#light orbit 50 | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

armpirate · 2 months ago

Text

Like We Were || Jungkook

pairing: JK x fem!reader || Forgotten love

w.c.: 15.6k

Warnings: smut, dirty talk, car sex, protected sex (Minors DNI! Refrain from reading if you're not +18, and ignore if you don't like this type of content), angst

Aprox. time of reading: 40 / 50 minutes

Summary: Jungkook's world turned upside down after the accident, but he felt it completely broke the moment he knew about your state. You forgot everything. Him, your relationship, everything you had built together... For a while, he thought letting go would be the best choice. The thought of him turning into a stranger after you two were each other's lives was something hard to handle. But living without you was a worst kind of pain. That was why, he'd help you remember, without you knowing the cute guy that you met at the bar was the person you hugged to sleep every night.

MASTERLIST || BONUS

The music was loud -some mix of funky beats and synth pop- but Jungkook could still hear the soft clink of the ice in your glass from across the bar. You were seated at the far end, alone, just like that first time. Just like before.

He leaned against the brick wall, half in shadow, fingers drumming a slow rhythm against his thigh. The denim of his jacket was worn in all the places your hands used to touch. You always tugged on his sleeves when you laughed, like he was something to hold onto.

You weren't laughing now.

You looked... calm. Pretty. Like nothing was missing.

Except everything was.

You didn't notice him. Not yet.

And just like the first time, some guy, button-down open too far -smile too wide-, saw you sitting there and made his move.

Jungkook stiffened, exhaling slowly through his nose.

He'd timed it. He knew this was when it happened, when you got approached and rolled your eyes so hard he could feel your annoyance from across the room. He'd used that moment to swoop in, smug and playful, pretending to be your boyfriend just to get the creep to back off. It worked like a charm. You laughed, he stayed. And you two talked until the bar closed.

It was the beginning of everything.

So this had to work.

He watched closely now, waiting for the same flicker of irritation on your face, but it didn't come. Instead, you smiled politely at the guy. Laughed, even. Tucked your hair behind your ear like you were actually interested.

Jungkook felt the sharp stab of something he didn't want to name.

The guy leaned in, too close, and Jungkook couldn't stay back anymore. He pushed off the wall and crossed the bar with purpose in his step, heartbeat hammering, sweat pooling at the base of his neck. He rehearsed his lines a thousand times in his head.

Same as before. Same as before. Same as before.

He stopped at your table, resting his hand on the back of your chair like it belonged there.

"Hey, baby," he said, trying to keep it light, teasing. "Sorry I'm late. You didn't wait long, did you?"

You blinked up at him, surprised. The man sitting across from you frowned, shifting in his seat.

"Excuse me?" you said, brows furrowing.

Your voice was soft, unfamiliar even in its familiarity.

Jungkook's smile didn't falter. He had practiced it in the mirror, wanting to do it just like that first night. "You know I hate it when you start drinking without me" he gave the other man a polite smile that didn't reach his eyes. "Mind giving us a minute, bro?"

The man looked between you both, clearly annoyed. But you didn't say anything. You just looked at Jungkook like he was an inconvenient glitch in your night, not someone your soul used to orbit around.

"Whatever," the guy muttered, grabbing his beer and walking away.

Silence settled between you and Jungkook, heavier than the bass vibrating through the walls.

He expected you to be angry, confused. Maybe even impressed like last time. But instead, you stared at him with narrowed eyes and a bemused smile.

"That was... bold," you said, tilting your head. "Do I know you?"

The words punched the air from his lungs like a second car crash.

Those were the words he was so scared to hear when he first knew of your state after the accident.

He didn't visit you a single time you were in the hospital after you woke up, he was sure he wouldn't have been able to bear the idea of you not remembering him. He couldn't bear the idea of not being part of your life any longer.

That was why he asked your friends to erase any trace of him from your apartment, from your phone... He was about to let go, until he thought that maybe that was his chance to start it all over again, to live again the beauty of falling for you, and you falling for him.

You in that pub wasn't a coincidence. Not at all.

He chuckled softly, looking down for a second to hide the devastation in his eyes. "Kind of," he murmured. "We've met. Once or twice."

You looked at him for a long beat. Not with recognition. Not with love. But... curiosity.

"Well, if you're going to crash my night, you might as well sit down."

He blinked.

You gestured to the seat across from you, and he moved slowly, cautiously -as if the world might fall apart again if he moved too fast.

He sat.

You sipped your drink, watching him over the rim of your glass. "So... is this a thing you do often? Pretend to be someone's boyfriend to scare off competition?"

Jungkook let out a soft laugh, rubbing the back of his neck. "Only when I'm desperate."

There was a pause. You tilted your head. "And are you?"

He met your gaze. For the first time in weeks, you were looking directly at him. Really looking.

His voice was low, gentle. "I lost something important. I'm just trying to find it again."

You didn't answer right away. You just stared at him, lips twitching like they were debating whether or not to smile. And then -unexpectedly, softly- you did. You smiled. Not because you remembered. Not because you knew what he meant, but because something about him felt warm. Like a song you hadn't heard in years but still knew how to hum.

"Okay, mystery man," you said, tapping your glass against his. "Tell me the story of that thing you're missing, then."

He looked at you, breath catching in his throat. And this time, he let himself hope.

You sat across from him, your finger tracing lazy circles against the condensation on your glass, looking at him attentively as he refused to talk about himself, to go deep in anything that wasn't the moment between you two. And it made you suspicious, but also curious.

"So?" you asked, lips quirking at the corners. "Are you gonna tell me your name, or are we doing the whole mysterious stranger at the bar thing tonight?"

He smirked.

God, it was exactly like the first time.

That smug, amused curl of your lips, that cocky tone as you tilted your head. And he tried to mimic the way he reacted to it, mirroring your smirk. Only this time, there was something behind it. Something heavy in his eyes, buried just deep enough that you couldn't quite reach it.

"No names," he said smoothly, leaning forward with his elbows on the table. "It ruins the fantasy."

You raised a brow, playing along without thinking. "Oh? And what fantasy is that?"

"The one where you fall in love with me for the night," he replied, not missing a beat. "No expectations. No promises. Just... this."

Your heart skipped, maybe from the way he said it, or maybe from the way he looked at you, like he was seeing more than what was on the surface. It was unnerving, but oddly comforting.

You didn't know him. But something about him felt like déjà vu.

"Hmm," you said, swirling the last of your drink. "Sounds like a line you've used before."

He chuckled under his breath. "Once or twice."

You narrowed your eyes. "Do I look like the kind of girl who falls for strangers in bars?"

"You look like the kind of girl who pretends she doesn't," he said, a hint of challenge in his voice. "Right before she steals the guy's lighter and walks out with his heart."

You laughed before you could stop yourself, and it caught you off guard. It felt... real.

"So you think you've got me all figured out?"

"Not yet," he murmured, gaze softening. "But I'd like to."

The words hung between you like a dare.

You leaned back in your seat, crossing your legs, testing him. "Then why don't you tell me something about yourself? Something small."

He hesitated. Not because he didn't want to, but because every answer he had was yours. Every story he could tell was tied to memories you no longer carried.

So instead, he reached for a lie wrapped in truth.

"I box," he said.

You tilted your head. "Box?"

"Yeah. Keeps me sane." he looked down, twisting his ring, a nervous habit he didn't even know he still had. "Started when I was fifteen. Got serious around twenty. It's... one of the only things I'm good at."

"That's not true," you said quietly, before your brain caught up with your mouth.

He looked up sharply, for a second, excited about you possibly remembering something. You blinked, confused at yourself. "I mean, you don't look like someone who only has one skill."

A small smile crept across his face. "You think I look talented, huh?"

"I think you look like you think you're talented."

He let out a breathy laugh and pressed a hand to his chest. "Oof. Beautiful and brutal. You really haven't changed."

You froze for a split second.

"What?"

"Nothing," he said quickly, waving it off. "Just... déjà vu."

You stared at him, something prickling at the edge of your mind. That look again. Like he knew you too well for a stranger. Like he was holding a secret in his mouth, keeping it safe.

"Alright, mysterious boxer," you said, sitting up straighter. "If we're doing this no-names thing, then I get to make up your backstory."

He grinned. "Oh yeah?"

"Yeah. Let's see..." you tapped your chin, pretending to study him. "You're probably a spoiled rich kid, dropped out of business school, got into the underground fighting for the thrill."

"Interesting."

"You can drive a car" you continued, "but you ended up with a motorbike because it makes you feel free. You say you hate attention, but you love the way people look at you."

He laughed again, but this one hurt a little. Because it was true. All of it. You were remembering pieces without knowing you were.

"And what about you?" he asked, trying to push through the lump in his throat. "What's your story?"

You looked down at your empty glass, suddenly quiet.

"I don't know yet," you said, half-joking. "Still figuring it out."

He swallowed hard.

"Then let me stick around a little," he said softly. "See how it turns out."

You looked at him, eyes searching. Something pulled inside your chest, like the faint echo of a melody you used to dance to in the dark.

"Okay," you said. "But no names. Just for tonight."

He smiled, genuine, heartbreakingly sweet. "Deal."

And as the bartender slid two more drinks toward your table, Jungkook let himself fall into the lie a little deeper. Because if he couldn't make you remember, he'd make you fall in love again.

Jungkook had chosen the same quiet little café for your "first date", the place where you'd spent hours sipping overpriced lattes, talking about everything and nothing all at once. He'd kept it simple, just like that night. The table by the window, the soft hum of the city outside, the warm, golden glow of the café lights wrapping around the two of you like a blanket.

It was perfect, or it should have been.

He'd prepared for this moment. Everything was planned. Even the awkwardness that he had to recreate.

But as soon as the waitress dropped off the drinks and Jungkook reached for his, he fumbled. His fingers brushed against the edge of the cup, and the entire thing tipped over.

Splash.

The coffee spilled across the table, splashing onto his lap and soaking the front of his white shirt. Jungkook pressed his lips together, omitting the huge sigh after he managed to ruin the t-shirt you bought for him.

On your first day, he wore one of his favorite t-shirts before he ruined it by accidentally spilling the coffee over him -which, later, would end up with one of the most touching gifts you'd ever given him: the same shirt, brand new and clean.

He went through the same, although this time, it wasn't accidental. He spilled the coffee on purpose and he was wearing the same t-shirt you bought him.

It had been so embarrassing the first time. The coffee had scalded him, leaving him with a red mark on his skin. You'd laughed so hard that night, teasing him endlessly as he frantically tried to clean himself up.

But now, instead of laughing, you stood up, your face immediately flooded with worry.

"Oh my God, Jungkook, are you okay?" you reached across the table, instinctively grabbing a napkin, your hands trembling slightly as you dabbed at the wet spots on his shirt.

He watched you, caught between confusion and guilt. This was supposed to be fun. This was supposed to be a game.

"You're supposed to laugh," he said with a nervous chuckle, his tone strained as he shifted awkwardly in his seat. "You always laugh when I do this."

But you didn't laugh. You were too focused on him, on making sure he wasn't hurt.

"Jungkook, you're burning up!" you looked down at his shirt and noticed the red splotch from the coffee. The way his face twisted in discomfort made something in your chest tighten.

"I'm fine," he lied, wiping at the coffee stain with his napkin, still trying to brush it off like it was just another part of the act.

But when you kept leaning forward, your eyes full of concern, he felt that same vulnerability creep up on him, the one he tried so hard to bury. The one that always came to the surface when you'd showed him a kindness that had no ulterior motive.

You didn't pull back. Instead, you leaned closer, your fingers brushing against his skin as you carefully checked the burn mark, trying to gauge how serious it was.

"Please, let me take a look at it," you said quietly, your voice shaky with worry.

Jungkook's chest tightened, and his heart hammered in his ribcage. This wasn't how it was supposed to go. He was supposed to make you remember. He was supposed to recreate the fun, the banter, the way things were before.

But instead, he felt like he was falling apart in front of you.

"Hey, it's really nothing," he insisted, trying to pull away, but your grip tightened.

"No, it's not nothing," you said, your voice softer now, almost as if you were reassuring yourself. "This could leave a scar. What if it gets worse? You're not fine, Jungkook."

He finally allowed you to inspect the burn, the cool concern in your touch contrasting sharply with the heat that still lingered on his skin. It made his breath hitch, but you weren't teasing him. You weren't laughing at his clumsiness. You were genuinely worried about him.

It was so... different. It wasn't the playful teasing he remembered. It wasn't the way you used to mock him for every little thing. You were taking this seriously, as though he was the important thing at this moment. Not the game. Not the memories he was trying to recreate.

You met his gaze, your eyes full of something, something close to panic.

"Are you sure you're okay?" you asked again, more insistent now. "Maybe you should go to the hospital and..."

