wiihan

The smell of a new apartment is refreshing.

It's a fresh start, a blank slate for you to decorate, and goddamn, was it expensive. You stand in the doorway, eyes staring at 2 years' worth of savings. It's hard to believe you finally own your own place, away from bad roommates and annoying siblings.

"Babeee, You've been staring for hours. Can we go in now?"

Your boyfriend's whining behind you pulls you from your thoughts, a reminder you aren't completely alone. You giggle as he shuffles past you, a "wow" falling from his mouth as he takes in the space himself.

You remain idle as he ventures further into the apartment, leaving you alone at the entrance. Old memories start to flood through your mind as you step into the emptiness, the floorboards creaking with every step: this was one of the cheaper options.

You remember when you first met Leehan during your exchange year to Korea; it was your first time traveling outside of your home country, so you were awfully confused.

You weren't sure how to work the ATM at the convenience store next to your university; it was embarrassing, especially since there was a man behind you grumbling because you were taking too long. You almost gave up before Leehan approached you.

His personality was warm, his smile shining brighter than any star you've seen; nothing has changed since then.

What you recall specifically are his brown eyes; they never left you as you fumbled your way through the steps, almost dropping your card because of the proximity between you both.

You got his number after that—

"Sweetheart, come here!"

—and now you're here, about to officially start your life together.

You dive deeper into your mind, pulling out emotions and moments you haven't thought properly about in a while. You find yourself pulling at your own heartstrings as you enter the room Leehan called you into.

"Come see,"

He's looking out the window; you can see his eyes sparkle in the reflection as he takes in the view. You join him, your hands resting on his shoulders as you lean in to take a good look.

"..The city?"

Leehan shakes his head. He takes your hand from his shoulder and places it on top of the glass; you open your fingers, squinting at the sudden blue light bursting from behind your palm.

"There's a pet shop that sells fish across the street." 

Your heart swells at his boyish tone. You stare at his reflection, pupils dilating at the sight of his eyes turning into crescents. You watch as he swallows and turns towards you, meeting you.

"Don't look at me like that.." He mutters, averting his eyes to a corner in the room. You smile as blush creeps up his neck.

"Aww, but I think it's cute that you want to become a dad early—"

"Ugh, shut up."

You snort as your boyfriend wrestles you to the ground; he pins your wrists above you, panting slightly. 

It's suddenly quiet; Leehan gazes at you with nothing but love in his eyes, you shrink under it. Quite like you did earlier, you get back into your head. You have flashbacks to your first date, when he met your parents, to years of barely eating to save for this place, and now finally having it. You're overcome with emotions, and before you can stop it, tears well in your eyes.

Leehan instantly tenses, his hand coming down to your cheek in an attempt to soothe you.

"Wait- please don't cry. Why are you crying?" He questions, leaning down to kiss the wetness off your face.

"It's hard to explain," You start, sniffling as your boyfriend pampers you. (You also try to force out a few more tears so it lasts longer.) He hums in response and rolls off of you, lying on his side next to you on the floor.

"Well, good thing I have time."

A smile makes its way onto your face as you turn towards him, now doing everything to avoid eye contact.

"I guess I'm overwhelmed with my emotions. I'm happy, but then I remember how hard it was to get here, and then I don't know how to feel."

"I think you should be proud of how far you've come."

You pause at the quick response; you never thought of it in that way. You did sacrifice loads to be here: money, time, your mental health, almost everything. Leehan is right; you should feel accomplished for this journey.

"You have a way of saying things," You finally respond, wiping the excess tears from your cheeks.

"Do I now?"

"I'm serious."

He slowly rises from the floor; he seems surprised. You mimic his movements, eventually gaining the courage to make eye contact with him.

"Anytime I talk to you, I feel instantly better. It's hard to believe I deserve you."

Leehan rolls his eyes, blush returning to his pretty face. You can tell your words touched him, even if he didn't say anything.

You both sit there in silence, soaking in the moment while it lingers. Though reality returns to you in a cold chill. You realize how numb your legs are from the chilly floorboards.

"How about blowing up that air mattress now?" You break the silence, wrapping your arms around yourself.

"Yes, please, I was about to say the same thing." Leehan groans, stumbling to his feet.

You both laugh as you run back out of your apartment, broke, with barely any furniture, but still happy to be with each other.

a / n : HEY finally pushed this out, I can feel myself slowly start liking writing again😛😛 maybe this is good for me. ANYWAYS LIAAA I HOPE YOU ENJOY LOVELY

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PERM ๑　@beomtomie @leehanisleehaning @ajjaehyun @leeknowramona @wensurr @vanillakirstein @lovehakie @wishieyu

a/n: this is my first time trying a smau, so I’m still learning as I go. it might be a little messy, but I hope it’s still fun to read. thanks for being here and giving it a chance <3

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You met leehan long before he got his spidey powers. Back then, he was just kim leehan, an awkward freshman who seemed to always have his nose buried in a book or newspaper. He was neither popular nor athletic and certainly not the kind of guy people fought to sit beside at lunch. Everyone overlooked him entirely. Except the bullies.

One afternoon, you watched a group of boys bump into him in the hallway. Newspapers slipping from his arm and scattering across the floor. One of them laughed, mocking his ‘collection’. Another crouched down beside him as if to help and for a moment, leehan looked hopeful. Then the boy ripped a page straight out of one of his notebooks. The group cackled with laughter. You expected leehan to yell, to get angry. Instead, he just smiled. A small smile. The bullies eventually got bored and left. The second they disappeared around the corner, you went up to him, knelt down and helped him gather some scattered papers.

“How are you not angry?..” you ask. That earned a laugh from him, “trust me, i am.” for the first time, you noticed it. The frustration hidden beneath his smile. The way his fingers crumpled the edge of the newspaper. The exhaustion in his eyes. “I just don’t think it’d change anything,” he admitted softly. You looked at him for a moment before handing back the last page, “well for what it’s worth.. I think they’re idiots.”

Leehan blinked. Then a genuine smile appeared on his face, “thanks.”

From that moment on, you started spending more time together. One conversation became two. Two became dozens. You walked home together after school, studied together in libraries, texted each other until neither of you could keep your eyes open. And along the way, somewhere, you stopped being just the girl who helped him pick up papers in the hallway. You became his favourite person. And before either of you realized it, you were no longer just schoolmates. You were his girlfriend. And he was your boyfriend.

By sophomore year, you began noticing changes in leehan. At first they were small. The shy boy who used to stumble over his words now had a comeback ready for almost anything you said. He teased you more often, flashed smug little smirks whenever he won an argument. And somehow carried himself with a confidence you had never seen before. 

“You’re staring.” you blinked, “what?” “you’re staring,” leehan repeated, fighting back a smug grin. “I am not.” “you literally are.” you rolled your eyes and shoved his shoulder. “You’re just so annoying.” “yet you’re still dating me,” the smug look on his face only widened.

You hated how much you liked this version of him. He seemed happier, lighter. For the first time since you’d met him, it felt like he was finally becoming comfortable in his own skin. But only around you. At school, nothing seemed to change. Leehan was still the same awkward nerd everyone loved picking on. You would still find him kneeling on the floor of crowded hallways collecting newspapers. Bullies would shove him between classes, laugh when he stumbled, and make jokes at his expense whenever teachers weren’t around. The sight always made your stomach twist. You had seen him become more confident, more capable, more willing to stand up for himself. So why? Why did he still let this happen?

One night, while the two of you were walking home, you finally asked, “why don’t you ever do anything?” leehan glanced at you. “What do you mean?” “the bullies.” his expression immediately shifted. You noticed it every time the topic came up, a brief flicker of discomfort. 

“They don’t bother me that much.” “that’s a lie.” leehan laughed weakly, “you always know when i’m lying..” “that’s because you’re terrible at it.” for a moment, neither of you spoke. Then he said quietly, “it’s easier this way.” you didn’t understand what he mean then. You simply took his hand and continued walking, unaware that leehan was carrying a secret far bigger than either of you could imagine.

And as time passed, Leehan began disappearing for hours, then days, with horrible excuses that never quite made sense. ‘Sorry something came up.’ ‘I forgot.’ ‘Let’s do it another day.’. At first, you believed him. That was until you started counting how many dates he arrived late to, how many plans he cancelled at the last minute, how many messages were left unanswered for hours.

The seasons continued changing around you, but so did he. One afternoon, when he showed up late yet again, you noticed the bruises peeking out from beneath his sleeve. Dark purple marks, far worse than anything the school bullies could have caused. Your stomach twisted, “leehan? What happened?” his hand immediately pulled the sleeve down, “nothing.”

You reached for him, desperate to understand, but he took a step back. And that.. hurt.. Leehan used to tell you everything, every embarrassing thought, every stupid fish fact that crossed his mind. He was the boy who would call you in the middle of the night just to tell you something he forgot to mention earlier.

Now, he looked at you like you were a stranger asking him questions you had no right to ask about. The distance between you grew quietly, like autumn stealing the green from leaves one day at a time, nothing seemed different at first, until the branches were suddenly bare.

And for the first time, you wondered if you were losing him. Or if you had already lost him long ago.

The argument happened on a rainy night. Maybe it was because you were tired. Maybe it was because you had spent months pretending everything was fine. Or maybe it was because you couldn’t take being shut out anymore.

“What happened to you?” you finally asked. Leehan stood silently in your doorway, rainwater dripping from his jacket.

“You keep disappearing.” silence. “You cancel everything.” silence. “You lie to me.” his jaw tightened. “Can you just tell me what’s going on?” you hated how desperate your voice sounded. “Nothing’s going on.” that was the final straw. 

“Stop saying that!” you snapped, “do you think i’m stupid?” leehan flinched, for a second, he almost told you. About the mask hidden in his room. About the bruises. About the nights spent bleeding on rooftops while trying to save strangers. But he couldn’t. So he stayed quiet. And his silence felt like an answer. Tears burned in your eyes, “you don’t love me anymore.”

His head immediately shot up, “what?” “you don’t.” “i never said that–” “you don’t have to.” your voice cracked, “you barely talk to me. You don’t tell me anything anymore. Every time i try to help, you push me away.”

Leehan opened his mouth, then closed it again. Because every explanation sounded impossible. Because telling the truth would put you in danger. Because keeping the secret was supposed to protect you. But standing there, watching you cry, it didn’t feel like protection. It felt like losing you. “You don’t understand..” he whispered. “Then make me understand.” he couldn’t. And that hurt more than any punch he had ever taken.

Months of frustration spilled our in the form of words neither of you truly meant. Words sharp enough to leave scars. “Maybe you’ve become selfish.” his face fell. “Maybe you don’t care anymore. “That’s not true.” “prove it.”

He couldn’t. And eventually, there was nothing left to say. The rain continued falling as you stepped away from him. Neither of you tried to stop the other. Maybe because you were both too hurt. Maybe because you both thought there would be another chance later. There wasn’t.

As you closed the door in his face, you believed leehan had changed. That the sweet boy you once knew had become careless. Distant. Selfish. You never saw the way his hands trembled. Or the way he stood there long after you had disappeared from his sight. For the first time since becoming spiderman, fighting villains felt easy. 

Losing you was the thing that truly broke him. 

But neither of you had truly moved on. 

Leehan still found himself watching you afar, lingering on rooftops just long enough to make sure you got home safely before disappearing into the night. And you caught yourself making room for him in your life. At the bakery, you had absentmindedly ordered two of his favourite pastries before remembering there was no one waiting beside you anymore.

Old habits were hard to break. Especially when the person you were trying to forget was never really gone.  

One night, on your way home, you took a shortcut through a narrow alleyway. The city was quiet, the only sounds coming from distant traffic and the hum of streetlights overhead.

Then you heard it. A thud. Followed by a pained groan. 

Curiosity got the better of you. You carefully peeked around the corner and froze. A figure sat slumped against a brick wall, breathing heavily. Spiderman?! His suit was torn, blood stained the fabric, fresh bruises bloomed across the exposed skin as trembling hands struggled to pull the mask back on. Then, the mask slipped. And suddenly, the world stopped. Leehan. 

Your breath caught in your throat. Every late arrival. Every cancelled date. Every unexplained bruise. Ever lie. It all made sense. The person you had spent months resenting had been spending every night throwing himself into danger for people he didn’t even know. While you thought he was abandoning you, he had been carrying a burden far heavier than either of you could bear. 

Your chest tightened painfully. Leehan wasn’t selfish. He wasn’t careless. He was exhausted. The guilt made you feel sick. Before he could tilt his head and notice you there, you stumbled backwards and ran. Not because you were scared of him. But because you finally understood. And suddenly, you didn’t know how to face him. 

That day, you were walking towards leehan’s apartment with your heart in your throat. For days, you had rehearsed what you wanted to say. An apology? An explanation? A chance to start over. 

You finally knew the truth. You finally understood why he had changed, why he had lied, why he had pushed you away. And despite everything that had happened between you, you wanted to hear his side. You wanted to tell him you were willing to try again. But you never made it to his door. Because you weren’t the only person looking for Leehan. For weeks, the green goblin had been studying spiderman’s movements. Watching. Waiting. Searching for a weakness he could exploit. 

And then he noticed you. The same face appearing around the apartment complex. The same person lingering near the building more often than coincidence could explain. He didn’t now exactly who you were. A friend? Family? A lover? It didn’t matter. If you were useful to spiderman, then you were useful.

The attack happened so quickly you had barely any time to react. One moment, you were crossing the street and the next, a gloved hand seized you from behind. A scream caught in your throat as the city disappeared beneath your feet. 

The green goblin laughed as his glider carried you into the sky, “let’s see if he comes for you.” and just like that, you became bait. You know he will. Because now you know who spiderman is. And you know leehan would never leave anyone behind him

The green goblin carefully orchestrated the entire situation, ensuring that no matter what spiderman chooses, someone will suffer. The green goblin doesn’t want to kill spiderman, he wants to break him. Weeks of watching him from the shadows had taught him something important about the city’s beloved hero, he always tries to save everyone. So the green goblin creates a situation where saving everyone is impossible.

You are taken up high to a clock tower, your wrists bound as the wind howls around you. Far below, the city continues as normal, blissfully unaware of the disaster waiting to unfold. Then, the explosions begun. Across several blocks, chaos erupted simultaneously. A packed commuter bus is left hanging over the edge of a collapsed bridge. Part of a construction site crumbles, trapping workers beneath unstable steel beams. A crowded train station is thrown into panic as debris rains from above. 

The green goblin smiles, spiderman will come. 

When leehan arrives, he’s already breathing hard. He had been patrolling for hours before receiving reports of attacks. The moment he sees you restrained that high up, something in his stops. For a second, the city disappears. There’s only you. You. alive. Terrified. Close enough that he can see the fear in your eyes. The same eyes that once looked at him with trust. The same eyes that had been filled with disappointment when you walked away from him. The same eyes he hasn’t been able to stop thinking about since. His heart lurches. Then another explosion echoes through the city. 

