life in the 2000s means flip phones, low rise jeans, a chaotic friendgroup, and a cocky skater boyfriend who climbs your window when he needs to apologize.
pairing: bf!riki x fem!reader ⭑ ft. friendgroup Enhypen
🗯️ vaeh’s notes: the fic is finally here! you already KNOW i had to be cliche and make him climb through your window muhahah. I also wasn’t sure whether this was the right time to post this with everything going on atm, still posted it, hoping it helps cheer you guys up a little! Take care xx #enhypenis7
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There were seven of them.
Seven loud, annoying ass, inseparable boys who took up too much space at every party, every hallway, and every parking lot. They were always together, skateboards under their arms, half-finished coca-cola cans in their hands, laughter echoing too loudly through college apartments that definitely couldn’t fit all of them.
You really weren’t supposed to be part of them. Even thought they we’re weird at first.
The first time they saw you, you were standing alone at some shady off-campus house party.
You were leaning against the kitchen counter in low rise jeans and a baby tee, flipping your pink bedazzled Motorola shut and open again because you didn’t know what else to do with your hands.
It was Sunghoon who noticed first. “Why is she by herself? She looks nice.” And then all seven of them ended up standing in front of you like a mildly intimidating boyband.
You don’t remember how, but that night you were adopted into their friendgroup.
You’d been with them ever since.
Especially Riki.
—
You and Riki were never stable.
You were either disgustingly in love or dramatically broken up. There was no in-between.
You’d ‘break up’ over anything:
Because he didn’t call you back fast enough. You helped another guy with his homework. He didn’t let you borrow his clothes. You told him smoking was unattractive.
And once because spilled an entire cup of Sprite on your Juicy Couture bag, which you spent your entire salary on.
You cried like a baby. He’d rolled his eyes and said, “It’s just a bag. Get a new one.”
You didn’t speak to him for a week.
The friend group suffered… Riki got quieter. You got meaner. The air felt heavy every time you were in the same room.
Until Jungwon snapped.
“I can’t do this,” he’d said, rubbing his temples. “You two are exhausting. Apologize. Now.”
You tried to act careless but you both folded in under five minutes and ended up in your bedroom.
—
You hated being called popular, but you weren’t invisible.
People knew you.
You had that early-2000s glow. Glossy lips, hoop earrings, low-rise everything. Professors remembered your name. Girls whispered about you. Boys stared a little too long.
Riki? He had baggy jeans sagged so low you could always see which brand of underwear he was wearing, Calvin Klein most days, sometimes something knockoff that you’d tease him about constantly.
“Pull them up,” you’d hiss in the middle of the mall, grabbing the waistband of his jeans and yanking it higher. “You’re embarrassing me.”
He’d just grin, completely unbothered.
“Why? You don’t like my boxers?”
“I don’t like that everyone else can see them.”
He’d lean closer, smoke still lingering faintly on his breath. “I don’t care.”
And then he’d glance down at your hips.
Low rise jeans. A tiny strip of pink lace peeking out when you moved. Belly piercing glinting under the mall lights.
“Oh,” he’d mock, tugging lightly at the strip of your thong on your hip, making it snap back. “And that’s modest?”
You’d swat his hand away. “That’s fashion.”
“Mine is too.”
“You look homeless.”
“You look like a hooker.”
“I do not. You asshole.”
You’d both be smiling by the end of it.
—
It’s one of those perfect late mid-August afternoons.
The sun is low and orange. Everything smells like hot pavement, sunscreen, and cigarettes. The entire city feels outside, kids with scraped knees, girls in denim skirts, boys shirtless with skateboards tucked under their arms.
The skatepark is loud.
Wheels scraping. Laughter echoing. Music playing from someone’s brand new portable speaker.
The whole friend group is there and Riki insisted you’d come too.
His white tank top clinging slightly to his back from sweat. Wired headphones dangling out of the pocket from his jeans. A cigarette tucked behind his ear, which you hate.
Heeseung is beside him, attempting something reckless off a skating ramp.
They take turns.
They hype each other up.
They shove each other when one of them almost eats concrete.
You’re sitting on top of the half-pipe, legs dangling over the edge, flip-flops hanging loosely off your toes. The smallest top imaginable clings to your torso more lace than fabric, blue jeans sit dangerously on your hips, held in place by a big bedazzled belt.
Riki had absolutely hated the top.
“That’s not a shirt,” he said earlier.
“It is.”
“It looks like a bra.”
“It’s hot outside.”
“It’s hot for me too.”
“Then take your shirt off.”
He gave you a glare, you walked ahead anyway.
Now you’re bored.
Bored and slightly irritate because you’ve already watched him light up two cigarettes.
Two.
And you hate when he smokes. Hate the smell. Hate the way it makes his voice raspier. Hate how casual he is about it.
And he knows that, but he does it anyway. Which makes it worse.
He skates toward you suddenly, rolling to a stop between your knees. One hand presses to the ramp beside your thigh, the other still holding his board.
“You look grumpy,” he says, squinting up at you against the sun.
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
He leans forward and kisses your forehead anyway.
Then he pushes off again before you can respond.
You sigh.
You’re melting. You’re bored. And you’re watching your boyfriend risk concussions for fun.
Amazing.
Then Heeseung has an even more amazing idea.
“Teach her something,” he says, nodding toward you.
Riki looks up immediately.
You narrow your eyes.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
He’s already skating toward you again.
“Come on,” he says, grabbing your hand. “It’s easy.”
“It’s not easy.”
“It is.”
“I’m wearing slippers.”
“Then take them off.”
You gasp like he’s insane.
He grins.
“Baby, I’ll hold you.”
Everyone’s watching now.
Jay whistles from somewhere near the fence. Sunghoon pretends to wipe a tear from his eye. Sunoo is already smiling like something crazy embarrassing is about to happen.
“If I fall and ruin my outfit,” you warn, pointing a manicured finger at him, “I’ll kill you.”
He laughs. “You won’t.”
“You don’t know that.”
You step onto the skateboard and it wobbles instantly.
You grab his hands.
“Why is it moving?”
“Because it has wheels.”
“Yeah, no shit.”
He positions himself in front of you, holding both your hands firmly.
“Okay,” he says, focused now. “Just bend your knees a little. Then pop the tail and slide your foot up.”
“Pop what?”
“The back.”
“I don’t know what that means Riki.”
He laughs softly.
“It’s fine. I’ve got you.”
You glare. “You better.”
He counts you down.
“One. Two—”
You jump.
The board flips sideways instead of up.
Your foot lands wrong.
His grip slips and suddenly you’re falling. You hit the concrete with a very embarrassing thud.
There’s a split second of silence, then there’s Laughter.
Sunoo’s laugh is the worst. High and dramatic and absolutely unnecessary.
You sit up slowly, hair in your face, pride completely shattered.
Riki is crouching immediately. “Are you okay?”
You stare at him.
“Did you catch me?”
“I tried—”
“You did not.”
He bites back a smile.
You gasp.
“Don’t you dare laugh.”
He fails. Just a little chuckle, but that’s it for you.
You stand up, brushing off your jeans dramatically.
“I’m done.”
“Baby—”
“No.”
You grab your slippers and stomp back toward the half-pipe.
Sunoo is still giggling when you sit down beside him.
“I’d like to see you try next time,” you snap.
Sunoo chuckles. “I would never fall like that.”
“You absolutely would.”
“I have natural balance.”
“You have natural dramatics.”
He raises an eyebrow. “You wanna bet?”
You both dissolve into a stupid little argument about who would survive longer on a skateboard.
It almost distracts you from Riki.
Almost.
Until you glance over and see some random guy offering Riki a joint.
And Riki… takes it?
Your stomach drops.
He laughs at something the stranger says. Throws his head back slightly. That boxy grin that made you like him in the first place.
Your jaw tightens.
Sunoo is still talking beside you.
“…and then I’d definitely land it because— helloo? Are you even listening?”
You aren’t. Your eyes are locked on Riki.
Then a girl loses control of her board and swerves straight into him.
She stumbles forward and Riki catches her.
One hand at her waist on instinct.
You feel it before you even think, that little sting in your chest.
He lets her go immediately.
“You good?” he asks casually.
She laughs. “Yeah, thanks.”
She lingers half a second too long.
That’s it. That’s your last straw. You’re already on your feet. Sunoo reaches for your wrist. “Wait—”
Too late. You walk fast, hips swaying, chin lifted, eyes low and dangerous.
Riki doesn’t even notice until you’re right in front of him.
You grab his arm and tug him away from the small group of strangers.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
He blinks. “What?”
“I said what do you think you’re doing.” you repeat, quieter but sharper.
He genuinely looks confused. “Nothing?”
You look at the joint still between his fingers.
Without breaking eye contact, you reach up, snatch it from him, drop it to the ground and grind it into the concrete with your heel.
“Are you serious right now?” he mutters.
“Oh, I’m serious.” you snap.
He runs a hand through his hair. “What is your problem?”
“My problem?” Your voice rises. “You’ve smoked, like, five cigarettes today. And now this? Oh and you’re just touching girls?”
His head jerks back. “Touching girls?”
“You literally had your hands all over her waist.”
“She ran into me.”
“And you had to grab her like that?”
“She was falling.”
You let out a sharp, humorless laugh.
“Keep it down,” he says under his breath. “Not everyone needs to know you’re mad at me again.”
That does it.
“Oh, I’m embarrassing you?!” you fire back. “You weren’t embarrassed five seconds ago.”
He steps closer, lowering his voice. “You’re making a scene.”
“You’re smoking in front of me after I told you I hate it.”
He exhales hard. “It’s my choice.”
“Oh my God.”
“It’s called free will,” he adds, clearly irritated now.
You stare at him.
“Right,” you say flatly. “So you just do whatever you want.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
“You were all up on her.”
“She bumped into me.”
“You didn’t have to hold her like that.”
He scoffs. “Like what?”
“Like—” You stop yourself before you say something dramatic.
He shakes his head. “You’re overreacting.”
You feel your chest tighten.
“Am I?” you ask quietly.
“Yes.”
Silence hangs between you. Then he makes the mistake.
He gestures vaguely at you.
“And don’t act like you’re not out here in that top all day.”
Your eyes widen.
“What about my top?”
“It’s too revealing.”
You laugh once. Sharp. Disbelieving.
“So now this is my fault?”
“I’m just saying—”
“You’re just saying what?” you cut him off. “That I deserve it?”
“That’s not what I said.”
“But you thought it.”
He looks frustrated now. “You can’t tell me what I thought.”
“You can’t tell me I’m overreacting.”
“You are tho.”
Your face goes cold.
“Okay.”
You step back.
“Okay,” you repeat.
He frowns slightly. “Where are you going?”
“Home.”
He grabs your wrist once.
“Don’t leave.”
“Whatever.” You say and you turn and walk away.
You expect footsteps. You expect him to call your name. You expect him to follow you like he always does.
You walk past the fence, the group of boys, past Sunoo’s wide eyes. And still nothing.
You finally glance back and your stomach drops.
He’s back on his board like nothing happened.
Like he isn’t supposed to chase you.
And that hurts more than the cigarette, more than the girl, more than the argument. Because in your head, he’s supposed to follow you and beg you to stay. But instead he just skates.’
—
By nine o’clock it’s almost completely dark, the last bit of orange fading out of the sky. Your room is lit by the glow of your TV, candles and the small lamp on your nightstand. You’re curled up in bed in soft pajamas, a plate of brownies balanced on your stomach while Clueless plays for what might be the hundredth time.
Your flip phone has been buzzing the last half hour.
Four missed calls.
Ten texts.
You’ve read none of them, you refuse to.
Then you hear A small tick against your window.
You pause mid-chew.
Another one.
And then a third.
You sit up slowly, pushing the plate aside and sliding out of bed. The floor is cool under your feet as you walk toward the window and pull the blinds apart.
Riki is standing in the street below, hands filled with tiny rocks to throw, looking up at your room like he’s been waiting for you to appear. When he sees your face, he waves casually, like this is completely normal behavior.
You stare at him for two seconds.
Then you shut the blinds and walk straight back to your bed.
Your phone buzzes again immediately.
You don’t check it.
A few seconds pass.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
You exhale sharply and shuffle back to the window, throwing the blinds open this time and sliding the window up.
“What?” you hiss down at him.
“You need to let me in,” he says like it’s obvious.
“I don’t want to talk to you.”
“But I want to talk to you.”
“Too bad.”
He steps closer to the house, lowering his voice even though no one is outside. “Please, baby. I wanna make it up to you.”
You cross your arms against the windowsill. “Make what up? You didn’t do anything, remember?”
“Come on,” he tries again. “Are you really gonna let me stand out here looking like a fool?”
“Yes,” you say immediately.
He stares up at you, half offended, half impressed.
You hold his gaze for another second, then slide the window shut and drop the blinds again before he can argue. You get back into bed, pull the covers up, grab your brownie plate, and press play like nothing happened.
For a few minutes, it’s quiet.
Then you hear something strange. Not rocks this time, but a scraping sound. A shuffle. Something brushing against the side of the house.
You freeze.
The sound gets closer.
Your heart jumps as you sit up again just in time to see two hands grab onto your windowsill from the outside.
And then Riki’s stupid face appears.
You let out a sharp gasp and scramble out of bed as he hoists himself up, creased sneakers braced against the brick. He looks mildly proud of himself, slightly out of breath, hair falling into his eyes.
You slide the window open with a dramatic sigh.
“Seriously, Riki?”
He doesn’t answer. He just swings one leg over the sill and climbs into your room like he’s done it a hundred times before, landing lightly on your floor.
“You’re insane,” you whisper-yell, shoving the window shut behind him. “My dad is literally going to kill the both of us if he finds out you climbed through my window.”
“He won’t,” Riki says easily.
“And you smell like smoke,” you add, wrinkling your nose. “If he comes in here—”
“He won’t,” he repeats, completely unbothered.
You stand there with your arms crossed, trying to stay angry while he casually looks around your room like he’s on a tour.
He glances at you slowly, eyes dragging from your messy hair to your pajama shorts. A lazy grin spreads across his face.
“Those make your ass look good.”
Your mouth drops open. “That’s what you have to say right now?”
“I’m just being honest.”
“You’re fucking unbelievable.”
He walks past you toward your bed, picking up one of your pillows and tossing it aside before noticing the plate of brownies. Without asking, he takes one and bites into it.
“You made these yourself?” he asks through a mouthful.
“Yes.”
“They’re good.”
“They’re mine.”
He shrugs and flops down onto your bed like he belongs there, one arm behind his head, chewing lazily while Clueless continues playing in the background.
Your eye twitches.
“I’m still mad at you, Riki” you remind him.
“I know,” he says. “That’s why I’m here.”
You stay standing by the window like you’re guarding it, arms crossed tightly over your chest. Riki, meanwhile, looks entirely too comfortable sprawled across your bed, one hand behind his head, the other reaching lazily for another brownie.
He watches you for a moment, amused.
“Are you gonna stand there all night?” he asks.
“Yes.”
He snorts softly. “Come sit down. You’re making me nervous.”
“You weren’t nervous climbing up my house like a creep.”
He pats the mattress beside him anyway. “Baby.”
You hesitate, but you do it. Of course you do. You walk over and sit cross-legged on your bed, leaving a noticeable gap between you. You grab a pink heart-shaped pillow and hold it against your chest like armor, arms wrapped around it as a clear barrier.
Riki doesn’t look intimidated.
He slowly looks you up and down instead, gaze dragging over your shorts, your bare legs, your messy hair. He takes another bite of brownie, chews thoughtfully, then winks at you.
“Can I get a kiss?”
Your jaw drops.
“You’re unbelievable.”
You lean forward and snatch the plate of brownies out of his hands before he can grab another one. “Start talking,” you demand. “Or I swear I’m throwing you back out that window.”
He raises an eyebrow. “You’re not strong enough for that.”
“I’ll get my dad to do it.”
He actually laughs at that, like the idea is ridiculous.
You glare harder.
He sighs dramatically and sits up, closing the space between you. The mattress dips as he moves closer.
He reaches out, resting his hand on your thigh, thumb brushing lightly against your skin. The touch is warm and familiar, annoyingly gentle.
“I’m sorry,” he says.
You narrow your eyes. “For what?”
He pauses half a second too long.
“For… making you mad.”
That’s it.
That’s the apology.
He doesn’t even fully know what he’s apologizing for, the smoking, the girl, the comment about your top, he just knows you’re upset and that saying sorry usually fixes it.
You try to hold your glare, but your grip on the pillow loosens.
This is how it always goes. One of you gets mad. The other gives a weak apology. And somehow it’s enough.
He watches your expression soften, just slightly, and that tiny shift is all he needs.
“Come here,” he says quietly, patting his lap.
You roll your eyes like you’re still annoyed, but you put the pillow aside and shift forward, settling onto his lap anyway. His hands come to your waist automatically.
He leans in and kisses you.
It starts slow, almost careful, like he’s testing if you’ll pull away. You kiss him back, fingers curling lightly into his black hair. For a few seconds, everything feels lke the argument never happened.
Then you wrinkle your nose and pull back slightly.
“Take your jacket off.”
He blinks. “What?”
“It smells like smoke.”
He smirks immediately. “If you wanted to undress me you could just say that.”
You don’t even entertain it. You grab his shirt and kiss him again just to shut him up.
He laughs against your mouth, hands tightening at your waist, and for now, at least, the fight is over.
Until he chuckles, he pulls back just slightly, still close enough that his lips brush yours when he talks.
“You know,” he mumbles, half smiling, “Sunoo told me to apologize.”
You don’t really listen, just give him another peck on his lips. “Hm?”
He shrugs, leaning back in to kiss you again like it doesn’t matter. “He said I should just say sorry and you’d stop being mad.”
Your lips press together instead of moving with his.
“And?” you ask slowly.
“And it worked,” he says lightly. “I don’t even know what I did wrong.”
You freeze.
He tries to kiss you again, but you pull your head back this time.
“Are you kidding me right now?,” you say.
He frowns, confused at the sudden shift. “What?”
“You don’t know what you did wrong?”
He laughs a little, like this is harmless. “You were just in a mood.”
You slap his arm.
Not hard. But sharp enough.
“Ow— what was that for?”
You’re already climbing off his lap. “I actually can’t stand you.”
“What?” he repeats, genuinely lost.
“You didn’t apologize because you meant it,” you snap. “You just didn’t want me to be mad.”
“That’s the same thing y/n.”
“It’s not the same thing!”
He sits there, staring at you like you’ve switched languages mid-conversation.
You grab his arm and yank him off the bed. “Come here.”
“Why are you dragging me?”
“Because you’re leaving.”
He stumbles after you as you pull him toward the window again. “I just said sorry!”
“No, you didn’t!” you fire back, pushing the window open. “You said sorry because Sunoo told you to and because you wanted me to shut up.”
“That’s not—”
“That is exactly what it was.”
He steps closer, trying to catch your wrist, trying to pull you back in like he did before. “You’re overthinking it.”
You shove his chest lightly. “Go.”
“Can you calm down for two seconds?”
“No.”
He leans in again like kissing you will solve it, like it always does. You put your hand flat against his chest and push him back.
“Get out.”
“Baby—”
“Go!”
He exhales sharply, clearly frustrated now. “You’re making this a bigger deal than it is.”
“And you’re not making it a deal at all!” you shoot back. “Come back when you can take accountability!”
You don’t care how loud you are. You don’t care if a porch light flicks on somewhere down the street. You’re too irritated to think about neighbors.
He glares at you for a second longer before finally swinging one leg over the sill again.
“This is so stupid,” he mutters as he climbs out.
“You’re stupid!” you yell back.
“You love me though.”
“Bye Riki!”
He drops down to the ground below with a dull thud and looks back up at you. “Throw my jacket!”
You grab it off your floor and hesitate for a second.
“It smells like smoke! Wash it out!” you shout.
“Just throw it y/n, Jeez!”
You toss it out the window a little harder than necessary. It hits him in the face before falling to his arms.
“And pull your up your goddamn pants, you loser!” you yell one last time before slamming the window shut.
He stands there for a second in the dim streetlight, running a hand through his hair and muttering a curse under his breath. “Fucking hell.”
He pulls up his pants anyway, then he turns and starts walking.
Riki walks home with his jacket slung over his shoulder. His jaw is tight, hands shoved deep into his pockets as he kicks at small rocks along the sidewalk. He replays the entire thing in his head.
He apologized.
Didn’t he?
He showed up. Climbed yout house. Said sorry. What else was he supposed to do?
He mutters under his breath, calling the whole situation dumb, ridiculous. Calling you dramatic.
You just crawl back into bed and press play on your movie again, rather relieved than angry.
Cher’s voice fills the room.
You reach for a brownie.
Your fingers hit an empty plate.
You stare at it.
“Oh my god,” you mutter to yourself, rolling your eyes.
—
The next day feels like nothing happened, it’s a Saturday and you’re at the mall with your friends, like usual
The mall in the center of the city is loud. Every store window is screaming SALE in red letters. Somewhere above them, a movie trailer echoes from the cinema entrance. The air smells like hotdogs, sugar, perfume samples, and fryer oil all blending into one.
Every time you guys go there to “just walk around”, someone somehow leaves with an empty wallet.
The vibe between you and Riki, though? Ice cold.
You walk slightly ahead when he’s near. Conversations split awkwardly around you two. You guys barely acknowledge each others presence. Everyone notices. No one says it yet.
You split up near the giant directory map in the middle of the mall.
Heeseung, Sunoo and you walk towards the arcade, immediately distracted by blinking machines and the sound of digital coins clinking. Jungwon and Jay walk off with one mission only, to eat every free sample the mall has to offer.
Jake, Riki and Sunghoon head towards the skate shop onsecond floor.
“Bro, I’m telling you, softer wheels are better for street,” Jake insists.
“Yeah, if you like going slow,” Sunghoon shoots back.
Riki barely speaks. He flips a board over, studies it, doesn’t see it.
He sees you in his head instead, standing at your window, yelling at him to come back when he can take accountability.
They check every board. Compare prices. Debate colors. In the end, none of them buy anything.
When they walk out into the mall hallway again, the crown hits them full force. Sunghoon stretches his arms above his head.
“So,” Jay says casually. “You and her gonna keep pretending you don’t know each other?”
Riki clicks his tongue immediately. “She’s mad at me.”
“Yes,” Riki insists. “I climbed her window. I could’ve fallen and died bro. I said sorry.”
Jake squints at him. “For what?”
Riki opens his mouth.
Closes it.
“…For making her mad?”
Sunghoon actually laughs. “That’s not an apology, idiot.”
Riki runs a hand through his hair, frustrated. “She was yelling about the joint, and the cigs, and that girl at the skate park. But I didn’t even do anything with that girl. I just caught her because she bumped into me.”
Jake raises a brow. “By her waist?”
Riki hesitates. “…On instinct.”
“Mm,” Sunghoon hums. “And then?”
“And then she dragged me to the window and kicked me out ‘cause I said Sunoo told me to apologize,” Riki mutters.
Both boys stare at him.
“You told her…” Jake says slowly, “that someone else told you to apologize.”
“I was joking. “And at least I apologized? I don’t see the problem.”
Jake lets out a sigh. “I don’t know how you ever got her to like you, man.”
Riki scowls. “I literally climbed into her room. What more does she want?”
Jake grins. “Maybe don’t touch random girls in front of her.”
“She ran into me.”
“And you caught her,” Sunghoon says dryly. “You couldn’t even catch your own girl when she fell.”
Riki groans. “It’s not like that.”
Jake smirks. “Then go tell her that.”
“She’ll just get mad again.”
Sunghoon shrugs. “Get better at apologizing.”
Meanwhile the boys are discussing how to apologize to girlfriends, you’re at the arcade, trying to win a stuffed animal.
