up, that she finds this more amusing than you do. 

“It’s fine,” Yuri breezes against your arm, “I’m glad to have a little time to myself before heading off to Manhattan or something,” before settling with a huff that produces a thin cloud of breath in front of her face. “What about you? You must’ve been busy too, not much time to be sitting around and missing me.” 

A moment of weakness is an understatement. What you’d give in exchange for the courage to tell her the truth that, yes, you missed her with all your heart, and that not a day on this God-given earth has passed that you haven’t wished she was right back there with you, without any or all of this complicated nonsense that you can’t bring yourself to tell her drove you two apart. Or, on the other hand, you could also say no, not one bit, you haven't even thought of her, and your password isn't your anniversary anymore, and the gallons upon gallons of midnight oil you burned at your desk at work didn’t have anything at all to do with not having her near. 

Instead, your hands ball into fists in your coat pockets. It’s for the warmth, it has to be for the warmth. There’s no particular reason why your tongue finds its way between your teeth, why the flashing digital billboards of brands you’ve never heard of suddenly seem so interesting, why the birds and chatter and the buskers singing love songs are much too loud for 3 pm. But you look to your right, see the tiny girl clung to your arm like a koala, half watching where she’s going past the crowd of people going the opposite way and the other half looking up at you. 

“You’re holding back,” she huffs, another breath-turned-fog-cloud rising up her face, though it’s just a smidge too late to hide the tiny furrow in her brow when she says it. “You never hold back.” 

Nevertheless, reassure her, “Am I? I don’t think so.” Pat the hand that clings to you, convince her that you’re okay and convince yourself harder, “I’m fine. You?”

Clearly not satisfied, (of course she’s not, not even you would buy that bullshit you just spouted), she presses: “Something’s bothering you. You think you’re so slick.” She pokes your side, in the spot you curse that she remembers is ticklish. “Fine, don’t tell me yet. But I bet you’ll slip or something. You always were,” she stops for a moment, the playful tinge in her voice flickering. “You always were an open book.”

She suddenly stops, fingers still tight on your arm, but she pulls out her phone with her free hand. She puts it to her ear, mumbles a simple “Uh-huh,” and her face does that thing again when she gets bad news. “Alright, thank you, oppa,” before pocketing it back with a sigh.

“Everything okay?” 

Not even one breath after you start, she perks back up: “Come up with me.” She tilts her head to the right, pointing at the big revolving door of the hotel she must be staying at. “My legs are tired, and it’s too cold, and everything is so loud here.”

“Oh, if you’ve had enough—”

“Come up.”

It’s one singular moment of hesitation—both yours and hers—before she pulls you along, into the lobby, past the staff, into the elevator. You almost don’t mind the eyes, human or digital or otherwise, that might catch you; you only allow yourself one of the worst palpitations you’ve ever had the displeasure of the thought of Jo Yuri being caught with some nobody not even worth a second of her time. She rushes down the hallway, avoiding eyes and ears like the expert you know her to be, until the last moment before she places her hand on a seemingly random doorknob: a man emerges from the room to the left, asking her who you are. 

“He’s new,” she says, before you realize that she was talking to you. She shoots you a new smile—a teasing one—before addressing the man this time, “He’s someone I need you to keep from management and everyone else, especially you-know-who. He’s not here at all.” The door flies open, Yuri doesn’t wait for a reply from him, shoves you in. 

~~~

Everything like old times, from the rambling about work and schedules, to how her mother and yours are doing, to fighting over the TV volume that has to be either a multiple of 2 or of 5 before ultimately settling on a crisp 30. That’s why it’s unsettling to you, creating friction somewhere deep in your chest, at the stark lack of it outside. It’s most apparent when she takes a big, lazy, manspread seat onto the sofa while you do the same on the floor in front of her, falling into step like you used to. You know things have changed, and she knows that things have changed, and that your old routines aren’t, shouldn’t, be the same as they once were. But the world is quiet, save for the TV spewing nonsense about the news or this telenovela or even this funny streamer she loves so much. You want the fighting, the interrogations between each other, the explosions of passion and yearning like the dramas—like it should be.

Instead, after the hellish couple hours of leisurely catching up like neither of you deserve, she chuckles, swings a leg over each of your shoulders, breathes out a slow sigh. Wraps a calf around the front of your neck, snuggling you between her thighs, and you place your hands right on her shin—not to remove, but simply to touch—kneading the muscles she's been complaining of soreness ever since the morning. 

Your eyes stay fixed on the TV, but watching it has long been out of your mind. The little people onscreen couldn't do anything right now to grab your attention back; now it's just on the gentle voice somewhere above and behind you, humming a familiar song as fingers run through your hair and ruffle through the liminal spaces between every strand. “Can't believe you remember we used to do this,” Yuri says, and she bends down over you, tilting your head back just a smidge with a soft tug. It's not demanding in the slightest, though you fight down the urge to tell her you would've given in if she did.

Her eyes were always so pretty. They could be soft, or piercing, or mysterious on command, but now it's nothing more than that comforting curiosity that got you to fall in love with her in the first place. It's always been the trust she had in you to be patient even to a fault, to let her go off into the wide open world as you stayed behind, to be there for her when she comes home and complains about her feet hurting as you come down to rub all the tension out once more. 

With the awkwardness only finally starting to melt away, you whisper in the most gentle tone you never knew you could muster, “This was my favorite part. I'm glad you let me do this back then,” as your fingers prod and squeeze away the spots of pain and pressure woven between her muscles, “even now.” She continues running her fingers through your hair, letting you feel the gentle strokes of her fingertips and nails against the skin of your scalp. She comes eye to eye with you, tilting your head far enough back that it rests on her lap, and she shows you that raw honesty you can tell she's been dying to show anyone. “Do you remember why we broke up?” you ask her, whispering far too quietly, scared to break this unbreakable peace you’ve already built with her. 

She sighs through a mouth curved into a sad smile. “No, it's been so long. I bet you remember, though. I must've been a bad girlfriend or something. Did I forget your birthday?” Warmth from a hand on each of your cheeks now, and the smoothness of a pair of lips right on the center of your forehead. The ends of her hair tickle your face wherever they land, but you don't mind them enough to brush off. Yuri peppers tiny pecks all over your face, and you have to let it happen. You get to let it happen. 

“Let's let that be my burden to carry. I don't blame you for not remembering.” You close your eyes slowly, receiving her love like you deserve it. On one particularly slow kiss right between your eyebrows, her smile grows a little wider, her exhale a little more forceful as she takes comfort in the tiny graces you pay her back. Your fingers continue to knead her calf, feeling the tension melt away as she grows ever more pliable under your hands, half-hoping that she doesn't realize you've been playing Fur Elise on her leg for the better part of the hour now, with the other half hoping that she does. 

And then, without warning or heed, her lips meet yours. They're just as soft as you remember, with the familiar pout you've come to memorize and, hell, even miss. She parts them slightly, takes your upper lip gently between her teeth. It's everything to you to let her have her tiny nibbles, all the while you get to love her right back. She takes the utmost care, as if handling the most fragile of glass mirrors, as she rubs her thumbs across your cheeks, feeling how corporeal and simply present you are with her. It's everything to be here again, to be hers again, to be again. It feels like an eternity and a day that you stay in her presence, taking from her without deserving, yet—

She pulls away, just for a moment, and whispers against your lips: “Here you go again with the owing me something. I know that twitch in your lips. I don’t like it.” She traces circles on one cheek, holding you steady by the other, waiting for you to settle. Waiting for you. Waiting for you. 

“You can’t not remember by now,” you chuckle, breath pushing lightly against her smile. “Tell me why we broke up. Right now. Come on,” poking and prodding at her psyche, before she breaks into that same adorable giggle that lights up the room and everything in it. 

“I said I was gonna be busy.” The way she says it is plain as day, as if it’s the simplest thing. “And you took it like ‘She doesn’t want to spend time with me anymore’ when you know it’s not that.” She rubs your cheeks again, trying to pull away the layers even though she knows it’s not you that’s hiding, “it was never that.”

“What was it then?” Keep testing her, even if you know she’ll get all the answers right anyway. The little things get lost in the noise, but not the big thing she keeps close to her heart. 

“It was,” with a pause much too short to be pregnant, “It was me saying ‘You aren’t worth the few free hours I have anymore.’ And you hated that, because who wouldn’t?” she confesses, voice shaking like old wounds were opening again. “But that’s not what I meant.”

Your turn to kiss her forehead, and the way you pull her down isn’t as awkward as you want it to be. Instead, she takes one slow glide into position, hovering right above your lips, and you don’t make her wait a millisecond longer than she needs to. “I know what you meant. But do you think I’d have ever forgiven myself if I ever got in your way?”

And then she pulls back, meeting your eyes again as if seeing for the first time the blazing galaxies behind the inky cover of night. Her smile tugs at the corners of her mouth, stretching ever so slightly, like it’s getting wider against her will. “It’s not fucking fair,” she says, gaze still locked on you, smile reaching peak width. “You make it look so easy, loving me. It’s like you’re this perfect fucking soulmate for me. How do you know me so well?”

“I,” you take a deep breath, bracing yourself for an answer that pains you to give, “I don’t know.” It’s the truth, that you don’t know how easy it was to fall for her, or why it was so simple to learn her little habits. How long she stays in bed scrolling after waking up, the number of the place she always gets her spicy marinated crabs from, her unnatural insistence that the volume of the TV has to be a multiple of 5. It’s all these little things: stuff that you and only you could ever know of her, stuff she only ever lets you see. It strikes you as every bit of odd, knowing so much about her, when all you are is some background character in the grand scheme of her life—

“I don’t get it.” Yuri’s voice shocks you back down to Earth, “You’re not the type to cry. Or hesitate. Or keep things hidden, at least from me. That’s that twitch in your lips, when you want to say something out loud but you bite it back. I don’t like it.” She thumbs your cheek again, more slowly, deliberately, “I don’t like when you don’t tell me things.”

Her phone again, this time a Kakao message judging from the notification sound. It reaches you both at the same time, but the effect it has on her is the worst yet. She shuts her eyes hard, as if wishing the message would be gone by the time she checks, and she doesn’t plan to check anytime soon. You even feel her hands get ever so slightly chillier, like it pains her to think about what that message could be. 

“You can get that if you need to.” You always had that soft spot for her, knowing where you stood in her life and when it was your turn. And of course, you were more than happy to step aside, because God forbid you, as you accidentally so eloquently put it, got in her way. 

But a fresh, warm breeze of breath hits your forehead. “That’s the second stupidest thing you’ve ever said.” Her eyes open again, and it hits you: soft or piercing or mysterious on command. Shining like the blazing galaxies that hide behind the inky blackness of the sky. All at once, the mystery of how you remember everything about her even after all this time just seems to solve itself. 

But there’s that doubt in her eyes again, when she sees your lips twitch again. “I really hurt you, didn’t I?” She’s downtrodden, and you can’t console her. Not like this. “What did I do?” 

Lie. Just lie. “Nothing, that was it.” Fight the twitch in your lip again, pretend you can hide it when she’s this close. 

You want her to let go, then say she’s busy, then pick up her phone and read it and say she needs her rest, then kick you out. But she doesn’t, even with the incessant pinging seemingly getting louder and louder. Through it all, she stares into your eyes, thumbs brushing the skin of your cheeks, trying to find any clue she can find. Instead she mumbles, “Bullshit,” focused on you. 

~~~

The TV hangs above a fake fireplace far from the foot of the bed, waiting patiently for the next time they can light back up. A newly-snuffed stick of incense fades out in its stand in the kitchen, and the far off cars and people somewhere on the busy 10-in-the-evening New York street beneath you try their hardest to throw soundwaves up that many stories and through your window to you. And her. 

She finally pulls you down, taking her with you as she descends backwards onto the fluff of the mattress. All the while, your lips never leave hers: slow kisses, fast, light, deep, and everything in between. Tongues swirl in a dance from long ago but never forgotten, somehow recalling every step of the way like you were never apart. Her breath grows heavier along with yours, vying to keep up with the heat you offer her and trying to outdo you all at the same time, when it all comes to a screeching halt; she pushes you off, keeping you only a hair's width away from her, no more and no less. 

Don’t ruin it. Don't do it. Don't say it. Don't—“So you’re not going out with him?”

And she looks up at you with those gorgeous eyes, piercing, before settling into soft, as her lips curl into a smirk that she tries so hard to fight down before failing anyway and, god forbid, laughing right in your face. You’d thought that this would happen sooner or later, but not like this. Not her comfily lying in a fluffy bed, keeping you mere millimeters from her face as she lets out a laugh from deep in her chest, at something you said that made her happy again. Once she settles, “No, absolutely not,” pulls you closer again right up until you’re fully flush against her lips. “Don’t make it hard for me now. How many more times are you gonna ask tonight?”

“Just one more,” you joke. Indulge her, even if only for this. She deserves at least one good memory—

“There you go again, that twitch in your lips. It’s distracting.” Yuri is nothing but gentle when she nudges you backward against the headboard, straddles your legs, places your hands on her lap as she has her way with you. It’s one deep kiss after another, not knowing where one ends and the next starts, the minutiae doesn’t really matter. What matters is that she’s here, you’re here, and that things haven’t changed at all. Her hands find their way to your neck, trying in vain to pull you any closer than you already are, and yours find her hips, going along with the grinding on your lap that she’s starting to build up.

“Mmh,” straight into your mouth, and it's something you didn't even know you needed. She's had onscreen kisses before, including the ones she's gotten into bed with you and shown you before falling asleep right before the good part comes. And it's that that you held on to: that the way she does those kisses is the farthest thing from the way she does these kisses. She's needy for something more than any physical contact a kiss could offer but the kind of comfort it brings, and you can tell by the way she takes and takes and takes from you, like you don't deserve to be the one offering it.

“Fucking—” but there's no actual heat behind the word. She pulls back ever so slightly, only far back enough to be able to look you in the eyes without crossing hers. “Stop that. Whatever it is you're thinking, I don't like it. Just kiss me again.”

“Sorry.” There's nothing to apologize for, really, since you know deep in your gut that you'll do it over and over. Your chest grows heavy, and not because of the girl that's doing nothing but trying to love you. Even when she insists, from the way she reaches behind her and under her shirt before pulling off her bra and throwing it off somewhere to the side, to her utter refusal at letting go of your hands once she places them on her chest herself, you can tell that she needs that comfort again. Through her knit top, you can feel the rising warmth of her body, the neverending softness of her boobs, the growing stiffness of her nipples already starting to poke through her shirt and into your palms. 

But despite it all, you can't ignore the weight in your chest. You're the one who let her drift away, never explained why or how, and now you're taking the same sort of comfort like you used to as if nothing changed. Like she's still the same Yuri, your Yuri, who isn't an international superstar nor budding small screen staple with a future she can't help but rise up to. No, Yuri is there now. Household name, face on the Netflix profile pictures, hundreds of thousands of monthly Spotify listeners and every other metric of success anyone could ever come up with to show just how right you were to let her go. 

She pulls back, not gentle in the slightest, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, “What in the fuck do you want to hear, huh?” She slides her hands under your shirt, coming up your sides, before slipping through the hole for your head to station her hands on either shoulder of yours. Her forearms do the rest of the heavy lifting, bringing the hem up until you have to take your shirt off for her. Not even a moment once it’s off that she dives back in, claiming your mouth before moving down to pepper wet kisses on your neck, leaving trails of spit on your shoulders, nibbling gently at your collarbone, taking deep breaths of the scent on your chest, leaving you breathless and wanting more of what she’s so desperately trying to offer you. 

Her turn now. You grab the hem of her top, pulling it up and over her head as well. As it clears her chest, her boobs bounce free, a sight for sore eyes; yet she doesn’t let you dwell. Yui allows you two perfect squeezes of her soft, supple breasts, and she goes down. Your pants come away with a concerted joint effort, letting her urgency get the better of you to tear it off, and she takes your throbbing length into her hand. “Please tell me this is what you want,” as she strokes your cock in deep and slow pumps, all the while letting her spit trickle down your tip, onto the slit, down the shaft where she rubs you up and down. “Please don’t make me play this fucking guessing game.”

“I—” is all you can put together, just as a groan escapes you. The warmth of her mouth is divine, the slickness of her tongue on your cock a feeling you sorely missed. Yuri wastes no time, knowing just how to work you, by taking a long drag up the underside of your cock all the way to the tip and leaving a warm glistening trail, and then suckling on your head like she knows she was always good at. 

She’s gorgeous. Never mind the way her tongue swirls on your tip, nor how she pays special attention to the slit of your cock, nor even the way she releases with a pop each time before coming back down for more. It’s all of ten seconds that she keeps those soft, or piercing, or mysterious eyes on yours, right when they flutter closed to enjoy having your cock in her  mouth once again. It’s blasphemous reverence: the way she tilts her head left and right to make sure she coats your length with her spit, and the delicious heat of her mouth, her subtle yet firm tracing of her tongue along every vein on your cock she can reach, is nothing short of heaven. 

For a moment, she retracts, and you sigh a breath of relief. It’s too soon, much too soon, but the way she gazes at you lovingly from between your legs tells you everything you need to know: she wouldn’t mind a second, third, fourth round with you. “You were saying?” she teases, her lips still stuck gently on the underside of your cock, tiny sucks and licks in that sensitive spot she knows you have. 

You confess, “I forgot,” just as she makes a particularly long stripe of saliva from your base to tip. It’s that deadly smirk pulling up only one side of her mouth, that look she gives when she’s amused. It drives you crazy, and she knows it. 

“Mind if I take a guess?” she relents, just for a moment, retreating her mouth and replacing it with light, lazy strokes. Her fingers work you the way she knows you’re weak against, tracing her fingertips in the most sensitive spots she could only know through her very own trial and error. 

