#[Mother Knows Best (Crack)] | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

solxamber · 5 months ago

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Choose Us!

In which you have to decide on a dorm to become part of.

Part 2: You choose the dorm

"You're serious?" you blink at Crowley, half-expecting Grim to wake you up from this fever dream. "I can move into any dorm?"

Crowley clasps his hands together with a benevolent smile that doesn't quite match his usual dramatic flair. "Indeed, my dear prefect! It's the least I can do to ensure your safety and comfort!"

Grim looks up from where he’s gnawing on a suspiciously burnt sofa leg. "Wait, what about me?!"

"You’ll go where the prefect goes, naturally," Crowley waves off Grim’s protests. "Now, chop-chop! Let me know your decision by the end of the day."

And just like that, he floats out of Ramshackle, leaving you standing in the middle of the chaos.

Heartslabyul

The second you hit send in the group chat, you regret everything. Ace and Deuce don’t even wait for you to explain. Within minutes, they’re barging into Ramshackle like the Kool-Aid Man.

“Heartslabyul!” Ace yells, grabbing one of your arms.

“Obviously Heartslabyul!” Deuce hollers, seizing the other.

“I haven’t even decided—”

“Blasphemy!” Ace gasps, as if you’d just insulted his mother. “We’re your best friends, how could you even think about choosing another dorm?”

Deuce nods fervently, dragging you toward the door. “Heartslabyul’s clean! Organized! You’d thrive there!”

"And the desserts!" Ace adds. "Think of the desserts!"

Before you know it, you're shoved into Heartslabyul’s rose garden, where Riddle is waiting with the most extravagant tea party setup you’ve ever seen. There’s a towering cake, delicate pastries, and enough tea to drown Grim.

“I thought you might need proper refreshments while considering your options,” Riddle says, adjusting his posture like he isn’t secretly trying to sway you. “Of course, I have no preference where you go. I’m merely concerned for your well-being.”

Trey hands you a plate with the biggest, most immaculate slice of cake you’ve ever seen. “You’d fit right in here, you know,” he says kindly. “We’re all about structure and care… and good desserts.”

"Plus," Cater slides in with a grin, “imagine all the cool pics we could take together! #DormGoals, am I right? You and me chilling in Heartslabyul, like, all the time?”

Riddle clears his throat loudly. “This isn’t about favoritism, mind you. But if you were to choose Heartslabyul, you’d be part of a dorm that values discipline and respect for the rules.”

Ace nudges you with a smirk. “Ignore him. Just think of all the times I’ll sneak you extra tarts.”

You glance around at the hopeful stares. Grim’s already halfway into a tart he snatched off the table. “I feel like I’m being ambushed.”

“Oh, you are,” Ace says shamelessly.

Savanaclaw

You stumble out of the Heartslabyul tea party, feeling like you’ve consumed enough sugar to fuel a small country. Before you can even catch your breath, a shadow looms over you, and suddenly, you're hoisted into the air like a sack of potatoes.

“What the—JACK?!” you squawk, flailing as he throws you over his shoulder like you weigh nothing.

“You’re coming with me,” Jack grunts, completely unfazed by your protests. “You need to see why Savanaclaw is the best dorm for you.”

“I can walk, you know!” you huff, punching his back.

He ignores you. “Not fast enough.”

By the time he sets you down, you’re in the middle of Savanaclaw’s common area, where Ruggie is lounging on one of the couches, counting a suspiciously thick wad of cash. Leona’s sprawled out nearby, pretending to nap, though his ears twitch at the sound of your arrival.

Ruggie grins as soon as he spots you. “Ah, perfect timing! I was just telling Leona how we could totally use someone like you here. Right, boss?”

Leona cracks one eye open and yawns, his tone dripping with disinterest. “Tch. Don’t care. They can do whatever they want.”

“That’s funny,” Ruggie says, nudging Leona hard enough to make him growl, “’cause I distinctly remember you saying—and I quote—‘If they don’t pick Savanaclaw, everyone else can rot.’”

Leona sits up, glaring daggers at Ruggie. “I said no such thing.”

“Sure you didn’t,” Ruggie snickers before turning back to you, his grin as wide as a hyena’s. “Anyway, check this out. Leona generously donated some funds to help you... you know, see the light.”

He shoves the wad of cash into your hands. You blink at it. “What am I supposed to do with this?”

“Whatever you want! Snacks, clothes, bribes for your annoying friends in Heartslabyul…”

Leona groans and drags a hand down his face. “You’re making us look desperate.”

“We? Speak for yourself, Your Highness.” Ruggie winks at you. “He’s just mad ‘cause he doesn’t know how to be subtle.”

Leona slouches further into his seat, watching you through half-lidded eyes. “Look, Herbivore, if you wanna be around people who won’t coddle you, Savanaclaw’s where it’s at. We don’t do tea parties here—”

“Obviously,” you mutter, thinking about the claw marks on the furniture.

“—but we’ll actually challenge you to grow stronger. You can’t get that in the other dorms.”

Jack nods. “He’s right. And we’ve got the best training facilities on campus.”

Ruggie waves a hand dismissively. “Yeah, yeah, training’s cool and all, but let’s focus on what really matters. Free snacks. Awesome vibes. Me.”

Leona rolls his eyes. “You’re going to scare them off.”

You cross your arms, trying to ignore the way Leona’s ears flick every time you shift your weight. “So… are you guys going to bribe me with anything besides money and vibes?”

Leona smirks. “What, isn’t my dazzling personality enough?”

Ruggie snorts. “Oh, sure. That’s totally why people flock to you.”

You can’t help but laugh, and Leona’s eyes soften just a little, though he quickly turns his head like he doesn’t care.

“I’ll think about it,” you say, handing the wad of cash back to Ruggie, who immediately starts recounting it like you’ve stolen some.

“Better think fast,” Leona mutters, though there’s the faintest curve of a smile on his lips.

Octavinelle

As you trudge back to Ramshackle, your brain still processing Savanaclaw’s “recruitment tactics,” a pair of arms suddenly wrap around you, lifting you clean off the ground.

“Shrimpy!” Floyd crows, spinning you around like you’re a prize he just won at a carnival.

“FLOYD! Put me down!” you shout, flailing uselessly in his grip.

“Nah, I got orders,” he says, grinning ear to ear as he hauls you off toward the Mostro Lounge.

By the time you’re unceremoniously deposited (read: still stuck in Floyd’s arms like a glorified teddy bear), you’re face-to-face with Azul and Jade, both of whom look way too pleased with themselves.

“Ah, perfect timing!” Azul says, standing up from his chair with his signature business smile. “We’ve been eagerly awaiting your arrival. Have a seat!”

“I would if Floyd let me down,” you deadpan, glaring at the tall eel holding you like a sack of seaweed.

“Nah, you’re comfy,” Floyd chirps, tightening his grip as if daring you to try escaping.

Azul clears his throat, pulling out a scroll of parchment that looks suspiciously like a contract. “Ahem. Now, as I was saying—let’s discuss the many benefits of joining Octavinelle. For starters, we pride ourselves on being a dorm of intellect and resourcefulness. Here, you’ll have access to unmatched networking opportunities, a plethora of unique beverages crafted by Jade himself, and—should you agree—my personal mentorship in matters of… negotiation.”

He flashes you a grin that screams, This is totally not suspicious at all.

Jade slides a glass of something shimmering and iridescent across the table toward you. “I would be delighted to name you our official taste tester. Imagine the prestige of being the first to try all my… experimental creations.”

You eye the drink like it might explode. “Define ‘experimental.’”

Jade smiles serenely. “You’ll find out.”

“Don’t be shy, Shrimpy!” Floyd chimes in, shifting you in his arms so you’re now sitting sideways like some sort of royal guest. “You’d have so much fun here. We’ve got good food, good drinks, and me.”

Azul adjusts his glasses, sliding the contract closer to you. “And, of course, we’ve prepared a special position for you. All you have to do is sign right here, and Octavinelle will officially welcome you as our newest member.”

You glance at the contract, then at the three of them—Azul’s scheming smile, Jade’s unsettling calmness, and Floyd’s unnervingly enthusiastic grin.

“I feel like this is a trap,” you say.

“It’s not a trap,” Floyd says immediately, which makes you even more suspicious.

Azul leans forward, steepling his fingers. “I assure you, everything is perfectly legitimate. Now, shall we seal the deal?”

“Or,” you say, leaning back as far as Floyd’s grip will allow, “I could not.”

Jade hums thoughtfully, handing you another drink. “At least try the beverages before you decide.”

Azul smirks. “I’m sure a sip or two will convince you.”

You glance at the drink, then back at Azul. “Is this bribery?”

“It’s persuasion,” he corrects smoothly.

“Same thing.”

Floyd suddenly squeezes you tight, grinning down at you. “C’mon, Shrimpy. Just say yes already! I’ll carry you everywhere. Betcha Heartslabyul and Savanaclaw didn’t offer that.”

You sigh, resting your head in your hands. This was going to be a long night.

Scarabia

You barely make it out of Octavinelle alive (or at least with your dignity and soul intact) when you’re immediately ambushed again.

“Prefect!” Kalim’s voice rings out, and before you can even process the sound, you’re being yanked into a whirlwind of color, music, and… is that confetti?

You blink as Scarabia's lounge comes into view, transformed into what can only be described as a full-blown festival. Tables are piled high with food, lanterns glow in warm hues, and cheerful music fills the air.

“Surprise!” Kalim grins, throwing his arms wide like he just gifted you the world. “Welcome to Scarabia! We threw a party just for you!”

“A… party?” you repeat, still trying to figure out how you got here so fast.

“Yep!” Kalim grabs your hands, his golden eyes shining with pure, unfiltered excitement. “I thought, ‘What’s the best way to convince you to join us?’ And then I thought, ‘A party! Everyone loves parties!’”

Before you can respond, a plate stacked with delicious-looking food appears in front of you, courtesy of none other than Jamil.

“Eat,” he says simply, pushing the plate closer.

“Oh, uh, thanks?” you mumble, picking up a fork.

Jamil nods, then leans in slightly, his voice low and almost conspiratorial. “This is just a taste of what Scarabia has to offer. Stick around, and I’ll make sure you’re well-fed every day. Properly fed.”

You pause mid-bite, noticing the way he emphasizes the word “properly,” like he knows exactly how many instant noodles you’ve been living off of.

Kalim, meanwhile, is still giving you the most devastating puppy-dog eyes you’ve ever seen. “You’ll join, right? We’d have so much fun together! And think of all the parties we could throw! Oh, and I can get you anything you want! Name it, and it’s yours!”

You glance between Kalim’s hopeful grin and Jamil’s subtle but persuasive bribes.

Jamil catches your hesitation and sighs, placing yet another dish in front of you. “Look, I’ll even help you stay on top of your work. You’re clearly the type who needs someone dependable around.”

“Hey!” you protest, only for him to raise an eyebrow as if to say, Am I wrong?

“Please?” Kalim chimes in, practically bouncing in place. “It’ll be so much fun! And I really, really want you to join. Scarabia would be perfect for you!”

You groan internally, stuffing another bite of food into your mouth just to avoid answering. Between Kalim’s overwhelming enthusiasm and Jamil’s quiet determination, you’re starting to think Scarabia might actually succeed in breaking your will.

You’re doomed. Aren’t you?

Pomefiore

You stumble out of Scarabia, clutching your overstuffed stomach and wondering how you’ve made it this far without officially losing your sanity. Taking the long way around campus to avoid any more ambushes seems like the best idea—you’ve had enough dorm propaganda for one day.

Or so you thought.

You’re halfway through the forest, breathing a sigh of relief at the quiet, when—

“Bonjour, mon cher trésor!”

You shriek as Rook appears out of thin air. Where did he even come from? Why is there sparkly lighting behind him? Is this even allowed?

“Rook! What—what are you doing here?!”

“Ah, I see you were clever enough to evade the others,” he says, ignoring your question entirely. “But you cannot escape me, the hunter of beauty! Pomefiore awaits, mon ami!”

Before you can protest, he’s scooped you up bridal style and is sprinting through the forest with unnatural speed, his laughter echoing ominously.

“This isn’t fair! You’re cheating!” you yell, flailing helplessly.

“All’s fair in love, war, and dorm recruitment, non?”

You soon find yourself unceremoniously plopped down in the middle of Pomefiore’s lounge. Vil is waiting with his arms crossed and an unreadable expression, though the way his foot taps against the floor suggests he’s less than pleased.

“Honestly,” Vil sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Was the theatrics really necessary, Rook?”

“Always,” Rook replies with a wink.

Epel is off to the side, clearly trying not to laugh at your predicament while casually carving an apple.

“Well,” Vil says, straightening his posture and fixing you with a regal gaze. “I’ve heard about this… situation of yours. Joining Pomefiore would be the obvious choice. After all, we are the epitome of elegance and refinement. It would be a privilege for you to stay here, and I might even be able to do something about your… appearance.”

You blink. "What's wrong with my appearance?”

Vil waves a hand dismissively. “Nothing I can’t fix. Consider it a favor.”

Epel, meanwhile, sidles up next to you, whispering conspiratorially “Don’t listen to him. He’s just tryna butter you up. But, uh… you should totally join Pomefiore anyway. Look, I brought you some fresh juice from Harveston. And this apple.”

You glance at the carved apple he’s offering. It’s shaped like a little heart.

“Epel,” Vil scolds, glaring at him. “Stop bribing them. That’s hardly dignified.”

“Well, it’s working, isn’t it?” Epel shoots back, crossing his arms. “I just think we need someone who’ll actually get how hard it is to survive your routines. And they seem cool. So there.”

You feel your brain short-circuiting as Vil and Epel start bickering in front of you. Rook stands off to the side, watching with sparkling eyes like he’s witnessing a masterpiece.

Somehow, you feel like this is still less stressful than Scarabia. But only barely.

Ignihyde

You somehow manage to escape Pomefiore in one piece, though your mind feels like it’s been through a blender. You’re determined to finally make it back to Ramshackle without incident when—

“Prefect!”

You freeze mid-step as Ortho zooms into view, his boosters glowing bright blue. Before you can even blink, he grabs your arm with surprising strength.

“Ignihyde is next!” he announces cheerfully, starting to lift you off the ground.

“Wait, wait!” you shout, flailing. “I can walk! Please, I’ve been carried around like a stolen handbag all day!”

Ortho tilts his head, his LED eyes flickering. “Oh… okay! As long as you promise to come willingly!”

You nod frantically. “I promise! Just no more flying, please.”

Satisfied, Ortho takes your hand and leads you to Ignihyde. The journey is mercifully uneventful, though you can feel your soul leaving your body as you realize what’s waiting for you inside.

Sure enough, Idia is hunched over in the corner of the lounge, a laptop balanced precariously on a stack of game boxes. The moment you enter, the screen lights up with a title slide: “Top 10 Reasons Why You Should Join Ignihyde” in bold, glowing text.

“Oh, you’re here,” Idia mutters, adjusting his hoodie nervously. His hair flickers faintly pink at the tips. “Uh, okay, so—yeah, uh—welcome? Or whatever. Let’s, um, get this over with.”

He clicks to the first slide, which is an overwhelming wall of text filled with bullet points, charts, and what looks like a meme of a cat wearing glasses.

“Reason number one,” Idia starts, stumbling over his words. “Um, we’re quiet? Like, no loud parties or annoying socializing. Uh… unless you count Ortho, but, uh, he’s not that bad. And you can play games as much as you want. Or watch anime. Or—uh—just chill. Yeah.”

Ortho, standing nearby, nods enthusiastically. “Ignihyde is perfect for you! And Brother worked really hard on this presentation!”

You glance at Idia, who’s clearly fighting for his life to make eye contact with you. He clicks to the next slide, which is just a stock photo of a cozy room.

“Reason number two,” he continues. “We, uh, have good Wi-Fi? Like, really good. You could stream in 4K if you wanted to. Not that you’d want to. Or maybe you would? Uh… I dunno. Anyway.”

His hair flickers a deeper pink, and he clicks to the next slide. It’s a crudely edited photo of you and him standing next to each other in front of a glowing Ignihyde logo. You’re not sure whether to be impressed or deeply concerned.

He glances at you, his expression oddly hopeful. “So, uh… what do you think?”

You can feel Ortho practically vibrating next to you, his bright smile threatening to blind you. Meanwhile, Idia is trying (and failing) to look indifferent, but the way his fingers tap anxiously on the laptop betrays him.

“I’ll… think about it,” you say carefully, not having the heart to crush Idia’s dreams outright.

His hair sparks bright pink for a split second before he slams the laptop shut, muttering something about “overheating processors” and “input overload.”

Ortho cheers. “Yay! I knew you’d see how great we are!”

You manage a weak smile, already planning your escape route.

Diasomnia

You’re so close—so, so close—to finally making it back to Ramshackle when the universe decides to remind you that peace is but a fleeting dream.

“Ah, there you are!”

You barely have time to scream before Lilia literally materializes out of thin air, grabbing you by the arm and dragging you into a swirling vortex of green light.

“Wait, NO—”

Too late. You’re already standing in the middle of Diasomnia’s lounge, disoriented and ready to file a restraining order against anyone with teleportation magic.

Malleus looks up from where he’s seated, eyebrows raising slightly. “Child of man? What brings you here?”

“Great news, Malleus!” Lilia chirps, dropping you onto the couch like a sack of potatoes. “They’re choosing a dorm to transfer to, and we couldn’t possibly let them pick anywhere but Diasomnia!”

Malleus freezes, his eyes wide with surprise, before his expression shifts into one of regal determination. He rises from his seat, his imposing height making you feel like a pebble in the presence of a mountain.

“Is this true?” he asks, his voice deep and serious. “You’re choosing a new dorm?”

“Uh, yeah, but—”

“Then it must be Diasomnia.” His tone leaves no room for argument. “Here, you will be protected. No harm shall come to you under my watch. And…” He pauses, his eyes gleaming with excitement. “I have a gargoyle in my room. A fine specimen. You would enjoy its company.”

You blink. “...A gargoyle?”

“Yes,” Malleus says with absolute sincerity, as though that’s the most convincing argument in the world.

Before you can process that, Sebek practically throws himself to the floor in front of you, bowing with the intensity of a knight swearing fealty.

“Human!” he bellows. “You must choose Diasomnia! To live anywhere else would be an insult to the Young Master’s unparalleled grace and power! Surely, you can see this is the only logical choice!”

“Sebek,” Silver mumbles from his spot on the couch, not even bothering to open his eyes. “Maybe let them decide for themselves.”

“But, Silver!” Sebek protests, his voice trembling with the sheer force of his conviction. “The honor! The prestige!”

Meanwhile, Lilia floats into view, holding a plate of… something. “Don’t worry about dinner, dear. I’ve prepared a feast for you! Go on, take a bite.”

You stare at the plate. It looks like it might be alive. “I’m… good, thanks.”

“Nonsense! You need to keep your strength up!” Lilia insists, thrusting the plate closer to your face.

Silver sighs, finally sitting up. “You should just do what feels right,” he says, offering you a calm, reassuring smile. “Don’t let them pressure you.”

You glance between Malleus’s earnest expression, Sebek’s passionate pleas, and Lilia’s… questionable cooking. Your stomach growls, but you’re not sure if it’s hunger or the beginnings of a panic attack.

One thing’s for sure: if you survive this day, you’re going to need therapy.

The sun is setting by the time you finally drag your aching body back to Ramshackle. The dorm looms ahead, creaky and crumbling, but for once, it feels like a safe haven compared to the dorm-hopping marathon you just survived.

As you step inside, you’re greeted by the unmistakable voice of your ever-demanding feline companion. “There you are! What took ya so long? I’ve been waitin’ forever!”

Grim is sprawled on the couch, a can of tuna already half-empty beside him. He squints at you suspiciously. “So? Which dorm are we movin’ to?”

You groan, flopping face-first onto the nearest piece of semi-clean furniture. “I haven’t decided yet.”

“What?!” Grim squawks, leaping onto the armrest beside you. “What do ya mean you haven’t decided? This is important! We gotta pick one where I can get the most tuna, y’know?”

You tilt your head just enough to glare at him. “Oh, sure. Let me just base my entire living situation on your snack preferences.”

Grim puffs up, indignant. “Hey! I’ve been puttin’ up with this dump longer than anyone! I deserve to have a say!”

You sigh, the weight of the day finally catching up to you. Somehow, Grim being his usual self is oddly comforting after everything. No bribes, no PowerPoints, no gargoyle sales pitches—just Grim being Grim.

“Can we talk about this tomorrow?” you mumble, your voice muffled by the cushion. “I’m too tired to think.”

Grim eyes you for a moment before huffing. “Fine. But don’t take too long, got it? I’m not stickin’ around this dump forever!”

With that, he hops off to raid the kitchen, leaving you alone to sink further into the furniture. You stare at the ceiling, your brain too fried to process anything else.

Tomorrow. You’ll deal with it tomorrow. For now, all you want is to sleep in your creaky, drafty old dorm. At least here, no one’s trying to kidnap you.

Masterlist

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heesmiles · 20 days ago

Text

FALLING INTO RUIN l.hs

೨౿ ⠀ ׅ ⠀ ̇ 22k ⸝⸝ . ‌ ׅ ⸺ word count.

pairings 𝜗𝜚 bad boy .ᐟ heeseung ៹ ex ballerina .ᐟ reader ᧁ ; smut ˒ angst ˒ bad boy .ᐟ good girl

warnings ⊹₊ ⋆ heavy angst lots of deep mentions of death graphic depictions of death centering around the reader and heeseung meeting at a grief group smut car accidents fights drug & alcohol use cheating (not heeseung) reader is a flawed character socialites past and present shifting timelines - this is dark, please read at your own discretion will have a happy ending.

synopsis ୨୧ your world ended the day your best friend died. In the hushed corner of a grief group you never wanted to attend, you find him — the boy with the defiant gaze and a hard exterior. with cracked pointe shoes and a heart still pirouetting in the past, you feel your family’s disapproval tightening around you like an old corset. He is everything you’ve been taught to avoid: trouble, danger, thrill. But in the quiet ache of loss, you discover something soft in him, something that mirrors your own hollow, and you never want to let go.