The arcade is chaos, neon lights flickering, pixelated sound effects, the constant clink-clink of coins dropping somewhere. A racing game to your left, a dance machine behind you, and right in front of you—
The claw machine.
Inside it sits the biggest stuffed cat you’ve ever seen. Grey and white, oversized head, cute smile. It’s ridiculous. You want it immediately.
You shove another coin in.
Heeseung leans casually against the machine beside you. “You’ve been trying for like ten minutes.”
“I almost had it,” you mumble, eyes locked on the claw.
Sunoo crouches dramatically beside the glass. “Manifest it. Tell it you love it.”
“I do love it,” you whisper.
The claw drops.
Grabs the cat.
Lifts it.
For one beautiful second it hangs there.
“YES!”
Then slips.
The cat falls back into the pile.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” you curse under your breath, stepping back in disbelief.
Heeseung laughs softly. “Y/n, did something happen between you and Riki?”
You don’t even look at him. “He was being a dick.”
Sunoo nods immediately. “Newsflash.”
Heeseung hums in agreement. “Fair.”
No further questions.
You shove another coin in aggressively. The claw misses completely this time and you kick the machine.
Heeseung gently nudges you aside. “Let me.”
You cross your arms, pretending you don’t care. “You’re gonna lose.”
The claw lowers.
It grips the stuffed cat around its head.
Lifts it.
Carries it over to the hole.
Drops.
The cat tumbles into the prize slot.
You and Sunoo scream like he just won an Olympic medal.
“NO WAY—” you laugh. It’s bigger than you expected, soft and and perfect.
Heeseung smiles, brushing his hands off. “All skill.”
He takes the cat from the slot and hands it to you with a small grin. “For your suffering.”
You hug it immediately. “You’re my favorite person.”
He just laughs.
ou three walk out of the arcade a few minutes later, the mall lights feeling calmer after all the flashing machines. You hold the stuffed cat in your arms like it’s something precious, its giant head resting against your shoulder.
Riki notices you.
From halfway down the hall, he spots you walking toward them, oversized plush cat in your arms, laughing at something Sunoo just said.
And unfortunately for his pride, you look cute. And pretty. And happy.
It does something uncomfortable to his chest.
The groups meet in the middle of the walkway.
Sunghoon claps his hands once. “We’re gonna go find Jungwon and Jay before they eat themselves sick.”
“Too late,” Heeseung says dryly.
They all start walking, Sunghoon and Jake up front debating something again, Sunoo walking slightly behind them.
Heeseung slows just enough to walk beside Riki for half a second.
He gives him a small nod toward you.
Go.
Riki exhales through his nose.
Fine.
He steps up, walking beside you.
You don’t look at him.
He notices that immediately.
He shoves his hands into his pockets, trying to sound casual. “Where’d you get that?”
Your eyes stay forward. “Arcade.”
“Obviously.”
“Heeseung won it for me.”
There’s something about the way you say it, so simple, that hits him wrong.
He glances at the stuffed cat.
Heeseung won it… not him.
“Oh,” Riki mutters. “Cool.”
You finally lift it slightly, showing him the cat’s stupid stitched smile. “It’s my new boyfriend.” You say it teasingly.
But Riki doesn’t smile.
Something annoyed flickers across his face before he masks it.
“Yeah?” he says, voice calm but a little tight. “He looks like he’d treat you better.”
You glance at him briefly, catching that tone.
“It doesn’t climb through windows uninvited,” you reply.
He huffs softly. “Yeah. It also doesn’t have legs.”
You shrug. “Less likely to run around with random girls then.”
He goes quiet for half a second.
Then he nudges the cat’s head lightly with his fingers. “He looks dumb.”
Your eyes narrow. “Don’t talk about him like that.”
“You really replacing me with a stuffed animal?”
You keep walking straight ahead.
“Depends. Can he apologize properly?” You say, then you step up your pace to nonchalantly walk away from Riki.
You eventually find Jungwon and Jay exactly where everyone expected them to be, around a food stand with tiny paper cups in their hands.
Jay is mid-sentence when the group walks up. “I’m telling you, if you circle back in ten minutes they forget your face.”
Jake nods seriously, holding up another sample. “This one’s teriyaki chicken. Third time.”
Heeseung sighs like a tired parent.
“Are we leaving?” he asks.
“Yeah,” Sunghoon says.
Everyone slowly makes their way toward the mall exit.
Riki walks quietly behind everyone.
You do too.
By the time the glass doors slide open, the air outside is thick and warm, with the hum of traffic and laughs from somewhere down the street.
Sunghoon and Jake walk ahead, arguing about the best type of flipphone. Jay tries to convince Jungwon to stop at a convenience store on the way. Sunoo keeps poking Heeseung about the stuffed cat like it’s some kind of trophy.
You and Riki walk a few steps behind them again.
For a minute, neither of you says anything.
Your arms are wrapped around the giant plush cat, its soft head resting against your shoulder. Riki glances at it once, then looks ahead at the group, then down at the pavement like he’s building up the courage to say something.
Finally, he exhales and speaks.
“Y/n...”
You glance at him.
“I was being an asshole yesterday.”
You blink slightly.
He keeps walking beside you, hands in his pockets, gaze locked on the ground instead of on you.
“And… I’m sorry,” he adds. “For the cigarettes. And the joint. And that girl at the skatepark.”
You don’t interrupt.
He rubs the back of his neck awkwardly.
“And I’m sorry for not knowing how to say sorry,” he admits. “I know I kinda… suck at that.”
For a moment you just look at him.
Then a small giggle slips out before you can stop it.
He looks over immediately. “What?”
“Nothing,” you say, smiling a little. “I just like hearing you apologise”.
He shakes his head with a quiet laugh.
“I maybe shouldn’t have kicked you out the window.” You say hesitantly.
He snorts. “Maybe?”
“Okay, I shouldn’t have done that.”
He slides his hand out of his pocket and slowly, almost carefully, he lets it brush against yours. When you don’t pull away, his fingers curl around your hand.
The group ahead of you turns a corner toward the quieter streets leading back to your neighborhood.
You glance at Riki. “Do you wanna come to my house?”
His eyebrows lift. “You gonna let me in trough the door this time?”
You roll your eyes. “If you behave.”
“I always behave, baby.”
You scoff softly. “Mhm… just pull your pants up before my parents see you.”
⊹
extra note: I rlly hate the ending, I had writers block…
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Content+Warnings: smut, pwop,soft dom , he rambles about anime & physics when he’s nervous or turned on, pure filth,kinda cute ki.
MNDI.
Note: likes+reblogs r appreciated,first time posting here lwk nervous˖ ࣪ . ࿐ ⊹ ࣪ ˖ꫂ᭪݁
The scene no one at uni gets.
how did the quiet, lanky, glasses-wearing game-dev major with the messy black hair and perpetual hoodie pull you? he still doesn’t believe it half the time. but when the door closes, the shy boy disappears and the one who knows exactly how to ruin you takes over. he just can’t stop talking through it.
You never planned on falling this hard for someone like Ni-ki.
He was the guy who sat three rows behind you in Advanced Calculus, always doodling mech designs in the margins of his notes, earphones in, hood up even indoors. The kind of boy people called “cute in a pathetic way” when they thought he couldn’t hear. You were the one everyone noticed — confident, sharp tongue, the kind of pretty that made people stare a second too long.
Yet here you were, three months into whatever this was, heart doing stupid flips every time he pushed his glasses up and gave you that small, crooked smile like he still couldn’t believe you were real.
Tonight started innocently enough.
You’d dragged him back to your dorm after he spent the entire study session quietly losing his mind because you kept brushing your leg against his under the library table (accidentally¿)but he wasn't having any of that. The second the door clicked shut he was on you — not rough, never rough with you — but desperate. Hands trembling as they slid under your shirt, mouth clumsy and hot against your neck fondling and squeezing the squishy fat of ur breasts through the thin materialof your top.
“Fuck… I thought about this all day,” he mumbled, voice already hoarse trailing hot kisses from neck to ur shoulders.“You in that skirt… sitting there like you weren’t trying to kill me.”
You laughed softly, tugging his hoodie off. “You’re such a loser, Riki.”
“Yeah,” he breathed, pushing you gently onto the bed, “but I’m your loser.”
Clothes came off in a messy trail. His long fingers — the same ones that could code for eight hours straight without breaking — traced every inch of you like he was memorizing a new map. When he finally pushed inside you, slow and deep, both of you let out shaky sounds that didn’t even sound human.
He bottomed out and stilled, forehead pressed to yours, breathing hard.
“God… you feel— you always feel so fucking perfect,” he whispered. His voice cracked a little. “Like… like you were made exactly for me. I don’t deserve this. I don’t —”
“Riki,” you cut him off gently, cupping his face. His glasses were slightly fogged. “Shut up and move.”
He let out a broken laugh, moving painfully slow.The first few thrusts were careful, almost reverent. Then something shifted. His hips snapped harder, the shy nerd melting away as he found that spot that made your back arch clean off the bed.
“You’re so tight… every time, fuck” he groaned, voice dropping lower. “It’s like you’re trying to keep me inside forever. Physics doesn’t even explain this— how you can feel this good. I swear I could stay here for hours.”
You moaned his name, nails digging into his shoulders. He was big — unfairly so for someone who looked like he’d never seen a gym — and he knew exactly how to use every inch once he stopped overthinking.
He hooked one of your legs higher, angling deeper, and suddenly the rambling started for real.
“Remember that scene in Neon Genesis where— fuck— where Shinji finally stops running? That’s how I feel when I’m inside you. Like everything else disappears and it’s just… this. Just us.” His thrusts grew messier, more urgent. “I love you. I love you so much it scares me sometimes. Like what if you wake up one day and realize you could do so much better than some dork who builds Gundam models at 3 a.m.?”
Tears pricked your eyes — not from the overwhelming pleasure (though that was definitely part of it), but from the raw honesty in his voice. He always got like this when he was close: vulnerable and filthy at the same time.
“Riki… baby, stop saying nonsense and look at me.”
He did, dark eyes glassy behind his crooked glasses, hair sticking to his forehead with sweat.
“I chose you,” you gasped between moans. “I want you. The nerd who explains orbital mechanics during foreplay. The one who blushes when I call him pretty boy . All of you.”
That seemed to snap something in him.
His pace turned punishing in the best way, one hand sliding between your bodies to rub tight circles over your clit while he drove into you. The wet sounds filled the small room, mixed with his low, broken whimpers and your desperate cries.
“You’re gonna cum for me, right?” he panted, voice wrecked. “Please— I need to feel it. Need to feel you squeezing me while I’m still inside you. I want to fill you up so deep you’ll still feel me tomorrow when you’re sitting in lecture pretending you’re not thinking about this.”
You came hard, vision whiting out, thighs shaking around his waist. He followed right after with a choked moan of your name, hips stuttering as he spilled deep inside you, hot and endless.
But he didn’t pull out.
Instead he collapsed carefully on top of you, still buried to the hilt, arms wrapping around your waist like you might disappear if he let go. His face pressed into the crook of your neck, breathing ragged.
You could feel him twitching inside you, oversensitive and spent, yet he stayed there, cockwarming you through the aftershocks.
“Stay like this… just a little longer,” he whispered, voice small again. “I like feeling close. Like I’m still part of you.”
You ran your fingers through his damp hair, pressing a soft kiss to his temple.
“I’m not going anywhere, baby.”
He let out a quiet, shy laugh against your skin, then mumbled, “You know… if we calculate the average time it takes for my heart rate to return to normal after you wreck me like that, it’s statistically impossible because it never really does. Not when it’s you.”
You smiled, heart so full it almost hurt.
“Shut up, Riki.”
“Make me.”
So you kissed him again — slow, deep, full of everything neither of you could quite say out loud yet.
And in the quiet glow of your desk lamp, with his long body draped over yours and his heartbeat steady against your chest, the rest of the world and all its confusion about how you two fit together faded away.
i needa hot make out session w niki while hes drunk and clingy for reader pleasemake it exciting when u have time
Oh, I’m yours tonight
Clingy! Drunk! Riki x reader
sypnosis: you were at a uni party with your bf riki until he decided to drink too much which leads to you two making out in jay’s room
warnings: smut 18+, unprotected sex, p in v, kissing (detailed), fluff, suggestive
now playing🎧- die for me- chase atlantic
📍a/n: hiiii tysm for your request, I enjoyed writing it😛😛 hope you’ll enjoy it too!!! First time writing smut😅 I would love your feedback❤️ ps. SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG😭
The heavy, bass-heavy thud of the music from downstairs vibrated right through the soles of your shoes, a constant, rhythmic pulse that seemed to mimic the anxious beat of your own heart.
Just an hour ago, you and Riki had arrived at Jay’s house for the university party. The house was packed to the brim, a suffocating blur of flashing neon lights, laughing voices, and clinking glasses. You had spent a lot of time picking out your outfit for the night, but the moment you walked through Jay's front door, Riki’s entire demeanor shifted. Under the harsh glare of the party lights, he looked at you and seemed to realize all at once just how stunning you looked—and worse, he realized he wasn't the only one noticing.
Everywhere you walked, other guys from your classes were staring. Jay’s friends kept lingering a little too close, their eyes tracking your movements. It didn't take long for a couple of guys from the football team to crowd into your space, smoothly offering to get you a drink from the kitchen, their intentions entirely transparent.
Before you could even answer, Riki stepped right into your space. His jaw was tight, his eyes flashing with a possessive irritation he usually kept well hidden.
"They're fine, we've got it," Riki had clipped out, his hand instantly finding the small of your back to pull you against his side. He snatched the red solo cups right out of their hands, downing his own drink and half of yours just to prove a point, his eyes locked onto the guys until they awkwardly backed away.
But Riki didn't stop there. Fueled by a sudden, intense spike of jealousy and the need to drown out the sight of anyone else looking at you, he kept drinking. Every time someone walked past or tried to strike up a conversation with you, Riki would drain another cup Jay handed him. He was playing the part of the cool, effortlessly composed center of attention, but the sheer volume of alcohol caught up to him all at once.
Within the hour, his sharp eyes grew heavily hooded and glassy, his movements slowed, and his fierce independence completely evaporated. Suddenly, he was desperate, his cool exterior completely melting into a magnetic, intoxicating need to be attached to your hip.
When you finally murmured to Jay that you were taking Riki upstairs to one of the guest bedrooms to get him away from the suffocating crowd, Riki didn't argue. In fact, the moment the heavy bedroom door clicked shut behind you, cutting off the worst of the noise, he completely unraveled.
The aloof armor he usually wore was entirely gone. He didn't just lean on you; he turned around and practically melted into your space, wrapping his long arms tightly around your waist and pulling you flush against his chest. He buried his face deeply into the crook of your neck, letting out a low, rumbling groan that vibrated straight through your collarbone.
"You're so warm," he mumbled, his voice a deep, gravelly friction against your bare skin. His breath was scorching, smelling faintly of the alcohol and sharp mint. He nuzzled his nose against your pulse point, his grip on your waist tightening until it almost hurt. "Don't go back down there. Don't let them look at you. Don't leave me."
"I'm not going anywhere, Riki," you breathed, your hands coming up to grip his waist, trying to support his heavy, uncoordinated steps as you guided him toward the bed.
But Riki didn't want to walk. He didn't want to wait. He wanted you, and he wanted you right now.
With a sudden, clumsy burst of strength, he pivoted his hips, backing you up until the backs of your knees hit the plush edge of the mattress. Before you could even register the loss of balance, his large, heavy hands wrapped securely around your hips, pulling you so tightly against him that your chests collided. The sudden momentum sent both of you tumbling backward onto the mattress in a tangled, breathless heap.
He didn't waste a single fraction of a second. The moment your back hit the sheets, Riki was hovering over you, his knees straddling your thighs, pinning you down with his full, intoxicating weight. His hooded eyes were dark, glassy with intoxication but intensely, fiercely focused on your lips.
"Look at me," he whispered, his fingers tangling into your hair, tilting your head back against the pillows. "Just look at me."
You didn't even have time to answer before his mouth crashed down onto yours.
It wasn't a gentle kiss. It was deep, bruising, and demanding—a frantic release of the tension he’d been holding in all night downstairs. Riki’s lips were hot, sliding against yours with a wet, messy eagerness that instantly stole the air from your lungs. He drank in your sharp gasp, using the opportunity to push his tongue past your lips, claiming your mouth in a deep, sweeping stroke that made your head spin.
A soft, helpless sound escaped the back of your throat, and Riki swallowed it whole, groaning deeply. The sound was low and primal, a vibration you could feel in your own chest.
He shifted, heavy and unyielding, pressing his hips down against yours to completely eliminate any remaining space between you. His hands were a frantic blur of motion. One second his fingers were digging firmly into your jawline, his thumb pressing into your cheek to angle your head exactly how he wanted it; the next, his hands were sliding down your neck, his palms searing hot as they raked down your chest and slid beneath the hem of your shirt.
The contact of his bare, warm hands against your skin made you arch into him. Riki whimpered against your mouth at the movement, his grip tightening on your waist, his fingers bruising your hips as he pulled you up harder against him.
"God, you taste so good," he panted against your lips, the words barely formed before he dived right back in.
The kiss turned even hungrier, completely devoid of rhythm, driven entirely by pure instinct. Your lips slid together in a slick, frantic rhythm. Riki began to bite at your bottom lip, his teeth tugging at the sensitive flesh just hard enough to make a sharp gasp hitch in your throat, before he immediately soothed the sting with the wet, heavy slide of his tongue. It was a dizzying cycle of friction and heat.
The heat between you was becoming unbearable, amplified by the heavy layers of clothes and the friction of your bodies moving together. Breaking the kiss for just a fraction of a second, Riki let out a frustrated, needy huff against your lips. His fingers tugged impatiently at the hem of your top, his intention clear.
You sat up slightly, helping him as he pulled the fabric up and over your head, tossing it carelessly onto the floor. The cool air of the room hit your skin for only a second before Riki's hands were back on you, tracing your ribs, his touch making you shiver.
“Fuckk, you’re so pretty” he whispered
Now it was your turn. Your hands traced up his chest, your fingers hooking under the collar of his shirt. Riki eagerly lifted his arms, letting you pull the heavy fabric off him, revealing the broad expanse of his shoulders and chest, slick with a fine layer of sweat from the heat of the room. He kicked off his shoes blindly, his feet working at the cuffs of his jeans to rid himself of the heavy denim, while his hands worked just as frantically to help slide your own jeans down your legs until they were cast aside.
The moment the barrier of clothes was gone, Niki collapsed back over you, the feeling of his bare chest pressing flush against yours sending a violent jolt of electricity straight down your spine.
You wrapped your arms around his bare neck, your fingers knotting into the damp hair at the nape of his neck, pulling him down to deepen the kiss even further. You wanted to be closer, but Riki was already taking up your entire reality. The scent of him—his cologne mixed with the warmth of his bare skin and the sharp tang of alcohol—filled your senses until you couldn't think straight.
"More," he muttered frantically, dragging his mouth down your jawline, his lips wet and heavy as they pressed a row of burning kisses down the column of your neck. "Don't stop. Please. Kiss me."
“Riki-I, wait, I need yo-you” you mumbled against him, the sudden rush of intimacy making your head spin.
He didn't even give you a chance to comply. He came right back to your mouth, his breath hitching as his hands slid down to impatiently rid himslef of his boxers, his chest heaving violently against yours. the space between you vanished completely. the heat of his bare skin leaving you breathless. This time, the make-out session grew even more chaotic and intense.
hovering over you, his gaze darkened as he looked doen at the last remaining barrier between you, “Raw?”he asked
“Y-yes” you answered, breath shaking as you arched slightly towards him, panties already wet.
Riki hooked his fingers into the waistband of your panties, stripping them away in a swift motion, “Look at you princess, already so wet for me” he mumbled against you as he trailed his kisses down your neck, nipping your skin, planting hickeys.
Your noses bumped, your teeth grazed, but neither of you cared—the friction only seemed to drive him crazier.
Riki’s hands wandered higher, sliding up your ribs, his thumbs tracing the curves of your skin. He kept kissing you passionately and continuously as his cock pushes in inch by inch.
“Riki!”you moaned loudly, unable to contain the wave of pleasure. Your hips grind against eachother, your hands pulling his hair;his hands all over you.
Every touch was heavy-handed and desperate, fueled by the alcohol clouding his mind and the sheer adoration he usually kept locked away.
"You have no idea," he whispered, his voice trembling slightly with that intoxicating mix of drunk vulnerability and pure, raw adrenaline. He pulled back just an inch, his eyes glassy but locked onto yours, his lips bright pink and swollen from how hard he'd been kissing you. "I've been watching you all night. I hated everyone talking to you. I just wanted... I needed this."
"Riki," you breathed, your own chest rising and falling sharply, your heart hammering against your ribs.
"Tell me you're mine tonight," he pleaded, his forehead dropping to rest against yours for a brief second, his breath fanning across your damp skin. He sounded so beautifully undone, so completely stripped of his usual pride. "Just tell me."
"I'm yours," you whispered.
The words were barely out of your mouth before Riki captured them again. The kiss was softer for a split second, a desperate expression of relief, before it quickly spiraled back into a heavy, bruising mess. He tilted your chin up higher, his cock sliding deeper, lips tangling with yours in a slow, possessive rhythm that made your knees weak.
His skin was a heavy, comforting weight, completely pinning you to the mattress. You could feel the heat radiating off him in waves, the dampness of his skin where your hands gripped his shoulders, your nails digging into his back as the pleasure washed over you in intense, electric waves.
He began to grind his hips against yours in a slow, agonizingly perfect rhythm, a low whine escaping his throat every time your bare skin brushed.
“Riki, i-im close” you let out a moan which made him go crazier. You couldn’t hold on any longer, you cum on his cock as he let out a satisfied moan.
“Fuckkkk, you feel so good princess”
The friction was unbearable in the best way possible. Riki’s hands gripped your thighs, anchoring himself to you, his mouth never leaving yours, continuing to drink you in until you were both completely breathless, dizzy, and utterly lost in the dark, heated quiet of Jay's guest room.
As he pulled out slowly, he falls into a hug with you, holding you tight. He completely melted into you now, His hair nuzzled against your chin, the fierce puppy during the session is gone, now replaced with a pouty puppy.
“I love you baby” he whispered, half asleep. You kissed his plumped lips gently, a small smile appears on his face.
While you guys were having sex…
Jay knocked on the door, wanted to check if Riki is feeling better. He realised the door isn’t locked, he opened the door, “hey Riki-”, he looked up, saw you guys making out aggressively, “GET OUT HYUNG”Riki yelled. “have fun!” He closed the door immediately, sometimes he wondered if Riki has a sixth sense, cuz how could he see him while burying his face in yours.
there’s this one clip with heeseung telling riki that he hugs him in his sleep im wondering like maybe “shy reader that rarely shows affection but does when sleeping” trope?? Idk the word but yeah like it can be any member
𝐬𝐥𝐞𝐞𝐩𝐲𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐝 ✶ 𝐞𝐧𝐡𝐲𝐩𝐞𝐧
shy reader who's affectionate in their sleep
───﹙h.﹚ heeseung is stuck. like, physically stuck. you’re usually so quiet and hands-off, but asleep? you’ve decided he’s your personal teddy bear. he’s texting the group chat one-handed because your arms are locked around his waist, face buried in his chest. “emergency,” he types, trying not to laugh. “my shy gf has been replaced by an octopus. send snacks. can’t move. this is my life now.” he secretly loves it.
───﹙j.﹚ jay wakes up to find you’ve fully koala’d onto his back. you’re clinging in your sleep, and he can’t even roll over. he tries to whisper, “hey… sweetheart… i need to breathe…” but you just nuzzle closer. he gives up with a happy sigh, accepting his fate as a human backpack. he spends the next hour wide awake, smiling at the ceiling, feeling like he’s won a secret prize.
