#junhui imagines

“Hm?” you hum, to break the silence.

“You always leave. Why don’t you stay? You’re always welcome to.”

After buttoning up your jeans, you finally turn to look at Jun.

Jun, Jun, Jun. 

It’s hard to focus when he’s sitting up in his bed, looking at you with shiny, earnest eyes. When you know he’s entirely naked underneath the covers. 

It’s always the same. 

You text Jun, or he texts you, you come over to his place when his roommates aren’t home, you let him rearrange your guts for hours, you cuddle under the covers until it gets dark out, then reality kicks in, so you get dressed and leave, convincing yourself that it’s better this way. 

You met Jun six months ago at your college campus’s local bar. Grace, your best friend, was invited to hang out with this guy she was seeing- Wonwoo, so she dragged you along, subjecting you to a dissection into how long it would take for Wonwoo, whom you’d never met, to kiss her. And what kind of kisser he would be. 

Wonwoo turned out to be incredibly handsome, so it only made sense that he had equally handsome friends. Like Wen Junhui. 

However, his personality was a tale as old as time.

I’m not into anything serious.

Haven’t you heard? He never sleeps with the same girl twice.

I like to keep it casual.

It’s not like you had to worry much about this because Jun didn’t notice you at all that whole night. The more Grace dragged you to places to see Wonwoo, the more you saw Jun, and finally, one fateful night in December, he noticed you. 

He was a lot softer than you were expecting, having a genuine conversation with you, bending occasionally to hear you better over the loud noise, looking deep into your eyes like you were the only person in the room. 

It was inevitable that you’d fall into his spell. And his bed. 

You’re not sure if you really like him, because even though he knows every inch of your body and you know every inch of his, you don’t know anything about him. What are his dreams? What does he do for fun? What is his biggest fear? You don’t know and you don’t ask.

It’s better this way.

It’s always going to be better this way.

“I have a cat.”

Jun tilts his head curiously.

“Um, he doesn’t really like my roommates, so I need to be home to feed him and take care of him.”

Jun perks up at this. “I love cats! What’s his name?”

“Peanut.”

The smile you receive is breathtaking. 

“I need to see a picture of Peanut sometime.”

You’re caught so off guard by this whole exchange that you don’t even flinch when he pulls the covers off his body, exposing himself to you before standing.

He grabs your elbow to pull you into his bare body and plants a kiss on your forehead just like he does every time you leave. He’s walking to the bathroom when you suddenly have a thought.

“Wait.”

Jun turns around.

“Do you, perhaps, want to meet Peanut?”

Peanut is the love of your life. He’s a Balinese, so he has super long cream colored fur with a mixture of dark brown around his face and paws. Your favorite features of his are his big, bright blue eyes. 

He’s incredibly apprehensive when you pull Jun forward to introduce them to each other. Peanut immediately runs to hide behind your vanity, slightly peeking his head out like he’s intrigued. You watch in profound dumbness as Jun gets down on his knees and starts meowing back at Peanut. How is Wen Junhui, one of the hottest guys you’ve ever met, this cringey? Before an ick can start to develop, Peanut slowly comes out of his hiding spot, approaching Jun like a fox on the prowl for prey. 

Step by step.

Before you know it, Peanut is curled up in Jun’s arms, purring contently. He looks at you, his big blue eyes saying one thing: I approve.

After taking your much-needed hot, steaming shower, you emerge from the bathroom to find Jun laying on his stomach, playing with Peanut, tapping his paws like a game of cat and mouse, giggling at Peanut’s tiny meows. You smile at the scene, glad that Jun is getting along so well with your cat, who isn’t even fond of your roommates. It also gives you the opportunity to observe the guy you know so little about. 

When you first started messing around with Jun, he had very long bleached blonde hair, bangs framing his incredibly gorgeous and well-structured face. Now his hair is back to its original color- black. It’s still long, parted slightly to the side, with bangs up to his sharp cheekbones. He wears small gold hoops, one on each ear, and lastly, dark brown oval-shaped glasses. When you see Jun outside of his bedroom, he’s typically not wearing his glasses, so you feel the slightest flutter in your heart that only you see him like this.

You also take the time to admire his muscular back, grateful that he chose to only wear loose gray sweatpants. Gosh, where do you even begin? Jun looks very tall and lanky, but underneath everything, he has an extremely well-defined body that you know takes lots of effort to maintain. From his chiseled abs, to his hard pecs, to his bulging arm muscles- you can’t even express just how beautiful he is.

He turns around to you, standing there ogling him, and of course, he gets a bit cocky, even flexing his biceps just for you. 

“I see you and Peanut are getting along?” you hum, curling yourself into Jun’s arms. He stares down at you with a look you’ve never seen in him. Before you know it, his lips are on yours, his big hand cradling the back of your head. It slowly starts to entangle in your hair, and you feel yourself melt into him. 

When you break apart, you feel soft fur brush against your arm. Peanut settles himself on Jun’s chest, nuzzling against his chin. The two of you let out a laugh of disbelief at getting cockblocked by your own cat. But, if you were being honest, you weren’t really in the mood. Just being with Jun like this was all you wanted. 

Draping the covers over him, you nestle into his side, making eye contact with Peanut. Jun wraps his arm around you, massaging your scalp in slow circles. 

“Is it really better this way?” you ask softly.

Jun’s hand in your hair pauses. “What do you mean?”

You shift so you can look up into his face. “Is what we have right now the best for us?”

“No, but to be honest with you, I don’t feel confident in my ability to be a boyfriend. It’s a lot of effort that I selfishly don’t feel like I can give. I just don’t want to disappoint you.” 

Silence fills the room as you process this subtle blow of rejection.

“How about this? Let’s go on a date. We can go to that new chicken spot downtown and get to know each other more?” he asks.

“Really?”

“Yeah. You’re worth trying for,” Jun reassures you with a smile.

𝐀/𝐍 ➙ ahh I adore this story so much!! I really hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I’m usually known for my angst works, so I guess this is my moment to shine hahaha. please don’t hesitate to click out or skip the explicit parts if they make you uncomfortable — this one gets a little intense with the kinktober themes 😭 anyways, reblogs (w/ or w/o tags) are always appreciated. love you lots!!

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The house was older than your name.

It stood past the last turn of the countryside road, half-swallowed by the forest, where even the birds refused to sing. The lawyer had given you the address over a call that sounded static, voice clipped, rushed — like he didn’t want to linger on the topic too long.

“An inheritance, Miss L/N,” he’d said. “A private estate. Been untouched for years. You’re the last living relative.” “Relative of who?” you’d asked. “Of the previous owner, Miss Wen.. if I remember correctly. Distant, very distant. She had no direct heirs. You might want to- ah -look through the documents yourself.”

The call ended before you could ask more.

Now, standing at the foot of the property, suitcase in hand, you realised how words could never have prepared you for this.

It was enormous, but not in the modern sense. The house was alive in its decay — a mansion of forgotten gold and black wood, wrapped in ivy that crawled like veins up the cracked stone. The windows glowed faintly amber, reflecting the dying sun. Even the wind that brushed against your skin felt heavy with something unsaid.

“Okay,” you muttered to yourself, pushing the rusted gates open. “Creepy, but not.. haunted. Hopefully.”

Your footsteps echoed across the gravel path leading up to the grand doors. Each step felt like trespassing on someone’s memory. When you finally pushed the door open, it didn’t screech or fight you like an old hinge should — it sighed, like the house itself was breathing you in.

The first thing that hit you was the smell — grass and rain, faint but fresh, like someone had opened a window minutes ago. The foyer stretched out before you, the chandelier above still glittering under years of dust. Paintings lined the walls. Not landscapes, not still lifes — just portraits. Of the same man.

You paused in front of one. He was handsome in a way that felt wrong for being immortalised in oil paint — sharp jaw, dark, tousled hair that falls around his neck in soft layers, eyes are gentle yet piercing. Scattered across his skin are small, striking moles — near his lips, another on his cheek, and gracing his forehead — as if even the universe couldn’t resist marking beauty where it found it.

Someone had painted him with devotion. You leaned closer. “Whoever you were,” you whispered, “you were definitely the favourite.”

The next few hours passed in quiet exploration. Every room was preserved — sheets draped over furniture, candles that looked half-burned but untouched by time, books still open mid-page on desks. It was eerie, yes, but also intimate. Like someone had just stepped out of the room and would return any minute.

By dusk, exhaustion caught up with you. You found the master bedroom on the second floor — and stopped cold. It was clean. No dust. The bed was made perfectly, the sheets turned down as though waiting. There was even a small vase by the window, a single white rose standing tall in it. You frowned.

“Someone’s been here,” you murmured. Then, louder, calling out just in case, “Hello? Is anyone-?” Silence. Except the faint hum of wind through the old vents. You hesitated, then sighed. “Guess I’ll just lock the door.”

The bed was too soft. Too inviting. You sat down anyway. The pillow smelled faintly of cedar and musk, a scent that didn’t belong to you. Still, the fatigue was pulling you under, and you let your eyes close for just a moment.

—

A breath brushed your neck. So real, so warm, it made every hair on your body stand on end. “You came back.” You bolted upright, eyes scanning the room. “Who’s there?” Nothing. Only the curtains swaying even though the windows were closed.

Your heart hammered as you reached for your phone flashlight. Its glow hit the mirror across the room — and froze you in place. In the reflection, someone stood behind you. A man, tall and pale, dressed in white collared shirt, neckline framing a single pearl necklace that adds a delicate contrast to his look.

Over it, he wears a black tweed jacket interwoven with silver threads, catching light in subtle glints. His expression wasn’t threatening. If anything, he looked relieved. He smiled softly. “You shouldn’t be afraid. I’ve waited long enough.”

You turned around. Empty. Your throat felt dry. “I’m-” You laughed weakly to yourself, trying to shake it off. “definitely calling the real estate agent tomorrow.”

You climbed back into bed, pulling the blanket tightly around your shoulders. But your body refused to relax. When your breathing finally steadied, you noticed something that made your pulse skip again. Your dress.

It had slipped halfway off your shoulder, your collarbone bare. And on your skin, faint as breath, was the outline of a handprint. You stared at it until your eyes blurred, until the scent of roses filled the air, until sleep pulled you back into the dark.

And somewhere, between waking and dreaming, you heard him whisper again — closer this time, almost tender “I’m glad you’re back, Wen Y/N.”

Morning came gently — too gently for an abandoned place. The light that poured through the curtains was soft and gold, catching the dust in the air like glitter. You sat up slowly, your body still wrapped in that hazy, half-remembered dream. There was no handprint now. No scent of smoke or roses. Just quiet.

“Okay,” you whispered, rubbing your eyes. “Maybe I just freaked myself out.” You checked your phone. Now we’re talking. I can definitely live here, there's a signal. It showed the time, 7:43 a.m. You must’ve slept like a rock.

After washing up with the little water that still ran in the bathroom sink, you wandered downstairs. The house looked different in daylight — less ominous, more tragically beautiful. Every surface was layered with dust except for a few areas: the stairs’ rail, the main hallway, the parlour table. Like someone had constantly wiped them.

You knelt beside one of the portraits in the living room and dusted it gently with your sleeve. The man’s painted gaze met yours again, unblinking and patient. His eyes were dark brown, almost gold under the varnish.

There were at least eight portraits in the entire house, all of him. Each painted a little differently: one in uniform, another in casual robes, another holding a book. You moved to the last one by the fireplace — this time, he wasn’t alone.

A woman stood beside him. The artist hadn’t captured her face clearly, but she wore a white dress and veil, hand resting delicately on the man’s arm. A wedding portrait. You tilted your head, curiosity pricking at you. “So.. you were married,” you murmured, brushing the edge of the frame. “And I’m guessing your wife didn’t inherit the place. Lucky me.”

You took a step back, hands on your hips. The house was huge, but not unmanageable. You could make it feel like home again. So you started cleaning.

At first, it was just idle — opening windows, letting air in, humming faintly under your breath. But then something strange happened. The longer you worked, the more you noticed subtle traces of order that weren’t yours: beds already made, a vase refilled with white roses, curtains tied back differently. Someone — or something — had been maintaining this house all along.

You shook your head, deciding to distract yourself before your imagination spiraled like last night. Grabbing your phone, you opened your messages to message your best friend.

Y/N: guess who inherited a horror movie set 😭

Hao 😈: LMAOOO don’t tell me it’s that creepy old mansion your mom mentioned??

Y/N: yeah. the one with zero neighbors and 800 ghosts per square meter

Hao 😈: pls send pics 😭😭

Y/N: hold up

You snapped a few photos: the cracked chandelier, the grand staircase, one of the portraits — you didn’t even realise until later that it was the wedding one.

Y/N: okay ngl it’s pretty. like victorian pretty. you should come here.

Hao 😈: looks like somewhere a hot ghost would haunt.

Y/N: stop! 😭😭

Hao 😈: no bc imagine waking up w/ a ghost husband like “good morning my bride” 💀

Y/N: STOP IT HAO I SWEAR I’LL MOVE OUT

Hao 😈: u say that but u also said ur into tragic romance when bored soooo 👀

You laughed out loud, the sound echoing across the empty hall.

Y/N: fine. if a ghost husband appears i’ll let u know so u can write my obituary.

Hao 😈: deal

You pocketed your phone, still smiling. The house felt a little less lonely now. By afternoon, sunlight filtered through the stained-glass windows, scattering coloured light on the floor. You carried an armful of old books back to the library and froze when you saw one already open on the table — one you knew you hadn’t touched.

Its pages were lined with elegant handwriting. You could barely read the faded ink, but you caught one phrase clearly underlined: “Bound beyond death, by name and vow.” A chill ran down your arms. You shut the book gently, heart thudding. “Okay.. enough cleaning for today.”

Outside, the wind had stopped entirely. The forest was silent. The only sound left in the house was your breathing — and somewhere, faintly, a low hum. Like someone singing through the walls.

The house was quiet that night. Too quiet.

You settled at the desk with your laptop, your only source of light a small lamp you’d brought from your old apartment. The rest of the room lay in shadows, the wallpaper peeling faintly in the corners as if the air itself had been holding its breath for years.

You cracked your knuckles, muttering, “Okay. Chapter sixty-three. Let’s do this.” The blinking cursor greeted you like an old friend.

Your book — To Breathe Again — had been a year in the making, and your editor had been hounding you for pages. The irony of working on a novel about necromancy wasn’t lost on you. You even laughed about it when you messaged Minghao earlier those years.

Y/N: if i start writing ghost love stories don’t pick me up, i’m doing the right thing

Hao 😈: u kinky mf

Y/N: shut up 😒

Hao 😈: ok but if u get possessed can u at least ask the ghost to edit my thesis

You shook your head, smiling to yourself before getting back to work. Hours passed unnoticed, the rhythm of typing filling the silence like a heartbeat. Sometimes you swore you could hear faint footsteps pacing the hallway — the kind that made the wooden floor groan softly, like memory itself stretching awake. Every time you paused to listen, the sound stopped.

Around 2 a.m., you leaned back in your chair and sighed. “One more paragraph,” you told yourself. But the words on the screen blurred together, and your head eventually dipped forward. You must’ve dozed off right there at the desk.

When you woke, it was morning again. The sun slanted through the tall windows, warm on your face. You blinked against the light, you woke up in the bed “ahm.. did I sleep walk here last night?” you mumbled, stretching your arms.

But your body felt sore in a way that didn’t make sense — like you’d been tossing in bed for hours, muscles overworked and trembling faintly. Your nightgown clung to your skin, a little too loose at the collar and ends almost reaching your hips.

You frowned, rubbing your eyes. It hurts. That’s when you noticed your laptop. The document you’d been writing was still open — but your last sentence had changed. Instead of “She pressed her hand against the cold stone altar..” the words now read:

She pressed her hand against the warmth of his chest and whispered, “I’m home.”

Your heart stuttered. You didn’t remember typing that. And yet.. the phrasing sounded exactly like something you would write. You closed the laptop slowly, the faint scent of something — cedar, musk, and roses — lingering in the air, as if someone had been beside you all night, breathing close enough to touch.

The smell of sizzling butter filled the kitchen, the sound of eggs hitting the pan soft and rhythmic. Sunlight pooled faintly through the old lace curtains, dust swirling in golden ribbons. You could almost pretend the house wasn’t haunted — that it was just another quiet morning.

Almost.

You rolled your shoulders, wincing. There was still a deep, dull ache running through your muscles, especially between your thighs. “Did I- sleep weird?” you muttered, rubbing the back of your neck. You brushed off the thought with a nervous laugh and reached for the salt.

It must’ve been another one of those dreams. The kind that felt too real, too heavy. You remembered flashes — pale fingers tracing your skin, a whisper against your ear. The dream man’s touch had been so vivid that your body still remembered the heat. You’d seen his face this time too, clear and unblurred, framed by soft candlelight.

And it wasn’t just any face.

Your gaze drifted across the kitchen, toward the hallway where the portraits hung — the ones you’d noticed. You froze, spatula hovering midair.

The reflection in the hallway mirror caught him perfectly — the same slanted eyes, the same mouth curved like a secret. You blinked, once, twice, stepping closer to make sure your eyes weren’t playing tricks.

It was him.

The man from your dreams.

Your stomach dropped, pulse quickening in your throat. He’d been here all along, hanging silently in those frames, watching you from the moment you arrived.

You forced a shaky laugh, brushing stray hair from your face. “Okay. Creepy coincidence. It’s just- just the power of suggestion, right?” you told yourself, trying to sound convinced. “You saw the portrait before bed, your brain mashed it into a dream. Simple.”

The portrait didn’t answer. Behind you, the stove hissed. And for the briefest moment — just before you turned off the heat — you thought you heard a low voice whisper near your ear, soft and familiar “Good morning, my bride.”

You froze mid-breath.. again, every hair on your neck standing up. The voice was right there. Close enough that you could feel the faintest whisper of air brush past your ear. Your body reacted before your brain did.

“WHAT THE!” You spun around with the frying spatula raised like a weapon, egg still clinging to the edge. “WHO’S THERE?! I SWEAR I’LL- I’LL FLIP YOU TO HELL!!”

“Please don’t,” came a calm, almost amused voice from somewhere behind you. It wasn’t echoing, wasn’t hollow — it sounded real. Too real. “You’ll stain the walls with yolk, and I quite like our kitchen.”

Your eyes darting around the empty room. No one. Nothing. Just the faint sound of your pan still sizzling. Your heart hammered against your ribs. “Who- who said that?” Silence. Then, softly: “Jun.”

You blinked. “Jun..? What? Huh- ha?!” A small pause, then a low hum that almost sounded like a chuckle. “So you can hear me. That’s good.”

Your grip tightened on the spatula. “Okay. Either I’m losing it, or I’m being haunted by a polite ghost who cares about kitchen hygiene.” “Haunted?” Jun sounded genuinely offended. “That’s a rather cruel word for a husband, don’t you think?”

You gawked at the air. “Excuse me- husband?!” “Yes.” His tone softened, almost fond. “You’ve been wearing my ring.” You glanced down — and nearly dropped the spatula. On your left hand, glinting faintly in the sunlight, was a thin silver band. You had no idea when it got there.

“Oh hell no,” you whispered, yanking it off. “This is not happening.” Jun’s laugh was gentle, teasing. “You always say that. I miss hearing from you.”

“What- no, no, no! Don’t gaslight me, Casper!” “That’s not my name.” “I don’t care!” you shouted at the air. “You-! Get out of my house! Out! Whatever supernatural lease you think you have here, it’s over!”

“I’m afraid it’s not,” he said lightly. “This house is also mine.. and to you.” You dragged a hand down your face, spatula still clutched tight. “Great. Fantastic. I move into a cursed house, and my new roommate is a ghost husband with boundary issues.”

There was a low, almost bashful chuckle. “You weren’t complaining last night.” You froze, eyes wide. “Excuse me?” But the voice didn’t answer this time — just a faint, amused hum that faded into the creak of the old walls.

You pointed the spatula at the ceiling. “Don’t you dare ghost-laugh at me, Jun!” Somewhere, you swore you heard the faintest echo of a grin in his voice, that made you drop your spatula “You’re cute when you’re angry, my bride.”

—

You sat at the kitchen counter, laptop open, breakfast cold. The spatula still lay on the floor where you’d dropped it mid-crisis. Your phone buzzed beside your plate. You snatched it up like a lifeline.

[Group chat: “Emergency Life Updates (aka Therapy)]

Y/N: besties i think my house is haunted

Hao 😈: LMAOOOO it’s been 3 days, that’s a record. what happened suddenly??

Y/N: some man’s voice called me his wife while i was making eggs

Min 😵‍💫: ..was he hot at least???

Y/N: I DON’T KNOW I DIDN’T EVEN SEE HIM

Min 😵‍💫: so u married a ghost sight unseen 💀 bold of u

Y/N: IM NOT MARRIED

Hao 😈: sure kinky mf who’s writing a novel exactly with that plot, i think u manifested it loll

Y/N: also i think he’s a victorian ghost level polite. kept saying “my bride” like bro calm down

Min 😵‍💫: LMFAO STOPPPP this is going in my notes. “haunted by horny regency ghost”

Y/N: NO 😭😭

Hao 😈: did u check the portraits u sent me? maybe he’s one of those men 👀

Y/N: that’s the thing. IT’S HIM.

Hao 😈: oh.

Min 😵‍💫: …babe.

Hao 😈: are u sure ur not just having like, a super vivid lucid dream? u do write romance for a living.

Y/N: im literally wide awake and my ghost just argued with me about kitchen cleanliness

Hao 😈: sounds husband material to me. when’s the wedding??

Min 😵‍💫: more like when was the wedding LMAOOO

You groaned, burying your face in your hands. “Why are my friends like this,” you muttered aloud. Why is Mingyu missing out of all times.. Seokmin and Minghao are no help. From somewhere down the hall, a familiar voice replied, low and teasing, “Are you in distress?”

You shrieked and nearly dropped your phone. “HAO HE’S HERE AGAIN.”

Hao 😈: ok listen before u start performing an exorcism, record it. i want receipts.

Y/N: u want me to RECORD THE DEMON?

Hao 😈: for science.

Y/N: i hate you.

You peeked over your shoulder, heart pounding. “Jun?” “I’m here,” came the smooth reply, closer now. “You don’t need to shout, my love.” You stiffened. “Don’t call me that!” “I can’t,” he said softly, like it was the saddest truth in the world. “You’re all I have left.”

The words hung in the air, so gentle it almost made you forget the absurdity of the moment. Almost. You typed one last message with shaky fingers.

Y/N: ok yeah maybe the ghost husband is kinda sad and not bad

Min 😵‍💫: so u admit he’s hot

Y/N: BLOCKED.

You set your phone down, exhaling deeply. “Okay.. Jun,” you muttered, scanning the empty room. “If we’re really doing this ghost tenant thing, why are you still here?” A quiet laugh brushed your ear like wind.

“Devotion. It ties me to the house.. to you.” You groaned. “Oh my god. He’s poetic too.”

It started the same way it had the last two nights. The soft creak of floorboards. The faint shift of weight on the mattress. The air cooling around you as if someone had opened a window. You didn’t move this time.

“Jun,” you whispered into the dark. “You’re here again, aren’t you?” Silence, then “I always am.” His voice came from beside you, smooth as velvet, threaded with something ancient. “You sleep so restlessly when I’m not.” “I sleep restlessly because there’s a ghost in my bed,” you muttered, sitting up halfway.

“Do you even.. sleep?” He chuckled, the sound low and fond. “No. Not anymore.” You exhaled through your nose, squinting into the faint light spilling through the curtains. “Okay, let’s try this again. Who are you, Jun?”

“I’ve told you,” he said gently. “I am your husband.” You rolled your eyes. “That’s not an answer. A name and a marital claim don’t explain why I wake up sore, by the way.” A pause. His voice softened, almost guilty. “I haven’t touched you without your consent.”

You arched a brow toward the darkness. “Really? Because my sore thighs say otherwise.” “I swear it.” His tone deepened, steady and earnest. “Your body aches from something else — the remnants of the bond. The house.. it remembers. And through it, so does your body.”

“The house remembers?” you repeated, half a scoff, half a laugh. “Jun, that’s not- that’s not even science. That’s..” “Magic,” he finished for you, quiet but unyielding.

You stared at the shadows for a long moment. “You expect me to believe that I’m some reincarnated bride living in a haunted love nest?” “I don’t expect you to believe,” he murmured. “Only to listen.”

Your throat tightened — something about the way he said it felt real. Too real. You tried to sound casual. “Then why are you here? Why can’t you just.. move on? Find peace, cross the afterlife, whatever ghosts are supposed to do.”

A silence. Then the faintest brush of a cold fingertip against your wrist — hesitant, reverent. “Because my peace was buried with you.” You froze. “You’ve got the wrong girl,” you whispered, voice trembling despite yourself.

“Perhaps,” Jun said softly. “But tell me, why do you wake up with my name on your lips?” You blinked, stunned. “I- I don’t.” “You do,” he said simply. There was no arrogance in it, only sorrow.

You fell quiet for a moment, staring at the darkness that felt far too alive. “You really didn’t do anything?” “No,” he said, and this time his voice was gentle enough to make you believe him. “Only kissed you when you were dreaming. You looked so lonely.”

Your heart squeezed. “That’s still technically not consent.” He laughed quietly, the sound curling through the air like smoke. “Then I’ll ask properly next time.”

You sighed, lying back down. “There’s not going to be a next time.” “I said that once too,” he murmured. You pulled the blanket over your face, trying to hide your smile. “You’re so dramatic for someone dead.”

“I was dramatic before I died,” he countered, teasing now. “You said you liked it.” You turned to where you thought he was, whispering, “You talk too much.” “And you listen too little.”

Somewhere between his chuckle and your quiet hum of annoyance, your eyes slipped closed. The bed dipped slightly, just enough for you to feel the outline of someone lying beside you. And though you told yourself you didn’t believe in ghosts, you still whispered, just before sleep took you,

“Goodnight, Jun.” A hand — cold but gentle — brushed your hair back. “Goodnight, Y/N.”

—

You pushed the front door open with your shoulder, grocery bags cutting into your fingers, sunlight spilling in behind you.

“Jun!” you called out, voice echoing across the empty living room. “I was literally talking to you outside for ten minutes simply about if you do eat or not, and then I realised-” You paused dramatically, setting the bags down on the counter. “You weren’t even there!”

There was a soft hum from somewhere near the hallway — warm, amused. “Why are you talking to yourself outside?” Jun said. You glared toward the voice. “Don’t turn this on me. The delivery guy looked at me like I’d lost my mind. I thought you’re with me. This past few weeks, you never leave me alone”

He chuckled quietly, the sound wrapping around you. “Would you rather I scare other people half to death? Also, I can’t help you outside anyway”

You huffed, unpacking the paper bags. “Still. You could’ve… I don’t know. Come with me? You never go out.” There was a pause — not defensive, just words. “I can’t,” he said simply. Your hands stilled on a carton of milk. “Can’t?”

“The house is my boundary,” he explained. “My anchor. I’m bound here — by the curse, by memory, by you. Step beyond the threshold and I start to fade.” You turned toward the sound, heart softening. “That’s awful.”

“It’s tolerable,” he murmured. “I was alone here for so long before you came.” Your chest tightened. “Jun..” He spoke again, light but wistful. “Besides, I like it here. You fill the rooms with noise and scent and warmth. It’s almost enough to feel alive again.”

You rolled your eyes — to hide the sudden pang of emotion. “You sound like a bad poem.” “I was a bad poet once,” he teased. “You threw my drafts into the fire.” You froze mid-unpacking. “What?” He laughed, low and delighted. “Ah — perhaps that was another life.”

You shook your head, smiling despite yourself. “You’re insufferable.” “I missed being called that,” he said softly.

The quiet after that settled gently, like a comfortable silence between old friends, or husband and wife..? You busied yourself with arranging the vegetables, pretending you didn’t notice the way the air thickened slightly around you — Jun standing close, unseen but undeniably there.

“Hey,” you said after a moment. “If you can’t go out.. what do you do all day when I’m gone?” “I watch,” he said simply. “Creepy.” “Protectively,” he amended, amused. “I walk through the halls. Listen to the wind. Sometimes I read over your shoulder when you’re writing.”

You shot a look toward the dark corner of the kitchen. “That’s definitely creepy.” “Then perhaps,” he said, voice warm with laughter, “I’ll keep doing it.” You couldn’t help it — you laughed too, shaking your head. “You’re impossible, Jun.”

“I was told I made an impossible husband,” he said, tone dipping into something soft, almost nostalgic. “But I like to think I’m improving.” You ignored the way your heart skipped. “Keep the flattery for someone you can actually touch.”

Another pause — this one quieter, heavier. Then: “I can touch you.. just to remind you,” he murmured.

You swallowed, suddenly unsure what to say. The light from the window dimmed as clouds rolled in outside, shadows crawling gently across the old wood floor. You pretended to focus on your groceries again, voice light but trembling slightly.

“Well,” you said, “if you’re going to touch me, at least help me unpack next time.” A faint rustle answered you — the bag of rice shifting slightly on its own, sliding closer to the cabinet.

You froze. Then laughed, a soft disbelieving sound. “Show-off.” From behind you hear his amused whisper, low and tender “Only for my wife.”

—

It was past midnight, the kind of hour where even the wind outside seemed half-asleep. The house was wrapped in silence, save for the soft rustle of paper as you turned another page of your book. The lamp beside your bed cast a warm circle of light that didn’t quite reach the corners of the room, where the dark always seemed to breathe.

You could feel him there. “Jun,” you said quietly, without looking up. “Are you here?” A pause — then that familiar voice, soft and close. “I’m always here.”

You smiled faintly, still reading. “That’s supposed to be comforting, right?” “I suppose that depends,” he murmured, “on whether you believe I’m haunting you or protecting you.”

You tilted your head toward the voice. “You keep saying you’re not haunting me, but it sure feels like it sometimes.” “Would a haunt make your tea every morning?” he teased gently.

“That was you?” You blinked. “I thought I was just.. sleepwalking.” “I can’t do much,” he said quietly, “but I can move little things when the night is kind to me.”

You shut the book slowly, the words blurring. “Why do you do it?” “Because you forget to take care of yourself when you write,” he said simply. “You get lost. I don’t want to see you vanish the way I did.”

Your breath caught. “The way you did?” He didn’t answer at first — only silence, deep and heavy, filled the room. Then, softly “I loved too fiercely. Enough to tether my soul here.” You looked toward the darkness, where you thought his voice had come from. “For her? Your wife?”

A faint laugh, like wind through old glass. “For you.” The room suddenly felt colder, your heart lurching against your ribs. “Jun, that’s-” “I know,” he interrupted gently. “It doesn’t make sense. Not to you. Not yet.”

You pulled the blanket tighter around you, eyes scanning the space though you knew you wouldn’t see him. “You sound like a tragic novel waiting to happen.” “Perhaps that’s why you were drawn here,” he said softly. “Writers always return to unfinished stories.”

You exhaled, half a sigh, half a shaky laugh. “You make everything sound like fate.” “Isn’t it?” His voice was closer now — you swore you felt the faintest brush of fingers along your hair, so gentle you might’ve imagined it.

“You should sleep,” he murmured. “The world outside can wait.” “Are you staying?” you asked, eyes drooping. “I never left.” You smiled faintly, a small surrender, before your eyelids fluttered closed.

Jun stayed — unseen but so achingly near, his presence hovering like a heartbeat in the dark. And when your breathing evened out, his whisper came, softer than a sigh “You once told me you’d find me again. I suppose you always keep your promises.”

The cafe was the kind that looked like a Pinterest board come to life — soft lighting, fern leaves drooping over every table, the faint hum of an espresso machine mixing with lo-fi music. You sat by the window with your laptop open, pretending to edit your manuscript while your three best friends interrogated you like you were on trial.

“So,” Hao started, sipping his iced latte dramatically, “how’s married life?” You choked on your drink. “What- excuse me?” Min snorted. “Don’t play dumb. You literally sent us a picture of another portrait and said, He’s kinda hot for a dead guy. Don’t tell me you’re not crushing on the house ghost.”

You pressed your fingers against your temple. “I was joking!” “Were you, though?” Gyu cut in, deadpan as ever. “You also texted last night that someone made you tea again. Either you have a kind spirit or a trespasser with excellent domestic skills.”

Seokmin gasped theatrically. “Or maybe both!” You groaned, burying your face in your hands. “He’s a ghost.” “Then why are you blushing?” Minghao leaned forward with a grin. “Look at her, Seok- she’s blushing!”

“I am not!” you hissed, but your cheeks burned hotter than the cappuccino in front of you. “He’s just..” You stopped, realising how ridiculous it would sound to admit that Jun talked to you every night. That he teased you, cared for you, comforted you in ways that humans can’t even do.

Mingyu leaned back, stirring his coffee lazily. “You’re acting like you’ve got a boyfriend who only comes out after dark.” You glared at him. “He’s not my boyfriend.” Seokmin propped his chin on his hands. “Not yet.”

Hao laughed so hard he nearly spilled his drink. “God, this is gonna be one of her novels, isn’t it? Lonely writer moves into a haunted house, ghost falls in love with her, she says it’s a curse, but he says it’s destiny-”

“Stop quoting my life!” you interrupted, waving your spoon like a weapon. “You guys are the worst.” “We’re the realists,” Min said, still smirking. “You just happen to be living inside your own plot twist.”

For a moment, they all laughed, that kind of carefree, echoing laugh that only happens in midday cafes. You joined in too, trying to drown out the strange warmth you felt under your ribs.

Your laughter stuttered, your eyes darting toward the window. The glass reflected only you and your friends — no one else. You sometimes think every time you’re outside, is he bored at home? Is he okay? That quiet presence. A part of you just wants to stay at home.

“See?” Min teased, nudging you. “She’s spacing out. Probably thinking about her ghost husband.” You forced a laugh, looking back at him, heart racing. “Yeah,” you said softly. “Something like that.”

The cafe hummed with lazy afternoon chatter. You sat across from Minghao, Seokmin, and Mingyu, who somehow turned what was supposed to be a casual catch-up into a full-blown roast session.

“You’re into ghosts now, huh? So that’s why you’re not dating anyone alive?” Hao said, chuckling. You jabbed a straw at him. “Minghao, I swear to God-” Gyu raised an eyebrow. “What’s his name again?” You hesitated. The word caught on your tongue. “Jun.”

All three of them stared for a beat before Min smirked. “Jun? You even named him?” “I didn’t name him!” you said quickly. “That’s what he-” You froze. “That’s what his real wife, maybe, called him.”

“Right.” Mingyu nodded, clearly unconvinced. “So this ghost talks to you, cooks for you, and sleeps beside you-” “He doesn’t sleep beside me!” you blurted, heat rising to your cheeks. “He just- he-” “Uh-huh.” Seokmin grinned. “You’re doomed, man. She’s in deep.”

You tried to laugh it off, but your pulse was unsteady. Because later, when you were back home and the house greeted you with that quiet stillness, the laughter from earlier still echoed faintly in your head — you called Jun, yet no one was responding.

You frowned. He always answered when you came home. Even just a faint, teasing whisper — You’re late, little human. But tonight, nothing. Just the quiet hum of air through the vents and the faint ticking of the antique clock in the foyer.