“Go on, spiderman.” the green goblin laughs. leehan gaze flickers toward the smoke rising in the distance. The bus. The construction site. The station. Hundred of lives. Then back to you. You watch him freeze, not because he doesn’t know what to do. Because he does. He always does. The hesitation only lasts for a moment then he’s gone. You watch him swing away. 

For a brief second, despite knowing why, despite finally understanding everything, your chest aches. The next thirty minutes feels endless. You can only watch from afar as flashes of red and blue move across the skyline. One disaster after another. One rescue after another. And with every passing minute, leehan grows slower. 

The green goblin keeps his promise. Every rescue is another trap. Every civilian saved costs spider-man something. A collapsing beam falls on his ribs. An explosion sends him crashing through concrete. By the time the last civilians are evacuated, leehan is exhausted. His suit is torn, his hands are shaking, blood stains the red fabric across his shoulder, every muscle in his body burns. But the moment the final civilian is safe, he doesn't stop the rest. He doesn’t stop the breathe, he comes back for you.

The green goblin sees him approaching and sighs dramatically, “finally.” 

The fight begins before leehan even lands. A bomb explodes beside him, throwing him across the rooftop. Concrete cracks beneath the impact. Leehan forces himself up immediately but the green goblin doesn’t give him time. 

Another attack. Then another. And another. The green goblin knows it too. Every punch lands harder. Every dodge becomes slower. Eventually, leehan crashes to the ground and doesn’t immediately get back up. For the first time, fear settles in your stomach. Not fear for yourself. Fear for him. 

The green goblin steps forward. Slowly, confidently. Like he’s already won. “You see?” he says, grabbing leehan by his hair, “this is what happens when you try to save everyone.” 

Leehan doesn’t answer, head hangs low, blood dripping onto the concrete. The green goblin laughs, then his gaze shifts towards you. And something changes. Leehan sees it. The direction of his eyes. The intention, the threat. And suddenly, every ounce of exhaustion disappears beneath pure panic. Because losing the fight is one thing. But losing you is another.

The green goblin moves. So does leehan. What happens next, is desperation. The kind born from months of regrets. Months of wishing he could tell you the truth. Months of watching you from afar because he wanted you to be safe. Months of wanting to apologize but never finding the courage. For the first time in the fight, he stops holding anything back, the battle reaches its breaking point. 

And somehow impossibly leehan wins. The green goblin falls and silence follows. The city is safe, you are safe. The fight is over. For a several seconds, leehan doesn’t move, he’s barely standing. But he removes his mask with one tug. Blood runs down his face, his suit is shredded, his hands shake from exhaustion. Then slowly, he turns to you. And despite everything, despite the breakup. Despite believing you hated him.. His first concern is still you. 

“Are you okay?” he asks immediately, his voice is strained, panicked. Like nothing else matters. Like he didn’t just fight for his life. And standing there, finally seeing the truth laid bare in front of you, you realize something devastating, leehan never stopped loving you. He just thought protecting you meant letting you hate him. 

He stumbles towards you, one hand clutching his side. “Hey.. Hang on,” he calls out, voice rough, “i’m coming.. It’s okay i got you..” the words are almost laughable. Because nothing about tonight is okay. But he says them anyway, because he wants you to believe him, because he needs to believe them himself. The concrete beneath you feet cracks. A deep, unsettling sound. Leehan’s stomach drops, “no–”

The structure gives way, and suddenly you’re falling. For one terrible second, all he sees is your expression. Surprise. Fear. then empty air. The world slows. His body moves before his mind can catch up. A web shoots from his wrist. It catches around your chest. Got you. Relief floods through him. Then he jumps, diving after you without hesitation.

The gears in the clock tower rushes past him as he falls, wind tears through his hair, his injuries scream, he ignores all of it. Because all he can think about is reaching you. As he dives, memories crash through him.

You laughing outside a bakery, holding up a pastry, force feeding him to try it.

You sitting beside him on quiet afternoons, talking about your dream with him being a mustard bottle and you bring a ketchup bottle. 

The warmth of your hand finding his automatically.

The way you’d call his name.

The way you’d smile at him.

The way you’d look at him before everything became complicated.

Then came the memories he hates.

The unanswered texts. 

The disappointment.

The arguments.

The night you stood in front of him with tears in your eyes. “You’ve changed.”

The way he couldn’t tell you why.

The way he watched you shut the door in his face.

The way he let you.

Because he thought keeping you in the dark would keep you safe.

The distance between you closes. Closer. Close. Until finally he’s there. His arms wrap around you, another web fires, then another, creating a desperate web-line to stop the fall. The force hits all at once, a violent jolt, a hollow crack sound.

He caught you, he did it. For a brief, shining moment, relief washes over him. You aren’t falling anymore. You’re safe. You’re– 

“Hey.” his voice cracks, he pulls back slightly, waiting for a response. Nothing. The smile on his face falters. “Hey.” still nothing. Around him, the city continues moving, he can hear car honking, distant sirens, the wind. But suddenly, everything feels horribly quiet. His chest tightens.

“No.” his voice comes out as a whisper, “no no no…” you remain motionless in his arms, neck limp. Leehan stares, unable to understand, unable to accept it. He saved you, he caught you, he was fast enough. For once, he was fast enough.. So why– 

His hands begin to shake. The realization arrives slowly. Cruelly. The impact, a force he couldn’t control, the thing even spiderman couldn’t stop. His breathing becomes uneven. “No…” the word breaks apart. He pulls you closer as if somehow that will change reality, as if holding on tighter will bring you back. 

The city celebrates somewhere around him. The green goblin is defeated. The civilians are safe. Spiderman won. But none of it matters. Not when the person he was trying to reach all his life is gone. For the first time putting on the mask, leehan realizes there are some people he can’t save. No matter how much he loves them. 

He pulls you into his arms properly, cradling you against his chest like he can shield you from what already happened. His gloves are shaking when they come up to your face. “Hey..” his voice breaks immediately. 

He presses his forehead against yours, eyes squeezed shut, arms tightening around you instinctively. Then very suddenly, everything he’s been holding back for months comes spilling out.

“I’m sorry..” he says, voice shaking. “I’m sorry i didn’t tell you.. I’m sorry I kept pushing you away. I thought– i thought if you hated me, you’d be safe.” his breath catches, rough and uneven. “I didn’t know how to be both things at once.. I didn’t know how to be spiderman and still be yours..”

A broken laugh slips out of him, but there’s no humor in it. “I wanted to come back.. I was going to.. I just– i needed more time.. I needed to fix everything first..” his fingers tremble as they brush your hair back. “You were supposed to be safe,” he whispers, “that was the whole point..”

A pause. A long unbearable silence. Then his voice completely cracks. “You were supposed to live..” his grip tightens again, not letting go even as reality makes it unavoidable. And for leehan, that’s when it finally becomes real. 

He can survive villains, he can survive pain. But he cannot save you from this. And as he hold you there, in the aftermath of everything he tried to prevent, leehan understands something he never wanted to learn. All the time he spent trying to protect you.. Ended with the one thing he couldn’t protect you from. Silence. Permanent. Irreversible silence. 

And for the first time since he became spiderman, he doesn't feel like a hero at all.

The funeral takes place in spring. The season is wrong for something like this, too bright, too alive. Flowers bloom anyway, as if the world has decided to keep moving forward without permission. Leehan stands at a distance. He doesn’t come closer. He can’t. 

Everything feels like it’s happening behind glass. Voices blur into one another. People speak gently, carefully, like the right tone might soften what has already happened. But nothing softens it. Because all he can see is the place you should be standing instead of laying in a coffin. 

When it’s over, he doesn’t leave immediately. He waits until everyone else is gone. Until the silence only belongs to him. That’s when he finds it. A message on his phone. Unread. Sent the night when you were headed to his apartment, before everything happened. His hands shake before he even opens it. 

Two words. ‘I understand.’

Leehan stares at it for a long time. Long enough that the world around him stops making sense. Because those two words shouldn’t exist there. They shouldn’t be real. They shouldn’t have come too late. 

And suddenly, everything he tried to protect you from becomes unbearable in a different way. Not because you died hating him. You died understanding him.

The world moves on. It always does. Classes resume, streets fil again, the city forgets the shape of grief faster than it forgets the shape of destruction. But leehan doesn’t. He stops trying to separate spiderman from himself after that. Because there’s no separation anymore.

Spiderman failed you. Leehan failed you. Both names lead to the same ending, and he can’t decide which one hurts more. 

Years pass, seasons keep changing the way they always do, spring returning every time like nothing happened. Autumn stripping the world down again without apology. But for him, nothing resets. Every spring looks like that night and your funeral. Every wind sounds like the moment you fell. Every quiet night feels like the space between his web reaching but too late.

He keeps patrolling. Keeps saving people. Keeps doing what he always did. But it only feels like repetition. Because somewhere deep down, he believes the truth never changed. If he had been faster. If he had been stronger. If he had told you everything sooner. If he had been honest at the start. 

You would still be alive. And so he carries it. Not just grief. But the unbearable weight that even spiderman cannot save everyone. 

Just like flowers, he never noticed the exact moment things began to die. Only that by the time he finally looked back at the garden he had been trying so hard to protect,

half of it was already gone.

divider by @andromeda-graphics | network @berrybittynetwork

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you sigh, picking at the food in front of you. not that the boy across from you notices. he’s too absorbed in his phone, scrolling with a small smile on his face.

what is so interesting?, you wonder. what is so interesting that it takes precendence over talking to me for just a bit?

“y/n”, he laughs a bit, looking up at you with a small smile. and despite all your inner turmoil, you can’t help but smile back at the sight of the boy you’ve been crushing on for years looking so happy.

but not because of you.

“hm?”

“onedoor are so funny. look,” he shows you his phone screen. on it is a meme of him, edited to look like a pepper.

you nod, exhaling slightly. “mm. very funny.”

he chuckles to himself and settles back into his chair, no doubt typing out a reply. he’s been like this the whole day. first at the movies, now at this restaurant. always ignoring you.

when did this happen?

so many years ago, he had looked at you like you hung the stars in the sky. when you had told him he should go for his dream of becoming an idol, he’d thanked you for believing in him.

where had that gotten you now?

“today was nice,” riwoo hums as the two of you approach your home. the neighborhood that riwoo grew up in as well. you remember running back from school with him, laughing as you raced down the street, shouts of who would get a sweet treat first echoing in your mind.

“yeah,” you say, but your chest feels hollow.

riwoo stops in front of your walkway, and you stop too. he stares at your face for a moment, dark eyes studying your features, before his gaze dips down to your lips. he steps closer, hands coming up to cup your cheeks, leaning in, coming closer and closer and closer-

“riwoo!” you snap, pushing him away, stumbling back. your chest is heaving, your heartbeat is pounding in your ears, and you’re sure you’re wearing a matching look of bewilderment as the one on riwoo’s face.

“what- y/n?” he sputters, eyes wide.

“was that- were you trying to kiss me!?”

“no- yes- i just- at the end of the first date, don’t people usually,-”

“god,” you groan, pinching the bridge of your nose. “this isn’t a stupid movie, riwoo.”

“i’m trying to make this a good date for you!”

“you’re trying?” you scoff. “listen. when i confessed to you, did you accept my feelings just so you wouldn’t hurt my feelings?”

he’s silent. and that’s all the confirmation that you need.

“you’ve changed, riwoo. if you don’t like me,” you begin, crossing your arms over your chest, “you could have at least been honest with me.”

riwoo shakes his head, eyes wide. “no, y/n, that’s not true. i do like you!”

“then why didn’t you treat me like you do?”

“i…”

“and i thought… oh, forget it,” you sigh. “we’re done.”

“what?”

“we’re done.”

⋆.˚ ☾⭒.˚ want to check out the planetarium's other exhibits?

he’ll gently grab at your wrist but never make an actual attempt to move you away. his breathing stutters when your lips linger more than usual, feeling the familiar pressure of a mark on the column of his throat. and he’s about to tell you off before you go right back to peppering him with kisses and he forgets all about it.

however, when he sees the aftermath of your “kiss” in the mirror, it all comes flooding back to him with an embarrassing blush on his ears. the softer kisses you pressed to his lovebite did nothing to hide it. sungho will say he’ll cover it with makeup when he goes out, but never actually does because he’s almost.. proud of it.

୨ riwoo ⋮ cheek + hands ୧

a simple, traditional kiss on the cheek is the way to go for riwoo. it never gets old and still causes his heart to race with you lean in for a peck. he finds it to be perfect because of how casual it is; a quick one while your perusing the town, more playful when you’re in the comfort of your shared apartment. he even loves posing for a selfie with your lips on his blushed cheek.

your expression when you cup his face in your hands is one he can never forget, especially when followed by a flurry of exaggerated ‘mwah’s all over his face. each moment of contact sends a surge of dopamine to his brain that tells him he needs more. he’ll occasionally lean in, almost expectantly, during random times of the day just to experience your love.

his chest feels like it’ll explode when you take the time to kiss the cute beauty mark that’s settled just under his eye. it’s such a small gesture but knowing you love every single inch of him only makes his love for you grow deeper. he’d tattoo the faint whisper of a kiss mark left by your lip tint on that spot if he could.. so he opts for just asking you to do it yourself everyday.

his heart also melts when you lace your fingers with his and bring the back of his hand to your lips. you could peck his wrist in the middle of a conversation, for no real reason in particular, and he’ll fall silent. his hands are just so pretty that you can’t keep yourself away !!

the feeling of your palms against each other is grounding for the both of you, so he insists on it even when you’re just at home. and so he’ll catch you absentmindedly brushing your lips against the tips of his fingers when you’re cuddled up. he finds it to be such a cute and quiet act of intimacy that still makes him a little nervous but finds it so so precious.

it’s especially perfect for when it’s cold out and you want to keep your lover warm. he’ll feel his skin still tingling even minutes after the contact and squeeze your hand even tighter. he’ll also press a quick kiss back to yours if he feels so inclined, which he normally does. it creates a much lovelier sense of warmth than what any pair of mittens could attempt to bring, he thinks.