.ᐟ rain's mic is on ⋆ ͘ . this one is heavy y'all so please read the warnings before reading, I have experienced a loss like this and let me tell you it is not easy. but honestly I think this will be therapeutic to write...I hope you enjoy.

You sit in a circle of battered folding chairs, each one occupied by a stranger cloaked in their own quiet ache. The walls are an unremarkable shade of beige, the ceiling tiles sagging as if even they are tired of holding up this room’s endless, aching confessions. A fluorescent light flickers overhead, buzzing like a fly caught between windowpanes. It hums in your ears, mingling with the low murmur of voices; voices that float around you like a fog you can’t seem to break through. They’re sharing their stories, each word rolling into the next, and yet none of them find purchase in your mind. You hear phrases —“I lost her six months ago,” “he was my brother, my twin soul,” “I don’t know who I am without them.” The syllables tangle together, a blurred melody of heartbreak and hollow confessions that should resonate, but don’t. Instead, your thoughts roam restlessly, slipping past the edges of this circle like water seeking an escape.

This is stupid. That’s all you can think. This room, these strangers, this forced performance of vulnerability. You don’t need to be here, you don’t want to be. It was your mother’s idea, or maybe your father’s, or maybe the friend who found you crying in the kitchen and didn’t know how else to help. “You’re not okay,” they’d said, their eyes soft, their voice careful, as though your grief were a fragile thing that might shatter at the slightest touch. “You should talk to someone.” But you don’t want to talk. Not to these people, not to anyone. You’re still angry — so angry you can taste it, bitter and bright on your tongue. Angry that she’s gone, that the world keeps turning anyway, that people you love can slip away as easily as breath. Angry that you’re here, forced to sit in this room and pick at the edges of a wound that still bleeds no matter how tightly you try to hold it shut.

Your hands twist together in your lap, fingers knotted tight as you stare down at the scuffed linoleum floor. You watch the shadows shift across the tiles, the way the cheap plastic chairs creak as people shift and sigh. You wonder what they see when they look at you; if they can sense how hollow you feel inside, how every breath feels stolen from the silence you can’t seem to fill. A voice cuts through your reverie, sharper than the rest. The instructor; her name is June, but she introduced herself so quickly you barely caught it, leans forward, her kind eyes settling on you. “Would you like to share today?” she asks, her voice gentle but insistent. Her question drifts across the circle, landing in your lap like a stone.

You hesitate. You want to say no. You want to slip back into the fog of your own thoughts, let the stories of these strangers wash over you without having to offer anything in return. But June’s gaze doesn’t waver, and there’s a quiet determination in her eyes that tells you she won’t let you slip away so easily. “I—” you start, your voice a dry whisper in your throat. The word feels foreign, as though it doesn’t belong to you. You swallow, trying to find something, anything to give her, even if it’s just a shard of the truth. But before you can force out another word, the door to the room swings open with a soft groan of hinges. The quiet murmur of voices stills, the air shifting like a held breath. You look up, startled by the sudden interruption.

He stands there in the doorway, framed by the flickering fluorescent light. A boy; no, a young man, but with a reckless, hungry energy that feels too big for this small, sorrowful room. He’s tall and lean, dressed in a black hoodie that hangs loose around his shoulders and jeans torn at the knees. His hair is dark, falling across his forehead in careless waves, and there’s a glint in his eyes that doesn’t belong in a place like this; mischief, or defiance, or maybe both. He walks in like he owns the space, his steps unhurried, each one deliberate and almost lazy. There’s a kind of swagger to him that seems out of place here, where everyone else is weighed down by loss and uncertainty. He moves like he doesn’t care who’s watching, like the world could fall away around him and he wouldn’t miss a beat.

Your breath catches in your throat as he turns his gaze on the room. His eyes sweep over the group, pausing on you for just a moment; a flicker of something electric in the space between you, something that hums along your skin like static. He smiles then, a small, knowing curve of his lips that makes your stomach tighten. June recovers first, her voice steady as she addresses him. “Heeseung,” she says, her tone calm, as though she’s known him for years. “Glad you could join us. Please, have a seat.”

Heeseung. The name settles in your mind, a word with edges that feel sharp and dangerous. He doesn’t say anything, just inclines his head in a mockery of respect before sauntering over to an empty chair across the circle from you. He sits with the kind of ease that seems to come naturally to him, sprawling back like he’s at home in this room of strangers and sadness. Your pulse is a drumbeat in your ears. You don’t know why you’re staring, why you can’t seem to look away. He’s trouble; anyone could see that. He carries it in the curve of his grin, the careless way he lounges in his chair like he’s got nothing to prove and everything to lose. Your family would take one look at him and see every mistake you’ve ever been too careful to make.

But there’s something about him that pulls at you anyway; something that feels like a challenge, or a promise, or maybe just a spark in a life gone too quiet. June’s voice breaks through your thoughts again, gentle but firm. “You were about to share,” she reminds you softly, her eyes encouraging. The others in the circle watch you with polite curiosity, their own pain momentarily forgotten as they wait for your words. You’re too caught up in the magnetic pull of the boy who just walked in, the way he lounges in his chair like it’s a throne and he’s the king of this quiet kingdom of broken hearts. His presence crackles in the air, a live wire of confidence and mischief that feels out of place here; like a thunderstorm that’s wandered into a library.

Your eyes meet his again, and for a moment, the whole room seems to vanish. The flickering lights, the shifting shadows, the low drone of sorrowful voices, they all dissolve into a hush that’s just the two of you, suspended in a glance that feels like a secret whispered against your skin. Heeseung holds your gaze with an ease that makes your breath stutter in your chest. His smirk is slow and deliberate, a curve of his lips that’s both a challenge and an invitation, and it sends a rush of heat to your cheeks, blooming like a flush of summer in the cold hush of winter. You can feel the rest of the group watching; feel their curiosity flicker and sharpen as they notice the way you’re staring, as if this boy has turned you inside out with nothing more than a look. Embarrassment burns in your veins, a bright, fierce blush that you can’t quite hide. You tear your eyes away, the weight of their collective gaze pressing in on you like a vice, but it’s too late. Heeseung’s smirk deepens, dark eyes glinting with amusement that slices right through you.

You cough, the sound small and fragile in the hush of the circle. Your hands twist together in your lap, fingers fumbling with the edge of your sleeve as you try to gather the tatters of your composure. “I—I have nothing to say,” you stammer, your voice barely more than a whisper. The words feel like an apology, but you’re not sure who you’re apologizing to, June, the others, or maybe just yourself. June sighs softly, a gentle exhalation that speaks of disappointment and understanding all at once. She doesn’t push further, her eyes lingering on you for a heartbeat longer before she shifts her focus to the next trembling soul in the circle. The moment slips away, swallowed by the rhythm of the meeting, but the echo of it still hums in your bones, a melody you can’t quite silence.

You risk one last glance across the room, drawn back to Heeseung like a moth to flame. He’s still watching you, his head tilted just slightly, as if he’s trying to see right through the careful mask you wear. His gaze is steady, unflinching, and there’s a kind of quiet challenge in it, like he’s waiting to see what you’ll do next, or if you’ll let yourself fall into the gravity of whatever this is between you. You know he’s trouble. The kind of trouble that’s all sharp edges and reckless laughter, the kind that would make your parents’ hearts seize with worry. But you also know that there’s something about him that feels like possibility, like the flicker of dawn on the edge of a long night, a spark of something wild and bright in the darkness of your grief.

You look away quickly, your pulse a ragged drumbeat in your throat. You tell yourself you’re here to heal, to stitch your heart back together with soft words and shared sorrow. But as Heeseung leans back in his chair, that smirk still playing at the edges of his lips, you can’t help but wonder if healing is really what you’re searching for.

Before

You’re back in the old studio, the one with mirrored walls that seem to stretch on forever and floors that smell of rosin and sweat and quiet determination. The soft strains of a piano echo through the room, each note a gentle command that your body obeys without thought. You’re in the middle of your rehearsals, your limbs aching in that sweet way that comes only from hours of repetition, from the careful sculpting of muscle and will. Your best friend Nari is there, her laughter ringing like wind chimes as she prattles on beside you. She’s tying the ribbons of her pointe shoes, nimble fingers weaving them into place as she talks a mile a minute about some party on Saturday. Her voice is a melody of excitement and mischief, rising above the music like a warm breeze. But you’re only half-listening, your mind caught on the precise line of your arabesque, the subtle shift of your weight that can make or break the beauty of a single pose.

The showcase on Friday night looms in your thoughts, its promise and threat shimmering like a mirage just out of reach. It’s everything; the culmination of years spent spinning your soul into motion, of dawns and dusks blurred by practice and sweat. If you can dance this one performance perfectly, if you can become the music itself, there’s a chance you might be seen — truly seen — by those who can open the doors you’ve been dreaming of since you were a little girl with stars in your eyes and blisters on your feet. Nari’s words ripple through the haze of your focus, a bright ribbon of sound you can’t quite catch. “Are you even listening to me?” she huffs, nudging your shoulder with a grin that’s all playfulness and exasperation. You blink, startled out of your reverie, and offer her a sheepish smile. “Sorry, Nari,” you murmur, breathless from both the dance and the sudden warmth in your cheeks. “Can you say that again?”

She rolls her eyes, but her smile never wavers, eyes alight with mischief and affection. “Beomgyu’s having a party on Saturday,” she says again, slower this time, like she’s repeating the steps of a new routine just for you. “He wants me to come, and he said I should bring you too. You know, his roommates are going to be there, and they’re… fun.” She raises an eyebrow in a way that makes you laugh despite yourself, the sound of it soft and surprising in the hush of the studio. You pause, your breath steadying, and you brush a stray lock of hair from your face. “I’ll think about it,” you reply, your voice careful even as your heart tugs in two directions, between the shimmering future of the showcase and the siren call of a night that promises a different kind of abandon.

Nari grins, satisfied. “You’ll come,” she says with the certainty of someone who’s already decided for you. “I’ll see you there.” She winks, and for a moment, the air feels brighter; like the soft glow of stage lights just before the curtain rises, or the hush of the audience as they lean forward in anticipation. You just smile, the knot in your stomach unraveling one by one.

Present day

The clink of cutlery on china fills the hush of your family’s dining room, each sound a brittle punctuation in a conversation that has long since dried up. You’re pushing your food around your plate, letting the fork drag through the creamy potatoes in swirling patterns that feel like they should mean something. The roast sits in thick slices, glistening with juices that have already gone cold. It tastes like nothing in your mouth, like dust and memory. Your parents are seated across from you, the soft glow of the chandelier casting their faces in warm light that doesn’t reach their eyes. Your father’s brow is furrowed, the way it always is when he’s trying to figure out how to reach you without knocking you further away. Your mother’s lips are pressed into a line that might have once been a smile, but now it’s just another careful crack in the façade she wears for dinner.

They ask you about your first day at grief group, their voices careful and measured like they’re afraid of stepping on shards of glass. You shrug, your shoulders stiff and aching with the weight of words you’re not sure how to shape. “It’s stupid,” you mutter, each syllable slipping out like a sigh. “I don’t need it.” Your mother sighs, and the sound feels like a door closing softly in the night. She doesn’t argue, doesn’t push, and for a moment you’re grateful for it, grateful for the quiet that settles like a blanket over the table, even if it’s heavy with all the things you’re not saying. She clears her throat, the small sound snapping through the silence. “There’s a banquet this weekend,” she says, her voice careful as she changes the subject. “I think it would be good for you to come. To get out of the house, to socialize a little.”

Something in you flares at that, a hot spark of anger that surprises even you. Socialize. Like it’s something you deserve, like it’s something you’re entitled to just because you’re still here and breathing. Your fork stills, the silver tines scraping against the porcelain as you lift your gaze to meet hers. “Why should I?” you ask, your voice quiet but sharp. “Why do I get to socialize when Nari doesn’t?” Her name hangs in the air like a ghost, and your mother’s eyes falter, her gaze dropping to the untouched green beans on her plate. The silence stretches, taut and trembling, and you can feel the shape of the words you’re holding back, a raw scream echoing in the hollow of your chest.

“Nari’s parents,” you continue, your tone as flat and bitter as the cold dinner in front of you. “Will they be there? Beomgyu? Should I smile and pretend it’s all okay while they’re looking at me, knowing I’m the reason she’s not here?” Your mother doesn’t answer. She doesn’t have to. The way her shoulders slump, the way she can’t meet your eyes; it’s enough. It’s everything. You push your chair back from the table, the legs scraping against the wood floor with a grating shriek that echoes in the quiet. Your hands are shaking, but you keep them fisted at your sides as you stand, your breath coming hard and ragged.

“I don’t deserve to socialize,” you say, your voice hollow and aching. “I don’t deserve to sit there and smile and pretend I’m okay when I killed their daughter.” The words fall into the silence like stones, and for a moment, no one breathes. Your father opens his mouth, but there’s nothing he can say, no soft reassurance or gentle lie that can wash the blood from your hands, even if it’s only there in the quiet chambers of your guilt. You turn away before you can see their faces; before you can see the pity or the pain or the fear in their eyes. Your footsteps are quick and sharp as you leave the table behind, your pulse a drumbeat in your ears. You don’t know where you’re going, only that you can’t sit there under the weight of it all, can’t stand to be in the same room with the echo of your own confession.

In the hush of the hallway, you pause, your hand pressed to the cool wood of the doorframe. Your breath is shaking, each inhale a jagged cut. You close your eyes, and for a moment, you can almost feel the soft press of Nari’s hand in yours, the bright laugh that used to pull you back from the edge of yourself. But that’s gone now, a memory that tastes of salt and regret. You open your eyes and step away from the door, the shadows of the hallway swallowing you whole. Empty.

Heeseung moved like a storm in a bottle, all coiled energy and restless, reckless hunger. The girl underneath him was a blur, a placeholder for a connection he didn’t care to remember the shape of. Her moans were a hollow echo in his ears, a soundtrack he barely noticed as he chased his own release. He didn’t know her name — he didn’t care to know. All she was to him was a means to an end. A small glimpse of euphoria in his already fucked up life.

“Oh god.” Her voice was pitched just right, her body taunt with pleasure as her nails deliciously traced the expanse of his back up and down. It sent shivers down his spine, his head falling forward to rest on her shoulder. His orgasm approached fast and unyielding; blinding him completely for only just a second. When it was over, he didn’t bother with softness or sentiment; he just rolled away, breath ragged, the sweat cooling on his skin in the stale air of his too-small room.

It was then that the pounding came, a hard, insistent thump on the door that rattled the handle and broke through the post-coital haze. Heeseung swore under his breath, his brow furrowing in annoyance as he pushed himself upright. The girl beside him made a soft, questioning noise, but he didn’t answer. Sunghoon’s voice called through the door, muffled but clear: “Hey man… I don’t mean to bother you, but your dad is at the door asking for you.” A string of curses slipped from Heeseung’s lips, low and biting as he turned to the girl. She was sitting up, her hair tangled and her eyes wide with confusion. Heeseung didn’t bother with apologies, he just grabbed her shirt from the floor and tossed it at her, his jaw tight. “Get lost,” he muttered, his voice like gravel.

She scowled but didn’t argue, her movements quick and sharp as she tugged the shirt over her head and gathered the rest of her clothes. Heeseung didn’t watch her leave — he was already halfway to his dresser, yanking on a pair of jeans and grabbing a wrinkled shirt from the floor. His movements were hasty, all careless urgency as he buttoned the shirt with fingers that didn’t quite stop shaking. By the time he reached the bottom of the stairs, he was still tucking the shirt into his waistband, his hair damp with sweat and falling into his eyes. His father stood in the doorway, the harsh afternoon light casting deep lines across his face and turning his eyes into cold shards of glass. The girl slipped past Heeseung in a hurry, not even sparing a glance at the older man as she ducked out the door.

His father watched her go, his mouth twisting into a frown that spoke volumes without a single word. “Is she your girlfriend?” he asked, his tone as sharp and clipped as the cut of his tailored suit.

Heeseung let out a short, humorless laugh, his shoulders rolling back in lazy defiance. “Nah,” he said with a smirk. “Random girl.” His father’s face darkened, the muscle in his jaw ticking as he shook his head in silent disappointment. Heeseung could feel the weight of that look like a hand around his throat, but he didn’t let it show, didn’t let it break through the practiced mask of indifference he wore like armor. “I’m only here because your mother wants you to come to a banquet this Saturday,” his father said, his voice cold and final. “No questions, Heeseung. You’ll be there.”

Heeseung’s lips twisted, his laughter gone as quickly as it had come. “No way in hell,” he snapped. “I’m not going to sit with a bunch of prissy rich kids and play pretend. Find someone else.” His father’s eyes narrowed, and the room seemed to go still around them, the air heavy with all the things they’d never said out loud. “If you don’t go,” his father said quietly, his words cutting deeper than any shout could, “I’ll yank your inheritance money right out from under you. I’m done watching you piss away everything your brother worked for.”

The mention of Han hit Heeseung like a blow to the gut, the name a ghost in the space between them. His father didn’t flinch, didn’t look away, just kept his eyes fixed on Heeseung like he was daring him to break. “Usually we’d be asking Han,” he said, his voice low and venomous. “But obviously, because of you, we can’t do that.” The words rang out, sharp and final, the old wound split open once more. Heeseung’s hands clenched at his sides, his breath a ragged snarl as he took a single step forward. “I’ll be there,” he spat, his voice low and dangerous. And then he slammed the door in his father’s face, the sound of it echoing through the quiet of the house like a gunshot.

He stood there for a moment, his chest heaving, the anger coiling in his gut like a living thing. The silence in the house felt heavy, the memory of his brother’s name still clinging to the air like a curse. Heeseung closed his eyes, let the weight of it settle over him for a heartbeat and then he turned away, his jaw set and his mind already miles from the echo of his father’s voice.

Before

The memory snuck in like smoke — thin, curling at the edges of Heeseung’s mind as he lay back on his bed, the anger from the encounter with his father still simmering in his chest. It arrived uninvited, as most memories of Han did, but he never had the heart to push it away. It was a Thursday evening. Late spring, the windows open to a warm breeze that stirred the curtains and carried the faint sounds of traffic from the road outside. Heeseung had just come home from his job; something menial and forgettable at a music store, the kind of gig he kept for pocket money and for the simple pleasure of thumbing through vinyls all day. His shoulders ached, his hair smelled faintly of dust and old plastic, and there was a smear of something, maybe ink on the hem of his sleeve. He strolled through the front door like he owned the place, calling out lazily, “Han! You alive?”

The house was quiet except for the subtle shuffle of papers in the den. Heeseung followed the sound, and sure enough, Han was there, tucked behind their father’s massive old desk, sleeves rolled up, brows drawn in that signature furrow that meant he was neck-deep in whatever the hell their dad had dumped on him this time. His tie hung loose around his neck like a forgotten noose, and the desk lamp cast a tired yellow light over his papers and the dark shadows beneath his eyes. Heeseung leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, watching his brother like a man studying a machine. “What are you doing?” he asked, not unkindly, but with a tone that leaned slightly into mockery. Han didn’t look up right away.

“Contracts,” Han replied eventually, flipping a page with fingers that were stained slightly with ink. “Dad wants me to review the Q2 proposals before the meeting next week. He’s testing me, I think.” Heeseung scoffed and stepped into the room, hands shoved into his pockets. “You know you’re twenty-six, right? You’re allowed to act your age. Get drunk. Flirt with someone. Sleep until noon. Come on, man, you’re wasting your golden years.”

Han chuckled under his breath, a soft, familiar sound. He leaned back in his chair finally and looked up, eyes slightly bloodshot, but sharp. “My golden years?” he repeated with an amused snort. “You sound like a commercial. Look; I get it. But I can’t afford to screw this up. If I’m going to take over the company someday, I need to prove I’m ready. Dad won’t hand me anything just because I’m his son.” Heeseung made a face, as if the very idea bored him to tears. “Yeah, yeah. Legacy, pressure, expectations, whatever.” He waved a hand dismissively. “You sound just like him, you know? Minus the part where he breathes fire every time I walk in a room.”

There was a beat of silence between them, a moment that stretched like taut string. Then Han smiled again, this time with a hint of warmth. “You’re not so bad, Hee. You just… don’t want the same things I do.”

“Damn right,” Heeseung said, grinning. “And that’s why I’m inviting you to this party saturday. You need to blow off steam. Come on, it’ll be fun. Booze, music, girls who don’t talk about market projections. Maybe you’ll get laid, huh?” Han threw his head back and laughed, a full-bodied sound that filled the room and warmed something deep in Heeseung’s chest. “God,” Han said, shaking his head, “you’re such an idiot.”

“An idiot who knows how to have a good time,” Heeseung countered.

Han leaned forward again, reaching for his pen, already turning back to his mountain of responsibility. “Maybe next time. I’ve got to finish this before morning.” Heeseung sighed dramatically, shoulders slumping. “Suit yourself, nerd.” He turned on his heel and headed for the hallway. “One day you’re gonna regret choosing paperwork over parties.” Han didn’t answer that, and Heeseung didn’t expect him to.

Present day

The kitchen is quiet, too quiet for a house that used to hold the hum of music and the scent of spices and your mother’s laughter like a cradle. Now, it’s just you, curled on a barstool with your knees drawn up and your fingers clenched around a lukewarm mug of tea you forgot to drink. The steam’s long gone, and the honey at the bottom has settled into something thick and bitter. You stare into it like it might offer answers, like it might bring her back. The fridge hums. A fly taps against the windowpane. Somewhere upstairs, your father’s voice filters down faintly as he takes a business call, every word sharp and clipped, like life never paused for him. Like the world didn’t lose her. But yours did.

Nari’s absence is a bruise that never yellows, never fades. It’s sharp even now, especially now. She would’ve hated this silence. She’d be here, chattering about nothing, raiding the pantry for snacks and nagging you to put down your damn phone and just be present. And maybe that’s why your thoughts won’t stay still, because they’re clawing for a world where she still exists, a version of today where she might burst through the back door in her worn-out slippers and call you “ballerina girl” with that lopsided grin of hers. You press your palms flat against the countertop. It’s cold beneath your skin, grounding. You try to focus on the pattern of the granite, the little swirls and veins, but your thoughts still pulse like static. You feel raw. Like someone scraped out your insides and filled you with salt. Then — Buzz.