Before you know it, her free hand is no longer free, holding up her phone and showing you the screen. A guttural moan escapes you as she gives you those deep strokes you love her doing, keeping her lips on your head, as it finally connects: she’s calling her co-star. 

He picks up, and amidst a raucous background, “Hello? Yuri?” and immediately you know what she’s playing at. A loud pop, followed by a drag of her tongue around her lips, and she says back, “Are we dating?” Her gaze stays sharp on you, hand unceasingly tight around your base, but above all else, she looks bored. And, perhaps, a little bit annoyed to be hearing a voice she absolutely would not want to be hearing otherwise. 

“Uh, if you’re free—” more of that background noise, and you surmise he’s in some club, “—If you’re free, let me buy you a drink—” 

Yuri just stays hovering over your tip, her tongue sliding again and again over your slit, letting her spit dribble down the sides of your shaft. You know she’s bored now, and a little bit displeased—not by the apparently disappointing phone call, but by you who forced her to make it in the first place. 

“Just…” she mumbles, making sounds suspiciously like sucking on a lollipop for the call, “Are we dating? Yes or no?”

“No,” said the other voice, tentatively and having taken way too long, “I don’t think we are, yet, unle—” and she drops the call. Her phone lands on the mattress, bouncing slightly, before Yuri takes half your length into her mouth again. It’s that heat of her that you’re loving: the utmost care she showers all over your cock, the pointed attention she gives to you and you alone, the deliberate slowness and pressure she knows you like. The other half she can’t fit in your mouth, she strokes with her hand, as her cheeks hollow out around you, and she tries just a little bit harder with every bob of her head to take more of you in. 

“Y-Yuri,” you can’t resist. Everything in you wants to be rough with her again, to have what she’s promised only you can have all along. There’s absolutely no sign or hesitance in her eyes when your hand makes for the back of her head; only a breath held in anticipation of what’s to come. She halts, pressure constant and unchanging in her mouth and hand, cradling your cock like it’s something precious. A beat passes, she’s waiting for you, and you finally give in. 

Push her gently down. Her hand makes way, and her tongue works the underside of your cock as she takes more and more of you in. It’s slow, careful, almost shy, as if you were a stranger when you aren’t—you never were. 

Her nose meets your pubic bone, eyes slightly watery, the way she takes you tells you there’s nowhere she’d rather be. You’re not even pushing her at this point anymore; just taking the pressure of going all the way for her, promising her that you want this too. Her throat squeezes and constricts, massaging your cock in all the perfect spots, wrapping your length in an intoxicating heat, while she makes all these tiny attempts at making eye contact with you, only to fail when she feels you throb against the muscles of her throat, causing her to gag and settle and gag and settle. Even when you let go, retreating your hand away from the dark, fluffy strands of her hair, she stays wrapped around your length, not at all fighting for anything but merely letting you feel her.

But her need to breathe prevails, and she rises slowly, savoring the way your length slides and throbs against the walls of her throat. Yuri fully pulls her face off of your crotch, lines of spit still connecting, her breath heaving warm air onto your soaked cock. She takes a moment to steady her breathing and her heart, before wiping the spent saliva off her lips with the back of her hand. Then, as if nothing happened, she looks up at you with a teasing smirk. She knows she has you wrapped around her finger. 

It's really that easy for her to take your breath away. You almost succumb to the long, slow, deep strokes she makes on your shaft, throbbing even more against her palm, and her relenting when she knows you're getting worked up and getting close. It's heaven if it weren't hell, yet you love every second of it. It's a long time coming, and you're set on enjoying all the attention she gives you again.

But even so, it's different: the way she smirks changes ever so slightly, and you could never know why—you just feel it, know it. It devolves into something you've seen on her before, but never on the screen; not the smile she wears on stage performing her hit songs, nor the smile she puts on between the director yelling “action” and “cut.” No, it's the smile she shows you when it's nearly midnight and she needs her cuddles before a big day, the show of quiet contentment when she's leaning back in her chair with a massive plate of spicy marinated crab shells in front of her, it's the smile that's nothing but softness when she’s taking a break from packing for a location shoot and you promise her you'll stay up until 3 a.m. for her goodnight video call.

It's that smile she only ever shows you, and as she climbs on your lap again, her eyes never leave yours, that smile never shifts from her mouth. Yuri comes in close, plants a slow kiss on your lips, empties her lungs as her eyes flutter shut. She wraps her arms around your neck, tilts her head slightly to the left, makes tiny licks on your tongue whenever you allow it. 

She starts, “Can I—” but you already know. She hovers slightly over your cock, dripping liquid heat right onto your tip, teasing herself with it and rubbing her slick folds on you. You know it, and she knows it, only having fun, enjoying yourselves, no pressure, just… home.

She sinks herself onto you, her pussy lips parting at your familiar length. Even through it all, she’s hellishly tight as you remember, searing heat enveloping your length, giving delicious pleasure to every inch of you. Her descent is slow, almost savoring, as her grip on you tightens with every passing second. 

She’s beautiful. Her eyes closed in what you could only surmise is perfect bliss, head lolling back as if offering everything of her to you. The dim light of the moon filters through her hair, illuminating what she always considered her good side. It reflects off the smoothness of her skin, just the right amount of light to show you tantalizing glimpses of her curves: the swell of her breasts, the dip of her waist, the flex of her neck. Lean in, pull her close, take advantage of her vulnerability like she wants you to. You find the pulse on her neck like second nature, and the minute tugs as she snakes her fingers through your hair tell you more than words ever could. She holds you in place as you kiss and suck at her weak point, knowing you’re just as vulnerable in this moment as she is, and you can feel, with the way her grip is gentle yet needy, hungry yet loving, wanting to take so much but also wanting to give back. 

Only barely having forgotten, she finally sits herself onto your lap. She’s still for a moment, drinking in your affection through the kisses you place all over her neck and collarbone, trying to find her bearings as you hold her steady in place. Her heart beats against your chest, her breath tickles your shoulder, and before she pulls back to look you straight in the eyes again, she mumbles, “I missed you.”

It doesn’t take long before she captures your lips again. She starts a slow grind on your lap, and you help her along with your hands on her waist, feeling her warmth against your palms. It’s only small noises now: the deep exhale of a breath held too long, tiny whimpers slipping through the gaps of your lips, the gasp caught in her throat as you hit that perfect spot inside her. Above all else, there’s no hurry—she doesn’t make any effort to speed up, nor do you let her. Yuri maintains her pace on your lap, grinding instead of bouncing, fully feeling you inside her, as she says, “I really missed you.”

Deeper is the game, and both of you know it. Yuri leans forward, drawing herself closer onto you. It gives her that much of a better angle that her moans draw out longer, that you feel the quiver in her thighs just that little bit more. She arches her back in your direction, and you take that opportunity: you catch her nipple as she gets close, sucking and licking to your heart’s pleasure. It’s give and take when it comes to this position, like it always was with you two: “Mmh” and “fuck” and “please” in the empty spaces you never really needed to fill but do anyway. In every single one is the love you only now get to show each other again, and by God will you love her. 

It’s everything all at once, and you can’t get enough. The jiggle of her boobs against your face, her incessant pulling of you harder onto her chest, the steady speeding up of her grinding on your lap until she’s pathetically leaking onto the sheets below. “Shit, shit, shit,” she whines, getting closer and closer to her peak, and with the way you’re wrapping your arms around her waist, lapping up the drops of sweat that fall down the valley of her breasts, bouncing her on you with help from the mattress, you’re drawing close right with her.

Pressure mounts, the floodgates strain, and her tiny whimpers are music to your ears. She’s scratching marks on your back now, sinking her teeth in your shoulder, and you don’t mind the sting at all. You hold her tight, no doubt leaving handprints on either side of her waist, getting faster and faster vying to keep up with her when you know she’s straining to keep up with you. It’s that one final bounce, that broken moan, that sudden jerk that sends you over the edge. “Mmh,” just as you’re sucking her other nipple, and you bite down a bit too hard without meaning to. But, instead of anything else, she pulls you in, nearly jerking, as she throws her head back. You feel goosebumps forming up and down her back, and she gets that much tighter around your length. It’s that moment when her voice cracks, and she finally lets go, and her squirt floods your lap, coating your entire length with liquid heat as she convulses over and over around you. It triggers you too, and within a second, you pull her down, embedding yourself as deep as possible into her. You shoot spurt after spurt after spurt of your hot seed into her waiting womb, and she welcomes it by milking you for everything you have. Even with her going crazy bouncing on your cock, spraying her squirt all over your crotch, she takes in every drop you give her. It feels like forever, filling her up with your cum, pushing more and more into her, and she thrashes against you that you have to hold her still. You keep cumming and cumming, until she’s only wringing small spurts out of you. 

Then, nothing. The air is still and full and humid, the only proof that you exist being the ragged breaths the pair of you take. Her grip on your shoulders is loosening, and you slowly pull yourself from her chest and meet her gaze again.

“Holy shit, that was hot,” she gasps, chest heaving against yours. Her arms are limp around your neck, same as yours around her waist, holding loosely but holding all the same, just to let her know you’re still there. Her head finds the crook of your neck, snuggles into it. You feel her breaths on your shoulder, and you savor the moment of having been her utmost happiness, even for just a little while. 

“You good?” you attempt. A beat passes.

“I think so.” 

A breath. 

“I missed you.”

Another beat, another breath. 

“I missed you too.”

Pull a blanket over her and you, kiss what you can reach of her hair. Beyond that you stay motionless save for your own breaths. The last thing you want is for her to move, or, God forbid, get off of you. So you stay still; she’s comfy enough, and you have that trust in her that she’d tell you if she needed a change in position. But it never comes. 

The blaring urban jungle of New York City may as well be millions of miles away from your little world of just you and her. Inhales and exhales, small squeezes of fingers, split-second blinks that you’d never have noticed otherwise had her face not been buried in your neck. The world is dark and silent and unmoving, and for a second, you think that eternity like this may not be so bad. 