"No," he interrupted, his voice tight. "I'm fine. Really. It's not as bad as it looks."

But you didn't seem convinced, still gently dabbing at his shirt, your touch careful and concerned, the weight of your eyes never leaving him. It made him feel seen in a way he hadn't been before. The memory of that first date -the teasing, the laughter- felt like something out of a past life now, replaced by a deep, undeniable care he didn't know how to handle.

"I think we need to get you cleaned up," you said, standing up. "Come on. I'm taking you to the restroom."

He followed you, unable to hide the tightness in his chest, the way his pulse quickened. This wasn't the same. It wasn't supposed to be like this. And yet, the way you gently guided him toward the restroom made him realize that maybe... maybe this was better. The way you worried about him, your eyes soft but full of something deeper, made him feel like he wasn't a stranger to you. Even if you couldn't remember who he was, the connection was still there. Unspoken, yet undeniable.

When you reached the restroom, you immediately pulled paper towels from the dispenser, and as you handed him a few, your fingers brushed his. The smallest touch sent a shiver through his spine.

"You're not making this easy," he muttered, his voice laced with that same nervous humor he'd used to cover his discomfort, but there was no bite to it now. Just a soft, vulnerable edge.

You gave him a smile that didn't quite reach your eyes, but it was warm, and you were still checking him over.

"I know," you said, your voice gentle. "But I need to make sure you're okay, Jungkook."

And for the first time since everything had shifted, since the accident, since the loss of memories, Jungkook wondered if maybe, just maybe, you were remembering him in a way he could never fully understand.

He was disappointed at first, but not anymore.

It was late when you both ended up outside the apartment building. He had to pretend you were guiding him when, actually, he knew the steps there by heart. He could've easily been blinded and he still would've found his way to your door.

The city buzzed quietly around you, muted streetlights casting gold halos across the wet pavement, the air still damp from an earlier drizzle. Jungkook walked beside you, his hands tucked into the pockets of his jacket, his shoulder brushing against yours every few steps.

He was quiet.

You were too.

The kind of silence that felt almost sacred. Like something was waiting to happen.

He'd walked you home. Just like that first night. After coffee and ruined shirts, after shy smiles and missed glances, he'd done exactly what he did all those years ago: offered to walk you back, pretending it was "just in case." Pretending he wasn't already hopelessly caught in your orbit.

But this time, the orbit felt unfamiliar to you. You didn't recognize the gravity between you. Not logically.

Only emotionally.

There was something there. Something unspoken.

You reached the front steps, turning to face him, and he stopped just a breath too close. He looked at you the same way he had back then, like he was trying to memorize your features, like the weight of the moment sat heavy on his chest.

"I'm not gonna ask to come up," he said softly, almost repeating the words he'd used the first time. "That's not how I do things."

You tilted your head. "But you want to come up, don't you?"

A small, surprised smile tugged at his lips. "Yeah. But... Eventually."

"Eventually... That means you're confident on a second date" you teased him.

"I know there will be"

You both laughed, gently, though yours was more confused than amused. Something about that vibe felt familiar, like you had lived it before. Although you couldn't tell. Not clearly. It was like catching pieces of a dream you weren't sure you'd had. But the way your body reacted to him -how your heart raced, how the tips of your fingers tingled when he stepped a little closer- it made it hard to ignore the sense of déjà vu.

He licked his lips, suddenly nervous.

His mind started flooding with memories from that night. He kissed you for the first time there, while you were leaning against the railing, with that half-smile that always drove him crazy. A smile that told him you already knew what was about to happen, but you were just waiting to know if he dared to do it.

He blinked at you, caught between then and now. Because you were the same person, but your eyes were sparkling differently from that night. There was something in your vibe that told him you weren't with him. Not completely.

"I wish I could kiss you right now" he whispered out loud.

And then, softly: "You wish... Is there something stopping you?"

His breath caught.

God, he wanted to. He wanted to lean in and kiss you exactly the way he had that night, slow and reckless, like he had nothing to lose. But this wasn't that night. This wasn't you. Not really. You didn't remember the tension, the stolen glances, the anticipation that had built up between you back then.

You were looking at him with new eyes.

And still...

You hadn't pulled away.

He raised his hand slowly, brushing your hair behind your ear. His fingers grazed your jaw, tentative, reverent, like he was afraid he might scare you off. You leaned into his touch instinctively, and that one simple motion shattered something in him.

So he whispered, "I'm going to kiss you now," and you nodded before he even finished the sentence.

The kiss wasn't like the first time.

It wasn't playful. It wasn't bold.

It was quiet.

Tender.

A question instead of a declaration.

Jungkook kissed you like he was saying please remember me, and you kissed him back like you were saying I don't, but I feel you anyway.

Your hands found his jacket, gripping the fabric just slightly, like you needed something to hold onto. His thumb brushed against your cheek. You melted into him, the city and the night and the world dissolving around the pressure of his mouth on yours.

And when he finally pulled back -breathless, eyes wide and glassy- you stayed close, your forehead pressing against his, like it was the only place in the world that made sense.

"That didn't feel new," you whispered, your voice soft and trembling. "That felt like... like I've done it a thousand times before."

Jungkook let out a broken laugh, one that sounded suspiciously like a choked sob.

"You have," he whispered back. "You have."

And for the first time, he let go of the script. Stopped trying to make you remember by recreating the past.

"I mean, maybe... you dreamed about it" he corrected himself quickly, as soon as he was aware of the confused look.

Jungkook sat at the end of the table, eyes fixed on the untouched glass of beer in front of him. The bar was the same. The booth was the same. Even the playlist hadn't changed much, still throwing out old songs that reminded him of shared nights, loud laughter, your hand under the table laced in his.

But this time... your seat was empty.

"You did it?" Jimin asked quietly from across the table, voice careful not to trigger whatever thread was barely holding Jungkook together. "You brought her here again?"

Jungkook didn't respond right away. He dragged a hand through his hair and exhaled slowly, the breath shaky and uneven. "It's where we used to hang out all the time. If there's a chance it triggers something..."

Namjoon leaned forward, concern etched into every line of his face. "You can't keep doing this to yourself, man."

"I'm not doing this for me," Jungkook said too quickly, then caught himself.

He was. Of course he was.

He needed you to remember -not just for you, but because he didn't know who he was without you. And this version of you, this distant version who looked at him like he was just another charming stranger, it was slowly unraveling him.

"She used to sit right there," Jungkook muttered, tapping the empty cushion beside him with his knuckle. "She'd steal fries off my plate even though she ordered her own. Called it a 'tax for good company.'"

The group chuckled softly, but no one really smiled.

"She used to kick me under the table when I made bad jokes," Jungkook went on, his voice cracking ever so slightly. "And whenever someone flirted with me, she'd hold my hand tighter. Not because she was jealous. Just to remind me she was there. And now..."

He looked up suddenly, eyes rimmed with red.

"She is here," he whispered, "but she's not. She doesn't know she was my everything."

No one spoke. Hoseok reached out first, a quiet hand on Jungkook's shoulder. Jin slid his beer across the table without a word, just as he had the night Jungkook told them you were in the hospital.

"I brought her here last night," Jungkook continued, staring ahead like he was talking to someone far away. "Sat in this exact spot. Tried to recreate the night we celebrated her getting that job at the museum. Even told the waiter it was her promotion night again. He just looked at me like I was insane, and I had to tell her it was an excuse to get a discount."

He laughed bitterly.

"She smiled at everyone but me."

Another beat of silence passed.

"Why don't you just tell her?" Taehyung asked quietly. "Tell her who you are. What you were to her."

Jungkook shook his head violently, the muscles in his jaw twitching. "Because if she really doesn't remember... then it's not her choice to love me again. It's just pressure. A story she doesn't recognize. She deserves to choose me. Even if it means she doesn't choose me."

His voice broke completely on the last word. No one had seen Jungkook cry in years, not like this. Not with his head down, fists clenched, eyes burning with grief that hadn't found closure.

Jimin reached across the table and grabbed his hand, squeezing once.

"We'll help you," he said quietly. "Whatever memory you want to bring back, whatever moment you need to recreate next... we've got you. Even if she doesn't remember yet, we do."

Jungkook swallowed hard.

His voice was hoarse when he whispered, "The picnic. The one in spring. With the wildflowers."

Namjoon blinked. "The one where you both got locked out of the car and had to hitchhike back?"

Jungkook gave a weak laugh through the tears. "Yeah. That one."

The friends all exchanged looks.

"God, she teased you for weeks after that," Hoseok smiled.

Jungkook's eyes turned to the door. "I just need to see her laugh like that again."

The air was soft with spring, the kind of day where sunlight filtered through a pale blue sky and the breeze carried the scent of blooming grass. A wide field stretched out before them, dotted with patches of wildflowers that danced like secrets on the wind.

Jungkook laid the blanket down carefully, pressing the corners with rocks just like he remembered. Every detail had been replicated: the chipped thermos filled with cold brew, the half-burnt cinnamon muffins, the little Bluetooth speaker already playing the playlist he'd made for you back then. Even the weather was working in his favor like the universe just wanted things to work out.

He glanced toward you as you stepped barefoot on the blanket, your shoes left somewhere in the grass. You looked peaceful -curious, but peaceful.

"This is... beautiful," you murmured, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear. "Feels like déjà vu."

Jungkook smiled, carefully setting down the sandwiches. "You... I mean, a friend said that exact same thing I brought him here." he lied.

You looked up. "Really?"

"Hmm." he plopped down across from you, legs crossed and heart pounding. "Y.... He also told me I'd probably forget the sunscreen and get a sunburn on just my nose."

You paused. "...Did you?"

He pointed to his nose with a sheepish grin. "Roasted like a marshmallow."

But it wasn't any friend, it was you who warned him, and it was you who started teasing him for looking all red for days.

A laugh slipped from you before you could stop it, and his heart ached at the sound. That laugh. That warmth. It was like watching the sun through fog. But something else was happening too, little things.

You hummed along to a song playing through the speaker, one that wasn't particularly popular. Jungkook had added it to the playlist on a whim, years ago. You shouldn't have recognized it.

For a moment, it felt like everything was working out. Like he was making a good job on just reliving everything that happened.

But then... the keys.

He was about to whine about the car being locked out, but you stopped him before he could, swinging the keys in your hand up in the air.

As he stood to throw away a crumpled napkin shortly after you arrived, you casually reached into the open car door and plucked the keys from the ignition where he'd left them hanging. You didn't even look twice. Just dropped them into your bag like it was second nature.

Jungkook froze, confused about the sound. Confused about the fact that you had picked them up.

"Hey," he said slowly, cautiously, "why'd you grab the keys?"

You blinked, caught off guard. "What?"

"The keys," he repeated, nodding toward your bag. "You took them out of the car."

You hesitated, frowning faintly. "Oh. I don't know. Just... reflex, I guess."

Jungkook's chest tightened.

Because last time -back then- you hadn't grabbed them. He'd left them in the ignition, and you'd both realized hours later, after the car locked itself automatically. It was the beginning of a mini-disaster -your phone was dead, his had no signal, and the two of you ended up hitchhiking back with a couple of old farmers and a trunk full of potatoes.

It had been the most ridiculous, uncomfortable, hilarious afternoon of his life.

And now -this time- you had stopped it from happening. Without realizing. Without remembering.

Something in you had changed the outcome.

"Are you okay?" you asked suddenly, your eyes scanning his face.

Jungkook quickly shook himself back to the moment, forcing a smile. "Yeah. Yeah, I just... I was kind of looking forward to getting locked out again."

You tilted your head. "Again?"

He grinned, half-teasing, half-choked with emotion. That was the first time you held his hand for more than five seconds without making a joke about his rings. But now that chance was gone.

"I mean... getting locked out. That's it. Not again"

You stared at him, lips parted, like you didn't know whether to laugh or ask questions.

But you didn't ask. Not yet.

Instead, you reached out and grabbed his hand, quietly, gently. No jokes. No teasing. Just fingers threading through his, like you'd done it a hundred times before.

Jungkook swallowed hard and looked away, blinking back the sting behind his eyes.

"I really like being around you," you said softly, thumb brushing over his knuckles. "It's strange... but comfortable. Like... like I've missed you, even though I don't know you."

And with that, the tension in his shoulders gave out.

He didn't say anything.

He just nodded, eyes closed, clutching your hand like it was the only tether he had left.

"You don't need to lock us out of the car for us to spend more time together" and there it was, the teasing. "You should just... ask".

The sun had dipped below the hills after they both had finally chosen to stay there, painting the sky in deep purples and sleepy oranges. What began as an afternoon picnic had slowly turned into an evening spent inside the car, warm and close, with music playing softly in the background and empty snack wrappers strewn across the dash.