───﹙j.﹚ jake tries to get up for water and literally can’t. you’ve got a fistful of his shirt in a death grip, murmuring something sleepy and unintelligible. he freezes, then melts. “okay, okay, water can wait,” he whispers, sliding back down. he spends the next 30 minutes just watching you sleep, heart so full he thinks it might burst, gently prying your fingers loose just so he can lace his with them instead.
───﹙s.﹚ sunghoon is trying to be quiet as a mouse, but every time he shifts an inch, you whine in your sleep and pull him closer. he’s being held hostage by cuddles and his own blush. “y/n, i have to practice…” he whispers to no one. you nuzzle his neck. he’s defeated. he sends a selca to the members—just his desperate face above your very clingy sleeping form—with the caption: “call for help. also, never been happier.”
───﹙s.﹚ sunoo lets out a tiny gasp when you shuffle over and tuck your head under his chin in your sleep. you, who barely hold his hand in public. he’s so still, scared to break the spell. when you snuggle closer, he can’t stop the giggle that bubbles up. he wraps his arms around you carefully, whispering, “got you,” and decides sleep is overrated. this is better.
───﹙j.﹚ jungwon wakes up because he’s slightly overheating. you’ve become his little spoon, back pressed entirely to his front, and your hands are holding onto his arm like a lifeline. he’s trapped in the best way. he tries to wriggle free for a second, but you make a soft, displeased sound and hold tighter. “alright, alright,” he murmurs, smiling into your hair. leader by day, personal body pillow by night. he wouldn’t trade it.
───﹙n.﹚ niki is used to being the clingy one. so when he wakes up and finds you wrapped around him like a vine, he short-circuits. “no way,” he whispers to the dark room. he tries to move, just a test, and you cling harder. a huge, goofy grin splits his face. he finally feels like he’s gotten a secret look at the real you, and he spends the rest of the night trying to memorize the feeling, heart pounding with pure joy.
do not republish, edit, translate, or plagiarize my works !
—𝑶𝑹 𝑾𝑯𝑬𝑵 you walk into a tattoo shop drunk just to prove a point, and walk out with the best thing to ever happen to you. Except he’s hiding something. And between the secrets and your stalker classmate closing in, you get it twisted before you get it right.
playlist… hanging out to dry — florence road // vampire — dominic fike // addicted — lovelace // fallen star — the neighbourhood // real people — hozier // nothing’s gonna hurt you baby — cigarettes after sex
pepa speaks!! hii so this is my first time writing a fic and I’ve been working on this for like a longgg time and decided to post bc I’m a bit nervous LOL uhm so yeah there will be a part 2 btw and also my taglist is open! pls enjoy and I’d really appreciate likes and reblogs 🤭💐
The thing about a girls’ night with Ria was that it always ended somewhere it wasn’t supposed to. The club had been Hana’s idea. The fourth round of shots had been Soo’s.
The part where all four of you ended up on the pavement at eleven-forty-five, heels in hand, looking at a tattoo shop with a red light glowing in the window like it was personally inviting you in — that had been Ria. “We’re going in,” she said.
“We are not going in,” Soo said.
“It says open.” Ria pointed at the sign. Studio 13. Like that settled it.
“It’s almost midnight.”
“They put the sign out.”
“Ria—” But you were already looking at the door and thinking why not, which was the alcohol talking, and also you were cold and your feet hurt and the red light looked warm from out here on the pavement. “I want a piercing,” you said.
Ria grabbed your hand. “She wants a piercing.” Soo looked at the sky. Hana was already moving toward the door.
The club outfit had been Ria’s fault entirely. The top was small — that was the only word for it, small and black and doing everything a top could reasonably be asked to do. The skirt wasn’t much better. You’d spent the whole night at the club feeling like the main character, which was the intended effect, and the cold air outside had done nothing to make you feel less exposed.
You pushed the door open and the warmth hit you first. Then the smell — ink, clean soap, something faintly chemical underneath it. Black walls covered in flash art. Low red lighting that made the whole place feel like a deliberate secret. Something slow playing from speakers you couldn’t locate.
Two guys inside. One in the back with his head down over a drawing tablet. One at the front counter. The one at the front counter looked up.
He was tall even on the stool, long legs stretched out in front of him, forearms resting on the desk like he owned the surface and everything past it. Full sleeve on his left arm. Silver rings on most of his fingers. Dark hair pushed back slightly. One earring. The kind of face that got you in trouble if you looked at it for too long — sharp jaw, dark eyes, a mouth that was currently sitting in the very early stages of a smirk.
He took in all four of you in about two seconds. Then his eyes found you and the smirk finished forming. “We’re open,” he said. “Barely.”
Ria and Hana peeled off toward the flash wall immediately. Soo planted herself near the door with her arms folded. Which left you walking up to the front counter alone, bare legs, tiny skirt, heels clicking on the concrete floor.
You watched him watch you walk over. He didn’t pretend he wasn’t watching. Didn’t do the polite thing where you glance away and back. He just watched, easy and unhurried, the way someone looks at something they find genuinely worth looking at, and when you got to the counter and leaned on it his eyes moved — slowly, and with complete lack of apology — from your face down to your chest and back up again. Held eye contact like nothing had happened. You’d been looked at before. This was different. This was a man who had decided he wasn’t going to pretend. “Hi,” you said.
“Hi.” His voice was low. Even. The smirk hadn’t moved. “Can I help you?”
“I want a piercing.”
“Yeah?” He leaned back on the stool, arms folding across his chest, the sleeve shifting with the movement. His rings caught the red light. “What are you thinking?”
“Tragus.” You reached up and tapped the outer ridge of your ear, which meant your arm lifted and your top shifted and you watched his eyes drop again, briefly, before they came back to yours like he wasn’t the least bit embarrassed about it. “I’ve been putting it off. I’m in a decisive mood.”
“Decisive,” he said.
“Very.”
“I can see that.” He said it like it meant something else. Then: “How much have you had tonight?”
“Enough to be excellent company.”
He looked at you. Really looked — quiet and thorough, taking in your face, the flush across your chest, the way you were leaning on his counter in that top — and then his tongue pressed briefly against his cheek like he was trying not to smile properly. “Can’t pierce you with alcohol in your system, baby.”
Baby. Like he’d been calling you that for years. Like it was already established. “That’s a rule?” you said.
“That’s the rule.”
You leaned further onto the counter, closing some of the distance between you. His eyes went exactly where you expected them to go and stayed there for a beat longer than was professional before dragging back up. His expression didn’t change. He was completely comfortable with being caught, which was — honestly — impressive. “What if I promised to be very good?” you said.
“I’m sure you would be.” His voice was smooth, unhurried. “Still no.”
“What if—”
“You can come back tomorrow,” he said. “Sober. I’ll pierce your tragus.” A pause, his eyes dropping once more, quick and deliberate, before landing back on yours. “Or whatever else you want.”
The air between you did something. “That sounds like more than a professional offer,” you said.
“I’m a professional.” The smirk was fully settled now. “The offer’s professional. What you do with it is up to you.”
You held his gaze. He held yours back without any effort at all, completely at ease, like this was just how Tuesday night went for him. It was annoying. It was also working. “I don’t know where this place is sober,” you said.
He was already reaching under the counter. He slid a card across the desk with two fingers — didn’t look down to do it, kept his eyes on you the whole time. STUDIO 13. NISHIMURA RIKI. PIERCING.
You picked it up. “Your personal card,” you said.
“Goes straight to me.”
“Bold.”
“Efficient,” he said.
You looked at the card. Then at him. “I’m Y/N.” His eyes went down again — unhurried, completely unapologetic, a slow look that started at your face and made its way south before coming back up — and then he said, “Y/N,” like he was just trying the name out. Like he’d be using it again. “You gonna remember that?” you said.
“Yeah,” he said simply. “I’m going to remember that.”
The way he said it made it about more than your name. Behind you, Ria made a noise she covered poorly with a fake cough. You didn’t turn around. “Come back sober,” Riki said. “I’ll take care of you.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because I’m going to do it.” He picked his phone back up, easy as anything, like the conversation was filed away now and he was done performing — except the smirk stayed. “Get home safe, Y/N.” Dismissed. Warmly, cockily, with complete confidence that you’d be back.
You picked up the card, slid it into your bag, and let Soo steer you to the door because your own legs had made a decision to co-operate with his energy and you weren’t going to give him the satisfaction.
Outside Ria grabbed your arm with both hands. “Y/N. The way he looked at you—”
“Ria.”
“He looked at your tits like—”
“Ria.” Hana was fanning herself. Even Soo was quiet, which was its own verdict. The Uber was three minutes away and you looked at your phone and felt your face doing something warm that you were crediting entirely to the alcohol.
Inside, Heeseung finally looked up from his drawing tablet. He’d watched the whole thing. Ten feet away. Nobody had noticed. He looked at Riki.
Riki had his phone in his hand but he was looking at the door — at the space where you’d just been standing in that top, leaning on his counter, letting him look — with an expression Heeseung couldn’t quite name. Something had landed and settled behind his eyes.
“Who was that?” Heeseung said.
Riki looked down at his phone. “Some hot girl.”
“Some hot girl,” Heeseung repeated.
“Wanted a tragus piercing.”
“Uh huh.” Heeseung looked at the counter. At the space where Riki’s personal card had been sitting ten minutes ago, now somewhere in your bag on the way home. “You give clients your personal card often?”
Riki said nothing. Heeseung looked back at his tablet. “Right,” he said quietly, and said nothing else.
Three weeks later you were standing outside Studio 13 again and this time you were completely, annoyingly sober. “I don’t know why I’m here,” you said.
“Because Riki said come back sober and you kept his card for three weeks,” Ria said, pushing the door open.
“I kept it by accident.”
“In your purse.”
“That’s where cards go.”
“You don’t keep any other cards in your purse, Y/N. I’ve seen your purse. It’s a graveyard of receipts and one lip liner.” You followed her inside because the alternative was standing on the pavement arguing with her and you’d already lost this argument six times on the way over.
Ria had a tattoo appointment. That was the reason you were here. You were just here for moral support. You were going to sit in a chair and look at your phone and not think about the guy who had looked at you like that and said I’ll take care of you with complete sincerity and a smirk that should have been annoying.
The door swung shut behind you. Same as before — black walls, flash art, red light, the slow dark playlist. A different energy in the daytime though, busier, more lived-in. Jay was at the side counter doing something with ink caps, talking loudly to no one in particular. Jake was sweeping near the back. Heeseung was visible through the half-open door of the back room, head down, working.
No one at the front desk. You relaxed slightly. Ria was already at the counter, checking in for her appointment, and you drifted toward the flash wall and started looking at the art because it was genuinely good and also because you needed something to do with your eyes.
You heard the door from the back open. Heard footsteps. Heard someone say, “Riki, someone’s here—” You turned around because you were a person with normal human reflexes and not because your body had already clocked the name.
Riki came through the back door with a pair of gloves half-on, looking down at the appointment book, and then he looked up.
He saw Ria first. Then his eyes moved — one smooth, unhurried slide — and found you standing by the flash wall in your jeans and your jacket looking like someone who was absolutely only here for moral support. “Hey,” he said.
“Hi,” you said. There was a pause that lasted slightly too long for two people who didn’t know each other.
“You came back,” he said.
“Ria has an appointment.”
“Right.” He looked at you. “And you’re just here for Ria.”
“Correct.”
“Nothing to do with the card.”
“I forgot I even had it.”
“Uh huh.” He pulled the second glove on, still looking at you, and the smirk had settled into something warmer now — less performance, more genuinely pleased. “How’s the tragus feeling? Still decisive?”
Ria made a sound from the counter that she turned into a cough. You didn’t look at her. “I’m considering my options,” you said.
“Good answer.” He turned to Ria, professional now, easy switch. “Ria, yeah? Heeseung’s got you, he’s just finishing up. Five minutes.”
“Perfect,” Ria said, and then immediately looked at you with an expression that meant she was storing everything and you would be debriefed extensively later.
Riki came around the counter. Didn’t go back to the desk — came and stood near the flash wall, close enough to talk, far enough to be plausibly looking at the art. “You look different,” he said.
“I’m sober.”
“That’s probably it.” His eyes did the thing — a brief, easy drop and return, taking in the jacket, the jeans, the way you were standing — and then he was looking at your face again like that was just how he operated. Open about it. Unbothered. “Still good though.”
“You’re very confident,” you said.
“I’m accurate,” he said. You looked at Riki. He looked back. This close you could see the bar through his tongue properly — silver, subtle when his mouth was closed, noticeable when he talked — and the ring in his ear and the way his rings shifted when he crossed his arms.
“So,” he said. “You actually want the piercing or did you come all the way here just to tell me you forgot my card existed?”
“I could still want the piercing.”
“You could.” He tilted his head slightly. “Do you?”
You held out for three more seconds. Then: “Yeah.”
His smile did the thing again — the slow, settled version, the one that looked like satisfaction and something warmer underneath it. “On the house,” he said.
“You don’t have to do that.”
“I know.” He was already moving back toward the piercing station, unhurried, like it was decided. “Come on.”
The piercing chair was in a partitioned section near the back — semi-private, its own mirror, a tray of tools laid out with the kind of precision that told you he took this seriously. He snapped a fresh pair of gloves on and gestured to the chair and you sat down and tried to look like you were not thinking about the last time you’d been in this general vicinity, considerably less sober, telling him he had criminally pretty eyes. You were thinking about it.
He adjusted the chair height without asking, tilted the light, and then stepped in close to look at your ear. His fingers were gentle when they touched the outer ridge — thumb pressing lightly to test the cartilage, professional and careful — and he was close enough that you could smell whatever he was wearing, something dark and clean. “Tragus is a good choice,” he said, still examining your ear. “Suits you.”
“You can tell that from my ear?”
“I can tell from your face.” He stepped back, reached for the marking pen. “You’ve got good bone structure. Something small here draws attention without being loud.” He met your eyes in the mirror. “You’re already loud enough.”
“I’m going to take that as a compliment.”
“It was one.” He marked the spot with the pen — quick, precise — and then held up a small mirror so you could check the placement. His hand was steady. Everything about him was steady, which was both reassuring and slightly irritating. “Good?” he said.
“Good.”
He put the mirror down. Reached for the needle. And then paused, looking at you in the main mirror with an expression that was more direct than the smirk — more level. “You nervous?” he said.
“No.”
“Your jaw is doing something.”
“My jaw is fine.”
“Y/N.”
“I’m a little nervous,” you said. “About the needle. Not about—” You stopped.
“Not about?” he said.
You looked at him in the mirror. He looked back. The smirk was quiet right now, just his face, just the question sitting there. “The needle,” you said. “I said what I said.”
He let it go. Looked back at your ear, positioned his hands. “Breathe in,” he said. You breathed in. “Out.”
You breathed out and he moved — quick and precise and over before you’d finished processing it. A sharp bite of pressure, brief, clean, and then his hands were already switching out the needle for the jewellery, smooth and practiced. “Done,” he said.
“That’s it?”
“That’s it.” He stepped back to let you see in the mirror. Small flat-back stud, exactly where the mark had been, sitting perfectly. “What do you think?”
You looked at it. Turned your head slightly. It was — actually exactly right, the placement, the size, the way it sat. “I think you’re good at your job,” you said.
“I know.” But he said it lightly, without the edge, and when you looked at him in the mirror he was looking at the piercing with something that read like quiet pride. Like he actually cared that it was right.
He peeled his gloves off. Started going through aftercare — saline spray, what to avoid, how long to leave it — and you listened and watched his hands and thought about how he’d looked at you when you walked in. That slow, settled smile. You came back. Like he’d known you would. “Any questions?” he said.
“No.”
“Good.” He handed you the small aftercare card. His fingers brushed yours when he passed it over and he didn’t move his hand immediately, just let the contact sit there for a second before stepping back. “You should come back in four weeks so I can check it.”
“Is that standard?”
“For you it is.”
You looked up at him. He was close still, leaning against the counter beside the chair, arms crossed, completely at ease with the proximity and what he was saying and the way he was looking at you. “That’s a very smooth way to make a follow-up appointment,” you said.
“I’m a smooth guy.”
“You’re a cocky guy.”
“Those aren’t mutually exclusive.” He smiled properly. “Four weeks, Y/N. I’ll be here.” From the main floor, very clearly, you heard Jay say to Jake in a voice that carried: “Twenty says she’s back in two.”
Heeseung appeared in the doorway of his room as you were walking back out to wait for Ria. He looked at you. Then at Riki, who was cleaning up the station behind you. He said nothing.
When you were out of earshot, he leaned in the doorway and looked at Riki with a level expression. Riki didn’t look up. “Don’t.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were going to.”
Heeseung was quiet for a moment. “She coming back?”
Riki stacked the packaged jewellery back in the tray. “Four weeks.”
Heeseung looked at the ceiling. Looked back down. “Right,” he said, and went back into his room.
Riki looked up once — just once — at where you’d gone back to sit with Ria, talking and laughing, your hand coming up to touch the new piercing gently like you were checking it was real. He looked back down at the tray. Picked up his phone. Set it down again. Four weeks was a long time.
You were back in two weeks. You told yourself you had a legitimate reason. The piercing felt slightly tender on one side and the aftercare card said to come back if anything felt off and this was a medical concern, essentially, and had nothing to do with anything else. Ria, when you told her this, said “uh huh” in the exact same tone Riki had used and you’d hung up on her.
You pushed the door to Studio 13 open at four on a Thursday afternoon.
Jay was at the front counter this time. He looked up, recognized you, and his whole face did something delighted. “Y/N,” he said, like you were a returning champion.
“Hey.” You unwound your scarf. “Is Riki—”
“In the back.” Jay was already leaning back in his chair, tilting toward the hallway. “Riki.”
“I could have just—”
“RIKI. Your girl’s here.”
From the back, a pause. Then footsteps. Riki appeared in the doorway with a black coffee in one hand and his phone in the other and when he saw you something moved across his face — quick, controlled — before it settled into the usual. “Two weeks,” he said.
“I know.”
“I said four.”
“The piercing felt off.”
He looked at you. You looked back. He took a slow sip of his coffee. “Come here,” he said. Back in the piercing section again. The chair, the mirror, the tray. He set his coffee down on the counter and snapped gloves on and tilted your chin to the side with two fingers, turning your head so the light hit the piercing properly.
He was quiet while he looked. Close, the way he’d been last time, close enough that you were aware of exactly how tall he was and exactly how little space existed between you. “Looks fine,” he said.
“It felt tender.”
“New cartilage piercing. It’s going to feel tender.” He turned your head a fraction more, examining the entry and exit points. “You sleeping on it?”
“Sometimes.”
“Don’t.” His thumb pressed gently just below the piercing, checking the tissue. “You’re not rotating it, are you?”
“The card said not to.”
“People do it anyway.”
“I follow instructions.” He made a sound that wasn’t quite a laugh. His fingers were still at your jaw, light but there, and in the mirror you could see him looking at the piercing with that focused, careful expression he got when he was working — like the rest of him went quiet and it was just this, just the task, just making sure it was right.
“It’s fine,” he said again, quieter this time. “A little irritated but nothing bad. You’re cleaning it?”
“Twice a day.”
“Good girl.” He said it the same way he said everything — even, unbothered — and went right back to examining the piercing like he hadn’t just said it, like it was nothing, like your entire nervous system hadn’t just done something embarrassing.
He stepped back. Pulled one glove off. In the mirror you watched him look at you — your face this time, not the piercing — and the focused work expression shifted back into something more personal. His eyes moved down briefly, back up. Unhurried. Unapologetic. “You didn’t just come for the piercing check,” he said.
It wasn’t a question. “I was in the area,” you said.
“Y/N.”
“I was.”
“Okay.” He pulled the second glove off, dropped them both in the bin. Leaned against the counter beside the chair with his arms crossed, looking at you with that steady, patient expression. Like he had all the time in the world and was fully prepared to wait you out.
The rings on his fingers caught the light. The bar through his tongue was visible when he spoke and sometimes when he didn’t, a small flash of silver that your eyes kept going back to without your permission. “Can I ask you something?” you said.
“Go ahead.”
You nodded toward his mouth. “Does it affect anything? The tongue piercing.”
The corner of his mouth pulled up. He knew exactly what you were asking and you both knew you both knew it. “Depends what you mean by anything,” he said.
“Talking,” you said. “Eating.”
“No,” he said. “It doesn’t affect talking or eating.”
The way he said it made the implication sit in the room like a third person. “And what about—” you started.
“Yes,” he said simply. You looked at him. He looked back at you, completely relaxed, the smirk at about thirty percent, like he was letting you sit in the answer rather than pushing it.
“That was going to be a different question…” you said.
“Was it?” It wasn’t.
You looked away first, which you were counting as a tactical retreat rather than losing, and he made that almost-laugh sound again and pushed off the counter. “Come out front,” he said. “I’ll get you the saline to take home.”
Jay was now pretending to organize a drawer he had clearly already organized when you came back out. Jake had appeared from somewhere and was leaning on the wall near the door with his phone out. The effort to look casual was extraordinary.
Riki went behind the counter, got the saline, slid it across to you.“Stop sleeping on it,” he said.
“I’ll try.”
“Don’t try. Just don’t do it.”
“You’re bossy,” you said.
“I’m thorough.” He leaned on the counter. His forearms were right there, the sleeve on full display this close — you’d been trying not to look at it properly but it was a lot of work. Intricate blackwork, something that looked botanical near his wrist, darker geometry climbing toward his elbow. “Like the sleeve?” he said.
You looked up. He’d caught you. “It’s good work,” you said.
“Heeseung did most of it.”
“Heeseung tattooed you?”
“First one when I started here.” Something shifted slightly in his face — not closed off, just more considered. “Kind of a thing between us.”
You wanted to ask what kind of thing. Something in how he’d said it made you not push. “You do your own piercings?” you said instead.
He tilted his head so you could see the earring. “This one.”
“Doesn’t that hurt more when it’s yourself?”
“Yeah.”
“And you did it anyway.”
“I do most things anyway,” he said. He said it lightly but there was something under it, something matter-of-fact about pain being a variable he’d simply accounted for. You looked at him for a second longer than you meant to. “Four weeks,” he said, quieter now, just to you. “Come back in four weeks and I’ll check it properly. And if you’re in the area before that—” he held your gaze — “you know where we are.”
“Very smooth,” you said.
“You keep saying that.”
“You keep proving it.” He smiled. The real one — not the smirk, not the performance, the actual smile that did something to his whole face. You’d only seen it once before, the night you came in drunk when he laughed at something Ria said, and it was worse up close and sober.
You picked up the saline. Shouldered your bag. “Thanks for checking it,” you said.
“Anytime.”
You were halfway to the door when Jay said, loudly, to no one: “Two weeks. Called it.”
“Jay,” Riki said, flat.
“I’m just saying—”
“Jay.” You pushed the door open and let it close on whatever Jay said next. On the pavement you breathed in cold air and stood there for a second. I do most things anyway. You thought about that the whole way home.
You texted Ria that night.
you: the piercing was fine btw. just irritated.
Ria: sure
you: it was a legitimate medical concern
Ria: how did he look
you: that’s not relevant
Ria: how did he LOOK
You stared at your phone. Put it face down. Picked it up again.
you: good. he looked good. go to sleep.
Ria: 😭😭😭 Y/N YOU ARE SO DOWN BAD
You put your phone on the charger and lay on your back in the dark and stared at the ceiling. The bar through his tongue caught the light when he talked. Yes, he’d said. Like it was nothing. Like he said it every day. You put a pillow over your face.
Across the city, Studio 13 was closing up. Heeseung was cashing out. Jake was wiping down surfaces. Jay was retelling the afternoon to Sunghoon, who had come in for his evening shift and was listening with the specific expression of someone enjoying information they could use later.