୨ jaehyun ⋮ cheek + lips ୧

jaehyun will claim he doesn’t have a favorite place to be kissed because absolutely any form of physical affection you give him has him all giddy and happy. but you’ve noticed he gets extra doe-eyed when you lean in closer to his face. whether it’s the proximity, the intimacy, or both, jaehyun’s face gets all warm and red when you press a kiss to his cheek. he thinks your lips are so soft and like a gift from heaven that graces his skin. and no, he’s not exaggerating.

he’s even worse when you have lipstick or gloss on. something about seeing the specific shade you use against his skin is addictive to him. he’ll ask for more and more while he looks at you, pupils dilated and eyes glossed over, until his face is littered with pinky-red kiss marks and he is exactly where he wants to be.

sometimes, he’ll be cheesy and kiss your cheek back, pressing your faces together just to leave a mark identical to his on your skin. “even our kisses are kissing,” he’ll grin, holding you tight even after saying the corniest line ever. and yes, he does ask to take a picture for his wallpaper each and every time.

his lips are always special, too. he’ll pucker up and send you flying kisses from across the room in a wordless attempt to ask for a kiss, which almost always ends up with him just walking over and kissing you himself.

but when you make the first move and close the gap yourself, jaehyun is smiling and giggling into the kiss while pulling you closer. he has the most lovestruck look on his face that melts into a puppy-like smile. he’ll hold you in place for a while, not wanting to separate and end the moment. but when you finally do, the way his eyes sparkle and you see how kiss-bitten his lips are only has you wanting to kiss him again, which causes the cycle to repeat and jaehyun to ascend to cloud nine.

on the days that end a little rough for him, a foolproof way to coax him out of a bad mood is a loving kiss to his lips. you can’t stand to see his saddened pout so you take him into your hands in hopes of fixing the problem. he’ll always happily accept the invitation and end up losing himself in you, forgetting about what made his day so bad anyway. because how could any day end horribly if this is what he gets in return.

୨ taesan ⋮ lips + neck ୧

taesan only claims to love a kiss on the lips because of the journey it takes to get there. he watches with an all too smug grin, using his height to his advantage as you try to reach his face. he thinks you look cute like that with a slight pout and eager eyes. but he’s not evil, he’ll soon cradle your face in his palms after having his fun and close the distance, still laughing into the kiss.

when you do catch him off guard, however, he’ll hum into your mouth as if satisfied with how you’ve taken after his teasing nature. honestly, he’s grown addicted since the very first time you shared a kiss, now looking for any excuse to share one. a quick peck as you pass him in the hallway will leave him stunned for a second before turning around for a ‘real’ kiss.

he’s noticed that you’ve grown bolder and more confident when leaning close to his face and he loves it. because now he looks forward to how your fingers now tangle in the overgrown hair on the nape of his neck, gently pulling him closer. the flavor of your lip balm will linger on his lips and drive him crazy throughout the day as he waits to come home to you and get another taste.

but going in for his neck really gets him going. something about you kissing him first, especially in a spot like that, just makes his heart race. he was like a kid on christmas the day you kissed his neck for the first time and he’s continued to chase that high ever since. he’ll tilt his head up to give you better access because he wants you to leave a mark. he won’t ask for it but there’s a noticeable pout on his face when you leave him without one (that you also have to kiss away)

taesan tries to convince you that his collarbones are at “just the right height for you,” and even if it sounds like an insult, he’s completely serious. he’ll start wearing looser shirts that open around his chest like a bird trying to tempt his mate. he means for it to be seductive but it comes out as a cat trying to catch your attention. you give in anyway and he thinks his plan so clever, showing that bread-like smile every time.

he’s grown a liking to when it’s later in the night and you’re giggling from drowsiness as you curl into him. the feeling of your nose nudging against his jaw and how he can feel you smiling against his skin is what makes the moment special, because you’re so you when you’re happy. he of course returns the favor, littering you in kisses while keeping you in his arms, filling the room with your overlapping fits of laughter.

୨ leehan ⋮ nose + forehead ୧

because of how often he leans in close, leehan loves when your faces nudge together and you plant a kiss on his nose, eyes sparkling with admiration. the act is so cute that it’s always followed by a low giggle that’s like music to your ears and your boyfriend wrapping you in his arms to keep all to himself.

it’s such an adorable feature on his face that you can’t help but pay attention to it. especially when he gives you that warm, crescent-eyed smile where his nose scrunches into the most kissable thing ever. the times you get him while he isn’t paying attention, he’ll shyly turn away, the tips of his ears flushed red as he plots a way to ‘get you back’ with a kiss attack of his own.

although, it happens to be most effective when he’s in a sulky mood. he’ll try to maintain his scowl while acting like nothing is wrong, but he can’t turn you down when your lips are so soft against the tip of his nose and your smile is so sweet and determined to make him happy again. he’ll still ask for another before indulging in you, just for good measure :3

he also savors each and every smooch on the forehead you give him. despite his height, he’ll occasionally crane his neck downwards with a knowing smile, level to your face to lure you to kiss him. it’s best for when he’s feeling just a little needy for your attention and the small act of praise is enough to keep him going for the day.

you have perfect access when he lays on you. his arms wrapped around your middle and face tucked into your chest like all he needs to breathe is you. careful fingers push his bangs out of his face and give way to the best place for a kiss just above his eyebrow. he’ll hum in amusement and peek out from the crook of your neck in a silent plea for some more loving, to which you graciously give into each and every time.

and even though he doesn’t like when others mess with his hair, it feels different when it’s you. in fact, he’ll encourage you to do so by not-so-secretly guiding your hand to his head. you know it’s because he likes when you fix it up for him, following up with a kiss above the bridge of his nose, and he knows you know this. so it’s become a mutual exchange where you, in turn, get to act as your very pretty lovers own personal hair stylist while he stares at you like you hung the moon and stars. (plus, you both get kisses at the end, so win-win!)

୨ woonhak ⋮ lips + shoulder ୧

woonhak swears he’s all smooth and suave when it comes to being romantic. he’ll lean on a doorframe in an attempt to flirt and serenade you in the car during a spontaneous late night drive. but a sweet kiss will shut him up pretty quick.

you’re both so used to him rambling all the time that cutting him off with a kiss has become normal, and almost expected..(sometimes he’ll talk nonstop just to get you to kiss him.) and yet, he’s still caught off guard by it almost every time, a quiet gasp escaping his lips before they connect with yours. but he can never resist you and melts into it every time, letting out a low whine while his hands find yours. you find his nervous blush so comically adorable, it only makes you lean in again!!

plus, he lovess when you kiss the corners of his mouth. he’d never admit it but that specific little moment gets his heart racing and makes him want to pull you in closer. whether it’s to kiss a pout away or when you claim he has a crumb there, woonhak thinks you’re just too cute when your lips land on the edge of his. so he’ll bridge the gap before giving it a second thought and lean into your touch on the back of his neck.

and on the days where days in the studio drag into later nights, a kiss to his shoulder can easily calm his mind. you’re perfect company when he’s working and somehow know exactly when he needs a little break. he loves that you’re just the perfect height to rest his chin on, exchanging little acts of love throughout the day with one to your forehead and one to his shoulder.

he appreciates the calmer act of affection as opposed to everything else in his life moving so quickly. it’s gentle, the way you lay your head against the broadness of his frame and tilt your chin for your lips to make contact. soft yet solid kisses pressed against his shoulder blade, followed by you leaning further into his side. it’s sweet, quietly intimate, and just what he needs when everything else gets a bit too busy.

you will admit, however, that you can’t hold back on the days he wears a tank top. woonhak swears he doesn’t do it on purpose but loves the extra attention he gets from you. he’ll jump at the occasional bite or mark you decide to leave on the exposed skin and whine that he should give you one back, “just to be fair,” to which he’ll act upon anyway and might get a little carried away..

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the pub never felt fully alive in the way people expected it to be. it wasn’t the music or the laughter or even the warm taste of alcohol. it was something quieter, in the pauses between orders and the way time seemed to drag its feet whenever park sungho stood behind the bar. he learned your shifts before he even learned your name properly. learned the tune that you hum before he ever let himself look for too long. and every night as he poured drinks with steady hands and a blank expression, his eyes would still drift, betraying him, towards you. and always, without fail, there would be men who looked at you like you were part of the menu. hungry eyes that didn’t belong to hunger at all. lust. sungho would tighten his grip on the bottle of alcohol until it stopped feeling like glass.

after closing time, the pub emptied itself of strangers. sungho would wait outside, hands in his pockets, shoulders loose, acting as if he just happened to be leaving at the same time as you, every night. and every single night, he would walk you home. it became a quiet habit before it became a decision. the streets after 3am felt different, less loud. the world shrank into the space between your steps, with the soft glow of streetlights. you talked sometimes. other nights, you didn’t. but the silence between the two of you was never empty.

he learned the small details without asking for them. the way you hugged your coat tighter when the wind turned sharp. the way your apartment was too small for someone who carried so much of the night on their shoulders. somewhere along these walks, sungho stopped thinking of it as protection and started realising it was something worse. something much softer. something that stayed even after he told himself it shouldn’t. he didn’t notice the exact moment it changed. only that one night, when you reached your door and turned back to say goodbye, he found himself hoping, unreasonably hoping, that you would look at him longer. and when you did, he finally understood. he was already falling. too deep. too fast.

it happened on a night that looked no different from the others. same dim lights. same vinyl records. same people drinking their asses off. sungho noticed him the moment he walked in, the burly man who laughed too loudly, drank too fast, and looked at you like lust was the only thing he knew. at first, it was just another uneasy presence in the room, one of many. sungho told himself not to stare too long, he told himself it wasn't his place. 

but then he saw the way the man kept calling you over, the way his hand lingered a second too long when you handed him a drink, the way you smile tightened at the edges. and then, too suddenly, too wrong, sungho saw him cross a line. the man called you over again, and this time when you leaned in to place the drink down, his hand didnt stop where it should have, it slid up your thigh. then further. your breath caught so sharply it hurt, body freezing as if it had forgotten how to move. “hey–” you managed, barely. but it wasn’t loud enough. it never was in moments like this. across the room, sungho saw it. something in him snapped. 

a strange hollow stillness filled him like everything inside him had gone too quiet to function properly. then he was moving. out from behind the bar, through the noise, straight towards the table without thinking long enough to regret it. a punch landed before anyone could understand what was happening. the man stumbled back, chair crashing, shock snapping into rage almost instantly. “who the hell do you think you are?” he spat, already pushing forward again.  

“don’t touch her.” sungho said. his voice wasn’t loud and that was what made it worse. someone grabbed his arm, someone shouted his name. the pub erupted, chairs scraping, voices rising and security rushing. sungho didn’t step back, he hit him again. and again. not because he wanted to fight but because he couldn’t unsee what he had seen. and through it all, you finally found your voice, “sungho– stop!” 

he turned immediately. like you were the only sound he could still hear. he looked lost, breathing unevenly, knuckles red. “i’m sorry.” he said quickly, “i saw him touching you and i– i couldn’t just stand there–” your hands were trembling, you hated that they were. “you’re going to get fired..” you said. “i don’t care,” he answered instantly. 

something in your chest tightened, because that was exactly the problem. you stepped forward without thinking, grabbing his wrist and dragging him into the breakroom. “idiot,” you muttered, though your voice wasn’t sharp. it wasn’t an insult, it was something softer pretending to be one. 

sungho sat on the back chair near the storage room, still tense. you found the first aid kit and when you came back, he looked up at you like he wanted to say something but decided against it. “let me see.” you said simply. he hesitated. then, slowly, he held his hand out. you knelt in front of him, careful as you cleaned the cuts. the silence between you was heavy, full of everything neither of you knew how to put into words yet. he watched your face more than he watched your hands.

“you shouldn’t be here,” he said suddenly. your fingers paused, “what?” “this job,” he said, jaw tightening slightly. “this place.. you shouldn’t have to deal with people like that.. you deserve better than.. all of this.. you could leave, you could just– walk away.” he frowned. “and go where?” you asked softly. that made him stop. your hands moved carefully again, wrapping the bandage around his knuckles. your knee brushing his. sungho noticed, of course he did. the air between you shifted undeniably.

“you did it for me..” you said. his throat moved slightly as he swallowed, “i would do it again.” that broke the silence. or maybe deepened it. you didn’t realise you were leaning in until you were already too close to pretend it was accidental. sungho didn’t move away. he looked like he was waiting, like he had been waiting for too long to stop it now. when you kissed him, it wasn’t the usual gentle way people expect first kisses to be. it was full of everything unspoken, too careful and too desperate at the same time. his uninjured hand cupped your cheek as he tilted his head to deepen the kiss. for a moment, nothing else existed. 

then you pulled away first. breathing unevenly. eyes not quite steady. you stood up too quickly, “i should go,” you said. his brows furrowed slightly, “wait–” but you were already stepping back and avoiding his eyes. sungho didn’t stop you and just watched. like he knew you were leaving before you even stood up. and this time, the silence felt like something cracked open.

the next few days felt wrong in a way sungho couldn’t explain properly. at first, he told himself it was normal. people took time off, shifts change. but then a second day passed, then a third. and your name stopped appearing on the chart entirely. on the fourth day, he finally asked. the boss didn’t look at him for long before answering. just a tired glance, a shrug that carried too much meaning. “she resigned, didn’t say much,” he said flatly.

sungho didn’t remember leaving the pub after that conversation. only the feeling that his body had already started moving before his mind agreed to it. your apartment looked smaller than usual. he stood across the street for a long time before crossing over, like he was afraid the closer he got, the less real it would become. he peeked through your window, no light inside, no movement, no sign that anyone was home. he knocked anyway. ddok ddok ddok. nothing. then the door beside your apartment opened. an elderly woman peeked out, eyes narrowing slightly in cautious curiosity before softening when she saw him. “you looking for her? she asked. “ah– yeah.. is she home?” sungho asked. 

the woman hesitated. the she sighed, shaking her head. “oh dear.. she hasn’t been home for a while,” she said gently, “you must be someone from her work..” sungho’s throat tightened, “do you know where she is?” 

at that, her expression changed slightly, something quieter, more careful, “she’s in the hospital.. been there for a while now..” the word didn’t land properly at first. hospital. it stayed suspended between them, refusing to turn into meaning. sungho stared at her, unblinking. “...hospital?” he repeated. the woman nodded slowly, “yes.. i think they tried contacting family but–” she stopped when she saw his face but sungho was already moving before she could finish. 

sungho didn’t think. he just ran. the streets blurred into each other under the flicker of streetlights, each steps hitting harder than the last like his body was trying to outrun something it already knew was coming. he didn’t feel the pain in his lungs at first. didn’t feel the ache and burn in his legs. only the sharp, relentless urgency in his chest that refused to slow down. hospital. the word kept repeating in his head like a broken alarm. hospital. hospital. hospital. and with it came fragments he hadn’t asked for, memories that surfaced violently as he ran. you standing by the counter, like exhaustion sat heavier on your shoulders than you let on. the faint way your hand would tremble when you thought no one was looking. the nights you smiled anyway. the nights you didn’t. he pushed harder.

glass doors came into view, he stumbled inside, breath ragged, immediately approaching the front desk. “Y/n L/n..” he said, voice breaking before he control it. “I– I’m looking for her.. i’m one of her emergency contacts from work..” the receptionist checked the system then directed him upstairs. sungho didn’t remember the elevator ride, only the sound of his own heartbeat, too loud, too fast, like it was trying to warn him. a doctor met him in the corridor, not rushed, not confused, just still. too still. and sungho knew, even before a word was spoken, that something inside the world had already changed shape. “where is she? is she okay?” sungho said immediately.

the silence that followed was wrong. the kind of silence that doesn’t belong in conversations about living people. the doctor’s expression softened in a way that felt unbearable. “she was suffering from lupus..” he said gently, “it was diagnosed too late.. a month ago.. we did what we could but..”

the rest didn’t come out as words. it didn’t need to.sungho stared at him, uncomprehending at first, like the sentence had been spoken in a language he used to know but had forgotten how to translate. then it hit. all at once.