Jungkook sat in the passenger seat, one leg propped up, his shoulder brushing against yours every time he shifted. Outside, the air had cooled, the windows fogged slightly with your breath and the temperature drop, casting a soft haze over the world beyond.

You were both laughing, genuine and unfiltered.

"I still can't believe you tried to impress your professor with a meme," you giggled, hugging your knees to your chest.

Jungkook groaned, burying his face in his hands. "It was intellectual humor. I was ahead of my time!"

You nudged him, and he looked over -smiling, disarmed.

He knew all your stories by heart, he swore he could tell them by himself. But he just loved hearing them from you again.

There was something different in the air now.

The kind of quiet that only comes after hours of sharing too much. The kind where words run out, and the silence doesn't feel awkward. It feels close.

The car had grown dark. Only the faint glow of the overhead light lingered, and the soft ambient music, now long into the playlist's more intimate side, filled the small space with low, lazy beats.

Your gaze lingered on his profile.

Something in the way he looked that night -quiet, open, raw- pulled at something deep in you. Maybe it was the soft rasp of his voice. Maybe it was the way he looked at you like he'd seen this moment before, and had been waiting for it to happen all over again.

You didn't speak as your hand reached for his.

He took it like he always had -with ease, like it was second nature. Like your fingers belonged between his.

"I don't really understand what's happening between us," you whispered, voice barely audible over the music. "But I don't want it to stop."

Jungkook's breath caught.

He turned toward you slowly, his expression unreadable for a moment -like he was caught between joy and heartbreak.

"You don't have to understand it," he said softly, "just... stay in it."

You nodded. "Okay."

And then you kissed him. Not like strangers. Not like it was new. But like your mouth remembered the shape of his. Like your body leaned into his not with curiosity, but with longing that had been stitched into your bones.

Jungkook sighed against your lips, his hand cradling your face like he was scared you might disappear if he let go. The kiss deepened slowly -lazy, warm, like hours of conversation had been leading to this single moment of surrender.

Without a word, he climbed into the backseat, pulling you gently with him. Limbs tangled, laughter hushed as you maneuvered into the cramped space. The cold pressed against the windows while your bodies grew warmer.

Clothes slipped away in pieces, not rushed -felt. And you didn't feel shy, you didn't feel nervous when his eyes fell over your bare breasts, because the comfort mixed with a familiarity you weren't sure how to handle.

Good lord, he loved the way you always arched for him.

Jungkook cupped your breasts, his thumbs momentarily twirling around your nipples as he leaned down to kiss you again. Your tongues tangled together, and the taste was so intoxicating but pleasant that you could only find yourself holding onto him even tighter.

"It's the first time I like the taste of cigarettes so bad" you admitted out of breath with a smirk.

His hands mapped your skin like it was familiar ground, his mouth following with reverence. He didn't worship you like someone new -he remembered you, in every soft kiss down your neck, every pause where he just looked.

His lips went back to yours, crashing against your mouth as he dragged you on his lap, arms wrapped around your waist.

I love you. I love you. I love you.

His mind kept screaming, but he kept his lips sealed, forcing the kiss to grow even rougher as a way to keep those words from slipping and scare you away.

"Wait... Let me..." you broke the kiss, trying to readjust yourself on top of him.

Neither of you could help but giggle the moment you looked into each other's eyes as you shifted on his lap.

With a hand on your neck, he pulled you into a new kiss, making sure his arms around you kept your bodies glued to each other. He groaned into the kiss when he felt your hand slipping in between your bodies to redirect him to your wet channel, both of you moaning as you pushed him into you the moment you lowered your hips.

You weren't in love with him. Not yet. But your body moved like it still was.

Your hips met his with the perfect depth and synch, like the two of you were dancing to a dance you had practiced several times before.

And you had.

Jungkook couldn't move his eyes away from you. His arms remained wrapped around your waist, just enough to pull your torso close to him and have his lips closing around one of your nipples, one hand teasing the other, while his free hand squeezed a spot below your ribs that made you squirm and moan.

It was like he had studied your body, like his only aim was to make you feel good.

"Jungkook" you moaned with a cracked whine.

He swore he was going insane. He flipped the two of you over the backseat, resting his body in between your legs to pound into you, to angle his hips and make you lose control of your own body. One of your hands was on the window, the other on his shoulder. Yet he needed more.

With a rough movement, he moved your hand away from the window to place it over his face. "Touch me, Y/n. I need your hands on me" he almost begged.

And for that one night, in the backseat under a thousand quiet stars, Jungkook let himself fall again. Silently. Without hope or demand. Just the sweetness of closeness, of skin on skin, of your breath in his ear whispering his name like it still meant something.

When it was over, tangled together under the soft cotton of his jacket, you fell asleep on his chest, heart steady against his. Jungkook didn't sleep. He just held you, eyes fixed on the ceiling of the car, wondering how long he could keep pretending that fate would give you back to him.

For the first time, Jungkook didn't feel like recreating everything that happened between you two. It wasn't necessary. He was so caught up in taking the old you back, that he forgot about the possibility of him falling for you all over again under a whole different circumstance.

Your relationship was bound to happen again.

The next morning, the sun rose quietly. It didn't burst into the sky -it crept. Gentle and gold, seeping through the fogged windows of the car in soft beams that filtered across tangled limbs and rumpled jackets.

You stirred first.

Your cheek was pressed against the bare skin of Jungkook's chest, rising and falling with every slow breath he took. His arms were still around you, protective and steady, and his heartbeat -low and calm- drummed beneath your ear.

You didn't move.

There was something safe about this. About waking up here, wrapped in a warmth that didn't feel foreign. Even though it should have.

Your fingers shifted slightly, brushing against his ribs, and he tightened his hold just a little, as if even in sleep, he was scared you'd slip away.

Jungkook was awake.

He had been for a while.

He hadn't moved, hadn't spoken. Just breathed you in and let the silence hold him. Let the weight of your body against his lull the ache in his chest to something soft, something tolerable. But even in this dreamlike calm, he knew it wasn't real.

You didn't know him.

Not really.

Not the way you used to.

Still, when you tilted your face up and blinked sleepily at him, your mouth barely parted, skin still kissed by the warmth of last night, Jungkook let himself pretend. Just for a second.

"Hi," you whispered.

His heart squeezed. "Hey."

A quiet smile tugged at your lips. "Did we actually...?"

He gave a soft laugh. "Hmm. We did."

You leaned back slightly, your eyes scanning his features. The messy hair. The tired eyes. The little indent on his lower lip where he always bit when nervous. "I don't usually do that."

"I know," he said gently, gaze never leaving yours.

There was something in the way he said it -too sure, too knowing-, but before you could question it, he reached out, brushing a strand of hair from your face. His fingertips lingered on your cheek.

"You're cold," he murmured.

"I'm not," you replied, but you didn't stop him when he pulled his hoodie over your head and helped you into it, even though it was far too big and still smelled like him.

You let yourself curl into his side again as if you'd done it before. Like you knew how.

Outside, the world was waking up: birds calling through the trees, the breeze rustling through tall grass. But inside the car, time was still. The windows glowed softly with morning light. Neither of you spoke for a long while.

Eventually, you tilted your head toward him again. "I feel like I'm always a step behind around you."

Jungkook swallowed. "What do you mean?"

You shrugged, fingers absently tracing the tattoo on his arm. "Like you know something I don't. Like... I'm supposed to understand all this, and I just... don't."

He didn't answer right away. Instead, he turned his face toward the window, eyes catching the sunlight like it might burn away the truth if he held it too long.

"I guess," he said slowly, "some things just need time."

You nodded, even if you didn't really understand. "Is it crazy that I trust you?"

"No," Jungkook replied, his voice so soft it could have shattered. "Not crazy at all."

And in that moment, you reached out and laced your fingers through his again.

No questions. No demands.

Just skin on skin. A touch that said, I don't remember, but this feels right.

Jungkook closed his eyes and let himself stay in the dream for one moment longer.

The theater was quiet.

Not empty, just quiet. One of those midweek showings where only a handful of people were scattered across the seats, too far to hear or care what anyone else was doing.

You sat next to Jungkook with a bucket of popcorn balanced between you and the sleeve of your drink pressed against your thigh. The previews flickered across the screen, too loud, too flashy, but neither of you really cared what movie was playing.

He'd picked the film. Something fun. Light. Familiar. But you kept sneaking glances at him instead of watching.

He looked different in the darkness. More relaxed. A little slouched. His beanie pulled low and a soft flannel shirt hanging open over his tee. It was almost domestic, comforting, the way he sat beside you like he'd done it a hundred times.

Maybe he had.

You just didn't know it.

While the next trailer blared on screen, Jungkook leaned forward, checking his phone. Probably a text from a friend -you hadn't met any of them yet, but he talked about them often. Warmly.

He always spoke like there were pieces of you in his stories, but never named them.

You glanced over casually... and paused.

His phone was dim, but not enough to miss it. There you were, on his screen. His lockscreen. It was a photo of you in the sun, squinting at the camera, wearing sunglasses perched lazily on your nose and a soft smile playing on your lips. You looked free. Happy. Head tilted back slightly like you'd just been laughing at something he said.

But you had no memory of it.

You didn't remember the shirt you were wearing. Or where you were. Or him being there.

Your chest tightened, breath caught somewhere high in your throat.

It was just a photo. But it was proof of something bigger, something you couldn't quite reach.

"You okay?" he asked suddenly, turning to look at you.

You blinked, startled. He must have seen your face. Or maybe the way you were staring at his phone a second too long.

You nodded quickly, brushing it off. "Yeah. Just... tired."

He didn't press, but you could feel it. That slight shift in his posture. That tension in the air like he knew you'd seen too much. Or maybe... not enough.

He slipped his phone into his pocket and reached out, his hand brushing yours between the armrests. When you didn't pull away, he linked your fingers gently, grounding you with the warmth of his palm.

You leaned your head on his shoulder. He smelled like something soft and earthy. Familiar. Like you'd worn his hoodie once, weeks ago, and the scent had never left your skin.

"I like being with you," you murmured, almost a whisper.

Jungkook's grip tightened ever so slightly.

"I like being with you too," he said, voice hushed, almost cracking.

Neither of you watched the movie. You just sat in the dark, wrapped in something fragile and unnamed, with your face on his lockscreen and a hundred memories you couldn't see, but were somehow starting to feel.

After the movie ended, you both chose to take your love somewhere else.

You were back at your apartment now, Jungkook leaning against the kitchen counter, sipping on that awful canned iced coffee he swore by, while you sat cross-legged on the couch, scrolling through your phone.

He was telling you a story, something about a prank his friend -Taehyung- had pulled at a wedding. It was strange, telling you a story you were once part of, as if you had never been there. But he had grown used to it.

But your mind wasn't really on it, because the image had stuck with you.

The lockscreen.

That photo of you on his phone.

You chewed your lip and finally cleared your throat. "Can... can I ask you something?"

Jungkook stilled, the can pausing mid-air. "Sure."

You stood, walked to him slowly, and held out your hand. "Your phone."

His brows lifted. "Why?"

"Just wanna see something."

He hesitated, just for a second, before unlocking it and handing it over. You navigated to the lockscreen, pulling it up again. Your heart gave a strange little flutter.

"This picture..." you started softly, holding it out between you. "Where did you find this?"

Jungkook looked down at the screen like it was something fragile. His thumb twitched against the seam of his jeans.

"That was... I scrolled through your social media, and I found it" his voice was careful while he came up with a lie. "I thought you looked great, so I just... took it. I can change it if it makes you uncomfortable."

"No, it's just... I was surprised after seeing myself on your phone" you admitted. "I didn't expect it".

He nodded. "You don't mind it?"

You frowned slightly. "No. I actually look good" you teased with a chuckle. "I look happy there".

Jungkook swallowed hard, his gaze lowering as he murmured. "You were."

You studied his face for a long moment. Then your lips curved upward, just a little. "Your taste in screensavers is nice, I guess."

He let out a soft chuckle, but the sound didn't quite reach his eyes.

"Funny, though," you added, unlocking your own phone. "Mine's kind of similar."

You turned your screen toward him. It was a photo of a man's back -broad shoulders, hair messy in the wind, walking just ahead of you. The setting sun behind him made it hard to see clearly, but the place... it was the same river. The same wildflowers. The same time of year.

Jungkook stared at it. Everything in him stilled.

"That's... a coincidence," he said, voice almost too calm.

You nodded slowly. "Guess so."

But neither of you said anything for a while.

You left the photo up a little longer, as if trying to feel something stir in your chest. Some sense of connection. But all you felt was the silence between you -quiet, waiting, fragile.

Then Jungkook smiled softly, stepping forward and brushing your hair behind your ear.