Riki was at the piercing station. Cleaning the tray. Doing the same task he’d done a hundred times. “She came back in two weeks,” Jay said.
“I heard,” Sunghoon said.
“I called it.”
“You did call it.”
“Riki,” Jay said. “You owe me twenty.”
“I don’t owe you anything,” Riki said. “We didn’t make a bet.”
“Spiritually we did.” Riki said nothing. Put the tray away.
“She’s coming back in four weeks,” Jay told Sunghoon.
“Or two,” Sunghoon said.
“Or two,” Jay agreed.
“Both of you,” Riki said, without heat, “can shut up.”
They did not shut up. He let them talk and went back to the tray and thought about the way you’d looked at his mouth when you asked about the piercing. The way your eyes had gone somewhere specific and come back and you’d tried to cover it with a different question.
He’d watched the answer land. Had watched you process it and look away and call it a tactical retreat when it wasn’t. He was good at reading people. He’d had to be, for a long time, for reasons that had nothing to do with tattoo shops or piercing chairs.
You were going to come back before four weeks. He put the tray away and picked up his coffee and didn’t say any of that out loud.
You were back in ten days. You didn’t have a reason this time. You’d run out of reasons. You showed up at three on a Wednesday with two coffees and the vague awareness that something had shifted from I’m in the area to something you didn’t have a word for yet. Jay opened the door before you reached it. “She’s got coffee,” he announced into the shop.
“Jay—”
“Is one of those for me?” He was already holding the door open, looking at the cups in your hand with genuine hope.
“No.”
“Y/N.”
“I brought two.”
“There are multiple people here who drink coffee.”
“There are two coffees,” you said. “Do the math.”
Jay looked wounded. You walked past him into the shop and he let the door close and called after you: “I’m telling Riki you were mean to me.”
“Please do.” Riki was at the front counter. Actually at the counter this time, not coming through from the back, sitting on the stool with his forearms on the desk and his phone in his hand. He looked up when you came in and his eyes went straight to the cups. Then to your face. Then he smiled — not the smirk, not the performance, just a real and immediate thing that he didn’t seem to think about first. “Hey,” he said.
“Hey.” You put one of the coffees on the counter in front of him. “I didn’t know how you take it.”
He looked at the cup. Looked at you. “Black is fine,” he said.
“Lucky guess.”
“Is it?” He picked it up. His fingers overlapped yours on the cup for a second before you let go — brief, probably accidental, neither of you addressed it. He took a sip. Put it down. “Ten days.”
“I know.”
“Getting closer to two weeks, not further.”
“I’ve been busy,” you said. “This was the first chance I had to—”
“Y/N.”
“What?”
“You don’t need a reason,” he said simply. You looked at him. He looked back, completely even, like he’d just said something neutral about the weather. “Sit down.”
That was how it started. Not with anything dramatic. Just you sitting on the other side of the counter on a Wednesday afternoon with a coffee while Riki worked through his admin, and the conversation that happened around it — easy and unhurried, drifting from one thing to another, the kind of talk that didn’t feel like it was going anywhere because it didn’t need to.
You learned things without asking for them. That he’d been at Studio 13 for two years. That he and Jay had met here. That he had opinions about piercing placement that were borderline philosophical and he’d share them unprompted if you let him.
He learned things back. That you were in your final year. That Ria had been your best friend since you were sixteen. That you had three other piercings already and had done two of them yourself, which made him look up from his phone with an expression that was equal parts impressed and horrified. “You did your own helix,” he said.
“With a kit.”
“A kit.”
“People do it.”
“People also do a lot of things I have to fix,” he said, and leaned across the counter to look at your ear without asking. His fingers found the helix piercing, examining it with the same careful focus he brought to everything, and you sat very still. “It’s crooked,” he said.
“I know.”
“I can fix it.”
“I know.”
He was still looking at your ear, close, his thumb light against the cartilage. “Why haven’t you?”
“I kept meaning to.” You paused. “And then I found Studio 13 and I figured I’d—”
You stopped. He pulled back just enough to look at your face. His expression said he’d heard the end of the sentence even though you hadn’t said it. “Figured you’d what?” he said.
“Come here eventually,” you said. “For things.”
The smirk appeared. “For things.”
“Piercings.”
“Right.” He stepped back, let you breathe, picked his coffee back up. “I’ll fix it whenever you want.”
“Add it to my tab.”
“You don’t have a tab. Everything I do to you is on the house.” He said it completely straight and then looked at his phone, leaving you to sit in the everything I do to you by yourself.
Jay appeared from the back at that exact moment, looked at you both, looked at the counter between you, and went directly back the way he came without saying anything, which was somehow more powerful than if he had.
Hana came with you the following Wednesday. She had been angling to see the shop since Ria had described it in approximately four hundred texts and the second she walked in she stopped in the middle of the floor and looked around with wide eyes. “Oh,” she said. “Oh this place is cool.”
Jake, who was at the side counter, looked up. Hana looked at Jake. Jake looked at Hana. You filed that away.
Riki was with a client in the piercing section — you could see him through the partition, gloved up, talking the client through something in that low steady voice. You hadn’t told him you were coming. You weren’t sure why, except that you’d wanted to know what it felt like to walk in and see him before he saw you. It felt like something, as it turned out.
He was focused on his client, head tilted, hands precise. He’d pushed his sleeves up and the full length of the tattoo was visible now — blackwork that climbed from his wrist to somewhere past his elbow, detailed and dark. He was saying something that made the client laugh. Patient and calm and completely in his element.
You stood there and looked at him for maybe four seconds too long.
“Y/N,” Hana said quietly beside you.
“What.”
“You’ve got a face on.”
“I don’t have a face.”
“You’ve got a very specific face.” She looked at Riki. Looked at you. “Oh you are done.”
“I’m looking at the flash art,” you said, and turned to look at the flash art.
Jay materialized at your shoulder. “She does this every time,” he told Hana, like you weren’t standing right there. “Comes in, looks at him, then looks at the wall.”
“I can hear you,” you said.
“I know.” Jay smiled. “Coffee?”
Riki’s client left at half past three. He came through from the partition still pulling his gloves off and stopped when he saw you and Hana at the counter with Jay. The gloves came off slower. “You didn’t text,” he said to you.
“Spontaneous visit.”
“Hm.” He dropped the gloves, came around to the main counter. His eyes moved to Hana briefly, assessing, friendly. “Friend?”
“Hana,” you said. “She wanted to see the shop.”
“Welcome.” He said it to Hana and then his attention came back to you in that way it always did — like you were the fixed point and everything else was peripheral. “How’s the piercing?”
“Fine. Good.”
“You sleeping on it?”
“Mostly not.”
“Y/N.”
“Mostly not. I’m a side sleeper, it’s a process.”
He leaned on the counter. His coffee was cold by now but he picked it up anyway. “I’ll fix the helix today if you want. While you’re here.”
“Yeah?”
“Chair’s free.” Hana’s elbow found your ribs with surgical precision. You ignored it.
“Okay,” you said.
The helix took ten minutes. Precise, careful, the same focused quiet he brought every time. Afterwards he checked the tragus — habit, he said, like that was a normal thing, like of course he was checking it — and you sat in the chair and let him and looked at his face in the mirror while he was looking at your ear.
Up close like this you could see things you couldn’t from the other side of a counter. The small scar through his left eyebrow, barely visible. The way his jaw set when he was concentrating. The rings on his fingers — he took them off for client work and put them back on after, and watching him slide them back on was a thing you were apparently noticing now.
He caught you in the mirror. Didn’t call you out. Just held your gaze for a second and then looked back at the piercing, and the corner of his mouth moved slightly. “Good,” he said. “Helix looks better. You’ll need to re-do the aftercare cycle.”
“I know.”
“You actually know or you’re saying you know?”
“Riki.”
“I’ll write it down.”
“I literally work a piercing counter in my memory called things Riki has told me,” you said.
He went still for a half second. Then: “Yeah?”
“You’re very thorough,” you said. “It sticks.”
He looked at you in the mirror. Steady, quiet, something behind his eyes that was more than the usual easy confidence — something that had weight to it. “Good,” he said, quieter.
He stepped back. Started cleaning up. Normal, routine, the way he always moved through the shop like everything was exactly where it was supposed to be. “Same time next week?” he said. It wasn’t really a question.
“Sure,” you said.
In the main shop, Hana was sitting on the counter watching Jake explain the difference between traditional and neo-traditional tattooing with the energy of someone who had found religion. Jay was watching this with profound satisfaction. When you came back out Hana looked at you and then at Riki behind you and then at you again. “We should go,” you said.
“Should we,” Hana said.
“Yes.”
“Jake was just explaining—”
“Hana.” She got up, reluctantly, and said goodbye to Jake in a way that suggested she was also going to be back before four weeks. Jake watched her go with an expression that Riki clocked and then looked away from like he hadn’t seen it.
At the door you turned back. Riki was at the counter, already on his phone, or pretending to be. “Thanks for the helix,” you said.
“Anytime.” He didn’t look up. “Wednesday?”
“Wednesday,” you said. Jay made a noise. Riki didn’t look at him. You pushed the door open and the cold air hit you and behind you you heard Jay say, quiet and satisfied to no one in particular: “Regular.”
The Wednesday visits became a thing. Not every week, sometimes every ten days, but consistent enough that Jay started having your coffee order ready. Consistent enough that Jake stopped looking surprised when you walked in. Consistent enough that Heeseung, who said little and noticed everything, started nodding at you when you arrived like you’d passed some quiet assessment he’d been running.
Riki never texted first. You did sometimes — nothing significant, a meme about piercings, a question about aftercare that you probably knew the answer to. He always replied. Never with much. But always.
The counter between you was becoming a problem. Not the physical one — the metaphorical one. The distance that was exactly the right size for this isn’t anything yet and felt increasingly inadequate for what was actually happening in the space between you every Wednesday afternoon. He looked at you like you were a decision he’d already made. You were starting to think you had too.
Daniel texted on a Thursday.
Daniel: hey, haven’t seen you around much. you ok?
You stared at it. You and Daniel had two seminars together and a loose group chat and approximately nothing else, and this was the third text this week.
you: yeah all good, just busy
Daniel: we should get coffee sometime
you: I’m pretty slammed rn, sorry
You thought nothing of it. You mentioned it to Riki the following Wednesday — offhand, in the middle of a conversation about something else, not thinking. “This guy in my seminar keeps texting,” you said. “It’s starting to get annoying.”
Riki was writing something on the appointment book. His pen slowed.“What guy?” he said.
“Daniel. We’re in the same module. He keeps asking for coffee.” Riki’s pen stopped. You looked up. His face was the same — neutral, easy — but something had shifted underneath it. Something had gone very still in the specific way of a thing that was actively being held still.
“You said no?” he said.
“Obviously. I’m not interested.”
A pause. He looked back at the appointment book. Wrote something. “Good,” he said.
Just that. Good. You looked at him for a second. “Riki.”
“Hm.”
“Are you—”
“Helix check,” he said, and stood up from the stool. You let him redirect you. Sat in the chair. Let him check the helix he’d fixed two weeks ago and didn’t need to check again. His hands were as steady as they always were. His voice was as even.
But when you looked at him in the mirror his jaw was set in a way it wasn’t usually and his eyes, when they met yours in the reflection, had something in them that was more than the usual warm certainty. Something that looked a lot like mine with nowhere to go yet. You looked away first. Neither of you said anything about it.
Daniel was waiting outside your seminar on Tuesday. Not accidentally. He was leaning on the wall opposite the door with his phone out, and when you came through he pushed off and fell into step beside you like it was coordinated, like he’d timed it. “Hey,” he said.
“Hey.” You kept walking.
“Good seminar?”
“It was fine.”
“I thought Professor Kim made a good point about the—”
“Daniel.” You stopped. Turned to face him. He was decent looking, objectively — tall, friendly face, the kind of guy who probably did well in situations where persistence read as flattering. “What’s going on?”
He smiled. Easy, practiced. “I was thinking we could grab that coffee.”
“I said I was slammed.”
“You’re not slammed right now.”
“I have somewhere to be.”
“Where?”
You looked at him. “That’s not really—”
“I’ll walk you,” he said. Like that was a reasonable response. Like the answer to I have somewhere to be was I’ll come.
“Daniel.” You kept your voice even. “I appreciate it but I’m not interested. Okay? Not trying to be harsh, just being clear.”
Something moved across his face — not anger, more like recalibration, like he was filing this away as a temporary obstacle. “Maybe just as friends,” he said.
“I’m good. Thanks though.” You walked away. Heard him say something behind you — see you Thursday — and didn’t respond. You texted Ria about it on the bus.
you: the Daniel thing is getting annoying
Ria: what happened?
you: he waited outside my seminar
Ria: ew
you: I told him straight I’m not interested
Ria: good. are you telling riki?
You stared at that.
you: why would I tell riki??
Ria: because you tell riki everything now??
you: I do not tell riki everything
Ria: you told him about your mum’s cat
you: that came up naturally and I’m not telling him, it’s not a big deal
You put your phone in your bag. You didn’t tell him.
Wednesday came and you sat at the counter with your coffee and talked about other things — Hana and Jake’s ongoing situation, which was developing at a glacial pace that was driving Ria insane. A new flash piece Heeseung had drawn that you’d been looking at for twenty minutes when you came in. Whether you should get a second tragus on the other ear. “Yes,” Riki said, without hesitation.
“That’s a very immediate answer.”
“It’s an obvious answer.” He looked at your ears, both sides, that assessing look. “Symmetrical double tragus. Come in next week.”
“Maybe I want to think about it.”
“You don’t need to think about it.”
“Riki.”
“You came in drunk wanting a tragus piercing,” he said. “You knew then. You know now.”
You looked at him. He looked back with the patience of someone who was completely certain and was willing to wait for you to catch up. “Fine,” you said.
He smiled. “Next week,” he said.
The following Tuesday Daniel was outside your seminar again. This time you saw him before he saw you and you changed direction, took the long way to the exit, added seven minutes to your walk. Small, manageable.
On Thursday he was in the coffee queue behind you. “Coincidence,” he said, and smiled at you, and you smiled back tightly and paid for your coffee and left.
On Friday he messaged. Again.
Daniel: hey saw you in the queue yesterday, why’d you leave so fast?
You didn’t reply. And he messaged again on Saturday.
Daniel: did I do something wrong?
You showed it to Ria over the phone that night. She was quiet for a second. “He’s not taking the hint,” she said.
“I didn’t hint. I said directly I wasn’t interested.”
“Then he’s not taking the direct statement.”
“Yeah.”
Another pause. “Tell Riki.”
“Ria—”
“Y/N I’m serious, tell—”
“It’s fine. I can handle it.”
“I know you can handle it, that’s not the—” She stopped. “Just tell him. You know you want to.” You didn’t answer that.
Wednesday came around, you’d been at the counter for forty minutes. Jay had come and gone twice. Jake had shown Hana something on his phone that made her laugh and Riki had looked at that for approximately one second before very deliberately looking elsewhere.
You were mid-sentence about something — your dissertation, probably, you’d been complaining about your dissertation — when the door opened.
Sunghoon came in from his afternoon off, still in his jacket, unwinding his scarf. He was unfairly attractive and moved through the shop like he knew it, dropping his bag behind the counter and immediately coming over to where you were sitting. “Y/N.” He leaned on the counter beside Riki’s stool, friendly, easy. “How’s the tragus?”
“Good.” You touched it briefly. “Riki’s doing the other side next week.”
“Nice. You should let me draw something for you. Little custom piece, just here—” he touched his own collarbone— “would suit you.”
“Yeah?”
“Hundred percent.” He looked at Riki. “Right?” Riki was looking at his phone. “Riki,” Sunghoon said.
“Hm.” He didn’t look up. Sunghoon looked at you with a small what’s his problem expression. You looked back with a I genuinely don’t know expression.
You talked to Sunghoon for twenty more minutes. He was easy to talk to — funny, straightforward, the kind of person who filled a room without trying. He showed you his portfolio on his phone, talked you through a couple of pieces, asked about your university course with actual interest.
Riki stayed on his stool. He wasn’t on his phone. You could tell because you kept looking over and the screen was dark. He was just sitting there in the specific stillness of something being actively held in place, forearms on the desk, jaw set. When Sunghoon went to the back to change into his work clothes you turned to Riki. “What’s wrong with you?” you said.
“Nothing.”
“You’ve said four words in the last twenty minutes.”
“I’ve been busy.”
You looked at the dark phone screen. Looked at him. “Riki.”
“I’m fine.” He finally looked at you. His face was even, controlled, the expression he wore when he was putting effort into the expression. “You want more coffee?”
“No.” You kept your voice low. Jay and Jake were across the room but still. “Talk to me.”
Something moved behind his eyes. For a second you thought he was going to — actually going to, drop whatever this was and say it. His jaw shifted. His eyes moved over your face and then away. “It’s nothing,” he said. “Forget it.”
You looked at him for a long moment. He looked at the counter. You picked up your bag. “I’m going to head,” you said.
He looked up then. Quick, like he hadn’t expected it. “You don’t have to—”
“I have stuff to do.” You stood up. Your voice was even, you’d made sure of it. “I’ll see you next week for the tragus.”
“Y/N—”
“Bye, Riki.” You said goodbye to Jay on the way out. Waved at Jake. Pushed the door open into the cold.
Behind you, through the glass, you heard Jay say something. Heard Riki’s voice, short and clipped. Didn’t hear the words. You walked to the bus stop and stared at the road and felt something hot and frustrated sitting in your chest that you didn’t have a clean name for.
He texted at nine that night.
Riki: I’m sorry about today
You stared at it.
Riki: I get like that sometimes. I don’t like it.
Another one, a minute later.
Riki: It wasn’t about Sunghoon. It wasn’t about you.
Riki: ok it was about Sunghoon.
You sat on your bed with your phone in your hand and read that three times.
you: do you want to tell me what “getting like that” means??
A pause. Longer than his usual response time.
Riki: Not over text. Wednesday?
you: yeah
you: Riki, Sunghoon was just being friendly
Riki: I know. I know that. It doesn’t always
The message cut off. Like he’d deleted the end of it and sent what was left.
Riki: Wednesday. I’ll explain.
Riki: night Y/N
You got there at three. Jay handed you your coffee without being asked and then found somewhere else to be, which meant Riki had said something to him beforehand, which meant he’d been thinking about this. Riki was at the counter. He looked up when you came in and the usual ease wasn’t fully there — not gone, just quieter, like he’d dialed something back. “Hey,” he said.
“Hey.” You sat down. Wrapped both hands around the coffee. “So.”
“So.” He exhaled. Looked at the counter for a second, then at you. “I get possessive.” He said it straight. No build up, no softening — just put it on the counter between you like something he’d decided you should see.
“Okay,” you said.
“I don’t like it,” he said. “It’s not — I’m not trying to make it your problem. I know Sunghoon wasn’t doing anything. I know you weren’t doing anything. It just—” He stopped. His jaw shifted. “It sits wrong. Someone else in your space. Being the thing making you laugh.”
You looked at him. His eyes were on the counter, which was unusual — Riki who held eye contact through everything. “Has it always been like that?” you said.
“Yeah.” Simple. “Better than it used to be.”
“What was it like before?”
He looked up. “Worse.” A pause. “I dealt with it badly. I’m not—” He stopped again. “I’m not like that anymore. I don’t act on it. But I feel it and sometimes it makes me go quiet and disappear into my own head and that’s not fair to you.”
You sat with that. “Why are you telling me this?” you said.
He held your gaze. “Because you asked.”
“People don’t always answer when you ask.”
“I know.” Something in his face. “You should know what you’re—” He stopped himself again, and you heard the end of that sentence clearly even without the words. What you’re getting into. What I am.
“Riki,” you said. “If Sunghoon had been doing something—” You held his eyes. “Or anyone. I’d handle it. That’s not— I’m not someone who needs protecting from other people’s attention.”
“I know that.”
“But I’m also not—” You paused. Chose the words. “I’m not interested in other people’s attention. Okay? That’s just—” You shrugged. “That’s just where I’m at.”
The silence that followed had weight to it. Riki looked at you. Really looked — the way he did sometimes, like he was reading something underneath the surface of what you’d said, like he was checking if you meant it.You meant it. “Okay,” he said quietly.
“Okay,” you said.
He exhaled. Something in his shoulders dropped slightly — barely visible, but there. “Tragus,” he said.
“Tragus,” you agreed. He stood up from the stool. And as he passed behind the counter his hand came down briefly on yours where it rested on the surface — just for a second, just his fingers over your knuckles, warm and solid — and then he was moving through to the piercing section and the moment was gone.
You sat there for a second. Then you followed him. Across the room Jay looked at Heeseung in the doorway of his office. Heeseung looked back. Neither of them said anything.
It happened on a Friday. Not a Wednesday. Not planned. You’d come in with Hana at five because she’d finally committed to a small piece on her ankle and wanted moral support, and by the time Jake was finishing up the linework the shop had emptied out — Sunghoon’s last client gone, Jay heading out with his jacket half on, Heeseung locking his office with his keys already in his hand. “You good to close?” Heeseung said to Riki.
“Yeah.” Riki was wiping down the front counter. “Go.” Heeseung looked at you. Brief, unreadable. Looked back at Riki. Said nothing and left. Jay pointed finger guns at you on his way out. You ignored him.
Jake finished Hana’s piece at half past six. She sat up and looked at it in the mirror with the expression of someone who had just made a very good decision, and then she looked at you and at Riki and made a different kind of decision entirely. “I’ll get a cab,” she said.
“I’ll come,” you said.
“You don’t have to.” Serene. Innocent. Absolutely deliberate. “I’m fine on my own.”
“Hana—”
“I’ll text you when I’m home.” She hugged you, said goodbye to Jake, said goodbye to Riki with a smile that communicated volumes, and then she was gone and Jake was heading out behind her and the door swung shut and the shop was quiet.
Just you and Riki. He was at the front counter. You were near the piercing section. The red light was low and the playlist had shifted to something slower, something with bass underneath it, and the flash art on the walls looked different when there was no one else here — more intimate, like the shop had exhaled. “You can head,” Riki said. He wasn’t looking at you. Wiping the counter, routine.
“I know,” you said.
You didn’t move. He stopped wiping. The silence lasted four seconds. You counted. Then he looked up. The expression on his face wasn’t the smirk. Wasn’t the work focus. It was something stripped back — something that had been running underneath everything for weeks and was apparently done waiting. “Y/N,” he said. Low.
“Yeah,” you said. Like you were answering a question he hadn’t asked yet.
He put the cloth down. He came around the counter and crossed the floor and he didn’t stop until he was right in front of you, close enough that you had to tilt your chin up slightly, and his hand came up to your jaw — not grabbing, just his fingers along the side of your face, tilting you toward him — and he looked at you for one more second like he was making absolutely sure.
Whatever he saw made his mind up. He kissed you and it was nothing like the slow build you’d been expecting — it was immediate, certain, his mouth on yours like he’d been thinking about it for weeks because he had been, and you got your hands into his shirt and kissed him back and the sound he made low in his throat did something catastrophic to your ability to think.
His hands moved — jaw, then your waist, pulling you in until there was no space left between you — and you felt the rings on his fingers through the fabric of your top and his body was solid and warm and there, fully there, nothing held back.
You bit his lower lip without planning to. He pulled back half an inch. His eyes were dark, his breathing had changed, and he looked at you with an expression that rearranged something in your chest. “Do that again,” he said quietly, “and we’re not stopping.”
“Good,” you said. And you did it again. He walked you back until your shoulders hit the wall beside the piercing partition — not rough, controlled, one hand flat against the wall beside your head and the other at your waist, and he kissed you deeper this time, slower, like he had you exactly where he wanted and wasn’t in any rush now that he did.