“Okay,” you muttered to yourself, forcing a laugh. “So we’re doing the ghost-silent-treatment thing now? Cute.” You busied yourself in the kitchen, slamming a cabinet or two a little louder than necessary. Still nothing. The quiet felt heavier now — not the peaceful kind, but the kind that watches you.

“Jun.” You called again, voice sharper. “If you’re mad at me for something, at least say it. Don’t just.. vanish.” The air stirred faintly behind you, like a breath on your neck. You turned, but the space was empty. A shiver ran down your arms.

“Come on. Don’t tell me you’re sulking because I went out with my friends.” You rolled your eyes, more to convince yourself than anything. “You’re not seriously mad, right?” Still nothing. You exhaled. “Fine. Silent treatment it is. You win. I’ll just talk to myself then.”

You started rambling, pacing the living room like a stand-up comic trying to fill dead air. “For the record, they’re friends. Normal, breathing, alive friends who buy me coffee and don’t haunt my house.”

The chandelier above flickered faintly. You stopped. “Did I strike a nerve there?” A faint hum of energy prickled across your skin — the sign that he was listening, even if he didn’t want to admit it.

You sighed, softer now. “You know, it’s kind of unfair. You disappear when I talk to other people, but then you act like I’m supposed to just stay here waiting for you to materialise out of thin air.” The silence stretched.

You pressed your lips together. “I’m not yours, Jun.”

That’s when you heard it — not a loud voice, but something that slid into your mind like a thought that wasn’t yours. “Aren’t you?” You froze. The temperature dropped suddenly, enough for your breath to fog in front of you.

“You wear my ring,” his voice murmured now, closer, though he still wasn’t visible. “You live in my house. You sleep in my bed. You call my name every night without realising it.”

You spun toward the sound. “You didn’t answer when I came home. You scared me.” “I know.” The reply was soft, low, guilty — but underneath it, something darker stirred. “You talked about me with them,” Jun continued, voice drifting between the walls, nearer and nearer. “You laughed. You blushed. Did you enjoy that?”

“Jun,” you warned, heart pounding, “how did you even-? Don’t do this.” He let out a breath of what almost sounded like a laugh. “You think I don’t feel it? Every time someone says your name, every time you smile at someone else, it burns.”

Your pulse quickened, a strange mix of fear and warmth tightening in your chest. “You’re not even alive, Jun. What are you implying?” “Maybe not,” he whispered. “But you still make me feel it.”

You swallowed hard, staring at the faint outline of his form starting to shimmer near the hallway mirror — not solid yet, just smoke and memory. “Then don’t disappear like that again,” you said quietly. “If you can feel something, then talk to me. Don’t just.. leave.”

For a heartbeat, nothing. Then the faintest smile crossed his half-formed face. “You missed me.” You scoffed. “You were sulking.” “I was angry,” he corrected. “Because for a moment, I thought maybe you preferred your men.” You looked at the mirror — at his faint, sorrowful expression behind your reflection.

“They're not my men.. they’re my friends. You’re impossible,” you whispered. “And you,” Jun said softly, “are the only thing I’ve wanted in centuries.”

The room stilled. The air grew warmer. You felt the ghost of fingers trace the outline of your wrist — not cold, but not quite warm either. Just real enough to make you tremble.

Jun's reflection leaned closer, his gaze locked on your lips. His hands moved from your wrist to either side of your head, trapping you gently between his ghostly palms. “Say you're mine,” he whispered, his voice low and urgent.

You didn’t answer. He held your hands and pulled you near the mirror, “Do you need to see me, for you to talk?” he said, a little annoyed, you’re not sure whether to you or to himself. You looked directly at the mirror, memorising his ethereal face.

His hands framed your face, thumbs gently brushing your cheeks as he stared into your eyes, making you look at his direction directly, nothing, you can see nothing. But you could feel his presence, his breath ghosting over your neck. “I'm not in the mirror, my wife” he murmured, voice coming from both directions. “I'm here.”

The ghostly hands slid from your cheeks to the back of your neck, fingers tangling in your hair. He leaned in closer, his translucent lips hovering just above yours. “Let me kiss you,” he whispered against your mouth. “Please.”

You smiled.. “only because you asked this time.” Jun's reflection smiled, his eyes crinkling at the corners. He loved when you teased him, even a little. It meant you weren't scared of him. “Only because I asked?” He repeated softly, his voice ghosting over your lips. “You admitted before that you did without my consent.”

His expression turned serious, one hand moving to gently grasp your chin, turning your face slightly as if preparing to kiss you but stopping himself. “I’m sorry. That was my mistake.” His thumb brushed over your bottom lip. “This time.. will be different.”

He stared at you intently, his hands steady and gentle. “I'll ask for permission every time. I'll wait for your agreement. And if you say no, I'll stop.” His voice was quiet, sincere. His eyes searched yours, looking for understanding.

You parted your lips slightly to answer. “Then go on.” That was all Jun needed. He surged forward, capturing your mouth softly at first. He tested your response — one hand cupped your cheek possessively while the other slid around your waist. You hummed softly, making him deeper. Now this is weird but also kinda hot.. I’m kissing the air.

Jun’s kiss grew more insistent, his tongue gently probing your mouth. He tasted sweet, like a phantom memory of honey and mint. His hands roamed from your waist downwards until they gripped onto your hips firmly pulling you closer towards him. You can feel him.

You gasped against his mouth as he pulled you closer, his cold hands gripping your hips tightly. Jun took advantage of your open mouth, deepening the kiss even further by pushing his tongue inside. He tangled it with yours, exploring your mouth thoroughly as if he was trying to memorise the taste of you. “Fucking hell, you taste like heaven.”

“For someone who’s dead, you curse so strongly.” You said laughing in between the kisses. In the mirror, you can see him smirking against your lips, his voice husky and amused. “Even ghosts can curse when they’re kissing someone they’ve been longing for.” His hands slid down to your thighs lifting them slightly as if trying to pull them around his waist.

You giggled, the sound muffled against his mouth. Jun groaned, the vibration sending shivers down your spine. He pulled harder, attempting to wrap your legs around his unseen waist. The mirror grew warmer, fogging up completely as their kiss grew more intense, more desperate.

“Jun.. my imaginations may be wild, yet I can’t do this to someone I can only see in the mirror”

Jun’s smirk faltered. For a second, his reflection looked as though it was flickering — as if even his smile could no longer hold shape. Then he stepped back, his eyes dark and distant. “You can’t see me because you’re not supposed to.”

Before you could ask what that meant, his hand — cold but firm — grasped your wrist. The mirror rippled like water as he pulled you through the hallway. You stumbled after him, feet barely touching the ground, until you reached a door you had never opened before. It was the last one at the end of the corridor at the third floor — carved oak, locked since the day you moved in.

“Jun, wait-” But the door creaked open on its own, revealing a dimly lit room heavy with the scent of old wood and faded perfume. Dust particles drifted lazily in the air, but beneath the decay, everything was preserved. A canopy bed stood at the center, its sheets neat, untouched. A wedding veil lay folded at the pillow’s edge.

“This room” you whispered. “I never-” “Because you weren’t meant to remember it.”

Jun’s voice was quieter now, stripped of playfulness, stripped of warmth. He stood by the window, you can’t even see his figure under the pale afternoon light. You could see the garden though — but you know his eyes were solid, endless, tired.

“You walk through this house like a stranger because you are one. But once, you weren’t.” Your chest tightened. “What are you saying?” He looked at you, a faint tremor in his hands. “You can’t see me because you can’t even remember who I am.”

The words felt like a knife — sharp, but dull in disbelief. “That’s impossible. I just moved here. I just-” Jun shook his head. “No. You came back.” He stepped closer. His voice softened, trembling with a kind of desperation you’d never heard from him before.

“You promised me you would, before you died.” Your breath caught. “Died?” “Before you died,” he said again, slower this time, as if tasting every syllable. “You said you would find me. You said, ‘Wait for me. Even if it takes lifetimes, I’ll come back.’”

You blinked rapidly, a faint ringing in your ears. Your mind refused to accept it — but your body remembered something. A pulse in your fingertips. A flash of a wedding ring. A man’s laughter. A voice saying My Jun.

He continued, eyes glimmering like glass. “I remembered everything. That’s my curse. I have lived every life remembering you — who you were, how you died, how you looked at me the day we said our vows. Every damn lifetime.”

The room felt like it was spinning. You staggered back a step and looked around the room, dizzy. That’s where you realise, this room is the real master bedroom, with another portrait.. where Jun and the same woman from downstairs. The difference is that you could see her face clearly now.

A face that is very familiar to you. A face that you see everyday. It’s your face. It’s you. “No.. Jun, that can’t be real. That’s-” “You’ve always said that,” he whispered. “Every life. Every time we meet, you never remember at first. But I always do. And every time, I find you.”

You shook your head, heart pounding painfully. “Then why am I here? Why this house?” “Because it’s where we lived,” Jun said simply. “Where I built a home for you. And where I died waiting when you didn’t come back.”

Your lips parted, but no sound came out. He looked around the room, his gaze softening with memory. “They called it devotion. I called it punishment. I’ve been bound here, in this house, between life and death, waiting for you. Every creak of the floorboards, every breeze through the window — it’s been you I’ve been calling.”

You sank onto the edge of the bed, the veil beside you brushing against your hands. “Then.. I died?” Jun nodded slowly. “You did. In this life, you lost control of your car the day before our wedding anniversary. You were coming here.” He knelt before you, his touch barely grazing your knee, but warm now, almost human.

“You survived,” he whispered. “But you lost your memory. You forgot me.” Tears burned your eyes before you even realised you were crying. “So that’s why I can’t see you. Because part of me still refuses to remember.”

Jun smiled sadly, brushing your tears away with fingers that faded halfway through the motion. “You can’t see me because you don’t believe in me anymore. And without your belief, I’m barely here.”

You tried reaching out to touch him, his hands guiding your hands to his face — his cheek, his hair, anything solid — but your hand passed through his face like mist.

Until it didn’t.

Warmth bloomed under your touch. Solid. Living. Real. You gasped softly, feeling your heartbeat stumble as Jun’s features sharpened in front of you — the faint curve of his smile, the mole beneath his eye, the soft slope of his nose. He was no longer just a shimmer in the mirror; he was right there.

He was beautiful. And familiar. He’s divine.

The air pulsed once and then everything tilted. The floor beneath your feet dissolved, colours shifting, walls melting into light. You blinked and suddenly, the world changed.

Sunlight streamed through the canopy of white sakura trees, their petals falling like snow. You stood under an arch woven with lilies and pearls, your hands trembling as Jun slid a ring onto your finger.

“Do you promise to haunt me even if I die first?” you teased, your voice catching from laughter and tears. Jun’s lips curved into that same half-smile you’d later dream about. “I’d rather haunt the world than live in it without you.”

You threw your head back, laughing softly, pressing your forehead to his. “That sounds like a curse.”He smiled against your lips. “Then I’ll gladly be cursed.”

—

You stood in front of the house you live in now — only brighter, newer. Boxes piled high on the porch, sunlight filtering through the vines climbing the walls. Jun appeared behind you, wrapping his arms around your waist. “Our forever home,” he said, kissing your temple.

“It’s old,” you murmured. “And it creaks.” “So do we, sometimes.” You laughed, swatting at him. “That’s not romantic.”

He leaned closer, whispering, “Then let me try again.” He kissed your shoulder gently. “Our love will creak too, old, stubborn, and impossible to let go.”

—

The sound of clinking porcelain. You sat at the wooden kitchen table, hair still messy from sleep, while Jun poured you tea with that same careful grace he did everything with.

He kissed the back of your hand. “You always forget breakfast when you write.” “And you always act like I’ll starve in two hours,” you said, rolling your eyes playfully.

“Because you will,” he replied, sliding the cup toward you. “My wife, the novelist who forgets she has a body.” You smiled, reaching out to tug him closer by the tie. “You talk too much hubby.”

He chuckled. “I love you” you smiled “I love you more”

—

The clock struck midnight, the house silent except for the faint hum of the record player. You were in your pajamas, barefoot on the hardwood floor. Jun appeared behind you, holding out his hand.

“Dance with me,” he said simply. “There’s no music.” “There’s us.”

You laughed, slipping your hand into his. He spun you once, your laughter echoing in the dim light. The two of you swayed lazily, the world shrinking to the warmth of his hands on your waist and the sound of your quiet breaths syncing together.

—

Thunder boomed outside, rain drumming against the windows. You were both huddled in front of the fireplace, wrapped in a single blanket. “Tell me something true,” you murmured, tracing his palm with your finger.

Jun’s gaze softened. “When I first saw you, I thought I had seen you before. Like in a dream that I’d already lived.” “And did you?” you asked.

His silence was long, his thumb brushing your cheek. “Maybe I’ll tell you in another life.” You frowned. “That’s unfair.” “Then stay with me in this one,” he whispered, voice low, almost pleading.

Both of you laughed, as the warmth between you two became one, cuddling at the stormy weather at the bed.

—

“Jun, stop reading over my shoulder!” you groaned, swatting him lightly with your pen. “I can’t help it,” he said, grinning. “Your characters sound like us.” “They do not.”

“They do. ‘The stubborn man who won’t take no for an answer,’” he quoted dramatically, pointing to the page. “That’s clearly me.” You threw a crumpled paper at him. “Then I’ll kill your character next.”

“Then I’ll haunt you,” he teased, eyes glimmering. You rolled your eyes. “Then I’ll marry you out of guilt.” “Perfect. My plan worked.”

—

Sunlight peeked through sheer curtains, painting soft stripes across the bed. Jun’s arm was draped lazily around your waist, his chest rising and falling behind you.

“Jun,” you murmured sleepily. “You’re heavy.” He chuckled, half-asleep. “You used to like it.” “I changed my mind.” He buried his face into your hair. “Too late. You married me.”

You sighed, smiling to yourself. “You’re impossible.” He kissed your shoulder. “So are you. That’s why it works.”

—

The dining room was dim except for candles you hastily lit on a lopsided cake. Jun entered the room and froze, eyes widening as you yelled, “Happy birthday!” “I told you not to-”

“You think I listen to you?” you said, grinning. “Make a wish before I eat it all.” He stared at you for a moment before blowing the candles out. “I already did.”

You blinked. “What’d you wish for?” He leaned in, his lips brushing your ear. “To live long enough to grow old with you.” You laughed, rolling your eyes. “That’s so cheesy.”

But he smiled softly. “Cheesy things are true things.”

—

The smell of oil paint filled the room. You sat by the window, sunlight catching in your hair while Jun worked on a portrait of you. “You’re taking forever,” you complained, swinging your legs.

He looked up from the canvas, smirking. “You move too much.” “I’m bored.” “Then talk to me.” You tilted your head. “What should I say?”

“Say something I can remember,” he said. You smiled. “I love you.” He paused, brush mid-air. “That’ll do.”

The memories collided with reality, your breath ragged as you stumbled back. The house, the mirror, the kitchen — everything shimmered and settled again into the dim golden light of dusk.

You were crying. Not from fear, but from the weight of recognition. “Jun,” you whispered, your hands trembling as they cupped his face. “I remember everything.”

Jun smiled through the tears shining in his eyes. His thumb brushed the corner of your lips like he’d done a thousand times before. “You came back to me.”

Your lips trembled. “And you waited.” He nodded once, a soft, broken laugh escaping him. “Every lifetime.”

His smile turned into a hungry kiss as he pressed you against the old bed where you shared countless moments together you’ve forgotten. His hands roamed over familiar curves remembered through centuries of waiting — for this exact moment where memory returned fully between two souls meant to be entwined forever.

His hands trailed down to your waist, pulling you flush against him as he kissed along your jawline. Suddenly, he pressed a cold finger to your neck, activating a necromantic chill that made you gasp and arch into him. “Do you remember my touch?” He whispered huskily

A wicked smile spread across his face as he remembered your kinks. He reached over to the bedside table and lit a candle, the flame flickering to life in the dim room. He started playing with temperatures, his breath, his touch being entirely cold, and the candle.. the wax. He dribbled hot wax onto your collarbone, watching as you gasped and your eyes fluttered closed. He knew exactly what you liked.

He kissed down your neck, his mouth alternately hot and cold like fire and ice. “Wife.. you taste so good.” His lips trailed open-mouthed kisses along your collarbone with wax on it as he slowly unbuttoned your shirt, revealing more skin for him to worship.

One hand continued the slow torture of dripping hot wax onto your skin while the other hand slipped under your bra, teasing your nipple with cold fingertips. “Cold or hot first?” He didn't wait for an answer, switching between hot wax poured onto your chest and his ice-cold hands caressing your skin.

This leaves you shivering and gasping beneath his touch. He unhooked your bra, throwing it somewhere as he continued his assault on your senses, his mouth claiming one hardening nipple while his fingers played with the other.

Junhui worshipped your body like he’d been starved for centuries — because he had been. His mouth trailed down to your stomach, kissing and licking each inch of skin he uncovered. He unbuttoned your pants slowly, almost reverently, pulling them down your legs along with your underwear.

He spread your legs gently, his cold hands contrasting with the heat of your core. He leaned down, blowing a cool breath over your clit before he spoke. “I remember everything about you. Every moan, every gasp, every shiver.”

“And I remember how you used to drive me crazy with that mouth of yours.” You spread your legs wider, teasing him deliberately. Jun groaned, pressing a freezing cold kiss directly onto your clit. “Stop teasing me with your knowledge of my body,”

His cold tongue replaced his lips, licking a slow path up your slit before sucking your clit into his mouth. He used his fingers to spread you open further, his ice-cold digits pushing inside you suddenly. You gasped and bucked against him. “Uhmm-hmm jun..” “You used to call me hubby.” He murmured.

“My hubby,” He growled against your sensitive folds, his fingers curling inside you while his tongue worked overtime on your clit. He remembered every spot that made you moan hubby. His other hand snaked up to pinch one of your nipples hard, making you arch into him.

“You used to grab my hair and fuck my face when I do this..” He demonstrated by sucking hard on your clit while pushing three cold fingers deep inside you, curling them exactly how you used to love. “Ugh! Fuck-”

You instantly wrapped your legs around his head, gripping his hair tightly and riding his face as you moaned his name like a prayer. Jun moaned loudly, his fingers freezing cold inside you as he remembered how much he loved being used by you.

“God, you always ride my face hard when I touch you like this.” He added another finger, spreading them wide inside you, hitting your favourite spot. He blew cold air onto your clit again, watching your body tightly coil with remembered pleasure.

“Stop reminiscing,” You pushed his head away sharply. He laughed softly, his mouth wet with your arousal. “No more remembering how you used to bounce on my face?” He teased, trying to pull your hips back down onto his mouth. You smacked his head lightly, “Asshole.”

He caught your hips sharply, pulling you back. He spread your legs wide, feasting on you like a starving man. His fingers still inside you, curving them perfectly as he ate you loudly, slurping and sucking your clit like it was his last meal.

Your body tightened like a bowstring as he remembered exactly how you liked it. Within minutes, you were crying out, your legs shaking as you came hard against his mouth. “Junhui- God! Aghh Oh my- fuck!”

He kept eating you through your orgasm, his cold fingers never stopping their relentless attack on that sweet spot inside you. He loved how you tasted, how you moaned his name like a dirty prayer. When your legs finally stopped shaking, he pulled away slowly, licking his lips.

He sat up, his face glistening with your juices. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, looking up at you with hooded eyes. “You taste even better than I remembered,” he said huskily. He spread his legs slightly, palming his hard, cold erection through his pants.

“My turn, hubby.”

You smirked and slowly removed his jacket and white collared shirt, revealing his perfectly sculpted abs. He lifted his hips so you could pull down his pants and boxers in one smooth motion. His massive, erect dick sprang free, slapping against his stomach with a wet smack.

His hands came up to grip your hair as you looked down at his length. He was already cold and hard, leaking pre-cum. “Take it in your mouth,” he ordered roughly, his Chinese accent thickening with desire. His hand tightened in your hair possessively. “Open Wen Y/N”

You spread your lips slowly, taking the tip of him into your hot mouth. He hissed sharply, his hips bucking slightly. “Damn it,” He muttered softly, watching your wet mouth stretch around him. “You used to deep throat like a pro.” He gripped your hair tighter, guiding you slightly.

His eyes rolled back as you suddenly took him deep into your throat without warning, your nose pressing against his balls. He let out a choked groan — “Fucking hell..” His hands tangled in your hair desperately as you started bobbing up and down rapidly, sucking hard “Shit.. shit- shit, you’re even better now!”

His cold dick throbbed in your mouth as you kept deepthroating him, your tongue pressing against the sensitive vein underneath. He could barely speak, his voice coming out strained “Fuck...fuck..fuck! Goddam- Ughh”

With a loud, muffled groan, he came down your throat, his hips jerking uncontrollably. You swallowed every drop before pulling off with a wet pop. He fell back onto the bed, panting heavily. “Still so noisy” You commented dryly, crawling up his body.

He wrapped his arms around you tightly, nuzzling into your neck and inhaling your scent. “Sure sure..” He murmured against your skin, his voice hoarse. “You’re the loud one. Always screaming my name.” He started kissing and sucking on your neck possessively. “My hubby.. still so good for me.”

He rolled you onto your back, covering your body with his. I can’t even see the ceiling. His cold hands gripped your wrists, pinning them above your head. His dark brown eyes bore into yours intensely. “Turns out, my wife gives even better head now. I wonder how else she’s improved.”

One hand slid under your thigh. “Spread for me, Y/N. Let me check if that tight hole still belongs to me only.” His voice was low and commanding.

He pushed your legs apart roughly, his cold dick already hardening again. I’m fucking a ghost. He’s so cold. He positioned himself at your entrance, rubbing the head against your sensitive spot. “You know what I love about this position?” He asked, his voice husky.

“What?” You barely said, “It lets me go deep,” He answered darkly, pushing your thighs back sharply and slamming inside you hard. He hit the bottom instantly, making you cry out loudly. “See?” He pulled back and thrust hard again, making you bounce on the bed. “Noisy.”

He started pounding into you relentlessly, the sound of skin slapping against skin filling the room along with your loud moans and cries. One hand remained on your wrist above your head holding it back while the other on your thighs “Fuck-” He groaned, “Too loud, my wife”

His thrusts became deeper and harder, hitting that spot inside you perfectly. Your loud moans turned into high-pitched screams as he fucked you brutally. “Shut up...shut up”

He slapped a hand over your mouth as you screamed during another deep thrust. “AHHH-” “Jesus,” He muttered against your neck, “You sound like a fucking porn star.” He bit down on your shoulder to muffle his own groan, still fucking you mercilessly.

Your world turned into a blur of cold hands gripping your body painfully, eyes glinting menacingly above you, and a ghostly cock pounding into you. You could feel every inch of him stretching you open, hitting depths you never knew existed. “Mmph..”

You felt possessed, fucked by a literal ghost who showed no mercy. His cold body slammed against yours relentlessly, making the headboard bang against the wall loudly. Your screams were echoing, spit dripping from the corners of your mouth.

Tears streamed down your face from the intense pleasure-pain as he hit your cervix with every thrust. Your nails scrambled against his back, leaving red marks on his pale skin. You felt like you were being claimed by a supernatural being, completely at his mercy. “Nghh!”

Your tears only seemed to fuel his hunger for you. He watched, mesmerised, as they spilled down your cheeks and dripped onto the pillow. “Adorable,” He groaned, his voice laced with dark desire. “My pretty wife crying while I fuck you stupid.”

Mid-thrust, an abrupt memory flashed through his mind — the candle he had lit earlier, still burning softly nearby. A wicked smirk crossed his ghostly face as an idea struck him. “Hold that thought..” He suddenly pulled out completely, leaving you empty and whimpering. “Don't move.”

He quickly reached the candle, dipping his cold fingers into the melted wax. The room fell silent except for your laboured breathing and soft sniffles. “I forgot you’re a ghost, and how you can’t feel pain.” He chuckled then looming over you with a sinister grin and wax-covered fingers. “Spread wider,” He ordered darkly. “Let's play a little game.”

Without warning, he pressed the warm wax against your sensitive entrance, pushing it inside you slowly. You gasped at the foreign feeling, your hole stretching to accommodate the wax. He added more, filling you up with the warm substance before snapping his fingers. “Cold now.” The wax instantly hardened inside you,

Leaving you with a feeling of extreme fullness and pressure. He pushed your legs back even further, until your knees were practically touching your ears. “Now, let's see how long this pretty little human can hold still while I fuck her with a frozen, wax-filled hole.”

He lined up his cock again, pushing the head against your entrance. He groaned as he slowly slid in, the hardened wax making you even tighter than before. “Goddamn,” He grunted, “You feel insane right now.”

With a sharp thrust, he buried himself balls-deep inside you. The sudden intrusion forced a loud, strangled moan from your throat. “Ahh..! F-fuck..!” You bucked your hips instinctively, only for the wax to shift inside you uncomfortably. “N-no...ahh- st-still..”

He wrapped a hand around your throat to hold you down as he started thrusting his hips slowly, each thrust causing the wax to grind against your prostate pleasurably. Your moans turned into broken whimpers as he fucked you with that unrelenting fullness. “Shh, my wife.. just take it”

He picked up the pace, his hips slapping against yours with wet smacks. The wax inside you began to melt slightly from the friction, creating a warm, sticky sensation that had you moaning uncontrollably. “Ahh..ahh...ahhh!”

Your loud, desperate moans sent him over the edge. He slammed into you one last time, hitting your prostate dead on as he came hard inside you. “FUCK!” He groaned loudly, his cock pulsing as he filled you with his hot cum. “HUBBY!” You screamed as you cream his cock as well inside.

He stayed buried inside you, his heavy breathing gradually slowing as he nuzzled against your neck. The melted wax and his release dripped out of you messily, coating your inner thighs. After a moment, he pulled out slowly, watching as more fluid followed. “Mmm”

You looked down at the mess between your legs, then back up at him with confused eyes. “How.. how are you cumming? You're a ghost” He smirked mischievously, “Ghost sex has its perks, wife. My spirit can still produce semen.”

“And trust me, it feels just as good as real cum would.” He chuckled softly, floating down to clean himself up with some tissues he got at the night stand. “Plus, being dead means I can fuck you for hours without getting tired.”

Your eyes widen, completely not understanding what happened just now, “can I get pregnant..? BY A GHOST?!”

He raised an eyebrow at you, then shook his head with a soft laugh. “No, Y/N. You can’t get pregnant from ghost sex.” He explained, “My spirit might produce semen, but it lacks the necessary components to impregnate anyone.”

“Oh ok,” you sighed, relieved. His smirk turned into a full-blown grin as he went back up to top you, hovering between your legs. “So basically, I can fill you up as much as I want, and there’s zero risk of an actual baby.” He leaned down to kiss your neck and the night was long.

The morning light slipped through the old lace curtains, pooling soft gold across the floorboards. The air was warmer than usual — almost gentle, like the house itself didn’t want to disturb you. You stirred under the sheets, your body still aching in ways you couldn’t explain, every muscle sore but tingling with something that felt like longing.

This bed feels more like me, than the other bed. I love to be back.

Jun sat beside the bed, his elbow resting on the headboard, chin on his hand, smiling softly. “You’re awake,” he murmured. His voice was as calm as ever, but there was something different in his gaze — something steady, quiet, almost resigned.

You groaned, trying to sit up. “Remind me to never let a ghost manhandle me again.” He laughed — that deep, melodic laugh that used to echo down the hallways when the house was still alive. “You weren’t complaining last night.”

“Yeah, well,” you muttered, cheeks warming as you tried to swing your legs off the bed, “that was before I realized ghosts apparently have stamina.”

Jun leaned forward, catching your wrist before you could stand. “Careful,” he said softly. “Don’t move too fast. You’re still sore.” You rolled your eyes. “I can handle it.”

“Of course you can,” he teased, standing and offering his hand anyway. “But let me handle you for once.” You took his hand without thinking — it felt solid now, warm even. The thought almost made your chest ache. “Since when did you get so smug?”

He smiled faintly, leading you toward the kitchen. “Since I got my wife back.” You froze mid-step, and for a moment, your breath caught. He said it so casually, like it was the most ordinary truth in the world. But something in his tone — that faint tremor beneath the calm — made your heart twist.

“Jun..” He only smiled again, brushing a stray strand of hair behind your ear. “Breakfast first. Heavy hearts need coffee.”

He made pancakes. You didn’t even think ghosts could cook, but the smell of butter and sugar filled the air, and when you asked how he did it, Jun just shrugged. “You said you missed the scent of home,” he said, flipping one perfectly golden. “So I borrowed it from your memory.” You laughed. “That’s creepy and romantic. I can’t decide which.” “Can’t it be both?”

The rest of the day passed in a strange sort of domestic bliss. You both cleaned the bedroom — or at least, you did, and Jun hovered around you, pretending to help but mostly teasing you. He brushed wax off your cheek, steadying you every time you leaned too close.

“Do you ever miss it?” you asked suddenly, when you caught him watching the sunlight through the window. He turned to you, smiling faintly. “Miss what?” “Being alive.” For a heartbeat, his smile faltered. Then he said quietly, “Not anymore. Everything I ever wanted.. is standing right here.”

You stared at him — the soft glow in his eyes, the way his voice trembled like he was holding back something heavy. You didn’t press. Instead, you reached out and brushed his hand — and this time, it felt entirely real.

Jun blinked, then smiled again, softer this time. “See? You’re getting stronger.” You frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?” He didn’t answer right away. Instead, he leaned forward, pressing a light kiss to your forehead — his lips almost warm now. “It means you’ll be okay,” he whispered. “Even when I’m not here to make pancakes for you.”

You looked up sharply. “What are you talking about-” “Nothing,” he interrupted, smiling again — that same too-gentle, too-final smile. “Just saying.. ghosts like me don’t get forever. So promise me, if I ever fade away” He brushed your cheek with his thumb. “…don’t stop living.”

You didn’t know why, but the air grew heavier around you. The sunlight dimmed. You forced a laugh. “You’re being dramatic again.”

Jun chuckled softly, though his eyes were glistening in the light. “Maybe. But if being dramatic lets me stay in your memory, then I’ll take it.”

You stared at him for a long time, the ache in your chest tightening, and for a fleeting moment, you swore you could see through him — just a shimmer, like heat rising from pavement. But you blinked, and he was solid again. Smiling. Alive in his own way.

And so, you smiled back. “You’ll have to work harder than that to get rid of me.” He leaned in and kissed your lips. “I know,” he whispered. “That’s what I’m afraid of.”

—

The night came gentle, like the world itself didn’t want to wake you. You sat on the veranda with Jun, a single candle flickering between you — its flame bending and swaying with the wind. The garden was quiet, the air thick with that faint sweetness of rose and memory.

Jun leaned back in his chair, watching you instead of the stars. You didn’t notice at first how still he’d become. “I used to dream of this,” he said softly. “Of what?” “Peace.” He smiled faintly, eyes never leaving your face. “I thought I’d forgotten what it felt like.”

You chuckled, sipping your tea. “You sound like someone who’s about to give a farewell speech.” “Maybe I am.” You frowned. “Jun.”

He turned toward you, eyes reflecting the candlelight, gold and endless and unbearably sad. “You remember everything now, don’t you?” You blinked. “What do you mean?” “Us,” he whispered. “Before this life. Before this house. Before the accident.”

The words hit you like a chill. The images — faint, half-remembered — started to surface. The rain. Screeching tires. The ring glinting against the pavement. Jun’s voice calling your name, desperate, echoing. And then.. nothing.

Your throat tightened. “I- I saw flashes. I thought they were dreams.” He reached out, brushing your cheek with the back of his hand. His touch was lighter than before — fading. “They were memories. The last ones we shared before everything ended.”

You shook your head, tears already welling. “Ended? No.. we found each other again, didn’t we? You said you waited for me-” “I did,” Jun said, smiling. “Every life I remembered, I searched for you. Sometimes I found you. Sometimes I didn’t. But this time..” He paused, his voice breaking. “This time, you came back to me.”

“Then why- why does it sound like you’re saying goodbye?” you asked, your voice trembling. “Because I am.” You froze. “No.”

He moved closer, cupping your face, thumbs tracing slow circles over your tears. His hands were almost see-through now — light bleeding through his fingers. “My curse was to remember every life,” he said softly. “To live them all until I learned to let go.”

“Jun, stop-”

“But yours,” he whispered, “was to forget. To live free of the pain. To start again.”

—

The moment the words left his lips, something in your chest cracked open — a white flash of pain, too bright to bear. And then..

White walls. The soft hum of machines. A dull ache at the back of your head. You blinked your eyes open and found yourself lying on a hospital bed. Your throat was dry, your body heavy. The faint rhythm of a heart monitor keeps time with your shallow breathing.

“Mingyu- she’s awake!” You turned your head weakly. Three faces came into focus — Mingyu, Seokmin, and Minghao — all hovering near your bed, eyes wide with relief. Mingyu reached out, holding your hand tightly as if grounding you.

“Hey,” he said softly, voice trembling. “You scared us.” You looked at them, confused. “What.. happened?” Seokmin’s smile faltered. “You got into an accident. You’ve been out for a few days.”

You nodded slowly, your mind foggy. But as you looked at their faces — familiar yet oddly distant — you felt something off. Something hollow. “Was anyone else with me?” you asked after a moment.

They froze. Minghao looked down at the floor, his jaw tight. “No,” he said finally. “You were alone when they found you.” You frowned, trying to recall anything — a road, a sound, a name. But your head throbbed the harder you tried. There was nothing. Just blank space.

Days passed, and you went home, that doesn’t even feel like home. You walked through your apartment, touching the furniture, tracing the edges of picture frames that held no faces. You caught your reflection in the mirror and felt the strangest ache, like someone else should’ve been there beside you. Someone who wasn’t.

Late one night, unable to sleep, you sat on your bed and whispered into the dark — not knowing why, or to whom. “Maybe it’s not about moving on,” you murmured, clutching your chest where that invisible ache lived, “but trying to remember the memories I’ve already lost.”

A tear slipped down your cheek before you even realised you were crying. You didn’t know what you were grieving — only that your heart was mourning something you couldn’t recall.

—

You sobbed, shaking your head violently. “Then why- why bring me back here? Why make me remember?” “Because you deserved to know you were loved,” Jun said, voice trembling. “Even after death. Even after forgetting. You were my heart in every lifetime, and I needed you to know that before I go.”

The candle flame flickered. His form wavered, the edges of him breaking apart like smoke. “No,” you cried, clutching his shirt — your hands passing through him. “Please, stay. I’ll remember you this time. I swear, Jun, I won’t forget”

He smiled faintly, leaning forward until his forehead touched yours. “You will. You have to. That’s how you live.” He said. You sobbed. “Then what now? What happens to us? To you” “You live,” he said gently. “You finish your book. You keep the house. You keep going.”

“As for me.. I’ll keep waiting. Like I always do.” You shook your head violently. “No. No, you can’t. You deserve to move on.” “How can I?” Jun whispered. “My heaven was you. This is my fate.. I finally have the reason to cross the afterlife for this life, Y/N.” You felt the warmth of his breath one last time as he whispered,

“Find me again, in another life, my bride” The candle went out.

Silence filled the house — that heavy, sacred kind of silence only grief can make.

You sat there long after, whispering his name into the darkness, your tears falling onto the wooden floor. When the morning light finally touched the veranda, there was no trace of him — just the faint scent of cedar and rose and the ghost of a handprint on your cheek.