"Maybe we just like the same places," he said gently.

You tilted your head, searching his face. "Maybe."

But as you leaned into his touch, your hand brushing lightly against his chest, you couldn't shake the strange flutter in your ribs, like a memory had tried to surface, only to slip beneath the water again.

"It was the lockscreen I had when I woke up" you frowned.

Jungkook froze when he heard that confession, but he remained silent, waiting for you to speak, waiting for the next thing you'd say.

"I haven't told you before... Well, it isn't something I go around telling" you nervously chuckled. "Some months ago... I had an accident. A pretty bad accident. I was in a coma for a few weeks, and when I woke up my mind was completely blank from the past five years and on. I didn't recognize my friends, or my workplace... I didn't even expect to be living here. But, somehow, that lockscreen was the only thing that made sense and gave me calm when everything was upside down. And it's ridiculous, because I can't see his face, or know who he is, but it just makes me... feel relaxed. Like nothing will be wrong".

Jungkook felt his lip trembling. For the first time in weeks, he felt guilty. Because he left you alone when you needed support, because he abandoned you when you needed guidance, only because he was scared of his own feelings when you looked at him differently. And now, he was scared of how you'd react when you remembered things.

"Why are you crying?" you scoffed, feeling your own eyes filling up with tears.

"Oh?" he asked, brushing the reverse of his fingers against his cheeks, finding them wet.

"You aren't feeling sorry for me, aren't you?" you asked, wrapping your arms around his waist.

"Never, bunny".

The nickname slipped from his lips before he could hold it back. And he noticed, the flash of surprise, the sparkle in you eyes under the tears.

That nickname stirred something in you.

"Bunny?"

He remembered the way you'd always jump around when excited, the way you'd make small jumps instead of just walking or running, and that nickname made complete sense for him back in the day.

"It's a nickname. It just... slipped out"

"I like it" you confessed with a giggle.

The sun was dipping low behind the skyline as Jungkook waited outside your office building.

He leaned casually against his Jeep, black hoodie pulled over his head, one boot crossed over the other as he scrolled through his phone. To anyone passing by, he looked like someone killing time -apathetic, detached.

But his thumb hadn't moved in two minutes, because his entire body was tense. Stomach in knots. Eyes flicking toward the doors every few seconds.

You were running late.

Again.

Which gave his mind far too much time to spiral.

He hadn't expected this part to hurt so much. Watching you build new routines that didn't have him in them. Smiling at strangers, coming out of buildings he'd waited for you a hundred times before -when he was your boyfriend, your ride home, your safe place. Now he was just... someone you were getting to know. And that should've been enough, except today, it almost wasn't.

"Jungkook?" a familiar voice called.

He stiffened. His eyes snapped toward the sound, heart dropping like a stone.

It was one of your coworkers. Julie, maybe? He vaguely remembered her from a few parties, or maybe your birthday dinner. The two of you had once danced together after too much wine. She had no filter and a memory like a vault.

She approached, smiling wide. "Oh my God, it is you! Wow. It's been a while. Y/n didn't say you were picking her up today... Are you two back together?"

Jungkook felt his blood turn cold.

His mouth opened, then closed again. "I... uh..."

"She looked so lost after the accident," Julie kept going, oblivious. "But I always had a feeling you'd come back. You two were like..."

"Hey, sorry," Jungkook cut in suddenly, eyes locked on the entrance.

You were walking out. Right. Now.

Shit.

"Can we not... talk about this right now?" he muttered, voice urgent but polite, already stepping away.

Julie blinked, confused. "What? Wait, aren't you...?"

"I'll text you," he said quickly, already turning his back.

And then he was moving, crossing the pavement fast, intercepting you before your eyes could sweep over to Julie's side of the street.

"There you are," he said with a practiced smile, pulling open the passenger door. "Rough day?"

You blinked at the sudden warmth, distracted by the way he touched your lower back, guiding you gently into the car like he'd done it a thousand times.

"Exhausting," you muttered as you slid in.

He rounded the Jeep fast, hands tight on the steering wheel by the time he started the engine. You didn't notice the way he was breathing just a little too fast. Or how he double-checked his mirrors like he wasn't just looking for traffic, but watching to see if someone was still standing nearby.

"How was your day?" you asked casually.

Jungkook gave a small, breathless laugh.

"Almost perfect."

The drive was silent for a few minutes, until you broke the silence again, curiously looking at him while turning your body to him.

"Do you know Julie?"

"What?" he nervously eyed you, his glance on you lasted less than two seconds.

"Julie, you were talking to her before I got out"

Jungkook sighed, trying to come up with an explanation. "Oh, yeah. She's a friend of a friend. It's been a long time since I saw her last".

Before you could ask more about it, he rushed to come up with a new topic that would distract you from the fact that he knew your coworker. And he breathed out, relieved, when you didn't fight back as you played along with his conversation.

Three weeks slipped by like honey in warm tea -slow, golden, and somehow too sweet to be real. You and Jungkook weren't official, but something between you had rooted itself deep. You texted constantly, called often. He picked you up from work most days. You spent weekends together now: grocery shopping like old lovers, laughing too loudly in parks, falling asleep on his shoulder without even realizing it.

And still... you never asked. Never pried about the way he knew exactly how you liked your coffee, or how his hand found yours in the dark before you could even reach. Just like you didn't ask why he was so against you meeting his friends, or how he didn't want to meet yours. At some point, you just assumed he didn't have any, and he just was too embarrassed to admit it. Just like you accepted he was more of a homebody than someone who went out and about, since most of your dates were either in places with barely anyone around or in either of your houses.

You didn't know why you didn't ask, maybe you were afraid of the answer.

That night, and after too much arguing, you finally managed to convince Jungkook on going out. The pub looked just like you remembered it: old brick walls, low golden lights, the constant hum of music and conversation thick in the air.

"Déjà vu," you said, stepping in beside him. "This place feels... familiar. And I don't mean it because of the day you brought me here a few weeks ago."

Jungkook smiled, a little sad, a little hopeful. "It should."

You glanced up at him, eyes narrowed. "Why?"

He shrugged like it didn't matter. "It's just the kind of place that feels like a memory."

You were led to the same table. Same corner. Same view of the bar. Jungkook even ordered the same drinks for you both, though you didn't notice that part. You were too busy scanning the room, trying to place this strange pull in your chest.

"Have you been here a lot?" you asked.

He took a sip of his beer, staring at the spot where, once upon a time, he'd stepped in to save you from a stranger's wandering hands. "A few times before" he said "and it kind of stuck with me."

You smiled. "Because of the atmosphere?"

He met your eyes. "Because of the person I came with."

Your gaze faltered at the heat behind his words. You swallowed hard, suddenly shy. "She must've been special."

"She still is."

You laughed awkwardly, not sure how to reply to that -if you were misreading the moment or if he meant exactly what your gut whispered he did.

"Hey," you said, trying to shift the tone. "You keep saying all these mysterious, romantic things and then changing the subject. Should I be worried you're secretly married or something?"

Jungkook grinned, but it was the kind that didn't quite reach his eyes. "I'm not married."

"But?"

"But some things are hard to explain."

You nodded slowly, reaching for your drink. "Well... I guess I don't need everything explained. Not if it keeps feeling like this."

He looked up sharply at that.

"Like what?" he asked.

You hesitated.

"Like I've done all this before," you said quietly. "With you."

And Jungkook -heart breaking and healing all at once- only whispered back:

"You have."

But you didn't hear it. Or maybe you just didn't let yourself.

So you smiled again, tilting your glass toward his with a playful smirk. "To familiar strangers."

Jungkook clinked his glass against yours. And for a moment, everything in him screamed to tell you the truth. But instead, he just said:

"To second chances."

As the night went on, you had shifted in the booth beside Jungkook, your hand brushing his every now and then, and neither of you moved it away. The world felt slower tonight, like it was holding its breath around you.

The conversation had dipped into quiet comfort when a voice sliced through it, casual and familiar:

"Jungkook?"

He turned quickly. A tall man with honey-blond hair and a denim jacket was approaching with a grin, Mitchell. You didn't recognize him, but the smile on his face said he recognized you.

And worse, he knew you.

"Dude! I didn't know you two were back together!" Mitchell laughed as he reached them, clapping Jungkook on the shoulder before turning toward you. "Y/n, you look good! How's your head, by the way? That whole accident thing was a shock for everyone..."

"Hey," Jungkook said sharply.

His voice was low. Controlled. But his hand gripped Mitchell's arm with a pressure that meant stop talking now. He blinked, confused.

You glanced between them, eyes narrowing slightly.

"Sorry, do I... know you?" you asked, trying to place the man's face.

Mitchell looked stunned for a beat. Then opened his mouth again to speak, but he was interrupted before he could make a sound.

"She's not who you think," Jungkook cut in, voice firmer now. "You're probably confusing her with someone else."

Mitchell's eyebrows shot up.

"What? Jungkook..."

Jungkook stepped closer to him, almost blocking you from view. "Drop it," he muttered through clenched teeth. "Please."

Mitchell froze.

And in that moment, something passed between them -something heavy, like grief and fear woven together. Then, after a pause too long to be casual, Mitchell gave a tight smile.

"Oh," he said finally, turning toward you. "My bad. You just... reminded me of someone. Sorry about that."

You laughed softly, but something about the exchange had stiffened your spine. "No worries. I get that a lot, apparently."

Jungkook's hand slid to the small of your back. Warm. Protective. A silent plea not to ask more.

You didn't.

Not really.

But as Mitchell waved goodbye and disappeared into the crowd, you glanced up at Jungkook with a quiet curiosity in your eyes.

"Is he an old friend?"

Jungkook smiled gently, like nothing had just happened. "Yeah. Known him for a long time."

You nodded slowly. "He seemed... surprised to see us together."

There was a pause. Just for a breath.

"Guess I surprise people sometimes."

"How did he know... about the accident though?" you furrowed your eyebrows, looking at him cautiously.

"It's... that other person had a light accident, too. It's just a coincidence".

A coincidence, again.

You watched him a second longer before looking away. The conversation moved on, but the moment stayed with you. Like a thread you weren't quite ready to pull.

Actually, neither of you brought up that conversation for the rest of the night, not even when you were back in his place, like you always did with all the small details. You usually shrugged them off, swiped them off the carpet and forgot about them. But there were too many coincidences not to notice the huge bulge under the carpet in the middle of the living room.

The room was quiet, too quiet.

Jungkook's arm lay across your waist, his breath feathering warm against your shoulder, the rhythm steady, soothing. But your mind was anything but.

Even in the dark, the memories -or lack of them- pulsed behind your eyes. You could feel the shadows of things just out of reach, a phantom touch on your hand before you moved. The way he smiled when he thought you weren't looking, the moments where you caught him watching you like you were something lost and he didn't know how to let go.

Your fingers grazed over the sheet as you slowly shifted his arm off your waist. He mumbled something incoherent, but didn't wake.

Barefoot and quiet, you slipped out of the bed and stood in the middle of the room, arms crossing over your chest, heart pounding like a second heartbeat.

Mitchell's voice rang in your ears."That whole accident thing was a shock for everyone..."

Another accident, where the main person also got hit on the head.

"Back together".

And Jungkook's eyes, how fast they had darkened. How quickly he had shut it all down.

The question you'd buried for weeks finally pushed its way to the surface: Was he hiding something? Or someone?

Your stomach churned. What if he had a girlfriend he wasn't telling you about? What if this whole time, this strange intimacy you'd fallen into with him wasn't yours to fall into?

You were pacing in the dark before you realized it, your steps soundless on the cool floor. Back and forth. Breath uneven. Thoughts louder than your heart could handle. And then... thud.

You stumbled as your foot collided with something under the edge of the shelf in his living room. Bending down, your fingers found the edge of a small wooden box: worn, heavy with the kind of weight that wasn't just physical. There was something sacred about it. You shouldn't have opened it, but you did.

Inside were pieces of a life that didn't belong to you. And yet, they did.

A photo lay at the top. You, smiling in a way you'd never seen in the mirror. Your cheeks flushed, your hands cupping Jungkook's face like he was the only thing that existed. His eyes were shut in the photo, a smile tugging at his lips. Pure joy.

Your breath hitched.

Beneath it were dozens more. A photo booth strip of four blurry, laughing frames, a candid of you asleep against his shoulder, a selfie with his nose pressed to your neck, his eyes closed, and a faint lipstick mark on his cheek, you found one where your friends where also in the picture -and, by the way Taehyung was hugging Jungkook, you could tell they were close. And then, at the bottom, you found a familiar photo that made your stomach turn. You were wearing the exact same outfit of the picture he had as his lockscreen, and he was wearing the same clothes as the man in yours, same background... The only difference was that, this time, you two were together, kissing.