It’s almost a shame to break the silence. But with her, it comes like it was destined: “I can’t sleep.” 

~~~

“That’s a fucking massive tilt into big tech.” Way too dramatically do you slam your coffee cup onto the table. She laughs out loud at it, clutching her own for the last few slivers of warmth it can offer. “If you’re gonna buy tech, buy tech. Why an ETF?”

“Because,” she smirks, still incredulous and irreverent and mayhaps a slight bit teasing, “it’s diversifying. I don’t want to be caught up in the whims of the market.”

“You’d have been better off commissioning some AI prompter for some fanfiction.” Bury your face in your hands, feign this frustration that she used to always love about you. You hang your head low, her laughter picks up higher, and in this moment, you feel neither you nor she would rather be anywhere else. 

She takes a sip, then “Excuse me for using my own hard-earned cash to make a bet for the fucking tech industry.” You can tell, by the way her voice clears up from that early morning roughness, that the coffee is working its magic. “I have hope for this future, you know. QQQ isn’t the worst option out there.”

“Then buy Nvidia!” You explode, though every bit of heat from it is fake, and she all but falls out of her chair laughing-crying. “Buy Apple! Buy fucking Microsoft before Copilot tanks it even worse, for fuck’s sake! You’re paying fees you don’t have to pay for! God, it’s like talking to a brick wall,” and to drive the point home, you lean back, past your own chair’s backrest in faux exasperation, feeling the roughness of the actual brick wall on your hair and scalp. Through it all, she clutches what she can of her stomach through the layers and layers of blankets, tears nearly falling from the corners of her eyes from laughing the most beautiful laugh you’ve ever heard.

A star streaks through space, or at least you think it was a star, barreling through the pinks and reds of a sky only starting to stir. Looking back down, across the small marble table, past the pair of rapidly cooling coffee mugs placed quite close to each other and to each of you, Yuri meets your gaze. The metal railing wobbles slightly with the air currents this high up, and the crisp dawn atmosphere sends chills up and down your spine even through the bundle of jackets and coats you’ve wrapped yourself in. The wind blows through her hair and yours, momentarily pushing her bangs out of place. Reach over, pat them back down. She wouldn’t have minded, having only you up here, to show her forehead like that. But—

“Thanks. I’m still getting over it.” 

“You looked really pretty in that Love Shhh stage. I liked that look.”

“God, please don’t remind me,” she giggles, hiding her face in her coat underneath the three blankets she’s also chosen to keep herself warm with. She pulls up her sleeve all the way past her fingers, then reaches over and takes your hand in hers. After a moment of staring into the changing colors that make up the grand sky, “Stay a while.”

You give an incredulous exhale through your nose, letting the fog of it rise up and dissipate into the atmosphere. Little by little, the windows in the building across the urban chasm go dark, and the chatter of New York City picks up at ground level, lightyears below you. Taking a sip of your now-cold beverage, “Don’t you have somewhere to be today?”

“Would you believe me if I said I had a date?”

You chuckle. “No, not really.”

“Then there you go.” She gives your hand a gentle yet firm squeeze before pulling back, exposing the skin of your palm to the frigid morning air once more. She narrowly avoids the coffee, picking up hers and downing the last few sips of it in one go, “Stay here with me.” She pulls the several layers of blankets around her tighter, tilts her head back inside towards the warm, fluffy bed waiting for her. “Unless you have a date.”

“I do, actually,” you say back, getting up and stretching as far as you can without really exposing your midriff to the nippy air, “booked and busy the rest of the day.”

“Oh yeah? I take it this girl is a real catch.”

“She is, and she just invited me to spend the day in bed with her. So, there you go.” She giggles, and you walk over to her side of the table. She doesn’t really say anything, just watching, perhaps admiring, as you get closer, and more so when you scoop up the bundle of blankets and warmth in your arms. Once you regain your balance and make for the sliding glass balcony door, she sighs, accidentally brushing away her bangs from shielding her forehead, and as the heat of the great indoors meets her skin again through all those layers, she leans her head on your shoulder. 

“You know, I really hate being so,” she’s being careful with her words, and despite wanting to say that she doesn’t need to be, you also know it’d be a lie to say so, “so reckless. I don’t like it. And you, well, you make me less reckless. Is that bad?”

Tug at the outermost blanket she’s cocooned in, and she gives it up much too readily. You get in bed with her, unceremoniously just plopping into the empty white space next to this girl, “Why would it be bad? Without you, I’m all jealous and doubtful and all that shit. That’s even worse, I think.” 

“Mm, maybe.” She turns to you. Always to you. “Then I guess we just…”

“Lay here with me?”

“Deal.”

“Come on, nerd, you need the fresh air. It’ll be fun, stick with us.” Hanbin nudges you from your other side, making you drop your kimchi back onto your lunchbox. He wiggles his eyebrows at you, “We’ll find you a fineshyt to grind with on the day.”

“What? It’s not that—” and the table erupts in teasing and jeers. A round of laughter follows, but you were always touchy with it, even if you never really showed or said. At least, not in front of…

Yuri dusts off her pants, “Gotta go, next class,” and scurries off while still chewing without another word. You have to follow, because it's your class too—albeit being thirty minutes too soon—anything to get out of the situation. Once you get up though, your ears catch the slightest hints of gossip behind you from your friends, punctuated with the usual tones of teasing and tomfoolery only your friends could ever, ever make, and you shake your head at them. What else were you supposed to do?

Instead of paying them any more mind, “Hey, busy on the day?” as you jog to match her pace.

“No, I’m just… I don’t wanna.” And despite the earlier brisk steps, she slows to a more comfortable rhythm. “Not like I have the funds to put an outfit together, can’t just pop back home and find something nice to wear.” 

“What, that’s all? Ryujin must have something your size—”

“And… I’m not looking for a teary goodbye.” 

She’s right, you have to admit, though the realization is less than pleasant; much more so to Yuri who’s probably had this weighing on her since the announcement. 

“I want quiet ones, with each of you, separately. It’s just… I’ll miss you all. There’s a lot of stuff I want you all to know,” and you can feel the subtle shaking in her voice as she says it, “especially you.”

You concede, “Okay, okay,” falling finally into an easy pace with her towards the class you know won’t even miss you. “When were you leaving again?”

“Just a month after the end of sem. Then I’ll help with all the logistics like packing and plane tickets, which’ll take about a month or two—don’t visit, house will be messy,” she shoots you a glare, ”I’d love to come to the homecoming, seriously, but I just don’t have it in me right now.” 

One last try to convince her, “I mean, really, Ryujin would have something you can borrow. And if you really think about it, won’t that be a good stage for goodbyes?”

She ponders for a bit, as if scared to commit to anything she can’t uphold, so you offer her a little more, “Come on, I’ll go with you. It’ll be fun. Plus, there’s a call for volunteers. If you wanna do that too, I’ll be right there with you. I want you to come, so please?”

~~

“Hey, what's the first—Whoa,” she gasps out loud, looking you up and down. Yuri's wrapped herself in a gorgeous brown dress that'd never catch anyone else's eye, hugging her body not at all too tight, but still doing long-overdue justice to the curves she’d always tried to hide. The deep sunset hue that bathes what she calls the bad side of her face makes her glow in only the most ethereal light, and the way her deep, dark hair falls around her face to make a perfect frame of her gorgeous features is nothing short of magnificent. 

And you're staring.

“Uh, yeah, ready.” Your gaze shoots down to the floor, inadvertently to her cute shin-high boots that somehow make her look taller than she has any right to. You can't deny the warmth that spreads across your cheeks, nor the jitters you just got from the half-second spent looking her in the eye, but if she noticed, she didn't say anything. All she does is push her hair behind her ear, pick up her guitar case, start to walk in step with you. It's a short, silent couple minutes down the stairs and back to your car, punctuated only by commas of footsteps and the occasional colon of a throat being cleared. 

Engine starts, and you're off to the last time you'll ever see her, again. You want to say something, anything—“The first thing,” you scramble to recall, not at all distracted in any way, shape or form whatsoever, “we… sign off on inventory. You took the floor? Tables and setting?”

“Yeah, and you took backroom?” She doesn’t meet your eyes, but you figure she doesn’t need to. 

“Mhm” is all you need to say back. 

It’s not really anything: you’re only vaguely aware of the way your shirt sleeves cover your arms, and how your jacket sleeves cover your shirt sleeves. There’s friction there where there shouldn’t be, or that the friction isn’t something you think you could get used to. Your leather shoes feel loose in some spots and tight everywhere else, so unlike the usual sneakers you have on. And it doesn’t help that Yuri is right next to you, looking every bit as pretty as she always is, but wearing the lightest makeup and in the nicest clothes you've ever seen her in.

You can afford a momentary distraction at a red light, can’t you? Look over to your side, find her having pulled down the sun visor and going through some routine of checking her cheeks and lashes. Just a touch more liptint dabbed gently yet firmly with her pinky, a light swish of her bangs back into place, and the tiny smiles and poses she’d always do when she was faced with a mirror and a challenge she had yet to figure out how to overcome. 

“You okay?”

“Yeah, just… nervous. Big event.” Yuri settles back into the seat, sun visor flipping up a bit too gently to reach up all the way. But her eyes land back on the road, as the light turns from red back to yellow and finally back to green, and she lets out a deep breath of something or other just as the car jerks forward. 

“It’s just homecoming, not even ours.” Just as the words leave your mouth, you regret it; you were always one to downplay, but not to others, especially not to her—

She giggles anyway. “Yeah, I don't know why my nerves are acting up. Maybe just some other stuff going on.”

Both you and she relax, with the sounds of a dusk-riddled urban Saturday evening filling the voids of silence. You settle, same as her, and the nerves don't seem as bad—not even yours. 

“Actually, I’ve got something on my mind.” She fidgets with the gingerbread keychain she keeps on the strap of her bag, trying to form the words in her head while her lips stay clamped, and with your eyes back on the road you can only imagine what could be so important that she can’t just tell you like she always does. 

“Just… I wouldn’t be here, staying out late, doing this, if it wasn’t for you. And I really, really… think this is gonna be fun. You know, besides all the work, it’s gonna be fun to see our friends, and the alums, and the professors—”

“And the pay,” you remind her, with a sigh too dreamy to warrant a couple additions to your bookshelf, or a weekend of fast food, or maybe half of a new, albeit knockoff, electric guitar. 

“Right, the pay…” and she’s suddenly all the less fidgety. “What are you planning on buying?”

“I’ve been saving up for something, but until it’s mine, I can’t really say,” as your mind drifts to that very knockoff electric guitar you saw with her at one of those stalls at the stripmall. You even remember hooking it up to the amp for her as she slid the strap on her shoulder, and the way she picked at the strings for that “wise-men-say” song was maybe 90% beautiful and 10% still beautiful but with notes her fingers defied her to play.

“Yeah? Me too,” and you catch her just as she looks away and back to the road ahead. Cars whizz past beside you, city lights twinkling overhead in apartment buildings and billboards. The smile stays on her lips as the two of you settle into a comfortable silence, and for a brief moment, you consider, but shove it away again. This is Yuri. This is enough. 

~~

“You know she likes you?” Hanbin slings an arm around you, causing you to nearly drop the very expensive mic. “Turned me down. Twice. Don’t make me look bad, alright?”

You’re at the very least able to right yourself before anything falls, and the mic reaches its stand alive and functioning well. “What is that supposed to mean? And how do you even know that?” 

“It means it’s you or no one. She likes you,” he insists, with a light jab poke at your ribs, “and you’re being kind of a dick for not making a move.”

A chuckle and a shake of your head is all you give him. After all, it doesn't make any sense. She's Jo Yuri, for God's sake: university scholar, College of Mass Comm sweetheart, Music Circle senior vocalist, and the rest of a longer list of other things you could never live up to. She's Jo Yuri, and you're… you. 

“Yo. Just go. It's gonna happen,” as he helps you untangle a particularly uncooperative cord, “She’s not gonna say no. Granted, she won’t say yes either but—”

“Okay, thank you, Hanbin, get the fuck out of here. Employees and volunteers only.” Shove him away, give him a pat on the back, turn him around and to the door. 

Even still, you’re reminded why you and everyone else knows him to be so hardheaded, “One last thing.” He straightens his shirt, fixes his jacket, “Chaeryeong is out there getting talked down right now. Jeongin and Ryujin already got theirs, and I’m next. Not sure where Somi is, but I’ll bet she got Yuri’s goodbye speech first.” Each word weighs on your heart a little bit more, and that sinking feeling of losing her roots itself back into your chest, “Dunno when you’ll get yours. But don’t make her regret it.” He makes insistent strides towards you, almost angry, even, “Do not fuck this up.”

“Don’t fucking talk to me like that.”

“You know what I mean. Either do this for her, or do this for you. The rest of us aren’t supposed to care, but when it’s this glaringly obvious, we can’t just let whatever this is keep happening and still call ourselves good friends.”

Hanbin turns on his heel, marches out the double doors, rejoins the party on the other side. Yuri’s somewhere out there, baring her heart and thanking everyone for memories they’ve formed with her over the past few years. Soon it’ll be Hanbin’s turn, and she’ll no doubt thank him for his feelings and turn him down again. You recall his words, “She won’t say no,” but it still scares you, to death. You’re spiraling, you’re frazzled, you’re angry, “Why does she have to move?” “She has a great life here, why change anything at all?” 

No, none of this is helping. Hanbin’s right, do it for her. She deserves a good, happy, peaceful last few weeks here with everyone, with you. Do not fuck this up. 

~~

“Fucking there you are.” She walks over to you, the widest smile tugging on the corners of her mouth, never mind the sweat that makes her hair cling to her forehead and the sides of her face. Her arms swing with each step less carefully than the rest of the night, but with the loud beats shaking the air around you, nobody else seems to notice. “I was wondering if you’d left me here already. I can’t find anyone else, looks like they left,” she crosses her arms as she falls into position next to you, scanning the rest of the area you’re looking after. 

A cup of Pepsi makes its way from your hand to hers, and while she does take it gratefully, you can’t really recall meaning to do that. “They let you off the hook already?” 

“For now. Once it ends, I’m staying to help with egress.” Yuri hands you back the cup, still half-full, thankfully, and with a faint lipstick mark on one side of the rim. Turn the cup around, mark steadily away from you, take a sip. She eyes you with a playful glare, “The fuck was that for? We’ve eaten with the same fucking spoon and fork at the same time and you’re queasy now?”

You do agree it was silly, but whatever, “It’s a ‘respect’ thing,” taking another sip, but right next to the mark this time, “I’m not exactly looking for chances to take swipes at the spit you left behind on my cup.” Even as it makes its way out of your mouth, hearing it ever so quiet with your own voice, it still does sound pretty fucking dumb. 

And yet, all she does is giggle. Her attention drifts back to the dancefloor and its various inhabitants—esteemed ladies and distinguished gentlemen, good dancers and good singers, GPAs of 4.0 and of 0.4—and her gaze softens for some reason. She wraps her arms around her just a tiny bit tighter, as you can tell by the way her fingers flex and hold her elbows and the way her dress creases at the sleeves under the dim swirling disco lights, and the way she lets out a little sigh.

“You almost weren’t here,” you say, tone flat as the board some cunt brought to tapdance on, “you good?”

Yuri shakes her head, “Yeah. I’m really glad I’m here. I’m glad you convinced me. This is really, really fun.” She gives you a light shove and an even lighter laugh, “Thanks.” 

Breathe slow, breathe out. It’s nothing. It’s always nothing, when it comes to her. But, as she leans her head on your shoulder, settling into a quietness that drowns out all the noise of the world, you feel this is enough. More than, even. This is Yuri. 

“You know,” you start back, “I can just come back to pick you up. You don’t have to take the bus or anything.” 

“It’s not that, you know it’s not that. You’re already tired. Besides, you’ve done enough for me: talking me into this, driving me here, hanging out all night and keeping me in line,” she snakes arm around yours before it retakes its place crossed in front of her, “If I can’t thank you before we really do go, at least let me live with a lighter memory than burdening you with looking after me all night.”

“Burden?”

“Ryujin told me, when she caught me earlier, you didn't plan on coming either; you’re only really here for me. And what’s worse, she said you asked her for my size to buy me this stupid, pretty dress.” 

You feel another warmth spread across your cheeks again, and you think for a moment how many times does it actually take to get over something like this. But, true to Yuri, she doesn’t notice, or if she did, she didn’t say. 

“So don't do any more sweet shit tonight, okay? I can't repay everything in the last few weeks we get to see each other anymore as is,” with a song under each word she says like it's nothing to her that this is one of the last few times you meet.

Last few times you'll meet.

Fuck.

“Gimme a couple minutes? I gotta tell you something.” Your palms get clammy right away, your heart beats ever so slightly faster. The regret of not telling her is palpable in the air surrounding your face, you find it even harder to breathe just considering it, but the regret of telling her at all is, somehow, just as bad or even worse. 

“Hmm? Anything.”

You take a deep breath, “You’re perfect to somebody, and I know you won’t stay long—”

A subwoofer statics and dies, and half the dancefloor snaps out of their revelous haze. They look around for a little bit, and the lights-and-sounds guy from the backroom is calling you back to help look something over. “I’ll be right back,” though both of you know you won’t. And as you walk away, only seeing her shoot the most apologetic smile she can show through the dimness of everything around you, as the first of the last few songs of the night start to play, you decide that whatever it was, that was enough. A good, honest attempt, again struck down by mere circumstance, or fate, or whatever, and you decide that’s enough. 

~~

For some reason, you always thought the first time you'd hold her hand would send your heart fluttering. You thought butterflies would rush down your throat and fill your stomach until you were a bumbling mess. Your dreams would come true, your heart finally be happy, your feelings of anxiety put to rest and replaced by a future with her by your side.

But here she is, standing in front of you, in a dress you've already told yourself was glimmering, with the moonlight supposedly bathing her face in an ethereal glow, and her hair perfectly framing her delicate, gorgeous face. Just Yuri. No flutters, no butterflies, no ultimate actualization of the feelings you've had for her for the past decade. Her hand rests securely in yours, and she looks up to you with the most beautiful smile on her face.

What’s worse, the somber atmosphere of a party long ended takes over the both of you. Only stray soundwaves bounce around the walls, poorly-aimed beams of light reflecting off rough surfaces. All the energy is gone, replaced by the fatigue of a successful party from attendees already long since when home. All that remains is you and Yuri, making lists, checking them off, tidying up. 

With the last few items on the egress list struck through, “So, 100%, huh?” in the breathiest pant you've ever heard her make, “good job, you. Never doubted you for a second.”

You grasp her hand just a smidge tighter, despite it not being what you thought it would be, “I was thinking… I want my 112%.”

Her eyebrow rises, her smile devolves into a teasing smirk. “Alright, what’s that last 12%?”

“Just,” you say with the easiest tone you've ever taken with her, and as she adjusts her hand so her fingers intertwine with yours, “3%, I get you in a pretty dress.”

She giggles, “Done.”

“3%, dance with you.”

“Alright…” as you place your hand on her hip, as she places hers on your shoulder. Your feet move on their own, bringing her along to sway with the music that's far too quiet to be important. 

“3%, let you know you how beautiful you are. Every day, every time I see you, whenever you smile or do something or breathe.”

The gentlest pink blooms across her cheeks, but her eyes sparkle without ever leaving yours, “Thank you.”

“And last…” you have to pause. You were always the type to be dramatic or suspenseful, but now, it's only really a matter of steeling your nerves. Yuri is nothing but patient though, only waiting encouragingly for whatever it is you need for this to be a night of perfection that you could finally share together. She only looks on, with a ‘take your time’ kind of crinkle in the corners of her eyes instead of the usual ‘get on with it already’ you're so accustomed to.

“I have to tell you something I've wanted to tell you since forever.” Your senses dull, or sharpen, or both, you can't really tell. The music is gone, lights fade to dim, only the sparkles reflecting off the cellophane onstage as the disco spotlights spin around a hall that's missing all its lively hectic chaos. But you suppose you and her are enough to fill it right back up.

It's the worst time to get tongue-tied, but it's probably for the best. She's only indulging you, throwing you a treat, giving you a glimpse of what could have been. After tonight, everything will go back to the way it was, as if this past couple weeks had never happened between you two at all. And yet…

“I'm not gonna have to share you with anyone, will I?” she chimes in, slowing to a stop. Instead of pulling away, she places her hands gently on either side of your neck, “You know I don't like sharing what's… mine.”

“Yours?” you challenge without any real reason to. Both hands on her hips now, as you move to a comfortable stillness with her. Her own hands meet on your nape as she places her wrists on your shoulders now, closer than most other times you've ever been. “No, you won't be… sharing… me.”

She tilts her head to one side, “Good. So,” in a tone so curious you'd swear to search the world for an answer, knowing that it's about to be the easiest question ever asked, “what did you wanna tell me since forever?”

“Just… sorry. For everything I did wrong.”

But she just laughs. In your face. A sudden high-pitched squeal. You watch as she drops her head down, hiding the rest of the laugh from you. It’d be so easy to say it’s fine, but it isn’t. 

And yet, despite yourself and everything you just thought in the last twenty seconds and the last twenty years, “Sorry, that was… weird. What was it you did wrong?” Yuri buries her face in your chest, wiping away sweat from her forehead as if she knows you wouldn't mind. 

~~

Yuri really is nothing but sweet: “I washed that one set of clothes you left when we had that paper together,” “Fuck you, it’s just a shirt, shorts, and underwear,” “I’m not above washing my best friend’s clothes along with mine.” They even smell just like her. 

“Hey, come here.” She pats the spot next to her on the bed, smiling that sad smile you always hated to see, she always hated to show. Your steps come slow—no point in hurrying now—and take the seat Yuri so graciously offers you. 

“So this is my goodbye?”

She leans her head on your shoulder again, like it was always meant to be. Her arm slips under yours again, fingers intertwining as she holds what she can of you for what might be the last time. And yet, she’s no sadder than what she looks like, and for that, you can’t be thankful enough. “Mhm. Your turn; last one.” 

There’s really no way to prepare for anything like this: your heart aches at the thought of losing her, your eyes start to well up with tears you don’t deserve to let fall, your hand closes around hers like that’ll keep her from leaving and perpetually by your side. With the way she looks up at you, the manner in which her fingers squeeze yours, it’s more-than-obvious, less-than-subtle that she feels the exact same way. 

“Twenty years, huh?” she starts, albeit fighting through the slight shaking in her voice, “hell of a long time.”

“Am I allowed to feel special for being last?” Always the poorly-placed joke, and yet…

She giggles, again, “Of course, dumbass, only you,” like she always does at every joke you make. 

You spend a moment in silence with her, staring into the dimness of the room. Traces of her life here have dwindled to near-nothing: sink clean and clear save for the tiny water stains just about drying, rarely-worn clothes already packed neatly in the corner of the room instead of hung up in closets and drawers, her desk cleared of succulents and picture frames and with only her laptop and rolled up charger left sitting on top. Her eyes and yours drifting around the space feels like a goodbye to everything, but the breath that exits her nose deep and slow is without a doubt for you and you alone. 

“Thank you, for the whole… The dress. The night. I loved everything, every second.”

“Don’t mention it.”

Her fingertips meet yours, rubbing against each one, letting you memorize her callouses as she memorizes yours. 

“And for the… twenty… years. You really are the,” she takes in a deep breath of air, “best friend,” releases, “that I could ever hope for.” Not even trying to hide it anymore, but she doesn’t need to. Neither of you do. 

“Pleasure was all mine, I mean it. You were great too. Everything I needed in a best friend.”

Yuri breaks the mold this time: places her chin on your shoulder, and you feel her gentle exhales by your ear. You look over, and you meet her gaze, knowing you’ve never been closer than this now yet also never really farther away. 

“That was your song, wasn’t it,” her eyes never leaving yours, “I know you won’t stay long.”

“That was your takeaway?” Her hand leaves yours, and you let her, only for her arms to find their way around your waist. She smiles up again at you, though you think it’s the same smile she’s held this entire quiet moment, with just a tinge less sadness for every word of this farewell she manages to get across. 

“Not exactly. ‘You’re perfect to somebody’ was a bit too on-the-nose. But it was really, really cute.” 

Silence.

“Could you sing me the whole thing? Please?” She nods in the direction of her guitar, so you reach out for it, unzipping the bag carefully as its sound bounces around the bare walls. 

And you start, “You’re perfect to somebody, I know you won’t stay long… so let me try to love you just a little more honest.” The notes come out beautifully, even through the rust and wear on her strings. Her arms wrap tighter around your waist, face digging comfier into the crook of your neck as you continue, “The words go like ‘I’m sorry,’ but we both laugh it off, I should’ve tried to love you just a little more honest.” 

“Okay, stop,” as a tear runs down her cheek. A light sniffle follows, another wipe of her face on your shirt. “You are so… Gah, I fucking hate you.” Worry creeps in, though contentment comes with it: you start to think maybe letting go would be easier now, for the both of you. It’s a goodbye that puts every other one to shame, but on the other hand, it’s an ugly sort of bittersweet you decide you’ll bear for her. 

And yet, the next words are so much harder to let go of, in a sniffly, sickeningly sweet voice of hers you’ve come to know and love, “Stay the night? One last time?”

She places her guitar carefully on the floor, sliding it under the bed and out of the way in case either of you need a quick trip to the bathroom in the middle of the night. And with one slow, persistent tug, she pulls you down onto the mattress. Not that you fight it at all, falling with her was always a dream you never let yourself dwell on. 

Your head and hers securely on the pillow, faces closer than they’ve ever been, your hand on her waist and hers on the side of your neck. It’s nothing but natural—you’ve slept in the same bed a million other times before—but with the way she looks at you, and the way you’re probably looking back…

You sigh, “what are you thinking of?” like it isn’t the easiest read on her you’ve ever had. 

“I feel kinda guilty. You’re really handsome.”

“I don’t think that’s your fault, though?”

“True,” she laughs like a breeze, “I meant my fault is that you never went out with anyone because of me.”

“Again, not your fault.” Rubbing your thumb against her waist, feeling her smooth skin, and her letting you do as you please. All the while, it’s the most informal yet hardest-fought staring contest in the world, and neither of you are backing down. Her eyes crinkle at the corners, just as her thumb mirrors yours on your cheek, and she comes in for a quick peck on your lips.

“I’m allowed to do that, right?”

“Yeah,” you chuckle, leaning in closer to ask for another one just as she pulls away. And she obliges.

“And that?”

“Mhm.” Lean even closer. Another peck, slower this time.

“And that?”

“Mm.”

You take her lips for yourself, and she stops pulling away. There’s no way to know who lost that staring contest, but her lips are soft against yours, her exhales warm against your nose, her hand on your cheek keeping you securely in place as she takes her time with a kiss much too long overdue. There’s no expectations; only the contentment of finally being able to show this girl you’ve known your whole life how lovestruck you are with her. She nibbles your top lip for a moment, and you suck her lower lip right back. Her hand moves to your nape, yours moves to the small of her back pulling each other ever closer by mere inches at a time, and breaking and setting new records for how long you’ve been next to her without admiring how beautiful she really, truly is. 

“Mmh…” she whimpers right against your mouth, slipping deeper into the kiss. Your breathing grows heavy, and she takes advantage of your open-mouthed gasps to slip her tongue around yours. You let her, of course, and she takes everything she can of you: your gentle, deep breathing in sync with hers, the way your tongues swirl around each other’s, the slow drift of your palm from her back to lower down…

“Mm.” Her hand leaves your cheek, knowing she can trust you not to pull away from her now. Instead, it meets yours as you only start to squeeze her butt. Yuri lets you have a couple more squeezes, as her lips curl into a smile with how much she’s enjoying you and being yours. But it’s decidedly not enough: even if a little bit sheepish, she brings your hand to her front, asking for just a bit more of a different kind of love. 

Yuri’s lips form the word, “Please,” as she manages your hand into her shorts, making straight for her core. Immediately you feel the heat coming from her bare pussy, as well as the slick that’s starting to leak out to soak her folds. “I mean… we can’t—I’m ovulating, so—”

Kiss her again, shut her up, none of that matters right now. “Yeah, I got you.” Rub anyway, in slow and firm strokes, up and down between her lips. Feel her grind against your hand, getting wetter with each pass and more shameless with what she wants. Help her along, finding what spot she likes pressure on, giving her just a little bit more friction with every stroke that rubs against her clit. “Just feel good for me?”

A sigh escapes her, you receive it with more kisses down her jaw, her chin, her neck. She tilts her head up—she sounds heavenly—giving you better access to wherever of her you want. “Come closer…” as if you could, but she takes you anyway: she finds your cock with her thigh, rubbing you right back as she urges you to grind on her. It’s the perfect tightness, how her fingers wrap around your length, rubbing you in long, slow strokes. “You’re not the only one who wanted this.”

Your lips meet again, tongues swirling together in a sensual dance. Your hand on her, her hand on you, and it’s again not what you imagined at all. You thought it’d be the stuff of your wildest dreams, ultimate pleasure, having her in bed with you to touch and please however you wanted, but not at all. Instead, it’s more of the same: it’s so easy to read what she wants, like how exactly to apply that friction she needs on her body, and she does the same to you. It’s not the mindblowing experience you envisioned a night with Yuri like this would be, but it’s somehow… better. There’s nothing between you, like it always should have been. It’s so easy to fall into this rhythm with her, to just have her like this, and you start to wonder what fucking took you so long.

Suddenly, “Ow… ow, ow, ow!” she recoils, and you’re shocked out of everything else and crash back into the real world. “Fuck, I’m sorry,” is all you can say back, before she buries her face in your chest. Her hands shoot up to your shoulders, her foot digs deep into the mattress, she sucks in a harsh breath of air through her teeth. 

“M-my leg is cramping…”

“What?”

“Can you do that thing you do… please?”

It’s more than magical, you suppose, how she seeks your comfort even now. Retract your hand from her shorts, wipe her slick onto some far-off corner of her sheets. But she snaps, “Did you just fucking smear—” 

“—Did you want me to massage your leg with all that pussy juice?” You ground her right back, despite the twisting pain growing more intense in her calf. She laughs a hearty laugh for you, and you get to work. You trace slow, deliberate circles along her cramped calf, pressing gently but firmly, while pushing her to flex her toes toward the shin. Her muscles slowly loosen under your touch, and she lets out a soft, relieved breath right into your chest. You move up to her thigh, kneading with steady strokes, careful not to hurt her more than necessary, guiding her leg slightly so the tension melts away. 

“Better?”

“Mhm… thank you. Love you.”

Well, fuck. That’s not how you imagined to hear that the first time at all, and yet—

“Yeah, love you too.” It’s the most natural thing in the world, as your fingers keep dancing over her cramp, dotting the pain down and away. Her grip slowly loosens on from shoulders, and her breaths come easier, before everything just… stops. Her foot is finally at rest and she throws it over your hip, and Yuri looks up at you with another sweet smile, but nothing like you’ve ever seen on her before. She loves you, and now she’s showing it, shamelessly, softly, truthfully. 

“So… where were we?” The corners of her eyes crinkle again, her smile spreads across her face. She maneuvers your shorts and underwear down, and tries teasing you anew, “Give me a second chance, please.”

“You must be tired, it’s okay,” but she steals your hand and pushes it onto her core again. Only remnants of her former arousal remain, but it’s just as easy to get her back. Closer now—much closer—and she takes your lips again, Yuri teases the underside of your shaft with her fingertip, and the constant mindmelting attention is enough to get you going as is. It’s even worse when she grinds against your hand, showing you just how much she wants to be doing this with you, “Mmh, eager much?”

Her smile grows bigger against your lips, “Over-fucking-due. You owe me years’ worth of orgasms.” You stiffen faster in her palm, and she takes this as the signal, wrapping her fingers around your length and starting her slow strokes once more. “Like from summer two years ago at the beach.”

“What? I was in a rashguard.” You ease your finger into her core, and she gasps, then relaxes as you settle, stretching her open ever so slightly. “Fucking perv,” but it does turn you on knowing she found you hot.

“It was the fucking surfboard, asshole. Plus… you have sexy hands.”

“Excuse me?!” You both erupt into laughter, just like old times. It’s nothing but comfort, despite your childhood friend and forever-crush jerking you off while you’re one—no, two now—fingers inside her. “What does that even mean?”

“It means your hands look—oh fuck—your hands look… hot,” making deep strokes now, and you can tell with how her walls are fluttering around your fingers that she’s loving every single second of this. “Always liked seeing those… veins… fuck, don’t stop, pleasepleaseplease—” Her lips crash into yours, and she stifles a moan with your mouth. She’s unbearably close, grip tightening around your now-throbbing length and stroking faster, deeper, “Make me cum… make me cum!” 

You can't lie; it’s heaven seeing her lose control like this. Addictive, even. Her eyes shut tight, hand wrapped around your cock, slowly letting pass things that only ever held her back. You have to kiss her. Have to feel her on you, and hold her tight as she lets it all out. She's stroking even faster now, determined to rub out your orgasm too, and by God, it's working. You're falling into a comfortable rhythm with her, forehead to forehead, lips to lips, hands on each other like letting go would kill you. Among everything else this isn't how you imagined pushing each other to the edge would be, but like everything else, it's so much better. She's well and truly yours, you plain and simply hers, her walls clamping down on your fingers as she grinds against your palm, you thrusting into her hand as you throb and leak onto her fingers. It's all too much, yet not enough at all—she was right, you had years to make up for, but it has to be enough for now—

”Fuck… fuckfuckfuck!” throwing her head back as she screams, and you dive into her neck to suck at her skin. You don't even mean to, but your teeth scrape and dig lightly into it, leaving more than conspicuous marks you'd love to keep leaving forever. It’s one last deep, perfect swipe at her g-spot, she comes undone, and she lets it all run through her: a quick jerk takes over her body, and it's followed by a mess of squirt that jets out of her and onto your hand. She lets it spray all over, soaking the bottom half of her shirt and the front of her shorts, as well as the mattress underneath you with all her excess love. Through it all, she grips your hair, making sure you keep your lips on her neck, your nose on her jaw, leaving every single kiss you should've left in all those years you've loved each other quietly. It's the same singular swipe at the peak of your pleasure, her thumb right on the underside of your tip, and she doesn't let go: forces you to shoot your own warm, sticky cum all over her tummy. Each spurt is another glob of cum, sending shockwaves of arousal through her with each warm drop on her cool, smooth skin. She keeps stroking you through it all, as you do with her, desperate to give each other that pleasure that's been the longest in the making. It goes on for two eternities with no end in sight, only the dawning realization that you're in bed together, hands on each other's crotches, having just cum your brains out with each other using each other. 

Breathing heavy, or at least you think you are, “Fuck… I love you.”

“Mm, love you too,” she kisses you one last time. Slow, sensual, not wanting to receive and only really giving the love she and you've been wanting to give since forever. 

It's not even a shame to pull away, because you know she's right here, not going anywhere, ever, at all. She’s exhausted, satisfied, fucked out, and it’s all your fault. “You good?”

All she can do is nod, eyes heavy, but still wearing that smile that always made your heart do flips in your chest. She’s drifting off to sleep, and you kind of are too—until her 7:00 am alarm blares, shattering your peace like a tiny betrayal. You groan, half-laughing, and she mumbles something sleepy, turning over with a soft sigh to turn it off, still smiling even through the chaos of morning. 

“It can’t be fucking sunny yet,” pulling her back against you. Reach for a blanket, wipe down her abs, and she laughs such a sweet laugh that you almost forget what you just did with her. But you don’t; not really. 

“Let’s just take a quick nap. Everyone will understand if we’re a little late.” She sandwiches your hand with hers, keeping it safe as she settles into being little spoon. Her breathing slowly evens out, her fingers relax, and you can tell she’s fallen asleep just like that. You feel her exhales on your fingertips in front of her face, tiny jerks of her palm, the rise and fall of her shoulders as seen from behind. Now this is what you expected: the easiest aftercare in the world. Just cuddling, maybe holding her hand as she powers down right next to you. Gentle kisses on her neck and shoulders as she snores away. 

~~

“So,” Hanbin grunts, staring incredulously at your hand intertwined with Yuri’s, just like Ryujin, Somi, Chaeryeong, Jeongin are, “you two now.”

“Yeah,” you say back, voice tight and uncertain with how this looks and what to explain.

“It was really sudden,” Yuri chimes in, but the way she purses her lips is an admission all by itself that that was a lie. “But yeah, we’re… seeing each other now, and after a little bit of time back home, I’m coming back and looking for a permanent apartment.”

You slide in, “And she’ll be staying with me while that’s going on—”

Jeongin holds up a hand, “Just fucking stop, okay? We get it. Congrats and all that shit.” He stands up, dusting off his pants, and reaching into his back pocket. He pulls out a fairly large bill, crumples it into a ball, tosses it in Hanbin’s general direction, “Couldn’t fucking wait two weeks.” 

Everyone else follows suit. Chaeryeong fishes out her wallet from her purse, Somi removes her phone case and retrieves her own bill, and they both hand them to Ryujin, who’s already smiling wide. “Thank yewww,” she gloats, counting her new cash.

And just like that, it all shifts again. Everyone’s serious, but with smiles all around, “We’re all really happy for you two. You’ve liked each other forever,” Chaeryeong notes, followed by Jeongin, “And it’s about fucking time.”

Somi slams down her smoothie, “Wait, did you fuck?” 

Your eyes meet Yuri’s, wondering how in the fuck you’re going to explain to them. You can sense she’s uneasy with the way her brow furrows, and she states plainly, “All yours, don’t lie. I trust you.”

Everyone’s eyes are on you now; deep breath, here goes. “We kissed a lot,” looking around to see only expectant faces, “hands stuff,” eyes widening, including even Yuri’s, “and we came. No penetration.” Groans erupt from your table, hands thrown in the air in defeat. All at once, everyone reaches for more bills, Chaeryeong asks “Ryujin, change for a thousand?” before it all switches hands so quickly, all settling in Somi’s. 

“Did you all actually bet on us getting together and having sex?” Yuri’s absolutely red in the face, and while you’re sure you are too, you can’t lie that it’s adorable on her. She leans her head on your shoulder, hides her face in the crook of your neck. You pat her hair, trying to hide behind it too, but with the topic already changed and normalcy reattained, you think that this setup with her is a pretty good start to a lovestruck rest of your lives. 

Puppy dog eyes, the kind you couldn’t resist, not that you wanted to. She came home in her usual fit: a knit sweater over a comfy shirt, a pair of shorts that reached to her knees, cute little puppy socks under her black sneakers. Her hair is tied up in a messy, barely-holding-it-together bun, just the way you like it. She flashes you that signature smile, the one only meant for you: quiet, shy, wanting only the softest attention only you could provide. 

Apart from her outfit and that lovely smile, she had something else, and needed no words to introduce it: too many bottles of soju for too few people to share them. “I can hold my alcohol,” she always said, and truth be told, she’s always been able to—there was no doubt in your mind, nor was there any need to. She’s fine, you’re fine, “Just tired, Oppa. Come drink with me?”