His tongue — god, his tongue, the bar was there and present and you felt it and made a sound into his mouth that you would have been embarrassed about if his hand hadn’t tightened on your waist the second you did it. “There it is,” he said against your mouth.
“Shut up,” you breathed.
“You’ve been thinking about it.” Not a question. His lips moved to your jaw, your neck, unhurried. “Since I told you.”
“Riki—”
“Yes,” he said, quoting you back to yourself, and you felt him smile against your throat.
“You’re so—”
“I know.” He pulled back to look at you. His hair was slightly wrecked, his eyes were very dark, and he looked at you with the kind of focus he usually reserved for his work — total, precise, like you were something he intended to get exactly right. “Tell me what you want.”
“I want you to stop talking,” you said.
“No you don’t.” He was right. You didn’t.
“I want—” You stopped. His thumb had found the hem of your top, tracing the skin at your waist, barely moving, just there. Your brain was doing something unhelpful. “I want you to keep going.”
“Keep going,” he repeated. Like he was logging it. “That’s not very specific.”
“Riki.”
“I want to hear you say it.” His voice had dropped, lower than usual, and there was something in it — not a demand exactly, more like an invitation with weight behind it, like he already knew and wanted you to catch up. “Tell me.”
You looked at him. He looked back, steady, patient, his thumb still tracing that small arc at your waist.
“I’ve wanted you for weeks,” you said. “You know that.”
“I know.” He leaned in, his mouth at your ear. “I wanted to hear you say it.” His hands moved — both of them, finding the hem of your top, sliding underneath to your bare waist, warm palms spreading across your skin — and you exhaled shakily and his mouth came back to yours and the patience dissolved.
Somewhere on the walk from the counter to the wall you got his shirt off and you put your hands on his chest and then his stomach and then lower and found the waistband of his jeans and his breath caught — actually caught, an involuntary thing, the first crack in the steady control — and you looked up at him.
His jaw was tight. His eyes were dark and fixed on your face. “Keep going,” he said. His own words back. Low and rough. You undid his jeans. Your hand found him and he was — there was a Jacob’s ladder — you stopped. He watched your face process it.
“Riki,” you said.
“Yeah.” His voice was rough now, the evenness wearing thin at the edges.
“When were you going to—”
“When it came up.”
“It’s come up.”
“It has,” he agreed, and something in his expression was almost amused except he was too far gone for amused, too focused, his hands gripping your waist with more pressure than before. “Still want to keep going?”
You looked at him. “Are you serious right now.”
He laughed — real, brief, surprised out of him — and then his forehead dropped to yours and you felt him exhale and then his mouth was on yours again and the laughing was done. Your jacket off your shoulders and it hit the floor and his mouth was on your throat before it landed — open, hot, his tongue against your pulse point and the piercing bar cool against your skin and you made a sound that echoed off the black walls. “Riki—”
“I know.” His hands were at the hem of your top, shoving it up, impatient in a way that cracked the usual control wide open. “Off.”
You got it off and his hands were on your tits and his mouth came back to yours.
He walked you back into the wall beside the piercing partition — not slow, not careful, just direct — and pinned you there with his body and his hands were everywhere and yours were too and it was nothing like the slow careful thing you’d half imagined. It was desperate. Both of you. Weeks of it.
“You have no idea,” he said against your jaw, your throat, lower, his mouth on your collarbone, “how long I’ve—” He stopped. His teeth grazed your skin. “Fuck.”
“Tell me,” you breathed.
“Since you walked in here in that dress,” he said into your skin. “Since you leaned on my counter and looked at me like that. I’ve been—” His hands found your jeans, the button, the zip. “Since then.” He shoved your jeans down your hips and you kicked them off and his hand pushed between your thighs and found your pussy through the thin fabric still there and pressed and your hips rolled forward hard.
“There,” he said. Low, rough, satisfied. “There you are.” His fingers moved — slow, deliberate, feeling the heat of you through the fabric — and he looked at your face while he did it. Watching. Taking everything. “Soaked already,” he said. “Were you like this the whole time?”
“Don’t—” you started.
“You were.” He pushed the fabric aside and his fingers touched your folds directly and you choked on a breath. The rings were cold, the contrast of it shocking and good and — “Riki—”
“Good girl,” he said quietly. Like it meant something. Like you’d done something right just by responding to him. His fingers moved through your folds and found your clit and you grabbed his shoulders and held on. “So wet. So fucking — look at you.”
“Please—”
“Please what.” His fingers kept moving, unhurried despite everything, despite the fact that you could feel how much he wanted this — felt it against your hip, hard, his own breathing gone ragged at the edges. “Say it.”
“I need—”
“Say it, Y/N.”
“I need you to fuck me,” you said. “Now, Riki, please—” He made a sound low in his throat and his fingers disappeared and he was shoving his own jeans down, just enough, barely, one hand braced on the wall beside your head — and then he looked at you, dark eyes and wrecked hair and jaw set hard.
“Here?” he said. Rough. “Right here?”
“Yes—”
His hand found your pussy again, two fingers pushing inside, testing, and you made an embarrassing sound and he groaned at the feel of you — “fuck you’re—” — and then his fingers were gone and he was there, the head of his cock at your entrance, and you hooked your leg over his hip. He pushed in. Both of you went still. His forehead dropped to yours. Your nails were in his shoulders. The Jacob’s ladder — you felt every single one and your mouth fell open and you heard him exhale shakily above you. “Riki—”
“I know.” His voice was barely there. “I know, just — fuck — just give me a second—”
“Don’t stop,” you said. “Don’t stop, keep—”
He moved. There was nothing controlled about it. That was the thing — Riki who was steady and certain and always in possession of himself — gone. Completely. He fucked you against the wall with his jeans half down and yours on the floor and his rings cold against your thigh where he’d hooked your leg higher and the bar of his tongue in his teeth when he looked at you and it was overwhelming, the closeness of it, the sound of it in the empty shop.
“Good,” he said, rough and low, his hips rolling into you, setting a pace that had your head dropping back against the wall. “Good girl, just like — yeah, just like that—”
“More—”
“Yeah?” He shifted his angle and you cried out and he did it again, deliberate, watching your face. “There?”
“Yes — yes, don’t stop—”
“I’ve got you.” His mouth found your throat. “I’ve got you, you’re doing so — fuck, Y/N, you feel—” He broke off. His rhythm stuttered and recovered. “You feel so good. So fucking good.”
The praise landed somewhere it had no business landing, warm and devastating, and your hips were moving to meet him and your clit was grinding against him with every thrust and you were already… “Riki I’m going to—”
“Do it,” he said immediately. “Cum for me. Come on.” His hand moved between you and his thumb found your clit and pressed and you shattered — your whole body going taut, his name in your mouth, your nails breaking skin on his shoulders — and he fucked you through it, relentless, not letting up—
“That’s it,” he said against your ear, rough and wrecked. “That’s it, good girl, god you’re—” He followed you over the edge not long after — his rhythm breaking, his breath gone, his forehead hard against the wall beside your head — and the sound he made when he came was low and helpless and you felt it everywhere.
There was silence that followed apart from the playlist over the shop speakers. The red light under the door still illuminated. Both of you still against the wall like butter of you planned to move soon, his weight partly on you and partly on his arm and neither of you in any hurry to fix that.
Your leg slid down from his hip. He pulled back enough to look at your face. His hair was completely wrecked. His mouth was slightly swollen. He looked at you with an expression that had nothing performed in it — just open, just him, something that hadn’t had a name all this time and still didn’t quite yet. “Hi,” he said.
You laughed. Surprised out of you, real. He smiled — the real one, the one that changed his whole face — and pressed it briefly into your hair.
You found the back room couch eventually. His shirt on your shoulders. The rings back on his fingers because he’d put them on out of habit and then looked at his own hands like he hadn’t noticed himself doing it. You lay on your back. He sat with his back against the couch, forearm on his knee, looking at the floor. “So,” you said.
“So,” he said.
“What happens now?” you said.
He was quiet for a moment. “What do you want?”
You thought about the card in your bag. The Wednesdays. The way he’d looked at you across the counter every single time like you were a decision he’d already made. “I don’t know yet,” you said. Honest.
“Okay,” he said. Easy. No pressure in it. His hand found yours in the dark. Didn’t make anything of it. Just held on. You stayed on the couch until the playlist rolled over twice. At some point the I don’t know yet became irrelevant because his mouth found your throat again and his hands were back under his shirt on your skin and the question got buried under something more immediate.
You left at nine. He walked you to the door. Held it open, leaned in the frame. The cold air hit you and you turned back. He looked wrecked and unbothered about it. Shirt on, jeans done up, rings on every finger. Hair a disaster. Looking at you with that expression — the settled one, the certain one. “Wednesday,” he said. You nodded.
Neither of you said anything about what it was. That was the agreement, unspoken, the way most things between you and Riki were unspoken. You came in on Wednesdays. Sometimes other days. Sometimes he texted at ten at night — nothing explicit, just you up or studio’s empty — and you went, and nobody named what that meant. It worked. Mostly.
The sex was — there wasn’t a word for it that didn’t sound inadequate. Compulsive was close. Inevitable was closer. Like once the wall had come down neither of you had any interest in rebuilding it, like your bodies had been having a conversation for months and were now just speaking plainly.
He learned you fast. Faster than anyone had. What made you gasp versus what made you come apart completely. The difference between what you asked for and what you actually wanted. He paid attention the way he paid attention to everything — totally, precisely — and used it with a focus that should have been illegal.
You learned him too. That the control was real but thin in the right circumstances. That his jaw set right before it cracked. That he made sounds he didn’t seem to know he was making. That he said your name differently when he was close — shorter, sharper, like he didn’t have room for the full shape of it. That he always, always pulled you back when you tried to move away after. Not possessive. Just — unwilling to let the warmth go yet. You were trying very hard not to think about what that meant.
Three weeks after the first time, on a Tuesday night, you were in the back room of Studio 13 with Riki’s shirt on the floor and your jeans somewhere near the door and his mouth on your throat and his hand between your thighs and the playlist coming through the walls and everything was fine, everything was exactly what it was, unnamed and manageable —
And then he said I’ve got you in that low rough voice right against your ear and something in your chest did a thing it wasn’t supposed to do. You filed it away. Dealt with it later. Later didn’t come because he did something with his tongue that made later completely irrelevant.
Wednesday afternoon. Counter. Coffee. Normal. Easy. The same as it had always been except for the part where it wasn’t because now you knew exactly what his hands felt like and what sounds he made and what his face looked like when the composure cracked and sitting on the other side of a counter from him in the middle of the afternoon was — a different experience than it used to be.
He was telling you something about a client — complicated custom piece, back and forth for weeks on the design — and you were listening and also watching his hands move when he talked, the rings catching the light, and thinking about those hands on your waist last night and… “Y/N.”
You looked up. He was looking at you with the quiet knowing expression. “I was listening,” you said.
“You weren’t.”
“I was. Custom piece. Back and forth on the design. Client keeps changing their mind.”
He tilted his head slightly. The corner of his mouth. “What were you thinking about?”
“The flash art.”
“Hm.” He leaned on the counter. His forearms right there, the sleeve on full display, and he looked at you with that unhurried certainty. “You were looking at my hands.”
“I was looking at your rings.”
“Y/N.”
“They’re interesting rings.”
He held your gaze for a long moment. Then he looked down at his hands, turned them over slowly, looked back up at you with an expression that was doing something to your ability to function. “Come back tonight,” he said.
“I was here last night.”
“I know.”
“And the night before.”
“I know.” He didn’t look remotely apologetic. “Come back tonight.”
You looked at him. “We should probably — this probably shouldn’t be—”
“Probably,” he agreed, like the word meant nothing.
“Riki.”
“Tonight, Y/N.”
You looked at your coffee. At him. At the rings on his hands that you had been thinking about and were now not admitting to thinking about. “Fine,” you said.
He picked up his own coffee. Satisfied. Like there had never been any other outcome. From across the shop Jay said nothing. He had learned, over the past three weeks, that saying things got him absolutely nowhere and had adapted accordingly. He simply made eye contact with Sunghoon across the room and they had an entire conversation without words.
That night after Studio 13 closed, which had become its own specific thing — the red light, the quiet, the shop breathing differently when it was empty. Riki had barely locked the front door before you were crossing the floor toward him and his expression when he turned around and saw you moving like that— “Hi,” he said.
“Hi.” You reached him. Your hands went to his chest, his jaw, pulling him down, and he came without resistance, his hands finding your waist immediately, already knowing where to go.
He kissed you slow this time. Deliberately slow, like he was making a point, like the urgency of the last few weeks had shifted into something that wanted to take its time. That was somehow worse. “Riki,” you said against his mouth.
“Hm.”
“Stop going slow.”
“No.” He kissed your jaw. Your throat. Slow and deliberate, his hands sliding under your top to your bare waist. “I spent all afternoon thinking about this.”
“So did I, that’s why—”
“That’s why we’re taking our time.” His mouth at your collarbone. “I want to—” A pause. His lips against your skin. “I want to take you apart properly. Not fast.”
Your hands tightened in his hair. “That’s not fair,” you said.
“No,” he agreed, and kept going. He got your top off and looked at you in the low light the way he always did — that slow, unapologetic assessment that moved over you like you were worth looking at carefully — and then his mouth found your tits and your head fell back.
His tongue. The bar of it, cool and present, circling your nipple, and you made a sound and his hands tightened on your waist. “Good girl,” he said against your skin. “Just like that.”
“Riki—”
“I’ve got you.” He moved to the other side, same slow attention, his hands holding your waist like you might float away. “I’ve got you, just — yeah, just feel it.” You were going to lose your mind. Your hands found his shirt and he let you get it off and then he was walking you back to the couch in the back room and laying you down and looking at you from above with dark eyes and that expression — the open one, the one that had no performance in it.
He got your jeans off slow. His hands running down your thighs as he pulled them, his mouth following, pressing to your hip, the inside of your knee, and by the time he got back up to your folds you were already soaked. “Riki, please—”
“Please what.” His breath against your inner thigh. Close, not close enough.
“Please—”
“Tell me what you want.” His lips brushed your folds, barely, just the suggestion of pressure. “Tell me.”
“Your mouth,” you said. “Please, your mouth—” He gave it to you. The bar of his tongue against your clit and you grabbed the back of the couch and held on. He ate your pussy like he had nowhere else to be — thorough, focused, the same attention he gave everything — and the sounds he made against you, low and hungry, like he was getting something from it—
“God—” your hips rolled and his hands held them down, firm, keep still, and the loss of control of that made it worse in the best way. “Riki I’m — don’t stop, don’t—”
“Not stopping,” he said against your clit. “Cum for me. Come on.”
You did. He worked you through it until you were pulling at his hair telling him too much, too much and he pressed one last kiss to your inner thigh and came back up your body and looked at your face with an expression that was — satisfied wasn’t the right word. Reverent was closer, which was a thing you were absolutely not processing right now. “Good girl,” he said quietly.
“Stop calling me that,” you said, breathless.
“No,” he said simply, and kissed you.
When he finally pushed inside you both exhaled like something had been solved. Slow, this time. Deep. His forehead against yours, his arms bracketing you, his rings cool against the side of your face where his hand was. “Okay?” he said.
“Yeah.” Your voice wasn’t working right. “Yeah, keep — please keep going.”
He moved. Slow, deep rolls of his hips that had you feeling every ridge of the ladder on every stroke and your mouth kept falling open and he watched it happen. “You feel it,” he said. Low, not a question.
“Yes—”
“Good.” His hips rolled deeper and you gasped. “That’s good, you’re so — fuck, Y/N—” His composure was fraying at the edges, the rhythm getting less controlled. “You take me so well. Every time. Like you were—” He stopped himself.
You looked up at him. His jaw was set, his eyes dark, something moving behind them that he’d just pulled back from saying. “Like I was what,” you said.
He looked at you. For a second — just a second — something was right there on his face, unguarded, something that went past the physical and landed somewhere neither of you had named yet. He kissed you instead of answering.
You let him. Filed it away. Pulled him closer and let the question dissolve into the drag and heat of him moving inside you and his mouth on yours and his hand sliding between you to find your clit— “Riki—”
“I know,” he said. “I know, come on, cum for me again, you can—”
“I can’t—”
“You can.” His thumb on your clit, his cock deep, his voice at your ear. “You can, good girl, come on, let me feel you—” You came with his name in your mouth and your whole body shaking and he followed you with his face pressed into your throat and the sound he made was low and broken and yours.
After his thumb moving slow at your hip. The ceiling. The playlist. You were thinking about like you were— and what came after it. You were thinking about I’ve got you and how he said it every time, always, like a reflex, like something that came from somewhere deeper than the moment.
You were thinking about the fact that you knew what his laugh sounded like — the real one, the surprised one — and that you’d been collecting these things without meaning to and the collection was getting heavy. “Riki,” you said.
“Hm.”
“What are we doing.”
Silence. His thumb stopped moving. Then, carefully: “What do you want to be doing.”
You stared at the ceiling. “I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking.”
He was quiet for a long moment. You could feel him thinking — that specific quality of his silences, weighted, considering. “I’m not good at this part,” he said.
“What part.”
“The—” A pause. “Saying things.”
“You say things to me all the time.”
“Not these things.”
You turned your head to look at him. He was looking at the ceiling, jaw slightly tight, the expression of someone navigating something carefully. “What things,” you said quietly.
He turned his head. Your faces close in the dim light. His eyes moved over yours. “I don’t want you going anywhere,” he said. Finally. Quietly. “That’s — that’s what I’ve got right now.”
It wasn’t everything. You both knew it wasn’t everything. But it was Riki, who didn’t say things, saying a thing, and it landed with the weight of something much larger behind it.“Okay,” you said.
“Okay,” he said. His thumb started moving again. You looked back at the ceiling. The unnamed thing stayed unnamed. But it was there, in the room with you, and you both knew it.
The thing about not naming something was that it didn’t stop it from being a thing. It just meant you had no language for it when it started to matter. Four weeks into whatever this was, Ria staged an intervention.
Not a dramatic one — she didn’t have people over or make a presentation, she just showed up at your flat on a Saturday morning with coffee and pastries and sat across from you at your kitchen table with the expression of someone who had been patient for a very long time and was cashing that in now. “Talk,” she said.
“About what.”
“Y/N.”
“I don’t know what you want me to say, Ria.”
“I want you to say what’s happening with Riki.”
You picked up your coffee. “We’re—”
“If you say friends I’m leaving and taking the pastries.”
You put your coffee down. “It’s complicated.”
“Is it? Or is it simple and you’re making it complicated because you’re scared?”
You looked at her. She looked back with the patience of someone who had known you for six years and had seen every version of your avoidance. “We haven’t put a name on it,” you said.
“Why not.”
“Because—” You stopped. Because he’d said I don’t want you going anywhere and you’d said okay and neither of you had pushed past that. Because every Wednesday and every late night felt like building something and neither of you would say what you were building. “It’s working the way it is.”
“Is it.”
“Yes.”
“You like him.”
“Obviously.”
“Like like him.”
“Ria—”
“Y/N.” She leaned forward. “You went back to that shop every week for two months before anything happened. You know his coffee order, his schedule, what makes him laugh. You’ve met his friends. He checks your piercings as an excuse to be close to you.” She paused. “That’s not complicated. That’s you being terrified.”
You stared at the table. “He’s not easy to read,” you said. Finally.
“He gave you his personal card the night he met you,” Ria said. “Heeseung told me he’d never done that before.”
“When did you talk to Heeseung?”
“Jake texts me sometimes.”
“Jake texts you.”
“That’s not the point.” She pushed a pastry toward you. “The point is that boy is absolutely gone for you and you both keep dancing around it and it’s making everyone at Studio 13 insane, apparently.”
“Everyone?”
“Jay’s exact words were if they don’t sort it out soon I’m locking them in the back room.”
You put your face in your hands. “I don’t know how to do this with him,” you said, muffled. “He doesn’t say things. I don’t push. We just—”
“So say something first,” Ria said simply. “You’re not someone who waits, Y/N. That’s not you. You’re doing it because you’re scared he won’t say it back.” You lifted your face. Said nothing. She was right and you both knew it.
You didn’t say anything that Wednesday. You came close — sitting at the counter, coffee in hand, Riki talking about something, his rings on the desk, his eyes finding yours every few sentences the way they always did — and the words were right there, and you looked at his face, and you thought about Ria’s voice saying terrified, and you said nothing. He looked at you at one point like he knew something was moving behind your eyes. “What,” he said.
“Nothing.” You smiled. “Keep going.” He held your gaze for a second. Let it go.
The following Saturday Sunghoon texted you. Not unusual — you’d exchanged numbers for shop-related things, flash piece ideas, scheduling. He was easy to talk to, straightforward, the kind of person whose texts read exactly like his voice.
Sunghoon: hey, you said you were thinking about a collarbone piece right
you: yeah still thinking
Sunghoon: I drew something. wanna see
He sent a photo. Small, delicate, blackwork — something botanical, two thin stems crossing, minimal and precise. It was exactly your taste and you had no idea how he’d known that.
you: sunghoon this is gorgeous
Sunghoon: right? come in monday, I’ll show you the full size version. riki’s off monday so it’ll be quiet
you: sounds good, see you then
You didn’t think anything of it. Sunghoon was your friend. He’d drawn something for you. You were going to look at it. You didn’t mention it to Riki because there was nothing to mention.
Monday the shop was quieter without Riki in it, which was a thing you noticed and filed away as information you didn’t love having. Sunghoon had the drawing laid out on the counter when you arrived — full size, done properly on transfer paper, and it was even better than the photo. You stood over it with him pointing out the details, his hand close to yours on the paper, talking through placement and sizing and whether to add a third stem.
Jay was pretending to do something at the other counter.bHeeseung was in his office with the door open. “Here,” Sunghoon said, and pressed the transfer paper lightly to your collarbone to show you the placement. His hand steadied it against your skin, professional, and you looked in the mirror and thought yes, that was exactly right. Your phone lit up on the counter.
Riki: you at the shop?
You looked at it. Jay looked at it. Sunghoon didn’t see it.
you: yeah, sunghoon drew something for me. just looking at placement
The three dots appeared. Disappeared. Appeared again.
Riki: k
One letter.
Riki: looks good?
you: really good actually. he’s talented
The dots again. Then nothing. No reply. You put your phone down. Sunghoon was still talking about the third stem. You looked at the transfer in the mirror and tried to pay attention and felt something uneasy settle in your chest.
Riki was at the counter when you arrived Wednesday. You knew within ten seconds that something was wrong. Not visibly wrong — he looked the same, said hey the same, had your coffee ready the same. But his eyes when they met yours were flatter than usual. The warmth was there but dimmed, like something had been turned down. You sat. Picked up your coffee. “How was your day off?” you said.
“Fine.” He was looking at his phone.
“Did you do anything?”
“Not much.” Jay appeared from the back, clocked the atmosphere in approximately two seconds, and disappeared again.
You watched Riki scroll his phone. His jaw was set. Not dramatically — just tight, controlled, the way it got when he was holding something still. “Riki,” you said.
“Hm.”
“Look at me.” He looked up. The flat quality was more visible face to face. Something was moving behind his eyes that he was keeping on a very short leash. “What’s wrong?” you said.
“Nothing.”
“You’ve said twelve words since I got here.”
“I’ve been busy.”
You looked at him. He looked back, and you could see the effort of it — the effort of sitting in whatever this was and keeping it even. “Is this about Monday?” you said.
Something shifted in his jaw. “No.”
“Riki.”
“It’s not about Monday.”
“So it is about Monday.”
He put his phone down. Flat on the counter. He looked at you with an expression that was very controlled and also not controlled at all if you knew what to look for, and you knew what to look for now. “You went in on my day off,” he said.