You didn't remember any of them. But your heart... did. Then, tucked beneath the photos, letters.

You picked up the top one. Unfolded it with trembling fingers. It wasn't long.

You forgot me.

I smiled through it. You said "nice to meet you" like it was nothing.

It almost killed me.

But I'll wait.

I'll wait forever if it means you'll smile at me like you used to.

Your vision blurred. You blinked quickly.

There were more. Pages of thoughts, of love, of ache. Some had dates, weeks ago. Some looked like they'd been written the day of your accident. One had a smear in the ink. A tear, maybe.

Day 9.

They said you might be able to hear me. So I'm here. Again.

I haven't left, not really. I go home to shower, sometimes. Eat if I remember. But I'm always back before sunset, just in case you wake up and wonder where I am.

I should've driven slower. I should've seen the turn. I should've...

You wouldn't be here if it weren't for me.

I replay it in my head every time I close my eyes. Your voice. The sound. The silence after.

I hold your hand and pretend you're just sleeping.

I talk to you like you'll answer.

Sometimes I pretend you do.

Everyone says to give it time. That you're strong.

But I know you're tired.

If you hear this, if anything inside you still remembers me, please, just come back.

I'll start everything over. I'll do it right this time.

I love you.

Come home.

Your breath came in shallow bursts. Your knees buckled. It was like everything was turning around you the more you read.

Day 37.

You opened your eyes today.

I should be there. God, I want to be there. But I can't. Not yet.

They told me you didn't ask for me.

That you didn't recognize anyone.

And I know it's not your fault.

I know it's the injury, the trauma, the healing.

But it felt like the last piece of me cracked open when I heard it.

How do I look at you and pretend we're strangers?

How do I sit beside you and not touch you the way I used to?

How do I call you Y/n when every part of me still aches to say baby?

I've spent weeks memorizing our history in case I had to remind you of it.

But now... I don't know if you even want to remember.

I'm scared. Not of losing you.

I'm scared you've already let me go.

Maybe I'll see you tomorrow. Maybe I'll walk past your door and keep going.

But I'll always be waiting, just in case something in you still knows me.

The box fell from your hands as you lost the last bit of strength to keep reading, the pictures scattered at your feet like a life spilled out.

You were the girlfriend.

You had been his.

He hadn't just found you by coincidence. He had been waiting. Recreating. Hoping.

A quiet sound behind you broke the silence. Then his voice -rough with sleep, confusion curling in its edges.

"Y/n...?"

You didn't turn around, you couldn't. Not yet.

Jungkook stopped, reaching for the switch to turn on the lights, wishing he had never done it in the first place. All the pictures he tried to hide were around your feet, all the contents of the box were exposed. "Baby?"

Your fingers curled around the corner of a photo -your face in it, laughing so hard your eyes had shut. Jungkook had his arm around your neck, tugging you against him like he never wanted to let go. The kind of moment that couldn't be staged.

Slowly, you turned. He was halfway inside the living room, shirtless, hair tousled, his eyes going from sleepy to wide open the second he saw what you were holding.

His mouth parted. But no words came out.

And then you whispered: "...It was me."

He didn't move. Didn't speak. Just looked at you like everything he had worked so hard to bury had been laid bare, and now, there was nowhere left to hide.

You looked down at the photo again, your fingers brushed the smile you didn't remember, but somehow still felt.

"I was the one you were waiting for."

His throat bobbed. You were crying now, but it didn't feel heavy. It felt like truth cracking open, like light breaking in.

"Why didn't you just tell me?" you whispered.

Jungkook swallowed hard. And finally, he stepped forward -eyes burning, voice trembling, as he stopped right in front of you.

"Because if I told you the truth..." he reached for your hand -hesitated- then wrapped his fingers around it, pressing it to his chest. "...I was terrified you wouldn't want to come back."

You didn't look at him. You couldn't. Your chest felt tight, each breath shallow and sharp.

"Why?" you asked, your voice low and sharp like a blade.

He sat up, the sheets slipping from his torso, pooling at his waist. "Y/n..."

"Why did you lie to me?"

Silence.

You finally turned, eyes wide and brimming with betrayal. "You were my boyfriend. Before the accident. Before I lost everything. You were my life, and you let me believe you were just some guy at a bar?"

Jungkook's throat bobbed as he swallowed. The guilt had already settled deep in his face.

"I didn't know how to tell you," he admitted. "I didn't want to scare you off."

"Scare me?" you repeated, voice cracking. "You didn't want to scare me, so you thought pretending none of it happened was better?"

He opened his mouth, then closed it again. You could see the words scrambling in his brain, but none of them made it out.

"You thought it would be better to lie to me? To manipulate me into remembering you? Not even to remember you, but to force your way back into my life" your hands were shaking now. "You robbed me of my own story, Jungkook. You made me feel crazy every time I caught something familiar in you."

"I was terrified," he said finally. His voice broke around the edges. "You looked at me like I was no one. You smiled like we'd just met. And I... I was scared you wouldn't want to come back."

Your breath caught in your throat.

"That wasn't your decision to make," you said, each word clipped, each syllable deliberate. "You should've told me the truth. You, my friends... someone should've told me."

"They wanted to," he said quietly. "I asked them not to."

You laughed bitterly. "Of course you did". You stopped for a second "Why don't I have anything about you in my h...?"

But you didn't need to finish the question to know that he and your friends had something to do with all of that.

"My social media?" Jungkook just looked down at your question, knowing one of your friends also managed to delete the two years of relationship off the Internet. "Of course..."

"I didn't do it to hurt you," he rushed to explain, eyes pleading. "I just wanted to be near you. I thought if we could do it all again, if I could just feel you again, maybe you'd remember. Maybe your heart would recognize mine, even if your head didn't."

You stared at him, so many feelings surging at once it made you dizzy.

"I've been falling for you," you whispered, your voice tight. "Thinking this was new, something just beginning. I let myself believe I was starting something real with you. But it was just... a copy. Shit, Jungkook. Can't you see how fucked up all of this is?!"

He stepped forward slowly, as if afraid to shatter what little remained between you. "Y/n..."

"You let me doubt myself, Jungkook. Let me question why everything felt like déjà vu. You watched me struggle and said nothing"

He looked like he might fall apart right in front of you.

"I didn't need to be protected," you said, softer now. "I needed the truth. I needed support, help."

Jungkook's expression twisted with grief. "I didn't know how to live in a world where you didn't remember me. I didn't know how to be near you and not be yours."

"You know, there's something I remember..." your voice wavered.

He looked at you hopefully.

"And it's that you always will choose the easy path. Working with me to remember you meant patience, dealing with frustration and obstacles, while just living this lie was quick and fast. You just needed to do absolutely everything you did the first time, and it was done. You didn't give a fuck about my recovery, but about having me in your life in the way you wanted"

It crushed him. You saw it happen. You watched his shoulders fall, his chest cave.

You shook your head, eyes brimming with unshed tears. "Now all I feel is that every moment between us lately was a lie. And I don't know how to trust anything you say anymore."

He reached for you, but you stepped back.

"Don't," you whispered.

The distance between you stretched, heavy with the things he never told you. You went back to the bedroom, and when you walked outside, you were already dressed with your bag hanging on your shoulder.

"I need time," you said, already walking toward the door.

"Y/n..." he called after you.

But you didn't stop, and you didn't look back.

The café was quieter than usual, the kind of silence that didn't come from a lack of noise, but from something heavier. The clinking of cups, low chatter, even the hum of the espresso machine, it all faded beneath the weight of everything Jungkook hadn't said out loud in days.

He sat across from Jimin, shoulders hunched over a cooling cup of black coffee, staring blankly at the chipped ceramic like it held the answers he couldn't find in himself.

Jimin didn't speak right away. He never rushed Jungkook in moments like this. Just sat there, sipping from his own cup, watching him with that steady, quiet patience that only came from knowing someone too well.

"She's stopped talking to all of us," Jimin finally said, his tone low but careful. "You know that, right?"

Jungkook gave a tired nod. "Yeah."

"She won't answer my messages. She ignores Hobi. I think she even blocked Tae."

Another nod.

Jimin leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. "You think she hates us?"

"No." Jungkook's voice was rough. "But she doesn't trust us. And I don't blame her."

Jimin stared at him. "She trusted you, though."

A muscle in Jungkook's jaw jumped. "Until she found out."

"She found out because she tripped over a box full of the truth," Jimin said, more gently this time. "Not because you told her."

Jungkook rubbed at his face, hands dragging over tired eyes. "You think I don't know that?"

"I think you do," Jimin said. "I just don't know if you've let yourself know it."

There was a long pause.

"She asked me once," Jungkook said quietly. "If I had a girlfriend."

Jimin didn't respond.

"I told her no." his voice broke a little on the word. "I was lying straight to her face, and she looked at me like I was the safest place she'd been since the accident. And I just..." he swallowed, hard, "kept pretending I didn't know what that meant."

Jimin looked away, lips pressed into a thin line. "You were scared."

"I was a coward," Jungkook corrected. "I thought if I could just make her fall in love with me again, I wouldn't have to tell her how much it wrecked me to lose her. But she's not stupid. She noticed everything. The bar, the photo, the letters... and then I watched it all snap together in her eyes."

Jimin was quiet for a moment before he asked, "What did she say?"

Jungkook's laugh was low and sharp, completely humorless. "She asked me why everyone lied. And I said... I told her I was terrified she wouldn't want to come back."

He paused. Swallowed again.

"And the worst part?" he looked up, eyes wet, voice shaking. "She didn't deny it."

Jimin exhaled, leaned back in his chair. "She's hurt. Give her time."

"What if time's the thing that takes her even further away from me?" Jungkook whispered. "What if every day she spends without me is a step closer to forgetting everything we were?"

Jimin reached across the table, gripped his wrist. "Then you wait. You wait for as long as it takes. You loved her enough to lie, fine. But now, love her enough to let her be angry, let her feel what she needs to feel. That's the only way this ends in something real."

Jungkook didn't answer. He just nodded once, slow and hollow, like his body had finally caught up to the weight his heart had been carrying all along.

Meanwhile, you weren't able to go on.

Just after you had asked, you had all of the memories from your relationship back in your house. Although they were inside a box you didn't dare to open yet. His words were enough to haunt the silence: "I was terrified you wouldn't want to come back."

The worst part was... he wasn't wrong.

You didn't dare to open the box and dig in those memories because you were scared the feelings from the past wouldn't align with the feelings you had. What if you didn't love him back then? What if your relationship wasn't good shortly before the accident? What if...?

You stood in the kitchen barefoot, wrapped in one of his hoodies that had been on the back of a chair, too tired to care if it still smelled like him. You hated that it did. That your body leaned into it, even as your heart tried to push away.

Your phone buzzed once. His name.

You stared at the screen until it faded back to black. A few more minutes passed before you turned it off completely.

You had trusted him.

From the first moment he sat across from you at that bar, with his cocky smile and flirty banter, you had leaned into the connection like you were meant to. And it felt like fate, hadn't it? The easy rhythm, the way he knew how to make you laugh, how he always knew just when to reach out or fall quiet. But it hadn't been fate. It had been a plan. His plan. A play-by-play reenactment of a life you'd already lived, without even knowing it. You'd fallen for him thinking it was new. Thinking you were choosing him, but he'd already had you. And he didn't tell you. He couldn't risk the chance that this version of you wouldn't pick him again.

That was the ache now, the hollow pit in your chest. Not just the lie, but the feeling that he'd stolen your choice.

You pressed your forehead against the cold glass of the window, blinking past the tight sting in your eyes. The street below was quiet, golden with morning light, like the world didn't care that everything inside you had shifted. Like nothing had changed at all.

You should have felt anger. And you did. But beneath it was something deeper and more painful: grief.

Because now every memory you'd made with him -every laugh, every kiss, every moment where your heart had fluttered- was tangled with the question: Was it ever really real?

And still, your body remembered the shape of his arms, the warmth of him in the middle of the night, the softness in his voice when he whispered your name like a prayer. You'd fallen in love with him again. That part was real. And maybe that was the cruelest truth of all.

Unable to keep that pain on your own, you finally called her. Jazmin picked up on the second ring. "Y/n?"

You didn't say anything at first, just breathed, your voice caught in the place where pain sat too deep to speak.

"Are you okay?" she asked, softer now, like she already knew the answer.

"I need to talk... Can you come?"

"I'm coming."

You didn't argue. Didn't try to sound fine. You just hung up and curled into the corner of the couch, knees to your chest, staring at the ghost of yourself in the dark TV screen. The reflection of a girl who didn't know who she was anymore. Not really.