~~~

It's the last shot, never mind that it's been the last shot for four shots now. The room spins around you and you try so hard to pin something down, all of it in vain. The tiredness from a too-long week for the both of you has long faded away, replaced by the tiredness of three bottles of soju shared between a couple that overestimated themselves. 

You're almost sure your head is physically lolling from side to side as you try to steady the world around you, but even with your hands cradling either cheek and keeping yourself still, your bearings seem to elude you all the same. The sharp sweetness of the alcohol stands guard at the back of your throat, defending your tongue from the acid that bears down and advances on your tongue. You can't tell whether it's your palms that are sweating or your forehead, though there’s not really much difference, you suppose, as a final coherent thought. 

Yuri doesn't fare any better. What looks like her lightly bumping her head repeatedly onto her arm on the table, followed by a small and sharp inhale or a tiny grunt, are actually her pathetic attempts to pick her head up off the table and failing miserably. She tries again and again, but the gentle thuds of her forehead reverberating through the wooden table soften your heart with each passing one. 

Despite your own numbing inebriation, you make to help your girlfriend up. The next time she tries to pick up her head, catch her with a hand placed hastily on her arm. Not too much force, hopefully only gently, push her forehead up til you can sort of see her face. And despite the world spinning around you, you find her cheeks are flushed, eyes half-shut as if she can't tell whether they're open or not, her jaw slack and hanging like she doesn't know it's still there. 

She spots you at the edge of her vision, and the smile that tugs the corners of her lips up—God, she's gorgeous. Her hands are careless, her arms flailing around trying to hit you, or something. They find your shoulders, and she pulls herself close just as recklessly. 

Despite a dull bump of foreheads, which neither of you notice anyway, you stare into what you can of her eyes. She's always had this look about her, the way she watches and observes, like knowing exactly what to pay attention to. Push her hair behind her ear, cup her cheek, feel the squish of her face against your palm. She smiles in your hand, nothing but love in her eyes as she admires yours. 

“Have I ever told you… *hic*... how fucking good you look?” Her speech slurs carelessly, each word fumbling past her plump lips like they didn’t need to be heard to be understood. And in a way, they really didn’t; the way she looks at you is proof enough that she’s head-over-heels for the one who looks after her so carefully despite your own drunkenness. 

Your chuckle is music to her ears, and she falls just a tiny smidge harder because of it. “I don’t know what you’re talking about… You’re… *hic*... the most gorgeous person I’ve ever fucking seen.” Your hands find her waist and squeeze ever so gently, and despite the thin fabric of her shirt between your skin and hers, the heat from her body makes its way easily to your palms and warms you like nothing else could ever dream of. 

Your hands travel up her sides, and with every inch you feel her squirm against you. She sits herself upon your lap, stumbling every which way as she does, her knees knocking against the table and your thankfully empty shot glasses tipping over and rolling off. In spite of everything, her hands fall gently on your shoulders, her eyes on yours, her lips parted ever so slightly as if telling, asking, begging you for attention she would only ever seek from you. “Is this okay…?” she asks carefully, as if it would ever be not-okay with you to have the most beautiful woman in the world on your lap, restricting your field of view to just her, taking up your entire line of sight to only, plainly, and solely her. 

So how could you not show this girl how deep your love runs for her? Mark after mark after mark on her neck, her smooth skin a canvas of light dots and barely-there bruises. Each one you leave comes with something slightly less temporary—from the breathy moan that escapes her as she keeps your lips on her skin, to trapping your face in the crook of her neck to steal away the little perfume she has left, to the light indentation of your teeth on her collarbone. And you oblige; you keep kissing her wherever she aims you, letting her guide your head on both sides of her slender neck, as you whisper sweet nothings in between every single peck and suck, “Mm…” “You’re beautiful,” “You taste so fucking good…”

Decidedly not content, she grows tired of her favorite shirt—she grips the hem clumsily and tugs upward, revealing her waist to you like you've seen a million times before yet could never, ever get enough of. The flimsy piece of clothing clears her chest, and you find her black bra covering her luscious breasts, strap fallen off her shoulder and her fingers dealing hurriedly with the clasp on her back. 