And for a moment, as you looked toward the mirror inside the house, you swore you saw him smiling.

Then he was gone.

And on the bed beside you, the veil stirred gently — as if brushed by unseen hands. unheard voice.

𝐀/𝐍 ➙ and that’s a wrap!! thank you so much for reading — I hope you liked it!! we’ve still got a few more left on our 2025 kinktober prompt list, next up is jeonghan, then wonwoo. see you all soon! stay safe, healthy, and a little unhinged, loves mwaa

⋆˚࿔ 𝐓𝐚𝐠𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭 : @blssble @astraleaa @kwonxy @k4trinabluu @ateez-atiny380 @loveforred @chandaleeeee @starringhani @acphengene @yoonjeo @shininghoshstar

“You’re okay, just breathe… I’m right here, I’m not going anywhere” You kept repeating the words over and over again until he seemed to calm, until he seemed to hear you. 

Unlike Junhui you had always been a very vocal and extroverted person, always the loudest one in the room, the one who stole the attention of everyone without even trying, but after him, after the mark manifested, you drew into yourself, wanting to spend your time with him, getting to know him and his soul. 

It was difficult at first, not being able to really communicate, but at some point a few words started to make sense and as the communication became better, and your love for him grew. 

He told you about his move to Korea, his dance, his brothers, the struggles of his every day that looked so different from your own. 

The mark made it impossible to learn specific details about one another, every time he tried telling you where he was going for his tours, his voice would be muffled. Just as every time you would try and tell him about your university, yours would as good as disappear from his head. 

It made it hard, but you both knew people had it harder than the two of you did. You at least had your love singing you to sleep every night. 

Junhui was sitting in the beauty room before a shoot. Next to him was Soonyoung, and in his lap sat none other than his sweet soulmate that they had all nicknamed ‘Pink’ due to the famous hair that had brought the pair together. 

She ran her hands through his hair as she styled it. 

“Do you really need to rub it in?” Dino said with a somewhat low voice. 

“Obviously” Pink said before squeezing Soonyoung's cheeks together and kissing his lips sweetly. He chuckled in response, looking just as the hamster he claimed he wasn't. 

Jun explained the situation to you through that little link he had in his mind. 

Tell them they’re disgusting. You quickly commented with a laugh. 

As he repeated the words, Pink clutched her imaginary pearls, before jumping down from Soonyoung's lap, earning her a whine from this very grown man. 

“Don’t worry Jun, I’ll make you pretty for her, in hopes that she’s watching along” 

He laughed. You had not found him yet, and he doubted that a performance unit song would be what did the trick. But he could always hope. 

They hadn’t expected carats to go as feral for the music video as they did. But apparently a little bling and smooth moves would be all it took. 

And they did look good, ethereal almost. 

Jun couldn’t help but hope that this would mean you found him, after all that was the reason behind becoming an idol. 

“I hope you see it” He said in his mind as he reached out.

You knew he did something within the music industry, but you couldn’t even imagine the scale it was actually on. How famous your soulmate was, how beautiful. 

Once in a while you stumbled upon Seventeen music videos, but you never clicked on them. There were too many views, and for some reason you had imagined him being from a smaller, more unknown group. 

If you were being completely honest you did think that the music was kind of a side gig. A passion that made life bearable. A hobby. 

It wasn’t until your friend actually forced you to sit down and watch the newly dropped music video for “Spell” that you realized exactly who he was. 

“You have to watch it!” She said as she gently stroked the clock that was counting down on her arm. 

You rolled your eyes with a smirk on your lips. “It’s not gonna be him” 

She shrugged. “You don’t know that! I’m staying in my delusional era, convinced that Minghao has a clock somewhere on that beautiful body of his” 

You pulled her close to you on the couch. “Fine, I’ll watch it” 

A small shriek escaped her throat. You could humor her. 

Exactly two seconds after the music video had started your heart stopped. Because you knew that voice, and on screen was the most beautiful human being you had ever seen. 

The brown curls framing his head, the eyes so soft and kind were looking into your soul. It was him, there was no doubt in your mind. 

The whole scenario was overwhelming, you knew the song, he had been humming it for months, singing it to you at night. 

“This makes no sense” you said slowly as tears welled in your eyes. 

Your bestie had her arms around you in a second, pulling you close as you sobbed into her chest. You didn’t know why, but this wasn’t happy tears, no. You were devastated. 

There was no way in hell a man like that, a man like him would be okay, that he would be happy with someone like you.

He didn’t know what he had done wrong. But he had to have done something. You had been quiet now for around 3 days, and it was the longest time since he had found you, that he had gone without hearing your voice. 

The remaining of the guys had all picked up on it. He was agitated, annoyed and snapped over the smallest mistakes. 

He was currently located in one of the small kitchens in the Hybe building, filling up on water in between breaks of practicing the choreo for the upcoming tour. 

Minghao was leaned up against the fridge, arms crossed in front of his chest as he looked at his best friend.  

“You need to tell me what the hell is going on” as usual when something was bothering either of them, they spoke mandarin. It gave them a sense of privacy even when there were people around. 

Junhui sighed as he looked down at his feet. “She doesn’t speak to me anymore…” it was almost just a whisper, but the hurt, the broken heart that was lying beneath that surface of his was evident. 

Minghao pulled him close, and for once he allowed himself to be comforted. He hid his face in his friend's shoulder as he let the silent tears fall. 

“Did you do anything?” He asked as he pulled away to look at his friend. 

Jun just shook his head as he dried his eyes. “No, at least I don’t think so. I’ve been ragging my brain over and over to find out what could make her pull away. But honestly? The only thing I can think is that she found me… and that she’s disappointed it’s me and not someone else” 

His voice shook, and he burried his head in his hands, hoping the tears would stop falling if he just squeezed the palms of his hands into his eyes hard enough. It didn’t help. 

“I don’t get it, I thought she loved me… I thought she was supposed to accept me for me, and not judge me for it” 

He felt a hand on his shoulder, one that didn’t belong to Minghao, but to Chan. And as he turned there stood the remaining 11 of his brothers. 

The youngest pulled him close and as he cried again, they all rallied around him.

Like the first time you had heard him, he hadn’t meant to let you in. But it did happen from time to time, if their emotions were out of control. And what he had said, had broken your heart. 

You were convinced it would be for the best, that he wouldn’t love someone as normal as you, someone as boring. You were convinced he deserved better. 

But hearing him break, hearing his sobs knowing you were the reason for them. Broke you even more than the potential heartbreak of him not wanting you. 

The days following his breakdown he had stopped trying to reach out, and it almost felt like he had given up. You had scoured the internet to find any kind of update, to see what he was doing, if he was okay. 

Dino had done a live with Minghao, begging Carats to send Jun all their love because he was struggling. 

This wasn’t what was supposed to happen, he was supposed to be relieved, supposed to be happy that he, as a world famous artist, didn’t have to settle for someone as ordinary as you. 

But you were slowly learning that you had made a mistake. Because Seventeen was despite being world famous, global superstars, kind people. 

You had watched every going seventeen episode, seen every music video and over all catches up on everything. 

It was funny seeing everything after the fact. You had heard story about his friends going crazy when they played games, and Hoshi and Mingyu especially fit that bill in the ‘Don’t Lie’ episodes. 

He was quiet, more quiet in these settings than he usually was with you. But then you noticed it, hidden smiles and small laughs, it was because when he was with them, he talked to you as well. 

Always updating you on their shenanigans, filling you in on the new games they made along the way or retelling the jokes he knew you would find funny. 

You had fucked up. Severely. Now all that was left to do was trying to fix it.

As the days went by you started to reach out to him. But he wasn’t quite ready to talk yet. He could feel the sorrow in your voice, in the emotions that ran through his mind as you said good morning and good night to him every day. 

You never pushed him, and he appreciated that. He wanted to hear your explanation, as to why you had chosen to cut him out, but he was scared, so scared that the explanation would be a confirmation of all his worst fears. 

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Joshua said as he laid a hand on his shoulder. 

He sent a tight lipped smile his way. “Yeah, let’s just get through the day” 

“Are you still not sleeping?” Minghao said as he looked up from his phone. 

Jun shook his head and sent a sad smile his way, his friends sighed in unison as Seungkwan entered the room. 

“You need to look after yourself hyung” 

“Maybe you need to talk to her” Joshua pushed. 

Jun only played with his long fingers as he released something in between a huff and a laugh. “I know, but what if all she wants is to cut the tie between us?” 

They would never quite get used to seeing their brother cry, and this past week they’d seen it more than they had in the last few years. 

It was his anxiety talking, he knew that, and so did they. But it was hard talking him down the edge when they had no chance of communicating with you, to actually hear your side. 

Seungcheol looked into the room, and all he got was a small shake of the head in return from the boys. “We’re going on in 5, game face on Jun” 

He took a deep breath and stood from his chair.

Your leg was bouncing up and down, fingers pulling on one another as you simultaneously chewed on your bottom lip. 

Something inside of you couldn’t quite figure out how this had happened, how you had made it happen on such short notice. But here you were sitting in a hall filled with carats, waiting for your soulmates and his brothers fansign. 

They entered the stage and you literally felt your heart stop in anticipation. And there he was, and if handn’t been because of the lack of oxygen you’re pretty sure you would’ve flown from your seat and into his arms before security would even have a chance to notice. 

He’s beautiful, he’s so so beautiful…

He heard your words eccho in his head and for the first time in a week he smiled genuinely all while his cheeks were painted in a subtle blush beneath the make up. 

You better be talking about me and not someone else. He quickly responded. It was a pure instinct, needing to know that you still loved him, that the silence hadn’t been because of a lack of love for him. 

He heard your chuckle in his head. It’s most definitely you Wen Junhui.

You watched him on the stage, hand quickly flying from his side to cover his mouth. You watched as his eyes sparkled. He turned away from the crowd and made these small almost awkward movements, as if he almost wanted to run away but couldn’t. 

Minghao looked his way with furrowed brows, but when he saw his friends smile, he knew that all the anxiety had just been whisked away from his body. And the remaining 12 of them quickly found that the burden they had been carrying was lifted.

“Hi” Minghao said as you sat before him on the long table. He pulled the album you had in front of him closer to sign it. It felt surreal sitting here in front of the people you knew so much about, the people who knew so much about you, but somehow had never met. 

“I feel like I owe you an apology” you said with a small voice in mandarin. The mans eyes lit up as he chuckled. 

“Why would you owe me an apology?” He asked with curious eyes and a smirk. 

You sighed. “Because I’m guessing you’ve had a rough week because of me. I didn’t… I didn’t mean to hurt him. It was just when I found out who he was, I suddenly felt like I was lacking in every aspect” 

You looked towards Junhui as you talked, and shrugged as you ended the sentence. 

“Oh…” you looked up at the beauty that sat there, looking at you with tears in his eyes. He left the album behind and reached out over the table, grabbing your hands in his, giving them a squeeze. 

“He was afraid that you were disappointed, that you had hoped he was someone else” 

You quickly looked back to Minghao with big eyes. “What?! How the hell would he think that?” 

This time it was Minghao's turn to shrug. “I don’t know, but now our time is up, so go get your man” 

He sat up in his chair, leaned over the table and kissed your forehead. “I’ll talk to you after” 

You heard the gasps, the murmuring that had started in the room. Minghao was known for not playing along with carats parasocial relationships, he was known for always giving people a wake up call. So you could understand the shock of suddenly seeing him kiss a carat at a fan sign. 

You also knew your bestie would end up killing you for not bringing her along for this. 

Before you knew it you were in front of him. He didn’t look up from the album right away, he just introduced himself, and when his eyes finally met yours, all he saw was you sitting there with an open mouth, trying to get the words out. 

He blushed, he actually blushed when he looked at you, and in your mind you heard a small; wow. 

You took a deep breath and then you blurted it all out. “I’m so sorry… I’m so sorry I made you doubt yourself, doubt me, doubt us. It was never my intention. I just, I finally found you and every bad thing I have ever thought about myself was suddenly under a magnifying glass. I felt so ordinary, so plain, so incredibly boring next to you, your life…” 

He hadn’t taken a single breath since you had started taking. He knew your voice as well as he knew his own. And before he knew it, before you even blinked he had thrown himself over the table and pulled you close. 

“You’re here”  he whispered into your hair, loving the smell of your hair, your skin and your perfume. 

“I’m here” you whispered back as your hands pulled him as close as physically possible despite the table. 

He pulled away and ran a hand over your cheek, catching your tears with his thumb. He rested his forehead against yours as he laughed, a laugh that you returned. It was one of disbelief and pure joy. 

You heard all the people move around you, heard as people were ushered out of the room to give the two of you some type of privacy. The fansign would continue when everyone had a chance to calm down. 

He stood up and walked around the table. “I can’t believe you’re here, that you actually found me, that you got in here so quickly” He pulled you into his chest and rested his cheek on the top of your head. 

You could hear his frantically beating heart beneath his chest, god you could feel his chest, every muscle. Beneath your skin. 

I swear you were hand sculptured by all the gods that have ever existed. 

You said through the link in your mind. He laughed. Loud and genuine. 

You’re so beautiful my love. That you were ever in doubt about being good enough for me… I’m sorry I didn’t tell you I loved you more often, that I didn’t tell you more often just how proud I am of you. That I didn’t manage to make you feel safe with me. I promise I will spend the rest of my life trying to make it up to you. 

He pulled you close with one of his hands on the back of your neck, the other on your cheek. He caressed your nose against his, looking for any type of doubt in your eyes. But he found none. Instead you closed the distance and kissed him. 

The room broke out in whistles and cheers, loud and chaotic. Just as you had always imagined they would be. 

The two of you smiled, before looking towards those he called his brothers. 

They were all over you in a second. Introducing themselves, bickering with one another about who should have the privilege of meeting you first. And Jun, he never let go of you, his fingers stayed intertwined with yours. Just as they were meant to be.

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The intern orientation is a thirty-minute slide deck with enough corporate jargon to resurrect a Roman senator. You're sitting near the back, doodling tiny skulls in the margins of your notes, when your manager says, “Let’s all welcome this year’s marketing interns!”

And there he is.

Wen Junhui. Hair longer than you remember. A navy button-down that you’re 90% sure used to be yours. He spots you in the crowd like it’s nothing. Like no time has passed. And then—the male audacity of it all—he smiles.

Your pen creaks, spine bending until the plastic gives a quiet, pitiful snap.

You recommended him. That’s the worst part. 

Back when he was unemployed and soft-spoken and yours in a way you never could quite name. You filled out a glowing referral form like an idiot. Said things like creative thinker and natural collaborator when what you meant was: makes me laugh when I don’t want to, makes me feel like I matter.

Now he’s here. Mid-career intern. Probably labeled as non-traditional in the onboarding notes. Definitely labeled as dead to me in your mental CRM.

You corner him in the coffee room after orientation. He’s stirring oat milk into some artisanal nonsense, back to you, as if this isn’t the beginning of your villain arc. “You’ve got some nerve, Junhui,” you declare, properly pissed. 

He doesn’t even flinch. Just turns, holding his mug like he’s in a toothpaste commercial. “... I was just getting coffee,” he answers, one perfect eyebrow already arched. 

You fold your arms. “What are you doing here?”

“Interning.”

“You’re in your thirties.”

“I’m only twenty-nine, actually.”

“You had a whole job before this.”

“And now I have a new one.”

You resist the urge to glower. “As an intern.”

“Mid-career transition,” he says smoothly. “It’s a thing. There’s a podcast about it.”

You’re aware. You introduced the podcast to him. “Why here?” you bite out. 

He sips his coffee, meeting your gaze without hesitation. “It’s the best, isn’t it?” he drawls. “And I always want the best.”

There it is. That infuriating sincerity, tucked behind some metaphor you can’t afford to unpack. That must mean I wasn’t the ‘best,’ then, you nearly snap, considering, you know, you up and left. 

You hate that your chest aches. You hate that he still looks at you like you mean something. Like he didn’t disappear. Like he didn’t cut the cord with clean hands and a lazy smile.

You made your bed. Now, you have to lay in it. 

–-

This Agreement was entered upon by Wen Junhui [“FORMER SITUATIONSHIP INTERN”] and You [“ABSOLUTE FOOL COMPANY”] and shall remain in effect until either party learns how to stop looking for closure in a coffee room.

–-

You decide to be a professional about it.

Which is to say: you ignore him. Flawlessly. The way an inbox ignores unread emails from old flings or the way a cat ignores physics. With dignity, aloofness, and a very calculated schedule of exits and arrivals.

You walk into Monday morning’s marketing sync with an iced Americano, a bullet-pointed agenda, and an expression that says try me. Jun, mercifully, sits at the far end of the table, between a girl who uses color-coded spreadsheets and a guy whose entire personality is PowerPoint animations. You pretend not to notice when he nods at you. You definitely pretend not to notice that he’s taken to twirling his pen the same way you do.

Soonyoung, the Marketing Director, is wearing a shirt printed with neon tigers. Again.

“Okay, okay,” he claps his hands once, then dramatically slaps a stack of post-it notes down. “Let’s make this week roar!”

The interns balk, but none of the full-timers bat an eye. You’re all used to it. The man once themed an entire quarter around ‘predator energy.’

You run through project updates with the calm precision of someone who did not threaten emotional homicide in the coffee room last Friday. You lead the discussion on the spring campaign revisions, answer questions, deflect unnecessary input, and even sneak in a joke that makes Soonyoung laugh hard enough to drop his whiteboard marker.

The meeting ends. You gather your things. You’re halfway out the door when he catches up to you. “Hey,” Jun says, gently, like he’s trying not to spook a wild animal. “You killed that. You always do.”

You glance at him, expression neutral. "Thanks."

He looks like he wants to say more. Like he wants to be invited to say more. But you walk away, shoes clicking a little faster than necessary.

You still remember the other times he said it. After your first promotion. After you helped him rehearse for a job interview he never got. After a random Wednesday when you had ranted over a headline you couldn’t get right and he said, I wish you could see yourself the way I do.

You don’t want to remember any of it, so you go get coffee with Jihoon.

The head of HR is not known for emotional delicacy. Or any kind of delicacy, really. He wears monochrome like it’s a moral stance and drinks black coffee like it’s a dare. But he’s your friend, and he gets to the point.

“I’m not asking for details,” Jihoon says, stirring his drink with the slow menace of someone thinking about a compliance form. “But I saw the way you looked at the new intern.”

You feign innocence while you still can. “Which one?”

“Don’t insult both of us.”

Short-lived. You sigh. “It’s fine. He’s fine. We’re professionals.”

“Good. Because if I get even a whiff of nepotism, I’m lighting your recommendation form on fire.”

“You’re throwing around the word nepotism pretty lightly.”

“Am I?”

You lean back. “Everything’s professional,” you insist. “I wouldn’t jeopardize my own career over someone who thinks career pivots counts as a personality.”

Jihoon gives you a look. You sip again. Neither of you smiles.

Business as usual.

At least, that’s what you keep telling yourself. Some of it fractures two days later, in the breakroom with the flickering fluorescent light. You’re there for a sad granola bar and a moment of peace. Instead, you walk into chatter. The kind with edges.

Three interns—clipboard girl, PowerPoint boy, and someone new who looks like she does CrossFit for sport—are huddled near the snack station, laughing in that tight, conspiratorial way that means something mean is about to follow.

“I swear, he’s like, ancient,” Clipboard says.

“Wasn’t he in finance before this?” PowerPoint Boy adds. “Kind of sad, right? Like, starting over in your thirties?”

“He’s not in his thirties,” CrossFit interjects. “I checked. He’s twenty-nine. But still. Mid-career intern? Kinda screams washed-up.”

There are no names being thrown out—the slightest practice of discretion. It’s not difficult, though, to nail the topic of their breakroom gossip. The oldest intern in the pool. The one who hasn’t quite meshed with the Gen Z-ers who take OOTD mirror selfies and film TikToks in the bathroom. 

You clear your throat. Loudly. The interns freeze, a tableau of bad choices and instant regret. “Funny,” you say dryly. “I thought interns were supposed to observe before speaking.”

Clipboard opens her mouth. Closes it. Tries again. “We didn’t mean—”

“You did,” you interrupt. “But that’s okay. Not everyone gets to be interesting on their own, so I understand the appeal of tearing someone else down.”

PowerPoint looks at the floor. CrossFit suddenly finds the nutritional facts on her trail mix fascinating.

Your words come out with their trademark sharpness, with the type of teeth that has silenced board rooms. “Jun has more experience than most of you. He chose to be here. He got in the same way you did. Maybe keep that in mind next time you’re measuring someone’s worth by your own insecurities.”

Silence. Blessed, blooming silence. You grab your granola bar and turn around.

And then you nearly walk right into Jun.

He’s standing by the doorframe, coffee in hand, eyes wide. You have no idea how long he’s been there. Long enough, judging by the way he looks at you. Not shocked. Not smug. Soft. And a little sad.

He doesn’t say anything. Neither do you.

You nod once. He nods back.

You walk away, heart tapping a rhythm that feels like a memory.

–-

IV. In addition, the Intern will be eligible to participate in bonuses and other employee benefits established by the Company for its employees. The Employer currently offers the following benefits to its employees: momentary witness to your better nature, free of charge.

–-

The assignment happens on a Wednesday. Which already feels unfair. Mid-week emotional warfare is always much more draining than, say, a Monday terror or a last-minute Friday deadline. 

You’re sitting in the glass meeting room with a half-dead laptop and a whole-dead espresso shot when Soonyoung bursts in with his usual flair, dragging Jihoon behind him like a reluctant paperweight.

“Alright, team!” Soonyoung announces, sleeves rolled and tie nowhere to be seen. “It’s time to mentor the future!”

Jihoon sets down his folder with the quiet judgment of a man who had no say in this decision. “Intern shadowing,” he says, flat. “Mandatory. Two weeks. No complaints.”

“Like a tiger teaches its cubs,” Soonyoung adds, teeth bared in a wide grin.

Pairings are doled out quickly. Clipboard girl is assigned to someone in data. PowerPoint boy goes to Accounts. CrossFit intern gets Soonyoung himself (“I will break her spirit or befriend her forever,” he declares).

And then—

“Junhui,” Jihoon reads. And then your name. 

You don’t flinch. You nod once, hand still moving across your notes. Professional. If the pen’s plastic creaks underneath your grip, that’s between you and whoever invented Faber-Castell ballpoints. 

Jun, across the table, shifts. “Is that... final?”

Jihoon frowns. Never a good sign, even if it is his default. “Would you like to dispute the legality of this HR-approved decision?”

“No,” Jun mutters. But he doesn’t look at you.

The meeting ends. People scatter. You’re organizing your things when Jun corners you in the hallway, by the glass copy room that reflects everything you don’t want to see.

“I was trying to give you an out,” Jun says curtly, almost explaining.

You glance up at him. “What?”

“Back there. In the meeting. I was trying to not make things worse.”

“By publicly questioning a department head’s assignment?”

“By not forcing you to work with me when things are clearly… complicated.”

You back out a laugh. “It’s just work, Junhui. Not everything is personal.”

He stares at you, like he’s trying to figure out if you mean it. You mean it. Mostly.

There’s a flicker of something—memory, maybe. The last time you fought, back in the vague non-label limbo of your not-a-relationship. Something about a canceled plan. Or the way he left your texts on read. It spiraled, and somehow you ended up half-yelling and then making out in his kitchen, back against the fridge.

Those arguments never lasted long.

This one already has.

You tuck a pen behind your ear, shoulders squared. “We’ll get the intern materials from Soonyoung this afternoon. I’ll book a conference room.”

“Okay,” Jun says. He still looks like he wants to say something else. Maybe everything else.

You walk past him before he can. The hallway feels colder than usual.

Just like that, the stage is set. You. Him. Two weeks. One shared desk. Zero unresolved tension whatsoever.

The project brief lands the next morning like a meteor.

Marketing strategy for upcoming romantic comedy starring Jeonghan, the email reads. The subject line includes a heart emoji. You click it with a growing sense of dread.

The film’s title? Just Friends.

“Fuck me in the ass,” you mumble underneath your breath, the same way a corporate slave does once or twice a week. 

You open the attached pitch deck. The logline reads: Two friends navigate the blurred lines of a no-strings-attached relationship until one of them catches feelings.

You close your laptop. You reopen it thirty seconds later. Professionalism, you remind yourself, is a decision.

By 2 p.m., you and Jun are in a borrowed conference room with Soonyoung, who has inexplicably brought snacks and a whiteboard shaped like a heart. “Okay! Let’s ideate,” Soonyoung says brightly, cracking open a soda. “No bad ideas. No wrong answers. Just vibes.”

“How about a trailer that ends with both characters alone,” you start, “because some things aren’t meant to be mutual.”

Jun’s lips quirk to one side. “A little bleak for a rom-com.”

“Not if it’s honest.”

“Or bitter.”

“Not everything has to be about you.”

Soonyoung pauses mid-sip.

Jun clears his throat of the faux pas. “We could do a digital campaign,” he offers. “Confession booth at the premiere. People record what they never told their almosts.”

You write it on the board. Then, without looking at Jun, you add: “QR codes on limited-edition tissues.”

“You still have those?” Jun asks, his tone a little snide. “Thought you threw them out.”

“I did.”

A beat. The marker you’re holding is probably going to run dry by the end of this hour. Jun’s fingers are tightly clenched over the table edge. Soonyoung is unashamedly looking back and forth between the two of you, as if this is a particularly interesting tennis match between Carlos Alcaranz and Jannik Sinner.

“Maybe a microsite,” Jun says quickly. “Where users can soft-launch their regrets anonymously. Could include heat maps for popular phrases.”

You nod. “We could include copy like Sometimes the fine print on friendship is heartbreak.”

Jun’s next words are spoken under his breath. “Right. Friendship.” 

Soonyoung raises his hand like he’s in school. “Sorry,” he squeaks. “Is this a pitch or—an actual breakup in real time?”

“Both,” you say simultaneously with Jun.

Jun clicks his pen. “At least I’m trying.”

“Is that what this is? Trying? Looked more like derailing.”

“Better than deflecting.”

“Better than ghosting.”

Soonyoung reaches for another snack. You turn back to the board. “Let’s bring in Jeonghan for a cheeky teaser. Maybe he narrates bad firsts. First kiss, first fight, first time you find their ex’s number still in their contacts.” 

Jun exhales, sharp. “How about the first time they refused to introduce you to their friends?” 

“Not as bad as the first time they said someone else’s name during sex.” 

Soonyoung coughs, intentional and interrupting. “Wow. Okay,” he exhales. “Let’s take a break, cubs. Hydrate. Process.”

No one moves.

You cap your marker slowly. “I’ll send a write-up.”

Jun’s stiff fingers flex on the table. “Looking forward to your notes.”

–-

V. The Employer also offers the benefit of one (1) shared creative meltdown in the presence of your manager, and unlimited awkward silence thereafter.

–-

Jihoon calls you into his office with the same tone someone might use to summon a guilty terrier who’s chewed through a power cord. You arrive with your laptop and your most composed expression. You know better than to ask what this is about.

He shuts the door. Points to the chair opposite his desk. You sit. Jihoon steeples his fingers. “Soonyoung says the marketing brainstorm was intense.”

“I’d call it thorough,” you say wryly. 

“He used the words ‘emotional combat.’ Also ‘trauma-fueled campaign ideation.’”

You exhale through your nose. “We delivered on the brief.”

“Is there something I should know?”

The question hangs. You think about deflecting. About redirecting. But Jihoon’s office is too small for half-truths, and cluttered with evidence of a man who lives off structure and caffeine. You suspect he can smell lies the same way bloodhounds smell fear.

You lean back into the chair and pick out the bullet points. “Jun and I were… sort of a thing. Before. It wasn’t official. But it also wasn’t not.”

Jihoon doesn’t even blink. “Yeah,” he huffs. “I figured.”

Your brow furrows. “Then why ask?”

“I wanted to see if you’d admit it like an adult,” he replies. “You passed. Barely.”

“I’m not going to make this a disciplinary thing,” Jihoon continues, flipping through some papers just to emphasize how above it all he is. “But you have to keep it together. Finish the project. Grin and bear it.”

“I am grinning,” you mutter. “Aggressively.”

“Good. Because this is what happens when you mix personal history with professional decisions.”

You squint at him. “You mean helping a qualified former friend apply for a job and letting HR do its job?”

“See,” Jihoon says, pointing with his pen, “this is why nepotism is bad.”

You groan. “It wasn’t nepotism. We weren’t even dating. He was unemployed. I had a moment of generosity.”

“And now you have a moment of regret,” Jihoon says. “Funny how that works.”

You cross your arms. “I liked it better when you barely spoke to people.”

“Me too,” he replies. Then, almost kindly: “Finish the campaign. Keep it clean.”

You nod. He returns to his laptop without another word. You take that as your dismissal.

As you leave Jihoon’s office, you hear him grumble, just loud enough: “God, I hate romantic comedies.”

You invite Jun for coffee the way some people file restraining orders. Terse. Cold. Legally sound. “After work,” you say, passing his desk without slowing. “Fifteen minutes. Corner place with the green awning.”

Jun, understandably, looks mistrustful. “Is this a trap?”

“Only if you make it one.”

Thirteen minutes later, he shows up. Hair slightly mussed. Shirt rolled at the sleeves like he’s trying to look less guilty. It doesn’t work. You’re seated already, nursing a decaf and a dull headache.

He slides into the chair opposite you. Eyes scanning your face like you’re a riddle he once solved and forgot the answer to. “If it’s not a trap, is it a truce?” he asks outright.

“Not everything has to be war, Jun.”

“You spent half our brainstorm launching missiles.”

“Well,” you say, sipping. “Some of them were paper airplanes.”

He grimaces. “I’m not doing this sober.”

You hate it when he’s right. 

The bar you two agree on is dim and semi-functional. Exposed brick. Mismatched stools. The music sounds like it was curated by a heartbroken DJ. Jun orders a peach soju; you get the blueberry one.

“So,” he says around the rim of his soju bottle. “Where should we start?” 

“How about,” you exhale, “with your obnoxious sipping habits?” 

“My what?” 

“The way you slurp. It still gives me the ick.” 

Jun’s responding laugh is humorless. The drinks go down quickly. The second round is unnecessary and immediate. 

“Remember that fight we had about ice cream?” you ask, after he chewed you out for being emotionally unavailable and unnecessarily anal-retentive about halving bills.

Jun laughs into his glass. “You said anyone who chose mint chocolate chip was self-sabotaging.”

“And you defended it like a personal religion.”

“You called it mouthwash in disguise.”

You shrug. “Still true.”

More drinks. More memory lane. There’s a half that has teeth, that tears through the gripes and frustrations. But there’s also a half that’s almost tender, that provides a montage of why it could have worked once upon a time. 

“You kept a spare toothbrush at my place,” he says.

“You gave me a drawer.”

“You never used it.”

“You never asked why.”

Silence. Real, this time. The music changes to something softer. A song you both know. You hate that you both know it.

“I was always trying to be careful,” he says delicately. “Trying not to overstep.”

You stare at your glass. “Yeah. Well.” 

In not overstepping, Jun ended up taking no steps at all. Another silence tugs. Longer. It doesn’t bite. Just lingers.

“We were never good at timing,” he says eventually. 

“We were never good at talking.”

You expect him to push back on that. He doesn’t. For a moment, you contemplate asking the million won question. Why did you ghost me? 

Before you can, though, he’s saying something too sincere for you to ruin. “Thanks for the rec. For the job.”

“Thanks for finally thanking me,” you answer, taking a long enough sip of your soju to ignore the way your heart flutters. 

He winces, smiles. “Small steps.”

You nod.

“So, we’re okay?” he asks.

You think about it. The ghosts, the drawer, the campaign brief that cut too close. “Whatever ‘okay’ means,” you say, because you never lied to Jun; you weren’t about to start now. 

He raises his glass in a wordless cheer. You clink.

The second brainstorming session is mercifully normal.

You arrive ten minutes early, not because you’re eager but because you’ve started pre-gaming meetings with silence. Jun arrives exactly on time, not a second more, not a second less. He looks at you like he’s bracing for shrapnel. You nod like you’re not holding any.

Soonyoung plops into the seat across from you both, wearing a tiger-print shirt that says FIERCE IDEAS ONLY. You want to make fun of it. You don’t. Growth.

The meeting flows. That’s the only way to describe it. No barbs, no barbed metaphors. Jun pitches clean, clever ideas. You counter with strategy. There’s laughter. There’s alignment. There’s a genuine moment where you look at him and say, “That’s a good one.”

He smiles, appreciative and maybe even a little fond. You have to look away from it. The compliment tastes like a penny on your tongue.

“Hehe,” Soonyoung cackles, eyes flicking between the two of you. “Am I interrupting something?”

“Just your reign of chaos,” you deflect.

“Horang-haaay,” he sighs. “Anyway. Love this direction. Run with it. Make it beautiful. Make it bite.”

You do.

The presentation goes well. Soonyoung beams like a proud zookeeper. Jihoon nods once, which is his version of a standing ovation. The execs approve the romantic comedy campaign with minimal edits. There are even murmurs of early awards submissions. You pretend not to care. You care deeply.

Jun catches you after the meeting, shoulder brushing yours in the hallway. “Hey,” he says. “We made that work. Really work.”

The pride blossoms in your chest, persistent and unwelcoming. “We did.”

“So,” he starts, casual but not, “Want to grab a drink? Just us. Not like before. Or maybe not not like before. Whatever works.”

You hesitate. 

If it were anyone else, you probably wouldn’t balk. This offer isn’t a romantic advance. It’s a grabbing-a-drink-with-your-workmate-after-a-job-well-done. Unfortunately, your mind is a slideshow of late texts, half-finished thoughts, and the sound of silence where a goodbye should’ve been.

“I can’t,” you answer. Not unkind. Just honest. You give no explanation, and Jun doesn’t press even though he flinches. Wavers. As if he’s remembering his place. 

He nods slowly. “Okay,” he says with faux cheer. “Another time.”

You don’t say yes. You don’t say no. He walks away like it doesn’t sting, and you stay rooted like it does.

To ease the hurt, you take yourself to dinner like a pity party with better lighting. Your comfort place is a hole-in-the-wall Italian spot tucked between a laundromat and a locksmith, which is, frankly, how you know it’s good. The tables wobble slightly, the waitress knows your name, and the carbonara tastes like a hug from someone who never judged you for your bad taste in men.

You order your usual. Set your phone face-down, then pick it up again. Jun’s contact is open. 

You don’t remember when you opened it. Your thumb hovers over the keyboard, caught between being impulsive and being pathetic.

You almost start typing. Something like, Hey, my schedule cleared up. Drinks on me? or Were you flirting with me or am I delusional? or I’m at the place where we had our first date. At the very same table we sat at, in fact. 

Then the door chimes.

You look up.

Jun walks in. Not alone.

He’s with another intern—the one from finance, maybe? She laughs at something he says as they walk toward the back. He’s relaxed. Rolling his sleeves like he wants to look like effort. He gestures to the menu like this place wasn’t once yours.

You watch, stone-still, as he orders. You catch fragments. “You’ll love the tiramisu.” “This place is a hidden gem.” “No, seriously, the carbonara—life-changing.”

You’re vaguely aware that you’re gripping your fork too tight. You don’t name the feeling. Not jealousy. Definitely not jealousy. Just territorial spite and righteous betrayal with a dash of indigestion.