The sound shatters the silence. Your heart jerks like it remembers how to beat.

You glance at your phone, already half-hoping it’s no one important. Spam, maybe. A group text you forgot to leave. Anything but —

Beomgyu.Can we please talk?

Four words. But they land like a punch. Your chest constricts so tight, it’s like your ribs are shrinking around your lungs. You feel your breath stutter. Your fingers twitch. The guilt is immediate, overwhelming, a tidal wave you don’t even try to brace against. You slam the phone down onto the table without thinking, the crack of it hitting the wood startling in the still air. You don’t check to see if the screen’s cracked. You don’t care. Maybe you want it to be. Maybe if it shatters, it’ll mirror something inside you that already has. You bite your lip hard enough to taste iron. Your eyes sting. You haven’t spoken to Beomgyu since the funeral. He hadn’t looked at you, not once. You’d sat three rows back, your nails digging into your palms, your throat like paper. He’d held Nari’s mother’s hand and stared at the coffin with a hollowed-out look that made you nauseous. You’d wanted to crawl out of your skin. You should’ve.

You think of how close they were; how easily they fit together. You’d seen it from the start. Even when Nari denied it, even when she’d said it was “just fun,” you’d known he was her heart. You’d seen the way she softened around him, the way she came alive when he laughed at her jokes. And now? Now he was just another ghost in your phone. Your gaze drifts to the corner of the kitchen where she used to sit, cross-legged on the counter, eating cereal straight from the box and swinging her legs like a child. You can almost see her there, smirking, eyebrow raised like you’re being dramatic again.

You whisper her name, just once, and it falls out of your mouth like broken glass. You don’t answer the text. You can’t. Instead, you let your forehead fall forward until it rests against the coolness of your arms. The silence returns, thick and absolute. And still, your phone waits. Quiet. Unanswered. Just like her.

The room is stuffy today; warmer than usual, like the air forgot how to move. You sit in the same chair you did last time, in the same semicircle of grief-soaked strangers and their tea-stained paper cups, their fidgeting hands, their voices weighed with sorrow and memory. You don’t bother pretending to listen anymore. Your eyes are fixed on a speck on the wall behind the group leader’s head, June, The voices in the room bleed together like watercolor in the rain, a blur of confessions and pain you can’t bear to carry. They all sound the same now. “My mother was my best friend…” “It’s been three years but I still smell her perfume…” “He was just twenty-two…”

You know you should care. You want to care. But your grief is greedy and cruel, and it’s made your heart a locked box. There’s no room left inside for anyone else’s sadness. You hear his voice before you see him; low, a little rough, carved out of something not entirely soft. Heeseung. You turn your head, eyes flicking to him like gravity pulled them there. He’s slouched in his chair, legs sprawled, fingers twitching restlessly in his lap. The swagger he wore like armor the last time is gone today. He doesn’t smirk. He doesn’t wink. He looks different, heavier. Like something happened between the last session and now, something that hollowed him out and filled him with fire.

June is addressing him now. She’s calm, as always, her voice like a therapist’s lullaby. “Heeseung,” she says gently, “would you like to share something today?” He doesn’t move. Doesn’t answer. “Heeseung?” she prompts again, a little firmer.

He lifts his head slowly, his dark eyes hooded, unreadable. His jaw is clenched. His voice, when it comes, is low and sharp as a blade.

“I have nothing to say.”

There’s an edge there that silences the whispers around the room. Even June falters, just for a second, before she forges ahead. “Sometimes saying something helps. Even a sentence. Even a word.” Heeseung lets out a humorless laugh, short and bitter. He drags a hand through his hair and stares at the floor like it betrayed him. Then he looks up; at her, at the room, and then, briefly, at you. You look away too quickly, pretending not to care.

“I belong in jail,” he says flatly. A sharp silence follows, sucking all the air out of the room. Someone coughs. Someone else shifts in their seat. Heeseung doesn’t blink. “I killed my brother,” he says, his tone brutal and matter-of-fact, like he’s just telling them the weather. “I don’t belong in a grief group. I belong in a cell.”

Your breath catches. The words strike you like a slap. You sit a little straighter, unable to look away. June sighs, quiet and practiced. “Your brother died in a car accident, Heeseung. That’s not your fault.” He’s on his feet before she can finish, the chair scraping violently against the tile as he kicks it back. The crash of it slams through the room like thunder. You flinch before you can stop yourself, your heart kicking wildly in your chest. Heeseung’s jaw is tight now, his face pale beneath his sharp cheekbones.

“Yeah,” he spits, voice rising. “He died picking me up. That’s why he was in that car. Because I was too drunk to drive myself. Because he was always the one who cleaned up my messes.” His voice cracks at the edges; just slightly, but enough to make you feel like something inside you is cracking with it. “I killed him.”

He stands there for a moment, breathing hard, eyes burning like twin eclipses. No one dares speak. The silence wraps around him like a noose, taut and thick. And suddenly, he looks so young. So lost. Like he’s still standing on the side of that road, glass in his skin and his brother’s blood in the air. You’re stunned; not just by what he said, but by the way it pierces through you. Because for the first time, you see him — not as some reckless, charming bad boy you were warned about, but as someone broken in the same places you are. Someone who walks with a ghost too.

You’d thought you were different. You, the quiet ex-ballerina with your good-girl past and your polished life. Him, the disaster with smoke on his jacket and grief in his bones. But maybe you aren’t so different after all. Heeseung doesn’t wait for permission. He grabs his coat and storms out, the door rattling in his wake. The room doesn’t breathe until he’s gone.

You can’t stop staring at the door. You wonder if he’s crying on the other side. Or if he’s just like you, too angry to mourn properly. Too haunted to move forward.

You sit there in the silence, the words echoing in your head. I killed him. You know what that feels like. And somehow, it makes you feel less alone.

You wake with a gasp, like you’ve surfaced from drowning. The sheets are tangled around your legs, soaked in sweat, your skin clammy despite the cool air slipping through the crack in your window. Your lungs heave, but the air feels too thin, like it’s not enough. Like nothing is enough anymore. The nightmare clings to you, half-formed and shadowy at the edges, but the heart of it remains vivid, cruelly clear. Nari’s hand; slipping out of yours. Her eyes, red with fury. The way her voice trembled not with sadness, but with disappointment, with anger.

The way she walked away.

How you let her.

How she never came back.

You sit up, pressing the heels of your palms into your eyes like you could rub it all away. The images. The guilt. The truth. The silence of the house is suffocating, so you shove off the covers and pad downstairs on bare feet, trying not to wince as the cold tiles bite into your soles. You want water; something cold, something real. Something to distract you from the storm in your chest. The kitchen lights are off, but the refrigerator hums faintly in the dark. You’re halfway to the cabinet when you hear it: the soft, broken sound of someone crying. You freeze.

At first you think you imagined it. But then it comes again — a quiet, trembled sob. Your eyes adjust slowly to the dimness, and there she is. Your mother, sitting at the kitchen island, her shoulders curled in on themselves like the weight of the world finally became too heavy to hold. One hand grips a crumpled tissue; the other is pressed over her mouth to keep the sound contained, like grief should be polite. You hesitate in the doorway, your instincts at war. Once, not so long ago, you’d have gone straight to her without question. But that was before. That was before everything fractured.

You were a different person then. Back when your world made sense. Back when you could still recognize yourself in the mirror. When you danced like your life depended on it, when your report cards came home like trophies, when your smiles were real. You’d never smoked, never drank, never snuck out. You’d dated the kinds of boys who brought flowers for your mother and shook your father’s hand. You were the girl everyone trusted, the girl who never let anyone down. But now?

Now you move through the world like it’s made of glass. Angry at everything. Detached. Numb. The mirror doesn’t recognize you, and neither do your parents. Especially your mother. You know it. You’ve felt it every time she looks at you like she’s searching for someone who disappeared. Still, something in you softens. You walk forward, slowly, and without a word, wrap your arms around her from behind. She flinches, surprised; your presence, your touch. You used to be so affectionate, but now? Now you rarely even speak at the dinner table. After a moment, she melts into you, her head leaning back against your shoulder. Her sobs taper into shaky breaths.

“I didn’t mean to interrupt,” you murmur into her hair. “I just… I couldn’t sleep.”

She doesn’t respond right away. Her fingers find your wrist, holding gently. Finally, she says, her voice hoarse, “I miss you.”

You close your eyes. “I’m right here,” you whisper, even though the words feel like a lie. She pulls away just enough to look at you, and in the glow of the fridge light, you see her eyes are puffy and red. She studies your face for a long, aching moment, then says, “No. Not really.” It hits harder than you expect. But she’s right. You haven’t been you in a long time.

“I’m sorry,” you say, voice cracking. “I don’t know who I am anymore.” Your mother nods, slowly, like she’s known that for a while but didn’t know how to say it aloud. She reaches out to tuck a piece of hair behind your ear the way she used to when you were little. “I know you’re hurting,” she says. “We all are. But I don’t want to lose my daughter.”

The silence swells again, thick with everything neither of you know how to say. The memory of Nari hangs heavy between you — so present, so piercing. After a long pause, your mother clears her throat. “The banquet this weekend,” she says, as gently as she can manage. “I was hoping you’d come. Just to get out of the house. Be around people again.” You want to say no again. It’s your first instinct. No to the dresses, to the small talk, to the pretending. No to the judgmental stares and whispered sympathies. No to the pressure of having to act normal when everything in you is still on fire.

But then you look at her. At the hope trembling behind her exhaustion. And for once, you don’t have the energy to argue. Or maybe, deep down, you want to try. Not for you; but for her. For who you used to be. “Okay,” you say quietly.

She blinks, surprised. “Really?”

You nod. “I’ll go.” Your mother smiles, small and sad, but genuine. And you wonder when the last time she smiled at you like that was. You get your water, finally, and sip it in the dark beside her, not saying much. But for the first time in a while, the silence feels a little less heavy. And upstairs, your nightmares wait. But at least now, you’re not the only one wide awake in the dark.

The night of the banquet arrives like a storm you’ve tried your best to ignore; thunder rumbling low in your chest, your limbs heavy with dread. You stand alone in your bedroom, the soft click of your heels echoing in the quiet, a fragile sound in the space that once held laughter. The mirror before you shows a girl you almost recognize. The dress clings in all the right places, something tasteful your mother picked. Your hair is pulled back with delicate precision, a touch of makeup to hide the exhaustion under your eyes. But there’s a hollowness beneath the polish, a dullness in your gaze that powder can’t disguise.

You stare at yourself and remember a different version of this same moment. You and Nari, side by side in front of this mirror, perfume in the air and bobby pins scattered like confetti across your desk. You remember how she'd curl your hair for you, then laugh when she burned her own ear. How she'd spin you around, tilt your chin up, and say “Look at you! total heartbreaker.”

And then she'd wink, adding, “Too bad you're a prude.” You press your hand to your stomach as if that could keep it from twisting. The ache there is sharp tonight. This isn’t right. She should be here. Not as a memory; but in the flesh, wearing that crimson dress she swore made her look “dangerously hot,” even though she always ended up changing it last minute. You’d have teased her for trying on three outfits, she’d have stolen your lipstick, and the two of you would’ve danced to some stupid pop song before leaving late and in a rush.

But tonight it’s just you. Just you and the ghost of her smile echoing in the silence. Your throat tightens. You don’t cry. You haven’t cried in days, not since the last nightmare; but the burn is there behind your eyes. That cruel, unshed weight. You let out a long, steadying breath, palms smoothing the sides of your dress. It’s too tight across the chest. Or maybe that’s just your heart.

Then, with lead in your limbs, you move. Open your bedroom door. Step into the hallway. One foot in front of the other, like choreography. Like a dance. Down the stairs, your parents are waiting. Your mother looks up and smiles, that practiced, brittle kind of smile she’s worn too often. Your father offers a quiet nod, adjusting the cuff of his shirt, saying nothing but scanning you like he’s not sure what version of you he’ll be dealing with tonight.

You don’t speak, just grab your coat and purse. And as the front door shuts behind you, you don’t look back at the mirror. You don’t want to see what’s missing in the reflection.

The car ride to the banquet was silent. No music. No idle conversation. Just the occasional turn signal and the sound of tires humming against pavement. You sat in the backseat, your hands clenched in your lap like a child trying to behave, your fingers twisting the fabric of your dress with a quiet desperation. Your mother, riding in the front with your father, was too busy reapplying her lipstick in the mirror to notice how stiff you were, how you hadn’t blinked in a minute. You watched the city pass by in blurs of warm gold and shadow. Each lighted window another life you weren’t living. When you arrive, it’s all so… much. The venue is a grand old hotel downtown, the kind of place people book months in advance, with chandeliers like frozen galaxies suspended above a sea of tailored suits and glittering dresses. A string quartet plays in the corner, the music slow and graceful, and the air smells of wine, floral arrangements, and money. You step inside, and it hits you like a punch to the chest. The whispers come fast.

Your chest tightens as if the air itself resents you being here. You swallow hard, your throat raw, and try to breathe around the phantom hands curling around your lungs. It’s not working. You shift your weight, your heels suddenly too high, too loud against the marble floors. Every breath feels borrowed, like you’ll have to give it back if you stay too long. But your mother doesn’t notice. Of course she doesn’t.

She’s swept into a conversation almost immediately, pulled in by polished friends with tight smiles and hands adorned in diamonds. You can see the way she lifts her chin, her lips curving perfectly, as though this night is a role she was born to play. She’s glowing beneath the chandeliers, nodding graciously, clutching a champagne flute like it’s the holy grail.

You’re a silent shadow beside her, just a flicker in the corner of their eyes. You hope it stays that way. You scan the room, dread rising like water in your throat. No sign of Nari’s parents. No glimpse of Beomgyu. You pray, silently, fiercely, that they don’t come. That they stay wherever they are. That you won’t have to meet their eyes and see the grief you gave them staring back. But fate has never been merciful to you. You barely have time to brace before another group approaches. Family friends. Old ones. People who used to pinch your cheeks at holidays and ask how your pirouettes were coming along. You recognize them instantly. The couple with the fox-faced smiles. The man in the navy suit and the woman with silver hair too stiff to move.

“Darling,” the woman says, voice dripping with pretend concern, “we’ve been thinking about you.”

You smile, tight, robotic. “Thank you.”

“And how have you been?” she continues, tilting her head like she expects something profound.

You don’t offer anything. Just one word: “Fine.”

A silence settles over the group, awkward and dense, before the man fills it with a polite cough.

“And ballet?” he asks, though it’s not really a question. More of a test. “Are you still keeping up with it?” You stare at him for a moment, then at the swirling wine in your untouched glass.

“No,” you say simply. “I don’t dance anymore.”

The woman blinks. “But you were so talented. Surely you’ll pick it up again once things settle?”

You force a smile. “Being a ballerina wasn’t in the cards for me. Not anymore.” The way you say it; final, flat, seems to unnerve them. They don’t push further. Just exchange a glance, murmur something about catching up later, and turn back to your parents. You’re left alone again, more alone than you were when you walked in. A knot forms in your stomach. It sits heavy, immovable, like stone. You sip your wine, but the taste is bitter, acidic. It doesn’t help.

Across the room, someone laughs too loudly. A toast is made. Another waltz begins. And still, all you can think about is Nari. About how she would’ve hated this place. About how her laugh would’ve cracked through the crystal calm like lightning. About how she would’ve made a joke about someone’s ridiculous earrings just loud enough for you to choke on your drink. She would’ve made it bearable. You set your glass down on a table and press your fingertips to your temples, as if that could stop the spinning. You want to leave. You need to.

But before you can step away, before you can disappear into the safety of some forgotten hallway, your gaze lands on a figure across the ballroom. Heeseung. He’s leaning against the far wall, half in the shadows, dressed in black like the storm he always brings. His tie is loose, his hair slightly tousled, and he looks like he doesn’t belong here either. His eyes, dark and sharp, scan the room until they land on you.

And just like that, the air shifts again.

Not like before—no, not suffocating this time. Different. This is tension. Electricity. A current you can feel down to your bones. He doesn’t smile. He just stares, unreadable. And you stare back, too stunned to look away. For a moment, it’s as if the crowd fades. The whispers fall away. The chandelier light softens. There’s just you, and him, and everything you haven’t said to each other yet suspended in the space between.

Before

The studio was nearly silent save for the soft shushing of your slippers against the marley floor, the gentle hum of the overhead lights, and the faint throb of your heartbeat in your ears. Outside, the sky had already turned a deep violet, streaked with orange at the edges where the sun had made its quiet descent. But inside, it was still you and your reflection, looping the same phrase of choreography over and over until your legs screamed and your lungs ached. Friday was the big day. The showcase that could change everything. The one that scouts were coming to, the one your instructors called a turning point. You needed to be perfect. There was no room for anything less. So you stayed long after the others had gone home, repeating your variations in dimmed silence, chasing something close to flawlessness.

You paused, chest heaving, sweat glistening along your collarbones. You stepped to the side and grabbed your water bottle, letting the cool liquid ease the burn in your throat. Just as you lowered it, the front door creaked open. You flinched. No one else was supposed to be here. And then, casually framed in the doorway with one hand in the pocket of his jeans and the other running through his shaggy dark hair, stood Beomgyu. Your heart jumped — not just from surprise.

He was in jeans and a soft flannel jacket, the collar folded haphazardly. His hair looked like he'd been in the wind, or maybe he'd just run his fingers through it too many times. He blinked when he saw you, a little stunned himself, then grinned. “Didn’t expect to see you here this late. Thought everyone cleared out by now."

You raised an eyebrow, tugging your towel over your neck. “I could say the same to you.” Beomgyu stepped in, letting the door creak shut behind him. The warm light cast soft shadows on his face, making his features look even gentler. “I came to pick up Nari’s pointe shoes. She said she forgot them in her locker.”

You nodded, gesturing to the changing room. “They’re probably still there. I can grab them for you.”

“Nah,” he said quickly, taking a few more steps inside. “I know where her stuff is. It’s cool. Didn’t mean to interrupt you.”

You gave him a small shrug. “Was just running through the piece again. Nerves.” Beomgyu lingered near the edge of the room, watching your reflection in the mirror. His gaze wasn’t invasive, just curious. He rubbed at the back of his neck. “Big show Friday, right?”

“Mhm.” You leaned against the barre, stretching your arms over it. “It’s the one that decides my whole future, apparently.”

“No pressure or anything,” he said with a lopsided smile. You laughed, a real one. It slipped out without your permission, caught you off guard. Beomgyu seemed surprised too, like he hadn’t expected to be funny. “I get it though,” he added after a moment. “We have our first show this weekend. It’s nothing big, just a coffee shop gig. But I’ve been running lyrics in my head all day and still feel like I’m gonna forget everything.”

You tilted your head. “You’re in a band?”

“Yeah. We suck,” he said, grinning. “But we have fun.”

You leaned one shoulder against the mirror and crossed your arms, amused. “What do you play?”

“Guitar. I write most of the songs too. Kind of emo, kind of indie. We're in a genre crisis.” You chuckled. “That sounds about right.” The conversation stretched on easily after that. What started as a brief chat turned into something warmer, something slower. Beomgyu stayed, leaning against the mirror beside you, the two of you trading stories about rehearsals and routines, stage fright, and the strange way people expected so much from you just because you were good at something. He spoke with his hands, animated and expressive, his laughter full-bodied and contagious.

You hadn’t laughed that much in weeks. Eventually, the clock on the wall struck ten. Beomgyu checked his phone, then glanced at you. “Want a ride home?” You hesitated. You were tired, your legs aching. And the walk back felt far longer than it ever used to.

“Sure,” you said. You gathered your bag and hoodie, flicked off the lights, and walked with him into the cool night. The sky had gone pitch black by then, stars hidden behind gauzy clouds. The parking lot was mostly empty, quiet but for the hum of streetlamps and the occasional car passing by in the distance. His car was older, navy blue with a cracked windshield and band stickers on the bumper. He opened the passenger door for you like it was second nature. You climbed in, the scent of spearmint gum and cheap cologne lingering faintly inside.

The drive was short. You lived only a few blocks away. But the silence that settled in the car wasn’t uncomfortable. He parked in front of your house, engine idling, the headlights casting long shadows across the street. You turned to him, already reaching for your bag. “Thanks for the ride,” you said softly.

He was looking at you. The way his eyes lingered was different now. Slower. Focused. Under the streetlight, his features looked almost unreal. The softness of his mouth. The mess of hair falling into his eyes. The calm in his expression that made your chest tighten. “No problem,” he murmured.

You lingered.

So did he.

There wasn’t a single logical thought in your head when you both leaned in. It was instinct. A gravity neither of you had expected, too strong to ignore. The next you know your leaning over all the while he is too. The kiss was soft at first, tentative; but it didn’t stay that way. Your hand found his jaw, his fingers tangled in the hem of your sleeve. It was impulsive, reckless, and stupid in the way only something that feels too good too fast can be. His lips moved against yours like he’d been waiting for it, like he couldn’t believe it was happening either. Your heart pounded. You could feel it in your throat, in your fingertips.

The kiss deepened. Your limbs felt light, dizzy with adrenaline and guilt, a dangerous cocktail that made you bolder. You shifted, climbing into his lap as though something inside you had been aching to feel this wanted, this close.

But then; it hit you.

Like ice water over the head.

Nari.

This was Nari’s boyfriend.

Your best friend.

Oh god.

You jerked back like you’d been burned, scrambling out of his lap, your breath caught in your throat. “Oh no,” you whispered, voice cracking. “Oh no, no, no.” Tears welled up fast, hot and full of shame. Your lips still tingled from the kiss, but the pit in your stomach was already growing. This wasn’t just a mistake; it was a betrayal. Beomgyu looked stunned, his eyes wide, mouth parting like he wanted to say something.

“I—” he started.

But it was too late. You shoved open the door, stumbling out of the car into the cold night, tears trailing down your cheeks. You didn’t look back. Couldn’t. The porch light blurred in your vision as you fumbled with your keys, your hands shaking. The kiss echoed in your bones like an accusation, like thunder in a silent room.