Dive into her chest this time, take her smooth flesh for yourself. She gasps as you nip and suck at unpredictable spots all over her, and as the bra falls away, you make for her nipples. You wrap your lips around one, sucking gently as you feel it stiffen against your tongue swirling around it, tracing her areola, and her breaths slowly turn into moans as you lap at her sensitive breasts. She snakes her fingers through your hair, tangling them in between to keep you in place as she pushes her tits further into your mouth. 

You switch to the other one, and you feel her nipple stiffening against your tongue. Yuri leads your free hand towards her other breast, begging you to touch her more, “Fuck, Oppa, please…” Her back arches, pressing her tits even harder against your face, as you take in everything of her: the soft flesh between your lips, the scent of alcohol and final quiet notes of her perfume wafting not even an inch off her body through the air, the harsh sweetness of the alcohol you shared riddled on your mouth and hers. 

“It's so good…” she confesses, and the blush on her cheeks grows redder, deeper. She grows restless, twitching and jerking on you as you lap mercilessly against the skin of her boobs. With a pop you release her nipple, and it sends her arching her back one more time, so beautifully that you couldn’t tear your eyes off of her even if your life depended on it. She’s rendered breathless, her fingers still gripping your hair to keep you still as she collects herself. 

Your girlfriend is beautiful: a deep and mysterious pair of eyes filled with nothing but love and lust for you, a tantalizing neck just begging to be marked over and over again by her man, a perfect set of tits that she's all but promised only you could ever see or touch or use. You stay frozen in place admiring the goddess of a woman on top of you, when she reaches out and touches your face, asking to let her pull you back in for more kisses. Lean over and meet her where she is, take her plump, luscious lips for yourself again as she moans into your mouth like it's how things were destined to be. 

Yuri cups your crotch, feeling your cock hard and straining against too many layers between your bare skin and hers. She fumbles with your drawstrings before ultimately untying them and sliding your pants down to claim her prize. She palms your erect shaft in your underwear, the last barrier separating her from what she wants, feeling how you throb against her hand like it was the only thing you wanted too.

“Oppa… can we…?” she mumbles. Her mouth dries quickly without your kiss, and you find yourself breathing heavy without hers all the same. She sits up and, to your surprise, hops onto your lap, keeping you in place and restricting your view to only her tits right in front of you and begging to be used again. 

Yuri begs, “Just suck, it's so fucking good…” as she wraps her hand around your cock. She makes slow strokes up and down your shaft, feeling you twitch and throb against her loving and lustful touch. 

Your lips find her nipple again, only starting to swell with how much attention you give to them. This time you bring her sensitive peak in between your teeth, nipping gently as she throws her head back. Her sweet flesh jiggles and bounces on your face, and you're spurred on further with how she whimpers as you make love to her boobs. Bring your free hand to her other breast, match the pace of your licking with your fingers. You flick her stiff peaks at the same time, one with your tongue and the other with your thumb, as her moans grow sweeter and airier.

“Fuck, you love my tits that much, Oppa?” Her giggle only makes your cock harder, and her thumb only rubs the underside of your tip just the exact way you like it, the way only she makes it feel so good. 

She takes another shot of soju, but not for herself—she swirls it in her mouth, oh so careful not to spill any despite your lapping and pawing relentlessly at her pert chest. Looking up, you find her lips trembling and her cheeks puffed as she tries her best to keep the drink in her mouth, until she stops you, pulls you off of her chest, comes in for a kiss. 

And it's messy in exactly the way the two of you love it. The moment you settle in, her lips part. The soju mixed thoroughly with her saliva floods your mouth and coats your tongue, each drop you couldn't catch streaming down trails from the corners of her and your mouths. She holds you in place, a hand on your neck, as if you'd go anywhere else. Grip her waist tighter and tighter, all the while she gently rubs the tip of your cock the way only she ever can.

You almost, nearly, badly want to swallow. Your tongue dances with hers, the soju still sloshing around in your mouth as she licks and nibbles on your lips before diving back down to try and fail to steal it all back. The alcohol still falls from the corner of your mouth, streaming in drops down your cheek and onto your neck, where her hand stays holding you in place like she never wants to let you go. And with every slurp and moan and tiny breath she takes, you never want to let go either. 

But all good things come to an end. She's slowing down, her breath all the more ragged, her hips starting to grind against your cock. It's one final dip of her tongue into your mouth, pretending to lap up the soju she so generously offered to you, before she pulls back and admires her masterpiece. Her eyes drift over your features, each marked and tainted with her essence. Your brow newly released from a furrow with tension still woven in, your neck slathered with alcohol mixed with her spit, your lips just as puffy as her with how much and how needily you've showed her just how fucking sexy she is. 

“God, you drive me insane,” she whispers with the most sultry smile you've ever seen on her, putting her hands on your neck again, “swallow for me.” Her fingertip teases a messy line from your jaw down your neck, tracing the drink as it slithers its way down your throat. And she goes further: her nail grazes your collarbone, the center of your chest, tickles your stomach. And finally, with much too much reverence and care, wraps her fingers around your shaft again. It’s only slow strokes, deep and careless but none the less intimate, as she watches your squirming at the pressure and leaking precum over her hand. 

“Baby, on your knees.” You push her gently off of your lap, between your legs; she clambers down obediently, practicing the restraint she's been working so hard to build while sober. She blinks, and her eyes are gorgeous, shining like stars as her lip trembles with the anticipation of receiving her prize. Hold her by the back of her head, and her teeth peek from between those plump, delicious lips. Pull her closer, and your cock throbs right in front of her beautiful face. Snake your fingers through her hair, clutching in your fist just enough to be able to control her. Less than a centimeter away from your tip, she pants hot breaths onto your head, getting more and more turned on by the growing bead of precum forming so painfully close to her tongue.

“That's my good girl,” you groan, admiring the way she admires your cock. She can only hold that wide-eyed stare, drool forming on her bottom lip as she shivers, waiting for your green light to let her choke on your length like she's done hundreds of times before. Inch her close, closer, until she's able to plant a kiss right on the underside of your rod, and the sensation forces shocks up your spine. Your hips buck against her lips, your grip loosens ever so slightly, giving her the smallest degree of permission she can have, and she takes advantage: one kiss after another, all along your length. Yuri is relentless, going up and down your length, one tiny suck after another with every fake kiss she wishes was more than just a kiss. You know she's just playing dumb, trying to see how much of the rules she can break and get away with: no sucking without permission, no licking until you let her, but with her eyes shut lightly and with how she worships your cock, you just have to give in. 

But not without one more game. 

Yank her off your crotch, yank her away. A gasp catches in her throat as she's so unceremoniously pulled off of you, and by the way that gorgeous line of spit stretches from her lip to your cock, you can tell she already misses you so fucking bad. 

“Does my good girl want more?” you ask, and immediately she melts: her tongue lolls out, she stares up at you, pants like a dog waiting for a treat, “Y-yes… *hic*... Yuri wants more…”

Trace your head along those luscious lips, watch her give herself to you. Her eyes flutter closed, and you take her chin oh-so-gently; she plants messy kisses on your head with her warped sense of respect, spreading your precum all over her mouth now that you’re allowing her. Your length drags across her lovely lips, letting her coat it with more of the drool she’s been desperately offering you. You stop all of a sudden, your head resting on her bottom lip, pulling it down slightly, and she knows what’s next. 

Yuri keeps her mouth open just a little, wishing with everything she has that you would just shove it in. But instead, you teach her her place, taking your time just as you take her mouth. The underside of your cock drags against her tongue as you push further into her mouth, and once you hit the back of her throat, once she gags that adorable little surprised gag you always do when you’re almost all the way in, her lips seal around your shaft and she sucks. Hard. 

Her cheeks hollow out, her head starts to bob up and down your length. Each time she goes down, she forces your tip against her throat right back, she lets out another loud slurp as she pulls back almost all the way. And all the while, you revel in how this absolute goddess of a woman takes your cock over and over again so willingly. She does it so well, slathering your cock with her spit like it’s what she was put on this earth to do. She works your cock like it was her sole purpose, services you like there was nothing else in the world for her. Each loving stroke of her face on your length brings you closer to the edge, and with the way she looks up at you—eyes unfocused, mouth anything but—she shows you she can’t fucking wait for it either. 

She pulls her face off your cock with a pop, or rather, you make her, “Hahh, haahhh…” she pants desperately, “M-more…? Please?”

And you swear she melts your heart right back. She’s the image of submission: polite, willing, needy, and on top of it all, you always did have that soft spot in your heart that only she could ever have. She looks up at you, waiting for whatever it is you’ll let her do, make her do, and the only signal she needs is your fingers falling away from her chin. 

Her eyes widen, pure joy spreads throughout her face at your permission. She giggles, sits up on her knees, “Thank you, Oppa.” She brings up her chest, presenting her beautiful tits to you once more: every single light hickey still prominently displayed on her smooth skin, her pink nipples stiff and puffy from all your past attention, the way she squishes them together around your cock like her body is your personal paradise. “Look at what you, *hic*, did to me…”

She continues her worship, keeping you secure between her tits. Yuri starts moving, dragging her boobs up and down your length, making you groan, music to her ears. Her titfuck is sloppy as sloppy gets: careless where you like, reverent where it matters. She almost loses her balance every once in a while, slipping to the left or right at a particularly enthusiastic jerk of you, giggling as she rights herself before continuing to service your cock. And her moans—God, her moans—like she’s getting off to getting you off all the same. 

And how could you tear your eyes off the sight? Here’s the most gorgeous woman in the world between your legs, the perfect skin of her shoulders and neck on display for you, the most delicious pair of breasts on your cock. The way she squeezes and bounces them, how she proudly shows them off, begging you to do more than just watch. So you indulge her, or rather, yourself: take over the job of keeping her tits wrapped around your cock, take her boobs in your own hands, and she lets out a low hum of absolute depraved pleasure at the sensation of being used again. She kneels politely in front of you, letting you grope and touch and squeeze her body like she knows you own her. 

She gets that glint in her eyes again, slows down her titfucking to a painful near-standstill. She hands you one of the fallen shot glasses, pours a drink into it, smiles that drunken smile only starting to turn sober. “Just a second…” she whispers only loud enough to tickle your ears. All at once, she throws her head back, the soju spilling into her mouth, but she doesn’t swallow; and you swear this girl being as in love with you as she is is nothing short of a miracle. 

She keeps it in her mouth, swirling, swirling like she did earlier, except not as long, not as careful: she wants to be messy for you. Her cheeks are puffed, filled with the drink, a smile reaching up to her eyes. Yuri, ever the romantic, always the depraved, takes your hands in hers. Her fingers wrap around yours as she pulls them back towards the warmth and softness of her chest, wrapping her tits around your throbbing length again. She’s evil in all the best ways, and the fact that she’s this brand of evil only for you is heaven on earth. 

“Smile for me, baby girl…” and she takes that ungodly amount of joy in obeying you: she shows you her pearly whites, and soju floods out from between them. The alcohol drips down her lips, chin, chest, leaving a light pink stain down the body only you’ll ever get to see. It’s close to heaven, how the warmth of her mouth spreads over your cock again, and once the drink finishes falling from her lips, she takes your head in again to lick and suck like taking it all back. 

It’s her head tilting to the side, making sure you see how your cock pokes and bulges against the inside of her cheek as she keeps running her tongue over what she can reach of your shaft. One last deep thrust into her throat, “Ghlk—” before you pull out of her warm, wet mouth slowly, letting her savor the taste and feeling of being yours. 

She coughs exactly twice, wipes her mouth with the back of her hand, shoots you another lazy, dangerous smile. Her eyes are cloudy and unfocused, knowing both you and she’s had more to drink that you know you can handle, yet she loves it more than anything. Takes your cock in between her tits again, goes faster and faster; she’s grunting now, doing everything she can to show you how well-behaved of a fucktoy she is to deserve your load splattered all over her face and coating her tits. “Oppa, I’ve been so good for you… *hic*... Please gimme…” 

You can’t take it anymore, not that you want to be holding back on this absolute perfection of a woman. Pull her off your cock, onto your lap. She’s straddling you before it even registers she moved—that sexy smile that spreads across her face as she realizes what you want of her—and she gives you slower and slower strokes as she hovers right over your cock. 

Don’t even wait, not when you have bliss itself right in front of you. Dive into her chest again, taking her nipple between your teeth. Suckling on her sensitive pink peaks causes her to groan, but it’s nothing like when she slides down onto your hard, throbbing cock: she throws her head back and lets out a choked moan, “F-fuck, Oppa!” 

And she can’t slide down fast enough: your hand on her hip, pulling her down as best as you can, making her take you faster, harder, while you keep lapping at her soft, luscious breast bouncing against your mouth. You grab the other one with your free hand, and you swear you could feel her right then and there squeezing your cock so desperately tight between her velvet walls, five seconds away from the pleasure you and only you could give her. But while you consider showing her the mercy of just the tiniest bit of breathing room, just for her to calm down, you’re reminded—by the way she grips your hair, shoves more of her tits onto your face, moans your name—that the last thing she wants is to calm down. Her thighs are jiggling as she fully sits on your lap, her pussy clenching desperately as she takes you all the way in. 

It’s pure bliss for the both of you, having each other close like this, intimate like this, owning one another like no one else ever will. For just one moment, you lean your head right against the middle of her chest, catching the breath you had only just let go. You keep your eyes shut, her delicate, needy whimpers filling your ears as you throb inside her, hitting spots much too sensitive after all your fun tonight. And she just plainly holds you close, taking in the peace and comfort of spending time with her person, twirling your sweat-drenched hair gently between her fingers as she holds you close against her pounding heart. 

“Oppa…” she whispers into your ear between deep breaths, “am I good?” You’re reminded that this was all for her, so she can relax and unwind, and the way she asks so cutely for your approval like she needs to earn it fills you with a warm fuzzy feeling to just give her whatever she damn well wants. 

Kiss her chest, slowly this time. Higher and higher, up her collarbone, towards her shoulders, feel the softness of her skin against your lips as she gives it all to you. She’s grinding on your cock now, making sure you’re never without her tender loving touch, and as you reach her neck, threatening hickeys that would be hell for the two of you to hide, you suck harder than both of you know you should. 

Yet she loves it, “Mmph, fuck, oppa, please,” grinding harder, holding your head against her neck like it’s what she needs to live. Sucking harder still, taking every drop of sweat, every wisp of what’s left of her perfume for yourself, all the while she’s growing louder and louder with each thrust into her wet, tight fuckhole you didn’t know you were giving her. 

She confesses, “c-cumming…” holding you as tight as possible, bouncing on your lap knowing you’re the only one she’ll ever feel this good with, “fuck, Oppa, in-inside…”

And there’s no way you can’t indulge her. You slide back down to her chest, squeezing each as rough as you possibly could. Your hands leave red prints on her supple flesh, but the way she clenches around your cock tells you she needs just a little bit more. It’s that breath that hitches, no doubt a sweet moan trying to escape with just the right tension—you raise your hand, not too high, but just right for what she needs—you bring it back down and slap her tit, causing her to let out the cutest yelp. And again to her other breast, “Mmm, it hurts so good, Oppa…” getting wetter as the sting of your palms settle into her boobs. Again still, watching how her tits jiggle as the sharp noise of your skin hitting hers gets the better of her: she’s clenching even harder now, slick spreading freely on her crotch as she rides your deeper and faster. 

It’s too much, and at the same time, not enough at all: you dive right back into her chest, but your hands stay right where they are—tug hard on her nipples, pinch and roll them between your fingers like the sort of roughness she begs for. You plant your tongue in the center of her chest and drag up: collecting every drop of sweat and soju you can find and hold. Again and again, drag your tongue up and down the valley of her breasts, all the while she’s screaming at how much tough love her sore, stiff nipples are getting from you. She’s quivering hard against your cock, throat growing sore at how loud she’s getting to be while confessing all her sinful pleasure with you. 

It’s too much, devastatingly too much, and with one last lick that reaches up under her chin, a final tug of her nipples that sends her hands wrapping around yours, that desperate thrust right into her core that forces your tip to kiss the entrance to her womb, she screams her heart out as she explodes: tight, messy, yours. She comes undone, squirting all over your cock as she frantically tries tearing your hands off her sore, reddened, boobs, barely registering that you’re leaving mark after deep mark on her neck and shoulders. 

Much too much, and you have no choice but to follow suit: that one last jerk inside of her sends a groan out your throat, and your hands leave her tits all the same, gripping her waist impossibly tight as you pull her mercilessly rough onto your cock, making sure she feels every single throb as you fill her with your hot, sticky love. It all but triggers another orgasm in her, she wraps her arms tight around you like you’re the only one saving her from drowning in pleasure and losing her mind. She shivers all over as the warmth spreads from her core throughout her body, knowing there’s no way she won’t be with your child after this. But you can’t be satisfied with merely filling her up—more and more of your cum shoots into her, painting her insides white, and she’s biting hard down onto your shoulder not knowing what to do with her overwhelmed body anymore. You’re leaking out of her, your seed mixing with her squirt as it drips down her thighs, and stars flash before your eyes and hers as you give and take everything of one another—

You can’t even tell how long it’s been. Your back is flat on the floor, staring at the ceiling like it has the answers to questions you can’t even bring yourself to form. And yet, there’s no need to hurry at all: lying her head on your chest, listening for your heartbeat as if it’ll bring back some hint of the physical world around her. Her arms stay tightly wrapped around your neck, yours snugly keeping her close as you two just… breathe. 