“no,” he said immediately, shaking his head once, then again, as if denial could undo it. “no, that’s not– she was just here.. she was–” his voice cracked, the world tilted slightly. the doctor’s mouth moved again, something softer this time but sungho couldn’t hear properly anymore. because the only thing that existed was the sudden, impossible absence of you. his legs gave out, he collapsed onto the floor, knees hitting the cold tile, hands trembling uselessly. 

“no..” he said again, but it wasn’t denial anymore. it was breaking. and for the first time, there was no anger left in him at all, only the unbearable realization that he had been running towards a moment he could never outrun.

too late.

too late.

too late.

a month later, the pub still opened at the same hour. the lights still flickered in the same tired music still spilled out into the street, and the same laughter still rose and fell like nothing had ever change. sungho still finished his shifts. still cleaned his station. still wiped down the bar until it shone under the light. still nodded at coworkers and customers who no longer asked where you were. time moved forward around him as if it had no memory of you at all.

but he did. every night, when the doors finally closed behind the last customer. sungho would step outside with the same habit he couldn’t break. same pause. same instinct. his hands would slips into his packers without thought, and his eyes would drift toward the street like he was looking for a shape the world had already erased. he would wait. not because he expected you to appear. but because some part of him still hadn’t learned how not to.

the air outside was always cooler after closing. quieter too. the kind of silence that used to belong to you both, walking side by side under streetlights that never quite reached the ground. 

he stood there longer each night. until the waiting stopped feeling like waiting and started feeling like remembering. one night, he took a step forward without realising why. then stopped. his gaze fell to the empty space beside him. and just like that, it came back all at once. the walk home, the sound of your voice, the way you used to look over at him like you were still deciding whether to trust the quiet between you. 

the absence hit him gently. not like the hospital. not like the floor. worse. like something that had always been there, and now wasn’t. sungho exhaled slowly. his hand tightened in his pocket then loosened again. like he couldn’t decide what to do with it.

and for a moment, he just stood there outside the pub, watching a street that no longer led anywhere he could follow. then he turned away, not because he had moved on but because there was nowhere left to wait.

he still stood outside the pub after every shift. waiting out of habit for someone who would never walk back to him again.

bunny gif divider by @kthice | network: @berrybittynetwork

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By noon, the boys were ahead by 30 tickets. By one o’clock, the girls had overtaken them. By two o’clock, taesan had managed to convince people to buy beverages from one of their booths. By three o’clock, you were glaring at him from across the courtyard while making a new promotional poster. neither of you had noticed your respective councils had stopped working and were now finding entertainment in watching the two of you. 

“this is getting ridiculous.” sungho muttered, staring at taesans determined back. “they’ve been trying to outdo each other since the charity drive.” riwoo shrugged. “and sports day” “oh don’t forget leadership camp.” “ahh cross country too” leehan, woonhak and jaehyun added.

Across the courtyard, taesan caught your gaze and raised a lazy eyebrow and smirk, silently gesturing for you to throw in the towel. you immediately straightened up, over your dead body.

an hour later, the final numbers were announced. a tie. the entire courtyard erupted in cheers. the two of you stared at the result board in disbelief. then both of you spoke at the same time, “this has to be wrong.” “there’s no way.” the teacher in charge took a deep breath, “just accept the tie.” neither of you looked convinced. 

As everyone began packing up, taesan walked over to you with two cans of banana milk in his hands. he handed one to you while saying, “you got lucky.” you grinned while accepting the banana milk, “we tied.” for once he didn’t argue but he did let out a chuckle. he glanced at the fairy lights hanging above the courtyard before his gaze fixed on your face again, “same time next event?” the corners of your lips couldn’t help but twitch upwards, “you’re on.”

and somewhere behind you, both student councils collectively groaned, already knowing the next event would tire them out from endless competition. 

── rival! taesan : makes sure to disagree immediately if any of his student council members criticizes you or your council. ˎˊ˗

“her councils’ schedule is kind of a mess isn’t it?” the comment from woonhak slips out casually during the meeting. taesan doesn’t even look up from his paperwork, “no it isn’t.” the room immediately goes silent. woonhak blinks, “well, i mean.. they changed the rehearsal schedule for the play three times..” “because the venue got changed twice.” “oh.”

sungho leans back in his chair, “their publicity poster isn’t that great either.” hearing this, taesan finally looked up from his paperwork, “they’re fine.” “fine?” sungho questions. “they have a high percentage of engagement.” the room falls silent again. “..how do you know that?” jaehyun asks.

taesan freezes. a little too long. “i read the reports.” 

all of the student council members looked at each other, not daring to say anything since nobody else bothered to read the reports. “well, the girls’ school only did well during the event because they had better sponsors.” riwoo said, trying to agitate taesan. taesan immediately shakes his head, “they secured the sponsors themselves.” riwoo smirks, “you’re defending them again.” taesan sighs, “i’m correcting you.” “same thing.” “it really isn’t.”

the council members exchanged knowing looks. because this happens every single time. the moment someone criticises you or your council, taesan is suddenly the first person to explain why they’re wrong. the moment someone downplays your achievements, taesan pulls out the statistics and reports. it’s getting.. suspicious. “you know for someone who’s supposed to be her rival.. you spend a lot of time defending her.” taesan’s pen stops moving. “just because i’m her rival, that doesn’t mean i have to lie.” jaehyun flashes his usual teasing smirk, “so you think she’s competent?” “obviously.” “talented?” “yes.” “hardworking?” “of course.” jaehyun’s smirk only widened, wanting to push him further, “and pretty–” “this meeting’s over right?” taesan manages to shoo all of them out his office as the council members erupt in cackles. taesan shuts the door behind them before anyone can point out the pink creeping up his cheeks. meanwhile, in your office, you sneeze, unaware that your biggest rival might just be your biggest fan.

── rival! taesan : becomes irritated when you don’t attend joint meetings (he’s secretly worried) ˎˊ˗

the joint meeting starts sharply at 3.30pm. by 3.27pm, taesan is already in the meeting room. not because he’s waiting for you obviously. maybe. the meeting room doors opened, members from both your student councils streamed in whilst chatting away. the seat across from him remains empty. weird. 3.30pm. the meeting begins. your vice president stands instead, “our president isn’t here today so let’s just start.” “why?” the question slips out of taesan’s mouth before he could process. all heads turn to look at him. your vice president blinks, caught off guard, “oh.. she’s sick.” taesan nods and the meeting starts properly. 

but something feels.. off.. every time he shares his proposal, nobody challenges him. every time the budget is discussed, no one argues with him about a stingy budget. every time he suggests something, not a single person shoots back with an even better idea just to annoy him. the meeting moves along twice as smoothly. and somehow, thats exactly the problem. by the halfway point of the meeting, taesan’s forehead is scrunched up. irrationally annoyed. jaehyun notices first, “what’s wrong with you?” “nothing.” jaehyun scoffs softly, “you look grumpier than usual.” taesan rolls his eyes and ignores him. the meeting continues. his pulls up the proposal for the leadership camp. normally this is where you’d interrupt halfway to point out the flaws in his plans. instead, the meeting ends. no interruptions, no retorts, no eye rolls. it’s quiet. far too quiet. and he hated it. the realization hits him before he can stop it. he misses you. the thought itself makes him irritated with himself. everyone is busy packing up their stuff when your vice presidents gathers some documents off the table. 

“can you give these to her?” she asks. the question catches taesan off guard, “why me?” the entire room goes silent. because everyone knows exactly why. your vice president smiles, “no reason.” there is always a reason. taesan takes the folder anyways, just to see you– no, just to make things easier. that’s all. 

── rival! taesan : teases you with his height when preparing for an event ˎˊ˗

the preparation for the leadership camp had been going relatively smoothly. relatively. which in your case and taesan’s case meant there had only been three arguments, two disagreements, and one debate over the placement of a banner. a new record. now you were decorating the auditorium. you were standing on your tippy toes, trying ,though failing, to pin up some banners. the top corner was just slightly out of reach. you stretched higher, nothing. slightly higher, nothing. a shadow suddenly appeared behind you. before you could react, a hand reached above your head and effortlessly attached the decoration where you’d been struggling for the past 5 minutes. you froze and slowly turned around. taesan was looking down at you with the most annoying smug expression imaginable, “..” “don’t–” the grin on his face immediately widened, “don’t what?” you poked his chest, “whatever you were going to say.” “oh, wasn’t going to say anything.”  you narrowed your eyes at him. he looked far too pleased with himself. then, he glanced at the decoration and back at you. his smirk returned, “i can see why that was difficult.” you gasp, “shoo.” “i’m just observing.” he smiles. “leave.” “i mean the top of the board is pretty high.” “HAN TAESAN!!” 

several of your council members immediately looked over. he raised both of his hands with faux innocence, “not my fault you’re vertically challenged.” you grabbed the nearest roll of tape and threw it as him. he caught it easily, unfortunately. “you know if you ask nicely, i might just help.” he tossed the tape around. “i would rather climb the wall.” you shot back before he chuckled. a few minutes later, you found yourself trying to hang another decoration on an even higher beam. you stared at the beam and then at the ladder. taesan unfortunately noticed. without word, he places the decoration he was originally doing down and walked towards you. you crossed your arms seeing this. he extended his arm towards you, “give it.” you hesitated but then reluctantly handed over the decoration to him. the stupid thing took him less than ten seconds. ten seconds. you hated him, “show off.” “not my fault i was blessed with height.” you rolled your eyes so hard they nearly fell out. 

as he climbed down the ladder, he looks suspiciously pleased with himself. he adjusted his shirt and then leaned down slightly, just enough to be annoying, “need help with anything else?” you smiled sweetly, the kind of smile that took him aback with suspicion. a pause. “actually..” you point to a banner in the corner, “since you’re so tall, can you fix that?” his grin grows, “so you need me.” you ignore his comment. you point to another decoration, “and that one.” then another, “that too.” “...” “hmm that one too.” by the fifth task, his smile was completely gone from his face. the council members stifled their laughter. “you’re making me do all the work.” taesan frowns. you only shrug, patting his head, “not my fault you were blessed with height.” taesan stands there frozen, blush creeping up his cheeks but he immediately turned his head away.

── rival! taesan : purposefully misses the last question on the test if he hears your pushing yourself too hard for first place. ˎˊ˗

the rumour reaches him by accident. he was walking past your school gate and since your schools were beside each other, he notices you talking with a classmate of yours. “i just need to beat him this one time.” you mumble. your classmate sighs, “you’ve been studying for hours on end.” “because if i don’t, he gets first place again.” you shot back. “you got 4 hours of sleep last night–” “i’m fine.” you shut her down. taesan keeps walking but the conversation stays with him all the way. every joint academic ranking by the district turns into another battleground between the two of you. first place. second place. always separated by one or two marks. always. the teachers’ think that it’s healthy competition. the students’ think that it’s cute. taesan, on the other hand, thinks it’s a problem. especially when he notices the heavy eyebags under your eyes. especially when you carry coffee with you everywhere. especially when you start dozing off in joint meetings. “you look terrible..” he mutters as he approaches you after the joint meeting. you immediately glare at him, “mind your own business.” “did you sleep?” he asks. “...” “exactly.” the conversation ends there. but the worry doesn’t. 

during the exams, taesan sits at his assigned desk, on the very last question. according to his calculations, he has at least 96 marks secured. his eyes drift to question 50. the one worth two marks. the one he confidently knew how to solve. the one he intentionally left blank. he stares at it for a moment. and then he closes the paper. the district ranking came out a few days later. for the first time all year, you’re first. by two marks. the next joint meeting is chaos. your council members are celebrating while his council members are mourning his loss. and you’re in the middle of it all, looking happier than he has seen in months. the smile on your face is bright. genuine. proud. just happy. and for some reason, that feels worth more than some number next to his name.

“what happened to you?” jaehyun asks later. taesan doesn’t look up from his notes, “what do you mean?” “you never lose.” jaehyun raises an eyebrow. “i didn’t lose.” jaehyun narrows his eyes suspiciously, “did you mess up?” taesan sighs, “no.” “did you–” “just drop it.” jaehyun studies his nonchalant attitude for a moment, and then realization slowly dawns on him, “oh my god..” taesan immediately looks up in surprise, “don’t” “you did.” “i did not.” “you absolutely did. you let her win..” “I DID NOT!!” the denial comes far too quickly. which makes the corners of jaehyun’s lips twitch up.  

a week later, you cornered him after a joint meeting. “you left question 50 blank.” you ask. his shoulders freeze. just for a second. you noticed, of course you did. “i didn’t know–” he shrugs. “it was the easiest question on the paper.” “...” the hallways suddenly felt very quiet. “why?” you ask softly. taesan sighs, “you were making yourself miserable. you looked tired all the time. so i figured, being first wasn’t worth watching you run yourself into the ground.” the words leave his mouth before he could stop them. your eyes widen and for once, you didn’t have a comeback.”thank you..” you say. taesan groans immediately, “don’t thank me.” “why?” you question. “because now you’re making it weird. you laugh. and for the first time in a long while, the rivalry feels a little less like a competition and a little more like two people making sure the other doesn’t fall too far behind.

── rival! taesan : first person to clap even when he looks annoyed that you won an award. ˎˊ˗

the district awards ceremony is held a few weeks later but no one thought much of it since everyone has already seen the rankings. you know you’re first, you know taesan’s second. and if you’re being honest, part of you still hasn’t forgiven him for what he did. even after confronting him about question 50, you had spent nights wondering why he thought sacrificing his own score was a good idea. it was stupid. incredibly stupid. and somehow annoyingly sweet. which somehow made it even worse. the principal steps up to the podium, students fill the auditorium, teachers sit along the sides. then the district rankings are announced one by one. then– your names echoes through the hall. for a second, everything blurs. the applause, the cheering, the people around you. because all you can think about is the paper sitting in a folder somewhere, question 50, blank. clap. the first clap comes from the person besides you. you don’t even need to look to know who it is. taesan. of course it’s taesan. he’s clapping before anyone reacts. when you glance over, he looks annoyed, not angry, not bitter. like he’d rather be standing on that stage himself. like losing still bothers him. because it does, but his hands never stop clapping.

after the ceremony, you find him outside. naturally leaning against the wall. “hey.” you say. he immediately groans, “no.” you huff, “you didn’t even hear the question.” “i know where this is going.” you lean against the wall beside him, award still in your hands, district champion, the title you had been chasing for years and yet somehow feels heavier than you expected. “you should have been up there too..” your words come out quieter than intended. “don’t start.” he looks away. “i’m serious. you let me win.” “i didn’t let you do anything.” taesan sighs. “you left the question blank.” “you still answered the other 49 yourself.” and you hate how easily he says it. like it doesn’t matter. a laugh escapes you. small and filled of disbelief. “you would’ve won.” “maybe.” “taesan.” “what?” you stare at him and for the first time since all of this started, he finally takes a long sigh. “you looked happier having the award than i’ve seen you in months and that's enough.” simple, matter of factly even. it was as if that was the end of the conversation, like it was a perfectly normal reason to throw away first place. no don’t know what to say because no comeback comes to mind. no sarcastic remark. no argument. nothing. 

the silence stretches, then taesan points at the award, “don’t drop it. it’d be embarrassing.” a laugh escapes you, “there he is.”  “who?” “the annoying you.” “i was never gone.” taesan smirks. for a moment, things feel normal again yet something has shifted. because now every time you look at the award sitting on your shelf, you remember two things. the district ranking. and the boy who is always the first person to clap for you.