Your pasta arrives. You pick at it. Every bite feels like chewing a memory that now has someone else’s fingerprints on it. In your head, it’s a litany of fuck you Wen Junhui, fuck you Wen Junhui, fuck you Wen Junhui. 

The carbonara is wrong. Too salty. Not al dente enough. And Jun is sitting a couple of seats away, smiling at his date. Blissfully unaware that he’s ruined your comfort food for life. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Fuck you, Wen Junhui. 

You flag the check. You tip generously, because if you’re having a terrible night, then the waitress might as well have a good one. 

Jun notices you only as you brush past his table. His expression morphs mid-laugh—first surprise, then something else. His companion’s gaze flits to you, recognizing you as a senior at the company.

“Hi!” she says politely. 

You give her a tight nod. “Hello.”

Jun rises. “Wait, hey—”

But you’re already pushing past the door. The air outside is cooler than expected. He catches up halfway down the block.

“Hey,” he calls, a little breathless. “I didn’t know you were there.”

“Clearly.”

“It wasn’t a date.”

“Didn’t ask.”

“I wasn’t trying to—”

“Oh, what, colonize my safe spaces?” You stop. Turn to him. “I didn’t realize you gave restaurant tours now. How generous.”

He runs a hand through his hair. Frustrated. “I wasn’t thinking about it like that.”

“You weren’t thinking. That tracks.”

The words hang. Sharp. Petty. 

“Don’t be rude to your not-date,” you grit out. “Haven’t you got some life-changing pasta to share?” 

You don’t wait for his reply.

You walk off, fast. The kind of walk that dares someone to follow.

He doesn’t.

That, too, tracks. 

–-

VI. The Intern is entitled to unlimited paid time off (PTO) for as long as they do not do it at bygone date spots. In light of this, the Employer may claim a lifetime of pettiness. 

–-

Soonyoung makes the announcement as if it’s a reality show reveal.

“There might be one or two interns we absorb after the cycle,” he tells the room of department heads, bouncing on the balls of his feet like this is an exciting twist instead of a budget conversation. “Jun’s doing well. Also, that other one—what's her name? Finance intern? The one who has a nice laugh.”

You freeze mid-note taking. He means the girl from the restaurant. The one who knows about the tiramisu. Your stomach coils, and your poor pen jabs into your paper a little too hard. 

You make it through the rest of the meeting on autopilot, the kind of dazed professionalism that only corporate trauma can birth. Jihoon gives you a look on the way out. You ignore it.

As expected, you’re assigned to write Jun’s intern evaluation.

It’s a task you’d normally treat like any other. Bullet points. Benchmarks. But the cursor on the blank Google Doc blinks at you like a dare. Because it’s not just about campaign contributions or interpersonal skills. It’s about putting on record what he it, or what he isn’t.

You close the tab. You’ll come back to it. Maybe. After a lobotomy.

Two days later, Jun finds you by the vending machine. “You’re evaluating me?” he says by way of greeting.

You take your time selecting a soda. The machine whirs dramatically. Maybe if you ignore him, he’ll go away. 

He proves otherwise. “Soonyoung told me,” Jun presses. “He said you’re writing my assessment.”

You procure your strawberry Fanta with deliberate coolness, fingers already toying with the metal lid. “Do you greet all potential references this way?” you say dryly. 

“I just—I figured you wouldn’t be neutral.”

That stops you. You turn, slow. “Excuse me?”

“I mean, after everything. The way we—” He gestures vaguely. “That night. The restaurant. You were pissed.”

You laugh. You can’t help it. God, what did you do in your past life to end up in a situation like this? The last of your patience snaps like a rubber band, and the words spill out of you with a kind of cutthroat that could melt tungsten. 

“I gave you a glowing recommendation, Jun,” you snipe. “I said you were sharp and collaborative and vital to the pitch. Which, in case you forgot, you were. I did my job. Maybe try doing yours.”

He gapes. You don’t stop. “You’ve been the unprofessional one here. You keep making things personal. You bring other people to restaurants that aren’t yours to share. You act like I owe you something when I don’t even owe you eye contact.”

Jun opens his mouth. Closes it again. You toss your still-full can in a nearby bin. You don’t have the appetite for anything sweet right now.

“You haven’t changed, Wen Junhui,” you bite out—the last word, huzzah!—before walking off.

It’s not the cleanest exit, but it’s something final. And right now, that’s all you have.

Jun pretends like nothing happened.

You’re not surprised. Denial is practically his native language. He nods at you in meetings, leaves polite spaces between you in the break room. He’s mastered the art of the neutral expression, the kind that suggests nothing has ever gone wrong. That everything is fine.

Then a package arrives at your desk.

No note. Just a brown paper bag tied up with string, like something out of a middle school crush fantasy. Inside, nestled in tissue paper, is a bouquet.

Of ballpens.

Dozens of them, in your preferred brand and ink weight. All black, all clicky. Not one of them chewed, cracked, or snapped in half—yet.

You stare at them like they’re a coded message. Maybe they are.

Jun used to tease you about it. How you went through pens like breath mints. How he’d hear the telltale crack of a barrel and look over to find you sheepish, a half-dismembered pen in hand. Once, he said he was going to buy you a box just to see how long it would take you to kill them all. You laughed and told him that was the most romantic thing he’d ever said.

You use one of the pens in the next meeting. On purpose. Jun notices. You can see it in the flick of his eyes, the way he registers it with a twitch of his mouth that isn’t quite a smile.

After, as people are clearing out, he lingers.

“That one working okay?” he asks.

You click it. Unclick. Click again. “Still alive,” you say. “No casualties yet.”

He nods. You don’t say thank you. He doesn’t say sorry.

All the same, it hangs there, between you. The closest either of you has come to being a decent person.

–-

VII. The Intern will respect all intellectual property of the Company, and in return, the Company will provide necessary tools for productivity—and occasional forgiveness.

–-

The interns are tasked with planning the company party to cap off the end of their rotation. It’s meant to be a fun assignment. Low-stakes. High morale. Naturally, it turns into an emotional landmine.

Jun, for reasons you pretend not to think too deeply about, takes the lead.

He delegates well. Manages expectations. Schedules with military precision. In the end, what catches your attention is the uncanny accuracy of his planning decisions.

The venue is one of your favorites. The playlist includes that one obscure indie-pop band you once had on repeat. The snacks avoid all your known aversions—no olives, no red velvet, no sad carrot sticks masquerading as party food.

You raise an eyebrow when he unveils the plan in the department-wide meeting. He doesn’t look at you directly, but when you glance his way, he winks. Later, when everyone’s clapping for the effort, you wait for him to slide into the seat next to yours. You lean over and mumble, taunt just for him, “Stalker.” 

He raises one shoulder in a shrug. “I shadowed you for two weeks. I’m observant.”

The party is in a week, which is probably why you run into him at the grocery store later that night, arms full of sparkling water and overpriced string lights.

You’re already in line, clutching a frozen meal and a bottle of wine that screams dinner-for-one. He falls in behind you, a little breathless, a little smug.

“Fancy seeing you here,” he says.

“Is that rosemary sea salt popcorn?” you ask, peering into his basket. “Wow. Intern budgets have really changed since my day.”

He grins. “Only the best for Carat Company.”

You point at a tub of hummus. “That brand’s terrible. Too tangy.”

“Noted,” he says, and swaps it out for another without fanfare.

You don’t know what makes you say it—maybe the buzz of fluorescent lights, maybe the way he’s stacking paper plates like it’s an art form—but you tilt your head and ask, “Bringing a date?”

Jun doesn’t miss a beat. “Nope.”

“Finance intern not free?”

“She’s got better taste than me,” he says. Then, a little more tentatively: “Position’s still open, if you’re interested.”

You click your tongue. Before you can think better of it, a responding flirtation breaks free. “I could be convinced.”

Jun giggles, quick and honest. He tries to cover it with a cough, but he’s still smiling as he sets down his basket.

The next couple of days unfold with unnerving ease. You tell yourself it’s just the party approaching, just everyone being unusually cooperative for once. But there’s a rhythm to the way you and Jun move around each other now—a familiarity that feels inherited. Like muscle memory. Like relapsing. 

You catch him finishing your sentences, anticipating your notes in meetings, handing you the pen you’re about to ask for before the words even leave your mouth. It’s annoying. It’s also disarming.

You’re in the office late one evening, finalizing a last-minute asset for the event. A print layout no one else had the brain cells to catch. Most of the floor’s lights have gone dark, save for your corner, glowing sterile and soft. But Jun’s still there too, cross-legged on the carpet like he lives here, surrounded by poster tubes and tangled cable wires, wielding a stapler with the intensity of a man on the edge.

“You know we have tape, right?” you say, leaning against the copy room door frame, sipping cold coffee that tastes like regret. 

He glances up, squints. “Yeah. Tape’s a coward’s tool.”

You snort. It sounds like something he would’ve said back when you were sharing fries and arguments on your living room floor, when evenings blurred into 2a.m. discussions about plot holes in movies and whether hotdog sandwiches were burgers.

“Besides,” he adds, popping a staple in with too much flair, “this is more permanent. It says, I commit.”

You raise an eyebrow. “To the banner?”

“To the bit,” he says, deadpan.

You roll your eyes and go back to your screen, but your grin lingers longer than you want it to.

He offers you a ride home. Says it casually, like it’s a weather update. You accept. Too casually. Like you haven’t already memorized the way his dashboard lights flicker, or how he drives five over the limit.

In his car, it’s too quiet. The AUX cable is broken. His windows fog slightly from the humidity. The air smells like mint gum, vinyl from a new car freshener, and something else—something old. You give him the directions without thinking, because they haven’t changed. Neither has the weight that settles in your chest when he takes each turn with instinctive precision.

Outside your apartment, the silence hovers. “Thanks for the ride,” you say, hand on the door handle, already half-gone. Trying very, very hard not to think about the dozens of other times this ride has happened, and how each of them ended the same way. 

He doesn’t answer for a moment. He just watches you, head tilted slightly like he’s solving a puzzle or waiting for permission. You face him, nose scrunching with mild confusion. “What?”

“Nothing,” he says. 

And then he kisses you.

It’s not sudden, but it still surprises you. Your body forgets to protest, forgets the smart thing to do, forgets the narrative you’ve been building for weeks about being over this. His mouth is warm, and patient, and frustratingly familiar. The kind of kiss that bypasses logic. The kind that knows too much.

You kiss him back. Automatically. Completely. As if no time has passed. As if the ghosting, the tension, the HR talks and overused pens never happened. Just mouths and memory and momentum.

It isn’t until you break apart—his thumb still barely touching your jaw, breath heavy in the space between—that you hear yourself say, “What are you doing?”

He exhales a laugh, like he’s embarrassed. “Convincing you.” A beat. “Is it working?”

The panic rises in your throat like bile. You’re not sure what you’re about to throw up—regret, probably. But for what? Which part? 

You don’t know the answer to that question. And so you peel away from a confused Jun, and you open the car door. The night air rushes in, cool and intrusive. You get out without a word.

He doesn’t follow. Doesn’t call after you. You don’t know what you’d want him to say, anyway. For once, you’re grateful that Wen Junhui has never chased after you when it counts. 

The morning after, you walk into the office like nothing happened. Which is to say: you walk in five minutes late with a coffee too hot for your tongue and sunglasses still on because your soul isn’t ready for fluorescent light.

You make yourself a promise. You will not acknowledge the kiss. You will not dwell. You will do what Jun did months ago. You will ghost in broad daylight.

It feels very mature.

Except, unlike Jun, you have to see him at the printer. And at the shared snack drawer. And at the joint team huddle where Soonyoung teaches everybody how to this weird, new hand gesture he picked up on. 

Jun keeps looking at you. That too-familiar softness, that edge of disappointment creeping around the corners of his mouth like he expected better from you. You don’t return the look. You don’t even return the stapler he loaned you yesterday. If professionalism is a hill to die on, then consider your gravestone already drafted.

Two days pass. You think you’ve successfully rewritten history until Jun corners you by the vending machine. Again. Before you can half-joke we have got to stop meeting like this, Jun is already snipping at the strings of your defenses. 

“Is this revenge?” he asks, low voice, eyes scanning your face.

Your hand hovers over the button for salted almonds. “What?”

“This,” he gestures vaguely at the space between you, which has become somehow both intimate and unbearable. “You pretending like it didn’t happen. Like the kiss didn’t happen.”

You choose the almonds. Not because you want them, but because silence is at least with vending machine clatter.

“You kissed me back,” he says. Almost an accusation. 

You shrug. It’s not as nonchalant as you probably want it to be. “People kiss. It’s a thing.”

Jun recoils, and something like white-hot guilt flashes through you. You douse it as Jun huffs out his next words with poorly-concealed offense, “Wow. Is this what being the bigger person looks like now?”

You pocket the almonds. “Well, you always said I was good at taking notes.”

His jaw flexes. Hurt flashes in his eyes before he smooths it over with a tired smile. “Right. Got it.”

You don’t stop him when he walks away. For the both of you, it’s a lesson learned. Turns out, the taste of your own medicine is bitter. 

And, sometimes, it comes with a side of overpriced almonds.

–-

VIII. The Employee acknowledges that emotional clarity is not listed among official job responsibilities, and therefore will not be provided under Company policy.

–-

The company party is held at a rented rooftop bar with fairy lights, questionable shrimp cocktails, and cheap beer masquerading as an open bar. Someone’s playlist is stuck on a loop of early 2010s hits, and there’s a half-deflated inflatable swan in the punch bowl. It’s all very on-brand. 

There are icebreaker games, a makeshift red carpet, and a cardboard cutout of Soonyoung in a tiger costume posing with the slogan: ROAR FOR Q4! It is, in every way, excessive.

You don a black silk blouse tucked into tailored high-waist trousers, sharp and clean and the only ironed thing in your apartment. Your lipstick is a soft red. Strategic, not romantic. You wear your hair up, simple earrings, and shoes that are just shy of painful. You look like someone who planned not to linger.

Jun shows up in a white button-down with sleeves rolled past his elbows, collar slightly askew like he got halfway ready and forgot to care. There’s a wine-colored blazer slung over one shoulder and, unfairly, it works. He has the ease of someone who didn’t expect to be watched yet somehow is.

You avoid each other all night with the precision of two people still nursing unspoken sentences. You talk to other departments. He lingers around the interns. Jihoon drinks exactly one cocktail, makes direct eye contact with you for three seconds too long, and vanishes like The Judgmental Ghost of Situationship’s Past.

The party buzzes on. There’s a chocolate fountain that no one trusts and a dance floor that Soonyoung won’t leave. There’s a photo booth filled with props from last year’s pirate-themed anniversary campaign. You find yourself laughing at something someone from Legal says, and immediately hate that it reminds you of how Jun used to make you laugh just like that—like you were surprised by it.

It’s going fine. Almost.

Until the awards begin. Soonyoung, of course, is the MC, beaming with chaotic delight. “And now,” he grins, pausing for effect, “for the honorary award for Best Enemies-to-Lovers Plot Unfolding in Real Time…”

You blink. Jun blinks. You both know how this film is going to end, and sure enough, Soonyoung is screeching your name and Jun’s. 

There are cheers. Some gasps. Mostly laughter. You rise with the grace of someone preparing for emotional war. Jun’s already on his feet, giving you that look like this is either his worst nightmare or his best bit. Possibly both.

Onstage, you are handed a trophy of a basketball player bought from the dollar store around the corner. You and Jun pose awkwardly for a photo as a chant of Speech! Speech! Speech! resounds in the crowd. 

You contemplate handing in your two week’s notice tomorrow.

Under string lights and scrutiny, you take the mic first. “I’d like to thank HR for not firing either of us,” you say for the lack of better thing to say. 

Polite chuckles. Someone from the Events team yells, “Not yet!”

Jun takes the mic next. “And I’d like to thank, uh, Soonyoung. For teaching me what a ‘horanghae’ is. Seriously, it’s done immeasurable damage to my vocabulary.”

Louder laughter. A few whoops. You both smile too hard, too bright, too fake. 

Later, you spot him near the edge of the bar, half-shadowed by a potted ficus. He’s slipping away. Classic Jun, retreating mid-scene. 

You excuse yourself before you think too hard about it. You follow him down a stairwell half-lit by emergency bulbs, the music above thumping faintly through concrete. He hears your steps before you speak.

“You always leave like this?” you ask.

He turns, hands in his pockets. His expression—initially closed-off, ready to bolt—creaks open ever so slightly. “I didn’t think you’d notice,” he answers. 

“Can’t help it.”

He looks at you like it hurts. Like you’re saying too much without saying enough. “Is this the part where you ask me why I’m leaving?”

You fold your arms over your chest, over the maddening beat of your heart. “No,” you breathe. “I want to know why you left.”

You don’t care about tonight. Jun could leave this party and never look back at The Carat Company, and you wouldn’t blame him. You care about the way his texts stopped coming in, the way it was radio silence for weeks. How he didn’t even come to take back his things, so you made the executive decision to donate them to a thrift shop like it might somehow make you feel better about yourself. 

Jun exhales, long and tired. He shifts from one foot to another. For a moment, you think he’s going to make a run for it. 

He doesn’t. 

“I didn’t think I could be enough,” he says, finally. “Not for you. Not for the version of you that has her life together, who writes like a scalpel and moves like she’s never tripped over anything in her life. I didn’t want to hold you back. I didn’t want to be another unfinished thing in your life.”

When Jun had gotten laid off his previous job, he’d fallen into a rut that you tried so hard to get him out of. You sent him motivational LinkedIn posts. You pointed out Harvard courses and helped him scour JobStreet. All the while, you were working your ass off at The Carat Company. Coming home burnt out but still willing to help him back on his feet. 

You hadn’t realized how that might’ve looked like for him. You hadn’t seen the cracks, stretching like spiderwebs over his fragile male ego. Obscuring the reason why you did it all in the first place. 

Love. Crazy, stupid love. You clear your throat, refusing to let the rage tip out of you. Some of it bleeds into your incredulous question, anyway.  “So you decided for me?”

His shoulders flinch. “I was scared.”

“You don’t get to do that,” you say, your attempt at being cool fracturing. “You don’t get to leave me, then show back up like a better man, when the truth is—you didn’t even let me choose.”

He looks at you, stunned. “I—”

“No,” you say, stepping forward. “Who I want to suffer for is my call.” 

This time, you kiss him. 

It’s not clean. It’s not soft. It’s messy and fierce and fueled by months of bitterness and longing, of misspoken lines and things unsaid. His hands find your waist like they’ve never left it. Your mouth moves like a dare. There’s a wall at his back, and your chest at his front, and none of this feels professional at all.

It feels like something finally falling into place. Or breaking open.

Jun’s car is parked two levels down, the far corner of a concrete lot that smells like rain, gasoline, and the ghost of things unsaid. It’s far from the rooftop’s sticky laughter and company-wide inebriation. A hush broken only by the soft echo of your heels and the low, restless rhythm of your breathing. His, too.

You’re kissing again by the time you get nearer to the car.  This time, it’s slower. Hungrier. The kind of kiss that drags a sound out of him—half-sigh, half-swear. 

Jun groans into your mouth, hands moving instinctively. One finds your jaw, the other your waist, fingers curling with intent. Your back hits the side of his car with a quiet thud. You smile against his mouth, sharp and satisfied.

“You gonna run again?” you mumble, voice low, all edge.

He shakes his head, dazed. “Not unless you tell me to.”

“Good,” you say, fingers slipping under the hem of his shirt, grazing hot skin. “Then shut up and get in the car.”

He listens. He always did know how to listen when it mattered.

The door slams shut, muffling the world. The air smells like him—clean linen, faint spice, something faintly sweet beneath it. The dash glows dim. Your blouse is unbuttoned by the time you straddle him, knees digging into the leather seat. He fumbles to push his seat back farther, and you don’t wait. You settle on his thighs, hungry hands pushing his shirt up, over his head.

His eyes are already wild. Chest bare. Breath uneven. Like he can’t quite believe this is happening. You kiss him again, rougher this time, teeth grazing his bottom lip. He gasps.

“You want this?” he asks, voice cracked, part awe, part fear.

You lean in, lips brushing his ear. “I need this.”

Clothes are tossed somewhere in the front seat—jacket, trousers, shirt, all lost to heat and haste. Your fingers fumble with his belt; he helps, hands shaking. You lift your hips, letting him drag your trousers down, your underwear already damp and sticking to your thighs. His knuckles brush the inside of your legs as he pulls them off, slow and reverent, then not-so-slow.

His fingers ghost along your inner thigh, then between your legs, slipping through slick heat. He exhales like it guts him.

“Still so wet for me,” he breathes, voice shredded. “How are you still so wet?”

You take his hand, guide his fingers to your lips, and suck your own slick clean. Your eyes on his the entire time. The sharp, guttural sound he makes is a reward in its own right.

The kiss that follow doesn’t end so much as it fractures. Broken by breath, by the heat of your thighs still spread over his lap, by the way your hips keep shifting like you haven’t quite had your fill.

Jun exhales sharply when you pull back. His mouth is swollen, his chest rising and falling like he ran a mile, and his hands—God, his hands—don’t stop touching you. One strokes your thigh, the other drifts higher, sliding back between your legs.

He groans, thumb dragging through your slick, and you shudder. “You always get like this,” he whispers, like it’s a secret meant only for you. “I touch you and you… fuck, you melt for me.”

You grind into his palm, voice already too hoarse to feign nonchalance. “Don’t pretend you’re in control right now.”

His eyes flick up, wide and wrecked. “I’m not,” he laughs. “Not even close.”

His fingers slip in. Two at once, with a stretch that makes your eyes flutter. You gasp, back arching, one arm braced against the seat in front of him as he starts to work you open. Slow. Deep. A rhythm that feels almost reverent, like he’s savoring this. Like he’s making up for every missed chance.

“So warm,” he grunts, forehead pressed to your collarbone. “So perfect.”

You reach down to find his cock still half-hard and twitching. Your fingers wrap around him, familiar with the way he likes to be touched, with how he reacts when you drag your thumb just under the head. He shudders. Moans. His hand falters inside you.

“Don’t—don’t do that,” he stammers.

You smile, sharp and smug. “Why not?” 

You jerk him slow, just enough to keep him on the edge. His eyes flutter. His mouth opens, breath catching on every exhale as your hand works him while his fingers fuck into you.

This is how it used to be, back when it was messy and undefined, back when you still pretended this didn’t mean something. His hands in your pants after a long day at work. Your mouth on him in a shared shower.  But this is different. Sharper. Hungrier. The way he looks at you now—it isn’t casual. It’s not temporary.

His lips graze your jaw. His voice cracks. “You feel so good,” he says, his words slurred with pleasure, “s-so good. I can’t think.” 

You lean closer, nipping at his throat. “Don’t think. Just give me your fingers.”

He does. He gives you everything. Curling deeper, pressing harder, stretching you out until you clench around him and gasp, nails digging into the side of his neck. “Shit,” you whisper. “There, please. Right there.”

He moans, like he’s the one being burned alive. His hips jerk up into your palm. “So polite,” he says affectionately, placing a quick kiss to your shoulder before going on, “You’re gonna come for me, baby? Huh? Just on my fingers?”

You grind down, breath punching out of you. The pleasure coils hot and fast in your stomach, that dizzy, electric pull that tells you you’re about to break. When you register that the old pet name had slipped out of him—baby—you shatter.

It hits you all at once. Tight, breathless, a wave crashing through your spine and curling your toes. Your moan rips through the silence, raw and wild, as you pulse around him.

Jun curses under his breath. Even as you climax, your hand hasn’t stopped moving. He trembles, thighs tight beneath you. “Fuck, stop, stop—please, I’ll come,” he pants. “I’ll come and I’m not inside you yet. Please.”

You still your hand, fingers flexing around the base of his cock. His hips twitch anyway, desperate. His head falls back against the seat, jaw slack, chest heaving.

You watch him. The boy you almost had. The man who’s trying not to lose you now.

“You good?” you ask, voice low. Fond. Worried. 

He nods, swallowing hard. “Barely,” he croaks. “Need you.”

You lean in, mouth grazing his. “You’ve got me,” you promise, and it’s the truest thing you’ve said all night. 

The second your hand lifts from his cock, Jun fumbles between your thighs with shaking fingers, lining himself up. His touch is clumsy, reverent, desperate. His breath hitches when the head of his cock drags against your slick, catching at your entrance.

“Fuck, yes,” he gasps, the sound raw, like he’s already too close.

You sink onto him in one motion.

It’s not graceful, not slow. It’s greedy.

Your body takes him deep, full, stretched wide around him in a single sharp thrust that leaves you both dazed. His head snaps back, mouth open in a moan that cuts off halfway, swallowed by the thud of your hips meeting. “Jesus Christ,” he chokes out. “You’re—fuck. Fuck. You’re perfect.”

Your nails dig into his shoulders, anchoring yourself. The leather creaks beneath your knees. You don’t wait, don’t answer. You ride him fast, rough, punishing—like you need him to feel just how badly you've wanted this.

His hands scramble to keep up, one sliding to your waist, the other gripping your thigh, then your ass, then back again. He can’t seem to pick where he wants to touch you, so he settles for everywhere.

“You’re taking me so good,” he groans, eyes flicking down to where you’re joined, completely lost in it. “So fucking deep. Missed this. Missed you.”

You grind down harder, pace unrelenting. “You missed me, or just my pussy?” you bite out, even as a moan escapes.

He laughs, broken and breathless. “Both. Don’t make me choose.”

You lean in and kiss him, open-mouthed and hungry, your teeth dragging against his bottom lip before you suck it into your mouth. His hands tighten, fingertips bruising. Your hips roll, bounce, grind. Every motion is intentional. Relentless. He’s twitching inside you already.

He lets out a strangled sound when you clench around him. “Trying to—hng—ruin me?” he whimpers, forehead pressed to yours.

“You’re doing that all on your own,” you exhale before chasing his lips. 

The car rocks. Windows fog. Sweat beads at your spine, your thighs, the crease of his neck where you bury your face to muffle a cry.

He’s fucking up into you now, meeting every downward slam of your hips with a thrust that has you seeing stars. His rhythm is messier than you remember, but it’s probably the moment. The setting. The reunion. 

“Gonna come,” he warns, voice wrecked. “Shit—baby, please.”

You pull back, lips brushing his ear. “Then do it,” you whisper. “Come—ah—inside me. Make a mess, baby.”

His whole body jerks. His fingers dig in. He groans deep in his chest like it hurts to hold on. You don’t let up.

Your pace gets rougher. Sloppier. He’s moaning, practically whimpering. The kind of sounds you’ve only ever pulled from him when he’s too far gone to pretend. “You sound wrecked,” you pant, dragging your nails down his chest. “You close, baby?”

He nods, dazed, unable to speak.

You fuck down harder. Grind meaner. Your clit drags against the base of him and your whole body tenses. It hits you without warning—full-body and sudden. Your orgasm crashes through you like a wave, ripping your breath away as your muscles seize around him.

He cries out, high and choked. His hips stutter. “Wait—wait, fuck, baby, stop—please,” he pleads, voice cracking. “Need this to last. Need to have you for longer.”

You freeze, panting against his mouth.

He’s trembling.

“Alright?” you ask.

He nods, frantic. “Yeah. Yeah. I just—don’t want this to end.”

You stroke his cheek, your body still sensitive in aftershocks.

He looks up at you, eyes glassy, lips kiss-bruised. “I used to dream about this,” he says, voice barely there. “After we... you know. Dreamt of having you again. But it never felt like this.”

“Like what?”

He swallows. “Like I could lose you if I didn’t hold on tight enough.”

The sincerity bowls you over, so you kiss him again. This time, you slow down. Not because you want to, but because you know you’re both too close to let it end like that.

Your next words are a tremble against his lips. “Don’t leave. Not this time."

“I won’t,” he answers without missing a beat.  

You don’t move for a moment. Just sit there, full of him, your body still trembling with aftershocks, hips twitching every few seconds like your muscles don’t know it’s over. Jun’s forehead rests against your sternum, his breath hot and uneven against your skin, his grip around your waist just this side of desperate.

You let it stretch. The quiet. The weight. The ache.

The car is still and humid, your skin sticking slightly where it meets his. All you can hear is the slow, syncopated rhythm of your breath tangled with his. Every now and then, your body clenches around him involuntarily, dragging tiny, startled sounds from both your throats.

After a couple of minutes, you start to move again. Just a slow, idle grind of your hips. Gentle. Lazy. The kind of roll that shouldn’t mean anything, but still makes you both react. A twitch from him. A flutter from you. You do it again. Then again. Just enough pressure. Just enough friction to keep you grounded in it.

He whimpers quietly, head tilting up to look at you through damp lashes. “This is torture.” 

You smile. Kiss his temple, almost laughingly. “I always did like making your life hard.” 

Jun huffs something like a laugh, more breath than voice. His hand curls around the back of your neck, thumb stroking over your pulse. The other traces down to your thigh, fingers dragging along the crease with slow reverence. You keep rocking gently, almost absentminded. Not fucking. Not chasing. Just—resting. Keeping him there. Letting him feel all of you, even in stillness.

It’s unfairly intimate, how your body fits against his like it remembers how. The arch of your spine molded to the shape of his chest, your forehead resting against the curve of his jaw, your hands cradling his face when you lift it.

His heartbeat pounds beneath your palm, too fast. Too vulnerable. “Can I…” he starts, voice cautious, almost shy.

You lift a brow. “Can you what?”

“Take some of the control. Just for a bit.”

It kills you. That he has to ask. That he still doesn’t think you’d give him the world. “Of course,” you say, the word murmured against the corner of his mouth. “Take me.” 

He doesn’t answer. His grip on your ass tightens, fingers digging into the supple fleshed. “Baby,” he says, wrecked and serious, “I’ve been dreaming of fucking you properly since the day I left.” 

Your teeth grazes his lips. “Do it, then,” you hum. 

And he does.

He plants his feet. Braces himself. Then lifts you slightly and thrusts up hard, cock dragging deep, unforgiving. The breath punches out of you like a hit. Your hands scramble for purchase on his shoulders, your head falling forward.

He does it again. And again. Brutal. Precise. Each upward slam meets the drag of your body grinding down, slick and hot and soaked with all the aftermath he’s still pulsing inside.

“That’s it,” he growls, his breath ragged. “Let me fuck you. Let me make you feel it.”

You let him.

You go pliant in his hands, let him chase the tempo, his rhythm messy but deep. Every thrust is a reminder of what you both lost and what he’s begging for now.

He fucks up into you like he’s trying to chase every unsaid apology down your spine. The car rocks with the motion. His arms strain with effort, sweat slipping between your bodies, your skin slapping wetly together with every filthy thrust.

“You’re unreal,” he moans. “So good. So fucking good. I forgot how you feel. I forgot how you sound when I—”

“You didn’t forget,” you cut in, panting. “You just—hng—thought you could survive without it.”

He whines at that. Literally whines. You tighten around him and his hips stutter.

The pressure rises again. Slower this time. No sharp edge. Just steady, building tension in your core. Your muscles twitch with each thrust, your chest pressed to his, damp and heaving.

Jun kisses you hard, tongue hot and desperate. “I wanna feel you come again,” he begs against your mouth. “Please. Please, baby. One more. Give it to me."

You nod, but it’s not conscious. Your body answers before your mouth can.

It crashes into you, serrated and mean. Your third orgasm claws through your nerves, your thighs clamping down around his waist as you cry out into his neck. It’s overwhelming. Scalding. Your body trembles, every inch of you unraveling in his hands.

That’s all he needs. He groans, deep and undone, shoving into you one last time and staying there. His whole body goes tight, shakes. You cup his face. Make him look at you.

The thought occurs to you for the nth time: Jun is so pretty when he comes. 

Even if he does it with a raw, wounded sound. He pulses deep inside you, buried as far as he can get, and you swear you can feel him shaking with it. Like it guts him. Like it saves him.

He clings to you afterward. Breathing hard. Drenched and unraveled.

You don’t say anything. You just stay. Let him hold you. Let him come back to you, slowly but surely.

Because this time, he isn’t running. And for once, neither are you.

The next morning, though, you wake to the absence of weight.

That’s the first thing you notice.

The second is the shape of your own anxiety, curling low in your chest, familiar as a bad habit. The other side of the bed is empty. The sheets are rumpled and cooling. There’s a single long strand of hair caught in the pillowcase. Not yours.

For a moment, you just stare at it. Then you look around. Bedroom door open. A thin shaft of light bleeds in from the hallway.

You don’t call out. You don’t move. You just go very, very still.

This is, after all, a familiar pattern. Boy meets girl. Boy runs away. Girl pretends she doesn’t notice until it’s convenient to feel something about it. The air smells like sex and detergent. The ceiling has a crack in it that you keep forgetting to report to the landlord. Your throat is dry.

Then Jun reappears.

Towel low on his hips, toothbrush in hand. He stops short in the doorway, mid-step, and you watch the exact moment he realizes what his absence must’ve looked like. The moment the air shifts. The look on your face must be something, because his shoulders drop in a slow exhale and his voice goes soft.

“Hey. I didn’t leave,” he says, swallowing his toothpaste—what a fucking psycho—before setting his tooth brush on to the nearest flat surface. “Just went to brush my teeth."

You raise an eyebrow. Try to mask the little betrayal that had already crept in. “You know, most people announce their morning survival before disappearing,” you say. “It’s customary.” 

Jun winces. “You’re right. I should’ve said something. I just didn’t want to wake you.”

You sit up, sheets falling to your waist. Your body aches in a way that feels earned. Your hair is a mess after the two, maybe three rounds that you and Jun had when he fell into your bed last night. You don’t care enough to hide the overthinking.

“You could’ve left a note,” you say. Half-serious, half-joking. “Or a sock on the door. A smoke signal.”

He laughs, crosses to the side of the bed. Drops the towel a little lower on purpose, the menace. “Noted. Next time I disappear into the bathroom, I’ll launch a full PR campaign.”

You narrow your eyes. “See that you do.”

His hand lifts to your face, thumb dragging just under your cheekbone. “I’m here,” he says, plain and simple as a promise. And he means it.

Maybe it’s stupid that you believe him. Maybe it’s messier than it should be, that you’re even in this place, in this bed, with this boy again.

But his hand is warm. His mouth is soft when he kisses your forehead. And when he climbs back in bed to hold you to him, you don’t say no. 

It’s a Saturday, so the two of you let the sun climb high enough to slice through your blinds. You’d move, but Jun is draped over you like a weighted blanket with abandonment issues. It’s clingy in a way that would be annoying if it weren’t also stupidly comforting. 

His leg is thrown across yours. His arm is a dead weight on your stomach. He smells like your shampoo and the faint citrus of your soap, and the whole thing is either domestic bliss or a very elaborate trap.

His fingers are tucked into the curve of your hip, not moving, just there. A quiet claim. As if anchoring himself will stop time or stop you from thinking of endings.

You’re not even annoyed, which is suspicious. You should be cataloging all the reasons this is a bad idea. Cross-department entanglements, your no-office-romance policy (written internally, unspoken externally), the sheer HR nightmare of it all. Instead, you’re memorizing the rhythm of his breathing.

“So,” he says after a long moment, voice still scratchy with sleep, mouth near your collarbone, "they offered me a job."

You blink at the ceiling. The fan clicks. One of the blades wobbles slightly. “‘They’ being The Carat Company.”