You slipped inside, heart splintering. And upstairs, alone in the dark, you cried until your chest ached; because you had just made the worst mistake of your life.

Present day

The air outside was colder than you expected, bracing against the heat still clinging to your cheeks from the banquet. You leaned back on the stone ledge, your palms flat against it, grounding you as your heart slowly tried to even itself out. Too many eyes. Too many voices. You could still hear them; those low, pitying murmurs, the way people glanced sideways and then looked away like the sight of you hurt too much to bear. Or worse, like it was something juicy they weren’t supposed to talk about but would the second you turned away.

You hated it. All of it. The way the room had swallowed you whole, a ghost of who you used to be.

A failed ballerina.

The girl who lost her best friend.

The girl who killed her.

The air helped. A little. The night had a stillness to it, only disturbed by the occasional hum of a car in the distance or the soft click of someone else’s shoes along the sidewalk. You closed your eyes, tilted your head up to the stars that were barely visible through the city’s haze. That’s when a voice broke the fragile quiet. “Hey.” Your heart lurched, and your eyes snapped open. You turned, already bracing yourself, and there he was. Beomgyu. You cursed under your breath, low and bitter.

He looked like he hadn’t changed clothes since the last time you saw him, his tie slightly loosened, his shirt untucked like he hadn’t bothered fixing himself up fully. He looked… tired. More worn than usual. But you didn’t care. He was the last person you wanted to see. The last person you needed. “Did you get my message?” he asked quietly.

You turned your gaze back toward the dark, refusing to look at him. “Yes.”

He hesitated, then took a few steps closer. “Why didn’t you respond?”

That made your blood boil. How dare he act like nothing happened. Like you haven’t betrayed your best friend and now she's dead. Like your word didn’t end the moment the two of you decided hurt her so badly it drove her to her death. You can’t even look at him without feeling an overwhelming shade of shame.

You turned sharply, your voice cold. “Are you stupid?”

Beomgyu blinked. “What?”

“You really came out here asking why I didn’t respond? You really thought I’d want to talk to you?” His brow furrowed, eyes filled with a hurt he had no right to feel. “We can’t not talk about this.”

“Yes we can.” You pushed off the ledge, straightening your back, ready to walk away. “I have nothing to say—” He reached for you. His fingers closed around your wrist. And you yanked your hand back like his touch had burned you. And in a way it did. It felt like a zap to your soul.

“Don’t touch me.” Your voice was sharp, your body trembling.

He looked wounded, frustrated. “Please, Ju—”

“She said let go.”

Another voice cut through the air, low and cold like the crack of a whip. You froze. Beomgyu did too. Your head turned slowly, disbelieving, and there stood Heeseung. Beomgyu looked at Heeseung, eyes narrowing. “Get lost,” he muttered. “This doesn’t involve you.”

Heeseung didn’t flinch. He didn’t even blink. He took a single step forward, slow and deliberate, his eyes steady. “It does now.”

Beomgyu scoffed, incredulous. “You don’t even know her.” But Heeseung didn’t answer. Not with words. Instead, before you could fully register what was happening, you felt his hand curl gently around your wrist; careful, unlike Beomgyu, and then you were being pulled forward, tucked against him, his arm coming around your waist like it belonged there.

“Don’t touch my girlfriend,” Heeseung said, cool and quiet, the lie sliding from his mouth like he’d rehearsed it a hundred times. Your breath hitched. What? You stiffened against him, frozen. Your eyes flicked up to his face, searching for a sign that he was joking; but he wasn’t looking at you. His gaze was locked on Beomgyu, steady, unflinching, sharp as cut glass. It wasn’t a threat. It was a dismissal. You didn’t know what to say. You didn’t know him. You had barely spoken to Heeseung, and yet here he was, holding you like you were something worth shielding.

And Beomgyu — he just laughed. A single, humorless sound that cracked open something bitter inside you. “Really?” he said, his eyes sliding between the two of you, his smirk twisting. “This loser?” He turned to you then, gaze challenging, voice low. “You can do better.”

You felt the blood rush to your ears. Your spine straightened, anger fizzing to life under your skin. All the things you wanted to say for months clawed at your throat. You stepped slightly forward, still half wrapped in Heeseung’s arm. “Really?” you said, voice trembling with heat. “Like with you?” Beomgyu stilled.

For a second, just a second, you saw something flicker in his expression; something uncertain and maybe even ashamed. But then it hardened again, sealed over by the same easy indifference he wore like a mask. He gave a low chuckle. “Whatever.” He turned to leave, his hands stuffed in his pockets, his voice floating behind him like smoke. “I’ll catch you some other time. And we will talk.”

You didn’t say anything. You watched his back as he walked away, each footstep carrying the weight of too many things unsaid. The night closed around him until he was just another shadow swallowed by the dark. And then it was quiet. Heeseung’s arm still hovered around you, tentative now, uncertain. You stepped away slowly, enough to put a little distance between you, enough to breathe.

You stayed in silence for a few minutes, the kind that lingered not awkwardly, but gently; like fog curling around a streetlamp. The chill in the air touched your skin, but the tension in your body had started to ease, little by little. Then you turned to him, brushing your hair back from your face. “Thanks,” you murmured, your voice low, but sincere.

Heeseung shrugged, his hands buried in the pockets of his jacket. “It’s whatever.” And maybe it was. Maybe to him, stepping in like that didn’t mean anything at all. But to you, it meant more than he could know. There was a pause, and then Heeseung tilted his head slightly, eyes narrowing in the direction Beomgyu had walked off. “What the hell’s his problem anyway?”

The question caught you off guard. You froze for a beat, lips parting. Then you shut your mouth again and gave him the most practiced shrug you had. “No idea.” Heeseung looked at you; really looked at you and you could tell he didn’t buy it. You could see it in the subtle lift of his brow, in the slight twitch at the corner of his mouth. He wasn’t convinced. But he didn’t press.

He just nodded once, slowly, as if to say: okay, I’ll let it go. You didn’t thank him for that out loud, you didn��t need to. The silence consumed you for a few more minutes until finally Heeseung speaks, his words surprising you for the second time tonight.

“Wanna get out of here?” he asks, his voice low, edged with something reckless, something soft.

You blink. “What?”

“This place sucks,” he mutters, glancing back toward the golden-lit banquet hall like it’s a prison, not a celebration. “We don’t belong here.” You open your mouth, about to say something responsible; about your mother, the expectations, the whispers that would follow, but instead, you hear yourself say: “Yeah. Let’s go.”

You don’t know what possesses you. Maybe it’s the tightness still winding in your chest. Maybe it’s the look on Beomgyu’s face as he walked away. Or maybe it’s something else entirely, the gravity of Heeseung’s presence, the pull of someone who seems just as lost as you. The two of you slip away from the banquet like ghosts through a wall, unseen, unnoticed. The air outside is cool and silver. You trail behind Heeseung toward his car, your heels clicking softly on the pavement, each step peeling away the image of the girl you were expected to be.

You slide into the passenger seat of his dark sedan, a little stunned, a little breathless. He doesn’t say anything. Just starts the engine and pulls away from the curb like it’s the most natural thing in the world. The ride is quiet. Your hands fidget in your lap, your phone buzzes once — probably your mother, and you silence it without even looking. The streetlights blur past like slow-dancing stars, and you feel something rising in you that you don’t yet have the name for. Guilt, maybe. Relief. Fear. Hope. All of them, maybe.

You glance sideways. Heeseung’s face is unreadable, cast in the faint glow of the dashboard. His hand grips the wheel loosely, like he’s driving nowhere in particular. Like wherever he’s going, he just wants to go there with someone. Eventually, he pulls into a dark parking lot. Some vacant strip mall long closed for the night. A single broken streetlamp flickers near the far end, humming like it’s trying to stay alive. Heeseung parks, cuts the engine, and the silence rushes in like a wave. Neither of you speak.

You sit there, breathing it in, the quiet, the dark, the feeling of being no one, nowhere. You hadn’t realized how much you needed it. Then, after a while, he shifts slightly. Reaches into the back pocket of his jeans and pulls something out.

A small, ziplock baggie.

Weed.

He doesn’t look at you. Just holds it in his palm like a casual offering, then tilts his head. “You cool?” You stare at it. You remember a time — clean ballet shoes lined up like soldiers, your life scheduled to the minute, your mother bragging about you at dinner parties. You remember being the good girl. The golden girl. But that girl is gone.

You turn your gaze to the windshield. The night stares back. “Yeah,” you say, voice barely above a whisper. “I’m cool.” And in a strange, twisted way, you think you mean it.

He watches you for a beat, his expression unreadable in the dark. The silence hums between you, heavy with something unspoken. Then, almost gently, Heeseung asks, “Have you ever smoked before?” You hesitate, then shake your head no. Never. You never had the chance, too many rehearsals, too many performances, too much pressure to be perfect. But you’d be lying if you said the idea never crossed your mind. If you said you weren’t curious. If you said a small part of you hadn’t longed for the kind of freedom where you could just… let go.

He raises an eyebrow, not in judgment but in quiet surprise. “Huh,” he says simply, like he’s filing the fact away. Then, he holds the baggie up again between two fingers, his gaze flickering to yours. “You wanna?”

Your heart kicks, once. Sharp and startled. But what startles you more is your answer. “Yes.” You don’t even let yourself think. You just say it. And it hangs there, bold and fragile in the air between you. Because you mean it. If it will help you forget, if it will quiet the scream you’ve been holding in your chest since the day the world cracked and Nari was gone, if it will make the ache a little duller, the past a little blurrier, then yes. You’d do it. Heeseung gives a slight nod, not smug, not surprised. Just understanding. Like he knows exactly what it’s like to want to float outside your body for a while.

“Alright,” he says. “Let’s make it a soft one.” He moves with practiced ease, fishing out a crumpled rolling paper and pinching the weed between his fingers. You watch, fascinated, the movements almost meditative. There’s something comforting in the way his hands work, steady, sure, deliberate.

The flame from Heeseung’s lighter flickered to life, casting a golden glow across his face before it kissed the tip of the joint. He inhaled slowly, his cheeks hollowing slightly, and the ember at the end burned a hot, bright orange in the dimness of the car. You watched him with something close to awe, or maybe curiosity, or yearning, or all three twisted into one. He looked so at ease, leaning back against the driver's seat, elbow perched casually on the window frame, his gaze fixed ahead like the night outside held all the answers he didn’t want to say aloud. He turned to you after a moment, his expression unreadable as he held out the joint.

You wanted it to help you forget — just for a moment; the aching cavern in your chest where Nari used to be, the guilt gnawing at your insides like acid, the unrelenting pressure of being whoever the hell everyone thought you were supposed to be. Heeseung passed it to you. You stared at the joint for a beat too long, unsure how to hold it, how to breathe it in, like it was an alien thing and you were fumbling through foreign rituals. He noticed. Of course he did. A lazy smirk crept onto his lips, his tongue darting out to wet them slightly.

“Here,” he said. “Don’t baby it. Just put it to your lips and inhale. Deep. But not too deep, or you’ll cough your soul out.” You rolled your eyes at his amusement, but you did as instructed. You placed it between your lips and drew in a breath, tentative, hesitant, but determined. The smoke filled your mouth and then your lungs and then; You sputtered. Violently.

Coughing ripped through you like a storm, your body jerking forward as tears sprang to your eyes. Heeseung cracked up, his laughter echoing in the small space between you. “Holy shit,” he said, wiping a tear from his eye. “I should’ve recorded that. You sounded like you were summoning demons.”

You glared at him, cheeks burning, but then you laughed too. Really laughed. A broken, breathless sound that felt like relief. Like freedom. You passed the joint back and forth after that, the air inside the car growing warmer, thicker with smoke and laughter and something else unspoken. You slouched lower in your seat, legs folded beneath you, and Heeseung mirrored your posture, his thigh brushing against yours now and then. The world outside faded. The banquet. Your mother. The whispers. The ache. None of it mattered.

You talked about everything and nothing. Dumb things. Childhood stories. Songs you hated. The worst school lunches you ever had. Heeseung told you he once got detention for throwing mashed potatoes at a substitute teacher. You confessed you used to fake headaches to get out of gym. You both laughed until your faces hurt, the high sinking its claws into your skin like a warm blanket wrapping around your bones. But somehow …..the conversation shifted.

Heeseung fell quiet. His smile slipped. The light in his eyes dimmed, like a shadow passed across his heart. “My brother used to love this song,” he murmured, nodding toward the faint music trickling out of his car speakers, some old indie ballad, moody and atmospheric. “He’d play it every night before bed. Drove me crazy.” You watched him closely, the haze not dulling your senses but sharpening them in ways that scared you.

“Is he… the reason you’re in the grief group?” you asked, soft, unsure. Heeseung didn’t answer right away. Then, finally: “I’m the reason I’m in that grief group.” His voice cracked, just a little, like something too heavy to carry was trying to escape his throat. He didn’t look at you, just stared ahead, into the dark.

And you understood. God, you understood more than you ever wished to. “I know the feeling,” you whispered. That made him look at you. Really look at you. And in that glance, smeared by smoke and shadows and sorrow, you both saw something reflected. A mirror image of broken pieces. A matching ache. Something shifted.

He leaned forward, just slightly, and you met him halfway. The kiss happened so fast you didn’t even think. It was clumsy, desperate, tasting like smoke and everything you’d never said aloud. His hand cupped your cheek, fingers grazing your jaw, pulling you closer like you were the only anchor he had. Your hands found the fabric of his shirt, tugging, gripping, needing to feel something — anything that wasn’t grief. It deepened in seconds. Lips parting, tongues meeting. Heated. Messy.

Heeseung moved with a hunger that mirrored your own, his hands roaming across your back, your waist, your thighs like he needed to memorize every inch. You felt his fingers slipping beneath the hem of your dress, your breath catching as his palm flattened against your bare skin. You didn’t stop him. You didn’t want to. This, whatever this was, felt like the first thing in months that made sense. That made you feel alive instead of just surviving. Your body reacted before your brain could catch up. The car was hot now, windows fogging, clothes tangling. His mouth left trails down your neck, and your fingers curled in his hair, pulling him closer.

You didn’t think of Nari. You didn’t think of anything but this moment, and the way Heeseung’s lips felt on your skin, the way his body pressed against yours like he needed you to breathe. It was exhilarating, your body alight like a flame catching fire. You didn’t know how to explain the feeling that seeped through your bones and laid a nest in your marrow.

His hand continued its climb on your thigh inching upward for what felt like a mile a minute. You broke away to catch your breath, your forehead resting on his. “I want you.” Heeseung said, his words low in his throat it almost felt buried, like he was trying to conceal himself but his body wouldn't let him.

“Ok.” You nod because that's the only word you could say that would be coherent.

“But not all the way. I want to take my time with you.” His breath shot shivers down your spine, his fingers caressing the skin of your knee. His lips find purchase on the skin of your neck sucking the skin slightly. A gasp falls from your lips, quick and breathy. You were not a virgin, that was the truth but you had never been as needy as you were now. In Lee Heeseung’s car of all people. He was trouble, that much was clear. You had just gotten high with the guy for crying out loud.

You didn’t care. Not anymore, at least. You were tired of caring. So, you let him continue his kisses down your neck, slow and careful, a strong opposition to your rapidly beating heart. A timeless boom let out into the quiet or your entire body and your entire soul. You welcomed it and it came crashing like a tidal wave.

His hand inched up, and under your dress. His hands caressing your clothed core with his finger. Your breath shook a small mewl leaving your lips. Heeseung smirked against your skin, a slow languid smirk that told you he was enjoying this just as much as you were. His thumb ran across your panties slowly like he was testing the waters. Watching your reactions, keening at your pleasure. Lee Heeseung knew what he was doing, that much was clear.

“I’m going to touch you now, Okay?” His voice was questioning but not uncertain. Like he knew you wanted this but just had to make sure. It was more appreciated than you could even say.

You nod, not trusting yourself to speak. His finger pulled your panties aside, his eyes never leaving your face, not even for a second. This was a movie and you were the star of the show, the leading lady. You deserved a fucking standing ovation after this one, only it wasn’t an act. This was real; very much so. You moaned breathily watching Heeseung with careful eyes. He was beautiful there was no doubt about it. His finger traced your clit, moving in slow circles over the nub. Your body felt electrified.

You reacted with a gasp, your hand reaching to grip Heeseung’s arm “Hee–” You whimpered as he slid a single finger into your entrance, eyes still locked on your face intently. “Feels good.”

“Yeah?” He asked with a smirk. “How good?”

“So good.” You withered under his gaze, your hips lifting to meet his fingers. It was euphoric. A mind numbing feeling you’d been searching for. It didn’t take long for you to tip over the edge. Your orgasm hitting you like a truck. Your moans ringing through the car and filling the space. Heeseung’s gaze turned dark, drinking you in.

“Beautiful.” He muttered “So fucking beautiful.” Then it was over. And not a single part of you regretted it. You had felt alive, ablaze with feeling. You needed this.

“What time is it?” You asked, after a stretch of silence. You watched as the foggy windows cleared your mind becoming less hazy as you came down from not only the high of your orgasm but the high of the weed.

“Just passed one. Need a lift home?” You nod tiredly, barely gaining the strength to lift your head. And before you know it, he was starting the car and taking off. Your perfect night ending as you knew it.

Before.

The house was already thick with tension, the air humid with summer heat and something more suffocating; disappointment, maybe, or something sharper, something older. Heeseung stood in the middle of the living room, jaw tight, fists clenched at his sides. The walls around him had once felt like home, but now they felt too close, like they were folding in on him. “You can’t just keep coasting like this,” his father barked, pacing across the living room with his arms crossed, brow furrowed like a permanent fixture. “You’re twenty-three, Heeseung. What are you even doing with your life?”

Heeseung leaned against the back of the couch, arms folded, expression unreadable except for the faint twitch in his jaw. “I’m figuring it out.”

“Figuring it out?” his father repeated with a humorless laugh. “You’ve been saying that for two years. Meanwhile, Han’s already lined up for internships, he’s tutoring on weekends, and he’s still pulling top grades. He actually wants something for himself.” And there it was. Han. The golden son. The measuring stick. Heeseung pushed off the couch, tension suddenly uncoiling in his limbs like a spring snapped loose. “Good for him,” he said bitterly. “Why don’t you make him a damn trophy?”

“Don��t talk about your brother like that,” his father snapped.

“I’m not talking about him,” Heeseung shot back. “I’m talking about you. You never look at me without seeing what I’m not.”

His father’s face hardened. “You have all the same opportunities. You just don’t take anything seriously.”

“Because I don’t want to spend my life miserable just to meet your standards.”

“God, listen to yourself,” his father muttered, dragging a hand down his face. “You think life’s about doing whatever the hell you want? You think you’re entitled to waste your time and your potential?”

“I’m young,” Heeseung barked. “Isn’t that what being young is for? I have the rest of my life to hate my job and sit in traffic and drink burnt office coffee. Why the hell would I start now?”

“You always have an excuse,” his father said. “Always. You’re lazy, Heeseung. And selfish. I’m just glad Han didn’t turn out like you.” The words sliced through the air like a blade. Heeseung went still. His chest rose and fell, his breath shallow. For a moment, neither of them said anything. The only sound was the hum of the fridge in the next room. Then Heeseung laughed; quiet and humorless.

He grabbed his keys from the counter. “You know what?” he said, voice brittle at the edges. “Thanks, Dad. Really. That was the push I needed.”

“Where are you going?” His father yelled after him.

“Out,” he snapped, walking toward the front door. “To do something useless. Just to spite you.”

He didn’t wait for a reply. The door slammed shut behind him, the sound sharp as a gunshot. Outside, the sun was still bright, but it felt cold in his chest. A hollowness had opened up inside him, and he didn’t know how to fill it, except to forget. So he texted the group chat, asking what parties were happening tonight. And as he walked down the street, hands in his pockets and jaw still clenched, Heeseung thought only one thing: Han can keep being perfect. I don’t want that life anyway. But part of him knew; even then, that something had cracked open. And that no party in the world would be enough to glue it back together.

Present day

The car ride home was quiet, the kind of quiet that sinks into your skin and makes a home there. After the haze and heat of that night with Heeseung, the soft high that blanketed your brain, the weight of his body pressed into yours like something grounding, you hadn’t thought about what came next. You hadn’t prepared for the way your real life would be waiting for you like a predator at the door. Heeseung pulls up slowly in front of your house, the engine humming low. The porch light is on. A silhouette moves behind the curtain. Your stomach knots. You should’ve known better. You should’ve gone home earlier. You should’ve texted.

You shouldn’t have disappeared. Heeseung glances at you. “You good?”

You nod, though you’re not. You open the door and step into the cool night air, the scent of pine and pavement rising with the wind. The moment the door swings open, you’re met with your mother’s worried face, and your father’s fury. “There you are,” your mother breathes, like the air had left her lungs hours ago and only now returned. Her eyes are wide, red-rimmed. Her robe is tied tightly at her waist, hands clenched. “Where have you been? We didn’t know if something had—”

“Where the hell were you?” your father’s voice cuts like a blade. He’s pacing now, his posture rigid, as if he’s been holding himself still for too long and has finally snapped the leash. The living room lamp casts long shadows on the hardwood, your mother’s expression flickering like candlelight. You cross your arms. “Out.”

“Out?” he repeats, incredulous. “You disappeared in the middle of the banquet. You didn’t answer your phone. We were about to call the police.”

“I was with someone.”

“Who?” he demands.

You shouldn’t say it. You know the weight the name carries in this house, the implications, the judgment it would bring. But you’re still high. You’re still reeling. And your anger, your rage, has been stewing beneath your skin for far too long. You tilt your head, smirk venomously. “I was busy having sex. With Lee Heeseung.”

Your mother gasps, small, but sharp. A sound of heartbreak and horror all at once. Your father stills. There’s a quiet moment, too quiet, before he explodes. “Do you have any idea what you’re doing to your mother?!”

“I don’t care,” you snap.

His face darkens. “You don’t care?”

“No. I don’t. Because none of you care about me. You only care about what I do. How I act. How I reflect on you. You don’t care about how I feel; about what I’ve been going through.”