── rival! taesan : realises he doesn’t know what to do without having a ‘rival’ when graduation comes around. ˎˊ˗

graduation day is loud. students are crying, taking photos, signing uniforms, promising to stay in touch. it feels like everyone’s standing on the edge of something, a beginning and an ending. taesan hates it. yet deep down, he know that’s not the reason, because every time he looks across the courtyard, his eyes finds yours. again, again and again.you’re surrounded by people. friends from your school, juniors asking for signatures. the districts’ top student. the girls’ school president. his rival. his– .. well. that’s the problem. for years, that title had been enough, you had always been there. and now? now graduation is ending. in a few hours, everyone will go home. in a few months, you’ll both be somewhere else. different schools. different schedules. this realization hits him harder than expected. because for the first time since meeting you.. he has absolutely no idea what comes next. 

the ceremony ends and without meaning to, taesan finds himself walking towards the joint student council room. the door is already open and you’re sitting inside alone, looking out at the window. he sits next to you and for a moment, neither of you say anything. “it’s weird.” you finally say. “what is?” “no more rivalry.” you said teasingly. but they hit harder than expected. because taesan realizes that’s exactly what has been bothering him all day. the idea that after today, you won’t just be in the school next to him anymore. you won’t be at the next district event. or anywhere he can easily find you. it was never about who wins. not really. 

“you know what’s annoying?” taesan exhales. you blink as he looks away then quietly laughs to himself. “the idea of not seeing you anymore.” silence. your expression changes immediately. “oh.” brilliant. now you’ve made it weird. “you don’t mean–” “i do.” your mouth closes. for once, neither of you has a comeback. taesan rubs a hand over the back of his neck, “i thought graduation would feel good.” you stay still, listening. “but every time someone talked about college, or moving on, all i can think about is..” he laughs once, “who’s going to argue with me now?” a small smile appears on your face, “that’s your confession?” his face immediately heats up, “i wasn’t finished.” “sure–” “i like you.” the words leave his mouth. simple. direct. heart fluttering. “i think i’ve liked you for a while.” he repeated. you stare at him, speechless. “say something.” he says softly. you smile, the same smile that has followed him through years of competitions, arguments, victories and losses. the same smile he’d recognize anywhere. “what took you so long to figure that out, rival?”

the laugh that escapes him is helpless. relieved. happy. and he kisses your forehead before he can overthink it. for the first time since graduation started, the future doesn’t seem quite so scary anymore. maybe he wasn’t losing his rival after all. maybe he was finally getting something better.

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“Dude, what the actual fuck—?!” Jaehyun gasps as he jumps out of his own skin, the wooden table under him still vibrating from the force of Sungho’s fork being stabbed into it. 

Sungho glares. He's been glaring for some time now, and not at Myung Jaehyun, but at the spot behind him—using the gap between his ear and his shoulder as a sniper scope. Straight at you. 

Jaehyun swivels around, following his line of sight.

He takes in the view of you silently eating your tray of food, slipping a piece of broccoli into your mouth as you read the book propped up next to it. When Jaehyun eventually turns around to look at Sungho, he's wearing a face of exasperation. “Not this again. Dude…”

“Number 2,” Sungho huffs out heavily, chest rising and falling in rapid fiery breaths. “I'm number two in my class…again.” 

“That's not bad.”

Sungho switches his maniacal glare towards him, making Jaehyun blanch like a ghost. He flails to fix his mistake but the blond is quicker to launch at his throat, “Not bad? …Not…Bad…???” He lets out a crazed laugh, one that won't sound out of place at a mental institution, making Jaehyun squirm in his place. “I have done everything right—I rewrote all my notes, I memorised the shit out of the additional readings… Hell, I even stopped showering for a week just to have more time to study for exams!” 

“Yeah, we needed to stage an intervention for that, remember?”

“I deserve that spot,” Sungho ignores him pointedly. “Why does she hoard it like a mole, can't she let up at least once?? It's been like ten years.”

“She’s more like a squirrel if anything, look at her,” Jaehyun gestures towards how you've been chewing the same thing for the past five minutes, cheeks all puffed out, too engrossed in your reading. “And, it's you that decided to go to the same university as her… Even when you got offers from literally all your top options.”

“That's—” Sungho’s words die on his tongue. He isn't going into the psychoanalysis of why he'd chosen to follow his sworn enemy into the battlefield again, after losing over and over for all of his school years. “I need to do something about this. I'm not gonna lose to her again.”

“Right.”

“I need a game plan.”

“Right.”

There's a menacing glint in Sungho’s narrowed cat-like eyes, duckling yellow hair falling across it to make him look like he's trying very hard and looking intimidating, and failing every bit of the way. But the resolve in his voice is sharp when he says, “L/N Y/N, you are going down.” 

Even if that means he might potentially be dragged down with you. 

SUNGHO'S FOOLPROOF STEPS TO CLIMB TO #1

Step 1: Find the target, then lock the fuck in. 

The clock ticks like a time-bomb about to explode any second, the hands on the dial moving with the pulse of his heart, his fingers tightly clasped within each other on the table. 

His eyes flicker between the wall and the door, maniacally—he’s early by thirty minutes and the waiting might just kill him before the looming disappointment of Rank 2 does. But this is all part of the plan. If he wants to finally shake off the jinx of the second spot (ugh, even thinking those words makes him want to punch a pillow), then he needs to follow through without making mistakes. 

The door finally clicks open and his heart finally soars, excitement building as your figure comes into view. 

You're the same as always: loose, plain clothes, the same half-open backpack hanging off a shoulder, hair a quick work of being pulled together by what appears to be just your fingers. A mess, he would say. Nothing like him. 

And it pisses him off, yeah. Because here is a disaster of a human being somehow doing better than him at what should be his forte. He's the one that spends hours poring over notes and utilising every resource he can get his hands on, going as far to hunt down the hard-to-access ones as well. He's the one that had a carpal tunnel for a month from non-stop typing. He's the one that has to hide his horrific eyebags under makeup in case he ends up spooking another child on the street into crying because they thought they'd seen a ghost. He's the one who works hard, who sticks to his regimen, who never crosses the lines he's drawn for himself, sticking within the confines of rules and propriety.

He's the one that cares. 

You—you don't give two shits about whether you do well or not, but you still somehow just win. 

And the worst thing is that you don't even seem like you're aware of this game you're playing. You're just swinging through life with no stress and still acing every bit of it. 

Sungho loathes it, but because he has ulterior motives (he's not evil, he swears), he plants the best and sugar-sweetest smile he can muster and calls for you. “Y/N, hey!” He grins, waving at you. “I saved you a spot.”

Your shoes scuff on the tiles as you stop walking to stare at him in confusion, a hint of a knot at your forehead. Then your eyes move from him to the empty space he's gesturing at next to him. “Huh?” 

“Come on!” he chimes happily (he's dying inside). “I won't bite.” (Oh yes he will, he so will.)

There's hesitation in your movements, but you've always been too shy to say no, he is aware of that and is shameless enough to monopolise on that fact. 

The second you sit down, you have stepped into the devil’s territory. Poor, poor you. Unaware of his clever schemes, totally clueless that you're about to hand over that first place as though under a spell. Because, guess what, Park Sungho, while the perfect student, is also a perfect campus heart-throb. He's shot many an unsuspecting passerby with the cupid's arrow, doing nothing but existing in all his angelic, golden haired (dye-job but it counts, okay?), feline-natured glory. 

He just has to distract you with his manly wiles until you forget how to study. That's the plan. 

“Oops,” he says as soon as you sit down to prepare for the class, checking your watch for when the professor will arrive. Other students have already started flocking in. “Ah, I think I dropped a pen,” Sungho feigns innocence, searching the floor for the pen he'd discreetly flung down a minute ago.

“Oh!” You’re immediately eager to help, shooting a hand down to scamper for his pen. 

But Sungho is clever; he does the same thing, and before your fingers can grab hold of the pen, his palm grazes yours, sending a tingle up your skin.

You slowly look up, and he does too, leading from the point where you touch to the gentle dips of your cheek, then to the sparkle in your eyes. 

Your eyes sparkle? That's new information... 

“Uh,” he whispers accidentally, but is quick to reel it back with a small cough and a polite smile. “Thanks.” He crinkles his eyes on purpose. 

He’s expecting you to blush. Or flounder for words awkwardly or topple over with the shock of how pretty he is. 

Unfortunately, none of those scenarios happen. You actually shoot him a blinding smile and return right back to your seat, opening up your work. 

And…

Sungho is the one to sit there flabbergasted at the turn of events. Because he hadn't expected you to be nice like that.

Or for your smile to be so…pretty.

Ew, no—! No no no, he does not think your smile is pretty, he’d meant to think petty—that’s it! Ha ha… Yeah…

Ahem.

It doesn't end there, he hasn't forgotten his mission to capture your heart just yet. There are still steps and sub-steps to follow, and he will do just that. A momentary lapse of his brain is nothing that can hold him back. 

So he doubles down on the efforts in the coming days: he brings you an extra cup of coffee for the 8 AM lectures, he offers to hold your bag for you when he sees you roll your shoulders with a pained sigh, he even brings a hairclip for you on the days you forget to brush your hair and need to keep it out of your eyes. 

It's a little counterproductive maybe—your focus definitely improves when you're hydrated and taken care of—but he is playing the long game here. A tiny lift of your spirits before it eventually plummets into the depths of hell, right into his opportunistic hands. 

You don't blush still, but you smile a lot more. When he gets you a slice of strawberry cake as a sweet treat after a test, you return the favour by paying for lunch. You eat together now, Jaehyun needing to find a new eating buddy because Sungho cannot get distracted by his dumb jokes while he's seducing you into failing. He splits his free time into studying, drawing up new and exciting methods to befriend you even further, and then preparing for these mini hangouts he's orchestrated. 

Everything is going swimmingly well. 

Step 2: Do not—absolutely never ever—get sidetracked. 

The ice cream shop is a quaint building at the corner of campus, with white bricks for walls and vanilla circling the air. The ideal spot for a romantic endeavour.

And Sungho is deviously romantic, of course. He's still stuck below you on the rank sheet, but the gap isn't all that big. It doesn't hurt him the same anymore. Just makes him determined to knock you off your throne. 

“Hmm…which flavour?” you ask, blinking at the shiny glass display holding a trillion different shades of ice cream. 

Sungho has to be a gentleman. So he says, “Anything you choose,” and he does it with a soft smile and lovesick eyes. (He practiced that morning in the mirror and almost fell in love with himself; it's a guaranteed trap.)

Your face breaks out in a happy grin, hair loosely falling along your cheek. It's a nice view—he has to admit—for how long he's known you from afar all these years, it's strange to see you up this close, with a smile that's admittedly very beautiful in the objective, factual, scientific sense. He's only agreeing with the voice in his head because he is after all, a scientific man, not for any other reason. 

Eventually you settle on a rocky road (he'd predicted this to be honest, you've got a raging sweet tooth), and end up with a wonky cone with two scoops bulging out of it. 

“You really like it, huh?” he chuckles at the way you eat it like a little kid would, with stars in your eyes. 

You nod shyly, twirling it around in your hand. “It's yummy. I had it a lot while I used to pull all-nighters in high school.”

“Yeah? Is that why you'd show up in the morning looking like a bird made a nest in your hair?” he teases, and he's met with a pout that makes him laugh at your reaction. “Sorry, sorry, just kidding. It wasn't that bad.” He holds his hands up in surrender, still grinning. 

It's a slow morning. There aren't any classes until noon, and the air is thick with the scent of spring—birds singing up on treetops, the lawn plush and green with rose bushes lining the curbs. Perfect romantic weather for a romantic scheme. 

Sungho is savouring the cup of vanilla in his hand when he looks up to see a tiny spot of brown at the corner of your lips. 

You haven't noticed yet, too engrossed in your own ice cream, and well—he tells himself it's just the messiness of it that bothers him. Not the way it mars your nice lips, no way. And his hand just moves on its own because he's always had a good instinct for cleanliness, not because he wants to touch you. 

But your eyes widen just the tiniest amount when soft skin thumbs at your face, swiping away the sweetness there. He watches closely, watches every minor change in your expression—the soft blinks, the stillness of your breathing, the way you have a gentle pink running up your cheeks.

His brain wants to scream jackpot! It wants to celebrate the victory of getting you to blush, of finally tripping you over into his metaphoric claws. 

But…

But why the fuck is his own face also heating up like a furnace?! 

He feels like he has a fever, a terrible affliction that causes his heart to run a mile a minute and for his mouth to stop working. Was he dying? Was he going insane? 

His thoughts only come to a swerving stop when you regard him with a sunny smile and say, “Thanks.” 

Thanks for what, really? He wonders. But he's quick to bury those complicated musings in favour of changing a steady mantra of ‘remember the plan, the plan, the plan, the plan—’, until he tunnel-visions and sees nothing but the score sheet pinned up on the bulletin in front of the lecture hall. 

Sungho does not stop until he's back in the safety of his dorm, having faked a stomach ache to run here before his next class—until he's splattered water into his face and climbed into bed without even changing out of his outside clothes, like a madman. Today marks the first day he's ever skipped a class. 

But it’s of no help at all, because he still ends up having a nightmare of your face giddy with happiness, and he burns like a fire the whole time he dreams. 

Step 3: Sympathy is for losers. Do not ever take pity on your enemy; it's a trap. 

The score sheet flutters from the draft through the window, the pale sun cutting dull lines across your name, and his right below.

Sungho tightens his fist, his jaw clenched in fury. At himself, not at anyone else. He's tried to do it this time, really pushed himself beyond what he thought was even possible. But it's of no avail when you've managed to secure the top marks again. 

“Oh,” he hears your voice from behind him, a small sound that he only picks up through the ruckus of students from how often he spends listening to it these days. 

When he turns back, he expects you to smile at him, maybe even give him a victory hug the way you do these days. But all he sees is the thin line of your mouth and the empty void in your stare. And…tears? 

“Hey,” he begins, instinctively on edge from worry. He doesn't even make it to you before you've schooled your expression into apathy, a robotic reaction so different from what he'd just caught a glimpse of before. He pushes forward anyways. “Come with me,” he says softly, wrapping a hand around your wrist and getting you through the crowd. 