He nods into your shoulder. You feel the curve of his smile before you see it. It’s smug and sleepy and dangerous—a combination that should come with a warning label.

You hum. Neutral. “That’s… a choice.”

Jun shifts. Enough to glance up at you, catching your expression with lazy amusement. It’s probably somewhere between polite support and visible internal shrieking. “Wow,” he murmurs. “You are doing an excellent job of pretending that doesn’t horrify you."

You sigh, staring at the water-stained patch on your ceiling. “I just think our HR department is one passive-aggressive email away from imploding, and I’m not sure I want to share a copier with someone who’s seen me naked.”

He chuckles. Kisses your shoulder. “That’s fair. But relax. I’m not taking it.”

You pause. Blink. Turn your head just enough to catch his face. “You’re not?”

He shakes his head, pulling back slightly, grinning like a man who knows he’s about to get a dramatic reaction. You squint at him. "So?"

“Sebong offered me something better.”

Record scratch. Full stop. You sit up slightly, sheet dragging across your chest. “Sebong Corporation? Our most flamboyant and passive-aggressive rival?”

“The very same.”

You purse your lips. “The one that sent us cupcakes during Q3 just to say ‘Sorry about your metrics’?”

Jun grins. “A plus for petty. But yeah, they want me.”

“You’re going corporate spy now? Love that for you,” you jab. “Can you wear a wire to our next team sync?"

He shrugs, undeterred by your sarcasm as a coping mechanism. “They offered better pay, better benefits. Free espresso on every floor.”

You make a sound of mock envy. “Now you’re just bragging.”

“I am,” he adds, with that soft arrogance only he can pull off without getting slapped. “I think I’m gonna take it.”

“Why?”

He looks at you with the kind of gaze that burns just a little. Like he’s searching for a permission he already knows you’ll give. Then he says it. The same thing he said when he waltzed back into your life, self-assured and saccharine. 

“It’s the best, isn’t it?” Jun says. “And I always want the best.”

You roll your eyes so hard your ancestors probably feel it. But something in your chest stutters. This time, the words land different. Softer. Honest in a way that makes your ribs ache.

He’s making a concession. He’s doing something to make this, make the two of you, possible. 

He’s calling you something he wants, and calling you the best, in the same breath.  

Jun leans in, presses his forehead to yours, nose brushing yours like an apology. When he kisses you, it tastes like toothpaste and devotion. And also maybe like something terrifyingly close to commitment.

You lie there for a while. Wrapped in warmth and silence and the complicated calculus of wanting things that feel big and breakable. Like him. Like this. Like futures you haven’t even said out loud yet.

At some point, Jun shifts behind you, arms tightening around your middle. His chin rests in the crook of your neck, breath brushing your skin.

“You okay with it?” he asks.

You shrug. “I mean, it’s marginally better than you working across the hall from me and flirting over the printer queue.”

“We’d both get nothing done.”

“Exactly. Chaos.”

Jun kisses the back of your shoulder again. It’s like he can’t stop kissing you, like he can’t believe he can do it all again. Somewhere in the quiet that follows, your brain writes the paperwork.

--

This Employment Contract (“Agreement”) is made between Wen Junhui (“Boyfriend”), and you.

WHEREAS the Boyfriend agrees to remain shirtless in your apartment at least three mornings per week, and to bring the good coffee whenever you run out;

WHEREAS emotional transparency shall be upheld with the same rigor as quarterly reporting, including but not limited to: post-sex vulnerability, Sunday-night anxiety debriefs, and one (1) designated safe word for moments of self-sabotage;

WHEREAS both parties are permitted one (1) bad take per fiscal quarter, to be gently corrected and never mentioned again;

THEREFORE, both parties agree to exclusive rights to back scratches, late-night ramen runs, shared Spotify queues, and slow dancing in the kitchen when neither of you feels like cooking;

FURTHERMORE, cuddling shall not be used as a diversion tactic during emotionally intense conversations, unless unanimously approved by both parties in advance.

The thing is, Wen Junhui barely made it through law school. Barely passed his licensing exam. Watched his classmates score prestigious internships and receive exclusive offers and network and schmooze and, he thought at the time, all but sell their soul to graduate with jaw-dropping salaries awaiting them and no debt.

And it fucking sucked watching that, because he was about to become a lawyer, sure, but he’d gotten scarlet fever as a kid, swore he was going to die, swore he saw not only the light but Jesus himself (his mother called this a delusion, still insists to this day the prodigal son did not travel all the way to Shenzhen to visit him), and decided if he survived he was going to dedicate his life to the church and become a priest.

(He only decided on law school after he got a little carried away with his high school girlfriend, received an honestly mid handjob that had him crying for three straight days and contemplating confession before he decided to take it to his grave, and he’d announced the next night at dinner, weighed down by an impressive amount of guilt and religious trauma, that he was just going to go to university and major in business or finance instead.)

Anyway. Turns out that whole selling their soul thing wasn’t a joke, and where others would’ve seen a loophole, Wen Junhui had seen an opportunity.

Because he didn’t have the grades. Didn’t have the family name or even the drive, because in another life he’s at least a deacon, so he had to do something. Had to think outside the box, get a little creative, carve out a niche for himself that none of his classmates would also be trying to occupy because he had student loans.

“How did you even get in here?” you ask, doing one of those really cool pen flips Jun has never figured out how to do. “A human hasn’t just strolled into my office in at least a millennia.”

Jun swallows, tries not to let show how nervous he is. “I, uh—I’m not sure? I sort of just… walked in, I guess.”

You blink. Study him for a while, eyes narrowed, before you make a small ah! sound and snap your fingers. What the heck? Jun can’t do that, either. “I know who you are now.”

“You do?”

“Mmhm, sure do. You were pretty famous around here for about thirteen seconds when you got that handjob and changed the trajectory of your own life forever. Some of the lower demons had bet money on you eventually becoming the Pope, so you can imagine their heartbreak… and the amount of coin they lost.” You click your tongue, return your attention to the scroll in front of you. “I kept telling them not to bet on that kind of stuff. Teenagers are wildly unpredictable, especially hormonal teenage boys. One of my finest creations, if I do say so myself.”

Not that he had any expectation of privacy here, but to say he’s mortified would be an understatement.

“Oh. That’s… really embarrassing.”

You nod, distracted as you press a large red button on your desk. “Yeah, I imagine for you it would be.”

Two men immediately materialize on each side of you. One is all cheekbones and sharp, calculating edges. Looks like the personification of mischief or perhaps temptation. After that handjob and the subsequent mourning period, Jun had come to really, really appreciate women, but he’s secure enough in his sexuality to acknowledge that the man in front of him—with his long, dark hair and lithe figure; his nonchalant, blasé attitude—is very attractive.

And the other one is no slouch, either. Has what Jun presumes is meant to be a friendlier disposition, a foil of the other man, good-cop-bad-cop, and they must be quite successful, he figures. Can’t imagine a world in which there’s anything that’d be denied to either of them.

Still, they’re well-acquainted with you, because they barely blink as you say, “Please say hello to our intruder,” with a frightening amount of bite.

The dark-haired one offers up a sleazy grin as he leans back against the wall. “Hello, intruder. Do you have a name?”

It’s a predictable question, and yet Jun still startles. Goes slack-jawed as he fixes his posture, sits straighter in his seat. Has the first syllable of his name sitting on the tip of his tongue when the other man sighs and gestures for Jun to stay quiet. “Don’t tell him your name. Better yet, don’t tell him anything, just pretend he doesn’t exist.”

“That’s rich coming from a person who chose to call themselves Joshua.”

Joshua pouts. “I thought there was something to be said for the irony.” A snort tumbles out of him, and Jun realizes that he is not the foil of the other man: he is, in fact, just as impish and rogue. “God is deliverance.” The dark-haired one does not react. “Aw, c’mon, it’s funny!”

“If you have to convince someone it’s funny, it probably is not so.”

Joshua rolls his eyes. “Alright, Jeonghan. As if you didn’t do the same thing.”

“At least when I strive to be ironic, it actually is humorous—”

With an exasperated sigh, you return your attention to Jun, who has suddenly found a fascinating piece of lint on his trousers. Pointedly does not make eye contact with you, because you had been intimidating and hellacious on your own—and, he’s a little flustered to admit, very attractive—but he’s extremely out of his element sitting across from the literal devil and two demons.

“So, Wen Junhui,” you say, tossing a pair of reading glasses onto your desk, “why are you here?”

(“Wen Junhui?” Joshua whispers to Jeonghan. “As in the Wen Junhui that got the handjob?”

“How the fuck am I supposed to know?” Jeonghan whispers back.)

And now it all feels a bit silly, because Jun had walked straight into Hell thinking he’d be able to… what, exactly? Strike up a friendly conversation? Start making demands? Cut a deal that didn’t include handing over his mortal soul?

Maybe the whole becoming a priest thing hadn’t worked out but he’d still learned a thing or two, and he remembers all the words used to describe you, your original purpose. Meant to reflect God’s glory, anointed, given the highest seat at the table. They’d blamed your downfall on pride, on vanity and violence, and Wen Junhui from Shenzhen, China, who once had scarlet fever and got a bad handjob, was a fool to come here and think he could go toe-to-toe with you.

Overcome with nerves, all he can do is laugh as he toys with the hair at the nape of his neck. Considers saying something like you’re gonna think this is so silly before he decides against it. You’ve been accused of having a sense of humor, but Jun can’t imagine this harebrained scheme of his would make the cut.

Still—he wouldn’t be where he is if the bad ideas sitting on his shoulder had kept quiet, and they’re still whispering to him now, reminding him how he wound up here to begin with: less fortunate than his classmates, less connected, looked over for all those internships and opportunities because he wasn’t born with the proper credentials. Those god-forsaken student loans. Desperation forced him to do this, and it’d be a real shame if he got this far only to give up at the last second, wouldn’t it?

So, he does what he did best all those years of law school: he fakes it.

“Let’s say I’m interested in… a partnership, of sorts.”

Jeonghan and Joshua share a look.

“Ah,” you reply, hands folded in front of you. “And what kind of partnership would that be?”

Let no man (or demon) ever accuse Wen Junhui of doing things half-assed, because he’s doing a concerning amount of oversharing and trauma-dumping before he can talk himself out of it. Spills all the highs and lows of his twenty-odd years, including his infamous handjob, much to Joshua and Jeonghan’s delight. They listen with rapt attention, elbowing one another as they gleefully press him for more details, and to their credit they only interrupt him once with lewd gestures before they’re slapping at and falling over one another with laughter.

He gets to his time in law school. Talks about feeling lapped by his classmates and all the advantages they’d been given, the benefits that weren’t on offer for someone like him: the oldest son of a piano teacher and a seamstress. Someone who showed up to class with a worn leather bag (repaired weekly by his mother) and secondhand books yellowing at the edges. Someone who spent his Friday nights and weekends holed up in his dorm room, not invited to parties and mixers.

“I had to do my first internship in personal injury,” he says, arms gesticulating wildly. “No one wanted those internships, and do you know why?” He pauses for dramatic effect. Jeonghan mimics a sound that sounds like game show countdown music. “Those pictures were gross.”

“Tragic,” you deadpan.

“It was,” Jun insists. He’s starting to feel fidgety. Has no idea how his plight is being received. “It wasn’t paid, either, and I had to take out student loans.”

Joshua beams. “Her second best invention.”

“What?” Jeonghan retorts, brows pinching in the middle. “No way, second-best is definitely cocaine—”

From you comes an exaggerated, long-suffering sigh, and Jeonghan and Joshua immediately cease their bickering. You turn your attention to Jun, and if he’d been able to trick himself into thinking a glimmer of patience or good humor or—god forbid—genuine affection had been visible before, no such delusions are available now. Your face is stern, the pupils of your eyes reflecting flames behind him that don’t exist, and the corners of your mouth are tugged severely downward.

He swallows hard.

“Wen Junhui, get to the point. Your human skin is starting to stink up my office.”

Subtly, he tries to sneak a sniff of his armpit. It’s not mountain fresh, but he’s certainly smelled worse, and he thinks he deserves a little leeway as his body acclimates to such extreme temperatures. He then crosses one leg over the other, ankle on thigh, and leans forward on his elbows. Tries to project some—any—amount of authority and confidence as he says, “I need a niche. Something just for me; something none of my classmates are going after.”

“Because you’re unable to compete with them,” you tack on. Unnecessarily and rudely, in Jun’s opinion, but he nods anyway. Behind you, Jeonghan and Joshua are once again elbowing one another, giddy at Jun’s impending failure while desperately trying to keep their expressions neutral. “Let me guess: you want the same deal?” You begin rifling through a drawer in your desk. “I think I still have all those contracts around here somewhere, so I’m sure I can get you something similar, but if we’re being honest you’re worth a good bit more.”

Jun blinks. “I’m sorry?”

“What part are you having trouble with?” you ask, still sorting through files. Only the top of your head is visible over the ledge of your African blackwood desk.

No horns, Jun notes. He was so sure you were going to have horns.

“Er, both, to be honest. What do you mean I’m ‘worth more’?”

Jeonghan rolls his eyes before slamming his palms onto your desk, causing Jun to startle. Just for fun. “Hey, moron, were you not listening when she told you earlier that you were supposed to be the goddamn Pope?”

“You weren’t even here when she said that,” Jun mumbles, every bit the moron Jeonghan accused him of being, because it’s far easier than acknowledging… well, the entirety of that statement.

Does the Pope get a salary? If he does, surely it’s more than Jun’s making now—

“He doesn’t,” Joshua says. Then clarifies, “Get a salary. Just some coins. A woefully underpaid position, if you ask me, considering how many babies he has to kiss.” He shudders. “Disgusting! When you could just eat them instead!”

Aside from the whole eating babies thing, Jun can’t really disagree. Only a handful of coins for being in charge of all of Catholicism and having to know Latin? And having to live in Italy?

“Also,” Joshua continues, “it’s kind of our job to know everything that goes on down here, so we did, in fact, know she told you that you were supposed to be the Pope.”

Jeonghan rolls his eyes. “And yet he became a lawyer. Imagine if Fibonacci had done the same—the eighth circle would be so boring.”

“Boniface,” Jun corrects him, immediately shutting trap at the look the three of you send his way. “He’s really in the eighth circle? I thought Dante just said that because he was upset about the exile.”

Upset is underselling it, Joshua mumbles. Looks like he wants to say more but has enough sense not to. Beside him, Jeonghan is once again rolling his eyes, growing more perturbed and borderline-homicidal in Jun’s proximity by the second.

Does he really smell that bad? Should he wear cologne next time? Is there a particular note those in the Underworld find appealing? Because Jun doesn’t mind tracking it down. He’s here on your turf asking for a favor, after all, so it’d be basic manners to smell nice and not stink up the place.

He’s about to ask when a booming sound of acknowledgement comes from you. A sly grin sits lopsided on your face as you toss a manila folder onto your desk, so thick a yellowing rubber band struggles to fit around it once. “This is you, Wen Junhui,” you say, pushing it closer to Jun.

All he can do is stare. Feels like his heart is going to pound right out of his chest, and he can’t pinpoint why, doesn’t know what’s got him so uneasy. He doesn’t have to look at it to know his entire life is in that file—perhaps even the before and the after. All the possibilities, all the could-have-beens. The consequences of him going right at the fork in the road instead of taking the left. Endless, and he finally realizes the boulder sitting on his chest is dread: existential variety.

“It’s, uh.” He licks at his lips. “It’s really big,” he finally says, feeling stupid and embarrassed at the way his voice trembles.

“Aish, this fucking kid,” Jeonghan grouses at the same time Joshua snickers and wonders aloud, “Do you think that’s what that girl said when he got the handjob?”

You press the red button again and Jeonghan and Joshua disappear without a word.

“Even in the lowest pits of Hell you must still suffer the displeasure of men,” you say, as if you’re imparting ancient wisdom upon Jun. “I must admit I’ve grown quite familiar with your file.”

“Manila,” Jun replies, also as if he’s being extremely wise. “Didn’t expect to see that around here.”

“Yes, well, the cheap ones are great for papercuts.” You pause and your demeanor grows serious, belying the importance of what you’re about to say. “You’re one of a select few, Wen Junhui. Not many files that come across my desk are this size.”

Pride swells in his chest, booting that existential boulder to the curb. “Oh,” he says, trying desperately to tamper down his excitement. “Yay!”

He does a little wiggle. Mortifying.

“Something you said earlier stuck out to me—something about certain things not being on offer for someone like you.” Your eyes meet Jun’s, and it suddenly feels like he’s been catapulted off the edge of the world. “I don’t think you realize just how much is on offer for someone like you.”

Jun swallows hard. Tries to, anyway—finds that his mouth has gone bone dry. His limbs, too, refuse to work, feel both heavy and weightless, and he’s anxious again, hands and feet saturated with sweat, no wonder he smells, and he knows, he knows, he knows who and what you are, knows this is a trick. Knows he’s offered himself up on a silver platter.

Good god, he came here willingly. No wonder Jeonghan kept calling him names.

“So,” you begin, moving your glasses to the top of your head, “what is it you want? You’re in an elite tier; I could give you almost anything you ask for.”

“Um—”

“You mentioned loans; is it money you want? You’re not quite qualified for billionaire level yet, but I think you’d find both the terms and the offered amount to be quite… agreeable.”

Oh, you’re good. Just as he had with the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, Jun always thought the story of Adam and Eve was simple: don’t do the thing you’re explicitly told not to do. But now, seated across from Temptation itself, he understands it’s not that simple, that those two never stood a chance. Because the longer he’s silent, the more relaxed he starts to feel. That headache he’s been fighting off for three days finally starts to recede. He feels confident and a bit euphoric, but he supposes everyone would feel that way if they were being offered any and everything they could ever want.

“Actually…”

Wen Junhui isn’t very religious anymore, but he used to be. Used to believe in all the teachings; used to sit at the piano in the living room and hum along as his father played processionals; used to beg his mother to read from the Studium Biblicum at bedtime so he could fall asleep and dream of utopia.

Wen Junhui isn’t religious anymore, but he remembers the basics.

Enough to steel his voice and say, “Actually, I didn’t come here to talk about money.”

Jun doesn’t know what time it is.

It’s late enough that the city has gone mostly quiet. The buses have stopped running, the elevator just outside his door hasn’t dinged in a while, and the light that’s refracted onto his bedroom ceiling is a familiar shade of blue-silver. Not long after two a.m. if he had to guess.

He doesn’t know how he got back to his apartment, either, which would’ve been the more pressing issue at any other time.

But he’s had a long day. Took a little trip to Hell, got laughed at, got offered a lot of money, and got laughed at again. Now he’s got the anxiety shakes. Keeps seeing figures in every shadow. Can’t sleep even though every part of his body is bogged down by exhaustion. All he can do is stare at the swirls in the ceiling plaster and be glad he doesn’t have to work for another two days.

At first, he thinks the knocking is on someone else’s door. Then, once it doesn’t cease, he chalks it up to hallucination. It’s only once it goes from hey, I’m here! to OPEN THE GODDAMN DOOR RIGHT GODDAMN NOW does he stumble out of bed and through the living room.

Through the peephole, all that stares back at him are the dingy fluorescent lights of the hallway.

“You know, judging by the outside, I thought this place was gonna be a real shithole, but it’s not that bad.” Jun shrieks, collapses to the floor with his hand clawing at his chest. “Oops, sorry, dude. Didn’t mean to scare you.”

There is a man in his apartment.

There is a man in his apartment. At two o’clock in the morning.

“Wh-who are you?” he stammers out, eyes squeezed shut as if it’ll protect him. “I do-don’t have any mo-money.”

The man scoffs. If Jun was looking, he assumes it was accompanied by an eye-roll. “Not to be rude, but I was able to ascertain that, yeah.”

Jun peeks one eye open. Before him stands a man of average height, looks to be early to mid 20s. He’s wearing gray sweatpants and a black hoodie that says FEMALE BODY INSPECTOR in large white lettering. His hat, which is so neon pink it seems to glow, simply says SWAG.

He opens his other eye and quirks an eyebrow. “Are you a demon?”

“Ew, no.”

“What are you, then?”

The man pouts. “You can’t tell by my extremely good looks and”—he pauses, clears his throat like he’s trying to remember something—“awesome sauce fashion?”

“I—no, sorry. Also, your what?”

“I’m an angel,” the angel says quickly before he starts digging through his pockets. “Do people not say awesome sauce anymore?” Jun shakes his head. The angel pulls a pen out of nowhere and strikes out something in a notebook. “What year is it?”

“Er, 2024. Almost 2025.”

“What year did people stop saying awesome sauce?”

“I don’t know,” Jun says. “Do you have a name?”

The angel sighs, the pen and notebook both blink out of existence. “Hoshi,” the angel replies. “It means star, which I am. By the way.”

“Okay. May I ask why you’re in my apartment?”

“You ask a lot of questions. You got anything to drink?”

“I don’t remember any angels named Hoshi in the Bible.”

“It’s my Earth name.” Hoshi flutters his eyelashes. “Suits me, right?”

Jun’s eyes narrow. “You also aren’t biblically-accurate.”

Hoshi scoffs, hands immediately finding the waistband of his sweatpants. “I am where it counts.” He starts to pull them down, much to Jun’s horror, and all he can think is, oh my god I’m about to see an angel’s penis, what’s the protocol for this, do I have to look at it, would it be rude not to, this is the weirdest day of my life, I must be in a medically-induced coma—

“I’m getting the impression you don’t really want to see my dick.”

Jun covers his eyes again. “I don’t!”

“Bummer. I’m gonna summon a Baja Blast, do you want one?”

“I—no, no thank you. I think I just—I really need to sleep? But I’m not tired? It’s been a long day and I’m still not one-hundred percent sure I’m not hallucinating all of this.”

Hoshi snaps his fingers and a garishly blue bottle of soda appears in his hand. He beams. “Trade offer: I help you sleep and you take me out for breakfast when you wake up. We have a lot to talk about.”

“You’re just gonna… hang out here? In my apartment?”

“Yes,” Hoshi confirms. “I’m going to look through all your stuff.”

Jun wants to say no. He should say no. Has half a mind to consider Hoshi is lying about being an angel and is instead another demon sent by you from Hell to keep tabs on him, but his aura is different—less… oppressive—so he gives in and nods.

He’s asleep within seconds.

It’s only a few hours later when he stirs awake. Sunlight streams in through the curtains, and the sounds of the city are drowned out by birdsong. Jun feels more rested and weightless than he has in years, and it allows him to wake slowly, recount the events of the past 24 hours and take stock of his body, how he’s feeling. Do some breathing exercises. Briefly contemplate if he has now twice altered the trajectory of his life for the worst.

“Get up!” someone yells from his living room. Right, the angel guy. “I want waffles and the diner stops serving breakfast in thirty minutes!”

Jun stares blankly at the ceiling. There’s no diner anywhere near him that serves American breakfast, but he assumes that isn’t going to stop Hoshi, who has no concept or time or space and no constraints on either.

Thirty minutes later, they’re sitting across from one another in a retro American-style diner.

“Where are we?” Jun asks, peering outside the large window to his right. All the cars are American makes; the walls look like they're made out of silver; all the signs are in English. He doesn’t have to ask why he can understand them. “Besides America. I’m gathering as much.”

Hoshi pours an entire sugar packet in his mouth and grins. “New Jersey. They have more diners than any other state in America, and some are even open 24 hours! It’s my favorite place on Earth.”

“Okay,” Jun acquiesces. What else is he going to do? He’s never been to America before, let alone New Jersey. “What do I order? I don’t know what any of this stuff is.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll order for you.”

Famous last words.

Whatever Hoshi had ordered for him has more sugar in one bite than Jun usually eats in an entire week, but it’s so good he can’t help himself. Half of his meal is devoured before they can get to the heart of the meeting even though Hoshi yaps the whole time—talks animatedly about things Jun doesn’t understand but thinks sound important, like his dog and his favorite music. Hoshi also talks about his love for dancing, and when Jun cocks his head to the side and asks, like Saint Vitus?, all he gets in return is a small smile.

“Okay,” Hoshi says, pushing his plate towards the middle of the table, “now that I’m ready to throw up, it’s time to talk business.” Jun swallows, no longer hungry. “I saw your entire pitch. It was embarrassing.”

Jun groans and face-plants onto the table. “Yeah.” Syrup sticks to his forehead.

“However, it was a convincing story. That’s why They sent me here.”

“They?”

Hoshi waves him off. “Whatever you know Them as: God, the Lord, The Big Boss. They also heard everything.”

Jun slowly picks his head up and studies the angel across from him. Hoshi is weird, no doubt about that, but he’s also endearingly earnest. “And They… what? Want to help me?”

“Precisely,” Hoshi confirms. “And before you ask why, I think that part is quite obvious, but it’s two-fold: yes, it’s partly out of spite, but also—some of those souls were supposed to be ours.”

Jun blinks. Feels like his brain is filled with primordial goo and is about to split at the seams. “Explain this to me like I’m an idiot.”

“That’s what I’m doing,” Hoshi replies, tone measured and slightly confused. “We’re all-knowing up there, as I’m sure you know. We know who’s meant to be ours at the moment of their birth and we keep an eye on them throughout their lives. We’re not allowed to intervene, though, which the Devil knows. Free will and all that.” Hoshi rolls his eyes. “With free will comes temptation, and temptation is a powerful thing. Most people are not immune to it, which is why They took notice of you.”

“Wasn’t I—”

“Supposed to be the Pope? Yeah. They weren’t, like, super thrilled about the outcome of that, but contrary to popular belief, it’s not against Their Word to get a handjob.”

“But I spilled seed.”

The look on Hoshi’s face almost looks like a grimace. “And you’ve spilled a lot more since then. Look, all I’m saying is if the worst thing you do in your life is have sex, you’re not disqualified. We look at the entire itemized receipt, not a single purchase, if you catch my drift.”

“Yeah,” Jun replies, a little dazed. He still could’ve been the Pope. “I became a lawyer for nothing?”

“Not nothing,” Hoshi insists, shaking his head. “You’ve actually put yourself in a very unique position, which is what I’m trying to get to. Some of those souls were meant to be ours, but they fell into temptation and made deals with those fuc—” He coughs. “Those… beings… down there.”

Hoshi reaches across the table and places a warm hand over Jun’s. “They want you to help return their souls to where they belong.”

“And how am I supposed to do that? You saw it: she laughed at me, not to mention she now knows what I’m up to. And how am I meant to advertise? If these souls are already in Hell, it’s not like I can put up a billboard!”

Hoshi’s eyes narrow. “She?” he asks. “That’s how the Devil appeared to you?”

“I—yeah. Is that not how she appears to everyone?”

“What did she look like?”

Jun trudges through the slime in his brain. Tries to remember anything besides—“Pretty,” he answers. “I don’t really—that’s all I can remember. I just remember she was really, really pretty.”

“Like the kind of woman you’d be attracted to on Earth, right?” Jun nods. “You need to be careful. She’ll appear to you again in similar forms, especially now that I’ve been here and told you Their intention.”

“So you’re telling me I have to be suspicious of any beautiful woman that finds me attractive?” Hoshi nods, soliciting a tortured groan from Jun. “This just keeps getting worse and worse.”

“You won’t be able to avoid her, nor are you expected to. It’s to your advantage she entertained you at all, and she certainly wasn’t lying when she said you are of a higher status to her and everyone in Hell. If we want you, it’s only natural they would as well.”

Jun mulls all of this over. Stares into his mostly-empty mug of coffee and tries to make sense of it. “I can’t even remember how I got there. I just had the idea, and then it was like I woke up in Hell. I didn’t mean to—what if I don’t even want to do this anymore? Can’t I just go back to my regular, boring life? This is—this is too much.”

“Unfortunately it’s too late for that. You have been chosen, Wen Junhui, and not just for this.”

Jun scoffs. “You’re making me sound like Harry Potter.”

“Thankfully that lady does not belong to us. Now, would you like to go back to your apartment before we get into specifics? It may take a while.”

“...Can we take another order of these things to go?”

Hoshi grins and flags down the waitress to order another massive stack of sugar-dusted waffles. “I think I’m going to enjoy my time on earth with you, Wen Junhui.”

The specifics are thus:

Hoshi is in charge of what earth-bound lawyers would call advertising. Jun isn’t privy to the specifics; he doesn’t know how Hoshi is even capable of it, if he’s just going to waltz into Hell and hand out business cards or what, but it’s more than he’s able to do so he doesn’t ask. (Well, that’s not entirely true. He did ask, and all Hoshi said in return was, “You know Metatron?” and left it at that.)

Hoshi is also in charge of The List: the souls Heaven wants freed from their contracts and returned upstairs. He allows Jun a brief glimpse of it, who is none too surprised to find a few law school colleagues but still overwhelmed at its length. It’s long—so long it had taken Hoshi quite some time to unfurl the scroll—and it isn’t static. Anyone destined for Heaven that makes a deal with the devil while Jun’s at work will simply be added to the bottom of the list. On and on it’ll go, ad nauseam, until Jun either dies or retires.

Which, speaking of retirement—

In a shocking turn of events, the job comes with benefits. Hoshi had been reluctant to call it a salary. For all intents and purposes Jun will be self-employed: he will be provided with a small office space in a nice area of downtown with no signage, although he’s also welcome to work remotely or wherever he feels most comfortable. Money will appear in his account, though he can opt for other forms of payment if he so wishes. (He’d been offered enough to live off of for a year for even accepting the job but chose to have his student loans paid off instead.)

They will keep him healthy. They will keep his sleep schedule regular and his refrigerator stocked with nutritious food. They will ensure people leave him alone and that no suspicions are cast upon him. They will ensure Jun has every tool at his disposal to be successful.

(It was a lot. Felt like making an inverse deal with the devil—he knew he was playing for the right side, but it was non-negotiable and non-refundable. Wen Junhui had been chosen, and in a moment of self-doubt and self-deprecation, he’d joked, “Can They make me smarter?”

Hoshi’s brows had furrowed. “The list of benefits makes no mention of increased intelligence.” Jun pouted; let out a whiny little oh. Hoshi grabbed another sheet of paper. “Your intelligence stats are nearly maxed, dude.”

“I barely passed law school!” he protested.

“I don’t know what to tell you. If we made you any smarter your brain would explode. Literally.”)

After that, there wasn’t much left to discuss. Hoshi had a lot of planning to do; needed to talk to someone in the marketing department but promised he’d be back as soon as possible. Left a tome in Jun’s possession and told him to study.

Theological Contract Law: A Very Comprehensive Introduction: Cases and Materials - 2326th Edition, it says, and Jun stares down at it full of foreboding. It’s bound in black leather, giltstamped in red. Nothing good comes bound in black leather with shiny red letters.

Still, he does what’s asked of him, lest his student loan pay-off gets reversed. He spends hours hunched over his small dining room table with a legal pad to his right, taking notes on any and everything that may prove important—what he can make sense of, at least, because it doesn’t resemble any legal or governmental structure he’s ever seen.

He groans. Tosses his pen onto the table and leans back in the stiff wooden chair, lets his head loll off the back as the wood digs into his neck. Says, “What the heck am I supposed to do with this?” to the empty space of his apartment, and before he’s even opened his eyes another book appears on the table.

Theological Law For Mortals: An Introduction (Sorry!!!! - Hoshi)

He swears.

The days bleed together. Hoshi pops in briefly to officially assign him his first case: one Kim Mingyu from Anyang-si, South Korea. Apparently sold his soul to be “tall and hot” and Heaven desperately needs him back. “This one’s important to the big boss,” Hoshi says, dropping off a stack of papers with a picture paperclipped to the front with the most attractive, symmetrical man Jun has ever seen. “He was meant to work in recruiting,” Hoshi explains.

Jun whistles low. “Understandable. Look at his face.”

“Exactly, so you get the need for a little urgency.” He tries to stamp it down, but Jun feels the panic start to rise. Has to dig his fingernails into the palm of his hand. “Hey, just do your best. Call me if you need anything.”

Hoshi turns to leave, ugly pair of brand new sneakers squeaking against the linoleum floor of the kitchen, but Jun’s able to stammer out, “What—what if I can’t do it?”

The angel turns, face marred by genuine confusion. “Why would you think you can’t?”

And then he’s gone.

Fueled by Hoshi’s unwavering—and frankly incomprehensible—confidence in him, Jun finds what he needs just after four o’clock Sunday morning. There, on page 4,837 of Theological Contract Law: A Very Comprehensive Introduction: Cases and Materials - 2326th Edition, in subsection 69 of section 567, it clearly states that souls handed over in exchange for vanity-related reasons must adhere to strict guidelines, limited to but not including:

General facial appearance

Eye and/or hair color

Penis, breast, and/or butt size

Height and/or weight

Others TBD

Pushed beyond the threshold of exhaustion, eyes going in and out of focus, he’s not sure the text following the sub-bullet point is real, but there it is: In regards to height, men must be made at least 6’2” or 188 centimeters for the contract to be considered legally binding.

“Hoshi!”

At once, the angel appears across from him. He’s decked out in another stupid t-shirt (Don’t Bully Me, I’ll Cum, this one says) and is drinking a 7-Eleven slushy through a bendy straw. His lips and tongue are stained blue when he smiles and asks, “Good news?”

Jun shakes his head. Tries to erase the scene in front of him. “Maybe,” he answers. “I need you to get an accurate height on Kim Mingyu. And I mean really accurate. Shave him bald if you have to.”

Hoshi’s smile fades as he grows serious. “You really think you’ve got something?”

“I think so.” Jun pushes the book across the table. “Take a look at that part I highlighted. I know his file says he’s 188 centimeters tall, but imagine if whoever measured him just rounded up? If he’s even a millimeter under that, the contract is void.”

Before he can comprehend what’s happening, Hoshi climbs halfway across the table, grabs Jun by the cheeks, and plants a wet, noisy kiss in the middle of Jun’s forehead. “Wen Junhui, you sneaky little minx, I may be a little in love with you.”

Jun’s face flushes hot and red.

“Just—just look into it, okay? I’ve been over the rest of this and I can’t see any other way out of it.” With a sarcastic salute, Hoshi disappears. Feels like he’s only gone a few minutes before he pops back up in the living room wearing a somber expression. “What?” Jun asks, panicked, feeling his stomach drop out of his ass. “What’s wrong?”

“Bad news,” Hoshi replies, heaving a sigh. Won’t look up from the floor. Does an impeccable job at selling it, before he looks up at Jun with a shit-eating grin, barely able to contain his excitement. “For the Devil! Ha ha ha!”

Whiplash. All Jun can feel is whiplash, and he stumbles out of the chair, can barely feel the ache in his bones. Trips over a rogue object on his way to the living room. “What? You mean—”

“You did it! Kim Mingyu officially measured in at a glorious six-foot-one-point-nine repeating.”

Jun grabs onto the back of the couch so he doesn’t pass out. Oxygen is not reaching his brain right now, nor is coherent thought. All those agonizing days in law school during which he resigned himself to being a failure. All those back-breaking nights he had to run to the bus stop to get home from his internship, only a handful of hours before he had to be awake again for class. All the meals he upchucked from anxiety before critical exams. All his classmates that’d ignored and belittled him. And now—

“I did it…” he says, voice colored with pure disbelief.