“I love you, Yuri…” you whisper, not needing to be any louder than the softest of breezes, “you’re my everything.”

“Love you too, Oppa,” she pants, still feeling your warmth swirling inside her, “can’t live without you.”

~~~

It was a while after you moved in, and Yuri was only herself a tenant for a short span by the time you joined her. She was a pretty girl at the very least; there were times you caught yourself staring, and other times she caught you. Good thing your interest was mutual, and the odd moments of Yuri looking with a bit too much interest in your direction was most common when you'd only just left the shower wrapped in nothing but a towel.

It started from that: teasing each other by walking in the common spaces of the apartment with less clothes on than you've been used to but not so little as to be weird—an afternoon of you in an undershirt showing off your arms gets you a night of her in shorts that covered nothing of her thighs. It came to a peak when one night Yuri, after a particularly long and splashy bath, came out of her room dressed in a thin pink top, tiny black FTBs that showed off more than even her parents had ever seen of her, and literally nothing else. She dried her hair with a towel, wafting her lavender shampoo all over, and crashed next to you on the sofa before picking up the popcorn bowl for herself. 

It was all of five minutes of you sharing the popcorn while she idly scrolled her phone when she caught you again, only this time you couldn't hold back. And who could blame you? A girl like that doesn't come by every day, especially not one so eager to have you too. You took her lips and she melted so easily into the kiss like you'd been married for just a couple months. Her tongue felt heavenly on yours—with the way she explored your mouth you knew that she felt the same—and you couldn't get enough of her. It was hellishly intoxicating, as the scent of lavender grew stronger and stronger the further into her you fell, and soon she had her arms wrapped around your neck while you trapped her between yourself and the couch cushions and threatened to hold her there forever. Frantic and reckless was the way she tore off her skimpy clothes: her shorts dangled around only one of her knees and her tank top scrunched right under her neck to reveal a pair of luscious tits she'd been dying to show you since forever.

She tugged at your shirt with a primal need, wanting to somehow be even closer to you, to somehow not break the kiss while you undressed to meet her where she is. It was impossible, though, but the few seconds you were away from her were well worth the trouble: her hands roamed all over your chest and back and everywhere she could reach, and she thanked you by making quick work of your pants–at that point you had to wonder whether she had experience with this sort of thing with how easily she got them off.

A few cursory rubs between her legs told you everything you needed to know: she was soaking wet and shuddered under your fingers and jerked like every graze over her sex would be the one to push her over the edge. It was the easiest thing in the world then to start satiating your lust for her using her, and with the way her hips moved along with yours, she told you she was using you right back. 

You trailed kisses from her lips down lower and lower to her neck, paying special attention to where you feel her pulse. She tugged at your hair and pushed you to other spots on her neck to kiss and mark to every degree of success, all the while she got more and more frantic of what she wanted from you. It was a thick haze you both found yourselves in: she wanted everything from you, to feel you anywhere and everywhere, and you wanted the exact same thing; not as urgent but just as careful. So why was it getting so hard to keep her under control?

It finally came to the point where she cleared from the mind fog and woke up with her wrists pinned above her head, and she melted when she found you still over her, face to face, nowhere else to look but to you and you alone. She brought her lip between her teeth, and it told you all you needed to know. With your free hand, you aimed your cock right at her soaking cunt, and you rubbed your tip all over her folds. She choked on her spit as you did, surprised and deathly turned on at what you were threatening her with, or perhaps promising her. The look in her eyes screamed a carnal need that only you could help her meet, and you did. 

Fuck being gentle, fuck being slow, and fuck Jo Yuri. It would never have been this easy to do so had it not been weeks and weeks of teasing each other, and memories slowly resurfaced: the way she bent over the counter while eating chips just as you happened to walk by, the way she put her arm under her chest while on the phone, the way she only ever somehow was just putting on something half-decent whenever she answered your knocks on her bedroom door. 

Now that you had her, or that she had you, you slid into her like the most natural thing in the world, and Yuri all but disagreed. Every inch you pushed into her brought her moans even higher, without any hint of discomfort until you were all the way inside her. Only then did you notice her eyes shut tight, her teeth almost drawing blood from her lower lip, and you had to reassure her that it'll feel better soon. 

“I know,” she said in between deep breaths as her fingers ran through your hair, “I always thought it would,” her moans rising in pitch as she pulled you into her neck, “it’s everything I've dreamed of,” she shivered as you started to move inside her.

And it was heavenly, having a woman like this under you, taking your cock like it's exactly what she needed to survive. Her breath hitched each time you bottomed out in her, and it was the first of the good spots you've come to memorize since. You hit it again and again, and again and again her grip on your back tightened, her breath shook, her pussy making your cock slicker.

“Ah, fuck, yes,” straight into your ear with every thrust into her dripping cunt. Her velvet walls squeezed your cock as she writhed underneath you—she arched her back uselessly as you kept her pinned on the cushions, but the both of you knew she wasn't trying to get free. “Fuck me harder…” she pleaded in that whiny voice you've come to love. The wet slapping sounds coming from where you two connect only turned her on even more, and the more she asked in that voice the more it felt so fucking good to be getting off to the body that teased you constantly.

Her wrists pinned over her head, your hand wrapped around her neck, her tongue sticking out as she watched you tower over her weak, submissive form. Fuck her deeper, faster, rougher; never mind the tears that formed in the corners of her eyes or how they crossed as you pounded her helpless body like all she was was a toy. Her toes curled and uncurled in a rhythm you couldn't quite place, her breath was unsteady and labored, with her only reprieve being the moments you let her neck go only to slap her tits. 

“Shit, I'm your fuckdoll, use me—” before she choked again. Drool dripped down her chin as her tongue hung out, Yuri too fucked out to know what to do with it. Another moment for her to breathe, and her tits jiggled against your open palm. Have the slightest bit of mercy for her, and another harsh slap as your hand met her tender breast again. You soothed her like your groping her chest made it all better, and in a way, it did. It had gotten overwhelming, tears streamed freely down her beautiful face as she grew tighter and tighter around you, and you knew she was close. 

Your hand wrapped around her neck again, cutting off her air just as she was about to take one in. Her eyes crossed, tongue out, babbling nonsense as her brain powered down; she was losing her mind, and she trusted you to take advantage of her however you wanted. 

Her thighs shook, her back arched further, her cunt throbbed—and you felt your release was imminent, faster and faster in this needy, warm hole—before a strangled moan finally fought its way through your grip. Her pussy gripped your rock hard cock tight, and streams of her girlcum splashed all over your crotch. Her vulnerable body jerked with each squirt, drenching your cock and the cushions underneath her sore cunt with her nectar. The way her tits and thighs jiggled, the way she thrashed trying to get free and cum the way she wanted; there wasn't any sight of her luscious, willing body that didn't turn you on even more.

“Yuri,” you whispered right into her ear, “I'm gonna fill you up, and you're gonna fucking take it.” And her response you couldn't tell if it was a nod or just her in the middle of the most groundbreaking orgasm she'd ever had. She screamed your name as she felt you pounding her poor hole, and at last the pressure in your balls cracked open the floodgates: one final thrust deep into her warm, wet cavern and ropes of your hot cum shot out of you and straight into her womb. With how she jerked and twitched beneath you as you filled her up, you could have sworn she really was just a premium sex toy instead of your teasing roommate. 

Without even the chance to recover, Yuri was sent into another climax, her gorgeous voice growing hoarse as she screamed every expletive she knew. The heat she felt inside her was unbearable, and the feeling of being filled by your seed only cemented into her mind that she'd never feel this good again without you.

Her eyes fluttered closed as her labored breathing desperately forced air back into her lungs; she lay there sweaty and motionless, your cum leaking out of her sore cunt and onto the couch, and you swear she'd never looked so sexy. Her sultry smile, the bruises only beginning to form around her neck, and her last effort before she completely passed out: she found your hand and brought it to her aching chest, asking you to soothe her abused tits. You did as requested, and as you toyed with her boobs, you noticed a sweet-sounding snore coming from your new toy.

~~~

The night's a bore, her dorm mates had all gone to sleep, and Nien had run out of things to occupy her. It's just one random message after the last, annoying the other members and latching on to whoever would text back. It's been five minutes since Yooyeon had last sent anything back, but to be fair, she did say she was starting to nod off. The hope that Nien could pester her for just a little bit more had faded anyway, so she goes farther down her contact list to find a new victim. Just for a tiny while longer. 

Then, she spots it: a tiny green dot that paints a brand new target on some other sorry nocturnal member's head. Nien doesn't even check who it is; tap the bubble, type out the random keyboard smash, hit send a hundred times. Her eyes crinkle at the corners as the bubble turns blue, more so when she sees a gray one pop up on the other side of the screen.

You:

aksksfhflshalgfjd

1:30 a.m.

nakynaky:

haha fucks wrong with you

1:30 a.m.

You:

I miss you

1:30 a.m.

nakynaky:

sure baby. go to bed

1:30 a.m.

You:

no

play with me

please

ill do anything

1:31 a.m.

nakynaky:

i’m busy nien

1:31 a.m.

You:

and im not-busy nien >:)

1:31 a.m.

nakynaky:

cute 

what r u up to

1:31 a.m.

A “gotcha” moment if there ever was one. She hits the voice call button, the smile on her face as wide as can be, and she waits as the dial tone starts playing. Her phone meets her ear in anticipation, and as she listens close, it vibrates and a new message pops up.

nakynaky:

sorry baby

i'm stepping into the shower

1:32 a.m.

Quickly Nien ends the call, slightly fumbling her phone as she does so, nearly dropping it as it hovers over her face. The green dot on the corner of the icon flickers, and she frantically hits the other button. Just as a little jokey joke, she swears so up and down. She's blinded for a split second as her screen flashes white and her front camera comes to life; she recovers, and her own video feed shrinks to the corner of the screen. Just as a little jokey joke. 

Instead, the other feed comes to life too, and suddenly Nien is virtually face-to-face with her Nakyoung-unnie, clean white tiles behind her, her laugh echoing badly into her mic and out Nien's earphones. “What does that mean, you ‘miss’ me?”

“Nothing! And what do you mean, ‘cute?’” Nien accuses, trying to keep her voice down lest she wake her roommates. She covers her mouth to stifle more giggles, but she doesn't show Nakyoung the finger that makes its way between her teeth—goddamn does she look pretty. 

“That whole thing, annoying me in the middle of the night, video calling me when I said I was gonna shower.” Nakyoung's reply is light and airy, though her audio is still just as bad. Despite that, her voice sounds clear as rain to Nien's ears, and she could hear—even feel Nakyoung's husky voice just underneath the skin of her arms. “I'm dropping the call now.”

“No!” Nien blurts out, and somewhere off to the side Chaewon shifts in her bed. “No,” much more quietly this time, “just do your business. I won't be a bother.” Her eyebrows wiggle suggestively, and her lips take on a shit-eating grin that she knows for some reason her Nakyoung-unnie just plain loves.

The giggle that passes through Nakyoung's lips is nothing but sinister, and once Nien smells the bait, Nakyoung sets the trap: “Promise?”

Nien is dumbfounded to be turned on so easily; her Nakyoung-unnie doesn't even wait for a response, just sets the phone down against the sink, sits back on the toilet lid, and sighs, shaking her head. Nien watches on, wide-eyed and staring lasers through her phone, as Nakyoung grabs the hem of her shirt, pulling up slowly and showing off her deadly curves. The gentle dip of her waist, the way her shirt stretches as it clears her chest, the sly grin that greets Nien back as Nakyoung takes her top off completely. She leans back onto the toilet, obviously enjoying the attention, but the look in her eyes tells Nien that there's plenty more where that came from. 

She reaches behind her, fiddling with her hooks as Nien grows more interested with each passing second. “A shower of attention is probably just as good,” Nakyoung thinks, watching Nien drool all over herself. But no, this is much too fun. The hooks come undone, and she pulls the bra off of her arms; Nien stifles a gasp as Nakyoung's tits bounce free, and it escapes anyway when Nakyoung reaches up and squeezes them for her.

“Like what you see?” Nakyoung teases, circling her nipples and getting them stiff. Nien's eyes nearly pop out of her head when she puts her hands behind her head and spreads her elbows as far apart as they can go, showing off everything of her boobs, armpits, neck. What's worse, Nakyoung shakes left and right, making her tits bounce and sway all for Nien's viewing pleasure. She's salivating now, wanting to burn the sight to the back of her own eyelids, knowing this will be the fucking best fap material for her to use when she sorely needs a quickie after a long day. 

But, then she's snapped out of it: “Fucking say something,” Nakyoung speaks out breathily, bringing her hands down to her shoulders, squeezing her tits between her elbows. She bites her lip, same as Nien does, and Nien only chokes out, “Unnie is so hot…”

“Oh, come on, baby. I know how you sneak glances at me. Is that the best you can do?” Nakyoung stands up, her abs taking up most of the screen. Her fingers find their way under the garter of her shorts and panties, and she tugs down. Nothing fast, but not slow either. It's the perfect pace for what she's showing off now: her hips that would be oh so delicious to grab onto, the clean-shaved pussy she nearly reveals, the beautiful pair of tits that take the screen up again to jiggle and bounce as she bends down. She rights her posture, and she spreads her thighs to show off her pretty pink cunt, soaking wet with slick nearly running down her thighs. 

“U-unnie looks so… fuckable.” Nien finds her own throat dry, the moisture evidently forming somewhere else instead. She can’t ignore the center of her own legs heating up anymore, and she has to start relieving herself. She thrusts a hand into her shorts, rubbing the delicate folds, matching her unnie's pace. She watches intently, her focus locked on nothing else but Nakyoung's finger as it circles her fuckhole, teasing herself as she draws out more and more of her slick to smear on her fingers and inner thighs. 

“You're so boring,” Nakyoung sighs, and once again her tone gets under Nien's skin, sending goosebumps up and down her arms. “Are you touching yourself, baby? Wanna tell me what you'd do to me if you were here right now?” Deep and luxurious, scratching the good spots in the insides of her ears as her unnie's words make their way straight into her brain. She can't resist for long, not when Nakyoung takes the phone and slips into the shower, nor when she hears the creaking of the shower handle and the beginnings of the artificial rain, and the final straw: Nakyoung sits on the floor, her legs as wide apart as they can go and showing off her dripping core as the water starts splashing all over her body. 

“I'm already wet, baby. Don't be shy—I want all of that filth you keep locked up in that pretty little head of yours.”

She can't resist. Nakyoung looks too fucking good not to catcall, especially when she's asking for it. Nien doesn't even care what the words are anymore so long as she gets to say them: “I'd—fuck—push you up against that glass. I'd get between your legs and lick that slutty little clit of yours til you cum all over my face,” Nien grunts as quietly as she can, her fingers dipping into her heat, “I'd put that fucking leg on my shoulder and shove my tongue right into that goddamned sexy cunt, clean you up inside out, drain you of every last drop of cum until you're fucking shaking and begging me to stop—”

“God, yes, baby, just like that,” Nakyoung moans, rubbing her clit even harder as she shoves three fingers into her fuckhole. Her arm moves like a blur as she strives to get off to the shower of attention, her tits jiggling with each hurried thrust into her pussy that Nien promises would make squirt over and over and over again given the chance. She takes deep breaths with every other idea Nien plants in her mind: Nien's head between her thighs and guzzling her cunt, a fingers or two stretching her asshole wide open, a hand furiously squeezing and slapping her breasts until they were red and sore like mere toys to be played with and thrown away when Nien gets bored. But with the way she makes her desires of her unnie known, the thought of Nien getting tired of her unnie's body seems more and more nonsensical, of course in favor of the rough fucking Nien's advertising. 

And Nien matches the energy, thrusting her fingers deep into her own pussy, reaching for the best good spots she knows she has, wishing so bad that it was Nakyoung's fingers fucking her aching cunt instead. She continues, “If I had a dick, Unnie, I'd never let you catch a break… I'd tear up all your fucking clothes and sit you on my cock all day long,” she grunts as her hand goes faster still, “fill you up ‘til you cry and beg for me to stop. I'd suck those tits of yours until you leak milk, spank that juicy ass until it's red and throbbing…”

And Nakyoung is loving this: her pussy clenches around her fingers as she fucks herself silly, feeling the walls of her cunt stretch and squeeze around her digits like Nien's cock is the one forcing them apart. Except Nien would be so much thicker, girthier than just a pathetic pair of fingers. No, Nakyoung knows for sure that Nien really would make her cry and beg for a break. It would be the best fucking thing to ride her massive cock, to let Nien use her body to jerk herself off like nothing more than a fleshlight. 

“Unnie, your tongue is sticking out… I bet your throat is nice and tight too, isn't it? You'd look so hot choking on me. I'd love if you wrapped those pretty tits around my cock and let me fuck them while you sucked it. You'd be such a good little fuck toy… wouldn't you? You're a slut like that, right?” 

“Mmm, haahh, fuck, I'm cumming…” Nakyoung's voice shakes as she confesses. It's three whole fingers inside her now, chasing a high that she's sure only Nien could ever bring her to. And Nien loves it even more, her unnie's sexy whiny voice turning her on so bad that she needs a third finger inside her as well. She matches her Nakyoung's already breakneck pace, coming to a peak herself, feeling her pussy clench tighter around her fingers, her toes curling and uncurling, her back lifting off her bed, sweat forming on her brow, the taste of iron as she swipes her tongue over her bleeding lip. 