“Sunghoon drew something for me. I told you.”
“I know what you told me.”
“Then what—”
“His hands were on you.” Quiet. Final. Like he’d been sitting on it for two days and it had compacted into something very small and very dense.
You stared at him. “He was showing me placement. For a tattoo. That’s his job.”
“I know that.”
“Then—”
“I know that, Y/N.” His voice was still even but something was pushing at the edges of it. “I know it doesn’t mean anything. I know Sunghoon wasn’t — I know.” He looked at the counter. “It doesn’t stop it feeling—” He stopped.
“Feeling what,” you said. He was quiet for a long moment.
“Wrong,” he said. “It feels wrong. Someone else’s hands on you feels wrong and I don’t know how to make that—” He stopped again. His thumb pressed against the counter. “I’m trying to be rational about it.”
“You went quiet for two days,” you said.
“I know.”
“That’s not — Riki, you can’t just go quiet every time something—”
“I know.” He looked up. His eyes were direct now, no flatness, just the real thing underneath — something frustrated and raw and tired of itself. “I know it’s not fair. I’m telling you I know that. I just—” A breath. “I don’t know how to feel it and not do that. I’m working on it.”
You looked at him for a long moment. “You went quiet instead of talking to me,” you said.
“Yes.”
“And you’re telling me now because I pushed.”
“Yes.” He held your gaze. “I would have told you. I just needed to — I needed it to be smaller before I could say it without it being—” He gestured vaguely. “A lot.”
“Is it smaller now?”
“Somewhat.”
You picked up your coffee. Looked at it. Put it down. “You know that there’s nothing—” you started.
“I know.” Immediately. “Y/N, I know. This isn’t about you. This isn’t about Sunghoon. It’s mine, it’s a me thing, and I’m not trying to make it your problem.”
“It becomes my problem when you disappear.”
“I know.” His jaw shifted. “I’m sorry.”
You looked at him. He looked back, steady, the thing behind his eyes open now in the way it only got when he’d pushed past the control on purpose — when he was giving you something deliberately. “Don’t disappear,” you said. “Whatever it is — just say it. To me. Not in your head for two days.”
“Okay,” he said. His hand moved across the counter and covered yours briefly — the rings cool, the weight of his palm familiar. “Okay, Y/N.”
The touch lasted a few seconds. He didn’t make anything of it. Just let it be there and then pulled back. From the back room, completely audibly, Jay said to someone: “finally.”
“Jay,” Riki said flatly.
“I’m just saying—”
“Jay.”
That night, late. He was in your flat, his idea — he’d texted at nine, not you up or studio’s empty but just your name, which was new. He was on your couch with his legs stretched out and his head back and his eyes on your ceiling and you were beside him close enough to feel the warmth of him and neither of you had moved toward the other yet. Just sitting. Existing in the same space. “Can I ask you something?” you said.
“Yeah.”
“The possessiveness.” You kept your voice even. “Where does it come from.”
A pause. He was quiet long enough that you thought he might not answer. “Control,” he said finally. “Or — fear of losing it. Things I care about.” His thumb moved against his own knee. “I spent a long time in situations where things got taken. People I — things I couldn’t protect.” He stopped. “I don’t talk about it.”
“You don’t have to.”
“I know.” A pause. “I want to. I just — not yet.”
Not yet. Not never. Not it’s not your business. Not yet meant there was a timeline. Meant he was thinking about it. Meant you were someone he was moving toward telling.
You leaned your head against his shoulder. He went still for a second — surprised, you thought, by the smallness of it, the casualness — and then his head dropped against yours and you felt him exhale. “The collarbone piece,” he said eventually. “Let me do it.”
You lifted your head. Looked at him. “You do tattoos?”
“Heeseung taught me. I’m not on the books for it but—” He met your eyes. “I want to do it. If you want.”
Sunghoon’s drawing. Riki’s hands. “Yeah,” you said. “Okay.”
Something settled in his face. Quiet and satisfied in a way that had nothing to do with the smirk. “Okay,” he said.
You put your head back on his shoulder. His arm moved — slow, like he was checking it was allowed — and settled around you. The unnamed thing pressed closer. Neither of you named it. But his arm tightened slightly and you let it, and that was something too.
The collarbone piece took two sessions. Riki had been clear about that upfront — small piece, delicate linework, he wanted to do it right and doing it right meant not rushing. You’d sat in the chair in the back room of Studio 13 on a quiet Tuesday morning with his hands on your collarbone and his face close and his full attention on the work and tried very hard to be normal about it. You were not normal about it. “Stop tensing,” he said, without looking up.
“I’m not tensing.”
“Your shoulder is up by your ear.” You lowered your shoulder. He glanced up briefly — dark eyes, the focus in them softening for just a second when they met yours — and then back down. “First line’s the worst,” he said. “Then you’ll settle.”
“I’ve been tattooed before.”
“Not by me.” He said it simply. Like it was just a fact. Which it was. But the way he said it landed like something more — like not by me was its own category, its own distinct experience, and he was right, as it turned out, because when the needle touched your collarbone the small shock of it dissolved almost immediately into the warmth of his hands steadying you and his voice saying good, just like that, breathe — and you settled.
You watched his face while he worked. This version of him — the work version, focused and quiet and completely present — was one of your favorites. All the usual energy went inward. The smirk was gone, the easy confidence was still there but different, channeled into precision. He moved the machine in small careful arcs and his free hand was always on you, always steadying, always aware of exactly how much pressure to use. “You’re staring,” he said.
“You said that to me once before.”
“You were staring then too.”
“Maybe I just have a specific staring problem.”
The corner of his mouth moved. He didn’t look up. “Maybe you do.”
He kissed you after the session. Not immediately — he’d finished, stepped back, examined the work with that quiet critical eye, declared it good. You’d looked in the mirror and felt something warm move through your chest at the sight of it — the two stems, thin and precise, sitting exactly right on your collarbone. “It’s perfect,” you said.
“I know.” He was already at the sink, washing his hands, and you could hear the smile in it even without seeing his face. You got up from the chair. Crossed the small space between you. And when he turned around you were right there and his expression shifted — from satisfied work-focus to something more personal, more immediate — and you put your hand on his jaw and kissed him.
He kissed you back with his damp hands at your waist, careful not to touch the fresh tattoo, and it was slow and unhurried and tasted like coffee and something that was just him and when you pulled back his eyes stayed closed for a second. Opened. Looked at you. “Hi,” he said quietly.
“Hi,” you said. His thumb moved at your waist. The rings. The warmth of his palms through your shirt.
“Come back Thursday for the second session,” he said.
“I know, you told me.”
“Just making sure.” He kissed you again before you could respond — quick, soft, his mouth on yours for just a moment — and then stepped back and handed you the aftercare sheet and was professional again, mostly, except for the way his eyes followed you to the door.
Thursday’s second session was longer. More detail, more shading on the stems, a small shadow that made the whole thing lift off the skin. You sat in the chair and he worked and you talked — properly talked, the way you did at the counter but quieter, more contained, just the two of you in the partitioned space.
He told you about growing up. Small things — not the things he kept locked, but around the edges of them. A younger brother. Moving schools twice. Being good at things with his hands from early on, carving things, taking things apart to see how they worked. “Is that why the piercing?” you said.
“Partly.” He shifted the machine slightly. “Partly because it’s — immediate. You do it right and you see it right away. No waiting to find out.”
“You like knowing things work.”
He glanced up. “Yeah.”
“Control thing.”
A pause. “Yeah,” he said again, quieter. You let that sit. Didn’t push.
“Tell me something else,” he said, after a moment. Deflecting but not — more like redirecting, like he wanted the conversation to keep going just in a different direction.
So you told him things. About your course, your family, the flat you’d moved into two years ago that still didn’t feel completely yours. The way Ria had been your anchor through everything since you were sixteen. How you’d wanted to study abroad and hadn’t and sometimes still thought about it. “Why didn’t you?” he said.
“Felt like running away from something.”
“Were you?”
You thought about it. “Probably.”
He looked up. His eyes on yours, level. “What were you running from.”
“Someone,” you said. “It doesn’t matter now.”
He held your gaze for a moment. You watched something move through his expression — something careful, something that might have been jealousy at its very distant edges but was mostly just — paying attention. Storing it. Like everything you gave him went somewhere it would be kept.
“Their loss,” he said. Simply. Looked back down. You looked at the top of his head and felt the unnamed thing press against your ribs from the inside.
He finished the piece in two hours. You both looked at it in the mirror — his chin near your shoulder, your reflection side by side — and neither of you said anything for a moment. “Well,” you said.
“Yeah,” he said. It was exactly right. Better than right. The kind of thing that looked like it had always been there, like your skin had been waiting for it.
You turned. He was right there, closer than you’d clocked, and you put both hands on his chest and looked up at him and he looked down at you and the moment expanded slightly. “Thank you,” you said.
“Don’t thank me.”
“Riki—”
“It was for me as much as you,” he said. Quiet. Direct. No smirk in it. “I wanted to put something on you. That’s—” He stopped. His jaw shifted. “That’s a me thing. Don’t thank me for it.”
You looked at him. He looked back, steady, and the naked quality of what he’d just said sat between you — I wanted to put something on you — and neither of you moved for a second.
Then you kissed him. Slow, deliberate, your hands spreading on his chest. He made a low sound and his arms came around you — gentle because of the fresh tattoo, careful, his hands at your back instead of your waist — and he kissed you back like he had time, like he wanted to use it.
When you broke apart he kept his forehead against yours. “Stay,” he said. Low. “Tonight. Just—” A pause. “Just stay.”
“Okay,” you said. You ate takeout on the floor of the back room because the couch was small and the floor had more space and Riki sat with his back against the couch and you sat between his legs with your back against his chest and it was so domestically comfortable that it was almost alarming.
He ate with one arm around you. His chin occasionally dropping to your shoulder to look at whatever you were showing him on your phone. His thumb making that small absent arc at your hip that he did when he wasn’t thinking about it.
“Ria thinks we need to define this,” you said, at some point. His arm didn’t tighten. Didn’t loosen. He was quiet for a moment.
“What do you think?” he said.
“I think Ria is right about most things.”
“Hm.” His thumb kept moving. “What would you define it as.”
You turned your head slightly. His face was close — close enough to see the detail of the scar through his eyebrow, the silver of his earring, the way he was looking at you with that careful open expression he only had when there was no one else around. “I don’t know,” you said. “What would you.”
“Mine,” he said. Quiet. Simple. Like it was the most obvious answer.
Your heart did something inconvenient. “That’s very you,” you said.
“Is it wrong?”
You turned back to face forward. His arm around you. The takeout. The red light. “No,” you said. “It’s not wrong.”
You felt him exhale against the back of your head. Slow, like something had released. His lips pressed briefly to your hair. Not a kiss exactly — too soft, too absent, more like a thing he did without deciding to.
You stayed on the floor until midnight. Talked about nothing important. Everything slightly important. He told you Jake was obviously falling for Hana and was handling it terribly, which you already knew, and you told him Ria had started texting Jake directly to speed the process along, which he did not know and which made him laugh — the real one, sudden, surprised. You stored it.
“I should go,” you said eventually. You had a nine AM seminar and the responsible thing—
“Yeah,” he said. Made no move to untangle himself from around you.
“Riki.”
“Five minutes.”
“You said that twenty minutes ago.”
“Five more minutes.” You leaned back into him and gave him the five minutes. He pressed his mouth to the side of your head again — that soft, absent thing, lips in your hair — and you closed your eyes and thought about mine and the way he’d said it like it was just the truth.
When you finally stood up he walked you to the door the way he always did. Unlocked it. Held it open. You turned back. He kissed you in the doorway — unhurried, thorough, one hand cupping your jaw and the other flat against the doorframe — and you kissed him back and it went on longer than a goodbye kiss needed to, longer than was practical, until he pulled back and looked at you with dark eyes and slightly wrecked composure.
“Wednesday,” he said. His thumb traced your jaw once before dropping.
“Wednesday,” you said. You made it to the end of the street. You looked back. He was still in the doorway, leaning on the frame, watching you go. When he saw you look he didn’t pretend he hadn’t been watching. Just held your gaze across the dark street. You turned back around and smiled at the pavement the whole way to the bus stop.
Heeseung had told everyone to come to his flat for dinner on Saturday — no occasion, just food, just all of them in the same place — and you’d arrived with Ria who had told you she’d been waiting for this invitation for weeks, which meant Jake had told her about it before Riki had told you, which meant something.
Heeseung’s flat was calm and dark-walled like the shop, art everywhere, music at a volume that allowed conversation. Jay was already there and immediately pulled Ria into an argument about something. Jake appeared from the kitchen and the way his face changed when he saw Ria was something you were going to tell Riki about later.
Riki was on the couch. He looked up when you came in and the smile that happened was immediate and unguarded — no performance, no build up, just his face doing the thing it did when you appeared, the thing you didn’t think he knew it did. He moved over without being asked. You sat beside him. Close. His arm went across the back of the couch behind you — not around you, but there, present, the rings near your shoulder.
Sunghoon arrived twenty minutes later and dropped onto the armchair across from you and looked at you both with an expression of great satisfaction. “You two sorted?” he said.
“Sunghoon,” Riki said.
“What? Last month you were—“ He stopped. “I’m just asking—”
“We’re sorted,” you said. Sunghoon grinned. Riki’s arm moved from the back of the couch to actually around your shoulders, like Sunghoon asking had given him permission to stop pretending he wasn’t doing it.
Dinner was loud and easy and everyone talked over everyone and Jay told a story about a client that got more elaborate every time he told it and Ria fit in like she’d always been there and Heeseung sat at the head of the table and said little and watched everything with quiet satisfaction.
After dinner you ended up back on the couch. Riki beside you, your legs across his, his hand resting on your ankle. The conversation had split across the room — Jay and Sunghoon, Ria and Jake in what looked like an increasingly interesting exchange, Heeseung in the kitchen. “You good?” Riki said quietly, just to you.
“Yeah.” You looked at the room. “This is nice.”
“They like you.”
“Jay likes everyone.”
“Heeseung doesn’t,” he said. Simple. “He likes you.”
You looked at him. “How can you tell?”
“He invited you.” He said it like it was obvious. “He doesn’t do this for everyone. He did it because—” A pause. His hand moved slightly on your ankle. “Because you’re—” He stopped.
“Because I’m what,” you said softly.
He looked at you. The room was noisy around you but it felt like it had contracted to just this, just his face and yours and the thing he was about to say. “Important,” he said. Quiet. “Because you’re important.”
Your heart did the inconvenient thing again, harder this time. “Riki,” you said.
“Yeah.”
“That word—”
“I know what word I used.” You looked at him. He looked back, steady, not taking it back, not softening it. Just — sitting in it, the way he sat in most things, patient and certain.
Across the room Jay said something loud and everyone laughed and the moment breathed. Riki’s hand moved from your ankle to your calf. Warm. Present. “Stay tonight,” he said. Low enough that it was only for you. “Not at the shop. Mine.”
His. His flat, which you hadn’t been to, which was a different thing than the back room couch. A different kind of staying. “Yeah,” you said.
He nodded. Looked back at the room. But his hand stayed on your leg and his shoulder was warm against yours and you sat in the important and let it settle into something that felt permanent.
Later, when most people had gone and Ria was helping Heeseung with something in the kitchen and it was just you and Riki by the door putting your jacket on he turned you by the shoulders. Kissed you slowly, his hands on your face, thumbs at your jaw. The kind of kiss that had no agenda, no direction, just wanted to exist. When he pulled back he looked at you for a long moment.
The word boyfriend was right there in the room. Neither of you said it. But his hand found yours and held it, and he didn’t let go the whole way to his flat, and somewhere in the space between mine and important and his fingers between yours on a dark street — the unnamed thing finally had a shape. You just hadn’t said it out loud yet.
His flat was on the third floor of a building that had seen better decades, the kind of place that was held together by good bones and someone who actually cared about the space inside it. You didn’t know what you’d expected.
More of the shop, maybe — dark walls, flash art, the deliberate aesthetic. And there was some of that. Dark furniture, a few framed pieces on the walls, one large canvas above the couch that was either very expensive or done by someone he knew and you suspected the latter. But it was also — lived in, in a specific way. Books stacked in an order that made sense only to him. A record player in the corner with a small collection beside it. The kitchen clean in the way of someone who cooked properly and cleaned as they went.
It was a home. Actually a home. That surprised you and you didn’t know why it surprised you and then you thought about what he’d said — I spent a long time in situations where things got taken — and understood it. He’d built this. Deliberately. Piece by piece. “Stop analyzing it,” he said from the kitchen.
“I’m not analyzing it.”
“You have your analyzing face on.”
“I don’t have an analyzing face.”
He appeared in the kitchen doorway with two glasses of water and looked at you standing in his living room in your jacket still on and raised an eyebrow. “Take your jacket off,” he said. “You’re staying.” You took your jacket off.
You fell asleep on his couch. Not intentionally — you’d been talking, the record player on low, and somewhere between one subject and the next the warmth of him beside you and the late hour pulled you under. You were aware of it happening distantly, the conversation getting slower, your eyes getting heavy, and you didn’t fight it.
You woke up in his bed. He’d moved you. At some point while you slept he’d carried you — or walked you, half-conscious — to the bed and put you in it and the duvet was pulled up and his pillow smelled like him and you lay there in the early grey morning and stared at the ceiling and felt something enormous and inconvenient sitting on your chest.
You heard him in the kitchen. The quiet sounds of someone who knew how to exist in the morning without disturbing anyone. You lay there and thought about mine and important and the collarbone tattoo and his hand in yours on the dark street and the back room couch and two months of Wednesdays and the card he’d slid across the counter the first night like he’d already decided.
You thought about Ria’s voice. You’re terrified. You were terrified.
He was at the kitchen counter with his back to you when you came in. Making coffee, unhurried, still in the clothes from last night minus the jacket. Rings on his hands already. You didn’t know if he’d slept. He turned when he heard you. Took in your expression with one look. “Hey,” he said carefully.
“Hey.” You stood in the kitchen doorway. Your heart was doing something loud. “You moved me.”
“You were asleep on my couch.”
“You could have woken me up.”
“You looked tired.” Simple. Like it was nothing. Like carrying you to his bed was just a practical thing he’d done without thinking. “Coffee?”
“Riki.” He looked at you. Really looked — reading whatever was on your face with that careful focus, taking it in.
“What’s going on,” he said.
“Nothing. I just—” You stopped. Started again. “I woke up in your bed and it—” You pressed your fingers to your mouth briefly. “It felt like something.” He was quiet. Waiting.
“I think this is something,” you said. “I think it’s been something for a while and we keep not saying it and I’m—” You exhaled. “I’m tired of not saying it.”
The kitchen was very quiet. Riki leaned back against the counter. Crossed his arms. His expression was the open one — no performance, no control layered over it, just his face and whatever was behind it. “Say it then,” he said quietly.
You looked at him. “I want this to be a thing. A real thing. I want—” You. “I want the name.”
He uncrossed his arms. Crossed the kitchen in three steps and he was right in front of you and his hands came up to your face — both of them, palms at your jaw, tilting your face up — and he looked at you for one long second. “It’s already a thing,” he said. “It’s been a thing.” His thumb moved at your cheekbone. “I’ve been waiting for you to catch up.”
“That’s very smug,” you said. Your voice wasn’t fully steady.
“I know.” He wasn’t smiling. His eyes were serious, dark, right there. “Y/N.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m not good at the words,” he said. “You know that. But this—” his thumbs traced your face, gentle and deliberate “—this is not nothing. This hasn’t been nothing since you walked into my shop.”
Your hands found his wrists. Held on. “Okay,” you said.
“Okay,” he said. He kissed you. Soft, slow, his hands still on your face like he wanted to hold the moment still. You kissed him back and felt the unnamed thing finally, finally settle into something with a shape and a weight and a name you’d figure out the exact word for later.
When he pulled back he pressed his forehead to yours. “Boyfriend is a weird word,” he said.
You laughed. Surprised out of you, real. “It really is.”
“But yeah.” His mouth curved. “That.”
“That,” you agreed. He kissed you again, brief and warm, and then stepped back and handed you a coffee and the domesticity of it — his flat, his coffee, his hands, the morning — hit you somewhere soft.
“Sit down,” he said. “I’ll make breakfast.”
“You cook?”
“Don’t sound so surprised.”
“Riki I’ve known you for months and I’ve never seen you eat anything that wasn’t takeout or coffee.”
“That’s at the shop.” He was already at the fridge. “At home I cook.”
You sat at his kitchen counter on a stool and watched him move around his kitchen with the same ease he brought to everything — competent, unhurried, knowing where things were — and drank your coffee and felt the warmth of the morning settle around you. “What are you making?” you said.
“Eggs.”
“Just eggs?”
“Good eggs.” He glanced back. “Don’t underestimate eggs.”
They were good eggs. You ate at his kitchen counter side by side, your shoulder against his, and the conversation came easy the way it always did — drifting, unhurried, one thing opening into another. He told you about the record player, how he’d found it at a market two years ago and had to carry it up three flights on his own. You told him about the flat you’d wanted that you hadn’t got and ended up in your current one instead and how it had turned out better. “Things usually do,” he said.
“Philosopher.”
“Just paying attention.” His hand found yours on the counter between you. Covered it. Not making anything of it — just there, warm and present. You turned your hand over and his fingers slid between yours. You sat like that until the coffee was cold.
He walked you out two hours later. Down the three flights and out onto the morning street, quiet at this hour, pale winter sun doing its best. He had his jacket on, hands in his pockets, walking beside you in the direction of the bus stop. “You don’t have to walk me,” you said.
“I know.” He walked you anyway. His shoulder bumping yours occasionally. Not holding your hand now — just beside you, present, taking up the right amount of space. At the bus stop he turned to face you. “Wednesday,” he said.
“Wednesday,” you said. Then: “Actually I might come Tuesday. I need to talk to Heeseung about extending the collarbone piece.”
Something moved across his face. Quick, then gone. “You want to extend it?” he said.
“Just the stems, maybe. One more.” You looked at his expression. “What?”
“I’ll do it,” he said. Immediate.
“I know you’ll do it—”
“I mean — the extension. Let me do it.” His jaw was doing the thing. “Not Heeseung.”
You looked at him. Understood. “Okay,” you said.
“Okay.” The jaw relaxed. A short exhale.
You reached up and kissed him — he leaned down to meet you before you’d fully extended, like he’d been waiting for it — and it was brief and warm and tasted like coffee. “Tuesday,” you said against his mouth.
“Tuesday,” he said. The bus appeared at the end of the road. He stepped back. Hands back in his pockets. Watching you with that settled, certain expression. “Text me when you’re home,” he said. New. That was new.
“Yeah,” you said, smiling. “Okay.”
You texted Ria from the bus.
you: we sorted it
The reply was immediate. She’d been awake, waiting.
Ria: WHAT
you: it’s a thing. officially.
Ria: I KNEW IT I HAVE BEEN SAYING does he even know the word boyfriend???
you: he said it’s a weird word
Ria: oh my god he’s so him
you: he made me eggs
Ria: Y/N!!!
you: they were really good eggs
Ria: I am going to cry. IM SO HAPPY!
You put your phone in your pocket and looked out the bus window at the city going past and felt something settled and warm sitting in your chest where the unnamed thing used to be.
Daniel saw you get off the bus. You didn’t notice him. You were texting Riki — something small, a photo of a dog outside the coffee shop you were passing, the kind of thing you sent now because you could — and you walked past him without looking up.
He watched you go. Watched the way you were smiling at your phone. He knew about the tattoo shop. He’d heard you mention it. He’d put things together — the visits, the name that came up, the way you’d brushed him off every time since October.