Hoshi starts doing some kind of concerning, robotic-looking dance. “Yeah, bitch!” A bolt of lightning strikes right in front of him and Hoshi startles. Rubs at the back of his neck and has the good sense to look sheepish. “I forgot I’m not supposed to swear.” He looks up at the ceiling. “Sorry, Boss!”

He turns his attention to Jun. “Go take a shower and get dressed. Wear something nice; we’re going out to celebrate.”

Whatever club Hoshi has brought him to is humid and sticky.

With what, Jun can’t be sure, but every time he presses his fingertips together it takes a concerning amount of time for them to peel apart.

Hoshi leads him to the bar. Hops onto a stool and kicks his feet as he waves over the bartender. She’s cute, Jun thinks; a bright, open smile splits her face as she pulls away from Hoshi, clearly endeared by whatever it was he had said. She moves around the bar with an easy confidence, does a little twirl to avoid her coworker, and Jun doesn’t realize he’s hypnotized until Hoshi digs an elbow into his ribs.

“Take it easy, killer. I ordered us some shots.”

Jun snaps out of his reverie. “Can you even drink?”

“Of course I can, I just can’t get drunk. Not here, anyway. Big Boss made the real good stuff exclusive to you-know-where after a few, uh… mishaps. Down here.” He coughs. “Let’s find somewhere to sit. I’ll come back for the drinks.”

There’s an empty booth tucked away in a corner. Jun takes the side that gives him an eyeline shot of the bar even though it feels a little creepy, and if Hoshi knows what he’s doing he doesn’t mention it. He’s back to yapping about one thing or another, gets distracted by all the commotion in the club—the group playing darts, the packed dance floor, a couple making out near the restrooms. Quite enthusiastically, Jun might add.

True to his word, Hoshi disappears for a second to retrieve the drinks. Jun watches as the bartender hands over a tray of rainbow-colored shots and also as Hoshi pats the pockets of his skin-tight pleather plants. Watches as he panics and frantically waves Jun over. Once he’s in his personal space, Hoshi leans in and whispers, “They say they need a card for the tab. I don’t know what that is so I’m assuming I don’t have one.”

Jun sighs. Explains, “It’s a credit card. How do you survive down here with no money?” Nevertheless, he digs out his wallet and hands his card over. “I can’t believe you invited me out and I’m getting stuck with the bill.”

Hoshi tuts. Hands Jun’s credit card to the bartender without an ounce of remorse. “Relax, I’ll have Matt reimburse you.”

“Who the heck is Matt—” Jun begins to say, but he’s interrupted by the most annoying angel God ever created placing the tray of drinks in Jun’s hands, then asking, “Can you take this back to the table? I’ll be right there.”

Hoshi is not going to be right there. Hoshi is going to hover around the bar because the cute bartender was making eyes at him, and Jun is going to return to their formerly-shared table to drink alone. There aren’t many things more depressing than going out with a friend to celebrate a personal achievement only to end up downing six shots on his own.

…Which are not to Jun’s taste at all.

He’s a habitual Tsingtao drinker. Never bothers to order anything else because he knows what he likes and it has never steered him wrong. Never had his head stuck in a toilet bowl, either, which is territory he’ll rapidly be approaching if he actually goes through with this.

“Is this seat taken?”

Jun knows it’s you without having to look up. Your aura is tangible—something thick and syrupy like molasses and just as dark; something suffocating, something that would drown him—and it follows you like a shadow. Slides into the booth before Jun can answer, just a nanosecond before your physical form does the same, and when you’re at eye level he has to swallow his gasp.

You look completely different.

Still beautiful, he thinks, because it’s hard to think of anything else. Jun knows who and what you are, of course; remembers the warning Hoshi had given him. Knows that this is just another one of your tricks, another layer of temptation, but it’s a beauty like quicksand. It’s a beauty like the misunderstood creatures at the heart of every fairy tale—those haunting kinds of myths meant to both make you wary and suck you in. It’s a beauty accentuated by darkness.

Worst of all, it’s a beauty that’s making his pants a little tight in the dick area.

“What does that imbecile have you drinking?” you ask, reaching for one of the remaining shot glasses. You grimace as you hold it up to the light. “You know, I once watched a man throw back twelve of these things before he stripped down to nothing but a diaper and attempted to rob a convenience store across the street.”

“Oh. What happened?”

You sigh. Place the glass back on the tray. “A comedy of errors, of course. He somehow managed to make it into the store unnoticed, but he had neither a weapon nor something to store the money in. He tried climbing across the counter to get to the cash register, but the clerk hit him in the head with a metal step stool and knocked him unconscious before calling the police.”

“I’m assuming he got arrested?”

“Oh, no.” You laugh, and Jun’s taken aback by how normal it sounds. “He came to before the police got there. I guess the sirens freaked him out because he ran out of the store and got hit by a bus.” Jun must be wearing a particular look, because you follow that up with, “He was always meant to be one of ours, so don’t worry, you won’t have to meet him.”

Right.

Jun had expected this. Not that he’d had a whole lot of time to expect it, considering Kim Mingyu had been freed from his contract for a whopping fifteen minutes before Hoshi was shoving Jun into the bathroom to shower, but it had been a passing thought on at least four separate occasions.

You’re not going to apologize, he tells himself. Wonders if you can hear his thoughts and desperately hopes you can’t, considering he’d thought about getting a semi from how pretty you are. It wasn’t even a semi, really, if he’s being honest. What’s half of a semi? One-fourth of a boner? That’s what he’d gotten, and if you can read his thoughts it’s very important that you know that.

“I’m not Joshua.”

Jun startles. Feels all the normalcy leak out of his body and form a gloopy puddle on the floor. “Um,” he replies stupidly. “Then how did you—”

“I can feel you thinking. Always feels like chickenpox when humans overthink around me.”

He wrings his sweaty hands together. Rubs them on his jeans when that doesn’t work. “Sorry,” he says instinctually. “It’s just—I’m not sure what I’m supposed to say.”

“Why?” you challenge. “Is there something you want to say?”

“I don’t think so. But I can’t imagine you’re very happy with me, and I get this sort of, um. When I know someone’s upset with me it feels like chickenpox, too. And even though I know, logically, that I did a good thing, I still feel like I’m going to throw up?”

Tense silence hangs between the two of you. Jun’s on the verge of word-vomiting another apology when you snap your fingers and turn the remaining shots into something resembling watery honey. You hold one out to him. “Drink this,” you instruct, and Jun makes a point not to let your fingers touch when he takes it.

“Is it poison?”

You heave another sigh. “Wen Junhui, there are some things you need to understand about me. First of all, this is an inherited job. Being The Anointed One comes with a lot of work and responsibility so we get burned out, okay? So there’s only ever been one devil as far as humans are concerned, but in a weird avatar-y kind of way that’s hard to explain and not worth my time to explain to you, specifically, considering you’re the enemy now. Second, I am capable of killing you in ways your human brain cannot even begin to conceive of. I do not need to poison you with ginger tea to take you out.”

Jun looks down at the glass. Raises it to his noise and takes a hesitant sniff.

Oh. Yeah, that’s ginger tea.

That you conjured him… because he said he felt nauseous?

“The last thing you need to understand is that the loophole you found was… unfortunate, to say the least, but Kim Mingyu’s contract was not one of mine. The next contract that idiotic angel is going to ask you to work on was also not my work. If you free him, too, it will be regrettable, but it will pale in comparison to what will happen to you if you even think about touching one of mine.”

You’re gone before the fear can even set in.

Jun blinks, staring at the empty seat across from him. No indication at all that you’d been there, no lingering shadow, just the taste of ginger on his tongue and one of those cartoon scribbles in a thought bubble hovering metaphorically above his head.

He doesn’t—

He can’t—

No, he decides, he is not going to have a mental break in this club. Not while “Friday” by Rebecca Black plays on a loop. Not while he can hear someone to his left vomiting all over the floor. Not while he watches Hoshi skip back to the table and he notices, for the first time all night, what he’s wearing.

“Did you change?”

Because he swears the angel wasn’t wearing that when they left the apartment. The pleather pants, yes, but not the baby pink cropped tank with a decal of a creepy child in the middle that says BOYS ARE STUPID, THROW ROCKS AT THEM.

“What? No,” Hoshi answers, sliding into the seat you’d occupied only moments earlier. “Why does it smell weird over here?”

Jun plays stupid. “One of the dartboard girls puked on the floor.” He’s not very good at it.

Hoshi shakes his head. “Not that.” An exaggerated sniff, not unlike a bloodhound. “It smells like… it definitely smells familiar. I know this smell. It’s like—you know how it feels when it’s about to snow? How the cold and the air burn your nose, but it doesn’t actually smell like anything? As if it used to have a smell, once, a long time ago, and all it is now is just an imprinted memory?”

Jun lies, “No. Nope, no idea.”

Hoshi visibly deflates. “Well, it’s kind of like that. Also a little bit like you used wet moss to put out a wildfire. It fills me with—” Hoshi pauses. Narrows his gaze as he studies Jun intently. Being stared at like this by a guy in that particular shirt is a bit disorienting, he must admit. “She was here, wasn’t she?”

He’ll know he’s lying, but Jun says no again because it’s a lot easier than explaining that being threatened within an inch of his mortal life made him cum in his pants a little.

After the club, Jun gets a few days of reprieve.

He doesn’t hear from Hoshi at all, nor does he materialize unexpectedly in his apartment. No mysterious books show up, either, which is a relief. He’d stored both Theological Contract Law: A Very Comprehensive Introduction: Cases and Materials - 2326th Edition and Theological Law For Mortals: An Introduction on a seldom-used bookshelf in his living room and now the shelf is starting to bow in the middle. One more tome of that size and the whole thing is going to come tumbling down and earn him a noise complaint.

Another one.

Because Hoshi has already racked up three in Jun’s name.

So he tries to go back to life as usual until he’s needed again. Does his grocery shopping in the middle of the week in the middle of the day when it’s not so busy and he can navigate the aisles without crippling anxiety. Goes to a check-up and has to lie about turning over a new leaf and taking his health seriously when his cholesterol levels are back within perfect range. He plays video games, picks a nice willow tree in the park to sit beneath and read (normal books this time), takes some of the Mingyu money to buy a decent watch and a few tailored suits.

For the first time in a while, he’s able to sleep through the night.

But he can’t shake the feeling that it’s all… strange. Ever since you’d shown up at the bar, he swears he sees you everywhere: in line a few registers over at the supermarket, in the waiting room of the hospital, coming out of a fitting room in the mall. It’s that aura again. Stalks him like prey. Has paranoia pricking at his skin, and it’s not healthy, the way it has him looking over his shoulder at every turn, scurrying away from every attractive woman with a frown and mumbled apologies.

Surely this cannot be the rest of his life.

Hoshi swings by on a Tuesday. Just like you said he would, he asks Jun to work on an assignment for one Lee Chan who tried to sell his friend to the devil but accidentally sold himself instead. “Wouldn’t have really mattered,” Hoshi explains. Today, his shirt says BIG DICK IS BACK IN TOWN. “It’s sort of against the rules to try and sell other people.”

Jun spits toothpaste into the sink and prays the towel stays snug around his waist. Hoshi had cornered him in the bathroom. “So why do you want him back, then?” Rifles through the medicine cabinet for his nice hair serum. “Seems pretty open and shut to me.”

“Why do They want him back,” Hoshi corrects, “and I don’t know why They want this one.”

Jun thinks about what you said: how Mingyu and Lee Chan hadn’t been your contracts, were basically freebies; the… avatar-ness; the not-subtle-at-all threats on his life. Says, “Can I ask you something?” as he rolls on antiperspirant.

Hoshi, who’s sitting in the tub making animals out of shaving cream, simply nods.

“She said something interesting to me—”

“Before or after being mean to you made you ejaculate in your pants like a teenager?”

Jun blinks. “Before,” he answers slowly. When Hoshi makes no move to interrupt him again, he continues, “She said the Kim Mingyu and Lee Chan contracts weren’t hers. That the role is… inherited? Something about an avatar? How does that work?”

The angel hums. Adds what appear to be bunny ears to an amorphous blob that does not look rabbit-shaped at all, and Jun tries to tamper down his excitement at the impending explanation. Everything he’s dealt with so far will have been worth it because he’s going to be in the know. The powers that be will reward him with their trust. He’ll finally get some answers to all those questions he fell asleep pondering as a child.

And then Hoshi waves him away dismissively and says, “You know I can’t tell you any of that,” and everything comes collapsing down like a house of cards.

Fair enough, Jun thinks—he’s only successfully completed one assignment. It’s still early days. “But you will eventually,” he says, and whoever’s listening in must think the optimism in his voice is so pathetic, “right?”

Hoshi is not cruel. They haven’t known each other long, but Jun knows that much. He wasn’t created from some Old Testament mold, when cruelty was the point of it all—intended to impress fear and strict adherence to Their Word. So when Hoshi laughs it isn’t meant the way Jun takes it. When Hoshi laughs it isn’t meant to make Jun feel disregarded and unimportant, small and irrelevant, but that’s where it strikes him all the same.

When Hoshi laughs and has no reassurances to offer, Jun is seventeen again, reckoning with his loss of faith. Now he’s a decade older and is constantly confronted by all those old names and characters, and when you’re trapped in the middle of their bidding, where can you go when you need to hide?

Jun has the Lee Chan assignment completed by Thursday night.

A significant amount of money appears in his bank account. He wakes up on Friday to an enthusiastic message from his landlord, thanking him for paying his rental contract through the end of his lease. His parents thank him for the grocery delivery. On the side, away from the proud ears of his father, his mother is especially thankful. She’s choking back tears as she thanks him profusely, says business has been slow, tells him he’s a good son and he’s made them proud, always, even if he traveled a different path than the one he originally planned to take.

None of it takes away the ache in his chest.

None of it makes him feel any less empty. It’s hard to feel fulfilled when you know you’re just a pawn, stuck in the middle of a holy war that existed long before him and will persist long after he’s gone. Wen Junhui will always be on the outskirts, because everyone needs him, but he’s not important enough to trust. He is someone and no one all at once. He is Purgatory.

He needs to feel human—needs to make human mistakes, destroy himself the way humans do. Needs to commit a few cardinal sins and scold himself, wonder what the fuck he’s doing as he rattles ice around his third glass of baijiu. Needs to wake up with a splitting headache and a fractured memory. Needs a hoarse voice beside him to ask what time it is as he stares at their naked back and wonders how to get out of it.

There’s a bar not far from his apartment. A dive, by every definition of the word: broken, flickering neon sign out front, cheap linoleum floors peeling at the corners, 70s paneling on the walls, the stench of cigarette smoke outlasting all the old regulars. It’s the kind of place ghosts gather; the kind of place Jun was always too scared to go, knew the questioning, distrustful stares that’d be there to greet him as soon as he stepped through the door.

Tonight, though, it’ll do just fine.

He sits on a stool at the bar and orders a beer to start. Intends to stay a while. Watches a trio of old men play dou dizhu at a table near the back, empty bottles at their feet, fat cigars stuck between their teeth, insults and accusations shouted around them. To his left, a middle-aged man tries bartering for another drink. Needs it, he says, because he lost his job and his wife in the same week. Fourth job this month, the bartender replies, no pity to be found. It’s only the twenty-second.

Across the bar sits a kid that reminds Jun a lot of his brother. Can’t be much older than eighteen. Might not be old enough to drink legally at all, but that’s none of his business. There’s dirt beneath his fingernails and a large chip taken out of a front tooth. Not a clean break, all jagged edges—the kind that probably hurts to run his tongue over.

Jun feels guilty for a moment, surrounded by all these people with real problems. He’s got money and a respectable career. Has a roof over his head that’s been paid for by someone else. He’s good-looking, has his health and his youth. Has enough to take care of his family.

“Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” You sit beside him with a humored smile that shines through a truly pinched expression.

Jun snorts as he empties his drink. “Thessalonians. Gotta be honest, not one of my favorites.” Spares a glance at you: you’re different again, appearance-wise, but the scent you wear like a signature perfume is the same. Heady, like it was bottled at the center of the earth. “Is this your way of telling me that comparison is the thief of joy or whatever?”

Your turn to laugh. The bartender sets a drink in front of you that Jun hadn’t heard you order. “No,” you reply simply. “I’m not all that concerned with human joy. Just thought it was ironic. Come sit with me.”

“This is starting to sound familiar,” he snarks, but he follows anyway.

A rickety table by the window. Winter air seeps through, frosts the glass; has Jun wishing he’d worn a thicker coat. It was warmer by the bar. The two chairs you occupy are upholstered in peeling vinyl, one ripped with the stuffing peeking through. Jun takes that one, figuring you’ll laugh at his human chivalry, but you take the seat opposite him without a word. That old flickering sign outside reflects on your face.

He didn’t come here for a therapy session—he came to get drunk on questionable liquor surrounded by people who don’t know him. You do, of course, which throws a wrench in his plan. You seem to know everything about him, including that he’d be here brooding. “Why’d you follow me here?”

“Well, it certainly wasn’t for your jubilant demeanor and fantastic conversation.” You put your drink to the side. Fold your hands in front of you. “Congratulations on Lee Chan. The outfit upstairs must be very pleased with the work you’ve done thus far.”

There’s no bite. No sardonic tone.

Jun realizes then how differently you treat him. How honest you are. You don’t lie or stretch the truth; you don’t brush off his questions. Hoshi is truthful at an arm’s length. Makes his stomach feel sour.

“I’m just a pawn, aren’t I? It doesn’t really matter if they’re pleased so long as I get the work done.”

You hum an acknowledgment. “People forget what They used to be like. The atrocities They committed and had others commit in Their name—humans, just like you, who were so desperate to appease their God they would’ve done whatever was asked of them.” Jun’s drink refills. He empties it in one go. “They killed their sons, waged war on their neighbors, have done unspeakable evils in Their name. It’s not only you, Wen Junhui, that has been a pawn to Them.”

He doesn’t react. A glass shatters at the bar. “And you?” he questions. “What are you, then, if those are the things They demand?”

“I’m a foil, of course. Would you still believe in good if there was no evil? Would you believe in the promise of eternal life if there was no threat of eternal damnation? Would you still be moral if there was no corruption?” Rhetorical questions. “Although you’re no stranger to crises of faith, are you?”

He isn’t. The handjob had rattled him, sure, but it hadn’t been the catalyst. Not really. Jun had still gone to church that Sunday. Still kneeled and received Communion and allowed himself to be blessed and prayed over. Still bowed his head before each meal and mouthed along as his mother said grace.

No, his loss of faith had been gradual: a question he couldn’t find an answer to, suffering he could no longer brush off with blind faith, words he used to treat as gospel that began tasting acrid in his mouth as he also lost his conviction. Everything started feeling like bullshit, and once everything started feeling like bullshit, he had to wonder what he’d spent eighteen years of his life chasing. What he spent eighteen years of his life believing in.

Until he found he didn’t believe in all that much anymore.

He has to ask: “Was it your doing?”

You shake your head. “People forget who I am, too. They call me the original liar. They say I am the source of all evil. They attribute every sin and misdeed to me, say it must’ve been my will, and yet it says right there in their holy book, in Isaiah 45:7: I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.” You focus all your attention on Jun—he feels the weight of it like a millstone. “I was the anointed one until I was overcome by sin and became the tempter, right? That’s what they say; how they wrote my story. And yet, by Their own word, it was They who created evil. It was God who created darkness.” A hefty pause. “Some may look at me and say I, too, was a pawn.”

“Do you feel like you were?”

You don’t respond. Instead, Jun watches as his view of the bar crumbles once you snap your fingers: block by block replaced with the interior of his apartment. His dining table instead of the off-balance one in front of the window. The ambient noise of his building instead of the bar. A mug of coffee in place of the baijiu.

“What the he—”

It’s within the four dull walls of Jun’s apartment building that you answer: “Even if I was, why should I feel like a victim? Did I not get the better end of the deal?” Jun feels like he’s standing atop a trap door. Like any second it’ll swing open and down, down, down he’ll go. “I rule over my kingdom and make no demands of anyone. I am a consequence of free will and not an inhibitor of it. I dole out punishment only for those deserving of it.”

The coffee is strong. Bitter. Just for a second before it melts away into something sweet. “You are temptation, are you not? Do the demons not do your bidding? Sow chaos in your name? Are you not the originator of all these contracts I’ve been tasked with destroying? If They are to be believed, those people were not meant to be yours, and yet you wound up with them anyway.”

“I like you, Wen Junhui,” you say. “You have an insatiable curiosity that is both admirable and ill-advised.”

He feels his face flush. “Sorry. Got carried away, I think.”

“It’s of little consequence to me. I must admit I have smited men for asking questions, but they were of a more crude variety. More coffee?” Jun nods. “I am who I am. It is who I’ve always been—I was created to walk this path and so I know no different.”

“Predestination.”

“Precisely, just as those dreadful fucking Puritans believed. God needed a foil, a betrayer, and so They created me. I know no other role.”

“You were an angel,” Jun argues. “They say you were beautiful, powerful, and intelligent; they say you were full of light. You don’t remember any of that?”

Sorrow etches across your face. Only for a second—blink and you’ll miss it. It is not in the same realm of pain Jun is experiencing. Yours is an ancient grief. It is something palpable and overwhelming, something liable to consume and destroy everything within its reach if left uncontrolled. Jun wonders if it has been; if you’ve let it unfurl before reigning it back in. If those are the plagues they speak of. Catastrophic disasters and genocides and everything on earth he cannot conceive of.

And then your face shutters. That grief is now nowhere to be found, borrowed features rearranged neatly once again. “Of course I remember,” is all you say.

Companionable silence. Jun sips slowly at his coffee and enjoys it. Wonders, briefly, how he wound up here, with the CEO and overseer of Hell sitting at his dining room table, before he lets those thoughts get chased away by a more pressing fact: there is an extremely beautiful and kind of terrifying woman sitting at his dining room table, and she hasn’t murdered him—yet.

He’s not above noticing it. Isn’t going to pretend he hasn’t thought about the night in the club roughly every twenty minutes since it happened; isn’t going to pretend he didn’t get a little hard in the shower that same night and that he didn’t relieve himself. Isn’t going to pretend that this isn’t doing something for him—the different disguises, each one just as enticing as the last, all of them conjured from deep within his psyche, checking off all his boxes.

Jun also isn’t going to pretend he has very much game. He hadn’t left university a virgin (although it’d been close) and nowadays women aren’t really falling over themselves to date a newly-licensed lawyer with little money and thrifted suits that feel like they’re playing at adulthood. However, if nothing else, this… partnership he has going on has served him well in the confidence department. He has disposable income and no debt. His clothes fit. He upgraded his cheap Casio watch to something that doesn’t turn his skin green.

“You didn’t really answer my question earlier.” You roll your head to the side, cock an eyebrow. His bravado falters slightly at the line of your throat. “Are you stalking me?”

What he aims for: cheeky, a little saucy; the kind of question that’s delivered with a shit-eating grin and earns him a coy laugh in response as you tuck your hair behind your ear. Oh, knock it off, you’d say as you playfully swatted at him. Of course I’m not. He’d catch your hand and press his lips to your knuckles before trailing them up your arm. The first kiss to the side of your neck would be gentle, a little hesitant, and then the heat would take over.

How it lands: an accusation completely lacking in charm and sass. Jun’s eyes widen in panic as soon as the question leaves his mouth, has him wondering how he’s still alive if the glare you send him is any indication of how you’re feeling. He should’ve known better. Jun is not the sort of person who can pull off a comment like that. Doesn’t have the charisma or the confidence. Isn’t sleazy enough. Jun is the kind of guy who lurks your social media after a one night stand to figure out your favorite breakfast so he can have it waiting the morning after; the kind who takes note of where you work so he can have flowers delivered to your desk and not for any other nefarious purpose.

Which, now that he’s thinking about it—

Every accusation is a confession, or whatever it is they say.

“That’s not—”

“What you meant,” you finish for him. Thankful for the lifeline, he nods, not trusting himself to not dig a deeper hole. “You want to know why it is I’ve shown up twice now, during both of your nights out.” He nods again. “You wanted to be suave when you said it, maybe even a little seductive, but you forgot your claim to fame is crying for three days over a handjob and how excruciatingly awkward you are.”

He waits for you to continue. When you don’t, he nods again, wishing he’d spent more time as a teenager on the degenerate parts of the internet rather than at Bible study.

“Are you an idiot?”

Not that it’s undeserved, but the question leaves him stunned. Has his mouth gaping open and shut like a goldfish. This is a trap, right? There’s a correct answer here that he’s expected to give. “...No?” he tries, and when your eyes narrow he quickly changes course. “Yes,” he says definitively. “Yes, I am an idiot. Sorry for my… idiocy.”

It looks like it’s being dragged out of you by force, but the clouds part, birds start chirping in perfect harmony, Jun feels the warmth of the sun—you laugh. You laugh, and it’s reluctant but it’s real, and Jun’s smile is so wide his face feels heavy under the weight of it. It’s so wide you say, “Wow, even your mouth is heart-shaped,” and, if Wen Junhui knows nothing else, he knows he’s in real big trouble.

“You know what else is heart-shaped?” You gesture for him to continue, except he’d just been yapping. Didn’t have a plan. There’s no punchline. And he can’t set it up as a dick joke because that doesn’t make sense. My dick is heart-shaped? What does that even mean? Unless it’s in a cute way? My dick is heart-shaped… for you. It could work, he reasons. Worse things have worked for other men. “My di—”

“No.”

He pretends to pout. “You didn’t let me finish.”

“Because you were going to make a dick joke.”

“No I wasn’t.” You roll your eyes. “I was going to say my… digantic heart.”

A pause. Another beat of silence.

“I’m not going to laugh at you twice.”

A shit-eating grin on Jun’s face. “But you would, is what you’re saying? If you didn’t already meet your one-laugh quota?”

“Don’t push your luck.”

I want to kiss you, he wants to say. Feels the words biting at the back of his teeth, begging him to open his mouth so they can escape and be real. I want to kiss you but I don’t know if it’d be real. Because it can’t be, can it? All the ways you’ve been described throughout human history, not once has anyone said you’re capable of love. Which—that’s not what Jun is looking for here, right? That’d be ridiculous. He has a crush.

A crush on a beautiful woman who looks like all of his wet dreams combined. Who’s terrifying and smart and maybe misunderstood in all the same ways he is. Who is halfway responsible for his current employment. Who conjures ginger tea for him when he feels sick and hasn’t snapped her fingers to turn him into dust… yet. It’s natural, especially for a late bloomer such as himself.

But that doesn’t mean anything.

You look like all of his wet dreams combined but it’s still just a costume. The same way Jun was playing at adulthood in his ill-fitting suits, you’re playing at being human. Take it off and you’re still the devil. Still primordial. Still not bound by the constraints and constructs of time. Not bound by mortality, which is probably the second-most pressing issue behind the whole fallen angel, prime ruler of Hell, purveyor of iron-clad contracts that are really, really pissing off Heaven thing.

“Congratulations,” you say, ripping Jun out of his spiral, “your overthinking has bypassed chickenpox completely and went straight to shingles.”

“They have a vaccine for that now.” Wow, he is really not nailing this.

“I know. Pestilence was devastated. Moped around for ages. Imagine all your hard work gone, just like that, because of science? That’s why I created Jenny McCarthy.” You sigh. “Anyway, out with it.”

Jun chews at the inside of his cheek. “I’m trying to figure out how to ask in a non-offensive way.”

You blink. “I am literally the devil.”

“Who can kill me,” he says slowly, trying to buy time. So are you, it seems, because you’re content to stretch the silence. Wait until it settles in Jun’s bones as anxiety. One of those old tricks he learned during law school that’s now being turned on him. He coughs. “Anyway, I—” He deflates. “It’s stupid, I don’t know why I even thought—”

“Out with it,” you repeat.

“Right.” He sucks in a breath. “Does this mean anything to you? Not in, like, an affectionate, I’m in love with you kind of way, but in a… human… way? Is it offensive to phrase it like that?”

“I think you’ll find not much offends me—except for you and your fucking lawyer thing ruining my contracts.” There are those flames behind your eyes again. The temperature in the room increases tenfold. “So no, it’s not offensive to wonder how human I am or am not, but I don’t know if the answer will be to your satisfaction or understanding.”

“Try me.”

You huff a laugh. Mumble something about the hubris of man. “You’ve read Their book, so you know how and why the angels were created. Ministering spirits, I think it says. Spirits without bodies. I have never known what it means to be human because I never was. I appear as one to you out of necessity.”

“Because my brain would melt if I saw your true form?”

“What? No. Because it’s terrifying. Would you rather hand over your mortal soul to someone who looked like an eldritch horror or someone who looked like one of those women you’ve jerked off to in porn magazines?” Jun swallows audibly. “Exactly.”

“But what does it feel like when you’re like this? When you’re here?”

“I don’t know,” you answer honestly. “It feels different, but I can’t say it feels human because I do not know what that feels like. You’ve interacted with me and have been to Hell—if I asked you how it felt to be the devil, how would you answer?”

Jun doesn’t have to think. He says the first word that comes to mind, which is, “Lonely. I think it’s lonely, because They have worshippers, Their followers are devout and love and trust without proof, and you were created to be hated and feared.” You move to interject, but Jun continues. “Maybe you have those things too, but they’re not the same. They gave you everything and then They ripped it away. Their followers heed every word of the Bible, name their children after its characters, but where’s your book? Why wasn’t anyone allowed to tell your story?”

“Maybe you should write it.”

What you aim for: cheeky, a little saucy; the kind of suggestion spoken around a sly smile that’s also a little self-conscious at someone taking you into consideration—at someone seeing you.

How it lands: fractured; words spoken slowly and intentionally so nothing is given away. How ironic that it’s the most human Jun has heard you sound.

But your bravery is inspiring, even if you’re unaware of it. Even if you aren’t making a conscious choice to be so, Jun can watch you be vulnerable and think he can do the same. He can finally say what he’s been dancing around this entire time, which is, “If I kiss you, what will it feel like for you?”

“The same as any other kiss, I imagine.”

“You’ve done this before, then? As a… human?”

Seems your patience with him has run out. You stand, make your way to Jun’s side of the table slowly. Drag a finger along the back of each chair, nails cherry red and sharpened to a point. He wants to feel them. Wants the sting as they dig into his thighs; as they scratch down the length of his back and mark him up. He wants to feel the phantom bite for days, long after you’re gone and he’s come to his senses. When he stands beneath the spray of the shower and his skin feels raw, he wants to know it was you that had done it.

He understands, now, why people make those deals and shake your hand.

As you loom above him, slowly encroaching upon his space—as the heady scent of you overwhelms him and makes him dizzy, has his eyes fluttering closed and rolling back in his head—he thinks he’d give you anything you asked for.

You lean in close. One hand on the arm of the chair, one wrapped around the meat of his thigh, just on the edge of sharp. Closer, closer, until he can feel the warmth of your breath against his cheek, the line of his jaw, the lobe of his ear. “Tell me: does this feel human?”

It does. Drives him a little crazy how he can feel each word punctuated against his skin; how he can feel your body heat seep through the fabric of his pants—heat he didn’t expect to find. And it isn’t like it matters, because he’d want you no matter how you felt, but it helps to ground him. Keep him in the moment. So he says, “Ye-yeah,” and knows you’re smiling at the need in his tone.

Need that starts in his toes and settles in his belly. Need that grows as your hand trails up his thigh and settles over his zipper, over the bulge you find there. Jun’s breath catches in his throat. He knows the mechanics—in, out; in, out; in, out—but can’t convince his lungs to work. Feels lightheaded and a little embarrassed because you’re not even touching him properly and he already feels untethered.

All you do is pull away, back out of his space, and for all he knows his world’s been turned upside down. Doubly so when he cracks one eye open and sees you on your knees, looking up at him with a half-lidded gaze, lashes impossibly dark. He can’t help it. He reaches out, places his thumbs in the contours of your cheek, cups your jaw, and presses his lips to yours.

Immediate searing heat.

Jun is engulfed in it. You taste like a storm—taste like the first deafening crack of thunder and the lightning that follows. And he knows he’s coming across too eager with the way he licks into your mouth, but you don’t seem to mind. You match his pace, groan into his mouth, palm at his cock with more intention. Jun’s hips roll, seeking the friction; wants more of the stinging pleasure. Wants to haul you into his lap and fit his hands in the curve of your waist, leave bruises on your hips with his thumbs. He wants to trace every inch of your skin and commit it to memory.

But you’ve got plans of your own.

You plant your hands against his chest and push. Jun goes willingly, chest heaving, missing your mouth already. There’s a crooked grin sitting on your face that sends a spark of excitement up his spine, has alarms sounding in his head, but he can’t look away. Everything you do mesmerizes him: the way you run your tongue along your bottom lip, the slow drag of his zipper, how your voice is husky and deeper than he’s ever heard it when you ask him, what do you want, and your smile when he answers, whatever you do.

And what you seem to want is to destroy him in record time. Pants at his knees, hard cock straining against his briefs, he feels like he’s back in high school. Has that same sense of adolescent urgency, like everything’s happening both in slow-motion and not fast enough, because he knows what’s coming. Watches with a lip tugged between his teeth as you free his cock. Whimpers when you wrap your hand around him, reminds himself to breathe; grips white-knuckled at the arms of the chair when you begin to move.

Your pace is torturously slow to start. You seem to delight in tormenting him; in hearing all those breathy moans that escape him and spur you on. You lean forward and spit and everything is slick. Jun feels like he’s going to come out of his skin. He grips at the chair tighter. Digs his nails into his thighs when that doesn’t work and lets his head roll back, neck on full display. Maybe it’s to tempt you. Maybe he wants you to sink your teeth into him and mark him up. Maybe he has a million fantasies, and not a single one compares to—

Your mouth. The sound that comes out of him is unholy. It takes every ounce of restraint he has not to roll his hips and fuck his cock deeper into your mouth, down your throat. All he wants to do is chase the bliss of that wet heat and give in to it.

But he needs this to last. If this is the only time he’ll have you like this, he needs to make it worthwhile.

He needs to tell you, needs you to slow it down before he embarrasses himself by coming in your mouth, except he can’t find the words. Doesn’t want to deny himself even a second of pleasure. Five minutes is all it’s taken to make a hedonist out of him. And that’s… well, it’s not a philosophy he ever thought he’d adopt, but who could blame him when you feel like velvet? When he starts babbling nonsense and you hum in response and everything feels electric?

“I’m gonna—” A sharp nip at the inside of his thigh has his declaration dead on arrival. His body shivers, trembles, tries to collapse in on itself. “Shit, don’t do that, I’m gonna—”

He feels your smile against his skin. Whimpers as you mouth at his balls. Wonders if he’s going to die like this; if someone will come to check on him and find his pitiful, half-naked body right here in this chair, and that is not a sight he wants anyone to walk in on, so he reaches for you, finds your hair and tugs at you gently. Seals his lips over yours before you can come up with any more ideas.

He hauls you into his lap, just like he’d wanted, and dips his hands beneath your top. Skims his hands over the warm skin he finds. Digs his nails in when you bite at the column of his throat and groans as his cock—so hard he can barely think straight; can’t think of anything except burying himself inside of you—brushes against the harsh fabric of your pants.

“God, c’mere.” You oblige. Kiss him with such intensity he no longer cares where he dies, so long as this is how he goes out. Watches as stars explode behind his eyelids when he realizes he can taste himself on your tongue, that you taste like him. Moves his hands to your chest, traces lightly over your hard nipples, delights in the way you react, that it’s him making you feel good. That it’s him you let pull your top over your head. That it’s him that presses praise into your skin like scripture.