“We’ve given you space—”

“No,” you cut him off, your voice rising with the heat in your throat. “You’ve given me rules. Expectations. You wanted me to move on quietly. To cry behind closed doors and never, ever make you uncomfortable with the reality of what happened.” Your mother clutches her robe tighter. “We’ve tried—”

“You’ve tried to ignore it!” you cry. “You want to pretend Nari dying didn’t ruin me. You want me to go back to who I was. But I’m not her anymore.” Your father slams his palm against the wall, the sound like thunder. “We’ve given you so much grace this year after Nari’s death but—”

“There is no buts!” your voice cracks. “My life ended the same day Nari’s did.” A silence falls over the room, heavy as snow. Your father’s voice is low, seething. “No, it didn’t. You’re still alive. And you’re treating yourself like some kind of corpse. Wake up.”

“Why should I?” you whisper. “Why should I get to live comfortably, eat dinner, go to banquets, kiss boys in dark cars, when it’s my fault she’s dead?” Your mother lets out a sound like a sob, but you can’t stop now. The words are fire on your tongue, and they’ve been burning there for too long.

“You don’t get it,” you say to your father, your voice shaking. “You don’t know what it’s like to carry that kind of guilt every single day. To wish it had been you instead. You’re right. I am acting like a corpse; because I should be one.”

That’s when he takes a step forward, his face pale with fury and pain. “Don’t say that.”

“Why not? It’s true.”

“Don’t you ever say that again,” he growls.

But you don’t listen. You’ve already turned. Your feet carry you down the hall like instinct, your fingers fumbling for your phone. You scroll through your contacts with trembling hands, your vision blurred. You tap his name. He picks up on the first ring. “Hello?”

“Heeseung…” you breathe, voice cracking. “Please. Come pick me up.” There’s a pause. Then; his voice, calm and certain. “On my way.”

You hang up before your father can say another word, before your mother can cry any harder, before the weight of their stares suffocates you completely. You step outside into the night, wind rushing against your skin like a balm, your heart still thrumming with rage and regret and pain. The world outside is dark, the moon obscured by clouds. Somewhere in the distance, a dog barks. You stand there on the sidewalk, arms crossed tightly over your chest, waiting. And when his car turns the corner, headlights cutting through the dark like a lifeline; you breathe again. You don’t know where you’re going. But you know it’s away. And for now, that’s enough.

Before

The theatre smelled of velvet and varnish and a faint current of dust stirred by restless feet; an intoxicating mix that lived in your bones long before you ever set foot in its wings. It was Friday, the day everything was meant to unfold exactly the way you’d mapped it in your sleepless imaginings: the day the scouts filled the back row with clipboards poised, the day your instructors whispered Watch this one, the day your life would pivot on the sharpened point of a single relevé.

But all week your nerves had been a live wire sparking under your skin. You’d flitted through dressing‐room corridors like a ghost, ducking Nari’s bright grin, her lilting voice calling your nickname, the glitter of anticipation in her eyes. Pre‐show jitters, you’d told her, forcing smiles so wide your cheeks trembled. In truth, your heart was a glass ornament rattling in its box, because tucked into it was a secret kiss that did not belong to you; a kiss that belonged to Nari, to her late‐night confessions about Beomgyu, to the dizzy way she clasped your arm and said He’s the one, I feel it. That kiss replayed in your mind on a merciless loop: the blurred parking‐lot lights washing across Beomgyu’s face, the soft rasp of his flannel collar, the unplanned tilt of two mouths colliding in a moment that should never have existed. Every beat of silence afterward felt like a fresh betrayal. You’d tried to bury it beneath pliés and pirouettes, to sweat it out into the marley floor, but guilt is a clever shadow; it clings to the arch of your foot, the curve of your rib cage, rides the breath of every port de bras.

Now, backstage, the hush before the storm pressed in on you. Scuttling crew members tacked stray cables to the floor; the stage manager hissed cues into a headset. Beyond the velvet curtain came the low hum of an expectant crowd; parents adjusting programs, instructors scanning rosters, the occasional rustle as someone leaned to whisper good luck to a performer slipping past. Your fellow dancers flitted in and out of light like dragonflies, tutus trembling, pointe shoes ticking softly on the worn boards. Somewhere out there was Nari, waiting two numbers after you, hair pinned in a sleek crown, eyes surely hunting the auditorium for Beomgyu’s familiar silhouette. And somewhere, closer than you wanted to imagine, was Beomgyu himself, sitting with the audience’s polite hush draped about his shoulders. You had not dared to look for him during warm‐ups; the very idea set your pulse galloping.

An assistant stage manager approached, clipboard clutched, voice gentle yet insistent. “Five minutes, star.” The moniker landed like a shard of glass. Star. The word rang hollow when you felt anything but stellar, when every muscle was soldered to fear. Still, you nodded and stepped into the narrow spill of light at stage left, waiting for the house to black out and the overture to climb. The curtain would rise on silence, a single spotlight blooming down like moonlight. You would step from darkness into glow, offering your first breath to the rafters. You’d practiced that entrance so many times the floor all but remembered your weight. Tonight you would give it everything, because failure, you’d decided, was the only penance big enough to fit this sin. If you danced perfectly, perhaps the universe would not forgive you; so you vowed to dance beyond perfect, to dissolve into movement so wholly that the world could forget it ever saw you kiss the wrong boy.

The house lights dimmed. A hush rippled across the audience like the draw of a single breath. In that hush you caught the faintest sound: a program dropping, a throat clearing, the soft scuff of someone shifting in their seat. And beneath it all, your name inside your chest, repeating like a mantra: remember the choreography. remember the music. remember the reason you began. When the curtain ascended, it felt almost slow like dawn unfolding. The low whirr of the fly‐system chains, the gentle rustle of velvet reaching upward, revealing a stage hushed, waiting. The spotlight found you, and heat flooded your skin. Applause dotted the darkness: a scattering of claps, polite and anticipatory, then fading to a reverent hush.

The first note of the piano slipped from the orchestra pit; soft, deliberate, as if testing the air. You drew a breath so deep it lifted your ribs like wings, and then your body obeyed the command that had been etched into its sinew over months of repetition. You stepped forward, ankle rolling through demi‐pointe to full, the world narrowing to the music, the floor, the fire in your muscles. For a heartbeat, it was perfect. More than perfect: it was transcendence. Each développé carved an invisible ribbon through space; each alignement felt true, as though gravity itself had arced to cradle you. You surrendered to the dance and let it carry you across the stage like wind across water. Every beat of the piano pulled another secret thread tight inside your chest, and yet, incredibly, you didn’t unravel; you soared.

Then your eyes lifted. A reflex. A mistake. Rows of faces climbed into the darkness, features softened by the spill of stage light. Far left, a head of sandy hair, a familiar tilt of a jaw, a pair of wide dark eyes that had once closed under your kiss. Beomgyu.

The breath caught in your throat mid‐pirouette. The world jolted slightly off its axle. In that split second, the clarity you’d fought so hard for shattered like a mirror under stone, and the edges flew at you; every shard a memory: his smile in the glow of the streetlight, the click of his seatbelt as you leaned in, the soft shock of his lips. Behind those shards, the imagined face of Nari when — if — she discovered the truth. Your next placement faltered. The edge of your pointe shoe skidded. You tried to salvage it, shoulders tightening, arms shooting wide but the correction was too sharp, too late. Your ankle buckled, and gravity claimed you in a brutal, inelegant swoop.

You hit the floor hard enough to send a tremor through the wings. A stunned gasp rippled across the crowd; a collective intake of breath that sounded like a verdict. The spotlight kept shining, merciless, on the shape of your failure. For a moment you couldn’t breathe; the air seemed to have left the theatre entirely. Your heartbeat thundered in your ears. In that bright, silent agony, one thought screamed louder than the pain: I deserve this.

Your palms slipped on the marley as you scrambled upright, but the choreography was gone, blown out like a candle. All that remained was the monstrous echo of what you’d done, of who you’d betrayed. The music continued, an empty cascade of sound; and you, trembling, stared out at the sea of faces until one face met your gaze: Nari’s. Stage left, waiting for her entrance, eyes wide with horror and a heartbreak you prayed she couldn’t name yet. Something inside you broke fully then. You couldn’t stay. You couldn’t finish. You couldn’t breathe in a world where she might learn the truth. With a ragged sob, you spun on your heel and fled the stage, the curtains swallowing you, the orchestra faltering into confused diminuendo. Behind you, the audience erupted, someone calling your name, others murmuring like distant thunder, parents half‐rising from seats.

Backstage smelled of dust and rosin and your own panic. You tore down the corridor, past startled crew members, tutus swishing as dancers pressed back against scenery flats to let you pass. Someone called after you; an instructor, maybe but their voice drowned in the roar of your pulse. You pushed through the stage door into the alley, the night slapping cold against your fevered skin. The street beyond the theatre was shockingly normal, cars rolling by, a neon sign buzzing across the avenue, the faint peppery smell of a late‐night food truck. But inside you, the world had ended. You bent double, hands on your knees, tears splattering the asphalt. On the other side of the stage wall, the showcase continued; voices, hurried announcements, an onstage piano vamping to fill the space you’d left barren. You pictured scouts scribbling notes: promising, but no mental stamina. poor recovery. not ready.

None of it mattered. You deserved none of it. You deserved exactly this emptiness, this shame coiled tight as wire around your throat. Because what kind of friend kisses the boy her best friend loves? What kind of dancer lets the stage become collateral damage for her guilt? A monster. You pressed your fist to your mouth to stifle a sob. Down the block, an ambulance siren wailed; shrill, insistent and the sound echoed in your bones. You didn’t know it yet, but hours later you’d meet that wail again in a different key, flashing red against wet pavement, broken glass glittering under streetlights, the night Nari would walk away from you for the last time.

For now, there was only the alley and the wreckage of a dream that had shattered under a single glance. You slid down the cool brick wall until you were crouched amid puddles of stage runoff, trembling with adrenaline and remorse. Somewhere inside the theatre, Nari was stepping into her music, dancing her heart out; maybe flawlessly, maybe faltering because of you. You’d never know, because you couldn’t bear to watch.

You buried your face in your hands and stayed there until the music ended, until the applause rose and fell, until the night air numbed the sting of your scraped palms. By the time a teacher found you, voice gentle, jacket draped over your shoulders; you had already decided you were done. With ballet. With pretending. With believing you deserved good things. Because the monster inside you had spoken, and the stage had listened. And you felt certain — absolutely certain that nothing would ever be bright again.

Present day

The streetlights flicker past like ghosts, golden halos warping through the tears blurring your vision. You don’t bother wiping them away. You just hope Heeseung doesn’t notice, but of course he does. Silence may fill the cabin of his car, but it's not a silence that shelters. It’s the kind that listens too closely, hears too much. The air is thick; warmer than it should be for nightfall. The windows are cracked just enough to let in a breeze that carries the scent of damp pavement and something flowering in the dark. Your fingers are clenched in your lap, nails carving half-moons into the soft flesh of your palms.

You feel his glance before you see it. Heeseung shifts slightly in the driver’s seat, one hand loose on the steering wheel, the other drumming an idle rhythm against his thigh. He doesn’t say anything right away, and you cling to that mercy for as long as you can, but then his voice slips into the space between you. “What’s wrong?” he asks, gentle. Like he’s afraid you might break if he presses too hard.

You inhale sharply through your nose and keep your gaze pinned to the window. You watch as the night spills over rooftops and lampposts and blinking store signs, blurry and distant, as if you’re floating somewhere above your life instead of living it. You debate lying. It would be easy. Safer. You could tell him it was just a bad day. School stress. A family squabble about curfews or drinking or some other shallow wound that wouldn’t require stitching. But Heeseung doesn’t feel like someone you can lie to. Not right now. Not after the joint, the kiss, the way he touched you, the quiet understanding that crackled between you like static in the dark. This thing between you, it’s not defined, not shaped into anything real; but it’s honest. And in a world where most people look at you with pity or suspicion or sanitized grief, Heeseung looks at you like he sees past the performance.

So you speak. Quietly. “I got into a fight with my parents.” Heeseung nods, doesn’t push. Just gives you space. You swallow, your throat tight. “It was about Nari.”

There’s a brief pause. You can feel the shape of the question before he asks it, cautious and curious. “Who’s Nari?”

Your eyes close for a beat. The ache swells in your chest again, a slow, suffocating bloom. “My best friend,” you say. And then, sharper, crueler, the words tear their way out of you: “My best friend that I killed.”

Silence. A heavier one now. Weighted. You brace yourself for the flinch, for the retreat, for the cold rush of judgment that always follows. You wait for him to tell you that you’re being dramatic, that it wasn’t your fault, that grief warps memory and blame. But Heeseung doesn’t say anything. And in his silence, there is no retreat. There is no recoil. You glance sideways. His expression hasn’t shifted into pity or horror. If anything, it’s softened. Eyes dark and unreadable, mouth slack with something that might be understanding, or pain. Heeseung just nods. Like he knows exactly what it feels like to carry something unspeakable.

When he pulls into his driveway, you expect him to say something more, to fill the silence with platitudes or distractions. But he doesn’t. He turns off the ignition, tosses his keys onto the dashboard with a quiet clatter, and says, “Come on.” You follow him into the house. The air inside smells faintly like detergent and something warm from earlier; maybe toast or ramen. The lights are low, and the hallway creaks under your steps. There are photos on the wall, but you don’t stop to look at them. It feels like trespassing, being here. Not physically, but emotionally. Like you’ve brought the rot of your guilt into a space that deserves better.

Upstairs, his room is dim and a little messy; sheets rumpled, books stacked sideways on the desk, a hoodie slung across the back of a chair. You hover in the doorway, unsure, until he gestures for you to come in. You sit on the edge of his bed, suddenly small. Your hands knot in your lap. The air is thick again. Not from heat this time, but from the weight of what’s unsaid.

“I’m sorry,” you murmur, your voice barely above a whisper. Heeseung drops to a crouch in front of you, hands braced on his knees. He looks up at you like he wants to memorize your face in this exact moment. “You don’t have to apologize.”

Your eyes sting again. “I do. I shouldn’t be here. I shouldn’t be doing this. I—”

His voice cuts you off. Firm. “You’re not a bad person for needing someone.” You shake your head, blinking hard. “I betrayed her. She was always there for me, and I hurt her. I broke something so sacred. She trusted me.”

Heeseung’s expression shifts. Not in disbelief, but in recognition. He knows this guilt. Wears it like a second skin. “I get it,” he says, softly. “I killed my brother.”

He doesn’t look away. “Not literally. But I might as well have. I— I did something. I didn’t mean to. But I did. And now he’s dead. And it’s because of me.”

Your voice is tentative. “That can’t be true.”

“It is,” he insists. His voice trembles just once, then steadies. “I might as well have put a gun to his head and pulled the trigger.” You stare at him, stunned. Not because of the words, but because of how familiar they sound. Like an echo of your own worst thoughts.

“I told her,” you say quietly, “that she didn’t deserve him. I told her he didn’t love her. I lied. I said it to hurt her.” You’re not even sure when the tears start again. They fall quietly, steadily, like summer rain.

“I kissed him. Her boyfriend. She found out. I never got to explain. I never got to say sorry.” Heeseung says nothing. He doesn’t have to. He just kneels there in front of you, steady as a lighthouse, his eyes locked on yours.

You can barely breathe. “It should’ve been me. Not her. I was the one who ruined everything. I should be the one—”

“Stop,” he says, gently but firmly. Your voice cracks. “Why does the world keep spinning when she’s not in it? Why do I get to wake up every day when she’s in the ground?”

Heeseung places a hand on your knee. Not romantically. Not out of pity. Just to anchor you. To remind you that you're still here, breathing, even if you don’t know why. “Tell me what happened,” he says. “That night.”

You don’t answer right away. You stare past him, past the walls, past the ache. Your throat works around the lump rising in it. That night. The one you’ve rewound and replayed a thousand times. The night everything shattered. You open your mouth. And the scene begins to unwind behind your eyes. But that’s for the next breath. The next storm. For now, you sit in Heeseung’s room, in the quiet aftermath of too much truth. And for the first time in what feels like forever, someone sees you in all your ruin; and doesn’t look away.

It was the night after the showcase, and you felt like a ghost in your own skin. The stage lights had faded, but their burn still etched itself behind your eyes, mocking you. You hadn’t even made it through the routine. You’d crumbled; right there, in front of everyone who ever believed in you. Your body, trained and honed like a blade for years, had given out at the mere sight of him. Beomgyu. His eyes in the crowd. His mouth, the one you’d kissed in secret. Nari’s boyfriend. Her everything. And you’d shattered. Now, your phone was a storm. Ping after ping, call after call. All from her.

Nari.

Her contact photo was a blurry selfie from last summer — her smile sun-kissed and wide, your arm looped around her neck. You looked so happy. So unworthy. She was worried. Of course she was. You were supposed to be avoiding her for pre-show jitters, remember? But now the show was over and the lies had nowhere to hide. The texts were a blur. hey.

please say something. i’m worried about you. i’m not mad. just talk to me. i love you. you know that right? That last one made you feel like you were going to throw up. You dropped the phone onto your bed like it was on fire. You paced. You screamed into your pillow. You considered telling her everything. The kiss. The guilt. The way your bones ached with shame every time her name crossed your lips. But you didn’t. Because what kind of monster kisses her best friend’s boyfriend and lets her say I love you like nothing happened? You pressed the heels of your palms into your eyes. You wanted to disappear. You wanted to punish yourself. And then she called.

The ringtone split the silence like a siren. You let it ring. Let it go to voicemail. It rang again. And again. On the fourth try, you picked up, breathless like you’d run a mile. “Hello?” Her voice came through, thin and frantic: “Oh my God; are you okay? Why haven’t you been answering? I’ve been freaking out—”

“I’m fine,” you lied. “Just… tired.”

“Tired? You disappeared after the showcase, you didn’t even stay for the closing photos. Everyone was asking about you. Your parents looked — I don’t know, really worried or something. What happened up there?” You couldn’t answer. Your throat locked up. The sound of her worry made you want to claw your skin off. Nari didn’t push. That was her gift and her curse. She gave you space when you needed it; even when you were lying to her face.

“I think you should come to Beomgyu’s,” she said after a long silence. “I know, it’s dumb. I know you don’t like these things. But maybe it’ll help. Just… I don’t know. I want to see you.”

The line crackled. Her voice wavered. “Please.” It was that word — please that broke you. Even after everything, even not knowing what you’d done, she still wanted you there. Still loved you. You whispered, “Okay.” And hung up before you could change your mind.

The second you stepped through the front door, the night swallowed you whole. Music pounded like a heartbeat, loud and consuming, the bass thudding through the soles of your shoes and up your spine until your body seemed to vibrate from the inside out. The house was an explosion of color and chaos; flashing LED lights staining the air red and green, the smell of alcohol and weed thick enough to choke on. Someone shrieked with laughter from the kitchen, their voice edged in hysteria. The living room looked like a scene from a dream gone wrong: bodies pressed together in the dim light, dancing on tables, spilled drinks soaking into the carpet, lipstick-smeared kisses exchanged without meaning. You were an intruder here, a ghost drifting through a world too loud, too fast, too alive for what was rotting inside of you. Your heart beat too loudly, but only with dread. You were here for one reason — Nari.

Your eyes scanned the crowd in desperation. Faces blurred together, a kaleidoscope of strangers and half-friends you didn’t care to recognize. Every movement felt slow, as if your limbs were dragging through molasses. You called out for her once, twice, but no one heard you over the noise. Your throat burned. Every second that passed stretched thinner than the last, stretched like the lie you’d built between yourself and the girl who’d once been your anchor. You grabbed a boy near the stereo, his breath reeking of vodka and his eyes glazed over with party-born indifference. “Have you seen Nari?” you shouted over the music.

“What?” he bellowed, tipping his head.

“NARI!” you yelled again, your voice hoarse.

He squinted, lips pulling into a sloppy grin. “Beomgyu’s room!” He jabbed his finger upward, then turned back to whatever game he was playing with the girl beside him. The words hit like a brick to the stomach. Your legs moved on their own, carrying you toward the stairs, each step heavier than the last. The music dimmed slightly as you ascended, replaced by the echo of your own breathing; shallow, frantic, uneven. The hallway was lit by a single flickering bulb, shadows creeping along the walls like phantoms. You hesitated at the door, the weight of what might be behind it pressing against your chest. You knocked.

No answer.

You tried again. Still nothing.

You opened the door.

The room was dim, just the low glow of a lamp in the corner casting a soft golden haze. Beomgyu was there, sitting on the edge of the bed, head bowed, fingers knotted in his hair like he was trying to rip thoughts straight from his skull. He looked up at the sound of the door creaking, his eyes dark and distant, the slump of his shoulders too familiar. You stepped inside, heart hammering. “Where’s Nari?”

He blinked like he’d just remembered you existed. “She’s in the bathroom,” he said, voice low. You nodded, relief flooding your system. You turned to leave, to find her, to finally talk, to explain.

But his hand caught yours. You froze. “Wait,” he murmured, standing. Your heart leapt into your throat. You turned toward him slowly, your fingers still curled beneath the weight of his.

“What are you doing?” your voice trembled.

“I can’t stop thinking about you,” he said.

The room tilted, the words crashing into you like a rogue wave. You pulled your hand back, stumbling a step away. “What?”

“I—” He reached up slowly, brushing a strand of hair behind your ear, the gentleness of the touch striking terror into the hollow space beneath your ribs. “I think I’m in love with you. And I’m not sorry about it.”

Your breath left your body. The room suddenly felt too small, the air thick and cloying. Your thoughts scattered like dust in sunlight. You couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. Couldn’t remember what day it was or who you were or why any of this had happened. Then he leaned in. And god help you, you didn’t stop him.

The kiss was soft, slow, nothing like what you should have felt. No heat. No passion. Just desperation. A collision of two broken people reaching for something to numb the ache. His lips pressed to yours like a promise he had no right to make, and your body moved on autopilot, not because it meant anything; but because you couldn’t stop unraveling. Because the guilt already inside you wanted to finish the job. And then the door opened.

“Sorry, Gyu, the line was lo—” Nari’s voice sliced the moment in half. You and Beomgyu broke apart instantly. Her figure stood in the doorway, her silhouette backlit by the hallway, her face frozen in pure, heart-wrenching horror. Her lips parted. Her eyes wide and glassy. A silence so violent followed that it rang in your ears.