He pulled out his own phone. Started looking. It didn’t take long. Public record. The charge, the conviction, the sentence. He read it twice. Read the name again. Looked up Studio 13. He sat with it for a long time. Then he texted Soo.
Daniel: hey, you’re friends with Y/N right. I need to tell you something about someone she’s seeing.
The thing about finally naming something was that it changed the texture of everything. Not dramatically. Not all at once. Just — small shifts, accumulating. The way he texted now, more often, nothing significant but there. The way he said my girlfriend to a client who asked about the collarbone piece, casual, not looking at you when he said it, and you’d had to look very hard at the flash wall for a moment. The way his hand found yours in public without him thinking about it first. Small things. Heavy things.
You were catastrophically gone for him and had been for a while and now there was nothing to hide it behind.
The first Tuesday after you came into Studio 13 at noon and Riki was with a client so Jay made you coffee and sat across from you at the counter with the expression of someone who had been waiting to say something. “So,” he said.
“Don’t,” you said.
“I just want to say—”
“Jay.”
“I called it.” He held up both hands. “First week you came in. I said to Sunghoon, I said that girl is going to wreck him, and I was right—”
“I didn’t wreck anyone—”
“In a good way.” He was grinning. “He’s different. He’s — I’ve known Riki for two years and he texted me last Sunday morning just to talk. Riki. Texting. On a Sunday. Because he was in a good mood and wanted to—”
“Jay.” Riki’s voice from the piercing section, flat. He’d finished with his client without you noticing.
“I’m just saying—”
“I heard what you were saying.” Riki came around the partition and looked at you and the expression on his face when it landed on you was the thing Jay had been describing without being able to name it — something unlocked, something that had been held tight for a long time and wasn’t anymore.
He came to the counter. Leaned down and kissed you hello like it was something he’d been doing for years. Brief, warm, his hand on your jaw for just a second. Jay made a noise. Riki sat on his stool without acknowledging him. Picked up his coffee. “How’s the collarbone?” he said.
“Good. I want to talk about an extension.”
“I know what I’ll doing with it.”
“I haven’t told you what I want yet.”
“I know what you want.” He met your eyes. Completely certain. “Trust me.”
You looked at him. Thought about the first piece — how right it had been, how it had looked like it had always been there. “Fine,” you said.
Jay, very quietly, said: “He’s so different.”
The extension happened the following Thursday. One more stem. Slightly longer than the others, curving toward your shoulder, a small bud at the end that he’d added without asking and that was so exactly right you hadn’t been able to speak for a moment when you saw it. “Riki,” you said.
“Hm.” He was examining the placement, focused.
“The bud.”
“Yeah.”
“I didn’t ask for that.”
“No.” He glanced up. Brief, the focus breaking for just a second. “Do you like it?”
You looked in the mirror. The three stems, the new one curving outward, the small closed bud at its tip. Something that looked like potential. Like something about to open. “Yeah,” you said. “I like it.”
He looked back down. Said nothing. But his free hand, steadying your shoulder, pressed slightly. Small. Deliberate.
Three weeks in and the shape of things had settled. Wednesdays at the shop. Tuesday evenings at his flat, which had become a specific thing — you’d bring food, he’d already have the record player going, and you’d eat on his couch or his kitchen floor and talk until one of you fell asleep. Some Fridays at yours, which he’d come to twice now and moved through with the particular attentiveness of someone learning a space they planned to know well.
His things had started appearing at your flat. A hoodie, first — left behind, not retrieved. Then a phone charger. Then a record he’d brought over to show you something and hadn’t taken back. You didn’t point any of this out. Neither did he.
You had a key to Studio 13. That had happened without discussion — Riki had taken it off his keyring one night when you’d arrived before him and handed it to you and gone back to what he was doing. You’d stared at it for a full ten seconds.
This was how he said things. Not in words. In the key. In the bud on the stem. In text me when you’re home and Sunday morning texts and the way he always, always knew when something was wrong before you’d said anything. You were learning his language. It was quieter than most people’s but it was fluent.
Four weeks in, on a Wednesday night after Studio 13 closed as usual. But tonight the energy was different from the second you’d locked the front door behind you — something in the way he’d looked at you across the shop all evening, something that had been building since you’d arrived and had nowhere to go while there were other people present.
He kissed you against the front counter the second the lock clicked. Not soft. Not the hello-kiss or the goodbye-kiss or the slow deliberate thing from his kitchen. This was four weeks of officially named wanting, his hands in your hair and your hands in his jacket and both of you breathing differently inside ten seconds. He pulled back. Looked at your face. “Hi,” you said.
“Hi.” His voice was rough already. His hands moved from your hair to your waist, sliding under your top to bare skin, and you felt his rings and exhaled. “Been thinking about you all day.”
“I was here all evening.”
“I know.” His mouth found your jaw, your throat. “Worse.”
“Riki—”
“I know.” He pulled your top up and off and looked at you in the low red light the way he always did — that slow, deliberate sweep that moved over you like you were something he was committing to memory. The collarbone piece. His hands on you. “God,” he said quietly. Not performing it. Just — reacting.
“Come here,” you said. He came. He got you onto the front counter. Which was new. Which was — you looked around the shop, the dark windows, the closed door, and then his hands were on your thighs spreading them and he was standing between them and the location became very irrelevant. “Here?” you said.
“Here.” He kissed you again, deep, his tongue against yours and the bar of it doing what it always did to your ability to think. His hands pushed your skirt up your thighs, found your underwear, pushed it aside — and his fingers were there, at your folds, and you grabbed the edge of the counter.
“Riki—”
“Already.” His fingers moved through your folds, slow, feeling you. “Fuck, Y/N, already—”
“Don’t be smug—”
“I’m not.” He pressed a kiss to your jaw, your throat. “I’m really not.” His fingers found your clit and circled and your hips rolled forward. “That’s it. That’s—” A breath. “You have no idea what you do to me.”
“Tell me,” you breathed.
He pushed two fingers inside you and your head fell back. “This,” he said, low, watching your face. “Every time. Every fucking time you walk in here I want—” His fingers curled and you gasped. “Yeah. That. I want that sound.”
“More—”
“More?” He kept the pace slow. Deliberate. His thumb finding your clit while his fingers moved and the combination was devastating. “You sure? We’re not in a rush.”
“Riki I swear to god—”
He laughed — low, warm, real — and his fingers moved deeper and his thumb pressed harder and you grabbed his shoulder and held on. “Good girl,” he said against your throat. “So good. So wet for me, every time, like you spend all day—”
“I do,” you said, breathless. “I do, okay, is that what you want to hear—”
“Yes,” he said simply, and meant it, and his fingers moved faster. You came with your face pressed into his neck and his name in your mouth, his fingers working you through it, not stopping until you pulled at his hair and told him too much, too much—
He pulled his hand back. Pressed his mouth to your temple. Your cheekbone. The corner of your mouth. “Good girl,” he said again, softer. “You’re so—”
“Don’t you dare say something nice right now,” you said. “I can’t handle it.” He pressed his smile into your hair.
You got his jeans open. Got your hand on his cock and felt him exhale sharply against your neck —that involuntary thing, the crack in the control — and stroked slowly and felt every bar of the ladder and heard him make a sound that was almost pained. “Y/N—”
“Yeah?”
“I need—” His hips pushed forward slightly. “Fuck, I need you to—”
“Need me to what.” You kept the pace slow. His own medicine.
His forehead dropped to your shoulder. “Please.” The please from Riki — rare, wrecked, genuine — landed somewhere it always landed and you let go of him and pulled him forward by his waistband and he understood, got his jeans down, stepped between your thighs.
He pushed inside in one slow stroke and you both went still. His hands braced on the counter either side of you. Your hands on his chest. The shop around you, the red light, the flash art on the walls watching everything. “Okay?” he said. Rough. Always asked.
“Move,” you said. “Please, Riki, move—” He moved.
The front counter was cold under your hands and he was warm everywhere else — his chest against yours, his mouth at your throat, his hips rolling into you in a rhythm that started slow and deliberate and got less controlled as it went. “You feel—” He broke off. His jaw set. “Every time. Like the first time, every—”
“Don’t stop talking,” you said. “I like it when you talk.”
He made a rough sound. “You like it.”
“Yes—”
“Good girl for telling me.” His pace shifted deeper and you choked on a breath. “Good girl for always — fuck — for always telling me what you want—”
“Riki—”
“I’ve got you.” His hand slid between you, found your clit, and you arched. “I’ve got you, come on, cum for me, you can—”
“I just—”
“I know.” His thumb circled. “Do it again. Come on. Let me feel you cum on my cock, Y/N—”
The degradation and the praise all tangled together and his thumb and the ladder on every stroke and his voice at your ear and you shattered again — harder this time, your whole body locking up, his name loud enough that it bounced off the dark walls—
He followed you. His rhythm breaking, his breath gone, his hands gripping the counter so hard you heard his rings knock against it — and the sound he made when he came was the broken one, the helpless one, the one you collected and kept.
After the both of you on the front counter, you sitting, him leaning against it beside you. Still not fully dressed. The playlist had long since ended and the shop was quiet except for both of you getting your breathing back. You looked at the flash art on the walls. “We just did that on the front counter,” you said.
“We did.”
“Where clients sit.”
“I’ll clean it.”
You looked at him. He looked back with the wrecked-and-unbothered expression, his hair completely destroyed, his rings catching the low light. “You’re not even slightly embarrassed,” you said.
“No.” Simple. His hand found your knee. “Are you?”
You thought about it. “No.” He smiled. The real one.
You leaned your head on his shoulder and he turned his face into your hair and you sat on the front counter of Studio 13 at midnight and the warmth of it — the us of it — felt like something you could live inside. “Stay,” he said. Into your hair.
“At yours?”
“Here. Couch in the back.” His hand moved at your knee. “Don’t want you to go yet.”
You lifted your head. Looked at his face. “Riki. I’m not going anywhere,” you said.
His eyes moved over yours. The thing behind them — the possessive, careful, quietly terrified thing that drove the jealousy and the silence and the hand always finding yours — settled. “I know,” he said. Like he was practicing believing it.
“I know you know.” You put your hand on his jaw. “I’m telling you anyway.” He turned his face into your palm. Brief. Eyes closing for just a second.
Then he stood up, pulled you off the counter, kept your hand in his. “Couch,” he said.
“Couch,” you agreed.
You were asleep within minutes with Riki’s jacket over you and his voice low in the background talking to someone on the phone — his brother, you thought, distantly, the conversation too quiet to hear properly — and the red light under the door and the smell of ink and his hoodie under your cheek.
You were asleep and warm and his and the storm was three weeks away. It felt like nothing could touch this.
Daniel texted your friend Soo on a Wednesday night. She didn’t tell you immediately. That was the first thing — she sat on it for four days, turning it over, looking at the record he’d sent her, reading it and rereading it. The charge. The conviction. The length of the sentence. Assault. Grievous bodily harm. Victim: female.
She read those words and thought about you and made a decision she believed was the right one. She texted you on a Sunday.
You were at Riki’s flat. Sunday morning, late, the good kind of late — his record player going, both of you in the kitchen, you on the counter watching him make coffee with the focused competence he brought to everything. His hair was wrecked. He had a bruise on his collarbone that was your fault and he’d looked at it in the mirror that morning with an expression of complete satisfaction that had made you throw a pillow at him. Your phone lit up on the counter beside you.
Soo: hey can we talk today. it’s important.
Soo: it’s about Riki.
You looked at the screen. “What,” Riki said. He’d clocked your face without turning around. He did that.
“Soo wants to talk.” You kept your voice neutral. “About you.”
He turned. Read your expression. His jaw did the thing — the subtle set — but his voice stayed even. “What about me?”
“She didn’t say.”
A pause. He looked at the coffee. Back at you. “When?”
“Today apparently.” He nodded. Said nothing. Turned back to the coffee and you watched his shoulders and thought about the tension in them and didn’t ask.
You met Soo at the coffee place near yours at two. She was already there when you arrived. She had her hands around her cup and her expression was the one she got when she was about to say something she’d rehearsed — careful, prepared, slightly guilty around the edges. You sat down. “Just tell me,” you said.
She put her phone on the table. Turned it to face you. A screenshot. A public record database. The name — Nishimura Riki — and below it the details, dry and legal and devastating in their simplicity. Charge: Assault occasioning grievous bodily harm. Victim: Female, 28. Sentence: 14 months. Probation: 12 months.
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pairing :: nishimura riki x fem!reader
warnings :: shy!reader, strangers to lovers, college/uni au, drug usage, petnames, mutual friends, fluff, light angst, pub❤️, imperceptible time skips (but they are there in my head), size diff, unprotected sex, dirty talk, miscommunication, overstim, condescension, dom!riki, riding, slight spit play, corruption kink
word count :: 2.5k
a/n :: #larp because my plug is literally an Angel sent from heaven Jus4Me
dealer!riki who has a reputation for being the moodiest guy you’ll ever meet. he’s polite enough when people approach him, but his trademark sour grimace rarely leaves his face. you’ve only seen him smiling once in the two years you’d known of him, when sitting with this small group of friends (if you could even call them that) in the pub. he lives alone in a flat just outside campus which occasionally hosts parties that you’ve only ever heard stories about because of how small he keeps his circle.
dealer!riki who gets slightly annoyed when jake randomly messages him asking if he can give one of his friends a discount. he reluctantly agrees (after much convincing), only because jake rarely asks him for favours. but he fully expects it to be a quick transaction, he unconsciously assumes to be with a guy too.
dealer!riki who’s caught completely off guard when it's you that meets him on the steps outside one of his lecture halls and not one of the guys that jake usually hangs out with. he’s rendered speechless for a few seconds after hearing your sweet voice, “hi, ‘m jake’s friend,” you muttered out, starting at the floor, obviously nervous. he held back the urge to coo at you after you just asked him for a few prerolls, sheepishly telling him that you never really learned how to roll for yourself. he just smirked before noting the way your gaze dropped to the ground again. he really didn’t want you to feel shy or scared so he told you, in the kindest tone he could muster up, “i’ll give ‘em to you in a few hours, sweetheart,”
dealer!riki who feels endless enamoured by your trusting nature. to be fair, he did text you to ask for your address to drop them round, but he hadn’t expected you to obey so willingly. he didn’t usually do house calls but he thought he’d make an exception for you :3 after all, he’d have to go home and roll a few up for you anyways…
dealer!riki who knocks quietly on your apartment door at 6pm that same day, hands awkwardly shoved in his pockets as he tries to mentally prepare himself to be met with your pretty face again. you open the door with wide eyes and thank him probably more times than you should, shy smile on your face as you take the little sealed bag from his hand, eyes crinkling a little at the corners after noticing the pink paper he’s rolled them in (which he bought especially for you) :p
dealer!riki who starts throwing in random extras whenever you text him. completely unrelated things too. he asks jake for information on you, attempting nonchalance while trying not to sound like an absolute creep, only to hear that you don’t smoke often at all and that you really like cats. he just rolls his eyes at the limited details but doesn’t push, not wanting to draw attention to the fact that he’d never asked about any one of jake’s friends before, and jake had many. the next time you text him he throws in a pack of garishly cute kitty sticky notes that sunoo had given him mid-lecture ages ago, previously shoved so far into the back of his drawer that he almost had to unscrew the whole thing to find them.
dealer!riki who feels like the stupidest guy in the world when you just giggle in the face of (what he thought to be) a very bold declaration of affection. “what the fuck is this?” you exclaim at him through forcibly stifled laughs at the door of your apartment. he shoves away his embarrassment just to tell you, “jake told me you like cats.” a wave of relief washes over him when your face softens, albeit, you were still giggling, but now the back of your hand was pressed over your mouth before you thanked him, eyes shining with a pinky promise that you’ll use them well :)
dealer!riki who wants to abolish every rumour about himself, who wants everyone’s perception of him as this scary and sullen guy to change because he’s still so bothered by the way you continue to seem nervous around him. he notices how you still avoid meeting his gaze, your cheeks pink while your hands fidget. the only explanation for this in his head is that you’re probably a little bit frightened by him, which absolutely upsets him to acknowledge :(
dealer!riki who decides he needs to actively try to become the nicest person alive when it comes to you and you only. he goes out of his way to try and remember the little things about you after he remembers sunghoon telling him about how “girls absolutely lap that shit up,” his notes app is full of your drink orders and your favourite songs and your little mannerisms that he hopes with all of his being that he’s the only one who notices. he smiles more around you. it started out a little forced, as a way to deter you from breaking eye contact or feeling shy around him, but ends up natural. he really can’t keep a straight face in your presence anymore, even if he tried :)
dealer!riki who finds excuses to see you when he realises that you hardly ever buy from him. he waits outside your lecture buildings every now and then, dragging his hand over face, rolling his eyes at himself and imagining how much of an absolute perv he probably looked like to everybody else. it was all worth it though when he got to see your pretty face, backpack slung over one shoulder as you quirked your head in his direction. “wanted to walk you home,” he says simply after you reach the same step he’s on, trying not to look too excited when he realises that you now meet his gaze with ease, looking up at him through your lashes before accepting his quick offer of carrying your bag.
dealer!riki who refuses to let you pay for anything from him after a few weeks of your first meeting, much to your dismay. he thought it was so cute how you insisted on paying in full so desperately, traces of anger in your tone before you gave in, accepting his bullshit excuses about discount stacking and other completely fabricated on the spot rationalisations leading to you getting 20 quid worth of product for free every week :3
dealer!riki who refers to you as his girl to the few of his friends that he's let in on the secret of his childish crush on you. jake and heeseung try their hardest not to act shocked, and to show nothing other than subtle amusement on their faces as to not scare him off from talking about you like this. it’s the first time they’d ever heard him even speak about a girl, let alone with so much reverence and adoration in his tone.
dealer!riki who develops the softest voice imaginable whenever he talks to you. people swear he’s a different person because the same guy that was arguing about prices with someone like his life was on the line ten minutes ago is now quietly asking if you’ve bought a jacket because it’s getting colder outside and he notices you shiver. when you tell him no he’s already draping his own coat around your shoulders, helping you put your arms through the sleeves and cooing at you when he sees how oversized it is on you, you looked as though it was swallowing you up, fabric just barely hanging onto your frame :(
dealer!riki who thinks about asking you out on a real date a month after he’d met you for the first time. he hesitates before asking jake and heeseung how to go about it, before being gently scolded by sunghoon for way overthinking it and then deciding, of his own accord, that he’d skip the formalities and just ask you to be his girlfriend instead. you of course, say yes. but not before asking him to take you on a date first!
nsfw under div🤓
dealer!riki who tries so hard to take it slow with you, content to just make out on the sofa with you perched in his lap, hoping you wouldn’t notice him rock hard under you as he held back his tongue from plunging further into your mouth like he’d like to do. his hands stayed firmly planted on your hips, the instinctual urge to run them up your shirt forced away before he moved one large palm up to cup your cheek :(
dealer!riki who’s convinced you’ll be the death of him when you sheepishly admit that you always thought it was him who was the nervous one. that it was him who was hesitant to take the next step with you. little did you know he’d been trying his absolute hardest to follow your lead, not even bringing up anything remotely sexual until you did first. he would’ve laughed when you’d told him this if it wasn’t for the sinking pit in his stomach, a harsh reminder of all of the things you both could’ve done together in the few weeks you’d been dating, a rude awakening of how well he could’ve learned the ways of your body by now if it wasn’t for this miscommunication.
dealer!riki who’s almost ashamed of how much he loves teaching you new things. how much he loves the way you clench around him when you’re on top for the first time, your legs folded and your hands planted firmly on his shoulders as you bounce up and down, screwing your eyes shut when he reaches a hand up to toy at your nipple. he thinks it’s the most beautiful sight he’s ever seen, even more so because he knows he’s the first one to see it, the thought promoting an involuntary twitch inside of you. and he ends up teaching you more about even your own body. you’d thought for the longest time it was impossible to cum more than once, but he’d quickly proved you wrong with his nimble fingers and his warm, wet tongue :3
dealer!riki who tries to slowly get you out of your shell even more so, who reminds you constantly that it’s okay to ask for what you want when you want it. you’d never been one to ask for help, or even voice the things that you wanted and desired. you knew this and riki knew this, and without your knowledge, he’d made the decision that this would stop, at least with him. he wanted you to feel comfortable enough around him to trust him in knowing the secrets of your needs. and maybe he went about it the wrong way, but it definitely worked! he’d been fingering you for what felt like hours now, your third orgasm threatening to rear it’s head as you clutched desperately at any part of him you could reach, tears brimming in your eyes at the stimulation. “ki…” you whined out with no further explanation. he understood. “you want more, baby? want my cock?” he almost felt a little annoyed at himself for giving in so easily, hoping that you’d be the one to ask him. you just looked up at him with that glassy gaze, assuming he’d take that as a yes like he always did. instead, “well then… you gotta ask me for it. you gotta tell me how bad you want it, sweetheart. if not, you’re gonna have to settle with just my fingers tonight.” typically, you wouldn’t mind. but today, you felt like you’d actually wither away if you couldn’t get him inside of your wet heat. it wasn’t long before you were muttering out borderline nonsensical begging, much to his surprise. he thought i’d take much longer to coax it out of you, but not unusually, he didn’t realise just how bad you needed him :(
dealer!riki who loves when you let him fuck you when you’re high because of how whiny you get. the mewling and whimpers that you’d normally hold back through clenched teeth are let free at full force, making lasting long enough inside of you to get you off too a much more difficult feat for him. but he’d never dream of asking you to be quieter, not in a million years, especially because he thinks you feel as though you have to be high to release your inhibitions in such a way, that being around him isn’t enough of a catalyst. he probably gets really in his head about it, only to come to the sudden realisation a few months later that you now act this way all the time with him, whether you’re pleasantly high or stone cold sober :)
dealer!riki who ALSO loves it when you let him fuck you when you’re high because you’re not afraid to be messier. usually, you’ll grimace slightly when you feel a mix of shared spit run down your chin, almost imperceptible in the way that your face screws up. but of course, he notices. he notices how you wince when you feel the slick from your cunt and his cum running steadily down your thighs. he notices how you cringe when he pulls his body away from yours, the thin sheen of sweat covering both of you now perceptible. so of course, he notices when you pay no mind to any of these things, and sometimes, when you begin to revel in them :p
dealer!riki who absolutely abuses dirty talk when he finds out how much his shy girl loves it. the pink that spreads deeper across your cheeks and neck doesn’t go unnoticed by him when he calls you his filthy girl, when he ducks down to whisper into your ear how he’s never had pussy like this, how nobody’s ever taken him as good as you do. your whines increase tenfold, and now you’re pawing at his chest from below, pussy clenching around him so tight he gets a little dizzy :3
dealer!riki who’s not all that shocked to find out you’re not as shy as you sometimes seem, at least, not in the bedroom. it’s taken him a while to get you to this point, to get you comfortable enough to instigate. but once you start, he can’t get enough, purposefully winding you up, spreading his thighs wide over the couch or winding his arms around your waist in public, lips brushing over your neck just to feel you press your thighs together. just to see your usually wide eyes look up at him, now squinted, gaze ever so slightly distant as you do a bad job of hiding the effect he has on you. as soon as you step through the door you’re all over him, grabbing his face and pulling it down to yours to press a harsh kiss to his lips, ignoring the smirk you could feel spreading across his face and choosing instead to pull at his shirt, signalling that you wanted it off... and who was he to deny you :3
taglist :: @nishimurarik, @luvpocket, @enteaura, @contactviaemail, @gojopolo, @rikiiholiic
↳ comment to be added ᵎᵎ
𝜗𝜚 n. riki x reader
&&. idol!riki x uni student!reader. fluff. fem-implied reader. some suggestive humor. teasing as a love language. est. relationship. fake idgafer niki (he’s in luv). main masterlist.
all content is purely fictional !
shit i do instead of actually preparing for my exams 💔 #my chungus life
黑穗病 ─── older! Sugar daddy! niki x student! sugar baby! reader. Contains NSFW. Reader is 18. Niki is around 25. Reader is spoiled.