When Jazmin arrived, she didn't knock, just stepped in like she used to, like her body still remembered where the spare key was and how your apartment smelled in the morning. She looked at you, standing there in Jungkook's hoodie, eyes rimmed in red, and said nothing at all, just wrapped her arms around you. And for a second, you let it break. The dam. The wall. The composure.

You sobbed into her shoulder, and she didn't ask questions. Not yet.

"I thought I was going crazy," you finally said when the tears had dulled to hiccups. "I kept thinking, maybe I was the other woman. Maybe he had a girlfriend he hadn't told me about."

Jazmin pulled away just enough to look at you, brushing your hair from your face. "You were the girlfriend. You are the girlfriend."

"Why didn't anyone tell me?"

She hesitated. "He asked us not to. Said he wanted you to come back to him on your own. That if it wasn't real, if you didn't choose him, it would crush him."

"But what about me?" Your voice broke again. "What about what it's done to me?"

She flinched, and you hated that you made her look like that. Like this pain had spilled over into someone else's bones too. But you couldn't take it back. Couldn't shrink it.

"I needed to know the truth," you whispered. "I needed someone to tell me. Instead, I was just... living in this version of a life that had already happened. Like a puppet on strings I didn't even know were there."

"I know," she said, pulling you in again. "God, I know, Y/n. I wanted to tell you so many times. But he looked so lost. So afraid. We all thought he'd break if you didn't come back to him."

"Maybe I needed to break too," you murmured, pressing your forehead to her shoulder. "So I can figure out who I really am without everyone else deciding it for me."

Jazmin nodded. Her fingers carded gently through your hair. You stayed there, the two of you curled into a silence that felt like a bandage over an open wound.

It had started to rain before you even realized where your feet had taken you.

You hadn't planned on going anywhere after work, just a walk to clear your head. No destination, no headphones, just the kind of silence that city noise couldn't reach. And yet, somehow, you were standing in front of a café you didn't recognize... or at least, didn't think you did. Still, something about it felt familiar. Not in the "I've-been-here-once" kind of way, but in the way a smell can unravel a dream, or a song can feel like a memory even when you've never heard it before.

The little sign above the entrance read Moka, the white paint faded into soft gray along the edges, weathered but charming. Your fingers curled around the brass door handle before you could talk yourself out of it.

The bell chimed above your head as you stepped in.

Soft jazz drifted from speakers hidden somewhere behind the plants and bookshelves that crowded the walls. The scent of roasted beans, vanilla, and something faintly citrusy wrapped around you like a warm coat. It felt like stepping into someone's living room, like a place where stories had been left behind, carefully folded into the creases of napkins and coffee sleeves.

You let your eyes scan the space and saw it: the corner booth near the window with the chipped table and the crooked lamp above it.

It called to you.

You didn't know why you sat down. You just... did.

You took a breath, your fingertips tracing over the wood. A divot near the corner snagged your nail, like muscle memory. You pulled your hand back.

A minute later, the bell above the door chimed again. You glanced up casually, and froze.

Jungkook.

He stepped inside, brushing rain off his shoulders, his hair damp and sticking slightly to his forehead. He looked like he hadn't expected the weather to turn on him so suddenly. He looked like he hadn't expected you, either.

For a heartbeat, neither of you moved. Then his eyes widened, and yours did the same.

"I didn't know you came here," you said, unsure why that was the first thing that came out.

He blinked, stepping in further. "I didn't think you even knew this place."

"I didn't," you replied. "I was just walking and... I don't know. My legs brought me here."

He gave a small, breathless laugh. Not mocking, just stunned. "Yeah. That... that sounds about right."

You both hesitated, hovering in two different worlds that used to be the same one. Then, without asking, he crossed the room and sat across from you. You didn't stop him.

You ordered two coffees, as if your hands remembered what your head didn't. Yours with oat milk and cinnamon. His, black with one sugar. You didn't realize what you'd done until the waitress left and Jungkook looked at you like he'd been struck.

"What?" you asked.

He shook his head. "Nothing. Just... you remembered."

You frowned. "I didn't. I guessed."

He didn't argue. Just gave a tired, tender smile and murmured, "Good guess."

The silence stretched between you. Not tense, exactly. Just... full. Like everything you hadn't said was sitting in the space between your cups, waiting for the right moment to rise.

You looked at him carefully. His eyes were heavier than you remembered. The curve of his mouth pulled more at the corners now, like he smiled less often. There were shadows beneath the tattoos on his arm, and tension in the way he gripped the edge of the table.

You stirred your coffee even though it didn't need stirring. "Why didn't you tell me?"

He stared at the chipped edge of the table. "Because I was scared."

"Of what?"

"Of ruining everything," he said. "Of trying to hold on to something that wasn't mine anymore. I kept thinking: what if you remembered and didn't want it? What if you didn't remember and I pushed too hard and it felt like I was trying to trap you in something you couldn't feel?"

Your heart twisted. "That doesn't make what you did okay."

"I know," he said instantly. "I know that. I lied to you. I took away your choice. I tried to rewrite something instead of... letting you read it again. On your own."

You watched him closely. There was no act. No polished version of himself. Just the raw, tired ache of someone who had held his breath for too long.

"And the accident?"

His eyes flicked to yours, and something flickered through them, shame, mostly. Pain.

"We were fighting. Some months ago, you started thinking of publishing the comics you had been working on, but I wasn't... supportive enough. I said they were a cute side thing, and it all blew after that" he said. "I... we started arguing, we weren't listening to each other, and the fight seemed to keep getting worse. It was raining. I slipped off the curb and..." he exhaled sharply, voice breaking. "The car didn't stop in time, I crashed against a tree, and you were the one who received the worse end"

You swallowed. "And after that?"

"I came to see you," he whispered. "Every day. For weeks. I sat beside you, read to you, talked to you even though you couldn't hear me. I brought you the cactus from your studio. I..."

You looked away, eyes stinging. "But when I woke up..."

"I stopped coming," he said, his voice barely audible now. "Because I thought... it would hurt less to disappear than to watch you forget me."

The words settled between you like ash.

"I didn't forget you," you whispered. "Not really. You were everywhere. In things I didn't understand. The way I reacted to you. The way I looked for you even when I was mad at you."

He watched you like you were saving him and tearing him apart at the same time. You exhaled, slow and unsteady. "You weren't a stranger, Jungkook. Not really. I didn't know why, but I kept choosing you anyway."

His lips parted, but no sound came out. Just a breath. Just gratitude.

The rain outside began to lighten, softening into a misty hush. Inside the café, the world had folded in around you: warm, quiet, intimate. Like the past and present were finally speaking to each other in the same room.

"Let me take you home," he said gently.

You didn't respond right away. You just nodded, slowly, carefully, like your body was making a decision your mind still hadn't caught up to.

He opened the door for you, and the wind brushed past you both. For a moment, you stood under the awning, watching the city blur behind rain. And then you turned to him and said, "You'll answer everything, right? If I ask?"

He looked you dead in the eye. "Anything. Everything."

And for the first time in a long time, when you both stepped into the rain and toward his car, it didn't feel like running. It felt like returning.

"What were we like... before the accident?"

He didn't answer right away.

You watched the side of his face, the soft twitch of his jaw, the way his eyes stayed locked on the road a second too long, like he was organizing memories in a drawer he hadn't opened in a while.

Then, slowly, he reached toward the glove compartment and pulled out a small leather-bound notebook, its corners frayed from use. He held it out to you without a word.

You looked down at it, frowning as you took it in your hands. The leather was warm, familiar. There was a tiny sketch of a cat doodled in the corner of the cover. Your sketch. You flipped through the pages.

Your handwriting.

Your drawings.

Short, messy notes written in blue pen. Dialogue bubbles. Storyboards. Scenes about a couple waking up late, arguing over grocery lists, dancing in the kitchen in their socks. Pages where the girl looked suspiciously like you, and the boy... well.

"Is this mine?" you asked.

He nodded. "You were working on it all the time. You said you wanted to make a comic about a normal couple. No drama, no perfect endings, just real life. Ours."

You flipped through the pages, stunned. You had no memory of drawing these, but the style was undeniably yours. Every detail made your chest ache with something you didn't know how to name.

"I don't remember any of this."

"I know," he said softly. "But you loved this project. You were going to publish it. You even had a name for it."

You looked at the front page. In your own messy cursive: "Monday Mornings."

A breath caught in your throat. You didn't even know why, but that title felt like something you'd once whispered in someone's ear, laughing under the covers.

"I didn't support you enough," Jungkook said suddenly, voice low and raw. "You wanted to take it public. You had this pitch ready, you were so excited. And I... I said we should wait. That, maybe, it wasn't the right time. I thought I was protecting you. I didn't realize I was just making you feel small."

You didn't answer, you just kept turning the pages.

A drawing caught your eye: the girl kissing the boy's shoulder while he made coffee. A heart drawn above them. Underneath, you'd scrawled:

"You always said mornings were cruel. So I made us soft."

Your fingers trembled.

"You said something before the accident," Jungkook continued quietly. "You said, 'Why does it feel like you're always patting my head instead of holding my hand?'"

You looked out the window. The trees blurred past in green shadows. Your heart thudded somewhere in your stomach.

"I never forgot that," he said. "I never stopped hearing it."

You closed the notebook and held it close to your chest.

He glanced at you, uncertain. "Are you okay?"

You nodded. But you didn't feel okay. You felt like you were standing at the edge of a memory that had just started to turn around and look at you.

The days blurred.

Not in the romantic way people talked about when they were in love, not in the way that made time feel like honey or sunsets. No, those days blurred like ink in water, like memory diluted until it left only a pale ghost of what used to be.

You tried.

God, you tried.

You woke up each day with hope clawing its way up your throat, searching the mirror for a spark, a flicker, something familiar in your own reflection. And sometimes, there were moments. A smell, a certain playlist, the way Jungkook's fingers traced lazy circles against your wrist when he thought you weren't paying attention. Sometimes it hit you like déjà vu, but soft, like the memory itself was holding its breath.

Other times, though, it felt like you were pretending to live someone else's life. Walking through a home filled with photos you couldn't remember taking, laughing at inside jokes you didn't really get, wanting to reach for Jungkook, only to stop midway, unsure if the heat in your chest was real... or borrowed from a version of you who no longer existed.

Jungkook didn't push. Not in words, anyway.

But sometimes you felt the weight of his gaze. Quiet desperation woven between the lines of his patience. And that's when it got hard. When it hurt the most, when you felt like you were failing both him and yourself.

That morning, you'd had another flash.

You had opened a kitchen drawer, reaching for a spoon, and your hand landed on a small, yellow plastic ring. The kind you get from a vending machine. For some reason, your breath caught. You had no idea why, but your fingers trembled.

You sat on the floor and cried.

Jungkook had found you there, and he didn't ask questions. He just sat beside you and held you close until your breathing slowed.

But he didn't say anything, either. And that was almost worse.

You both had grown used to that type of scene, where you just broke down and he held you until he made sure you were breathing properly again.

Now, in the car, your fingers fidgeted in your lap. "I hate this."

He blinked. "Hate what?"

"This... in-between. Not remembering. Remembering too much. Never enough. It's like I'm stuck between two mirrors, and I keep seeing myself, but never fully."

He nodded slowly, keeping his eyes on the road.

"I'm trying," you added, barely a whisper.

"I know you are," he said.

Silence again. Just the tires splashing over wet asphalt.

"But it's hard," you admitted, voice cracking. "It's hard needing space from someone who makes you feel safe. It's hard needing time from someone who clearly never stopped loving you."

He didn't answer right away. Just exhaled, slow and careful. "Do you know how many times I've almost told you everything again? How many times have I looked at you and wanted to say 'Just come back'? But I couldn't. Because if I pushed too hard, I'd lose you all over again."

"Sometimes it feels like you expect me to be her again. That girl I was."

"I don't," he said quickly, sharply. "I just miss her. That's different."

"Is it?" you asked. "Because it doesn't feel different when I look into your eyes and all I see is disappointment every time I get something wrong."

"I'm not disappointed in you..."

"Yes, you are!" you snapped. "Every time I forget something, you look away. Every time I hesitate, you sigh like it's breaking your heart."

He gripped the steering wheel tighter. "Because it is. But that's not your fault" his jaw flexed. "I know it's hard, but I never said you had to be her, that version of you. I love you. Now. Not just the version of you I lost."

You laughed bitterly. "But it's not that simple. You can say that all you want, Jungkook, but I see it. I see you looking for her in me. In every little gesture. Every place we go. You're always chasing the past. And I'm scared I can't give it back to you."

The air in the car turned cold.

He stared at the road, eyes dark. "You think this is easy for me? Watching you look at me like I'm a stranger, when I know what your laugh sounds like when you do something you like? When I still hear your voice every night in my head, begging me not to let you go?"

That silenced you.