Nakyoung climaxes first, her knees fly apart and her fingers pull out of her throbbing cunt, followed by a sinful stream of squirt that shoots across the shower cubicle. Her eyes shut tight as she jerks and squirms, each one sending another jet of cum flying to hit the opposite wall of the tiny space. Her abs flex and her boobs bounce, and Nakyoung has to stifle her moans with that same hand she fucked herself with. All throughout she still rubs her clit, pushing herself to her limit, wherever or whatever it was, and the wet sounds of slapping reach Nien all the same.

And Nien follows shortly after. She makes one wrong swipe of her own clit, and suddenly without meaning to she seizes and her orgasm takes over the entirety of her body. She pulls her hand back and she cums, hard, right onto her panties, feeling them drench as the wet spreads down her thighs and up to her waist. She jerks again, another stream of squirt that only makes it feel even better. Another, and her bed starts to creak with how restless she's getting to be, squirming and thrashing like she really just did shoot her load into Nakyoung. And one more, before she slowly descends from her high, catching her breath. She settles down, her brow beaded with sweat, and her panties ruined, definitely also her shorts, probably even her blanket, maybe her sheets too. 

She checks one last time and finds Nakyoung panting on the floor, legs still apart, her face buried in her hands. Just then, a stream of gold trickles out from her used pussy, and the puddle keeps spreading and spreading, before Nakyoung gives off a tiny shiver and sigh. In that moment Nien could only stare and wish that she could be with her Naky-unnie and lick up every single drop of it, just bury her face in her crotch and go wild, maybe even force another orgasm or two for her beloved unnie. Two beats of silence, sans the shower splashing water overhead, and Nakyoung finally picks up her phone. She sniffles and sighs, then mumbles out, “Thanks… Goodnight, Nien,” before the video cuts and her screen goes dark again. 

Nien drops her phone somewhere beside her as she drapes her arm over her eyes, still catching her breath. “Fuck, that was hot” is the only thing she can think. She almost drifts off to sleep, when…

“Are you fucking done?” Mayu chimes in from the bunk above her. Instantly Nien feels a blush spread through her cheeks, realizing how loud she must have been. Not waiting for an answer, Mayu asserts, “Good. Go to sleep, please.”

~~~

Dull thuds of feet against trampled carpet. A door that tries to creak open. The stench of lavender amongst iron and spent brimstone. Clear. 

She kicks off her heels as you crash onto the couch, only for her to follow. The plastic crinkles and ruffles underneath the both of you, growing stickier with each passing moment you're putting off cleaning up. Instead, you both opt for catching your breaths, taking in the cool breeze of air conditioning, and most importantly, listening intently for how your muscles scream and cry from overuse. 

With a grunt, she pushes herself up and reaches for the tiny white envelope on the table. She undoes the wax seal with two swipes of her fingernail and pulls out the letter, scanning carelessly through its contents before tossing it back onto the table and reslouching on the sofa. She's clocked out of work: she clutches her face with her hands, forcing her eyelids shut and her breathing slows to a steady, or steadier, pace. 

“Congrats, come home,” or whatever the fuck. The letter is unnecessarily more verbose, unbelievably so, but the important parts couldn't be simpler. It was a job well done, after all, and an invitation like that is always a sight for sore eyes were it not already expected. You stare at the seal in the top-left corner, pushing down your animosity for your employer as best you can.

A hand on her shoulder is all the consolation you allow yourself to give. “Go,” cold, tired, stern. She peeks at you through her slender fingers, and you steal a glance of her eyes crinkling at the corners before she pulls them away. With what sounds like a herculean effort, she gets up from the couch and heads off slowly to the bathroom as you sit and stare at the now-empty spot on the couch. Your eyes land back onto the annoyingly white sheet of paper on the table, silently cursing its bare existence, while the shower comes to life somewhere in the back of the room and of your mind. 

Push off the sofa yourself, follow the sound of pitter-pattering water. Your tie comes undone, as do your buttons. She watches through the open door how you slide the sullied clothes off your heaving form, momentarily pausing from scrubbing the vile leftover matter out of her hair. She covers herself modestly with her arms and the shower curtain—she can be as coy as she wants if it makes her feel better—as you lean against the sink and catch your breath. 

Dark circles under your eyes, splatterings of rust dotted across your face and arms. Some fresher, redder, more vibrant than others. All marks of victory, and nothing more. The water is cool in your palms, in stark contrast to the heat that blazes off the skin of your back and nape. Wash away your blemishes, wash away your sins. All marks of victory, and nothing more. 

You notice a towel on the rack, which you mindlessly reach for. Just then, the water ceases falling, and you knock on the cubicle door. She eyes you, and then the towel, and then you again. It changes hands far too quickly, and a few brief moments later she pulls back the curtain and emerges like brand new. She's wrapped herself in a pristine eggshell-white robe with the bow tied neatly over her tummy, as the towel sips gently from the moisture of her hair. 

She places a hand on your shoulder, shoots you a knowing smirk. You switch places: the floor grows only marginally wetter as she steps out to make space for you in the shower, and as you will the water to life again, you hear the faint sound of teeth being brushed from the other side. 

~~~

You step out of the bathroom, leaving the dirt and grime of the day behind you. You find her on the couch again, but this time it's stripped away of the sullied plastic covering. She reads the letter deep in thought this time, before finally looking up at you with an expression you can't quite decode.

A knock on the door, your senses switch back to high alert. Though her eyes stay expressionless, they're anything but dull, and all it takes is one shake of her head. You tiptoe over to the door and cover your side of the peephole with your hand. One. Two. Three. And again.

One.

Two. 

Three.

You open the door by a crack, and on the other side is an unassuming boy dressed as a staff member of the hotel. He clutches in his hands a tray with a single plate of French fries, which he serves to you and leaves just as wordlessly. 

It's fries. Steaming, fragrant, drizzled with cheese sauce and bacon bits over top. And the place is safe, from the staff to the food to the rooms. Still, looking over to her, you can tell she doesn't trust them as much as she did when she ordered them. And the feeling of pity roots snugly against, not in, your heart: you want more than anything for these fries to be as safe as when she ordered them. 

~~~

Not even a single speck of dust, only a hauntingly spotless brown ceiling to stare at. She rests her head on your chest and her plate on your stomach, staring out the window to the moon and stars that seem so close yet so far out of reach. She chews carefully, not savoring taste or texture, but only feeling around for the way her body moves to sustain itself. She breathes slow, checking in with how obediently her chest expands as she takes air in and pushes it back out. 

The silence makes known a ringing sound in your ears; it's a stark contrast to not even an hour ago when explosions large and small filled them instead. You can only imagine her feeling the same, looking out at the gentle borrowed light of the moon instead of the bright flashes of whites and yellows and reds that demanded to be beheld. 

“How much?” you whisper, breaking the silence. Place a hand around her shoulders, pull her close and secure as if you had the right to do so. She looks up, no doubt wondering why it matters enough for you to ask.

“Enough,” she sighs, returning her gaze to the moon, “for a hundred new iPhones every month until I'm eighty. A million of every ring, necklace, and broach my dad could never give my mom.” She pauses, wishfully, “A good, quiet, safe life.”

You sink deep in thought. It's true, there's nothing more valuable than that. The opportunity to leave this all behind and start over is the single most important thing everyone in this line of work works for. 

“And a bookstore?” you jest. 

And she giggles. “And a café upstairs. And a flower shop next door.”

She brings the next fry to your lips, hoping you'd accept. “And maybe… a husband? Whose name I… know.”

Both of you flinch at it, as if she hadn't meant to say it out loud nor you meant to hear it, but just as quickly you recover and smiles tug at the corners of your mouths. 

It's been on your mind for a while, too. Not the high fantasy of a lavish mansion or a vault chock full of gold coins to swim in, not even a two-story, three-bed, four-bath with a white picket fence keeping in two kids and maybe a dog. Just the privilege to hit snooze every once in a while, to have the option of the Wednesday farmer's market, to not seek clearance for exactly five watered down shots at the least horrendous of the closest agency-affiliated bars. 

“Sounds like a dream,” you confess, airier and more vulnerable than intended. You've been working this job longer than you care to remember, more missions completed than worth counting, more bones broken and lives claimed than anything that would get you a good afterlife. And yet, all of it has brought you to where you are now: lying at midnight in a bed you can't even appreciate the luxury of, in a hotel you couldn't bring yourself to trust, with the only person you've ever met that you ever truly did. 

You sigh, “If you're trying to tell me something, just tell me.” 

Your eyes meet under the moonlight, finding tiredness and regret behind each other's gaze. It's been too long, too much, and it's a mystery not even the two of you could solve together why you haven't already quit. But just like that, the answer reveals itself like it was right there beside you all along. 

“You've saved enough too. Come with me.” She brings her face closer to yours, planting sweet kisses along your jawline. Her plate is empty, laid to rest somewhere behind her and forgotten like what they do when agents misbehave. 

Lock her lips with yours, savor the feeling of being vulnerable with the one person who's ever been worthy of it. She takes your neck in her arms as you position yourself above her, chasing a future she and you want more than anything this organization will ever be able to offer. “And I assume you'll be leaving whether or not?”

She deepens the kiss, licking your tongue and letting you into her mouth. She moans breathily once you start to have your way with her: her grip tightens around you as your hand slides down the middle of her chest. Her eyes flutter shut as you move on to her neck, careful not to suck too hard lest you leave evidence. She spreads her legs just enough to grant you access; rub her folds through the thin fabric that may as well not be there at all. Feel her heat rising as her breath shortens, admire the way she lets you hold her like she's the most precious thing in the world. 

“You won't leave me, right?” She begs without begging you to make a promise she knows you can't make. You slide her panties down her smooth legs, and it's nothing but comfort and warmth beneath the cotton blanket you find yourselves under. She gasps at the very first contact of your fingertips rubbing against her clit, and she looks you in the eyes as if not believing that you're considering it for her. Her hips grind slightly against your hand, seeking more of the pleasure you're providing, all the while she grows even wetter at how much attention and care you give her. 

She pulls your shorts and underwear down too, thinking two can play at this game. She spits ceremoniously on her palm, the moonlight reflecting off the tiny droplet of saliva collecting in her hand, before she wraps it over your hardening cock as a thank-you. Her strokes are deep and long, leaving no inch dry and untouched, as her body jerks lightly at every swipe of your finger over her sensitive bundle of nerves. 

You stay on top of her, spurred on by how affectionately she watches you. Her hands stay on your shoulders, gripping tight as if she might lose you if she lets go. It's happened before, you think, and seeing her reaction under the dim glow of the moon, you feel it's a thought the two of you share. 

“Answer me. You won't leave me alone, will you?” She spreads her legs, though absentmindedly. She stares desperately into your eyes, looking for an answer she knows she won't like. As you lean down to her lips, taking claim of her tongue once again, she rubs your tip to her folds, coaxing you in your moment of weakness to give in to hers. 

“You know we can't make promises.” Push into her slowly, past her entrance, savoring how her walls part for you. It's heaven hearing her moan like this: airy, light, carefree. She squeezes your cock hungrily, tracing every inch of you with her pussy like it's what everything leads up to. You continue to move, thrusting gently in and out of her, and she can't help but moan and groan at the forbidden pleasure.

She wraps her arms around your neck, keeping you close as if you're the damning secret that unravels her life. She shivers each time you hit her good spots inside her throbbing cunt; she grows wetter and wetter as you keep using her body the way she needs you to. She was always the selfish type, not caring about how it felt for you, but something feels different this time:

“Come find me…?” she whispers into your ear between gasps. She nibbles at your jawline as she shakes, getting pushed closer and closer to her climax. Her back lifts off the mattress and her chest meets yours, begging silently for more contact she knows she can't have. 

Fuck her slow, but deep. Part her walls tantalizingly gently, making her groan at how you violate her luscious body. Her smooth skin and beautiful voice all whittle away at your resolve: you're led closer and closer to the idea that maybe, just maybe, a life with her isn't that bad. She squeezes your cock deliciously inside her, wraps her legs around your waist trying to keep you, hugs you tight like she needs you to live. 

“Faster…” she begs. Her toes curl and uncurl as you follow, her voice breaking as you speed up. She grinds her hips against you to meet your thrusts, and plants more kisses on your neck during the moments she runs out of breath. Her wetness soaks the bedsheets beneath her, all the while you bring her closer to her climax and yours. 

And faster still. You reach too deep into her; with every “mm” and “aah” and “please” she mutters straight into your ear, you feel your resolve crumbling more. The bed creaks slightly as you keep fucking her, all the while thoughts of waking up next to her everyday fill your head.

Her hitting snooze for you. Her hand in yours as you pick out fresh vegetables every Wednesday. Her eyes closed gently as you take your first sips of a fine aged wine. 

She kisses you deeply, exploring more of your mouth without you holding her back. Her sultry moans get the better of you, as do the faint ghosts of aloe in her hair. Her skin feels smooth against yours, as if they'd never been touched by blood or gunpowder. You can still taste the cheese lingering on her lips, fading farther away as she lets you nip and nibble on them as you please. 

You're in much too deep, you realize. She has her pussy clenching around your cock, her fingers tangled in your hair, her forehead on yours as she greedily kisses you in what would be the last time. And you're not pulling away. “You're really leaving, aren't you…?”

Slow down, catch your breath, give her, and yourself, just a little bit of space. Your nose two inches away from hers, your lips still tingling with the feeling of her love, her beautiful eyes focused solely on you like she'd forget your face if she looked away for even a second. 

“Yeah… I am. I'm done,” she confesses. She looks so much older than the last time you saw her in light like this—and it was only last week. She'd just finished scrubbing away the dust and soot of the day from her face, and the bruises on her arms were only almost all better. And yet, she still had just the slightest bit of fight in her eyes, the kind that carried a person through terror and tragedy knowing that the end of the tunnel was near. Now, here it is. 

She giggles, “You know they'd get rid of me if I said anything?” She caresses your cheek, admiring you for everything you meant to her: confidant, partner, constant. Anything else is a reach, and the both of you did everything you could to stay behind the line. Despite everything, here she is, admitting so casually to a crime that would get her wiped from the world, saying it so crudely like it was just another day in the life of a commoner who didn't know the lengths agents like you and she went through to protect. 

“Is that your plan? Out yourself and take a chance that they'd only throw you on the curb?” you chuckle, the question incredulous as it is weighted. Go slow in her again, try to knock some sense into her. She's not special in the slightest to get away with just a slap on the wrist like that. And yet, you hope with all the heart you have left that she is. “When has it ever worked?”

“We wouldn't—ah fuck—we wouldn't know… Once I leave…”

Shut her up. Seal her lips, swirl her tongue around yours. She can't say what she's about to say, not yet. Anything but that. You speed up, and she reciprocates. She grinds against you, and you wager she doesn't know what you're trying to do.

But do you know what you're trying to do?

She interrupts just a moment, “Switch,” and you have to physically tear yourself away from her to oblige. Only then do you allow yourself to feel the wear and tear of the day and the job again—pulling out of her may very well be one of the most difficult things you’ve ever done. 

And yet, she’s nothing but careful with you: she guides you down gently back onto the mattress, making sure your bruises fall onto nothing but cushiony softness. She clambers onto you, her own body betraying the same fatigue both of you tried so hard to ignore. Her hand on your still hard cock, twitching against your palm, and the faint moonlight filtering through the glass window illuminates only half of the most gorgeous face you’ve ever seen. 

She takes it in her again, slow and steady. She slides down, feeling herself stretch to accommodate your girth, all the while tiny whimpers escape her lips once more. She takes her sweet time, savoring probably the last she’ll ever have of you—you have to remind yourself of that—as the aches slowly meld with the pleasure of just plainly having her all to yourself like this. 

“You always look after me…” she whispers, placing her hands on your chest. It’s a nice change, or separation if you will, that she’s never this handsy in the field. She holds you down, “Can I look after you this time?” and she slides herself up before letting herself drop back. “Mmh—” she whimpers, and it takes everything to not start fucking her again yourself. Instead, settle for the next best thing: swipe at the straps of her nightgown, slip them off her shoulders. It brings the sweetest smile on her face, and as the gown slips down off her shoulders and back, you’re met with the sight of her delicious boobs, all yours to grope and handle like she wants.

“All yours, all of me.” She traces her finger along your arm, and as she reaches your hand, she brings it to her chest. Her breast is soft and pliant, with a perfectly stiff nipple you can’t help but pinch and tug at, and all it does is spur her on further. “More… please,” she pleads, the pleasure getting the better of her, throwing caution to the wind. She never lets go of your hand on her tits, wanting you to touch her forever. She bounces on your cock faster, trying to coax out the release she knows she deserves.

“Fuck… Please, I’m close.” Reach up and take her other breast. Her boobs bounce against your hands, and you feel her body heating up more and more as she rides faster. Her nipples poke against your palms, wanting nothing more than to be pinched hard, pulled, sucked, abused, but you’re too much of a gentleman, aren’t you? You pull her down, and to her surprise, she finds herself laying on your chest. Grip her ass like it’s all yours, thrust into her despite all the aches your body nags at you to submit to. Instead, you follow her, giving her what she wants. It slips in and out of your mind why you’re doing this with her, the memory getting hazier and hazier, but you wouldn’t have it any other way. 

You hug her tight on top of your chest as if this is the way you get to keep her. Her cunt only gets wetter with how hard you try to hold on, and she does the exact same: she wraps her arms around your neck again, wanting to never let go, as she desperately tries looking you in the eyes instead of having them roll to the back of her head. 

“I don’t know what your name is,” you confess straight into her ear, “I don’t know how long you’ve been working with me,” you thrust up into her faster, “I don’t know if I’ll ever see you again,” she moans as you get rougher, chasing her own release while helping you chase hers, “but…”

And her lips crash against yours again. She grinds against you, trying to overtake your need with hers. She wants to give, wants to serve you, wants to return all the favors you’ve earned from times you saved her ass from whatever stray projectile was hurtling her way. She tries wrestling back control despite almost losing it herself, but she stays on top of you, licking your tongue, controlling the pace. She has to.

“Mmm… you don’t get to say it,” her breath is heavy against your ear, her voice raspy from all the deep moans and rough confessions of pleasure she afforded to you, “you don’t get to tell me you love me without saying my name too.” 

She sits back up, plants her feet on the mattress, places her hands on your shoulders again, and bounces on your cock like there’s nothing else in the world to do. “You d-don't know how bad—ahh—I wanna say yours too…” 

And you get the feeling she's running out of ways to beg, getting more and more desperate to give you the pleasure she thinks you deserve. Pleasure is splashed across her face: a furrowed brow showing how hard she's trying to outlast you, a forehead beaded with sweat at how bad she wants you to feel good, a lip bitten and next to bleeding keeping herself from saying things she knows she'll regret for all the wrong reasons. 

Your breath hitches, and she almost doesn't catch it—she gives herself to you, insistent on making sure you won't want to pull out. She bends back down, pressing her tits on your chest, as she takes your lips one last time. Her tongue wraps around yours again and again, making the most of your remaining time together. She grinds hard on your cock, her slick, warm pussy squeezing around you like it's the only one she'll ever have, and it's this moment she draws her eyes open to find yours.

Her pulling up the covers for both of you. A bowl of fresh vegetable stew in the center of the table between two yet-empty plates. An arm around your shoulder as you stumble up the stairs together, thinking you're supporting her while she thinks she's supporting you. 

A flash of blinding white, and your orgasm reaches its peak inside of her. You jerk inside her, and before you know it, you're shooting ropes of hot cum into her throbbing cunt. You thrust as deep as you can go, meeting every single squeeze of her velvet walls with another spurt of your seed, until her eyes glaze over and roll to the back of her head. She lets out a guttural moan as you paint her insides, filling her up beyond what she can keep inside her. Even as you throb and thrust inside her, you feel your cum mixed with her juices running down the underside of your shaft. And her arms wrap impossibly tight around your neck she jerks and shivers uselessly against you, each one the result of another stream of squirt splashing against your crotch.

She collapses on top of you, landing on your heaving chest. You breathe deep to replace the air missing from your lungs, but you can't deny it was the best feeling you've ever had with her, or at all. She lays there peacefully, lightheaded and satisfied, her head placed perfectly dead center of your chest, letting out tiny giggles as she catches her breath.

Place her gently beside you, make sure she's comfy in your embrace. She looks up at you with a love you've never thought possible, but this girl has always been an impossibility come to life. She holds your cheek, finally coming to terms with the fact that she might never have you for herself, and trying to forgive herself for a regret she might never, ever overcome. 

“I wanna say it…” she laughs. Her teeth peek out from between her lips, her fingers gently trace your jawline as if trying to memorize it. 

“Me too. Stupid rule,” you sigh, and it eases her a bit more. It's common courtesy, after all, to say a person's name when you confess your love—or so you think, who knows how this is supposed to go—so you hold back with everything you can. 

She clicks her tongue and lets out a tired laugh, “Fucking ‘Master of Espionage’ can't figure out my fucking name,” and you silently wish you could hear her laugh forever. The smile gracing her features is one you never want to let go, one you want to keep alive for as long as you are.

“That's your job. My job is to make sure the ‘Master of Espionage’ doesn't get shot in the fucking face.”

And she settles. Her eyes give off a light that's betraying her weakness, “Why won't you come with me? Is there something you still need to do?”

It kills you, you don't even know. You don't have an answer for her, let alone a good one, why you can't be with her as she takes the next step into the rest of her life. Or, you couldn't admit that you think she'd never stay with a boring old dope like you who only knows how to pull triggers and crack necks. A young woman as beautiful and sensible as her would be wasted on someone like you—

Like reading your mind, “Stop that. Stop that right now,” she interrupts, and her lips meet yours one last time. She's insistent yet gentle, the way only she could ever be. “I want you… I'll always want you, I think. No matter what you try to convince yourself of.”

“That's cheating.”

“No it isn't,” she giggles again, “I make the rules. Not cheating.”

“Then…” take a deep breath, steel your nerves, “I want you too.”