You follow him quietly until he's found an empty lecture room, closing the door behind him and leading you over to the elevated stage in front. 

“Look at me,” he coaxes, gently bringing your gaze to meet his, with a soft palm guiding your cheek. “What's up, hm?”

“Nothing.”

It's a typical answer he'd have expected from you maybe some months ago and wouldn't have back an eye at back then. But now—now it feels odd. Like you're hiding so much and he’s only learnt to read past your mask, still in the process of figuring the meaning behind your little quirks. 

He knows you fiddle with pencils when you're nervous, that you twirl your hair when you're shy, the way you sometimes space out into distances when you're pondering something, when you're digesting a paragraph before it makes sense to you. And now, there's a tension in your shoulder that he knows is none of those things. 

“You can tell me anything, I won't judge,” he says, and it sounds true to his own ears for once. For once, he isn't lying. 

You open your mouth to deny, but you must be holding a lot in that a sharp, pained gasp escapes instead, and years begin to well up past your waterline before you've readied yourself to fight it. 

“I—” you try, and it tapers off into a choked sound when Sungho’s palms hold you with even more tenderness. “I’m not…I don't deserve it,” you confess into the air like it's a secret you've kept forever.

It doesn’t make complete sense to Sungho, but the one thing that he can say with his whole heart now is that if there is anyone that deserves all the good things in the world, it’s you. He’s been looking your way forever now—how could he not see how much soul you pour into your work… How dedicated you are and how diligent you are. He’s been envious of that talent of yours to absorb material like you’ve breathed in all the details and then recollected every bit of it on a test paper, but right now, he can only admit that it doesn’t just sprout from nowhere—you’ve honed that skill to perfection by working hard. 

“You do,” he disagrees gently, brushing the corner of your lashes with his thumb. “You deserve all of it.”

“I don’t even know what I’m doing…I…” You sniffle. “I don’t want to complain, I feel like an ungrateful brat when I do.”

Sungho lets out a soft chuckle at your words. “You’re anything but that. You say sorry to furniture when you walk into them…and you always ask me questions more than you talk about yourself. Not an ungrateful bone in you, Y/N.”

“It’s just,” you suck in a breath, finally managing to stop the tears from flooding down your face, just for a second. “I keep working, over and over, day and night, but I don’t know why I do it…”

“Hm?”

“I just feel so…lost…sometimes.”

Oh. 

Oh… Sungho realises a lot at that moment. Most of all, how he’d really chalked you up to be this superheroic entity that couldn’t feel more than just happiness and apathy. After all, you’re just a person. You’re just like him. Someone who is wandering life without having figured it all out. 

“I try so hard but I never know what I’m doing it all for and…today I just…I don't know, it's so stupid,” you bite back your sobs,body quivering from how tightly you hold yourself together, afraid of breaking apart. “I don't even like seeing my name up there anymore. It just reminds me I’m faking it all.”

“Who cares?” 

Your eyes flicker up to meet his, a little shocked, somewhat confused. “Huh?” 

Sungho shakes his head at how cute you look, all red and puffy-cheeked. “Who cares if you're faking it or not? I'm proud of you for getting that top spot again, and you should be too. I like how smart you are and how capable you are and how you never let it get to your head,” he says softly, in a voice reserved just for you. “Couldn’t be me.”

His funny smirk pulls an unexpected laugh out of you, even though it's tinged with the remnants of your tears. “Hey, look at that, you're laughing!” he teases, pushing your hair out of the way to get a better look at your pout. “How could someone so smart be so cute… It's unfair, honestly.”

It's too late when he realises he's said the last part out. It only occurs to him when you reply with, “You're only saying that because you're my boyfriend.”

…

Sungho stops breathing. 

Huh…?

Boyfriend?

You're unaware of how wide his eyes have gotten and how he resembles a fish letting out bubbles through its mouth right now. “I actually have thought of giving up this whole thing y’know—drop out of school and waste everything I’ve worked towards, because sometimes it feels like a race with no end and I’m just moving because I have to…” You press your forehead against this chest, leaving wet splotches of tears on his shirt. “But seeing you study with so much ambition…it makes me want to try just as hard. I like that we're always together on the grade sheets. It's not as hard when I’m not alone.”

And fuck, oh fuck, Sungho is late to so many realisations today. For someone who prides himself on his brilliance, he is so, so stupid.

“I'm your boyfriend,” he says out loud, the factual truth of the universe. “You're my girlfriend.”

The sun rises in the east. It sets in the west. Myung Jaehyun is annoying. The outings you go on are not schemes—they’re dates—the very real kind. You are smart. You are his girlfriend. Objective truths that not even his mouth has an argument for. 

“Yeah,” you look up at him, all the wonders of the world shining in your eyes. God, you're so pretty. He's blushing like the embarrassment he is, completely ashamed that it's taken so long for him to figure this out. “Aren't we?” you ask.

Beyond all the shameful musings, Sungho is not one to let go of a good thing that's happened to him. He's not an ungrateful idiot, just an obvious one. 

“We are,” he nods feverishly, matching the red of your skin. “I'm so happy that we are. I don't even care that you beat me to pulp on our exams anymore.”

This garners a giggle from you; you probably think he's joking, but he's dead serious when he says it. He doesn't give two shits that the scheme has backfired and instead of making you fall for him, he's done the exact opposite. And maybe, maybe he's been in love for as long as he's known you—just that he'd taken his unending interest in you as spite and not what it really was. A crush. A stupid, one-sided crush he’d never managed to put out. 

“We haven't even had our first kiss though,” he ends up blurting out, watching you melt into his hands. 

You must be dead set on surprising him today, because even though he comments with no intention to coax you into one, you pull him closer to press your lips against his, a clumsy but sweet kiss landing against the corner of his mouth. It's so quick, but it still manages to pull a whimper out of him. 

“Now we have,” you reply, coy and soft.

“That was just a victory kiss. For demolishing the exams again,” he tosses back. “Give me another.”

“For what?”

“For buying you ice cream all the time, duh.”

He half expects you to push him away, but in a second, your lips are back on his, slower than before. He takes it as a sign to return the favour, and the classroom melts away in your peripheries. 

In his head, Sungho makes a correction to the principles he's lived by until now, scratching out his not-so-successful plan with an imaginary red pen—because Park Sungho is no longer just a man of routine, he's a man in love.

Step 3: Sympathy is for losers. Do not ever take pity on your enemy; it's a trap. 

And then, in its place, he makes a correction—a reminder for future-Sungho. Something like a promise. 

Step 3: Fall in love with your rival. Then ask her to marry you one day. 

He seals it with another kiss. 

a/n: hope this was a fun little read for everyone and that it warms your heart/made it laugh as much as it made me happy to write it. for everyone dealing with exams right now, remember to take it easy and know that things always end in happiness despite the road-bumps you may experience on the way. and for fae, i hope you don't stress yourself out too much because we're all rooting for you and will be there for you whenever you want to unload your worries <33

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That was until he saw you with your group of friends, and oh how he thought you were the most angelic person he has ever seen—which you were.

Now internally monologuing in his head, he thinks what to do to get you notice him—the process goes like this:

Do I flash her a smile? I mean—ladies do love a guy with healthy pearly whites, right?

Should I ask Riwoo hyung for advice? Does he even have dating experience? Probably with guys. I have a feeling that he's dating Jaehyun but I just can't prove it yet.

Should I just go up to her and ask for her number? Or maybe talk to one of her friends to get her number?

Wait, what if she already has a boyfriend and what if he finds me and beats me to a pulp—oh who am I kidding…

With you on the other hand, you're tanning in the sand while your friends Gaeul, Moka and Sui are playing in the water when you see a ridiculously handsome man sitting outside of the lifeguard tower. While you're starring at this handsome man without realizing that it could get awkward if he looks at you. You look at his hands, oh those beautiful, veiny hands. You wonder what it's like to have those hands wrapped around your— "Hey! What was that for!?" you yell out while rubbing your eyes. Your friends splashed you with water and you're now drenched.

"Come on Y/N, you can tan after. Can you please come into the water with us?" Sui asks with puppy dog eyes. You can never say no to those eyes.

"What if I say no."

"You do know that going in the water makes you tan faster, right?" Gaeul mentions.

"Ugh fine…" you groan and roll your eyes at her as Sui and Gaeul drag you into the water, Moka following behind.

—

Leehan did end up noticing you and went straight to Riwoo—let's just say things were…chaotic. The second he opened the door of the lifeguard tower, he sees Riwoo and Jaehyun, another fellow lifeguard, making out. Hands all over each other and everything. Jaehyun's even pinning Riwoo to the wall.

"Oh my god, get a fucking room you two… why do I have to walk in to the two of you making out in here…? Please do your job—people could be drowning any time."

Riwoo and Jaehyun let go instantly. "Hey! We weren't even making out! We were just—uh… cuddling!" Jaehyun tried explaining to Leehan, terribly.

"Yeah well, can you at least keep the PDA to a minimum please? Thanks—anyways you two, I need advice."

"Oh? Is it a girl?" Riwoo questions the younger one with an eyebrow raised.

"Um…yes it is—you see, there's this girl I saw today tanning, and oh my goodness. She's like an angel that fell from heaven, and not to mention her tan is so damn good," Leehan responds while totally losing it.

"Riwoo honey, is he high?" Jaehyun whispers to his boyfriend.

"I wouldn't be surprised if he was," Riwoo replies. "I mean—just look at those eyes, not a single thought behind them. This kid's a total loser."

"I am NOT a loser by the way," Leehan huffs as he crosses his arms and turns away from them.

"Yeah yeah, okay buddy~ who the fuck says they're not a loser while talking about how good a girl's tan is…"

Oh it's gonna be a long shift…

—

You're in the water with your friends and you've come to the conclusion that being in the water IS fun and DOES in fact make you tan faster. The next thing you know is that Sui is bridal carrying you. "H-hey! Sui put me down!"

"HAHAHA!" Moka starts pointing and laughing at you.

"Moka this isn't funny! Put me DOWN!"

"Okay but it is funny though," Gaeul chimes in, giggling. "You should've seen the look on your face!"

"UGH GUYS I MEAN IT! PUT ME DOWN—"

3…2…1…

SPLASH!

You were thrown into the water, and suddenly you're regretting your life choices after decided to go to the beach with these three munchkins. You're totally going to get back at the, soon. Although the four of you are just having fun and playing around, you hear a sound in the distance—a whistle.

Leehan is sitting on his tall lifeguard chair when he sees some commotion out in the distance, and low and behold he sees you being thrown into the water. He springs into action, blows the whistle, and brings the life float with him on his journey to save you.

He runs into the water and starts screaming for you. "HEY! ARE YOU OKAY!?"

You face the direction towards the voice. "Hm? What's going on…?"

"Beats me." Moka replies unenthusiastically.

When Leehan finally makes his way to you, he feels relieved to you that you're okay.

"Hey, you okay?"

You raise your eyebrows at Leehan as you have no idea what he's saying. "Um, yes? Am I not supposed to be okay?"

"U-um—well, you were drowning, were you not?"

"Uh, no I wasn't…"

"Oh. Well, have a nice day?" Leehan's face turns red. This is the first time he wrongly thought someone was drowning. He knows that once Riwoo and Jaehyun find out about this, oh will the teasing be endless. You just starred at him. For a handsome guy, he's pretty strange and quirky.

—

Leehan walks back to the lifeguard tower with his head down feeling defeated. He looks up and sees Riwoo sitting on the desk doing some paperwork.

"Hyung, I just embarrassed myself…"

Riwoo turns around and looks at Leehan, trying not to hold in a laugh because he's seen Leehan embarrass himself several times in front of pedestrians at the beach. "Oh yeah? How so?"

"I might've thought someone was drowning because her friend threw her into the water, and I swam all the way to her. I even blew the whistle! I just made a fool out of myself in front of her and her friends," Leehan responds defeated and smeared his hands onto his face.

"Oh! Well that's a new one…" Riwoo's eyes widen slightly. "Wait a damn minute, is this the girl whom you said her tan was good?"

"Uh—yes."

"Oh my god Leehan."

"I'm trying here hyung!"

"Oh yeah, definitely."

The next day, Leehan was excited to see you. One problem, you weren't at the beach. So, predictably, Leehan was upset. Very upset. He went inside the lifeguard tower and met up with Jaehyun.

"She's not here," Leehan says sadly.

"It's still pretty early though, I'm sure she'll come later."

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK!

Jaehyun gets up from his chair and opens the door, and to Leehan's surprise, it's you.

"Um—hi there! I'm here for the job interview."

"Oh yes! Y/N, right?" Jaehyun asks.

"Yup! That's me," You respond back.

"Great! We were just waiting for you! Just follow me into this room where we do our interviews!" Jaehyun replied professionally, and you followed him into the small interview.

"Uh—hyung?" Leehan whispers to Jaehyun.

"Hm?"

"That's the girl I was talking about."

"Oh, her?" His smirk gets bigger. Oh no, what's he planning.

—

Leehan is waiting outside of the lifeguard tower with very conflicting thoughts. He wants you to get hired so he can talk to you and get closer to you but, he also doesn't want you to get hired because whatever happened yesterday could literally be used as blackmail.

He walks back into the lifeguard tower at the same time you and Jaehyun walk into the main room.

"Well, Leehan—you have a new partner. She's hired."

"O-oh…nice!" Leehan fumbles his words. What a loser.

Jaehyun looks back at Y/N. "Oh shit. I forgot to introduce you to Leehan! Y/N, this is Leehan.

"Nice to meet you Leehan!" Y/N enthusiastically says while shaking Leehan's very sweaty palms.

"N-nice to meet you too…!" Leehan fumbles his words yet again.

"Well then, I'm going to get stuff prepared for today's shift. You two be good. Talk and get to know each other! Play a game of icebreakers or something I don't fucking care," Jaehyun says while patting both Leehan's and your backs a little too aggressively, and he's off.

Once Jaehyun left the lifeguard tower, Leehan stares at the floor.

"Are you just going to ignore me, my lifesaver?"

"Hm?" Leehan looks up at you after you say that.

"Y'know, instead of making a fool of yourself of thinking I'm drowning, you could've just walked up to me if you wanted to talk to me," you say with a slight smirk on your face, feeling amused.

"…"

"You're one quiet guy, aren't you?"

"U-uh... yeah."

You walk up to Leehan and cup his cheeks with your hands. Then, you kiss him. Leehan's eyes widen with the sudden action. He doesn't kiss you back until five seconds after you initiated it. His hands fall to your waist, caressing it, and he's kissing you passionately. Until—

"Y/N, can you come out here for a sec—uh, am I interrupting your make out session?" Jaehyun interrupts realizing he walked in at a wrong time."

You and Leehan both let go from that pretty steamy kiss and you call out to Jaehyun. "Oh right, sorry about that!"

"It's all good, just keep the PDA to a minimum will you?"