His voice cracked. "I would give anything to forget how you used to love me, because maybe then, this wouldn't feel like being stabbed in the same place over and over."

You turned to him slowly. His knuckles were white on the steering wheel. His shoulders were tight with things he wasn't saying.

You stared at him. "I don't know who I am anymore. What if there's nothing to go back to?"

The words cut deep. You hadn't meant for them to come out like that. But now they hung in the air, heavy and irreversible.

His jaw tensed. "So what, Y/n? You want me to let go? To pretend none of it ever happened?"

You pressed your lips together, looking away again, knowing there was something cooking in his brain before he happened again.

"I'm not some villain in your story. And I'm sorry if it seems like I'm pushing you, but..." he stopped for a few seconds, getting some air back in his lungs "I'm trying to love someone who doesn't remember loving me. Do you know how hard that is? To have all these memories, all this history, and none of it matters unless you feel it too?" he took another deep breath, gulping down the knot in his throat. "But I'm not letting you go, I won't give up and I won't let you give up, because I'll be on every fucking step of the way. And if you don't remember me, then fuck it. We'll make new memories together that will be just as meaningful. But I'm not giving up on you, Y/n. I refuse to".

You hesitated, but you were thinking of the best answer to that. And just as you were ready to turn to him to speak again. It happened.

CRASH.

The sudden screech was the only noise in your ears for a few seconds, the blur of headlights the only thing you could see.

Your body snapped forward, seatbelt biting into your chest. Jungkook's arm instinctively flung in front of you, shielding, even as the car spun once and thudded to a stop against the guardrail.

Silence.

Rain tapped against the cracked windshield.

You gasped, chest heaving, eyes wide as your hands scrambled to reach him.

"Jungkook..."

"I'm okay," he croaked, already undoing his seatbelt. "Are you hurt? Look at me, are you okay?"

Your lips trembled, but you nodded.

He exhaled in shaky relief. His forehead had a small gash, bleeding into his eyebrow, but he was alert. Breathing.

"I'm fine," you whispered, touching his face. "You... you're bleeding."

He gave a strained laugh. "You should see the other guy."

You let out a sob that was half a laugh, half terror. Outside, the driver of the other car was already stepping out, waving, checking his own vehicle. No one was badly hurt. It was a scrape, a scare, not a tragedy.

But to you, it felt like an echo. Like lightning returning to the same scar in the ground. Your fingers trembled as you unbuckled your seatbelt. Jungkook looked at you, and for a second, neither of you moved.

"God, I thought..."

Your fingers trembled against his jacket, clutching him like you might lose him again. And maybe it was nothing. Just a fender-bender, but something inside you had shifted. A pressure in your chest, the sound of his voice, the flash of memory, your fingers curled around his wrist, and for a split second, you remembered.

A birthday.

Candles.

His laugh in the dark.

His hand brushing your cheek.

A yellow plastic ring.

It was small, barely a second, but it hit you so hard you flinched.

Jungkook caught the look in your eyes.

"What is it?" he asked, still breathless.

You shook your head slowly. "I... I think I remembered something."

He paused.

You closed your eyes.

"I think... you asked me to marry you once."

Jungkook's heart stopped. And then he smiled. A fragile, aching smile, like something inside him had cracked open.

"You said no," he whispered. "And then you made me ask again with a yellow plastic ring."

Your hand trembled over your heart. The ring in the drawer, the one that made you cry without knowing why.

You looked at him again, really looked, and for the first time, he didn't feel like a stranger.

After a few months, spring returned to the city in full bloom -and so, in your own way, did you.

After the second accident, everything shifted.

You didn't lose any more memories that night. If anything, something inside you cracked open, like a door that had always been there, waiting to be found. After that, you worked harder than ever. Not just because you wanted your memory back, but because he never stopped fighting for you, even when you didn't feel like the same person he loved.

You dove into it: the photographs, the journals, the smell of his cologne on your pillow, the comic sketches you once hid inside an old shoe box. The coffee shop, the places you used to go, the food he said you hated, but you found yourself ordering just to see.

Little by little, pieces returned.

Not all of them. You still forgot some dates. You still couldn't remember why Yoongi always called you "Captain," or what made Taehyung cry-laugh the first time you met. But the important things? You held onto those with everything you had.

You remembered how Jungkook's hand fit at the small of your back, the way he used to hum when he thought you were asleep, the soft way he'd whisper your name when he was half-asleep and needed to make sure you were still there.

And now, months later, you were there.

The bar buzzed with warmth and celebration, full of your friends, full of light. Outside, fairy lights glittered across the rooftop. Someone had already smashed the cake. There was a karaoke battle happening in the corner. Jin had taken over the music, and Jimin was trying to get everyone to pose under a banner that said you were celebrating the publication of your comics.

Your first printed volume. A comic book. A real one.

And even though you smiled at everyone and thanked them with full sincerity, there was only one person you were truly looking for in the crowd.

You spotted him on the couch near the edge of the room, nursing a drink. White shirt, rolled sleeves, his chain catching the light. He looked impossibly soft in the chaos, like a quiet moment wrapped in a person.

He was watching you, eyes half-lidded, that little smirk on his lips he didn't even realize he had when he looked at you.

You didn't overthink it. You just walked across the room, climbed right into his lap like you'd done a hundred times before, and leaned in close, so close your breath hit his ear. "Don't think I forgot the first night you let me draw you naked."

He choked.

You could feel the sharp inhale beneath your palms as his hands gripped your waist, stunned. "What... what did you just say?"

You pulled back slowly, watching his face twist with disbelief.

"Bedroom floor," you said. "You were freezing but you wouldn't move until I got the curve of your shoulder right. You were so dramatic."

His eyes filled with something raw.

"No one else knew that," he said hoarsely.

You shrugged softly, nose brushing his. "I told you I'd come back to you. I'm not all the way there yet, but I'm close. I feel it."

He stared at you like you were the answer to every prayer he'd never spoken out loud. Like you were a miracle wearing your own skin.

And then he kissed you.

There, in the middle of the rooftop, with music in the background and your friends around you and the stars blinking quietly above, he kissed you like the world had finally come back into focus.

"You remembered the sketch," he whispered against your mouth.

You smiled. "I remembered you."

And as his arms wrapped around your waist, holding you as if afraid to blink, you knew one thing for sure:

You weren't just returning to your old self, you were becoming more, you were rewriting everything with love in your hands.

The apartment was quiet, washed in golden lamplight and the soft shuffle of sheets.

You sat cross-legged on the bed, sketchbook in your lap, pencil smudged between your fingers. Jungkook lay beside you, one arm bent under his head, the other lazily tracing patterns along your thigh, like he couldn't stand to stop touching you, even for a second.

"Is that me again?" he asked, voice low and a little sleepy.

You smiled, not looking up. "No. It's us."

He shifted, propping himself up on one elbow to peek. The page showed a messy panel -your typical style- drawn in soft graphite. Two figures sitting in bed, one sketching, one watching. Simple. Intimate.

"I look good," he said, grinning.

You rolled your eyes. "You always say that."

"Because it's always true." he leaned in, brushing his lips over your shoulder. "But also... because you draw me the way you see me. And that version of me? That's my favorite."

You paused, pencil hovering mid-air.

Then, quietly: "I think I'm happy again."

His smile faded into something softer. "Yeah?"

You nodded. "Not just because I remember things now. But because I feel like myself again. Like... we're back. But not just back... better."

Jungkook turned onto his side, pulling you into his arms until your cheek rested against his chest. His heartbeat was steady beneath your ear.

"You know," he whispered, "you could forget everything all over again, and I'd still find my way back to you."

You pulled back slightly to meet his eyes. "You don't have to."

"I know." he kissed your forehead. "But I would."

The sketchbook slipped from your lap, forgotten. The city murmured outside the windows, but inside -here, in this room, in his arms- you had everything you needed.

You curled into him, your breathing syncing with his. And as the night folded around you like a favorite page in a well-loved book, you knew you'd never forget this feeling again.

Home.

Him.

You.

616 notes · View notes

thatdeadaquarius · 2 years ago

Note

About your language brainrot. I see your "Reader's writing can't match tyvat's long and flowery writing" and bring you "Tyvat isn't used to books over 50 pages long so a short story to the Reader is a whole dictionary to tyvat readers".

Seriously, have you seen how thin the books are? They don't wrote novels, they write short chapters formatted in the way really old stories are. As in, summarizing all the events down into one smooth story then adding a few quotes. Fanfiction writers are insane. They will willingly sit down and write hundreds of words at a time. To them, a proper modern day story of maybe, oh 10k words or so, would probably be like the Oddessy itself.

If we were to combine the two headcanons. It would end up as many historians being intimidated by this insanely long written scripture in the language of the forgotten.

I'm going to take this a step further and say that if the creator asked some people to proofread their things, it would establish a hiarchy of who is able to actually finish the book the creator read and who isn't.

NOW THIS, THIS IS MY FUCKING JAMMMM

I'm so sorry this is so old!! u probably all know this by this point that I've really slowed down as the year has gone on, but I graduated university and then got my first job so its been pretty crazy!

Sun: Reader (you/they/them)

Orbit: Headcanons-ish

Stars: dash of all the book/nerds of Genshin, heavy on Sumeru?

Comets & Meteors: Content Warnings: Cussing, 16+ Mature Audiences, Spoliers for Sumeru Archon Quests/Scaramouche, & Trigger Warnings: mention of shipping/characters shipping themselves with you.

Comment if any missed, please.

☆

FULL STOP.

THE AKADEMIYA, FONTAINE RESEARCH INSTITUTE, HAVE BEEN WAITTTINNGGGG ON YOUR ASS LMAO

You fall from the fucking sky like a 5 star, or pop out of the Irminsul or whatever

and immediately are mobbed by scholars. LMAO jkjk (not really, bc that's what it’d feel like)

can you even imagine the dread older stories(”the classics” to them), that was instilled in the poor students around Teyvat??

id like to think ur works are the most preserved over the thousands of years of Teyvat archeologists excavating them, in comparison to other authors (teyvat just likes you more, suck it William Shakespeare)

also, bc I cant resist language differences/world building I'm sorryyyy 😭 😭

the vocab of Genshin lang vs. ours, has significantly less vocabulary like their actual dictionary is 1/3 the size of ours type of energy

(Omfg all ur fanfics being considered like insanely long realistic romantic classics or tragedies like Jane Austen-level, and only the richest and biggest play companies put on plays about ur stories bc the script goes on for hours)

(ur plays only get put on for rlly big events bc of this, like Lantern Rite or like a Summer/Winter festival/your birthday, which is, yes, an international holiday)

dude the sheer power move of anything you’ve written being essentially “Journey of the West” to them, like Damnnn.

endless like adaptations, plays, Teyvat-short stories condensing it, (THEIR OWN FANFICTION ABOUT UR STORIES)

the power is, in fact, going to your head every time another scholar both deflates at how long ur stuff is, but also lights up bc they get to read it

speaking of scholars… you know who snatched you up first. you know. you don’t even need to read the next line.

Alhaitham.

sneaky bastard he is, absolutely manipulated, mansplained (and manwhored bc he knows he’s handsome, cheeky little shit) his way into getting you to sit down with him and interview you about both translating other classics, your own, giving your own analysis of others works and ur own, and picking ur brain apart of how/why you wrote urs, etc. its fucking endless,

Kaveh had to come rescue you bc u were starving to death after getting stuck with the Haravatat scholar in his office for nearly 7 hours of interrogation discussion about literature

and Alhaitham wasn't even nearly done, he’d informed you as you left that he already had another appointment for later conversation scheduled (how?? you don't even know ur own schedule??? you have a schedule???) and was looking forward to more of your “creative and enlightening input” :)))

(you’re never going to escape him, not even Nahida herself can save you from his stubborn ass)

On another note, Xingqiu is quaking when you agree to autograph his copy of your stories (of which he has all hard covers of the first edition translations)

Zhongli/Rex Lapis is known for having a near-lifelong passion for searching for your works specifically, and learning how to translate them better into Teyvatian vernacular

like the same way he can absolutely speak on Rex Lapis facts/rocks/adepti info, is the same confidence he speaks about knowing ur work lol

(yes he did also ask for several autographs and another sit-down talk about the works, tho a lot more sneaky then Alhaitham bc he just casually gets u guys into it during dinner)

Barbatos/Venti has written some of the most famous songs based on your stuff, he has his favorites too,

but he always claims the best songs are any that have been written in the story, like either when a character sings something, or there are like quotes from songs ur fanfics are based on lol

(he also demanded to hear what they actually sound like from you, yes, you have to sing them for him lol)

Venti also can surprisingly drunkenly ramble the entirety of at least one of ur stories, like, word for word lmao

(Diluc gave in and did give him a drink on the house for that one, just once, Venti doesn’t remember it lol)

(I forgot to mention, u guys still speak the same language, just like, different versions of it)

ur works being one of the few things all the Archons can freely talk about with each other, like it’s neutral ground bc they’re all fangirling about it lmao

Furina and Neuvillette have had like,, fierce debates over the decades about character dynamics and the general drama of ur stories, they’ve gotten into it enough they’ve stopped talking to each other for a couple days a few times lol

Albedo, Sucrose, Kokomi, Yae Miko, Ei, Raiden, have read every single work they’re gotten their hands on in Teyvat (it took them like a literal year or longer)

Albedo drew you fanart for every single story, bc he’s hyperfixated on everything related to you ngl,

Kokomi had commissioned smaller pocket versions of ur works (which later got popular thanks to Yae Miko) both the OG and the Teyvat shortened versions

THE HARBINGERS ARE THE MOST DOWN BAD LMAO

Childe has literally tried to recreate battle scenes from ur works lmao

and gets especially riled up about fighting someone who resembles any characters from them (esp villains, what a cutie)

You cannot fathom the amount of research throughout Teyvat that has been secretly or indirectly funded by Pantalone/Tsaritsa

from the experts to analyze them, to funding play companies to act them out, to actually excavating places to get more of ur stuff unearthed

(the Harbingers absolutely are the first group of people that got to read several of ur stories first bc of this, like the world’s most exclusive secret book club lol)

Scaramouche used to clown on Childe all the time about how he was too impatient to even “sit down and read the King’s classics”, and he was downright insufferable when he found out about Tartaglia’s habit of recreating battle scenes/that being what motivated him to fight sometimes lol

that being said, Wanderer surprisingly never forgot ur stories.