~~~

“We'll have you on holdover until we can find you a partner.”

“Excuse me?” You can't even begin to believe your ears. It's only been a weekend, you think. And already your partner is…

“Agents can't go out in the field alone. We'll match you with someone and then assign you two a mission.”

It's all but confirmed, then. You try and then fail miserably at forming a cold sweat; it's not like you didn't expect this—in fact, you knew she would. You just didn't think, or hope would be a better word, that she'd go so soon.

You can only stare back at the poor clerk who's only doing his job. Fight down the red that fills your eyes, scold yourself for blaming this guy, or anyone, or everyone, besides you. You're the one who failed to keep her, and there's no one else to point fingers at. 

“You can visit the office floor in the meantime, agent. We'd assign you a cubicle, but in reality we'd have you a partner in about ten—”

“Whatever. I'm not doing field work today.”

The clerk clicks his tongue with a bored feeling, whether disapproval or tediousness, you don't care to place. “Fine,” he sighs, “Records department, cubicle 1A4. Welcome back, agent.”

You head off to your desk and slump in the chair.

~~~

Kempt and tidy, albeit showing signs of gray. Your glasses sit elegantly on your face, making the wrinkles look softer and more welcome than they should. You draw your attention away from the image of you in the window and back to the pretty waiter girl walking towards you.

“Ready to order, sir?” Seeing you nod, she swipes her pencil from her ear and spins it before touching its graphite to the paper. She smiles a familiar smile, one you can't seem to forgive yourself for placing. 

“A mocha, please.”

“Size?”

“Medium.”

“We say ‘venti’ for that.”

“Whatever.”

“Hot or iced?”

“How old do you think I am?”

“Hah, alright. It'll be five minutes, sir.”

She walks away, heading for the counter. For some reason, your nerves are quiet—no alarms blaring, no warning lights flashing. If anything, you're hopeful that it's over and that you could finally leave the past behind you. 

And then you see her. She emerges from some back room, exchanging a few words with the pretty waiter girl. They share a giggle before she turns and spots you. Her jaw drops like she's seen a ghost before shooing away the waiter to the kitchen. 

She takes careful steps, looking around like there's something to find. She's inconspicuous—she hides it well—and slips into the booth opposite you.

Kempt and tidy, albeit showing signs of gray. Her glasses sit elegantly on her face, making the wrinkles look softer and more welcome than they should. She stares at you, wanting to say a million things yet having none come out.

Do the heavy lifting for her, again: “Hi.” 

“I—welcome. You…?”

“Congrats on the whole thing.” You look around: potted plants hang from the ceiling, bright windows let light into the cozy space just like next door. Jazz plays softly in the background like a cliché that fits so damn well. 

“Thank you. You look good.” She smiles, and her eyes crinkle at the corners. She looks you up and down, and you feel yourself doing the same. 

“Yuri,” you whisper, feeling the syllables roll off your tongue and past your lips. It feels forbidden to say, forbidden to hear, yet those laws were lifted so long ago.

She laughs a beautiful laugh, like old times. “How did you find me?”

“I'm sorry I took so long… But I'm here now.”

“You say that like I didn't wait.”

She holds your cheek again, feeling the wrinkles where there used to be residue of war. It's a different feeling, a strange one, but nothing unwelcome. 

You grasp the hand on your cheek, “Is she…?” before watching her give a solemn nod. 

The pretty waiter girl appears beside your booth promptly, setting down your mocha and an americano for your old friend. Yuri shoots a tender yet knowing look at her, but she's only puzzled so far.

“Mom, do you know him?” She glares at you, wondering why her mother has her hand on your cheek. The cogs on her head turn slowly, but they turn nonetheless. “Oh my God…”

“And you must be Mihyun,” you tease, taking a sip of your coffee. It's sweet, bitter, and comforting, much like the end of a long journey where you're all but one more dirt path from home. “Mm, good for a ‘venti.’ But I wanted it iced, though.”

She chuckles in disbelief, but the moment you scoot to make space, she tears up. She sobs lightly as you put your arm around her, and Yuri joins on her other side to wrap her in a tight hug.

“It's very nice to meet you, sweetheart,” you whisper, kissing her hair. “And you too, my love.” Find her once again, eyeing you with that signature mischievous smile as if saying how dare you make my daughter cry. 

“What did you tell her that she isn't kicking me out of here right away?” you laugh, and Yuri laughs back.

“I told her her dad is a wonderful man, and that he always put me first. For a little while, she couldn't understand why I never took a boyfriend. She liked one of the regulars from a long time ago, the handsome one that looked soft and homey, but I said I knew better and she was nice enough to leave it at that.”

“Sounds like I have quite the shoes to fill.”

“Better start now…?”

“Sangja.” You turn red in the face saying it, and just as expected, Yuri snorts.

“Fuck you. All this time, Agent Box?”

“As if you were any better, Agent Glass.”

~~~

a/n: this might be the most fanfiction-y fanfiction i've written so far bc of that namedrop and also for giving her a gun lmao anywayz tune in for squid game s3 next week y'all!!

~

a/n: update y'all they gave her a gun 😭😭😭😭

If only you could help, in any other way than just this.

Pull her closer, hug her tighter, squeeze out all the tears she's keeping deep inside. She grips you right back, wrapping her arms so tight around you like you'll slip away if she loosens. She takes fistfuls of your clothes in her hands all the while her face stays buried in your chest, breathing heavy and pushing out all the negative energy like she always does when she's upset. 

You don't need any more words, only the sobs that finally come as she tears off her professional mask and breaks down. Her sniffles accompany the far-off ticking of the clock in the other room and the silence that lets you hear it—only you.

As if it wasn’t enough that traffic was bad and she was an hour late to the set. Raining, tech issues, and all manners of delays came and went, and the whole team’s lunch hour flitted by and away like the tiny flame on her birthday candle atop the measly cupcake. Low spirits, empty stomach, and every loud “cut” in the director’s nagging voice still ringing in her ears, and the first thing she does as she walks through the door is call out for you.

So you meet her where she is—exhausted, overwhelmed, hanging by a thread—and you hug her back together. Wrap your arms tight around her stiff shoulders and the small of her back, plant kisses on the top of her head while trying to ignore the spent hairspray that starts to coat your lips. You start making mental notes of what you need for the next time the sun blazes high in the sky: detergent, wool balls, and clothespins, as well as ask her what brand of micellar water she uses. 

Yuri pulls away, still sniffling but breathing so much better, makeup unceremoniously torn away from her face like it should be after a rough day. You pat her hair down, and she takes your hands to cup her own cheeks with; your thumbs wipe away the tears that streak inky blackness down the sides of her cheeks, taking the stains anyway, and in that moment, she's as beautiful as she's ever been. Her eyes shine with a quiet flame behind them, heart willing to brave the blows of a universe that never seems to stop issuing her challenge after challenge. Her voice comes in melodious rasps in protest at how the world treated her this day, wanting to pay it back. Her lip trembles with an adamant weakness that has never known surrender, especially not next to someone who's only ever seen her like this and stayed. 

You voice it carefully, “I know, I know. Go,” as you usher her up towards the respectfully awaiting bed. She takes two steps up the stairs before looking back, only to find you waving her off to rest, and she knows you're excited and looking forward to falling in love with her all over again. “Yeah, I got it. 2 a.m., I’ll set your alarm when I come up.” And in that one shining moment, when her lips curl into the sweetest smile you could never, ever get tired of, you fall just a little bit deeper in love with everything she is. 

~~~

The door swings open without so much as a breezing creak, and peeking in you find Yuri already sitting on the edge of the bed and fighting for her life against nodding back off. Come in carefully, keep the breakfast tray balanced despite messing up the arrangement and presentation you've so painstakingly implemented for reasons you can't remember anymore. She looks up in annoyance yet with the slightest hint of curiosity, “You said you'd stay…” as she extends both arms toward you, trying to wrangle you back into her personal space. 

“You're supposed to still be asleep,” allowing yourself in, like she wants. You set the tray down easy on the bedside table, somehow successfully managing not to spill even a drop of her lemon black tea. Her arms wrap around your neck, and she takes a deep breath as soon as your neck is in range for all the sniffing she wants. She tightens her grip around you, making known how upset she is at waking up alone, telling you silently what it'll take to make up for it: she takes in your scent in breaths that reach the very bottom of her lungs, she nuzzles her face into your chest like leaving her scent on your shirt, she holds you tight so you never leave her again. 

She grunts back, “The deal was you stay until I wake up,” her hold tightens and threatens to rip your shirt clean off your back. But she relaxes almost right away, knowing even if the world was ending and everything she knew was wrong, the one thing you’d never, ever do was leave her alone. 

“No, the deal was we beat your alarm together—” before you decide it isn’t worth arguing when she’s being this needy. Luckily, you know exactly what to do instead: sit next to her on the bed, let her do her thing. She sniffs and sniffs and sniffs, moving to a new spot on you each time. It still tickles sometimes, when her hair gets in the way of the kisses she tries planting on wherever she decides to plant them, and especially when stray strands make their way against your nose. But you let her all the same, because you know like it's the simplest thing—because it is—that all she wants is you. 

The silence breaks, and both of you are reminded by your actual deal: her phone buzzes and rings with a soothing alarm, and you reach for it to turn off, fumbling around the bedside table in the process only because Yuri absolutely refuses to let go. “Alright, get up,” you chide, pulling her up by the underarms as she continues to insist on clinging to you. She shares warmth, knowing you love when it’s hers and you’d never turn her away, and it works just a little bit too well. 

“Five more minutes…” she mumbles into your neck, and honestly, how could you refuse? She stays quiet and still, plainly refusing to participate in the grand scheme of things and choosing instead, you. She makes small nibbles on your jaw, leaving light trails of kisses and saliva where she drifts over. And of course you'd want nothing more to indulge her, but not right now; she'll be late. 

“Yuri, please. Let's have breakfast, and when you get home tonight—” but she’s tugging you back down, and before you know it, you’re lying with her against your fluffy pillows and cotton sheets again. She keeps her eyes shut, knowing full well that she’ll fall right back asleep, and you have to shake her awake, to no avail. “You can’t be late again, sweetheart. Please, for me?”

You can feel her animosity at your reminder of her other commitments than you, and she peeks at you with only one eye before making a scene out of turning away from you with an adorable grunt. “You never listen to me,” she huffs, and you can sense even just looking at the back of her head that she’s crossed her arms and rolled her eyes at you already. God, you love her. 

Wrap your arms around her waist, pull her close to you. Her back meets your chest, her hair covers your face, but you wouldn’t have it any other way. Your thumbs rub against her sides, and you feel her hands drift on top of yours. She doesn’t fuss, doesn’t complain, doesn’t even move past snaking her fingers between yours. Gone is the tension that used to coat every single thing she did to get close to you, replaced with… nothing. Her hold on you is light and graceful, not at all like her gripping your shirt and keeping you still to get what she wants. There’s no urgency in the way she fixes her hair away from her neck to ask you for more of the kisses she could never get enough of, nor is there any hurry when she reaches behind and feels for your cheek to lead you where she needs you most. 

And Yuri knows you won’t refuse her like this, not when she’s being so cute about it. She pulls you closer by the cheek, still facing away, until your lips meet the pulse beating on her neck right where it meets her jaw. Like they always do, your kisses bring her giggles to the surface as you kiss her neck, and the last thing she wants to do is move, and making you stop only coming up as a very close second. 

So you stay with her, only if to make up for allegedly failing to hold up your end of the deal. You stay with her as she reorients herself to slip back into the world full of noise and stress and all things she could probably do without. And yet, she’s gracious when it comes to your apologies, “You owe me when I get back tomorrow,” she mumbles, and you can feel against your palm the gentle in-and-out of her belly as she talks and breathes and giggles. Yuri keeps your hand against her skin, right under her shirt, as if she’s trying to tempt you into another two hours of sleep, but you know by now she’s not. 

“I know, Jo Yuri. I’d do anything for you,” you promise, just as the alarm goes off again. She reaches for it herself this time, showing you 2:05 a.m. where she needs to be ready for her hair and makeup at 2:30, “I wish we could’ve seen the sunrise today,” and you plant one last kiss on her cheek before finally giving in to what she wants…

She turns to you, still keeping your hand securely under her shirt, now resting on the dip of her waist, “We have a million sunrises we can see. I’d rather miss one of those than a second with you.” Her fingers trace the outline of your face, drawing a line gently down your cheek as she feels you under her fingertip. “Are you even real? How did I get so lucky to get you to fall for me?” 

You can only chuckle back. “Whatever heroic benevolent deed I did in my past life, I wish I could do it again just to get you back the next time through.” 

“Just take care of me now, please? I’ll do anything I can to find you again in the next life.”

“Deal.”

Yuri scooches closer, up until her forehead is right against yours. She keeps her hand on your cheek, making sure you don’t get to look anywhere else, as if you’d ever want to. She caresses your temples with her thumb, plays with your hair, boops your nose just to watch you feign a blink. Above all else, she stays with you as you stay with her, letting the time pass. 

The breakfast gets colder, the bed gets comfier, and the moon covers more distance across the sky. In a few hours, she’ll be in some car, getting whisked too far away from you to be able to bear, off to the wide and wonderful world that sees the rising starlet Jo Yuri making a name for herself. You knew from the start that she’d always be destined for great things, and you were fine with not being a part of any of it at all. But when she asks that you stay, demands you spend time with her, begs to slow down and let the world spin without her, you start to come to terms with the fact that the million sunrises just about coming your way can wait, while she lets the moon stroll a little slower across the sky of the rest of your lives.