A/N idk how to do this or make proper storylines so these are just drabbles hope yall still enjoy them doee cuz i luv niki. Forgive me for the wordcount cuz i yap tew much and add details. ♡
TW idk how to do tws just your usual stuff, nothing weird. My fics are self-indulgent and that's the only thing yall have to worry abt.
Too fast.
The city is asleep. The penthouse isn't.
You know because you can hear your own heartbeat thrumming in your ears, loud and reckless, as Niki's mouth finds that spot just below your jaw. The spot he's not supposed to know about because you never give him too much time.
But he found it anyway. Of course he did.
You're sprawled across his bed-the one with the grey silk sheets you made him buy, the ones that feel like water against your bare legs. The late-night light filters through the floor-to-ceiling windows, casting everything in shades of blue and silver. It catches the curve of your collarbone. The shine of your freshly moisturized skin. The way your chest rises and falls beneath the tight black lace dress you put on an hour ago.
The dress is short. Dangerously short. The kind of short that makes his jaw tighten every time he looks at you. The neckline plunges low-too low, probably-the lace struggling to contain the soft, full swell of your tits. Every breath you take pushes them closer to spilling over. You know he's noticed. You've caught him looking at least fourteen times since you walked out of his bathroom.
Right now, he's not just looking.
His body is pressed against yours, one knee between your thighs, his weight braced on his forearms so he doesn't crush you. Considerate, even when he's hungry. His lips trail from your jaw to your throat, open-mouthed and slow, like he's tasting something expensive.
You tilt your head back. Let him.
"Mnph," you breathe.
The sound is soft. Accidental. You didn't mean to let it slip.
His teeth graze your pulse point in response. A warning. A promise.
Your fingers find the fabric of his shirt-black, thin, unbuttoned at the collar-and fist it. Hard, pulling him closer.
"Nngh" You breathe. his tongue flicks against your skin and he groans against your neck. Low. Vibrating. You feel it in your chest, your stomach, lower.
His hand slides up your thigh. Slow. Deliberate. The lace of your dress bunches beneath his palm as he pushes it higher, inch by inch, until his thumb brushes the edge of your underwear.
Your hips jerk.
"Mmm," you whine, half protest, half plea.
He pauses. Just for a second. His lips hover over your throat.
"Okay?" he murmurs.
You don't answer with words. You tug at his shirt instead, pulling him up, and when his face is above yours-those dark eyes, that sharp jaw, that annoyingly perfect mouth- you kiss him.
His hand leaves your thigh and cups your face instead, tilting your head, deepening the angle. His tongue sweeps against your lower lip. You let him in. Just barely. Just enough to taste the mint on his breath, the coffee he had hours ago, the something that's just him.
"Mnph," you sigh into his mouth.
"mm..." he hums, swallowing the sound.
Your hands move from his shirt to his shoulders to his hair. Your nails scrape against his scalp. He shudders-barely, but you feel it-and something hot curls in your belly.
His other hand finds your waist. Your tiny waist. His fingers span almost the whole thing as he grips you, pulls you closer, grinds his hips against yours.
You squirm. "Mmmgh."
Five minutes. That's what you told yourself. Five minutes of letting him have this. Five minutes of soft sounds and wandering hands and the kind of kissing that makes your toes curl.
Five minutes. Time's up. Push him away. Say the word. Do it now before you forget how.
But his mouth is on your neck again. And his hand is sliding up your ribcage. And his thumb is brushing the underside of your breast through the lace, not quite touching where you want him to, and-
"mnhh."
Now. Do it now. You press your palms against his chest.
He doesn't stop immediately. His lips stay on your neck for one more second. Two. Like he's hoping you'll change your mind.
"Niki." Your voice is breathy. Ruined. Hardly sounds like you. "Enough."
He pulls back.
His eyes are dark. Lidded. His lips are slightly swollen from kissing you. His hair is a mess from your fingers. And face still blank because he'd rather die than let you see how much you affect him.
Your chest is heaving beneath the black lace. Your thighs are pressed together, trying to ease the ache between them. You're wet-so wet it's almost embarrassing-and he hasn't even touched you there yet.
You want more. God, you want more.
But you pout instead.
"No sex," you say, and your voice wobbles just slightly at the end. "Not yet."
He stares at you. His jaw works.
"I didn't ask for sex," he says quietly.
"You were thinking about it."
"I'm always thinking about it." Blunt. Honest. So annoyingly him. "That doesn't mean I was going to do anything."
Your hands are still fisted in his shirt. You can feel his heartbeat under your knuckles. Steady. Strong. Faster than usual.
"You were about to," you insist, pouting harder. "I could feel it."
He doesn't deny it. Just looks at you with those dark eyes, waiting.
You swallow. Your throat is dry.
"You haven't earned it yet," you say.
His eyebrow twitches. "Earned it?"
"Yeah." You lift your chin. Try to look haughty even though your whole body is trembling and your nipples are hard beneath the lace and you're pretty sure he can see your soaked panties from his angle, sitting on his heels. "Sex with me? That's not something you just get. You have to earn it. Especially since-"
You stop.
"Since what?"
Your cheeks flush. Hot and pink against your glowy, perfect skin. You hate how easily he makes you blush.
"Since it would be my first time," you mumble, looking away.
Silence.
Then: "Y/n. Look at me."
You don't want to. But your body betrays you. Your eyes find his.
His expression has changed. The hunger is still there-always there-but something else has joined it. Something softer. Something that makes your chest ache.
"Your first time," he repeats.
"Don't make it weird."
"I'm not making it weird. You just-" He exhales slowly. His thumb traces your cheekbone. "You didn't tell me."
"Why would I? It's not a big deal."
"It's a big deal."
"It's not. I'm eighteen. Lots of people my age are still-you know."
"Virgins?"
"Don't say the word. It's gross."
He almost smiles. Almost. "What word do you want me to use?"
"None. We're not talking about this." You shove at his chest again. He doesn't move. "The point is, you haven't earned it. So no sex. Not tonight. Maybe not for a long time. Maybe never if you keep being annoying."
"I'm being annoying?"
"Yes. Extremely. You're looking at me weird."
"I'm looking at you the same way I always look at you."
"Exactly. Weird."
He studies your face. Your pout. Your flushed cheeks. Your eyes, still dark and lidded from kissing him, still hazy with want you refuse to name.
"Okay," he says finally.
"Okay what?"
"Okay, I'll earn it."
You blink. "What?"
"You heard me." He pushes himself up, putting space between your bodies. The loss of his warmth makes you shiver. "You want me to earn the right to have sex with you. Fine. Tell me how."
You stare at him.
He's serious. Of course he's serious. He's always serious when it matters, even when he's pretending not to be.
"I don't know," you say. "I haven't thought about it."
"Then think about it."
"Right now?"
"You're the one who brought it up."
You huff. Cross your arms over your chest-which pushes your tits up even more, and you see his gaze flick down for half a second before returning to your face. "I didn't bring it up. I just said you haven't earned it."
"Same thing."
"It's NOT."
"Y/n."
"What."
He leans back against the headboard. Arms crossed. Watching you with that infuriating calm.
"Tell me what I have to do," he says. "Dates? Gifts? Do I need to fight someone? Learn a language? What's the requirement for sleeping with y/n?"
You chew your bottom lip. The lace of your dress scratches against your thighs. You're still wet. Still aching. Still so painfully aware of every inch of your body and every inch of his.
"I don't know," you admit quietly. "I've never done this before." You stop. Realize you're trapped. Scowl at him. "You're manipulative."
"I'm patient."
"You're annoying."
"You've said that."
"Because it's true."
He brings your hand to his mouth. Presses a kiss to your knuckles. Soft. Lingering. Your breath catches.
"I can wait," he says against your skin. "However long you need. However much I have to earn it. I can wait."
Your eyes sting. Stupid. Stupid hormones. You blink rapidly.
"You better," you say, voice thick. "Because if you sleep with someone else while you're waiting, I'll kill you."
"I'm not going to sleep with anyone else."
"How do I know that?"
"Because I'm looking at you." His eyes hold yours. Dark. Steady. "I only see you."
"Stop being romantic," you whisper. "It's weird."
"You told me to earn it. This is me earning it."
(idk how to end this lolz heh sorry guys...*scratches neck sheepishly* ONTO THE NEXT ONE!)
2. A secret
The final bell hasn't even stopped ringing.
You're already halfway down the front steps of, your arm linked through your friend's, your other hand clutching your phone like a lifeline. Your navy blue skirt swishes around your thighs-short.. Your white blouse is crisp and tight, hugging the curve of your chest just right. The top two buttons are undone. Your hair is perfect. Your skin is glowy. Your lip gloss is fresh. You feel good.
"So," Mina says, bumping her shoulder against yours, "are you gonna tell me who's been buying you all that Chrome Hearts stuff, or are you gonna keep being mysterious?"
"I'm not being mysterious. I'm being discreet."
"Same thing."
"Different things." You flip your hair over your shoulder. "Anyway, it's not important."
"Mhm." Mina grins. "Sure. That's why you showed up last week with $200 chocolates for me last week..."
You're about to retort- something dismissive- when a low engine rumble cuts through the chatter of students flooding the courtyard.
You know that sound. You know that car.
No. Please god not today.
Your eyes blink over toward the front gate.
A matte black McLaren. (I know nothing abt cars *ohio scared*) Tinted windows so dark you can't see inside. The engine purring insanely loud, drawing every single pair of eyes in a fifty-meter radius.
Students stop walking. Phones come out. Whispers start. And the driver's door opens.
Long legs. Black trousers. black button-down, sleeves rolled to the elbows, exposing veined forearms and that one silver ring he never takes off. Dark hair falling over his forehead. Jaw sharp enough to cut glass.
Your heart drops straight through the concrete.
"Who is THAT?" Mina breathes.
"No one," you say too quickly. "I don't know him."
"He's looking right at us."
"He's not." You grab Mina's arm and start dragging her toward the side gate. "Come on. Let's go. I want boba."
"He's walking toward us, y/n."
"He's not."
"He literally is."
You risk a glance.
He is.
Niki is walking toward you with that infuriating nonchalant stride—slow, unhurried, like he has all the time in the world and he knows you're not going anywhere. His hands are in his pockets. His lips are curved into the tiniest smirk.
The crowd of students parts for him like the Red Sea.
Because of course it does.
"Y/N!" Mina hisses. "Why is a man in a McLaren walking toward us?"
"I don't KNOW him."
"Then why is he saying your name?"
"Y/n," Niki calls again. Louder this time. His voice carries across the courtyard like velvet over gravel. "You forgot your jacket."
He's holding something. A black leather jacket. Your black leather jacket. The one you left in his car this morning because you were running late and he was kissing your neck and you couldn't think straight.
You want to die.
You want the concrete to open up and swallow you whole.
Every single student in a ten-meter radius is now staring at you. Including Mina, whose mouth has formed a perfect O.
"I don't know him," you repeat, tugging harder on Mina's arm. "He's crazy. Let's go."
"Y/n." Niki's voice is closer now. Calm. Amused. "Don't make me chase you in front of your friends."
Your face burns. You can feel the heat crawling up your neck, flooding your cheeks, turning your ears pink. Your perfect composure. Your untouchable image. Gone. Wrecked. Ruined by a man who won't take a hint.
You stop walking. Turn around.
Past a sea of whispering students, you see him standing there. Sunglasses pushed up into his hair now. Dark eyes fixed on you. That stupid, sexy smirk still playing on his lips.
He's enjoying this.
The bastard is enjoying this.
"Hi," you say, and your voice comes out two octaves too high. "Um. Hi. Hello."
"Hi, baby." He holds out the jacket. "You left this."
Baby.
He said baby. In front of everyone.
You grab the jacket out of his hand so fast it's almost violent. "Thanks. Bye. Don't come here again."
"Who's your friend?" Niki asks, completely ignoring you. His gaze shifts to Mina. Polite. Charismatic. The full Nishimura Riki charm offensive.
"I'm Mina," she says dreamily. "I'm her best friend. She's never mentioned you."
"That's because I'm-"
"A DISTANT RELATIVE," you shout.
Silence.
You feel the sweat drop forming on your temple. Your smile is so wide it hurts. Your eyes are darting left and right, catching snippets of whispered conversations.
Is that her boyfriend?
He looks way older.
That car costs like half a million dollars.
"He's my… cousin," you babble. "Second cousin. Once removed. From- from Japan. He's visiting. Very distant. Very, very distant. We barely know each other."
Niki raises an eyebrow.
You glare daggers at him. Play along or I will end you.
"Right," Niki says slowly. "Cousin."
"Second cousin," you correct loudly.
"Second cousin," he repeats. "Once removed."
"From Japan," you add.
"From Japan," he agrees. His smirk is back. Bigger this time. "I'm here to pick up my… cousin… from school. Because her car is in the shop."
"My car is not-"
"It is now."
You stare at him.
He stares back, utterly unbothered.
Mina looks between the two of you, clearly not buying a single word. But she's a good friend, and she loves you, so she just nods slowly and says, "Cool. Distant relative. Very distant. Got it."
"Thank you," you say through gritted teeth.
You turn back to Niki. Lower your voice to a furious whisper. "What are you doing here? You can't just show up at my school. People are going to talk."
"I don't care if people talk."
"I CARE."
"Why?" He tilts his head. Innocent. Fake. "I'm just your distant relative."
You're about to unleash a string of insults that would make a sailor blush when you notice the crowd. Still watching. Still whispering. Still filming on their phones.
Your beautiful, perfect reputation. Down the drain.
You grab Niki's arm - his very solid, very warm arm - and drag him toward the car. Mina follows, giggling under her breath.
"You're getting in the car with your distant relative?" Mina calls out.
"He's giving me a ride," you snap. "Because he's family. That's what family does."
"I thought you didn't know him."
"I don't. I mean-I do. Barely. He's just-look, Mina, I'll explain later, okay? Just tell everyone he's my weird uncle or something."
"He looks young for an uncle."
"WEIRD YOUNG UNCLE."
Niki opens the passenger door for you. Because of course he does.
You climb in before anyone can get another photo. The leather seat is warm. The car smells like him-sandalwood and clean laundry and something addictive.
Niki closes the door, walks around the front, and slides into the driver's seat. The engine rumbles to life.
He doesn't drive.
He just sits there. Looking at you.
"What?" you say.
"Nothing."
"Then why are you staring?"
"Just enjoying the view." His eyes drop to your skirt. Your blouse. The undone buttons. "You look cute in your uniform."
"We're in a parking lot. Drive."
"Say please."
"I'll bite you."
"Promises, promises."
He pulls out of the school gates. The crowd of students fades behind you. You let out a breath you didn't know you were holding.
"I can't believe you did that," you mutter, sinking into the seat. "I'm going to get so many questions tomorrow."
"Then tell them the truth."
"The truth?" You turn to stare at him. "That I go around using old stupid men for their money. That-"
"That you're mine," he interrupts quietly.
The word hangs in the air.
Mine.
You look away. Your cheeks are burning. Your stupid, traitorous heart is doing something stupid and traitorous in your chest.
"I'm not yours," you whisper.
"Okay."
"I belong to no one."
"Okay."
"And I'm still mad at you for showing up unannounced."
"I know."
"AND-" You run out of steam. Deflate. "And you're supposed to say sorry."
"For what?"
"For embarrassing me."
"I didn't embarrass you. I brought you your jacket."
"You called me baby in front of my entire school."
"You are my baby."
"STOP SAYING THINGS."
He laughs. Quiet. Low. His hand leaves the steering wheel and finds your thigh, just above your knee. His thumb traces a slow circle against the bare skin below your skirt.
You don't push him away.
"Your friend seemed nice," he says.
"Mina's the best."
"Tell her the truth."
"I told you, I can't."
"Why not?"
You chew your bottom lip. Stare out the window at the city rushing past.
"Because they'll think I'm using you," you say finally. "Which I am. But it's not-it's not just that. You know it's not just that...it's embarrassing"
His hand stills on your thigh.
"I know," he says.
"Then why do you keep pushing?"
"Because I don't want to be your secret forever."
You turn to look at him. Really look at him. The sharp line of his jaw. The dark fall of his hair. The way his eyes are focused on the road, but his thumb is still moving against your skin, slow and gentle.
"You're not my secret," you say softly. "You're just… complicated."
"I'm not complicated. I'm a guy who likes a girl. The girl makes it complicated."
"Hey." You slap his arm. "I'm not complicated. I'm simple. I want money and clothes and attention and-"
"And me."
"And fine. Yes. And you." You huff. "Happy?"
"Ecstatic."
You're quiet for a moment. The city lights are starting to flicker on, painting the inside of the car in gold and shadow.
"Niki?"
"Yeah?"
"Don't pick me up from school again."
"No promises."
"NIKI."
"I said no promises."
You groan and drop your head against the headrest. "You're impossible."
"You love it."
"I hate it."
"Same thing."
You turn your face toward the window so he can't see you smile. But he sees. He always sees.
His hand squeezes your thigh once, then returns to the steering wheel.
"Let's get dinner," he says. "Then shopping. Then home."
"I want Italian."
"Okay."
"And gelato."
"Okay."
"And I want to try on your new Chrome Hearts chain."
"You always want to try on my things."
"Because they look better on me."
He glances at you. Just for a second. But that second is enough.
"Yeah," he says quietly. "They do." (i wanted to make some fluff even tho i hate it..this instance is an exception...ok moving on time for smut)
3. First and last time.
You're lying on your back on the edge of the bed. The gray silk sheets are cool against your bare legs. Your tiny dress-black lace, lace straps, barely covering anything-is rucked up around your hips, pink lace panties wide on display. Your hair is spread across the pillow like a dark halo. Your skin is glowing, flawless, catching the light in all the right places.
His body is pressed against yours.
Niki's lips are on your neck. His teeth graze your pulse point. His hips are grinding against yours, slow and deliberate, the thick ridge of his cock pressing against your core through the thin fabric of your panties.
Your legs are wrapped around his waist. Your ankles lock behind his back, pulling him closer.
"Mmph," you breathe.
Ten minutes.
You told yourself ten minutes. That's the deal. That's how this works. You let him kiss you, let him touch you, let him grind against you for exactly ten minutes. Then you push him off. Always. Nothing more. Nothing which you weren't ready for yet.
Last time, it was five.
You'd been so proud of yourself. Five whole minutes of self-control. Five minutes of soft moans and wandering hands before you pressed your palm against his chest and said enough.
This time, you'd given him ten. You're not sure what came over you.
Maybe it's the way he looked at you when he came home-dark eyes, hungry mouth, that infuriating smirk. Maybe it's the way your body aches for him, even when your brain says no.
Whatever it is, you're losing.
His mouth finds yours. Your lips part. His tongue sweeps inside. You taste mint and coffee and something that's just him.
"Mnngh," you hum against his lips.
His hand slides up your thigh. His fingers brush against the damp spot on your panties. You gasp.
"Already wet," he murmurs against your mouth. "And we're only at minute six."
"S-Shut up."
"You're so sensitive, baby." His thumb presses against your clit through the wet fabric. Your hips buck. A broken sound escapes your throat. "Ah-"
"Shh." He kisses your jaw. "We still have four minutes."
You're not going to last four minutes.
You know it. He knows it. Your body is trembling, your nipples hard beneath the lace of your dress, your core aching and empty and desperate and he's RIGHT there.
"Please," you whisper.
"Please what?"
"Please-"
"What do you want, y/n?"
You can't say it. You can't give him that power.
He grinds against you again. Harder this time. His cock slides against your entrance through the fabric, and you feel every inch of him, thick and hot and so fucking big.
"Ngh-ki-"
"Tell me."
"Please-please-"
"Tell me what you want." Your eyes are lidded, your lips parted, your breathing ragged.
"I want you," you breathe. "I want-I want you inside me."
His eyes darken. "That's my girl."
His lips crash against yours. His hands find your dress. He rips it-the thin fabric tearing down the middle like it's made of paper.
You gasp. "That was expensive-"
"Don't care."
His mouth finds your chest. His lips close around one of your nipples through the lace of your bra. You arch into him, a desperate sound falling from your lips.
"Ah—ki… mngh…"
He reaches behind and unclasps it easily. His hand slides down. He hooks his fingers into the waistband of your panties. Pulls them down your legs. Tosses them somewhere in the dark.
"You're so pretty," he murmurs against your skin. "So fucking pretty."
"I know," you breathe, gulping. He laughs. Quiet. Warm.
And then his hand is between your legs, his fingers sliding through your folds, finding you slick and ready and aching.
"Look at you," he murmurs. "So wet for me."
"Shut up."
"So needy."
"Niki-"
"Mm?"
"Just-please-"
"Please what?" You whimper. A frustrated, desperate sound.
"Please fuck me."
His eyes go dark. "Say it again."
"Fuck me. Please. I need-I need you inside me. Please, Niki. Please."
He kisses you. Hard. Deep.
And then he's unzipping his pants, pushing them down just enough, and you feel him—the thick head of his cock pressing against your entrance.
You tense.
"Relax," he murmurs against your lips.
"You're so-"
"Shh."
He pushes in. Just the tip. Just enough to stretch you. And it hurts.
"Ngh-" Your nails dig into his shoulders. "Niki-it's too-"
"Breathe."
"Can't-"
"Yes you can. Breathe, baby."
You inhale. Shaky. Broken.
He pushes in deeper. Your walls stretch around him, too tight, too much. Your eyes water.
"It won't fit," you whimper. "It's too big. Niki, it's too big-"
"Shh. It'll fit."
"No-it won't-"
He stills. Waits. His forehead presses against yours.
"Trust me," he whispers.
You trust him.
You always trust him.
He pushes in more. Slow. Careful. Your body resists, then yields, then accepts. Inch by inch. You feel every vein, every ridge, every inch of him filling you completely.
"Ngh-ah-Ki-"
"There you go." His voice is strained. "There you go, baby. Taking me so well."
"I c-can't-mmph!"
"Yes you can."
He's fully inside you now. Your legs are wrapped around his waist. Your walls are fluttering around him, trying to adjust. It's too much. It's not enough.
It hurts. And then it doesn't.
"ki..." Your voice is soft, breathless. "Move."
He does. Slow at first. Pulling out inch by inch, then pushing back in. Your back arches off the bed.
"nh-mngh-"
"More?" His voice is strained. "Want more, baby?"
"Yes-please-"
He speeds up. His hips snap against yours. The sound of skin meeting skin fills the room. Your moans get louder, more desperate, your nails raking down his back. "Ah-ki-ngh...ah-!"
"Look at me."
You do. Your lidded eyes meet his.
"So pretty," he breathes. "So pretty when you fall apart for me."
"I'm not-I'm not falling apart-"
"Yes you are."
He thrusts deeper. Harder. The head of his cock hits that spot inside you that makes you see stars.
"NIKI!" Your voice cracks.
"There she is."
His lips find your neck. He bites down on your pulse point. Your whole body convulses around him.
"Ah-mngh-please-"
"Please what?"
"I need-"
"Need what, baby?"
"I need-"
"Tell me."
"I need-" You're so close. So close. "I need to-I need to-"
"Come for me."
"Niki-"
"Come for me, y/n."
Your release crashes over you. Your back arches off the bed. Your fingers claw at his back.
He follows you. His hips stutter. His body tenses. He buries himself deep and spills inside you, his face pressed against your neck, his breath hot on your skin.
"Fuck," he breathes.
You're both shaking. Both panting. Both completely undone.
He doesn't pull out. He stays inside you. His weight presses you into the mattress. His lips press lazy kisses along your jaw. (i dont know how to end this ohio cry)