He mouths at you indiscriminately: your collar bones, the space between your breasts, the swell of skin there. Whines as you grab at his hair and tell him how to please you. Thinks he’s learning a lot about himself when he does as you say, when he sucks and bites at your nipples, and grows impossibly harder.

You sigh, blissed out; tell him you want his mouth elsewhere, fill his mind with thoughts that have him rolling his hips uselessly, thrusting at nothing, but fuck, he wants it all. Wants to taste every part of you. Wants to drag you to the edge and watch as your body writhes in satisfaction. Wants to know how beautiful you look when you come on his tongue, head thrown back, your nails digging into his scalp.

Wants to bury his cock inside of you before you can come down and watch as your eyes roll back and know, with every thrust of his hips, that he’s leaving his mark just the same as you are.

So that’s what he does. He stands, lifting you with ease, tells you to wrap your legs around him as he carries you to his bedroom. Lays you in the middle of the bed and helps strip you bare. Tells you, in every way he can think of, how much he loves seeing you like this, how stunning you are, how lucky he is. Kisses his way down your body until he’s level with your cunt. He breathes in your scent, desperate for all of you, before he circles a thumb over your clit and follows it with his mouth.

Ironic, he thinks, that you taste like heaven.

He gives as good as he got—flattens his tongue and works you over with long licks. Laps and sucks and doesn’t let up when your legs start to shake. Places one over his shoulder and dives back in. Swears fall from your lips in fractured syllables, breathless cries in between commands to keep going. He’s a man possessed. Doesn’t want to waste a second. Doesn’t want the taste of anyone else on his tongue.

You come with a sob, his name the only thing you seem capable of saying. Jun, Jun, Jun, like a chant.

…Like something he’d hear in church.

No reprieve. He stretches you on his fingers, almost delirious as he presses against your g-spot and feels how much wetter you get. Ruts against the mattress at all the crude sounds he’s pulling from you, unable to help himself. Says, “Can I…?” and slicks himself up with what he’s gathered from you when you nod.

He buries his face in the crook of your neck. Kisses the spot just below your ear as he runs his hands up and down your thighs. “How do you want me?” he asks. “Whatever you want, I’ll give it to you.”

He expects you to want it from behind. Maybe on top so you’re in control, turned away. He doesn’t expect you to say, “Just like this,” as you hitch a leg around his hip and pull him as close as possible. He doesn’t expect you to say, “I want you to look at me,” in that tone, like it’s imperative. Like you need it. He doesn’t expect you to grab the back of his neck and kiss the air from his lungs as he pushes inside.

Heat. Everything is white, blinding heat.

Jun whines into your mouth. Rolls his hips slowly as you swallow it. Your hands move to his shoulders and down his spine, settle in the small of his back, press into the dimples there. He pulls back only so he can tell you to mark him up, that he wants to feel you days from now, and you indulge him. Shallow at first—your nails ghost across his skin, more ticklish than painful, before they dig in a little deeper. Jun feels the bite as the welts begin to form and he thinks his smile must look crazed.

He keeps his pace steady. Fucks in as deep as he can and rocks back slowly, trying to hold on to the way your cunt squeezes him, but you need more. You tell him as much and don’t say please, and when Jun tries to be a little cocky, when he thinks he has a modicum of control and says, “You’re okay, baby, you can take it,” you send him such a nasty glare he immediately gives it to you harder and faster.

But he can’t help but laugh. “What, I can’t call you baby?” he jokes. There’s a rebuttal on the tip of your tongue that Jun does away with with a sharp thrust of his hips. He knows he’s playing with fire, that he’ll pay for this one way or another, but the thought thrills him more than anything else.

“I’m the—fuck,” you swear. Jun doesn’t have to ask why. Everything’s starting to feel tighter, wetter. Both of you are hurtling toward the inevitable, and Jun needs to feel you come on his cock, needs to watch you unravel beneath him.

He grabs your hand. Sucks two of your fingers into his mouth. “Touch yourself,” he says. “Make yourself feel good, I wanna see you come.” He moans, loud and unabashed, when you do as he says.

Each pass of your fingers over your clit makes you jerk, has electricity licking at your heels. Jun feels each one. Feels the way you clench and tremble. A bead of sweat runs down the column of your throat and he traces it with his tongue. Keeps fucking harder, deeper; grinds his pelvis against your clit and falls in love with the way you sound in the throes of lust. Wants to bottle it and keep it forever.

“Jun, I’m gonna—”

Another roll of his hips. Deep, deep, deep. “I know.” Two words he’s barely able to choke out. Feels like he’s being suffocated as his vision starts to go hazy at the edges. All he knows in this moment is your pleasure, your satisfaction, you.

Your orgasm hits with a shattering cry. Jun follows right after, unable to put up a fight against the vice grip of your cunt. It feels pathetic, the way his body shakes with the force of it, but when it passes, when he comes back into his body, all he feels is bone-deep euphoria.

He collapses onto your chest. Presses another kiss there. Sighs contentedly when your nails scratch lightly at his scalp. “Okay?” he asks.

“Yes,” comes your easy answer.

Minutes pass in blissful quiet. Neither of you speak, letting your heavy breathing do the talking, and for once Jun enjoys the sounds of the city outside when there’s someone beside him to hear it, too. “I’m gonna pull out,” he tells you, even though it feels a bit silly.

He feels the loss immediately.

Unsure of the protocol for something like this, Jun does what he always does: pretends there’s absolutely nothing out of the ordinary happening at all.

“I’ll be right back,” he says, punctuating his words with a kiss to your temple. He grabs a clean pair of underwear from a drawer, pulls them on, pads down the hall to the bathroom. He pointedly does not look at his reflection as he turns the tap on and waits for the water to warm. Knows his face is blotchy and flushed and his hair’s a mess and that you’re spread out on his bed looking like the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen, so he doesn’t want to look at his reflection and feel bad about himself. Doesn’t want to taint this moment by feeling unworthy of it.

But a bit of that self-doubt still manages to creep in, because he returns to his room and is surprised to find you haven’t left. That, above all else, you look content: laying on your front, one of Jun’s pillows tucked beneath your head, sheets barely covering your ass. You smile when Jun puts a knee on the mattress and you feel it dip. Smile wider when he kisses the length of your spine and tells you, in a voice unrecognizable even to his own ears, to roll onto your back so he can clean you up.

If it’s too intimate, you make no mention of it. If there’s no room in this moment for this kind of care and affection, if all of this is for Jun’s sake and you’re just letting him go through the motions, you don’t mention that, either.

He works slowly and with care. Apologizes when you hiss at the first swipe of the washcloth, the water warm but still colder than your skin. Cracks a joke about taking you out for breakfast in the morning even though both of you know you’ll be long gone by then, and he waits for that knowledge to sting but it never does, but he’s relieved when you laugh anyway.

It’s when you stop laughing, when your smile slowly disappears from your face, that it all starts to sink in. Because you ask, “Did it feel real to you?” and he’s not sure how to interpret that. If it’s a masked plea for reassurance or if you want to make sure he got his money’s worth.

Maybe it’s both. Or maybe it’s neither.

“I know it can’t be for you what it is for me,” he answers, “but if you’re asking if I had a good time, then my answer is yes. And I know what this is, so you don’t need to look like that, okay? I’m not about to confess my love for you and start crying.”

(That’s not entirely true. He really might start crying, but he’ll at least have enough sense to wait until you’re gone.)

“Well, it wouldn’t be the first time, so I…” You sigh, avert your gaze, tangle your fingers in the sheets. “It’s just—you’re doing all this nice stuff for me, so I didn’t… I wanted to make sure.”

“‘Nice stuff’? You mean helping you clean up and offering you a glass of water?”

You laugh again, but there’s no humor in it. “You’re treating me like I’m human, Wen Junhui. Like I’m the same as any other woman you’d sleep with.”

He cocks his head. “Why wouldn’t I?” he asks, and that’s the end of that.

Jun doesn’t use his downtown office much, but since his apartment still smells like you, he figures he can use a change of scenery. Hoshi will know where to find him if he’s needed.

He ducks into a recently-opened coffee shop and orders an expensive latte with ingredients he’s never heard of. When he pops the lid, he’s both horrified and intrigued by the purple-blue coffee that greets him. Back outside, he breathes in the musk of the city: the exhaust fumes, cigarette smoke, the sweat from people rushing to work.

A jianbing vendor is set up at the corner, fills him with nostalgia—smells just like the ones he ate nearly every morning during law school. He smiles as he orders and asks for extra lajiao, foolishly ignoring the questioning glance he receives in return, and he’s happy as he walks the remaining two blocks to his office with it warm in his hand. Sticks it in his mouth to hold between his teeth as he digs in his pockets for the key. Jiggles it in the lock as he accidentally bites down, and it takes a second, maybe five, but then—

He should not have asked for the extra chili sauce.

All 182 of his centimeters crash through the door and carelessly toss aside his briefcase. Water. He needs water desperately, even though it’s just going to make it worse, which he knows, but his mouth all the way down to his esophagus feels like it’s been set ablaze. Feels like he’s breathing magma. Feels like if someone stood in front of him right now and caught wind of his breath, they’d turn to ash.

Which explains how he misses the person sitting at his desk, their feet kicked up and face hidden behind a newspaper from six months ago.

He finally notices them some ten minutes later, after he locks himself in the bathroom and douses his face in cold water and can be sure he’s not about to die from excessive heat intake. Not that this is any less embarrassing for him: he shrieks, clearly not expecting anyone to be there, and the stranger shrieks in turn. The shriek-off lasts approximately thirty seconds and is cut off by an elderly woman sticking her head through the door and asking if everything is alright, to which Jun sheepishly nods and bows in apology as he thanks her for her concern.

Once she’s back on the street, he whirls around to face his intruder.

“Good morning,” Hoshi says, seemingly nonplussed by the entire sequence of events that have transpired. “Had a little mishap with the chili sauce, huh?” Jun ignores him. Snatches the newspaper out of his hands and shoos him out of his chair and into one intended for guests. “Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning.”

Jun glares. “Why are you—”

“Or should I say the only side of the bed, considering you had erotic entanglements with the devil.”

Annoyance flares within him. Has that lajiao heat rushing back to his skin. Hoshi’s got a lot of nerve—the same guy who refused to tell him much of anything, who just takes and takes and takes, is now criticizing him for exercising his free will. Well, Jun’s not going to accept that, he decides. Adopts a snotty little tone and says, “So you were spying on me? Wow, okay, you pervert.”

Hoshi balks. Trips over his words as he tries to mount a useless defense. “I didn’t—that’s not—no,” is the best he can come up with.

“Did you like the show?”

“Wen Junhui—”

“Very convenient that’s the thing you watched. Missed my whole crisis of faith, huh? Both of them? Didn’t think I’d maybe need some support during those times?” He shakes his head. Tries to hold on to the anger, because it’s less humiliating than crying after acting like a hard-ass. “At least she’s been honest. At least she’s always been upfront about who and what she is. You guys—you guys have all these demands, all these requirements, but at the end of the day none of it matters. We’re all just pawns, and that’s all you’ll ever see us as.”

The angel stays quiet. Can’t quite discern if Jun’s tirade is over. He narrows his gaze, opens his mouth as if he’s going to speak just to see if Jun will interrupt him. (He doesn’t.) He clears his throat and tries to remember the correct pitch for his Comforting Voice: this will prove to be a pivotal moment in Wen Junhui’s partnership with Upstairs, and he’s going to need it.

“Wen Junhui,” he attempts again. No, the tone isn’t right—needs to be a little lower. “Wen Junhui, I am… holding space for everything you’ve just told me.” That’s better. Sounds convincing enough. “Is it fair to say you feel abandoned and unimportant?”

Jun’s cheeks warm to a mortifying shade of red. “I guess,” he mumbles.

“Great!” Hoshi beams. “Thank you so much for trusting me with this sensitive information.” He snaps his fingers and another manila folder appears in front of Jun. “Since you’re feeling better, this is your next assignment! If you open to the first page, you’ll see the contractee’s name is Choi Seungcheol and that he is of the utmost import—”

“No.”

“—ance.” Hoshi, unused to being caught unawares not once but twice in the same conversation, simply blinks, limbs frozen mid-air. “Pardon?”

“I said no.”

“Right, right… See, I heard that, but I’m not following. What do you mean no?”

Jun stands and starts clearing off the desk. Not that there’s much on it besides a framed picture of himself sandwiched between his parents at his graduation and an unused candle. Peach bellini. Hoshi had procured it from who-knows-where, said it was “an important part of Internet history” (that Jun must’ve missed) and called it a “belated graduation gift,” except the smell was so sickly-sweet it immediately gave him a migraine as soon as the lid came off.

All of this is besides the point, which is this: Jun doesn’t need this office. He doesn’t need this weird job where he reports to these weird people.

He says as much.

“Hey!” Hoshi objects, to which Jun responds, “You’re wearing a shirt with a cartoon wolf on it that says Fighting the Gay Allegations Again. I mean come on, dude, where do you even find these things?”

“You don’t like my shirts?”

“No! And I also don’t like that you just pretended to care about my feelings so I’d get back to work like a good little corporate soldier!” He’s able to fit the picture frame in his briefcase, but the candle doesn’t fit. Even if they’re arguing, it seems rude to give it back to Hoshi when he’d gone out of his way to get him a gift to begin with, so he lets out a frustrated screech and decides to carry it back to his apartment. “Find some other would-be Pope to help you.”

Although his face is blotchy and wet, Hoshi seems undeterred. There are, of course, no other would-be Popes available on such short notice—especially not one that’s earned the favor of the devil—so he needs to think up a plan quickly. If he fumbles Wen Junhui, he’ll either never hear the end of it from the lower-ranking angels or he’ll be stoned, and neither sounds very favorable right now.

So he does the only thing he can think to do: he snaps his fingers.

Kim Mingyu looks exactly like his picture.

He’s just as tall and symmetrically good-looking as Jun thought he would be, dressed in an impeccably-fitting white suit that elongates his legs and makes him look far taller than the six-foot-one-point-nine-repeating he’d measured in at. Dark, slightly wavy hair frames a perfect set of cheekbones, and whatever cologne he’s wearing nearly has Jun drooling.

He might actually be doing that, he realizes with horror, because Kim Mingyu also looks supremely uncomfortable. Is fluttering from one thing to the next, never staying more than a few seconds in each spot, tidying and organizing the same items over and over, muttering apologies all the while. And the board room really is not that big, so all that anxiety is starting to wear off on Jun, who was in his own office only a few minutes ago arguing with an angel that is currently nowhere to be found.

“So sorry about the mess!” Mingyu chimes. Jun can tell he’s trying (and failing) for unaffected. “I didn’t know we were having visitors, but no matter! My mother always used to say…” He pauses. Straightens his posture. Grabs a bouquet of white hydrangeas from a stunning pearlescent vase just to drop them right back in. “Er, I suddenly don’t remember anything my mother used to say.”

Jun grimaces and hides it behind his hand. “‘Have a wonderful day at school’?” he offers.

Mingyu smiles, makes a little a-ha! sound as he snaps his fingers; seems thankful for the lifeline he’d been thrown. Says, “Yes, yes, of course!” and starts fussing over the state of the table. He squirts a concerning amount of cleaner and wipes at it so aggressively Jun fears he’s going to wear a hole in the wood. “I’ve been told there was a slight security issue, but please rest assured that the rest of our guests should be arriving very soon! Any second now!”

That last bit comes out more like a demand.

Even though he feels far less intelligent than Hoshi claims he is, Jun is still smart enough to deduce he’d been snap-blasted to Heaven, not only because Mingyu is here and there are vaguely ominous security issues, but also because there’s a placard next to the door:

Board Room 17 Pearly Gates Wing

“It’s weird seeing you in real life after staring at the picture in your file for so long,” Jun says, continuing to look around. Everything is stark white, which he expected, with accents of gold that dazzles so brightly it hurts his eyes and pink freshwater pearl, and the flowers are abundant and fragrant. Jun feels at peace here. If it weren’t for Mingyu and his rapidly-fraying nerves, he might even call it tranquil. “I think I have a crush on you.”

Mingyu flushes. Unsticks his tongue from the roof of his mouth to stammer out a response that’s interrupted by three more figures materializing by the door.

Hoshi stands in the middle of Jeonghan and Joshua, arms slung around both of their shoulders. The two demons, naturally, do not look pleased. Jeonghan especially looks tortured, which is at odds with his new pink hair, and he’s the first to shrug off the angel. He grabs the chair closest to him and makes sure it scrapes against the floor as noisily as possible before slumping into it, arms crossed, scowl so fierce his frown lines nearly touch his jaw.

Joshua does the same, though he looks far more delighted to have a seat at the table.

From an invisible speaker, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5 in C Minor comes blaring. Hoshi and Mingyu startle; the latter goes in search of a tablet, completely frazzled, mumbling oh no oh no oh no as he rummages through drawers. Jeonghan and Joshua side-eye one another and come away wearing matching glares. To his credit, Jun sits ramrod straight and doesn’t flinch. When no one’s looking he sticks his fingers in his ears to dampen the noise and smiles politely at Mingyu when they make awkward eye contact.

The music cuts out, Mingyu heaves a sigh of relief, and once the tense silence settles back into the room, he turns to Hoshi and stage whispers, “Should I put it back on, or…?” to which Hoshi frantically nods.

Opening blaring once again, it’s then that you walk through the door, flanked on all sides by an impressive security detail. (Heaven’s, of course. They’re also dressed in all white and wearing mitre hats with SECURITY embroidered across the front in gold beadwork. Jun wonders, briefly, if this is where Hoshi gets his inspiration from.)

You’re escorted to a seat. There are seven chairs on the side of the table opposite Jun; you’re given the one in the middle, and Jeonghan and Joshua immediately move to sit on each side of you. You carry yourself with an easy confidence, not at all rattled by being here in this setting. It’s almost comical how your body language contrasts with Hoshi and Mingyu: how they’re at home, where they’re meant to be, and their unease is so apparent; and you’re where you’ve been exiled from, antithetical to what you’ve been put in charge of, a place that Jun knows picks at all those old wounds like a buzzard, and your composure is faultless.

Something you have to be, he figures.

“Gentlemen, gentlemen, what’s with the long faces?” you ask, brows knit in faux-concern. You look the same as the last time Jun saw you—he’s sure it’s a power play, meant to throw him off, and it works. Heat simmers along his skin as the memories come flooding back. He wonders what you look like to everyone else. “It’s so lovely to see you all again.” You turn to Mingyu, who seems to shrink under your undivided attention. “Especially you, handsome. We’ve all been mourning the loss of our favorite eye candy.”

Mingyu squeaks. “Um!” He scrambles to the head of the table. His hands shake as he tries to unlock the tablet. “There’s, uh—an ag-agenda! For this me-meeting. Very important! Just one moment, please, and I’ll—”

“Very fascinating,” Jeonghan interjects. “Do you anticipate this happening at any point today? I have to oversee a workshop this afternoon about new ways to make men insecure about their penises and I simply cannot miss it. It’s my second-favorite event of the year.”

“What’s the first?” Jun can’t help but ask.

“The social media workshops. Next month’s is about online bullying and new ways to avoid getting banned by safeguarding teams so you can continue trolling in peace without fear of repercussions. The one after that is about sending in anonymous gossip to those Spotted In Such-and-such Facebook pages for places no one cares about.”

Joshua nods. “I think the Stevenage one is my favorite. When’s the workshop about the new Lego shapes to step on?”

Mingyu’s mouth snaps closed. In an attempt to nip the derailment in the bud, Hoshi says, “I think what our Head of HR meant to say was—”

“HR? None of you are human.”

“It stands for Heaven Relations, obviously,” Hoshi snaps, “and we’ve called this emergency meeting because we’ve been made aware of a very troubling development.”

You gasp. Lean forward and widen your eyes like you have no idea what he could possibly be referring to. “No! A troubling development, you say?” You fold your hands on the table. “Tell me all about it.”

Jun, however, cannot possibly play it so cool. Feels dread overtake his body as restless anxiety sets in. The mind reader that he is, Joshua sends him a discreet wink that does very little to settle his nerves. Still feels like he’s drank fifteen cups of light roast coffee and is about to sit for a law school exam he forgot to study for.

“It has come to our attention that…” Mingyu looks down at the tablet. Looks up and over at Hoshi. Grimaces. “Do I really have to say this?”

“Yes.”

He huffs and continues. “It has recently come to our attention that one Wen Junhui, would-be Pope and recently-licensed lawyer accepted into a contracted position at Their approval, has engaged in… sexual relations… with the being known colloquially as the Devil.”

Jeonghan looks sideways at you with the most disgustedly disappointed look Jun has ever seen appear on a face. To the contrary, Joshua leans across the table to high-five him and say, “You dirty dog! I bet it was better than that handjob, huh?” He leans back, whistles low. “Goddamn, why is it every time you get some action it’s like some end of days shit? You ever consider becoming celibate?”

“Not involuntarily,” Jun mumbles.

“Shame,” Jeonghan intones. You laugh at this.

Hoshi, once again fed up with his meeting being derailed, says to Jeonghan and Joshua, “Why are you two even here?” to which they reply, “We’re her advocates. We’re advocating.”

“No advocating has ever taken place while the three of you have been in this room.”

Jeonghan rolls his eyes. “At ease, Megamind.”

“Metatron,” Mingyu quietly corrects.

Jun snorts. Of course. Of course Hoshi is one of the most powerful archangels in Heaven. Speaker of God, permitted to be in Their presence and at Their side; celestial scribe and guide to humanity—the guy who appears earthside wearing crude t-shirts and stupid hats. Of-fucking-course.

All of this is enough to drive him to lunacy. All the things he didn’t and doesn’t know, all the secrets kept locked up tight, all the jokes he continues to be the butt of. Everyone in this room is on equal footing except him, and he’s the one seemingly on trial. Heaven doesn’t care what you do—your role is to sow chaos and they’re powerless to stop you, just as you’re powerless here. No, the only one that will feel the repercussions of this is Jun, not only because he’s the only one capable of being punished, but because he’s human.

He must sense his distress again, because Joshua mouths a watch this before saying, with all the conviction and tenacity of a seasoned prosecutor, “Allow me to advocate, then: we do not accept these accusations as fact without being presented with irrefutable proof, which I’m sure you have, considering you’ve made such a show of gathering us all here.”

Mingyu and Hoshi share a look.

“I—well, you see—”

“Surely you don’t need irrefutable proof to understand what a conflict of interest this is and why we’re concerned.”

“A conflict of interest which surely has already taken place?” Jeonghan tacks on. Joshua nods with grave sincerity. “Or have you called an impromptu, emergency meeting to discuss hypotheticals?” Mingyu and Hoshi share another look. “Gentlemen, need we remind you of the criteria that must be met before an emergency meeting may be called? I cannot imagine two high-ranking employees such as yourselves disregarded such strict protocols simply because of the parties involved?”

“Haaa, of course not!” Hysterical, frenzied laughter ensues. “No, no, we would never—”

Joshua shakes his head. “It sure is looking like that’s what has taken place here today, but I hate to assume the worst, so if you could just show us the permits I’m sure we can get this all cleared up.”

“Per-permits…?”

Jeonghan has all the patience in the world as he replies, “Section 894, subsection 12 of the accords states that in order for an emergency meeting to be called and granted between the constituents of Heaven and Hell, the proper permits must be filed and signed off on by the governing bodies of each at least 72 hours in advance. Now, it’s possible the paperwork was signed on our side, but as you know our boss is very, very busy and it seems to have been misplaced, so we have no way of confirming this.” You nod, sharing Joshua’s very serious look. “Hence the permits. Show them to us, please.”

There’s hope yet that Jun will get out of this. Be on the receiving end of his own strategy. Jeonghan and Joshua start up a show us the per-mits! show us the per-mits! chant that sends Hoshi and Mingyu into a panic. The latter, now soaked through with sweat, does a fruitless search on his tablet, while Hoshi tries to distract everyone with an interpretive dance none of them can make sense of.

“I believe this is a reflection of his current state of mind,” you say solemnly, playing the part of an esteemed art critic. “It’s histrionic on the surface, but once you dig deeper, it’s uncontrolled and frenetic at its roots. A wonderful metaphor for a fractured, disjointed mind, but severely lacking in execution.”

“Amen,” Jeonghan and Joshua say in unison.

Minutes pass. It’s clear the permits don’t exist, but Mingyu keeps up the charade of searching anyway, much to the delight of the Hell delegation. “Have you tried the top drawer of that thing?” Joshua asks right after Jeonghan suggests checking the trash folder on the desktop in his office. You, of course, stay quiet, content to soak up your victory in silence—albeit while looking extremely smug.

“Well!” you say, clapping your hands together with a wicked smile. “This was fun. Thank you both so much for the invite, but I fear we must be going. Duty calls.”

Hoshi is having none of this. Permits be damned, another snap of his fingers finds you bound to your chair, chains wrapped around each of your forearms. You hiss at the contact. “Whoa,” Jun whispers, and if Jeonghan’s and Joshua’s mouths hadn’t been removed by the same finger-snap, he assumes there’d be a crude joke coming his way.

“The three of you would do well to remember who and where you are.” Hoshi speaks with all the authority bestowed upon him. It’s a stark difference from how Jun usually sees him—aloof and unserious, more like a court jester—and it has him straightening in his chair. “None of us will be leaving this room until the matter is resolved.”

You roll your neck. Press your tongue into the fat of your cheek but otherwise don’t move. Pain flashes across your face each time the chains leave fresh wounds in your skin and Jun wants to tell them to cut it out, call this whole thing off, say it doesn’t mean anything, but he’s still so clueless. Still so far out of his depth. These matters concern him but are so far beyond his pay grade it’s all he can do to keep treading water.

And you know this, because you say, “There is no conflict of interest. Everything is business as usual.”

Hoshi doesn’t even make eye contact as he retorts, “Which is useless, coming from you.”

Mingyu offers up a tight-lipped smile. “I think what my colleague is trying to say is that we simply cannot trust word of mouth in a matter as serious as this. As I’m sure you understand, Wen Junhui is a special case. It’s quite rare They enlist the help of humans in such circumstances, and if he is no longer able to perform his duties in an unbiased manner due to your influence—”

Teeth grit, you repeat, “There is no conflict of interest.”

Mingyu sighs. Sets down his tablet and narrows his gaze. He seems to have shaken off the dregs of doubt and uncertainty, because he looks powerful. Looks intimidating, which is not a word Jun would have used to describe him twenty minutes ago. “Need I remind you of your role in this universe? Chaos and temptation; calamity and destruction. You serve no one. You do not speak in truths, nor are you concerned with them. Your ambition and pride were your downfall, and it seems you have learned nothing in the years since.” He turns his attention to Jun. “And if you doubt what I say, remember I witnessed all of this with my own eyes.”

“Scandalous! And what were you doing at the devil’s sacrament, Kim Mingyu?”

Jun nods, earning him an incredulous look from Hoshi. “Well, she has a point,” he defends. “There is that saying about stones and glass houses or whatever. He wouldn’t have seen all of those things if he hadn’t made a deal with her in the first place.”

Hoshi is quiet. Mingyu looks betrayed. “Are you not going to—”

“He, too, has a point,” the angel concedes. “I mean, did you really have to do all that? You were already hot and tall, I just don’t—”

Even with no mouths, it’s obvious Jeonghan and Joshua are snickering.

The bickering continues before eventually devolving into baseless name-calling. Jun’s head snaps back and forth like he’s watching a tennis match, and it’s not that far off. Mingyu hones in on your lack of character, prompting Hoshi to chime in with something equally cruel or just nonsensical in an attempt to back him up, and you handle both of them with ease, laughing off their taunting just to get under their skin. Which works, of course, so on and on it goes, ad nauseam, until Jun puts everyone out of their misery and puts an end to it.

“Isn’t anyone going to ask me how I feel?” At once the room goes silent, all squabbling ceased, and the sudden quiet has his ears ringing. “I know you don’t need me,” he says to you, amazed he can meet your eye when he feels like that admission is going to make him vomit. He turns to Mingyu and Hoshi. “But you two do, and throughout this whole experience I have been left out, lied to, and talked over. Did either of you ever stop to consider that’s why I refused the assignment and it has nothing to do with her? That she’s telling the truth when she says there’s no conflict of interest?”

At least they have the good sense to look embarrassed.

Mingyu is the first to crack. He bows slightly at the waist and says, “On behalf of Heaven, I would like to offer you our deepest and most sincere apologies.”

Hoshi follows suit. “Right. Exactly what he said.”

Jun studies each of them. Mingyu, he knows, is just doing what any human resources officer worth their salt would do: protect the company at all costs. Fortunately this works out in Jun’s favor. He’s important and necessary and, against all odds, has proven his worth and abilities to boot. Heaven can’t negotiate with Hell without him, and it’s this knowledge that spurs him on, has him crossing one leg over the other and folding his arms across his chest. Total power stance. Hoshi gapes a little.

“I think there’s a compromise to be found here.”

The compromise is this: just as there are souls in Hell that were meant to go to Heaven, the reverse is also true. Jun had stumbled across them during his hours of research: souls that had somehow slipped through the cracks and went north when they were meant to go south; souls stuck in an endless purgatory that a lax Judgment Deliverer let in because they didn’t feel like doing paperwork; judgment numbers in which an integer got input incorrectly. What he proposes is a one-for-one trade. Heaven wants Choi Seungcheol, so they’ll have to give up someone in return.

It evens the playing field—

“Which was the original intention, was it not?”

More importantly, and perhaps more selfishly, Jun will no longer be able to be used as a pawn. He’ll uphold his original agreement while doing the same for you—for Hell. He’ll rewrite the terms and conditions of the contracts after each soul has been judged fairly and impartially by both factions, essentially voiding the concept of sides.

“I would be working for you both,” he concludes. “It’s the only way any of this remains fair.”

(He’s also not trying to invoke your wrath and spend eternity getting dipped in hot oil, but he doesn’t feel it’s the right time to admit that.)

After a lengthy silence that Hoshi spends pressing against his ear, the angel eventually says, “Heaven is amenable to these terms if Hell is.”

You heave a long-suffering sigh that has Jun on the edge of his seat. This proposal was certainly better than the last one he’d pitched you, but you’re giving nothing away. Also of little help are Jeonghan and Joshua who have fallen asleep and are snoring loudly. Mingyu leans over to wipe a spot of drool from the corner of Joshua’s mouth. He doesn’t move.

After what feels like a lifetime, you nod. “Fine. Hell is also amenable to these terms.” A chorus of cheers. Jun does an embarrassing little wiggle out of excitement. Hoshi stands on top of the table and pumps his fist. Mingyu, still in HR mode, starts listing off all the potential new job titles for Jun.

(In the end his new name tag reads: Wen Junhui, Special Counsel to Heaven & Hell, Contracts Division.)

Before you leave, and before the celebrations can get too out of hand, Jun clears his throat. “I have a request,” he says, before adding on, “if the whole payment in forms other than money thing is still on the table.”

“It is,” Mingyu confirms.

“Great.” He sucks in a breath. Lets it go all disjointed and shaky. There’s no going back once he says this and they grant it—which they will, considering the way Mingyu’s nearly tripping over himself to give him whatever he wants. But it’s still a massive ask. It will still change the trajectory of his existence, just like that handjob had done. And even though he’s certain it’s what he wants, he still wonders if he’s making a mistake as he says, “I want to be immortal.”

Jeonghan and Joshua jerk awake. “What the fuck did he just say?”

Hoshi, too, looks stunned. “Uh, are you sure?”

No, Jun wants to say, please talk me out of it, but the words die in his throat when he looks at you. There’s not a hint of bewilderment to be found. No shock or awe. There’s just the smallest nod of your head, meant just for him, that says all he needs to hear—that you see him, that you recognize he’d gone through all of this insanity because he needed to find his own path, and that he’s finally found in it the meaning he’d been searching for.

“I’m sure,” he confirms, completely void of hesitation.

Hoshi scratches at the back of his neck. “Well, I—that’s quite a big request. I’ll have to see what we can do.”

Mingyu, however, spoils the inevitable surprise by giving him a thumbs-up.

After that, there isn’t much left to say. Mingyu formally concludes the meeting and thanks Hell for their attendance and participation, to which Jeonghan gives him the finger before disappearing in a plume of smoke that causes everyone to gag. Joshua takes advantage and slips out the door undetected. Mingyu and Hoshi are none the wiser until some of the employees down the hall start screaming. “Please excuse us,” Mingyu chokes out before he, too, disappears in the direction of the shouting. Hoshi hangs back, tries to swallow his amused smile, but then Mingyu returns to drag him away.

Only you and Jun remain. “What did Joshua do?” he asks, less to break the silence and more because he’s nosy.

“Released roughly three dozen of those terrifying tarantulas that eat birds.”

“Oh.”

Silence creeps in anyway—not awkward, but Jun can tell there’s something you want to say. Should he hover? He doesn’t want you to feel obligated (not that you would), but he can’t deny that he’s curious. You, the literal devil, reluctant to say something to him, just a human? It’s too good an opportunity to pass up.

“You’re not gonna get all clingy and weird now that we’ve had sex, are you?” he jokes.

Shockingly, you do not find this funny. “I may have lied about inventing Jenny McCarthy, but I did invent the guillotine. And the electric chair. And the rack—”

“Noted,” Jun replies, giddy all over. Can’t help it as he shoves his hands in the pockets of his slacks and rocks back on his heels. “Should I walk you to the door?”

“Don’t you dare,” comes your response, but Jun does it anyway. Gets away with it by dropping some quip about his mother raising him to be a gentleman, and it’d just destroy her if she knew Jun wasn’t abiding by her teachings.

Your reluctant smile is akin to pulling teeth, but it still shows up.

Whatever havoc had been wreaked by Joshua seems to have been solved. There’s blissful silence as the two of you reach the door, and Jun knows his escort is pomp and circumstance, that you could disappear in the blink of an eye the way Jeonghan had, but he appreciates you going through the motions for his sake, that you’ve allowed him a moment of normalcy.

“Was it hard coming back here?” he asks, leaning against the door frame to stem his desire to reach out for you.

“Well, it’s certainly never easy, but I’ve got plenty of psychologists down there I can talk it over with if need be.” You check an invisible watch. “Do you think Freud is available for lunch tomorrow?”

“If he’s not, I am.”

A bark of shocked laughter has you covering your mouth. “I did not expect that from you.”

“Did it work?”

“No,” you reply instantly. “Have a great weekend, Wen Junhui. I’m sure our paths will cross again soon.”

Jun nods… which is about all he can do, considering he’s stuck here for the time being. Hoshi sent him here, which means Hoshi’s the only one who can send him back—some stupid security rule Jun wasn’t paying attention to when it’d been explained to him. So he sticks the corner of his thumb in his mouth, thinks about how great your ass looked in those pants as you walked away, and pivots back into the conference room to await the angel with the stupid t-shirts.

Except, as soon as he turns around, there you are. Face to face. Close enough that your scent is paralyzing, but it’s different now—softer, he thinks; something that makes him feel less like he’s been ensnared in your web and more like he’s been invited in. Close enough that when you lean in he can feel the warmth of your breath on his skin, that sensitive spot just below his ear.