“Nari—” you began, stepping forward.

“What are you doing?” she asked, voice cracking. “Are you drunk?”

“No,” you whispered, voice trembling. “I…”

Beomgyu stepped in front of you, shielded you. “I love her.” The words detonated. You saw them hit her like bullets, tearing through her chest, her stomach, her soul. Her mouth opened in disbelief. Her hand flew to her face, eyes flooding. A tear slid down her cheek, and then another.

“You love her?” she repeated, the disbelief in her voice shattering into something sharper. She turned to you, her face contorted. “How could you?”

You shook your head. “I don’t— I don’t love him—”

“Then what the hell was that?” she screamed.

Your words failed. Every explanation tasted like ash in your mouth. Nari shook her head in disgust, chest heaving, shoulders trembling. “I felt bad for you,” she hissed. “I was here crying for you after you fell at the showcase. I was the only one defending you, worrying about you — and you were falling in love with my boyfriend?”

“I wasn’t—I’m not—” You took a step forward, pleading. “Nari, please—”

“Save it,” she snapped, her voice tight with betrayal. Then she turned and ran. You chased her, heart in your throat, vision blurring with tears. The house blurred around you, voices rising in alarm as people stepped back, made room for the spectacle.

“Nari!” you cried out, louder. “Nari, wait!” You hit the yard just as she reached the edge of the driveway. You grabbed her hand, stopping her.

She spun to face you, eyes wild. “How could you?”

Her voice cracked in two. Your breath hitched. “I made a mistake,” you whispered, barely audible. “I didn’t mean to—I wasn’t thinking—I—”

“I loved him,” she spat. “And you knew that. You knew what he meant to me. And you let him touch you anyway.”

You shook your head, helpless. “I was hurting, I wasn’t—I’m sorry—”

But it didn’t matter. She stepped back from you, tears shining in her eyes, her voice growing louder, shriller. “How could you betray me like that?” she screamed. “I gave you everything—I trusted you!”

The crowd that had spilled from the party stood in silence now, some filming, some whispering, none stepping in. She kept backing away, one trembling step at a time, her anger unraveling into sobs. “I hate you,” she choked. “I hate you—” Then headlights cut across the street. A roar of an engine. Screams. Tires screeching too late.

Your scream ripped from your chest. “NARI!” But the car struck her before she could turn. The impact was sickening. Her body flew; crashed to the pavement like a marionette with its strings sliced clean. Gasps exploded around you, someone dropping a drink, the shatter echoing like gunfire. You couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. You stood frozen as her body crumpled on the road, limbs twisted, her eyes wide and unseeing.

Time stopped.

The music had gone silent. The world had gone quiet. And all you could hear — over and over and over again, was the sound of her body hitting the ground.

Before Heeseung’s pov

The world had already begun to blur around the edges. Music throbbed through his skull like a migraine, and every heartbeat pulsed with fury. Heeseung swayed in the middle of the chaos, a red solo cup dangling from his fingers, filled with something that tasted like gasoline and bad decisions. Sweat slicked his back beneath his shirt, his skin clammy and hot. He laughed too loud at nothing, danced with girls he didn’t know; arms flung over their shoulders, mouths close enough to kiss but never quite touching, never quite feeling. He couldn’t feel anything. That was the point.

He hated this place. Hated the way people looked at him like he was just some pretty face with skates on. Hated the smirk that his father wore every time he talked about Han; the good son, the real winner. The one who did everything right. The one who didn’t mess up. The one who didn’t get drunk and high just to silence the noise of expectation. He stumbled into the backyard, stars smeared across the sky like someone had finger-painted them in haste. His phone burned in his hand, screen too bright, too white. His fingers fumbled over Han’s name. He pressed call.

“Hello?” Han’s voice was soft, groggy, that worried older brother tone he always used. “Hee? Are you okay?”

Heeseung let out a bitter laugh, the sound catching in his throat. “You’re not better than me.”

There was a pause. “What? Heeseung, what’s going on?”

“You think you’re so perfect.” Heeseung’s words slurred together like wet paint. “Dad thinks you’re the golden boy. But you’re not better. I’ll show you. I’ll show him. You’re not better—”

“Heeseung, you’re drunk. I’m coming to get you. Stay there, okay? Just wait.” Heeseung hung up. Or maybe he didn’t. He couldn’t tell. Everything was spinning. He staggered forward, gripping the porch railing like it could keep him tethered. He felt like throwing up. Or screaming. Or both. The inside of his head was all static. And then headlights sliced through the darkness. Han’s car. Heeseung stumbled down the steps, nearly eating it on the last one, and staggered toward the passenger side. Han threw the door open, face pale and tight with worry.

“Get in,” he ordered. Heeseung obeyed, limbs heavy and unwilling. He slumped into the seat, slurring more than he was speaking. “You think you’re better than me, huh?” he muttered, leaning against the window, his cheek pressed to the cold glass. “Just 'cause you got your degree and your dumb finance job and your clean record.”

“I don’t think that,” Han said sharply. “And Dad doesn’t either, he’s just… Heeseung, he’s hard on both of us. You know that.”

“Bullshit,” Heeseung growled, eyes closing. “You never had to be perfect to be loved. He just loved you.”

Han’s grip tightened on the wheel. “That’s not true. You don’t know what you’re saying. You’re drunk.”

Heeseung kept going, words bubbling out like poison. “You think I don’t see it? The way he brags about you. Han graduated summa cum laude. Han never got suspended. Han’s never in the papers for fighting or failing.” He laughed. “I hope you’re proud. Look at me now, huh? Look how far I fell.” Han opened his mouth to answer, but he didn’t get the chance. Because just ahead, in the fog of motion and the flash of headlights —

There was a girl.

A blur of limbs and hair and horror, stepping backward into the road. Han shouted. The brakes screamed. But the moment came too fast. The sound, oh god, the sound, of impact was the kind that split your soul in two. Metal and flesh, a sickening crunch, a thud that would echo in nightmares for the rest of time. Heeseung’s body flung forward with the jolt, the seatbelt carving into his chest. Time bent sideways. Han swerved. The world spun. A flash of a tree trunk—then blackness. When he came to, everything hurt.

The car was mangled metal wrapped around bark. Smoke coiled from the hood. Blood ran down Heeseung’s face, sticky and warm, his head lolling forward. His ears rang like a bomb had gone off. He blinked once, twice. Tried to move; glass in his leg. Something was wrong. Something was wrong. “Han?” he croaked. There was no answer. He turned his head and screamed.

Han’s body was slumped over the wheel, motionless. Blood pooled under him, his face obscured. Something primal split through Heeseung’s chest; panic, dread, disbelief. “No, no, no,” he muttered. “Han!” He shoved at him with trembling hands. “Come on, wake up—wake up—” Sirens in the distance. Voices shouting. People running.

Heeseung’s breath caught. A sob clawed its way from his throat. It was all his fault. It was too late. And Heeseung had never hated himself more.

Present day

The silence stretches between you like a drawn-out breath, trembling and thin. Heeseung sits beside you on the edge of his bed, shoulders hunched, jaw clenched like he’s trying to bite back the storm surging in his chest. You can still hear the echo of the past in his voice, the shattered edges of guilt rattling in his throat. The room is quiet but not peaceful; it's the kind of quiet that comes after an earthquake, when everything has fallen and the air still trembles with memory. You sit there, skin cold, heart unraveling, both of you held in the soft aftershock of everything you’ve said. “I’m sorry,” he murmurs.

His voice cracks like dry wood. And it catches you off guard, more than anything else could have. Of all the things you expected him to say, an apology wasn't one of them. Not to you. Not when the pain has stained both your lives in different, irreparable ways. You look over at him, eyes red but dry now, exhaustion threading through your bones like a second skeleton. “Why?” you ask him, barely above a whisper. “Why are you apologizing?”

He turns toward you slowly. The lamplight casts his features in shadow, sharp and soft at once; eyes that have seen too much, mouth that’s tasted too much regret. “Because,” he says, voice thick, “this all started with me. I was the one who called Han. I was the one who needed to prove something. I got drunk, I spiraled, I needed to be seen, and now he’s gone. And so is Nari.”

Your heart pulls painfully in your chest, but your voice is steady when you speak. “No. This isn’t your fault.” He looks at you like he doesn’t believe it, like your words are a kindness he doesn’t think he deserves. “I don’t blame you, Heeseung,” you continue, softer now. “Not one bit. We’re all carrying so much. And grief... grief makes monsters out of moments. It twists things until we forget where they really began.”

His eyes shine then; wet and wide. He opens his mouth to say something, but instead he leans in. Slowly, hesitantly, as though giving you a chance to stop him. You don’t. You meet him halfway. His lips brush yours with the gentleness of someone who knows how much you’ve lost, how much you’ve suffered. The kiss is slow, tender, and reverent. Like a vow whispered against a storm. His hand cradles the side of your face, thumb grazing your cheek, grounding you in the warmth of something fragile and real. When he pulls back, you both stay close. Foreheads touching. Eyes closed. For a moment, you just breathe. Then, he speaks. “Take a bath with me?”

The words are so simple, yet intimate in a way that leaves you breathless. Not lustful; this isn’t about escape or distraction. It’s about presence. About being in a space where nothing else exists. You nod, and he stands, offering you his hand. The bathroom is dim, lit only by the soft orange glow of a nightlight and a flickering candle someone must’ve left on the windowsill. The tub fills slowly, steam curling toward the ceiling like the last sigh of a day. You both undress silently, not shy, not rushed. You slip into the warm water, and he follows after, settling in behind you. His legs bracket yours. His arms wrap around your middle. The water laps at your collarbones like a gentle lullaby.

You tilt your head back to rest against his shoulder. He exhales into your hair. “I’ve been angry,” he says finally. “So angry. About everything. About my dad. About Han. About the fact that I’m still here when they’re not. That I keep waking up and they don’t.”

You nod slowly, fingers tracing patterns in the surface of the water. “I feel that too,” you say. “Like life just… kicked me. Over and over. Until I couldn’t stand anymore. Until I didn’t know if I wanted to. I keep wondering if this is the part where I break forever.” Heeseung’s grip around you tightens, just slightly. “You won’t.”

“I don’t know how to start over,” you admit. “Everything hurts all the time. Even the good things hurt.”

He kisses your temple. Not as a promise. Not as a cure. Just as a quiet I know. And maybe that’s enough. Because you’re not pretending it’s all better. You’re not trying to erase the pain. You’re sitting in it together. Letting it be real. Letting it matter. And in that space; where the warmth of the water holds you both like a womb, like a prayer, you begin to believe that maybe you can heal. That maybe ruin doesn’t mean the end. Maybe it’s the beginning of something else.

You don’t know where life will take you from here. You don’t know what redemption will look like, or if you’ll ever forgive yourself for what happened. But right now, wrapped in Heeseung’s arms, you believe in the small, aching miracle of this moment. Of choosing to stay. Of choosing to feel. Of choosing each other. You were ready to fall into the ruin. But not let it ruin you.

Epilogue 1 year later

The sky was soft that day, bruised with a gentle gray, the kind that made the world feel quiet; like the earth itself was holding its breath. You sat cross-legged on the dewy grass, fingers tracing the edges of Nari’s name etched into cold stone. A year had passed. A year of aching, unraveling, rebuilding. And now here you were, knees pressed into the earth, a heartbeat steadier than it used to be.

"You would love Heeseung, Nari, you really would.” Your voice came out tender, barely above a whisper. “He makes me laugh. He never lets me lie to myself. He doesn’t try to fix me, just holds me when it hurts too much.” You reached down and brushed away a few stray leaves that had gathered at the base of the headstone. “I wish you could’ve seen me now. I wish I could’ve said goodbye the right way.”

There were still tears sometimes. And nightmares. And those mornings where the weight of memory made it hard to breathe. But there was also sunlight. And laughter. And Heeseung’s steady presence like a compass in your shaking hands. Therapy had taught you to hold space for both joy and sorrow. Grief group gave you words for the things you once buried. But it was Heeseung who reminded you, every day, that you were allowed to keep living; that you didn’t have to stay in the ruins to prove your love for the ones you lost.

“Babe! I got the flowers!” a voice called out behind you, pulling you gently from the past. You turned to see Heeseung jogging toward you, a bouquet of soft blue hydrangeas cradled in his arms, cheeks pink from the wind. He still carried that quiet sadness in his eyes, the one only you really saw, but it was softer now; tempered by time and the work he’d done to understand it. He bent down beside you and laid the flowers in front of Nari’s grave, brushing your knee with his hand as he settled beside you.

“Did you talk to Han?” you asked, voice gentle.

He nodded, smiling faintly. “Yeah. It was good. I needed that.”

You turned back toward the grave, reaching for his hand. “I did too.”

The two of you sat there for a long moment, silence curling comfortably between your bodies. The cemetery was quiet, wind rustling through the trees, birds flitting through the distant branches. Around you, the world kept moving; cars humming down the road, life unfolding in soft, ordinary ways. But here, in this pocket of stillness, you felt grounded. Rooted. Whole.

Grief never left, it wasn’t something that vanished with time or faded into nothing. It changed shapes. Grew quieter. Some days, it bloomed like a bruise. Other days, it shimmered like memory. But always, it walked beside you, not as a shadow, but as a reminder. Of love. Of loss. Of the choice to keep going. You looked down at the stone again, your thumb tracing the curve of her name.

“I’ll keep living for both of us, Nari,” you whispered. “I promise.” And this time, when you stood, you didn’t feel like you were leaving her behind. You felt like she was walking with you.

(♬) - @beomiracles @biteyoubiteme @hyukascampfire @dawngyu @izzyy-stuff @1-800-jewon @xylatox

#enhypen imagines #enhypen smut #enhypen #enha imagines #lee heeseung #lee heesung smut #lee heeseung imagines #heeseung smut #heeseung imagines #heeseung x reader

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slowdivinqs · 2 months ago

Text

Presentiment

Stalker! Joel Miller x f!reader ( 18+ MDNI )

summary : no one is truly alone in the world, especially not you.

w/c : 12K

warnings : no use of y/n, horror themes and elements DDDNE, stalker behavior, feelings of isolation and depression, existential crisis? Kidnapping, cynical thoughts about life described, abuse, violence against the reader by Joel, old!Joel. slowburn-ish. dub-con?. unprotected PinV. Oral f!receiving. Manhandling. Hunter / prey kink. Twisted daddy kink but no use of the word 'daddy'. Joel popping a viagra. VERY Large age gap ( 35+ years ) . Manipulation. Obsession. Reader’s mother is described as a drug addict. Shitty men, harassment and pervertedness from a co-worker. Murder / death of side characters. Stockholm syndrome. Reader is toxic too. Religious imagery. Can be pixel or pedro Joel. The reader is implied as being thinner due to life long poverty, but her body type is not described or stated.

a/n : This was made for @pedgito's writing challenge and kind of ran away from me. It was such a blast, I've never tried horror or a specifically dark fic and it was sm fun! I’m sure the characters I wrote will stick with me forever. I sat with this fic for a long time before posting, and it's the longest thing I've ever written!! Not sure how I feel about it still. Thank you for letting me participate! Happy birthday ♡

if you don’t like dark themes, listen to the warnings and don’t read the fic.

masterlist

—— ☓ ——

Something feels wrong before your eyes have had the chance to open – a kind of warning, an omen, baked into the morning light stabbing your iris through moth-eaten curtains.

It was the way your body ached as you tried to sit up, stomach screaming for food you just don’t have. Your mother hasn’t been home for a week and you know she’s either run off with some incest-bred asshole who’s promised her a beer or she’s passed out in a crack-house miles away.

Your shift at the diner starts in thirty minutes.

The men that pass through this town are all the same.

Truck drivers – men who think all women in the world are there to satisfy their needs. Iagos of the world, the dark underbelly.

The men that stay in this town are not dissimilar, your days a monotonous blur of wondering when something better will drop into your desperate palms.

There is one man who feels like your only friend in the world.

Standing at a whopping five foot seven, and still kicking up the diner’s jukebox at eighty three, he makes sun shine out from your soul. You can confidently say that Jerry is the best.

He usually sits with you the entire day at work, and makes sure to fill your empty time by teaching you to dance to El Toro Rabón, and La Bamba. His rich hands, littered with wrinkles yet full of life, hold yours while he makes you laugh. Clapping as you finish off with an animated twirl and curtsy.

Jason usually eyes you from the kitchen, rolling his sleazy eyes at the sight of you having so much fun with your elderly best friend. Going back to making greasy burgers and puffing on a cigarette that’s gotten him in trouble with the owner before.

You never agreed with the sentiment that old people were cute until you met Jerry and his late wife during your first shift at the diner : fourteen years old and composed of an exhaustion that was ill fitting for someone so young. He’d been your first ever customer, seventy seven and still wearing that cowboy hat of his.

The first thing you noticed about him was his mustache, the way he uses wax to curve up the tight white curls into points, how it covered his top lip when he spoke, making him look like a cartoon character – his oak brown eyes that has gotten increasingly red and yellow around the corners as he’s gotten older. The way his warm skin has developed patches of darkness, yet he still looks the exact same as the photo of him he showed you from thirty years ago : fresh off his racing horse in Mexico, holding the same cowboy hat over his chest that he adorns now, smiling brightly. He kept his hair looser back then, his ringlets looked shiny even in those black and white photographs.

He calls you bumblebee, and you think he’s the first person that’s ever loved you – and he’s the first person you’ve ever loved. He’s your sunshine, a tether to the world past your 18 hour work day.

Every morning he’s seated in the diner at 8:30 AM with a joke to tell you, stories of his racing days, growing up in Cuajinicuilapa, his time travelling around South America before settling down in this small town near Wyoming. He tells you of his late brother, his views of the world and the people he’s met. He talks of humanity and how love is what is most important in life.

You feed off of the stories he tells you : meeting people from all walks of life under the pretense of coffee, sitting around the same food stand, chatting to strangers who would play guitar on the side of the street for no other purpose than passion.

You feel the desire for this ideal world thrum in your veins vicariously.

He used to come in with his wife Dolores until she passed two springs ago – he talks of her jewelry often, thinks that you should inherit it : they were never able to have children. You serve his coffee fresh and hot – asking Jason in the back to make his eggs perfect and his toast golden brown. You sit across from him at the counter to play bullshit with him while he eats – he always knows when you’re lying, his cheeky smiles catching you out, and his joy wraps it’s warm arms around you.

Your days are filled with giggles and smiles whenever he comes to see you, and he never leaves without a hug.

Jerry does not like Jason one bit – eyeing the skinny, pale cook through the serving counter, telling you that a man like that is ‘no good, honey’. You don’t blame him – Jason had tried to coerce you into giving him a blowjob a few weeks before your 18th birthday – but never forced you when you had threatened to go to the sheriff and have them run a much needed background check. Jason has steered clear of you since then, knowing you weren’t shooting empty threats. You never told Jerry about that, but you think he knows regardless.

He jokes that the forest behind your house has eyes – the kind only the old and the dying could feel. You never found it funny.

Your clothes were not too crinkled this morning when you pulled them on : giving you a small mercy as did your almost-dry mascara surviving one more day. That hadn’t quelled the uneasiness you’d felt all morning, the whole drive to the diner. All you could think about was seeing your friend, and hoping that he would give you a hug and tell you all those happy stories again.

The second you clock in, and Jason comes back in from his third smoke of the hour, Jerry opens the door to the diner.

You float over to the counter with a genuine smile, but it flickers when you see the look on his face.

He talks a lot that day – about his wife, about his old job, even the time a fight broke out in his hometown and his father died, how the horses he looked after got caught in the crossfire : admitting he had hurt the perpetrator afterwards and it haunts him. He tells you everything, even the things he’s told you time and time before – forgetting he ever mentioned it. He’s never forgotten a thing about you, but he talks as though he’s in a hurry, as though he needs to get everything out.

He does not come in the next day or the day after that, and when he doesn’t arrive on the third day you take time off to confirm your fears at the hospital. You do not hear it from a nurse, or a doctor, but from the silence you are met with when you ask for him. That silence, the loneliness that instantly sunk into your bones, shattered your heart into millions of pieces. It is destroying.

You did not come to see him when you could, there was still time to be had, stories to be told. He never saw you make something of yourself, he will never walk you down the aisle like you dreamt he would one day.

You are all alone in the world. No one to speak to, no one to comfort you. No one to make you think life might not be as meaningless as the whispers of your mind seem to believe. The warmth of him is gone, and you feel as cold and grey as the forest that surrounds this town, as if the sun has gone into eternal hibernation.

You want to bury yourself in your room for hours, to not surface for months and months until your body reflects the rot you feel on the inside. Hollow. Your sunshine is gone.

You tell yourself Jerry is now with Dolores, and laugh at the fact that your mind even supplied such a deluded thought. You never believed there was something better up there, not for long anyway.

You still go to his new tombstone, next to his wife’s, and speak to them. They were both religious, crosses carved into the place their names will stay forever, and so you ask any god out there to let them rest peacefully as though they are back in their hometown with their horses and not worry about you.

That evening you sit on your porch, chain-smoking the packs of cigarettes you had been saving, staring at the stars caged by thick trees. You realize you do not have a purpose. You don’t have a want – can’t have one, there’s not enough money for the luxury of wanting something. You’ll live and die in an 18 hour work day.

Your thoughts are scary and boring at the same time, so you begin to look out at the illuminated forest. The sounds of the night – it scares you as well sometimes, an entire empty forest just outside your door, nothing but rotten wood and locks keeping you safe.

Today you found out you will be alone for the rest of your life, but when you sit out on the porch, flicking your third cigarette – you don’t feel entirely alone at all. You feel as though there is something out here with you, your skin rippling with bumps.

You blame it on the Grim Reaper licking at your heart today.

The cabin on the other side of the forest you’re staring at now has been vacant since you were born. Never a light, a sound – it haunts you.

The closest you’ve gotten to it was at the ripe age of 8, venturing through the forest to explore. You had come to the front door until the house moaned at you, and the forest went quiet. You can still vividly picture the glance you got of the cabin while you ran all the way home.