"I literally said that when you and Riwoo hyung were making out in here yesterday!" Leehan chimes in.

"Yeah yeah, whatever." Jaehyun rolls his eyes and leaves the lifeguard tower.

You look back at Leehan as you both give each other a quick, short and soft kiss on the lips. "Well, see you pretty boy~" and you walk away.

Leehan touches his lips with his fingers. Oh he knows he's so in love to the point where there's no returning back. He's smiling like crazy. What on earth did you even do to him, he wonders. Now he just wants to kiss you all the time.

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“Listen—” you start, looking around for help but finding no one to back you up. Riwoo hears you mutter a curse under your breath at how Kim Woonhak and Han Taesan were backstabbing baboons who would be dealt with once you got out of this tight spot. Then you meet Riwoo’s eyes once more, putting on your most innocent, lovely smile. “You see, the principal’s been wanting to renovate this wing anyways. I was lending a hand—literally, haha.” You add jazz-hands for flair, hoping it’s at least entertaining enough to warrant a giggle.

However, Riwoo remains unimpressed. His brows meet in the middle of his frown, lips a thin, straight line, the muscle in his cheek twitching in annoyance. Or exhaustion—whichever you plagued him with first. 

“You finger painted…hand painted?—graffiti on the new student council room… My room.”

“Yep!” You nod, flashing all your teeth at him, happy to have helped. “It looks so much more vibrant like this, see—” You gesture towards the mural that looks like a unicorn shat rainbows all over it (with your chin, since your hand is in no state to be moved around freely, not when it's dripping pink and purple onto the ground). “Before I came in, this was all gray. Like concrete, ew. But I fixed it!”

“Fixed it…” Riwoo repeats, every nerve in his body fighting the urge to catch fire and explode like a cartoonic grenade. 

You nod again, wilder this time, getting your hair in your mouth but continuing to speak in spite of it. “Gotta make sure the stuco prez has a nice view.”

The sixth lash from the right on Riwoo's left eye twitches madly. His fists are balled up in the crooks of his elbows, arms crossed over his chest lest they decide to grow an impulse and slam themselves into his own skull. Not that he doesn't deserve it—he probably does—given this was all his fault for letting you get away with your delinquency all this time. 

“Vandalism,” he punctuates, gritting the word between his front teeth, “is against the school rules.”

You aren't convinced, rolling your eyes in easy dismissal. “It's called artistic freedom, look it up.” 

“I did. In the handbook. That I was asked to edit and enforce.”

“Dude, you need to chill out and like, dip your feet in a waterfall or something,” you continue, still too casual for Riwoo’s liking, like his position and power are simply dirt under your fingernails—or paint, in this case—to ignore. “Chase a dragonfly, like your vice president does sometimes.”

Riwoo’s patience is thinning, but he says, “Leehan is a special case. He gets distracted easily, that's all.”

“And that’s why he doesn't look constipated half the time and you do.”

That’s it. He's done being a doormat; he is going to put his foot down and make sure to whip your personality into shape if it's the last thing he does. 

He is so sick of your inability to sit still and follow rules for once. There's always something for him to clean up after: the busted pipes in the girl's bathroom from when you wanted to orchestrate a school-wide water fight for ‘team building’, the time he found out you were selling bootleg DVDs under the table (quite literally) for cash, the time he almost slipped and died from the loose papers you'd left scattered on the floor in a hurry to run to the toilets, because, apparently, peeing yourself is more of an emergency than preventing his potential funeral. 

Not anymore. 

You will respect him, and you will pay for your sins. 

“5 PM, after school. You're fixing this mess or I’m giving you another demerit.”

“But…” Your eyes widen, hands slowly dropping to your sides and getting colourful stains on your uniform. “That means suspension.”

“Good, so you have read the handbook.”

“No, you recite it every time you put me in detention,” you correct, and then regret it immediately. “Uhhhh…. I mean… Can't I just paint your face up there and call it a day?”

“Are you bribing me…?” Riwoo is offended if not confused, blinking an unnatural number of times at your audacity. “You're bribing me…with my own face?”

“Yeah! Is it working?” Not even the tiniest bit of guilt slips out your mouth when you speak, just hope. 

“... No.” Riwoo remains stern, despite the Herculean effort it takes to not give into your foolish smile. He straightens his spine, meets you head-on when he says—“5 PM. Or you find a new school midway through the year.”

And then, before you can get a word in, he speed-walks out of there without looking back, ignoring every single word of protest that makes its way out your mouth and echoes through the wooden door, until he's far away enough to give his heart, and brain, a rest.

The pen scratches against the paper in a smooth tempo, the spine of the ledger occasionally thumping against the desk when Riwoo presses the tip with a little too much force. Sunset orange spills through the murky glass and onto his visage, dappling amber through strands of his hair, his lashes, the raise of his cheek, through the lens of the glasses on his nose-bridge. 

Serene. That's what he feels. 

At least until—

“This is so harddddd. Let me go home!!”

Your whines are met with feigned oblivion and a glide of the page as he prepares to look over this week’s club accounts. Budgeting is a beast, and he's the only person capable enough to make sure no one goes over the limit and plunges the school into a debt they certainly cannot pay off. The principal has already threatened to cut funds and force them into begging on the streets if they were to keep splurging on puppy therapy days and useless visits to the aquarium like three times a year. (This is Leehan's fault, not his.)

(Well…it is his fault for not saying no to the vice president’s whims. But in Riwoo’s defense, he was way too preoccupied with attempting to wrangle you into line.)

“Prez. Yo, prez. Prez!?” you keep repeating petulantly, marching over to wave your scrub-cloth in front of his downturned eyes, failing to snap him out of his work. “Lee Riwoo, I can't do this anymore!”

“Less whining, more cleaning,” he says simply, not looking up for even a second. 

You pout, grumbling at how the paint is too stuck into the surface to come off without boiling hot water and a bone-breaking amount of scrubbing. You'd already struggled to fill and carry a heavy bucket all the way here, then almost collapsed from the level of effort required to reset the wall back into its original state. 

Riwoo hasn't moved an inch from the teacher's desk in the past one hour, no matter how much you attempted to strike up small-talk or huffed or sighed very loudly. He just sat there, writing. Doing math was certainly better than talking to you. 

He thinks you've given up on it after trying and failing too many times than he's bothered to count. Riwoo is swallowed up by tiny numbers floating above the blue lines, by mental additions and subtractions and estimations running across his mind as he mutters quietly under his breath, careful not to lose track of his place. He thinks you've already gone back to cleaning when—

When something soft and feather-like brushes across his cheek, and a looming shadow falls over him. He sucks in a sharp breath, feels goosebumps prickle up on his neck, feels something eerie crawl through his abdomen as he slowly turns his head to check…

“HOLY SHIT—!” he yelps as he jumps out of his skin—and off the chair, straight onto his butt on the floor. 

You blink down at him in confusion. “What? I was just curious about what you were so focused on.” And without regard for his privacy or the fact that he's still flat on his ass, you lean in to poke your head into his ledger, your face getting more impressed as you read down the page. “Damn, you run this place like it's the military,” you note, nodding. “Wait, do you take suggestions?”

“Huh?”

“The athletes get all the funds and us arts kids get morsels. Can't you update the instruments in the music room at least this year?”

“That is not my jurisdiction,” Riwoo says as he finally gets up, brushing the dust off his pants and straightening his tie, pushing back his rimmed glasses. “Also, weren't you the one that busted up a hole through the drumkit?”

You have the shame to look sheepish, flickering your eyes away from his pointed stare. “Uh… Yeah, maybe?”

“Right.”

You pout again. “I had too much sugar, okay? Sometimes I can't control my energy, and sometimes my drums suffer because of it.” 

Riwoo can sense a migraine strutting its way to him; he’ll have to do breathing exercises again if you keep threatening his health like this, and there are not enough ways to inhale and exhale in the world for him to recover from the damage you do. So he pulls himself together, climbs back into his spot at the table, and lets you move to meet his eyes properly. 

“If I say I’ll think about it, will you get back to cleaning the wall?” he asks, drumming the back of his pen on the wood in impatience. 

“Mayhaps,” you reply, but you're smiling when you do it, suddenly in raised spirits. “Will you actually talk back to me and not let me die of boredom all alone over there?” 

Riwoo chews on the thought—considers the pros and cons of saying yes to your request. 

Pros: you do your job, he doesn't have to nag. He doesn't get in trouble by the faculty for enabling your terrible habits. 

Cons: you…you talk a lot. Non-stop. 

“My wrists are sore. I had carpal tunnel once and that was the worst time ever. Swore I'll never get it again, and now look at me.”

And when Riwoo doesn't respond with the empathy you expect him to, you go, “Does the student council also cover medical bills?”

“No.”

“You swore you'd keep me company.”

“I am,” he tosses back. “I'm breathing very loudly so you can use it as white noise while you scrub. Now go on.” 

You huff and puff, but still return to squeezing water into the bucket. Then five minutes after—

“Hmm… I should've used more red on the cherries. Maybe glitter too… Shame that you're making me wipe all of it off…” Then—

“Prez, Prez, why do you wear glasses half the size of your face? Does it not hurt…? But you look nice though, so it's not all that bad.” 

And—

“Have you ever wondered what would happen if babies came in adult sizes? Like, imagine a giant baby in your house, just crawling around,” you're rambling as you lay on your back on the floor, cloth abandoned somewhere to the side, hair coming loose out of your ponytail and fingers stretched to the ceiling as though any further and you could touch it. Evidently, you have made no actual progress. “You’d need a giant cradle. And a giant milk bottle. Oh! And giant diapers, woah…”

Riwoo’s pulse has been climbing with every word you say, effectively building up into a mini explosion in his brain. It's been a slow tick of time while you talked yourself through nonsense, getting distracted with the task at hand with every pressing minute. He tried to reel you back in with his tuts and coughs, but it took a simple turn of his head away from you for you to give up and dramatically throw yourself onto the ground.

It's like he's taken away your life's purpose—of breaking every rule in the book and dragging him through mud along with it.

Also, turns out—and he should have expected this, really—you suck at sticking to a chore. So much so in fact that you do anything not to do what you were told to. 

It's leaking shadows into the room, sun well below the horizon, when you trudge back from your momentary break with a mop in tow. 

He presses his cheek into his palm when he asks, even though he knows without needing to. “What are you doing now?”

“Floor’s all dirty. I'm mopping.”

Of course you are. “You didn't finish the walls yet.”

“I'll get to it after the floors, duh.”

You don't. In fact, you don't even finish the moping before you've moved onto your next activity. First it's brushing cobwebs out of the dusty corners of the window, then you try to budge the window-panes open with no luck before giving up entirely, then you sit there with a pair of scissors you'd found from god-knows-where, snipping up old test papers out of your backpack for no reason at all other than wasting time. Once you've run out of things to cut up, Riwoo sees the way you eye his ledger and has to lunge to move it out of your dangerous reach. 

He's beginning to wonder if the duties of a school council president involved babysitting too…

And right when he thinks you've given up, when you're trailing the minute hand on the clock while wringing out the washcloth, while he's marking up the last bit of his work, while he's distracted just the slightest…

You pounce for your bag and book it for the hills out the door.

…

Riwoo doesn't know what's just happened. You were here at first, and then you're gone with the wind, like some metahuman speedster keyed up on high-functioning steroids, you've just…

Vanished. 

He picks up his pen off the desk first, then his mind off the floor, before realising that he should follow you and drag you back before you’ve completely evaded the responsibility he's placed upon your shoulders. 

Riwoo sighs deeply before sprinting after the direction you left, trying to not let the creepy hallways scare him into cowering, discreetly muttering consolations to himself when the broken lightbulb blinks once before dying, somehow trudging through a hellish field of weeds until he sees a figure throwing something over the back fence of the school’s perimeter.

A ghost, he thinks at first, but then he hears the signature jangle of the keyrings on your book-bag clattering to the ground and he knows it's no ghost.

It's just the devil incarnate, apparently.

“Y/N! Get back in there now!” he shouts through cupped hands, lungs burning from the run. But you're already stepping on top of one of the empty flower pots and trying to reach for the tall fence, determined to jump over. Riwoo acts fast, albeit exhausted, scurrying through dirt and moss until he's looking right up at you.

“Just a little more—” You're muttering to yourself, elbows propped up on the ledge as you try to push higher. But you make the mistake of looking down and almost die from the shock. 

Your grip loosens, and down you come tumbling, straight into Riwoo's arms.

Or at least you would have…

Had it not been for his terrible reflexes and weariness from having overworked himself the whole week. His hands are just too stiff to reach out, okay? Maybe that's why he's fallen onto his back, in a terrible imitation of the mishap from before in the classroom, and you're there, caging him with both your arms on either sides of his neck, hair a curtain around his face.

And Riwoo—he processes it slowly, eyes flickering from your widened eyes, then to the slope of your nose, and then to your parted lips, a millimetre away…

Badump. 

“I—” you begin, and he gulps just for the sake of needing something to do. This is weird—but not bad weird. Just…so new. 

Okay, that's a lie. He knows the way his heart jumps out of his ribs is not dissimilar to all the times when you've invaded his personal space with zero account for his well-being—for the heat on his neck and the butterflies in his stomach. For the way he’s always on high alert when you're near, an inbuilt radar in his brain for your misbehaviours. 

You are so close. And he is so doomed. 

“Y/N…” he says, mouth moving on its own accord, the badump badump badump growing wings in his chest, threatening to take flight and melt into the pulse between the two of you, in the slowly thinning gap between your lips. 

His fingers twitch where they lay stuck between your bodies, but he doubts he could have reached out even if it weren't. Because the way you look at him, moonlight reflected in the pools of your eyes, the tip of your nose almost grazing his own skin. And then—

You reach out first, gaze going from surprised to crinkled warmth, a hand lightly brushing over the plane of his cheek. He feels it move to place his glasses back onto his nose—and only now does he realises that it had come sliding off when he'd stumbled on his feet before. 

“There,” you whisper, and he's never heard you speak anywhere close to this softly. “It’s perfect again now.”

He is an idiot and his mouth is a traitor, because it goes on to ask, in an undeniably gentle voice— “Perfect?” 

“Hmm… Wait, not quite.” Then you adjust them so that it's not skewed to the right anymore, brushing back the strands that fall over his forehead and scorching every exposed part of him in bright red. And before he can count to ten and calm himself down, you dip lower and something plush meets his skin. 

Your lips. Soft and lovely and pressed against his cheek, right below the mole under his eye. 

The heat is gone as soon as it comes, when you lean back to take your weight off of him and stand up, so quickly he barely registers or remembers anything that's happened in the past 24 hours. There was a wall involved, he thinks. 

He's still splayed out on the dirty ground, dazed out of his mind, when he sees you shoot a dazzling smile of victory down and him before jumping up to grasp the fence-ledge again, calculating momentum—this time, successful in leaping over the boundary. 

It happens in slo-mo in Riwoo’s vision, a blinding halo around your silhouette, a choir of cherubs singing down from the suddenly sunny skies. He thinks he sees rose petals cascading down, and also a pair of wings on your back. 