“You were wrong,” you say, so quiet he’s not sure he isn’t imagining your words, filling in the blanks of what he wants to hear. “What you said earlier, about me not needing you.”

Then you’re gone.

In the blink of an eye, just like he thought you’d be.

He makes a mental note to be available tomorrow around lunchtime.

No invitations to drinks after work – you see them enough as it is. You hang up on remote meetings without saying much of anything, and you’re usually the first to leave the call without so much as a goodbye. Your emails and short and dry, signed off with only your name. You avoid the catered lunches provided by whatever restaurant your company paid out and stick to wedging yourself into the sixth-floor storage room with your package of fruit snacks and a sad turkey sandwich. There was a pink chair in the corner that you liked and tried multiple times to convince Mike (the janitor) to let you have but he refused. 

You do not make eye contact during breaks, and you don’t stop by the break room for coffee or complimentary muffins. You lied about why once, when you were asked by a coworker – and absently claimed a gluten allergy, only to be seen eating bread a few hours later. That coworker hasn’t spoken to you since, and you don’t think she plans to. 

But him? 

He started talking about two years ago, a year after you joined the company. He started talking too much, you could argue, but he would say it’s just enough. 

He’s too friendly, you thought. He dropped by your desk with a warm cup of tea every morning, if not your precious Monday morning pinecone. He slid a soft, lemon-blueberry muffin under your nose with a soft smile every once in a while. He asked you to lunch, to drinks, and he always sent you a separate follow-up email after remote meetings when he could very well just add your tasks to the bottom of the mass list he always sends in the group mail. 

He was just above you on the corporate ladder, but you felt no pressure to answer him in terms of social interaction. He didn’t make it a point, either – he just existed in your vicinity, and only came into your space when you allowed. Quite like a cat, you are. 

He told you about his life, quietly, calmly. He told you about how he learned wushu growing up, and how he played piano. He told you about how he got the cabin as a gift from a friend who was moving abroad, unlikely to return and much less spend time in the quiet woods surrounding your town. He told you about his late-night snacking habit, about his cat, Luna. He told you about his best friend, Minghao, and how he was the best man at his wedding a few years ago. 

But above all? 

He listened to you.  

He looked at you like every word from your mouth held weight, carefully nodding along to your mumbled stories of troubled childhood. He listened to you talk about your favorite dish, your favorite color, even your theories about how middle children suffer the most. He laughed at your wry jokes, the dry humor – though he would bite it back at the deadpan comments you’d make during department meetings. 

He always sat next to you in those department meetings. His knee was always just barely brushing yours, the soft material of his slacks making your skin prickle as it touched your bare thigh. He’d pass you doodled notes on his pink stationery with My Melody on the edges. He always adjusted the hem of your skirt down subtly when you stood up and pushed your chair in after you skirted around it. He waited until you’d gathered all your materials to leave, walking alongside you back to your desk even if his was across the office. 

And it made people wonder what about you had his attention so deeply. 

You’re not interesting to any of them, you never had been. You’re a liar (about a gluten allergy, of all things) and the kind of quiet that made them feel stupid if you looked at them for too long. They felt like you were judging them, when really – you were hoping they’d speed up their long-winded questions to end the painfully awkward social aspect of you fixing their problems. 

Sometimes, he’d send you home early to help you escape their judging eyes. 

He’d send you an email – the subject line usually only taken up by “🏠?” The body usually contained nothing more than a new picture of Luna, but you always appreciated it. 

He’d be looking over the edge of his monitor to watch you hear the dreaded Outlook ding, your eyes slightly lighting up at the sound before really brightening the moment you saw it was him. You’d look over the edge of your monitor, raising a brow that didn’t hide your shy smile as you sent him an email back before quietly packing your bag and slipping out of the office. 

It was always just a meme you’d found during your lunchtime Pinterest scroll – one you’re sure he’d seen you add to your shared board. 

Because, of all things, he’d chosen to first share his Pinterest with you. You saw his dream home, vintage cars, cool jewelry and the stupid memes he liked you send you in the middle of the night when he was thinking of you. 

You still reread that text, he sent it over a year ago. 

MESSAGE FROM: Wen Junhui ♡  [2:32AM] of course i think about you.  [2:33AM] i think about you all the time. after breakfast, when you try to sneak out of the office to hide in that storage room upstairs. even outside of work, sometimes i see things i think you’d like. but i mostly think about you now.  [2:34AM] i think it’s a comfort that you pass my mind before i go to bed. or maybe just an association i've made with the fact that i check our board every night to see if you’ve added anything.  [2:35AM] but...i prefer the former, honestly. goodnight, y/n. sleep well. ♡ 

You added the little heart to his contact name that same night. 

Granted, things between you and him never went further. He talked to you, he walked with you around the office, he gave you many ways to contact him outside of work even if you never texted him first. He shared moments of his day with you if you missed work or worked from home – which was rare and always worried him. He would send pictures of a lone pinecone sitting on your mousepad if you weren’t there when he delivered it, followed by whatever random emoji he felt fit the mood. Sometimes it was a hazelnut, sometimes it was a cat. 

Sometimes, it was the heart wrapped in a bandage. 

You tried not to overthink it. 

But it was hard not to notice the whispers about him. 

How a lot of your coworkers talked about him, and how cute he is. How sweet, smart, gentle. How he’s soft-spoken until he’s around his friends, even though you knew that his best friend was just as soft spoken. He worked two floors down, Xu Minghao. 

You met Minghao and his wife (and the rest of their shared friends) the first time you were ever invited out for drinks – and the first time you ever hesitated to say no. 

Junhui managed to get you right in the nick of time, too – right as the clock struck five. You hadn’t even gotten a chance to log out of your programs when he leaned over the wall of your cubicle with a twinkle in his eye that made your chest ache. 

“Have a drink with me. My friends are coming, too, but you know. I’ll be there.” 

And you had more than a drink – you had a good time. You had three blood orange margaritas and a sip of his beer, but it was like you were shining brighter than a million suns. You let yourself sink into the soft vinyl of the booth, surrounded by him and his scent and his friends. You let yourself talk, out loud and with gusto about everything. You were uninhibited, and you remember how they all warmly smiled as Junhui pushed your hair out of your eyes as you talked about how there was no way the megalodon shark was extinct. 

He walked you home that night, the two of you a little too tipsy to navigate the train or drive. He walked on the sidewalk closest to the street and held your pinchy heels in his fingers, letting you skip around and complain about the humidity. He only smiled, his hip bumping yours every once in a while, when you swayed a bit too far. 

When you got back to your apartment, he waited against the railing in front of your doorstep to watch you step inside. You remember hesitating before asking him if he wanted to come in for a nightcap. 

His eyes widened, and for a moment – he considered it. You saw how his eyes flickered to your lips, before he cleared his throat. 

“Maybe another night. Thank you for coming out with me tonight, I hope it wasn’t too overwhelming.” 

It hadn’t been, but his soft rejection was certainly disappointing. You shook your head then, staring at him for a split second more before speaking. 

“It was nice. I’d...I’d like to do it again, sometime. Just us.” 

You smiled softly, before giving him a curt nod and slipping into your apartment before he could respond. You leaned against the door, sliding down the cool wood before hearing him utter a soft goodnight. 

Since then, the two of you had gone for drinks over and over again – just the two of you, and with his friends. When it was just you, he’d talk about everything and anything under the sun. But when it was with his friends? 

They really liked you, enjoying the excitement that they never saw in the office. One of them, Kwon Soonyoung in finance, offhandedly mentioned that they hadn’t known you and Junhui were friends until he started mentioning you at random moments. Your face had felt hot as the rest of them giggled and agreed, with Minghao’s wife letting it slip that ‘random moments’ meant any time he could. 

“Yeah, he brings you up a lot. Oh, Y/N likes this. Y/N would love that. Y/N, Y/N, Y/N. It’s so cute.” 

You don’t remember Junhui refuting it, but you remember the flustered blush that settled in his cheeks after that. Things between you and him didn’t change, though.  

Until they did – one month, three days later, Junhui got a girlfriend. 

It was like he had vanished entirely – gone were the warm cups of tea on your desk, the muffins, the pinecones. No more invites to lunch or drinks with him or his friends. No longer did you receive emails asking if you wanted to go home early, no more pictures of Luna, no more separate follow-up emails outlining your tasks after remote meetings. 

None of it really bothered you, until you realized that your shared board hadn’t been updated by him in a while. Then, you noticed it, truly – he'd unfollowed you. Pinterest, Instagram, even Spotify. Spotify! 

He didn’t sit next to you at department meetings, either. No more passed notes, no more pushing your chair in. And he rushed out right after, not bothering to even speak to you. 

And people noticed. 

You hadn’t realized that by allowing yourself to associate with Junhui and his friends, you became more than a blip on people’s radar. People knew your name; they knew your face. The girls gossiped about what he could possibly see in you, unaware that you were reapplying deodorant in one of the stalls. Men speculated about your relationship status, wondering amongst themselves if you were open-minded – while they stood outside for a smoke, making you scrunch your nose in disgust at them for more reasons than one. 

People knew you – his friends, still said hello in the hallways. Minghao, gave you warm smiles and extended invites to drinks that you’d swiftly decline – with excuses of working late, of being tired, or whispering that time of the month. He always nodded, smiled...but you knew he didn’t believe you. 

Once you realized Junhui was avoiding you for what you believed was a girlfriend, it took you less than twelve hours to get back to your reserved demeanor. As long as you didn’t make noise in your cubicle, no one came around – and people realized then that your gaze wasn’t mean to intimidate or judge, but to time. You didn’t want to talk to anyone you didn’t have to, more than you needed to – and that was bothersome to most of them. 

Of course it was; in their minds, they’re great. 

They’re a catch, they’re fun to be around. 

But they’re not him. 

They’ve never cared to ask you a single thing about yourself beyond your relationship status and where you got your shoes. You always just stared until they left or mumbled something about the local department stores. 

Things with him never returned to the easy friendship you thought was starting to form, even as you rung in the new year at the company party. It made you sad. 

Maybe because you had a bit of a crush on him, actually. 

You thought a little too hard about the meanings behind his messages, the pictures of his weekend retreats to his cabin that he insisted you were always welcome at, especially if his friends were there. You missed the shared memes, the shared playlists, the way he’d sometimes find you inside the sixth-floor storage room, sitting on the dusty pink chair that always made him smile a little too fondly. 

You liked Junhui, more than just a cubicle crush that you could discuss with your girlfriends that you didn’t have. 

But he had one. One that meant more to him than you ever would, even with the way he opened his heart to you. 

You thought about what he shared with you – videos of him playing the piano at Minghao’s wedding for his first dance with his wife. He shared his presence and comfort, often walking you home and your hands always brushed. You felt like a schoolgirl every time you’d tuck your hand into your pocket. You once got caught in the rain together and stood under the bus stop before he fished his headphones out of his pocket and gave you one. 

He played starstarstar by Dosii as he pulled you out from under the safety of the bus stop, and the two of you walked to your apartment instead. Hand-in-hand, soaked to the bone, with the string of his headphones forcing even more proximity that made your cheeks heat. 

You don’t remember who interlaced your fingers. If it was you...you’re still happy. It means he was okay with it, maybe he wanted to. 

If it was him? 

He definitely wanted to. 

However, it’s all filed in your memories now – because you look over your monitor to see his brows fixed in concentration as he types across his keyboard, with you not even a blip on his radar. You watch carefully as he reads his own words over and over, before his eyes flicker up and meet yours. 

You’re not surprised when his shoulders sag for the umpteenth time, and he looks away. 

Like he wants to say something. Like he wants to talk to you, but the words get caught in his throat and he can’t seem to get them out. It’s been a year since you’ve spoken, and you would’ve forgotten the sound of his voice if he wasn’t your co-worker – but you never forget that night last spring, drenched in the rain. 

You would’ve kissed him; you could have kissed him. 

It’s spring, again. 

You walk to the train station after work in silence, with nothing playing in your headphones for the first time. You sit in between an elderly couple and a lone high school girl absently staring at a long thread of messages on her phone. They’re all left unanswered, and she repeatedly fills the text box with words before deleting them and starting over. 

You feel like that girl – except she’s brave enough to ask for answers and you’re gripping your purse in a claustrophobic panic. 

It’s a Wednesday in summer when you finally get tired of waiting for answers. Almost a year to the date when he first asked you to get drinks with him, you get an idea. 

Have a drink with me tonight. 

That's all it says. 

You stand over the copy machine, the sticky note you scribbled on moments earlier folded neatly in your hand. You wrote and rewrote it at your desk, your hands trembling and smearing the ink. You had to walk past his desk to submit the paperwork you were making copies of, and you planned to slip it onto his mousepad on the way back to your own. 

You don’t get a chance to do that, though. 

Your eyes are closed when you hear the copy room door open, but you don’t bother to look up as that same woodsy smell fills your nostrils. 

He doesn’t speak, but you know it’s him.  

You know, from the smell of lumber and the click of his shoes and the tension that makes you feel suffocated as you peer over your shoulder. He’s silent, thumbing at his own paperwork. He only glances up when he feels your eyes on him, but this time, you don’t look away. 

His jacket is gone, sleeves rolled up to his elbows and tie slightly loosened. You’d stare if it wasn’t against girl code to ogle someone else’s man. 

You turn, fully facing him as your last copy gets stapled by the machine and slides out. You gather them in your arms, before holding them to your chest and holding the sticky note out to him between two fingers. He glances at the hot pink paper, swallowing carefully before reaching for it. 

You give him a soft smile, before spinning on your heel and heading out of the room without a word. 

You’re moving at lightning speed to get out of the office before he can get a chance to catch up with you – shoving your copies into your manager’s hands with a rushed run-down of the day’s events and outages. You thank her with a bow, before beelining for your desk and yanking your purse out of the bottom drawer. 

You make it to the elevator without him noticing you, your eyes catching a flash of his white shirt and the hot pink paper unfolded in his hand. 

You feel your phone buzz in your hand as you reach the lobby. 

NEW! Message From: Wen Junhui (WORK)  [5:32PM] where? 

It’s nearing seven when he finally has the courage to get out of his car. 

He’s been sitting in front of the bar for ten minutes, hoping to see you walk by. If you’re late, you won’t notice that he is. 

Message From: Y/N ♡  [5:35PM] at dizzy’s  [5:35PM] 6:30? 

He waits another three minutes, watching the corner before his hand finally grabs the door handle and pulls. 

He sees you almost instantly, sitting quietly at a booth in the back. You’re not in your work clothes anymore, instead wearing a soft red dress and your hair is pinned back. You’re smiling at the waiter, who seems to be really interested in talking to you as he slides a margarita on the table. He holds the menu out, only for you to shake your head. 

He watches your glossed lips shape around the words: I’m waiting for someone. 

Him. He’s the someone. 

He wants to be the only one. Ever. 

He tongues his cheek as the waiter nods, patting the vinyl of the booth above your head. You lean your head back slightly, closing your eyes as your forefinger picks at your thumb’s cuticle. A nervous habit of yours, one he’d picked up on the first time he spoke to you. 

About pinecones, actually – but you don’t remember that at all. He doesn’t know what possessed him to bring them up – but he learned, through your hushed whisper in the elevator that morning – that you liked them. You like pinecones, because they are so diverse while all still being the same thing.  

He hadn’t understood it then, but he did now – albeit differently. 

He was like the pinecones, because he tried to show you that he liked you in so many ways...through the invites to drinks, the lunch, the shared memes. 

The pinecones. 

Sliding warm tea on your desk and lemon-blueberry muffins, to cracking jokes and passing notes to you on his pink My Melody stationery. To pulling your hair out and brushing your hair out of your face, to letting his friends embarrass him by practically outing his interest in you every time they got together with you and him for drinks at this very bar. 

To walking you home, even in the rain, just to spend a little more time with you.  

Only to realize that it was futile, because you didn’t see him that way. 

You didn’t see him as more than a friend, but he’s not brave enough to tell you why you should. 

“Hi.” 

Your voice is smooth as he finally slides into the booth opposite you, his skin warming at the sound of it. He clears his throat, giving you a curt nod as he adjusts himself in his seat. He shrugs off his jacket, tossing it to the side before feeling guilt begin to settle in his stomach. 

“Sorry. I was...” 

He gives up on coming up with an excuse, only running his hand through his hair as you nod. Your manicured fingers stir your straw in figure eights, the flash of an heirloom ring you never take off catching his eye. “I’m sorry.” 

“For?” Your eyes are curious, before tilting your head. “Being late? It happens.” 

He shakes his head like he doesn’t know, before clearing his throat again when the waiter swoops in to save the day. He internally thanks whatever God is out there as he asks for a beer, earning a scrunch of your nose as the waiter nods and leaves once more. 

You don’t say anything as he shifts, only stare. Maybe through him, maybe into him. 

He doesn’t mind the warmth of your gaze. He never has. 

“I didn’t know getting a girlfriend meant you’d treat me like I never existed.” You start softly, his eyes widening as you purse your lips. “I understand creating distance, because there is someone new. Someone who could perceive you and I as something more, when it’s not.” 

“I...I don’t know what to say.” He admits lamely, the shock of you thinking he has a girlfriend not yet settling into his bones. “Who told you I have a girlfriend?” 

You only shrug, taking a quick sip of your drink before shaking your head. 

“Does it matter?” 

He blinks, when the waiter slides the beer bottle on the table as he passes by. He touches it, the glass cold as he tongues his cheek. 

If this is a way to get over you, by getting you believe there is someone else when there isn’t -- he’ll take it. He’ll take it because then it means he never has to tell you how he feels, and he’ll never have to face the way you reject him so kindly. 

“I guess not.”  “Mmh.” 

You trace circles into the side of your glass with your thumb, before another smile graces your lips. 

“Are you happy?” 

How could you ask him that? 

Of course he’s not happy.  

He hasn’t had a proper conversation with you in an entire year, and he’s been too much of a coward to admit that he wants more. He wants to kiss you in the elevator, in the break room, in the storage room on the sixth floor during your lunch break. He wants to hold your hand on the way to department meetings, under the table at drinks with your friends, on the walk to your apartment before you pull him in for a good night kiss. He wants to come into your apartment for a fucking nightcap without knowing he’ll say too much and lose any chance of ever being more to you. 

So instead, he pulls away. 

He stops talking to you, he removes you off every social media platform he can think of, so he doesn’t have the urge to peek at your dream home board on Pinterest, or the way your dream wedding is so similar to his. So he doesn’t have to be subjected to the cute outfits you post on your Instagram story before you leave your apartment for work, even though he’ll just see it when you arrive and he’ll have to take a deep breath so he doesn’t scream about how nice you look.  

So he doesn’t have to know that you’re listening to the playlist he made for you to stay calm in the packed morning train on the way to work. 

On the way to him. 

“No.” 

Your eyes soften, your brows scrunching in that same worried way they do when you’re listening to someone explain their problems to you at work. You nod, that comforting look of understanding glazing over your eyes. 

“Can I ask why?” 

He doesn’t bother responding, his mind racing as he thinks about all the pinecones sitting in his car, the ones that he’s deemed perfect enough to place on your desk but hasn’t been able to. He thinks about the way you slip out of the office and how your heels sound as you sneak upstairs to the sixth floor during lunch. He thinks about when Mike caught him off-guard by coming down to his desk and saying that you liked a pink chair that was in the storage room and kept asking about it. 

A pink chair that used to belong to him, when he first got the company a few months before you did. 

He sighs, fishing his wallet out of his pocket and sliding two twenties on the table. 

“No. It’s better if you don’t.” 

He doesn’t allow himself to look at you as he slides out of the booth, his hand gripping his suit jacket much too tightly for it to go unnoticed. You don’t stand, only nod as you take another sip of your drink. 

“I hope it gets better. Have a good night, Junhui.” 

He fights back tears as he makes his way out of the bar, your understanding look stuck in his mind as he drives home. He doesn’t bother looking at the pinecones in his backseat or changing the playlist that blares through his speakers when he connects his phone – a playlist you made for him, for his long drive home from work. 

You’re in everything he holds dear to him. The music, the cabin – even if you’ve never been there. You know him, everything about him that is worth knowing in his eyes. 

Except the fact that he’s in love with you, and that he’s a liar. 

JUNHUI ISN'T AT HIS DESK ON THURSDAY. OR FRIDAY.

The whispering starts on Monday, with lots of wayward glances towards you and you almost want to go down to Minghao’s desk and ask if Junhui is okay.  

But you don’t -- you glue yourself to your chair until lunch time, only to see that the pink chair you loved is no longer in the storage room. Mike tells you that the original owner took it out on Wednesday night and offers a soft apology. You shake your head and say it’s okay, before turning around and going back to your desk. 

You arrive at your desk on Tuesday morning to your desk chair missing. There is a warm cup of tea on a coaster, and a cranberry orange muffin in front of your keyboard – but none of it distracts from the sudden pop of color next to your mousepad. 

A plastic pink storage box. 

You don’t bother to put your purse down as you crack the corner up, and your eyes widen as you realize it’s full of pinecones. There’s an envelope attached to the underside of the lid, and you pluck it off carefully before leaning against your desk. You peel it open gently, only to see the familiar pink My Melody stationery. 

Junhui. 

You ignore the urge to look up at his desk to see if he’s watching you over his monitor, feeling eyes from your co-workers trickling in as they spot the pink box. His handwriting is scrawled in purple ink across the stationery, and your heart sinks as you take in the slightly smudged words. 

My Y/N, 

I’m sorry about Wednesday. In fact, I’m sorry about the past year that I’ve gone without speaking to you. I have no excuse, only an explanation that probably won’t make things any better but will certainly give you some clarity. 

I pulled away because I knew things would get too much for me. I’ve got a weak heart, and I can’t take rejection well – so I figured I’d cut ties first. It never worked, cutting contact with you; I found myself constantly missing the sound of your voice. I wanted so badly for you to reach out first, but I should’ve known better than to expect that when I was the one who wedged my way into your life. Our friendship was fun, and I miss listening to playlists with you during the walks to your apartment, but it simply can’t be anymore. 

I like you so much, it’s painful to be around you and know you don’t feel the same. 

I wanted to kiss you that night last spring. The rain and everything, it felt like a movie. Maybe that’s corny, and maybe it’s too forward but it doesn’t matter anyway because nothing will come of this. I’m sorry, for being too much of a coward to ever explain this to you in person. And for telling you now, through a letter written on stationery.  

With this, I’ve got to admit something; finding out that you think I have a girlfriend when you’re all I’ve been able to think about since that first day we spoke is insane to me. Where do you get your gossip from? Is it a subscription? Unsubscribe effective immediately. 

Speaking of effective immediately, I’ve taken a new position at a new company. So not only am I a coward for confessing this way, but also because I’m running away from it all. I don’t think I could handle not going home to you, even after seeing you all day. I’m not equipped for the agony of a silent, one-sided office romance that you read about in books. 

I recommended you for my position. Don’t worry, people won’t talk to you nearly as much as they do now; but still...have fun, yeah? 

I hope you enjoy these pinecones, for whatever you might end up using them for – and the pink chair. Funny, it belonged to me when I first got to the company. That’s why Mike never gave it up, but he told me you liked it so I figured you should have it. 

Now it belongs to you! Quite like my heart. 

Have a good day, Y/N. I’ll miss you. 

Always and forever yours,  Junhui ♡ 

Your chest aches as you realize all the opportunities have slipped through your fingers. 

“Miss Y/N, Mr. Wen said he’d like for you to have this.” 

Mike startles you as you see the pink chair being rolled behind your desk, the fabric pristine and the small stain from spilled coffee at the edge is gone. Your fingers flit across the headrest, before you look at him with tears in your eyes. 

“Guess he changed his mind, huh?” 

He only smiles, nodding his head before turning on his heel and leaving. 

You look at the cup of tea. It’s still hot, so it must’ve been placed recently. You glance over at his desk; how vacant it looked. Almost like how your chest feels after having your heart ripped out. 

You don’t really notice that you’re moving until you’re in the elevator, nervously nibbling on your lip as you frantically press on Minghao’s floor number while balancing the box of pinecones on your hip. It feels like an eternity as the damn thing jostles, and you nearly trip as it finally opens on the third floor. You beeline for Minghao’s desk in the back, only to see him quietly arriving with his headphones slid over his ears and his wife’s lipstick still stamped on his cheek. 

He glances up as he feels your presence behind him, his eyes widening before a smile graces his lips. 

“Y/N! What brings you down here?” 

“Where is he?” You blurt, your hand still holding the note. He raises a brow, sliding his headphones off and onto the desk as he takes a seat in his desk chair. 

“Where is who, sweetheart?”  “Junhui.” 

His lips form an o-shape, making him nod before he shrugs. 

“Why should I tell you?” 

You gape at him, almost losing your grip on the box on your hip. 

“Because you obviously know, and if you care about me–”  “Tell me why I should tell you, Y/N.” 

You huff, your cheeks hot as you tap your foot. He tilts his head, an expectant look in his eyes before he speaks again. 

“I do have work to do, you know.” 

“Because I need to tell him that I...” You choke on your words, scoffing out a humorless laugh as you feel your eyes sting with tears. “Because I need to tell him that he’s an idiot.” 

“You can text him that, you know.”  “I’d rather die than text him how I feel.”  “So, you admit you feel some type of way about him.” 

He grins, slim fingers typing his password into his computer. You scowl. 

“I never said anything of the sort.” You argue, and Minghao gives you a look that says, really bitch? 

“You like him. It’s obvious to all of us, everyone in this office.” He reaches for his water bottle, his fingers aptly flicking the cap open. “So, admit it. Admit you have feelings for Wen Junhui, and I’ll give you the information you want.” 

You look at the crumpled stationery in your hand, your heart swelling slightly at his handwriting. 

My Y/N.  Always and forever yours,  Junhui ♡ 

“I love him.” You mumble softly as you stare at the paper, not catching how Minghao’s eyes widen. “I’m in love with him, Hao.” 

A single tear rolls down your cheek and you quickly wipe it away, before looking up to see Minghao looking at you with a soft glaze over his eyes. 

“I expect you and your boyfriend to get drinks with my wife and I this weekend in exchange for this.” His tone is warning as he reaches for a pen, his hand swiping a sticky note off the pad. You nod, ignoring the way your cheeks heat at the idea of Junhui being your boyfriend as he holds out the green paper. “Here, leave that. I’ll keep it safe, so you don’t have to lug it around.” 

He holds his hands out for the box, and you hesitate before carefully placing it down. You open the corner, taking one of the pinecones out with a wince as he raises a brow before you shove it in your purse. 

“I can explain.”  “Over drinks this weekend. I’ll work out your attendance with your department manager.” 

You smile gently, glancing down at the sticky note. It’s an address to an apartment building. 

“Thank you, Minghao.”  “Go, sweetheart. You’ll get caught in the rain if you stay any longer.” 

And you go. 

You don’t bother waiting for the elevator, practically flying down three flights of stairs. You sprint out of the lobby, nearly slamming into yet another of Junhui’s friends, Joshua, before yelling an apology over your shoulder. You make it outside, holding both pieces of paper in one of your shaking hands while the other fishes your phone out of your purse. 

A fat raindrop falls on the screen as you map out how far the address is, and you almost welcome the cool water falling onto your cheeks as you run to the train station. 

NEW! Message From: Hao  [8:02AM] day 1 of my best friend being a traitor. how is working from home, you bitch? 

Junhui snorts as the message comes in, settling carefully in his desk chair. He feels a bit alone as he texts back a simple, I’m sorry; the usual soft chatter of the office replaced by the sound of his aircon blasting. Everything feels too casual – his white t-shirt tucked into his blue jeans, the softness of his house slippers instead of his usual heavy dress shoes. He feels like he’s waiting for a lunch date with one of his friends, rather than signing into work for the day. 

He looks over the edge of his monitor, no longer seeing your warm eyes looking back at him; but a cat calendar flipped to July. He rolls his shoulders back, sighing inwardly when his phone buzzes incessantly on the desk.  

Your contact photo fills the screen. 

INCOMING CALL FROM: Y/N [PLEDIS] 

He feels the entire world stop. His breath is caught in his throat, and he suddenly can’t feel his limbs. He watches the phone ring until the call fails, nearly falling out of his chair as he stands up and grabs it. His hands are shaking too hard for him to press the missed call notification, only for you to call back again.  

His chest is tight as he shakily breathes out, his thumb swiping across the screen to answer it. 

“Hello?” 

“I wanted to kiss you that night, too. I have never once though back to that night and didn’t feel regret knowing I didn’t kiss you.” 

You sound slightly out of breath, and the sound of rain is loud in the background. He feels his stomach drop to his ass; feet rooted to his spot in his office.  

“Y/N, I–”  “You don’t have to say anything. Just come outside.” 

He blinks as the call ends, staring at his reflection in the dark screen.  

You’re outside. 

“Shit.”  

He nearly stumbles as he darts out of his office, beelining for his coat closet and shoving his feet into a pair of sneakers. He grabs the umbrella that leans against the frame of his front door, not bothering to grab his keys as he fumbles with the lock and throws the door open. A rumble of thunder startles him as he quickly shuts the door behind him, his fingers trying to fiddle with the umbrella when he hears your voice echo through the complex. 

“Junhui!” 

He glances over the railing, his eyes darting all over the courtyard before spotting you a few feet from the stairs. You’re wearing the black dress you wore the first time he’d spoken to you, and the attempt to wear open-toed shoes was ruined by the rain. 

“Wen Junhui! Get down here!” 

He feels laughter bubble up in his chest as he realizes you’re completely drenched, your hair is stuck to your face and your dress is practically dripping like the clouds above. 

“You come up! It’s pouring out here!”  “No, you have to come down here! I came all this way, it’s only fair!” 

He can’t really see your smile from where you are, but he can hear it. He can hear it and it’s like the rain doesn’t matter. It’s like this very moment proves he was an idiot not to overthink all those intimate moments between the two of you – the way your eyes would light up at his stupid emails, the way you’d let his hands linger on your neck or ears after brushing your hair out of your eyes. All the playlists, all the similarities down to the fact that you both want marigolds for your dream weddings. 

The way you interlaced your fingers that night last spring, and he’s so glad you did. 

“Junhui!” 

He shakes his head, dropping the umbrella on his doormat before sprinting to the staircase, hearing his heart pounding in his ears as he barrels down the stone steps.  

“What...what are you doing here? You’re going to get sick, I...” 

He trails off as he realizes you’re staring at him with a sparkle in your eye he can’t swallow. Your smile is all teeth, and he feels his chest ache as you shrug innocently. You take a step closer, tilting your head. 

“I thought you wanted to kiss me.” 

He feels his cheeks hot, and he absently runs a hand through his hair. 

“You’re drenched, Y/N.”  “I was that night, too. We both were.” 

You shrug again, before stepping out from under the stairwell back into the rain. You hold your hand out, the rain pelting it as he hesitates to take it. You wiggle your fingers, making him tongue his cheek as he takes it, letting you pull him out into the rain. You hand slides up his arm and cradles his jaw gently, and he fights himself not to lean into it but ultimately fails. 

“I told Minghao I’d tell you you’re an idiot.” 

He snorts, “Is that on his behalf or yours?” 

“Mostly mine, but I’m sure he has his own things to say about the matter. A year, Junhui? A whole year.” Your lip is jutted in a pout, and he sighs as the rain starts to soak in through his shirt. His hair is starting to stick on his forehead, and your hand swipes it back. 

“I’m sorry. I know that it’ll never be enough to say it, but I truly mean it.” He gently touches his forehead to yours, his heart warming at the way you peer up at him through wet lashes. “I don’t blame you if you don’t forgive me, either. It was a shitty thing to do.” 

He hates how your eyes soften, because he feels his knees grow weak as your other arm loops around his neck. He tentatively wraps his own around your waist, pulling you closer and he swears he sees your smile grow shy. 

“I wouldn’t have come all this way if I didn’t think hearing you out would be worth it.” You say softly, and a rumble of thunder makes you both flinch. A laugh escapes you, before your thumb strokes his cheek gently. 

“Is this still like last spring?” 

He smiles softly, “No.” 

“Did you ever think this would be the first time you get to kiss me? Like this?” 

He laughs, “No.” 

“Is it better, though?”  “Considering I’d hoped we would’ve gone on a date—”  “Say yes before I regret coming all this way.”  “Yes.” 

Neither of you move, but he feels it. He feels the same feeling of want he did that night, the same feeling of yearning that floated off you without a single word. You tilt your head up, your nose brushing his lightly . 

“I’m really cold.”  “I told you to come up.”  “This is more romantic.”  “I hope you know ‘romantic’ can also cost you three sick days at work.” 

“You’re worth all my sick days, Wen Junhui.” You mutter, pressing your lips to his. He can’t help but smile into it, his arm tightening around your waist as his other hand cups your face softly.  

All the warmth from your eyes, the bashfulness of your smiles, the kindness of your heart is too much for his heart to handle. He can’t believe you’re really here, in his arms...your lips so, so soft and eager against his. 

“We have to go inside. You’re going to get sick.” He forces himself to pull away, his heart melting at the way you chase his lips slightly. You frown, and he can’t help but press a chaste kiss to your pouted lip. “We can kiss all you want inside the apartment, I promise.” 

You don’t seem embarrassed at all as you smile at the mention of it, even if he feels his own cheeks grow hot as you nod. He feels his entire chest swell slightly as you interlace your fingers with his and pull him towards the stairwell, biting back his giddy smile. 

YOU SMELL LIKE LUMBER SOMETIMES.

You smell like the tree trunks he chops for firewood at his cabin on the weekends, and you roast his marshmallow for him – despite Minghao’s teasing.  

He still picks up pinecones. He dusts them off and examines them, and the best one is always promptly delivered to you at lunchtime as he drops by the company to whisk you away. The lunch invitations that once meant you’d be holed away in the storage room with a less-sad turkey sandwich from the deli down the block, now meant you’re getting bombarded with kisses before he finally lets you get out of his car with your to-go cup of iced tea. 

That wasn’t nearly the extent of your relationship with him. Now, he has a photo of you on his desk at home – and you have one of the two of you together on yours. Your pink chair is complimented often by your coworkers, and you’ve apologized to Diane for lying about a gluten allergy.  

Though you’re back to being under the radar, people notice the changes. They notice that Junhui, who no longer works alongside them, is still frequently in the lobby – but he’s picking you up. He’s kissing you; he’s spinning you around and calling you, my love.  

No one speaks to you unless they need something, and rarely does someone need something from you. 

But Junhui? 

He can’t help but need you every single day. He slips his pink stationery love letters into your purse before you leave his apartment on Sunday nights, even if he’s begged you to stay the night just one more time. He accepts invites to anything that means he can bring you with him -- drinks with Minghao, lunch with his mother, even a weekend trip that was meant to be strictly business, but he spent most of the time that he wasn’t presenting glued to you in the hotel room.  

Junhui doesn’t let you take the train anymore. Junhui takes your shy offers for a nightcap that usually end up with you kissing him breathless on your couch off two glasses of wine. Junhui, of all things, holds your hand on the table at drinks with his friends that are now yours, too.  

Junhui listens – to your complaints about work; to your theories about birthstones and how whoever chose them was clearly biased for September to have the sapphire; to your sweet whispers as you slip your hand down his shorts late at night, and the whiny moans of his name that slip from your throat when he’s pinned you against his mattress. 

But above all? 

Junhui loves you.  

Unabashedly, uninhibitedly and irrevocably.