You leave the shadow of the cabin in the dark forest behind, you need to get dressed for your shift. Money waits for no one, not even for the death of your best friend.

Down the empty highway, not a car in sight – the image of your headlines whirring past the thousands of trees burnt into your retinas from seeing it every single night. Your eyes are puffy and raw from crying, a headache pounding behind them.You pass the single off–ramp road you’ve never been stupid enough to take, the one that winds through the forest, all the way to an open clearing, a small path that can barely fit your sputtering car – leading all the way to the back of your rotting house. You used to play in that clearing as a child, pulling out grass and flowers and making huts out of branches until the day the forest went quiet for a second time – and you knew something was out there with you.

You had told your mother after running inside, but she pushed you away from the comfort of her arms and told you it was just jackals – you knew it wasn’t, even then.

It had seemed you knew something was coming your whole life, constantly looking over your shoulder – watching, listening. Sensing all and any kind of movement anytime, wary. You didn’t like the silence, you didn’t like being alone – yet you were singled out, not a soul or sound to comfort you through your isolated existence.

The gas station is empty as it is every night, you use the time to read. To think, to wonder what it’s all for in the end. If you should run away, leave and never come back. Go and find the ocean, let it swallow you whole.

The sliding doors of the entrance ding as they open. Your eyes flick up so quickly it hurts. A man walks in, and your stomach swoops. Everything falls quiet, and you think of the thing that your mother called the jackals, you think of the forest falling silent : baby birds quieting in the face of danger. He disappears behind a shelf, a glimpse of a Carhartt jacket that sparks a warmth : a remembrance of your dear friend who is now gone, the once comforting material on someone foreign, scary.

Your breath shallows. You don’t know why. It’s not just the quiet – it’s the kind of quiet that makes your blood congeal. Like the silence before a scream.

You glance to your side, below the counter, a bat sits for emergencies. You’re not sure why you are panicking the way you are, if it’s the hour, Jerry’s passing, the presentiment you’ve felt all week.

There is something silent, and something wrong.

When you look up, you still don’t see him. The light behind you flickers, and you almost want to cry at the fear that’s bubbling up in your throat, your hair is standing on end. Your ears prick at any sound, a fridge door opening and shutting.

Your body is shutting down on you, your heart crawling up your throat by claws : fighting and fighting for a chance to survive while your body quivers with the force of your instinct to run. Grab the bat, over the counter, out the door to your car.

You blink, realizing you haven’t been seeing a damn thing, and he’s on the other side of the counter. Looking at you with a blank expression.

Your heart fizzles and falls back to its place, your hands are shaking.

“Forgot milk.” His voice is entirely too flat, disarming and discerning.

You glance down at his hands, calloused and holding a single jug of full cream milk. He’s waiting for you to scan it.

“Right, sorry.” You mutter, sliding the milk over the scanner and taking the cash from him before returning the change. He hasn’t looked away from you once, he seems tired and bored : a normal milk run, but you’ve never seen him before. It’s shocking for a town with under five hundred residents.

He nods his thanks and leaves. The sound of his car sputtering away allows you to finally exhale.

You cash out and go home soon after that, shaken, like every ounce of fear you’ve felt in your life crashed through you the second he entered the store. An omen, a warning.

You wake up to a box at your door the next morning. In your sleep-shaken state, you have half the mind to stomp on it, fearful it came from The Man last night. Fortunately, curiosity seemed to be on your side this morning, as upon opening the box you find Denise’s necklaces, bracelets, rings and books. Paintings, antiques, and most importantly - a cowboy hat. Your favorite hat in the entire world. He had left everything of his to you, when he wrote his will you do not know. Maybe Jerry knew what was coming, he always was wise, connected to everything there is in a way you wish you could be.

You cry all morning, through your miserable shift at the diner. You must look like some sort of slug, because Jason asks you if you’re okay, as does the girl from your old english class who came in that morning all the way from New York : in town and visiting her parents. She dyed her hair and found her style. You see the sparkle of the world in her eyes, and your dirty fingers itch to steal it, to run outside with her car keys, assume her role as a real person. You do not feel real at all.

When you return to your rotting home you watch an old western - Jerry’s favorite - while you wear his cowboy hat, toying with the new jewelry that was sent to you when the police must’ve got around to acting out Jerry’s will. You feel loved and, oh, so lonely at the same time. You are a ghost in your own home, and the appearance reflects it. No real girl would live in a house of mold and quiet, where it is abandoned despite having a resident.

—-

The Man returns this evening as well, in the moment you were humming the iconic tune from your new favorite movie. Jerry had good taste. The world goes silent, and he grabs a pack of beers before heading to the till. “Marlboro Reds, please.” He has a Texan accent, and you stare at your hands as you give him what he wants. He leaves after that again, your only customer of the night.

The next night, he takes his time browsing the store. You watch him, watch how he languidly moves, scanning the items like his eyes would not eventually land on you. Approaching the counter with his chosen trifle.

“You don’t get scared workin’ nights?” He asks, and now you know your concerns were not unfounded.

“No.” you lie, meeting his eye for the second time since the first night. He does not have facial expressions, you realize. Blank, revealing nothing. He is a handsome man. An eerie man. He nods, holding eye contact as he grabs the useless item and goes back to his sputtering truck outside. He looked like he wanted to call you a liar.

You do not show up for your shift the night after that. Your gut tells you to stay home, to lock your doors and keep your father’s old pistol near you. To close the blinds – sit and listen to every sound of the night. Check under your bed just in case.

You’re late to the diner the next morning, greeted by Jason’s complaining that he had to serve the first customer’s coffee, asking for you to make it up to him. When you peep through the corridor, your heart drops at the only customer in the restaurant.

The Man has come to the diner. He knows you, he knows where you work – probably where you live.

Maybe he lives here, maybe it’s all some coincidence. Maybe it’s not what you think.

You bring him his eggs and bacon, and when you look up to his face he’s already looking at you. He does not move, does not touch his knife or fork. He’s staring at you.

“Leave me alone.” You say, quiet yet firm, standing over him as he blinks and looks down at his food. Your fear is making you angry, fire spitting in your eyes. He doesn’t answer you, and after two moments of being unable to bear the energy that exudes from him – you walk away, into the back of the kitchen to watch Jason work, peeping through the slits of the serving station to watch The Man eat his food. Your body hair prickles into points.

Jason eyes you, glances at The Man, and raises a faint eyebrow at you.

“That your daddy?” he asks, staring at the popping bacon. You watch the grease heat and solidify, the sweat sticking on Jason’s skinny yet defined triceps, coated with wiry hair that’s never been tended to.

“No.” you whisper, tucking your hands under your legs : they are cold, and your skin is overridden with goosebumps, hair standing. You feel as though you’re about to be swallowed, like large claws will pick you up and drop you into a maw of sharp, hungry teeth.

“Why’s he givin’ me the stink eye, then?” Jason grunts, picking at his gold tooth with a grimy finger as he lazily looks over to your thighs, then your face. Raising an eyebrow at how fearful you look, he glances back at The Man. Something like concern flashes across his face, and he lifts his cap to rub over his short, receding hair. It’s the first time his eyes have ever looked soft.

“Dunno.” is all you manage to mutter as you brace a peek to find The Man has looked away.

He’s slow, takes time to eat every piece of food while staring blankly out the window, like he’s watching the world as though he’s never seen it before, unnatural. You want to tell Jason about your all consuming fear that this man is going to hurt you, but his eyes have changed and he makes another comment about how good you look in the plaid dress that happens to be your uniform. You choose to wait outside of the building instead of enduring the male specimen of your species. It feels like you are alone in a world of monsters.

When you return inside, there’s a fifty dollar tip next to the spotless plate, everything stacked for you to carry.

You don’t return home that night : you ditch your job at the gas station for a second time, leaving your car at the diner to book a room at the shitty motel. It feels as though you died the same day Jerry did, maybe you are dreaming : alone in an empty world, your only companion being the monster. Nothing feels real.

You fall asleep to the sound of ugly moans, watching the handle of your door : your heart beating faster than your body can manage. Rocking yourself back and forth, humming a soft tune your father used to play on the guitar when he was sober enough to think.

You feel as though you are living on borrowed time, as though this opportunity to wait is a mercy.

He is not at the diner the next morning. Neither is Jason, it’s closed up and the lights are shut off – it is Jason’s job to open up and get the stoves burning. You try to call the owner with the small amount of change you have on the payphone, but no one answers. The sound of the dead line ringing in your ears as you look around in a panic.

You suddenly feel as though you’re back in that patch of forest, surrounded by tall trees and a monster waiting to swallow you whole. Watching. A fear so curdling you fear you’ll throw up over the plastic phone.

You’re wide awake standing behind the counter of the gas station. Watching the fluorescent lights flicker. You parked your car out back. You’re holding the bat in your right hand under the counter. You are waiting for him to come in. You should have driven far far away, but you have a sinking feeling he would have followed.

The night is completely quiet. No people, no sounds except for the humming of the fridges.

You glance at the back door, and the moment your eyes turn away from the sliding doors they ding. Your hair rises and stands violently. Skin alight and blazing as the first footstep echos in the store.

You don’t think about it, your body tells you to run and you do.

Out the back, to the edge of the concrete until your feet are pounding along the road, bat gripped tightly in your fist. The sound of your own feet are drowned out by the ones behind you, big and stomping. The trees framing your attempt at an escape as they yawn and stretch above - caging you in, suffocating. They grow tall as you sprint, closing like they will eagerly crash down and trap you like a wave from the ocean you’ve never seen.

You push with all your might, and you thank the lord you took track during school, adrenaline coursing through your veins as you run so fast the sound of feet behind you fade. It feels like victory, like being free – your chest blooms from the burn and the success. You think of the gun in your bedside drawer, and turn down the off-road into the woods you’ve never been brave enough to take before. The only sound is the one of your own feet : you’re not stupid enough to look behind you.

The moon lights up the forest floor, you don’t trip over a single root or branch. You’re moving faster than you ever have in your life : your lungs screaming, fear rising in your lungs like bile. You break into the clearing, the one that has always been haunted by Jackals.

You’re almost home.

A force heavier than you think you’ve ever felt crashes into you from the side, you’re slammed down into the one patch of grass you often picked, the bat flying out of your hands and rolling to the dirt in front of you.

“Knew you’d run here.” A deep, breathless voice says right into your ear, your hair is pulled as a hand clamps down on your struggling wrists, excited. “Always liked playin’ here, didn’t ya?” he grunts, pulling something out of his pocket. You swing your elbow up, knocking him straight in the jaw. He sways for only a moment, but it’s all you need. You dash forward, crawling away from him before you find your feet, grabbing the bat and smashing it down over The Man’s skull. He groans and stumbles, gripping the back of his head as you trip over your own feet to stumble away. You run towards your rotting home, you can’t think about the fact he knew where you played as a child, all you are thinking about is the gun.

You don’t even get to the steps of your back porch before he’s tackling you to the ground again and hitting the side of your face hard enough to make you cry, your head fuzzing. Your face stings and your eye throbs. You want to bring your hands to cup over the hurt, hold yourself in an attempt to make it better, but he is holding your hands. He curses at you, spitting vile words for managing to get solid blows at him.

“Come on, darlin’. You think that little gun ‘s gon’ do anythin’? It don’t even got any bullets.” He grunts, you feel zip ties around your wrists, your mind racing as you continue to struggle and kick until his hand is around your throat faster than you can think. “Don’t make me hit that pretty face again, bitch.”

You go still, and slumped. Trapped in a wolf’s jaws.

His hand squeezes tighter and tighter as you squeak a protest, until you can’t think anymore and the last of your squirming falls away.

The first thing you smell when you wake up is smoke, the kind that comes from a fireplace. The first thing you see is rich, dark wood. You’re on a bed and you glance up to see you’re handcuffed there. Your skin isn’t just throbbing – it's raw, the skin bitten where the metal has scraped against you. Your head pounds like it’s been split open, the ache thick and blinding.

You can feel he is somewhere within the room, the twist of your stomach and the lingering presence on the back of your head tells you he is there. A creak of a chair behind you finalizes his presence but you can’t be bothered to do anything besides slump back against the mattress, curling up into a tiny ball.

He says your name to get your attention, and you don’t attempt to look at him, your skin is already crawling with what you think he wants to do to you. Future years of using and hitting flash through your mind, wishing for the mercy of death.

He walked next to the bed too fast, too silent. A wall of muscle and heat as large as him should not be so quiet. He is touching your hair, stroking down your cheek. His hand is rough and warm, he smells like a cologne that reminds you of your father. You think you might be sick.

“I was bein’ nice. I waited.” he says softly, pressing down with his pointer finger on the bruise that has molted under your skin, making you wince and shuffle away from him, glancing up at him to find his striking, dark eyes on you. His jaw is bruised where you hit him with your aching elbow, a trickle of dry blood still stuck on a piece of his salt-and-pepper hair. You made a crack in his head – a small trickle of pride filling your veins at the fight.

It is small lived, and dies out at the next throb of your wrists.

He sighs at this reaction, before walking out of this bedroom and shutting the door behind him.

You lie there for what feels like hours, only moving when you notice the water and ibuprofen on the bedside table : still in its packaging. Your whole body aches, the last throttles of your adrenaline were beaten out of you with his hands.

It’s only when you sit up that you notice where you are. The view outside the window is the forest behind the cabin that groaned at you, that haunted you as a child.

He’s lived here the whole time : he’s been here the whole time. The feeling of impending doom that curdles your skin when he’s been near. The jackals you felt as a child, the forest going quiet.

It’s been him. It’s always been him.

Your skin feels as though it will turn inside out, every hair on your body standing to a rigid point. The fear feels as though you’re dying.

You don’t have to look to know he’s silently opened the room again, and you speak.

“You some kind of pedo?” You spit as your head throbs, sitting up on the bed, tugging on the cuffs, rage curdling and bubbling up on your skin – you think of your mother.

He stops moving at your words, “what?”

“You’ve been watching me since I was a child.”

“It wasn’t like that, Jesus.” He grunts, sounding uncomfortable at the idea. You almost want to laugh. In your periphery you see he’s ditched his canvas jacket, wearing a navy flannel that shows you just how large he is - as if you didn’t feel it the night before when he tackled into you so violently, stealing every inch of breath in your lungs.

“Oh, well sorry for assuming some old, sick pig stalking a young girl since she was a child isn’t a fucking pedophile.”

He smacks you over the throbbing patch of your skin, and you finally glare up at him with every bit of ire in your body. It was not any kind of hit, it was the kind that made you feel like dead weight, that knocks all the air out of your body as if you are a puppet with it’s strings cut.

He’s staring down at you.

“I’m not – christ, it ain’t like that.”

“So you’re just going to kidnap and keep me? You’re not going to – to do anything, is that right?” You scoff the words out, holding your hand to your cheek. The ache under your skin feels like it could stay there forever.

“I don’t want to do anything to you.” He seems to notice the irony of his words when you let your palm drop, face swollen. “I didn’t want to have to hurt you.”

You look out the window and go silent.

“You didn’t have to hurt me, this was your choice.” You spit, and he looks almost surprised by your words. There’s goosebumps that break out over his skin, and the energy in the room constricts as he backs away from you.

He glances out the same window before handing you a warm bowl of stew, pieces of meat and potato bobbing up from the thick, stock smelling liquid. You stare down at it, and then glare back up at him.

“Is it poisoned?” You’re not serious, you’re angry.

“If I wanted to kill you I would have done it earlier.” He says it as though it’s as casual as the weather, as though killing something – a person – is as boring as can be. Idle reassurance.

“You seem to like the waiting game.” You huff, staring at his large, twitching hands. His watch is broken.

He looks like he wants to smile at your quip, eyes crinkling in the corners.

“Eat.” He tells you, closing the bedroom door softly as he leaves you be.

—

You have been here for two weeks, only knowing this due to the little alarm clock next to the bed that he brought you from your house.

True to his word, he hasn’t touched you – in fact, he’s been taking care of you in ways you have never been before. It’s intimate, and a sick hunger has begun to heat low in your belly alongside the fear.

You feel as though you’ve been living in a small bubble where time never passes. He watches you at all hours of the day, asking you questions about the men you’ve worked with, if there’s anything from your house you want him to fetch. He tries not to hit you when his anger bubbles up at your persistent silence. He asks you questions about yourself, not ones like favorite colors, but if you think all people in the world are unsavable.

He looks like he’s hoping you will tell him he can be saved. You do not.

He makes you eat dinner with him every night, bathes you as well. The first time he tried it, after letting you rot in bed for three days, he had to wrestle you into the bathtub after trying to be nice, held you down while you kicked and splashed and scratched at him until he pressed his fingers over your injured face in an unforgiving manner until your cries went quiet, and you almost fainted from the pain. He made you apologize for making him have to hurt you.

You swallowed the clawing, raging voice at the back of your throat and did it. When he kissed your forehead and told you it’s okay, a warm sickness swirled in your stomach, nauseating and tentatively delicious all at once.

You have not tried to fight him after that night, scared of what would happen if he were to comfort you.

He tucks you into bed most evenings, pressing the blanket to cushion you and arranges the pillows. In the first nights, it had scared you : you hadn’t slept a wink, terrified he would slip into bed and his patience would wear thin. Now, it feels like something nice. He tries to tell you happy stories, he usually fails – but it makes you think of Jerry and you feel better regardless, it makes The Man seem more real, like a human rather than a monster.

He asks you to curl up next to him on the couch so he can read aloud to you, books you’ve heard about in passing but never read : he has a liking for Cormac McCarthy and the Wild West. He bakes cookies for you when you ask him your first question, letting you sit at the table with a glass of milk to enjoy them. You feel warmth radiating from inside of you, spiked with fear – no one has baked cookies for you before. You finish them, and he says he’s proud.

—-

The sinking feeling comes slowly. Seeping into your bones whenever he holds you. It gets worse when you begin to dream of him, a possible reality, one of him holding you and kissing you – telling you you’re lovable, perfect, worthy. Six months have warped your brain, slipping out of your grasp like sand. You wake up to slickness between your legs, a desire to go find him in the kitchen making breakfast and nuzzle under his broad arms, let him squeeze you tight and surround you with his scent. You don’t have to beg him to make you feel loved, he’s always loved you : he’s made that clear.

You had realized long ago that he is too big for you to fight, he is all consuming and overpowering. The sinking feels like acceptance, and you think it’s close to dying.

It’s a sunny day when it all hits you. He’s been out for half an hour – at the grocery store a few towns over – the moment he said goodbye you had felt a twist in your stomach. You didn’t want him to go. He hugged you and told you he would be back soon, kissing your cheek when you got teary, his whiskery beard tickling your soft skin.

You don’t know when the terror began to feel like safety. You only know that when he’s gone, it feels like you’re alone with the jackals instead of how it was when he found you. When he was the monster.

The worst part was you knew why you reacted that way. Sitting in the sunny room, you forced your mind to constantly think of escape routes, of the disgusting actions he had committed, the way he has trapped you in this little house. Your mind adamantly hates The Man, but that large pit, the self that was unloved and uncared for – alone, has already started to need him, to ignore the stupidity in believing he loves you. To latch on like a leech and suck up all of the love and care he has, not caring if it’s real or pure, to see if it’ll make you round and fat with it – satisfied.

The hunger for what he has to offer you makes you feel like you might be the true monster in the house : your desperation for what you have never tasted knows no bounds. You think you’d kill for it. You might have been the jackal the whole time, the hole that lived inside you might have turned you ugly from a young age.

You are scared of your own desperation.

He bathes you every night – ritualistic and precise. Guides you under the water until you reappear, clean and new to a kiss on your cheek, hands scrubbing you clean. Every time the surface breaks and you come back to him, the forest grows denser : tighter and vast while the home, your home, becomes all the more simple and clear, exactly how it is supposed to be.

You need him, and you think you love him. What that makes you, you’re not sure and you no longer care.

He goes out months later, telling you he needs to get food and soap, baby - he leaves the window open and the door unlocked : he knows you will not leave. He says he’s going to grab soap, but he is carrying a prescription slip with a little baggie, what he’s actually going to get remains a mystery to you.

The nightmare you had in the middle of winter had shifted something deep in your foundations – the fear that licked up your spine at the thought of being alone – the much lesser, flickering fear that your body had instinctually looked for him in his room, the dull scream your mind let out at the way you climbed into his bed, burrowing under his large, comforting arms until your brain went quiet and he pulled you closer. Those dull screams of fear and resistance from a lifetime ago have been washed away from his hands, and now a need so gravitational has birthed in its place. You want him.

Dusk comes softly in the weeks after taking residence in his bed. He still has not touched you, and you are beginning to feel ire towards his morality. A wrongness in the way he tries to be right. The cabin is warm with firelight, the smell of smoke wrapping around you like a blanket, similarly to his flannel that stretches over your skin. He jostles open the door slowly, grocery bags lining his fingers in a way that is dangerously domestic – his hair is tousled. His eyes catch onto the fabric, and he pauses.

“You’re in my shirt.” He states, but you know it’s a question. Your eyes search for the little baggie he had, wondering what he put in there.

You close the book he gave you to read, the cover sliding across your fingertips, “It smells like you.”

Something in his expression shifts. You think it might be guilt. Or pride. Or both, layered on top of each other until they’re indecipherable. He sets the bags down and moves to you, slow and steady – crouching to your level in front of the couch.

“You missed me?” He asked, eyes wild and dilated, hands skirting over your exposed thighs. Up and down.

You look away, unable to meet the gaze that is burning into you, to admit how far you’ve gone to his face. Yet your head nods, eyes flicking to his as your chin wobbles, bottom lip jutting out before tightening in a grimace. He wipes a tear from your eye.

“’s okay to miss me, I’m the only one who’s here f’you, darlin’.” He cups your cheek, rubbing the skin there. You meet his eyes this time, close them before you’re leaning in, resting your head on his shoulder as he sits next to you, guiding you onto his lap and telling you it's okay, and it’s natural, baby and finally I love you, don’t cry sweet girl.

You’re tired of the tears, of the fight. Tired of the empty woods and the silence – the loneliness that lives in your bones. You’re tired of running from the thing that makes you feel whole and real.