Either you were a real-life angel—or he'd hit his head a little too hard during that fall.

Or…

Or he was simply beyond the point of going back on these feelings starting to sprout inside him when he looks at you. 

It's only after he hears your feet landing on a crunch of dried leaves that he manages to regain balance and sanity.

“That's a demerit!” he manages to squeak out in a yell—but both you and him know that he's not going to get you in trouble. 

Not when his cheek is still singed with the burn of your kiss. And certainly not when he’s considering keeping the mural up just to have an excuse to get you alone again.

Riwoo is so doomed.

a/n: again again happy birthday to my unofficial official child, i hope you have an awesome day ahead!!! everyone go wish the coolest 14 year old alive and give them all the love at @beomtomie !!!!

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div cr: @saradika-graphics

The clock on the luxury dashboard read 10:00 AM.

Now, that was considerably late for any decent, law-abiding civil servant expected to clock in on time. But for you? Honestly, the fact that you even showed up was a miracle in itself.

You aggressively scooped your belongings—mostly documents, more documents, even more documents, and oh, a single lipstick—and shoved them into your expensive Jane Birkin bag. It was so criminally overstuffed it had completely lost its shape. Clutching the abused luxury leather, you marched into the police headquarters like a woman on a mission.

The passing glances from your colleagues followed you, but you couldn't care less. Your eyes were locked entirely on your sole destination: the gleaming silver elevator doors.

Beep! Beep!

⁠ACCESS DENIED⁠

The flashing red text on the digital scanner after you swiped your ID card made your eyebrow twitch violently.

As someone who practically worshipped speed, despised delays, and refused to waste a single second of her life—this exact scenario was profoundly, deeply irritating.

Before you could get yourself court-martialed for destroying government property (an offense you’d committed more times than you’d care to admit) or for assaulting a security guard (a crime you hadn't tried yet, but were highly considering), the expensive smartphone crammed into your back pocket vibrated, violently interrupting your incoming villain arc.

Incoming Call: 'Jungwon (HWK)'

"What" you snapped into the receiver.

The person on the other end immediately picked up on your murderous tone. And that, in turn, was also annoying.

"Whoa, easy there, tiger," Jungwon’s voice crackled through the line, sounding entirely too cheerful for your current mood. "Your badge got flagged because of the transfer order."

"Are you messing with me? Am I supposed to parkour up the balcony or something?"

"I’m just stating facts, chief. Please don't smash any state property just yet. Come up to the 15th floor... I’ve got something shiny to show you."

You let out an irritated sigh, bluntly hanging up on your 'best friend' since academy days without a shred of remorse. Still, your thumb aggressively punched the button for the 15th floor anyway.

You could feel the burning stares of the uniformed officers around you, but frankly, it was just a regular Tuesday for you. It wasn't every day people got to look at a Captain who broke the record as the youngest officer to reach the rank in police history. A literal top-of-the-class prodigy from the Police University, scoring straight A's in both theory and field tactics, a sharpshooter with deadly precision, and a hand-to-hand combat expert who made certified instructors cry for mercy.

Ah... well, just exclude the police ethics department from your resume. Come on, everyone has flaws. You can't expect a person to be a perfect saint, can you?

The elevator dinged and slid open on the 15th floor of the National Police Headquarters. This was the restricted zone of the Intelligence Division, colloquially known as Hawkeye. The atmosphere here was deathly quiet, as if it existed in a completely different dimension. You strutted down the hallway, your heels clicking sharply against the floor as you headed toward the deepest, most familiar office.

Yang Jungwon—your dear best friend—was casually spinning in his ergonomic chair in front of a gargantuan control panel, the blue glow of the servers reflecting off his glasses.

Ugh. Absolutely insufferable.

"Take a seat, Director," Jungwon said, rolling a chair toward you. "How was your one-week suspension? Word on the street is that Commissioner General Shim had to practically fist-fight the board of directors just to keep you from getting fired."

"Don't call it a suspension. Call it what it is: administrative archiving."

You threw yourself into the chair, crossing your legs with an irritated huff.

"The old man is just terrified of staining our prestigious, multi-generational police bloodline. Charges like 'excessive use of force' and 'destruction of government property' don't exactly look great on his favorite granddaughter’s record."

"Hey, but in exchange for bringing back a Black Box-level piece of evidence? I’d say it was worth it." Jungwon chuckled softly, his fingers flying across the keyboard.

"Your little stunt at the Incheon port last week forced the higher-ups to finally greenlight the D.A.R.T. unit... Even if, realistically, they only built it to serve as a living graveyard for all the HR nightmares they can't legally fire."

The massive screen in the center of the room flickered to life, transitioning from pitch black to a stark, ominous red. The data displayed on it, however, was so laughably empty it was almost depressing.

"Cut to the chase, Jungwon," you muttered. "Is this seriously all we have on these bastards?"

The screen was literally just a sea of question marks (⁠?⁠).

Right beside them was the crest that the entire police force utterly loathed, yet the public worshiped like they were some kind of modern Robin Hoods.

⁠THE HOUSE OF CARDS (H.O.C.)⁠

You raised an eyebrow at the screen, surveying the total lack of identifying information. "Name? Age? Nationality? Number of operatives?"

"Zero. NADA," Jungwon sighed, spinning his chair back to face you. "We know absolutely nothing about them. For the past two years, we haven't even figured out how many members H.O.C. actually has. Five? Ten? Or maybe it's just one incredibly cracked hacker doing everything by himself. Who knows."

Wonderful.

A briefing where we officially learned absolutely nothing.

"Okay, then what's the deal with these cards?" You pointed at the graphic of six playing cards lined up on the monitor.

"Ah, that is the single thing they deliberately leave behind for us to admire," Jungwon explained, zooming in on the cards. "Every time they pull off a heist, they leave exactly one card at the crime scene. The Behavioral Analysis Unit has formulated a 'hypothesis' that each card represents a specific member with a distinct role. Mind you, this is strictly a theory. Emphasizing on theory."

Jungwon clicked a remote, and the screen displayed the categories the police had basically guessed.

"The Joker."

The monitor shifted to show a bank's mainframe completely corrupted by a laughing clown virus.

"Any case where the system gets breached or data mysteriously vanishes into thin air, we find this card. We’ve never seen a face. Could be a solo hacker, could be a whole team of elite programmers. Your guess is as good as mine."

"Or maybe our cyber crimes division is just incompetent."

"Watch your mouth."

You shrugged, gesturing for him to move to the next slide. Jungwon took a deep breath, swallowing his annoyance before continuing.

"Next, the Jack of Clubs."

A blurry CCTV footage played, showing nothing but a fleeting, lightning-fast shadow.

"The Jack. Appears in high-casualty, brute-force breaches. No one has ever seen their actual face. Cameras only catch a blur, or a figure clad in pitch-black gear that defies all tactical profiling. Some say it's a ninja, others swear it's Spider-Man."

"Please, that is so cringe. It’s literally just some kid who's good at parkour jumping across roofs."

The faint hum of the projector fan filled the silent room after your remark.

"You have zero appreciation for the arts," Jungwon muttered. "Moving on, the King of Hearts."

You averted your gaze from the screen, tapping your fingers impatiently against the desk.

"The King of Hearts... left behind in high-profile corporate espionage and witness manipulation cases. The suspect always utilizes a different, perfectly forged identity. Oh, and it's always left with a fresh red rose. The street cops playfully call him 'Lupin'—hey, focus please."

You snapped your attention back at your friend’s sharp reprimand. The screen was now displaying a beautifully vibrant rose and the King of Hearts card, cutting between static-filled CCTV clips that glitched out every single time a specific man walked past.

"Is that static the Joker's doing too?"

"Highly probable, but unconfirmed."

You jutted out your lower lip, nodding slowly.

"The Ace of Spades and the King of Diamonds," Jungwon paused for a fraction of a second before pushing through. "The Ace is found in sophisticated extortion letters outlining intricate blueprints, while the King of Diamonds is always left next to massive stacks of cash left behind at the scene. So, our working theory is that they are the Brains and the Financier. And... yep, that's it. That's the grand total of our intel."

"So, to summarize... we are fighting ghosts with fancy code names?" You let out a bitter, mocking laugh. "No wonder the cases haven't moved an inch."

"There is exactly one exception..." Jungwon’s tone dropped, becoming deadly serious as he hit the final button. "There is one member we are 100% sure exists. Because he is the only one arrogant enough to actually show his face on camera."

The screen flashed, displaying the single high-definition photograph in the entire database.

It was a tall, lean young man clad in an exquisite, pearl-white tuxedo embroidered with intricate gold threading. His collar was adorned with layered, luxurious fabric, topped off with a white top hat and a matching cape that billowed dramatically in the wind.

His face was obscured by an elegant, ornate Venetian masquerade half-mask.

He was standing on the precipice of a skyscraper, bathed in the silver moonlight, one hand resting on a sleek cane while the other effortlessly twirled a playing card between his fingers.

"The King of Spades."

"The big boss... or as the media loves to call him, 'The White Prince of Spades'."

Jungwon stared at the image with a mixture of awe and sheer frustration.

"This guy acts like he walked straight out of a comic book. A phantom thief who literally performs magic tricks in front of the police. He steals priceless artifacts right under the noses of hundreds of guards without breaking a sweat. At the diamond auction last year, he materialized on stage out of nowhere. The lights went out for exactly eight seconds, and when they came back on, both he and the diamond were gone."

"That show-off piece of garbage..." You hissed through gritted teeth.

"Exactly. The only idiot who willingly sticks his head out to flex, wearing a blinding white outfit like he’s terrified people won't notice him," Jungwon added, making a disgusted face. "And he is the sole reason you got slapped with an 'assaulting a fellow officer' charge, because you literally elbowed the desk sergeant in the face just to steal the car keys and chase him down."

"Well, it's his fault for blocking my way!" You retorted instantly. "He was rambling on and on about protocol and paperwork while the thief was actively making his getaway!"

"So you stole a department vehicle? Drove out alone? No warrant? No backup? ...You are completely insane. If I hadn't bypassed the city cameras to map out your route, or if Wonyoung hadn't distracted the coast guard, you would’ve drowned in that harbor and died a week ago." Jungwon aggressively ran a hand through his hair.

"Watch your mouth, Jungwon."

Jungwon shrugged, deliberately looking away from you. "Sure, sure, Miss Elite Prodigy. Punching your co-workers just to chase a criminal. No wonder you got demoted." He shook his head.

"Do you even know what actually happened that night?!"

"Of course I do! I was the one watching your bodycam feed!"

11:00 PM (A little over an hour before the police's estimated timeline), Last Week.

The faint, metallic clinking of chains echoed softly through the night.

You slipped stealthily between the towering shipping containers, moving like a shadow. No backup. Just you, your service pistol, and a raw instinct telling you—they are here.

And you were right... well, half right.

Perched on top of a cargo container was the man in the white suit, casually swinging his legs and humming a cheerful tune to himself, looking like he was waiting for a cozy picnic rather than finalizing an illegal smuggling transaction.

He looked entirely relaxed... right up until you aimed your barrel directly at his chest.

"Freeze! Police!"

The King of Spades flinched so hard his entire body jolted, nearly dropping the hard drive in his hand. He whipped his head around to look at you, then frantically raised his wrist to check his watch in a clumsy, panicked motion that was entirely 'un-cool'.

"...Officer?" His voice, filtered through a vocal modulator, sounded utterly bewildered. "Wait a minute... It's only eleven? Ace calculated the police arrival time at midnight! Why on earth are you here so early?!"

"I don't drive a damn turtle like the rest of them." You advanced forward, keeping your weapon locked steady on him. "Hand over the evidence and climb down with your hands up."

"Oh, crap... I haven't even styled my hair properly. I didn't get to practice my introductory pose yet!" he muttered frantically to himself, taking a panicked step backward. "If Ace finds out the plan failed because of my poor time management, he's going to lecture me until my ears bleed..."

"You can complain all you want in a holding cell!"

You didn't waste another second listening to his rambling. You charged.

The brawl that followed was brief but fierce. He was smarter and quicker than you’d anticipated, fluidly dodging and parrying your strikes like a trained dancer. But he refused to strike back, focusing entirely on deflecting your blows and looking for an exit—until your sweeping kick sent the hard drive flying over the edge, plummeting to the ground below.

"Okay, okay! I yield, milady!"

He scrambled back to the edge of the container, shoving his hand inside his suit jacket.

You braced yourself, expecting a smoke grenade or a weapon, but instead, he pulled out a thick pencil(?) and a playing card. His elegant fingers scribbled frantically on the card, looking so rushed and clumsy the pencil almost slipped from his grip.

"Consider tonight your win! Take this consolation prize for now, and I’ll make sure to send a proper invitation later!"

BOOM!

A flashbang smoke bomb detonated at your feet.

Coughing through the thick smoke, you lunged forward to grab him, but your fingers only caught a single playing card that he flicked directly onto your forehead before vanishing into the night…

You reached into your jacket pocket, pulling out a clear Ziploc bag with a distinct red evidence seal.

Inside the bag was a heavily creased King of Spades card. On the back, a message was scribbled in messy, panicked handwriting:

⁠Next: case 26 – the void⁠

You slapped the evidence bag onto the desk with a loud thud.

"Look at this trainwreck," you scoffed. "He wrote it so fast the letters is literally smeared. This is the 'Mastermind' of a national crime syndicate? Please. He looks more like a middle schooler trying to scribble down his homework before the bell rings."

Jungwon reached out to pick up the bag, but you sharply slapped his hand away.

"Don't touch it. I haven't sent it to the forensics lab yet, you'll ruin the fingerprints."

"Wait a second..." Jungwon pulled his hand back, narrowing his eyes at you. "You haven't submitted this piece of evidence to central command yet? Y/N, that is a massive protocol violation. If Internal Affairs finds out, they're going to tack on a 'withholding evidence' charge to your record."

"Withholding what?" You shrugged, a predatory, mischievous smirk spreading across your face. "The evidence for Case 25 was the hard drive, which I have fully returned. As for this card..."

You tapped your fingernail against the plastic bag.

"The idiot wrote 'Case 26' on it himself... So, technically speaking, this is a 'lead' for a future case that hasn't officially occurred yet. And as the newly appointed Director of the D.A.R.T. unit handling this specific investigation, I have full operational discretion to retain it for investigative purposes... Right?"

Jungwon’s jaw dropped. He stared at you for a long moment before shaking his head with a breathless laugh.

"Wow. The mental gymnastics are unreal... Unbelievable. You literally memorized the entire legal penal code just to exploit it for your own chaotic convenience."

"It's called operational discretion, darling."

You snatched the bag back, sliding it safely into your pocket like a prized possession.

"Next time, I'm not just kicking his evidence away. Get a holding cell ready, Jungwon. Because I am going to drag that ridiculous white-suited prince by his collar and personally lock him behind bars."

A/N