You wonder if Jerry ever saw this coming, and if he did – why didn’t he ever warn you something so soul destroying would be waiting to swallow you? Why didn’t he tell you the most human monster in the world would be the only one to see you without the shiny idealism behind cataracts? You feel guilty for admitting that The Man knows you better than Jerry ever did. The Man knows you are not made of sunshine and flowers, he sees the hole carved in your stomach that makes you so achingly hungry, and shows his own back.

—

You noticed the loose floorboard on the second day, and now you pry it open. While you care for The Man, you are acting on instinct.

He had shouted at you this morning while you were still curled in his arms, gotten rotten and angry, called you a stupid bitch when you had asked him to come with him to the store, wanting to see the world again.

You were hopeful he would trust you, that he would prove you are, in fact, not living in a cage.

He had stormed off, and for the first time in eight months he had locked the door on his way out, shoving a small plastic bag in his pocket.

Spiders crawl out from the floorboard, and you jump back, standing on the couch while you throw The Man’s shoes at them, you wish he was here so he could take care of it, could laugh softly at your fear and hold you in his arms – away from the floor – to protect you.

You remind yourself you do not know his name and that you’re trapped here, a jarring reminder of the way you have settled.

You need something to prove he was a real, living man before his life revolved around you. You need to rebel against him, like a petulant, scared child because of his rudeness this morning.

Once you feel safe enough, you roll up the sleeve of the lacy undershirt he gave you and stick your hand inside. Searching for some sort of ocular truth amongst the bones of his own rotted cabin.

A pair of old boots with a ‘J’ engraved in the sole is the first thing you pull out. An army knife next, then a bunch of guns and weapons.

No matter how strange it is to find guns and knives buried in someone’s house, for The Man it’s quite boring.

You pull out a shoe box next, placing it next to you on the floor before blowing the dust off of the top. It doesn’t help much. From the amount of grime, it looks as though you are the first person to touch this box in years.

The lid sticks to the rest of the compartment from cobwebs, but you discard the thing anyway, desperate and careless.

A photo is the first thing you find, old and yellowed.

A little girl.

At first you are fearful she is a victim, until you see the photo of The Man - much younger - holding her in the hospital. Your stomach curdles, and it feels like rotting, eating itself from the inside.

A daughter.

Your heart swoops low, pensive. You think of the room he keeps locked, the warm light that streams under the gap of the door - reflecting something pink inside. The way you would watch the beams dance on the floor like a whole soul was trapped inside there, wilting as the sun set.

Her birth certificate is the second thing you find.

Sarah Miller : 1983 / 03 / 18

City of origin : Arlington, Texas.

Father : Joel Miller

A name, a life, a whole world buried in the foundations.

You gawk at the fact that The Man – Joel – is 60 years old.

Her missing poster is what you find next. Bile rises like acid on your tongue, a smiling, happy girl plastered with information about her last whereabouts, the pink shirt she was wearing and how tall she had gotten. She went missing on your third birthday. Your head swims. You drop the documents back into their casket with trembling hands and weak knees.

Stupid, stupid girl – why did you have to look?

The last thing you find is a golden tooth, familiar in its grime and dullness. You can imagine a sleazy tongue gliding over it in irritation. Jason’s golden tooth. You drop it immediately and slam the loose floorboard shut, burying what was meant to stay that way once more.

The room looks as though nothing has changed, yet everything inside of yourself is different. A storm of fog and clarity, adrenaline pumping for running and the desire to stay still.

You throw up outside the living room window.

Everything feels like a blur after that, grabbing your boots he stuffed away - a coat and a knife from his kitchen.

Run, just run. Don’t look back. Get away, fast fast fast.

You climb out of the bedroom window and run all the way to where you left your car the night he caught you, cold wind whipping past your face and sending a burn through your nose. Your feet pound along the ground like the whole world is weighing you down, like every stone is hoping to trip you and let you fall, to cut your knees open and stop you.

You eventually arrive at the gas station.

You're stunned that the place is closed and rotted, not a single soul in sight.

Your lungs are burning, you feel woozy, and you let out a pathetic cry when you see he has slashed your tires.

Stopping at the rough concrete of the shop, you attempt to open the back door, only to spot a poster plastered on the side of the wall.

A missing poster. Your missing poster, with not a single person in the world to care for its presence besides a man who you ran away from, who would tear it down and remove you from an existence that is not with him, that would try to come find you to bring you back.

You decide to keep running in the opposite direction of his home. A large part of you is screaming at you to run to the Sheriff’s office and tell them what happened, that Joel will find you if you try anything else, but a shamefully large part - a sick part of you does not want to run away from him. He has cared for you - he has watched you all your life, and you know – regardless of purity or morality – he loves you. All that is left for you without him is a town that would freeze in time if you were to vanish, fake in its existence, a facade for the life you were always meant to live.

To your horror, the twist in your chest tells you that you love him too, it’s a surety now.

You think of the soft kisses he pressed to your hair, the way you got used to him telling you of things he liked about you, that he only would have known from watching. The way he told you he too liked Jerry, and liked the movie you watched after his passing. He let you watch it every night for a month, and began to quote the lines with you in an exaggerated version of his accent to make you giggle.

He saw you, he has always seen you. He loves you and wants you and needs you enough to take you for himself.

You have stopped running, standing still for a moment before slowly turning around, feet shaking in your soul’s indecision. Torn and trembling. The forest is completely silent, yet this time you feel all too real – too alive.

Your mind is not what it used to be. The shake of your hands comes from the part of you that is pleading for you to run, to see the clear manipulation : the rose coloured glasses that have been forced over your eyes. The other part – the part that you are starting to believe is the truth of who you are – wants to run back to the cabin before he sees you ever left, to cup his devastatingly handsome face and let him take what has always been his, to be made a real person.

It is consuming, this primal want.

A twig snaps.

You don’t need to turn around to know he his standing close behind you.

You clench your fists and turn around, fear curdling and boiling in your belly, making your knees weak and shaky.

The look on his face clears your rational thought once again, and you quickly attempt to scramble away from the monster. He looks absolutely, impossibly, livid.

You do not know why you ever thought you could run, why you thought he would not find you, that he would let you go.

You burst into tears the second he has you against the forest floor once more. The ground ripping the skin from your cheek as you fall, crushed under him once again – worse this time : you knew better.

“Why’d you do it, angel?” He says softly, entirely contrasting from the way his arm is curled around your head, large biceps restricting your breath.

“I-I was scared.” You cry, trying to stop the hiccuping of your lungs to keep the breath you have.

“I know baby, I know.” He soothes, deep voice right next to your ear, his mostly salt and slightly pepper beard tickling the skin. “You made me so scared, sweet girl. Thought you cared ‘bout me.” he whispers. You do not know if the tightening of his arms was intentional, or if he is so upset at the idea you could hate him that he is consumed with it.

“I’m s-sorry,” You gasp, clawing at his arm, “I do care, ‘s why I–”

He raises his hand quickly, yet it hangs in the air for a moment. Hesitation, guilt – trembling like he’s stuck. You see something raw flicker in his eyes before it’s gone and he’s striking the ground next to your face, barely missing you – a last second decision.

“Don’t fuckin’ lie to me.” Desperate, angry, scared.

You need to placate him before he does something stupid.

“I turned back– I was going to go back home I promise, please.” you cry, looking into his eyes. You loathe the fact that your words aren’t lies, that the care he sees reflected in them is real. You want him, you need him.

He watches you silently, frowning. Waiting to see what you have to say to him.

“I snooped, I’m sorry. I was angry about this morning and I saw– I saw Jason’s tooth and–”

The sound that leaves him is punched from deep within his chest.

He is silent for a long time. Pulling away from you.

You do not breathe, scared – the back of your neck is bared to him. Your life depends on his reaction.

“You saw my girl.”

You tremble in his slackening grasp. He seems to be staggering for a moment, unprepared and assaulted by the memories you have brought back. His hands grip tighter and tighter.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to – I didn’t know.” you whisper, tears streaming out of your eyes as you look up at the setting sun, these must be your last moments. Your body trembles and your hiccuping noises are ugly. You wish you could take this all back to before.

“You ain’t supposed t’see what’s down there.” he’s lifting his hands off of you, and you think the scariest thing about this moment is how human he finally seems. Like you are the one seeing him after all this time. You stay down, turning to look into his eyes – all you can see is grief. “You know what it’s like to be lonely, that’s why you were brought to me, baby.” His hands wrap around your neck again, and you shriek a small protest, scrambling. Your nails crack and bleed as they attempt to rip yourself away from him by holding onto the ground and pulling.

You feel drops against the back of your neck, and fear lurches in your stomach at the fact that he’s crying. “She would have hated me, she was so good.” His hands are constricting, crushing. You choke and gasp for breath. “But I ain’t got her anymore. I got you. And God help me, I need you, sweet girl.”

“I’m sorry.” you whisper again, looking into his sad eyes with your teary ones.

“I know.” He says softly, and you whimper as his hand comes to your face. He rubs the skin for a few moments, letting himself breathe and feel you. It feels like an eternity, lying under him, trapped.

“I’m goin’ to give you a choice, sweet girl. I ain’t given you one before.” His voice builds up as he says it, like the memory of his daughter drives him to formulate a plan – a way to somehow fix everything he’d done. Your heart stops as he slides off of you, picking you up with him and holding you, the tips of your boots brushing the ground. He stares at you seriously, and he looks so different from the monster, like he’s trying his best to do the right thing after all this time, pretending it’ll take everything back.

“I’m goin’ to let you run, sweet girl. You can choose to go to the sheriff– or, or steal my truck, do what you want.” He swallows thickly, eyes wild. “I’ll let you go, I should let you go.” He whispers almost to himself. “But if you choose t’go back home…I won’t let you leave me again, baby.” He smooths his hand over your hair after setting you down. “You’ll be mine, honey. And I’ll be yours, we can be fair and make this right. I’ll take you, and I’ll tell you everythin’.”

You thought your heart was going to rip out of your chest. Everything is primal, it’s all desperate and ugly and raw. He lets go of you, taking a few difficult, staggered, paces back. His fists are clenched tightly at his sides.

“Go,” he nods slowly, like he’s trying to assure himself this is the right thing to do. “If you run now, I won’t stop you, I swear.” his voice breaks like he’s not sure of it himself — scared of what he’s capable of yet consumed with need. His eyes are soft and round, vulnerable in a way you’ve never seen. You are scared, but more importantly you are tired.

For the first time someone has loved every rotten bit of you – so desperately they leave morality behind. How could you run away from this?

You hesitate, stagnant and unsure. Your heart and your brain have gotten so tired from fighting it feels they have turned off all together, what happens now is primal – instinctual, you feel out of your own body, vaguely aware of the blood pulsing through you.

You turn around and run swiftly down the road, scrambling over a few loose stones. You glance back at him once, surrounded by the trees, watching you like a dead man watches water. Your heart lurches. He looks heart broken, shattered and as alone as you’ve always felt, like this is the last time he’ll ever see you.

Silly old man, you think.

You were always going to run back to his cabin.

You’ve got no need to disappear into nothing for the sake of rightness when everything you’ve ever wanted lives in the warm, wooden walls of his — your — home.

He underestimated just how hungry, how broken and corrupt you are.

You know now that you love him, and you know that you have always been just as much of a monster as he is. Rotten and broken and impure, tainted and shattered.

You have always been his match.

Your boots carry you home like you weigh nothing, light as air as ribbons of your past fears and wishes string and rip behind you. A flurry of ideas and thoughts until there is nothing except for yourself standing in that same flowery spot with plucked grass and no-more- monsters.

You bask in the silence of the forest. You have since lost track of the hurt, the burn of fear rising in your throat. You think of gold teeth and little girls and bright, wrinkled eyes surrounded by rich, dark skin – before your thoughts fall silent too.

You are under water. By the time you see his cabin : dim with no lights on as it always was until he found you – your mind is somewhere else, hollow and empty and replaced with something molten in your stomach. An ache, gnawing away at your belly.

You don’t knock, you let the stairs creak as you silently open the door.

He had not followed you, true to his word. The house is just as you’d left it.

You feel settled, clam and composed as you slowly begin to strip. Boots at the door, jacket in the living room. A trail made from your scarf leading to shorts and small socks. At the side of Joel’s bed, a lacy undershirt and bra.

You have already started to drift off by the time the cabin door opens. Two shuffles of feet before they stop short.

He takes time to make a fire, the sound of crackling wood creating a comforting blanket to your sleepy state, in and out of the haze, yet aware.

You are silent and waiting, your breath fanning softly as your eyes struggle to stay open. Somewhere deep, your heart throbs – the last fizzling jump of fear before it dies and fades away for good. You hear the opening of a small, plastic bag somewhere in the kitchen, little taps of what sounds like a pill falling against the counter top– a gulp of water a few seconds later.

The mattress dips as he climbs into bed behind you.

His callouses catch on your skin roughly as he traces the side of your face, bare chest pressing against your lower back while he buries his face between your shoulder blades.

You let your eyes flutter shut as he places open-mouthed kisses up your spine, wet and shaky. His hands grip your hips like you’ll turn to smoke if he doesn’t hold on. His beard tickles your shoulder as he continues, cradling you against him as if he is trying to stitch himself back together again, to become real and whole.

You let him.

He is shaking when you turn to face him. Neither of you speak, words unnecessary in the softness and stillness of the night : no need for words when there are only two people in the world who are so entwined already.

His palm cups your face, turning you to look at him, thumb stroking over the corner of your mouth like a prayer. You whisper his name to him for the first time, a shaky breath escapes him as he whispers yours back. A small ruffle of the familiar duvet as you turn to face him, his warm palm cups over your tit – your pounding heart – as you turn to face him. Eyes shining as they meet yours. He looks so human.

He presses his nose against your own before his chapped lips finally meet yours in hesitation, like he’s trying to confirm that you’re really here next to him, that he hasn’t lost the only thing he has.

It’s soft for only a moment before you both let the hunger take over – hot and wet, lips moving faster and faster as his tongue swipes across the seam of your lips. They part without hesitation, taking the warm wetness of it inside your mouth and sucking gently, rolling over the other’s until your tastes are the same.

You gasp as his hands – rough and trembling – slide down your body, tracing every feature he studied from afar that is now finally his to touch. His mouth nudges along your jaw, nipping at the skin before he’s burying his face in your neck and inhaling.

When you whisper his name softly, he shudders like you’re the first person to ever truly call for him.

Your hand glides down to his stomach, running through the silvery hair that coats it desperately, trying to ground yourself to him. To pull him impossibly closer like you want to merge your bodies into one, consuming.

His hands are everywhere as he groans into your mouth, surrounding you completely. One grips your hair, pulling back gently to bare your throat to him as the other runs down your breasts, pulling and squeezing your nipples into tight points, breath panting from the intensity. He paints your neck with bites, blooms where he’s sucked and tugged on your skin until his mark has been made – groaning as he licks over the skin, like he’s trying to infuse you into his bones. Your skin tastes like his surrender, like the salt of his prayers. It’s not forgiveness he asks for – but belonging, trying to carve a place for himself in the crook of your neck.

Your fingers slip under the band of his boxers, searching for that rigid warmth that’ll complete you, retreating slightly on a shaky gasp as his hot, wet mouth envelopes your nipple, pulling and licking.

He’s on top of you within seconds, hands splaying across your shoulder blades as he shows equal treatment to each breast, arching you against him. His heavy sighs travel across your skin as he exhales. Groin slotted against the warmth of yours, he lets your hands tangle in his hair as he moves Southwards, kissing as he goes.

You whine a protest, whimpering for him to join the two of you together, and he answers your previous curiosities in a deep rumble, “Gotta give it time to work, sweet girl. I ain’t young no more.”

You let your head fall back against the pillows, a spark of electricity running through you at the reminder of his age, wetness seeping out into the gusset of your panties as you try to close your legs – an attempt at alleviating some of the heat that’s been building there.

He grunts at this, large hands gripping your soft thighs as he plants them wide and flat against the mattress, “Easy, darlin’ – gon’ take care of you now.” He rumbles against your lower stomach, right over your womb as he reaches up to pinch your tit, prompting you to look down at him between your thighs. Those eyes you once used to fear with such intensity now only make more slickness spill into the cotton that conceals you.

“Want you t’look at me while I taste this pretty little cunt for the first time.” He whispers on a kiss against your mound, dragging your panties down by latching his teeth onto the little bow adorning the front and pulling. You moan softly at the sight, hands fisting the sheets next to your head as his broad, muscular shoulders keep your legs spread wide, baring your warm pussy for his taking.

His eyes meet yours as his breath falters at the first glide of his tongue through your cunt, breaking off into a deep groan as he tastes you. A small cry of his name leaves your lips at the new sensation, hands immediately going to tangle in his soft hair. His tongue is ravenous, licking up every ounce of arousal as his eyes stay on yours, only dropping down when your head falls back once more.

He sucks your clit into his mouth, beard tickling and stimulating you – sending head through your bones. His lips tug on your bundle of nerves, pulling so deliciously your hips cant up onto his face, letting your wetness coat his beard until it’s soaked.

He lets go of your throbbing bud with a pop, licking his lips as he lets his mouth glide lower.

“Taste so fuckin’ perfect, my angel.” He groans as his tongue digs over your hole, an obscene sound of him slurping up all you’ve given him echoes through the humid room, and your moan of approval follows soon after. His nose digs into your clit as he pushes his tongue inside you, letting it glide into your gummy walls as you clench around him. His moans of approval course through you, heat rising blindly through your bones as you cry out for him, hips bucking as he presses against your lower stomach with a large palm. The rough material of his watch-strap scratching your tummy as his brows furrow, focused on eating you alive. The smacking sounds of his lips against your wetness make your eyes roll as he digs his tongue inside. His hand moves lower, skirting against your entrance before he’s pulling his tongue out with a slick pop, replacing it with his fingers as he sucks on your clit once more.

“Joel I-I’m gonna…” You trail off into a high pitched gasp, body trying to twist away from him as his thick fingers curl, pads of them bruising a spot inside of you that makes wetness gush out onto his wrist.

“Cum f’me, sweet girl, look at me.” He grunts, waiting until your eyes meet his to suck on your clit harshly, tongue running against the underside as he spreads and lifts his fingers to press against your gummy walls.

Your first orgasm crashes into you when you realize he’s humping the bed, his hot tongue desperately lapping up the slick that gushes from your spasming hole. He moans at the taste, making sure to drink it all down before he’s pushing up the bed – capturing your mouth in a wanting kiss as his thick hardness leaks against your leg.

His pill must’ve worked.

“Joel.” You whisper against his lips, nails dragging down the muscles in his back as you try to paw his underwear off with your foot, cunt clenching around nothing, desperate to grip and coat his cock in your slickness.

He offers his body to you in a way that feels holy, the glide of him through your messy folds makes a sound so perfect leave his mouth you feel as though you’ve gone to heaven.

“I’ve got you.” He whispers against your lips, the hand that is not cupping your face is notching his fat, drooling tip at your entrance. “I’ve got you, baby.”

The first time he pushes into you, it’s gentle. A broken sound rips from him like he can’t bear it, face strained as he takes his bottom lip between his teeth, watching his cock sink into you at a sinfully slow speed. Only when your nails sink into the skin of his back does he look into your eyes, seeing his own want, need, obsession painted in your irises.

He rocks into you like he’s trying to carve a home for himself inside your body, bringing your hand up to cup at his face while you lose yourself to the delicious stretch of him – cunt gripping him so tightly he can barely leave. You were always meant to be wrecked by hand like his – hands that tremble, hands that destroy, hands that worship.

His moans fan across your lips, shaky as they exit. He’s slow, letting you feel every inch of him, every vein, as he glides into your soaking cunt. His eyes have rolled, but you lean up to bite your own mark into his neck, pussy clenching as he moans raw and deep at the bright red mark you suck into his skin.

He watches you now, staring into your eyes. You want him to see the hungry, ugly, ruined thing he’s made. You want him to love it.

And when he leans down to kiss you like this night has changed him forever, you know he loves you. He is searching for his salvation in your body.

You anchor yourself to him like the earth is shaking, moaning a soft gasp as his forehead pressed against yours. Reveling in the feeling of his sac slapping against your backside, the sounds of lewd smacks and wetness – his own moans and whispered words of praise floating around you as the sheer size of him swallows you whole. He fucks you like he’s praying at an alter and you devour him whole. In the darkness, there is no difference between love and need, no line between hunger and worship.

Every thrust feels like a prayer, a confession, like he’s spilling the truth of himself into you on every plunge, letting you see every crack of his soul, the ugliness through the pounding of his hips against yours. Rocking together, bound by the loneliness and hunger and something older than love.

You cry under him, silent and open as he digs into you, so big and taking that your body can hardly bear it. He kisses every tear like an apology, licking up the salt as he coos above you, kissing the tip of your nose as he lets the heavy weight of his cock sit and twitch inside you for a moment, pubic hair sticky from your arousal as it grinds against your clit. He buries his face against your neck as he begins thrusting shakily again, and you know he’s crying too.

“I love you.” He whispers against your skin, broken and raw as he shakily moves his hips, eyes flitting to you, hopeful and soul-crushingly vulnerable.

Your breath is shaking, heat coursing through you at the glide of his cock against that place, tailor made for him. Your eyes falter, fluttering as the last of your tears stream down your cheeks, clenching around him so tightly. Every shared breath tastes like forgiveness neither of you have earned.

“I love you too.” You whisper, shattered. Body light as a feather as you let yourself fall.

His breath hitches as he comes inside of you, unprepared for it – hot pulses of his seed spurting quickly, flooding you as he sobs out moans against your skin, gripping your hips so tightly you think you’ll break. You follow immediately, arching into him as his arms wrap around you, pulling you impossibly closer to him as you ride out the waves of your pleasure together, knowing it is so much more than this. You are no longer a scared bunny, alone in the world, and he is no longer a jackal hunting you down — you are only two humans, connected in a way that ascends your lives : cosmic.

It’s not just sex, it’s not just lust – it’s your whole life that has led up to this, to him. Two people who are too broken to live, yet too stubborn to die.

He’s made you his.

You’ve made him yours.

And lying in his arms, letting his hand rub up and down your back, you know neither of you stood a chance.

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