Even when his memories were wiped for a bit, he found comfort in these fantastical epics still sticking around, even when his old names did not

(he mayyyy or mayyy nottt have secretly namedhimselfafteroneofthetragicprotagonistsherelatesto- )

oh btw, Nahida also found joy and comfort in ur stories when she was trapped, they also helped her literally grow as a person bc she had ur stories to help her sort of process the world/what life was like outside of her dreaming prison 🥺💔❤️‍🩹

◇

OMFG

ANYWAY FULL TONE SHIFT LMFAO-

the ABSOLUTE SPIRAL-RED-STRING-CONSPIRACY-THEORY-BOARD ENERGY IF THIS WAS A BLUNT LANGUAGE AU LMAOOOO

like specifically how Teyvatians like to give all the context ever thru their words, but older deities/beings like you just do simple phrases that can have deeper meanings (whereas teyvat just explains all the meanings behind their words)

STOP there’s like an official display at the Akademiya and Fontaine Institute of red string theory boards 😭😭 (look what you’ve done to themmm LMAO)

for like every story of urs, INCLUDING THE FANFICS STOP

IMAGINE THE SHIPPING WARS IF U EVER WROTE ONE THAT WASNT EXPLICIT OR LIKE ONE OF THE MAIN ROMANTIC INTERESTS HAD CHEMISTRY WITH OTHER CHARACTERS HAHAHAHAA

that's actually what Akademiya scholars argue about the most viciously, it’s like politics you can’t just bring up ships from ur stories casually in regular convos 💀

(poor Cyno has to deal with a shipping war once a year bc someone always makes the mistake of reading ur work for the first time (without being told to not talk to others abt ships lol) and it starts an all out brawl in the cafeteria every time LMAO)

Also yes.

Cyno is a fanboy.

(he has read Creator x Reader-insert fanfiction.)

(As have most of the characters mentioned, and those not lol)

…

(I'm gonna make a whole Creator x reader fanfic post one day i stg lmao)

☆

an iced coffee? for me?? :0

ok but real talk…

wtf do you guys wanna see for new years!!

i didn't do a inktober/october days thingy bc i felt too unprepared (and bc id wanted to post that 1000+ followers eldritch au for Halloween)

but now i kinda wanna, at least for a few days :o

ill post a poll in a minute, so check it out!! but still, please feel free to comment some ideas here! :)

Safe Travels Deafening Dreamer,

💀♒

If you wanna join a taglist, DM me what for! "Pspspsss, please tag me for [All SAGAU posts, Only SAGAU Language AUs, diff fandom, etc.]!"

(If you ever wanna drop, just DM me! "No more taglists/[specifically this AU/fandom] please!")

♡the beloveds♡

@karmawonders / @0rah-s / @randomnatics / @glxssynarvi / @nexylaza / @genshin-impacts-me / @wholesomey-artist / @thedevioussmirk / @the-dumber-scaramouche / @chocogi / @fallen-starr / @areaderofbooks / @devilangel657 / @esthelily

3K notes · View notes

doctorho · 6 months ago

Text

dripping velvet, purring dark

Academy era Viktor x fem! curvy reader, 4.5k, no warnings only love in this house (ok there is a conversation about some people being idiots which can be interpreted as the reader getting unwanted attention at a party but it's nothing graphic or anything i promise and no-one is mean to her) also i made viktor horny and slightly subby because that's what the gremlins in my brain wanted. you're welcome. yeah! hi! not sure what this is, but here you go. the reader is described as she/her here (and curvy, and soft, and she is wearing an evening gown, because i wanted to think about pretty dresses). idk. have a thing. happy friday.

Viktor likes to think of himself as a person who's usually capable of focusing on things pretty well. On the task at hand. Give him a faulty circuit and he'll poke at it long enough to find the broken component, no problem. An error in the calculations? He'll find that missing minus sign or forgotten exponent, easy. He'll strip a wire in his sleep.

The task at hand now, though? The problem?

He had to sit through a whole evening of presentations at the academy end-of-year party, put on a polite face for the investors, and pretend not to care that one idiot after another was lining up to flirt with you while he was watching from the sidelines. You were wearing a dress that felt sinful to look at, and there was something primitive gnawing at the inside of his chest begging to be let out, and he had to just stand there and nod through the conversations, pretend he wasn't slowly boiling from the inside out.

And he was failing miserably.

He’d known he was in trouble from the moment he saw you that night – all expensive fabric covering smooth curves and soft-looking skin, sparkling eyes and easy smiles, and he’d been done for. Before this, it’d been much easier to compartmentalize his feelings; before this, it'd been easier to ignore them.

Before he’d kept his distance, emotionally and physically speaking, because, well, it’d been easier. He'd seen you around the Academy, all bubbling laughs and raw-honest radiant smiles and confident solutions, and he'd known that you looked…appealing, but he wasn't in the habit of holding up any illusions about what you might think of him in return. His place was in the dark dusty corner of the lab, turning over the ever-ticking problems, while you were out there shining like the sun. And sometimes you came by the lab, with new ideas or suggestions or just to borrow some equipment or ask about a shipment, and he had resigned to his role of staying at his desk pretending he wasn't burning to be closer to your orbit.

But when he sees you in the low lighting of the party, leaning to the bar and laughing, something just breaks in him. And then he can’t pretend to ignore it any longer. And sure, maybe he’s a little bit drunk, it was easier to stand these events that way, but it still feels like a solid-honest truth in his bones that he wanted to get closer to you, and suddenly he couldn’t stand the conversation he was in the middle of. Because one of them – the sour idiots he’d catalogued in his head for the whole night, the stupid people trying to impress you with their embellished stories and inherited wealth who weren’t worth your time – one of them was circling you like a hyena again, smiling.

You were wearing a dark, floor-length gown that wasn’t, on a purely technical level, much different from what about 50% of the other guests were wearing. However, it seemed to create a significant caveat that even though there wasn’t anything indecent in the dress itself, seeing it on you made him feel like maybe he shouldn’t look at you for too long or he might spontaneously combust. There was a slit on the side that revealed a more than generous amount of leg when you walked, and his focus kept wandering from that to your silhouette, the soft curve of your hips, your chest, your face – no, that’s worse, don’t stare, she'll notice – and truly, he had to force himself to keep his eyes at least vaguely on the vicinity of the person who was currently talking to him. Something about statistics and return investment. Yes.

He nods, pretending to look interested.

The dress drapes over your hips in soft little cascades, the fabric shimmering lightly as you moved, and something in his brain was itching, begging to run his fingers over it, to know what it feels like, to know what you feel like under it, all soft and warm and pliable under his fingers, and preferably sighing something into the crook of his neck, and–

“We'd like to get our investment back within a year,” the guy that's talking to him says – Viktor can't even remember his name, and he doesn’t really even care – and he just shifts his eyes back to the guy slowly.

“A year?” he repeats, with the barest amount of feigned interest, and the guy goes off in a whole new tangent. Viktor shifts his posture, and lets his eyes glide over to where you were again.

One of those idiots, one he thankfully doesn’t have the displeasure of knowing personally but who must be the son of some crooked diplomat, says something to you and you scoff through a smile, roll your eyes, and lean further into the counter at the bar. Viktor has to pretend to be present for his own conversation – yes, the new coating material for the wires was more heat-resistant, no, there was still the issue of mechanical stress, they were working on it – and you say something in answer to the current idiot (third of the night, he’d counted), and it is killing him that he doesn’t know what it is.

You’d turned down the first two, from what he could tell. But this latest idiot was still talking to you, like he was in any way entitled to your company. And it's making something inside Viktor raise its hackles, and he doesn’t especially like feeling like that, because he couldn't justify feeling like that to himself in any tangible way, and then it all just boiled down to a resigned even if she deserves better than that i have no business dictating that for her.

He's just about to focus on the conversation he was supposedly participating in again when something happens. He can't make out the details, but imbecile number three seems to lean way too close to you, says something, and smiles in a way that makes something cold creep down the back of Viktor's neck. And your expression coldens, too, and you say something to him, and turn away, more rigid than you'd been the whole evening.

“Excuse me,” Viktor is saying to the Investment Guy before he can fully think it through, his own voice feeling distant in his ears, and then he's walking to the bar.

You're alone – the idiot had had the sense to leave you alone quickly, at least. That's good. Viktor isn't sure what he's doing, but then he's leaning to the bar next to you and ordering another drink and trying to look like he isn't thinking too hard about what to do next.

“Whatever he just proposed to you,” Viktor says slowly, looking over the bar instead of directly at you, “I assure you you can do better.”

He can hear you take a deep breath, shift a little, and sigh it out with what sounded like almost a laugh.

“Yeah,” you agree, “I don't know what it is about people like that that makes them think they can just…” You sigh again, and make a hand gesture towards the room. ”You know.”

“Unfortunately,” he answers, resigned, “yes. I do.”

He gets his drink and thanks the bartender, and then leans to the counter too, mimicking your posture, holding the drink and letting it swirl around in his glass. “Have you talked with anyone actually worth your time tonight?”

You hmm. Then, “there was a little girl earlier that told me some fascinating things about insect metamorphosis.” You say casually.

And Viktor laughs. Without meaning to, he laughs, and you smile in response, visibly relaxing a little.

“I don't think she was on the guest list though.” You continue.

He hums in response, and rearranges his grip on the handle of his cane. “Sounds much more interesting than the conversations I've been in tonight.”

“I know,” you answer, and he can hear the smile in your voice, “you think we could swap out one of the main speakers with her?”

He hmms again, looking over the stage thoughtfully. “I think it would count as a public service,” he nods a little, considering the list of speakers yet to come, “what do you think, who'd be a good target?”

You shift in your place, looking over the same list of speakers, plastered over the walls on both sides of the stage. “The financial talk,” you answer, “Mr. Ross. I'd much rather listen to insect facts than another boring talk about investing.”

Viktor nods. “You distract him, I'll whack him unconscious?” he offers, and you laugh. You laugh, and it warms something in him.

“And then what?” you continue, still smiling, and he has to look away to keep his composure.

He shrugs. “Eh,” he answers, “we drag him to a bathtub somewhere and act like he just passed out there?" He shrugs, "I happen to know three ways to get out of this room that I'm pretty sure we could use unnoticed.”

“Uh-huh,” you answer, “and then we just find the girl and ask her if she wants to talk about bugs for half an hour. Easy.”

“Exactly,” he agrees, “and then we congratulate ourselves for making the evening better for everybody.”

"Except maybe Mr. Ross."

"No," he counters, looking over the crowd, "I think he would prefer a nice little nap. Surely not even he wants to hear himself talk all the time." He takes a sip of his drink, "and I think waking up in a bathtub would be a nice change of pace to the rumors of other places he seems to have a habit of waking up in after events such as these."

“Good point,” you shift in your place, settling to lean to the counter a bit closer to him. “Perfect plan. But why'd you get to whack him unconscious and not me?”

Viktor blinks. Lifts one eyebrow. “Because you are by far more distracting than I am,” he answers, “and I thought the plan could use the distraction.”

“I don't think that's true,” you answer, “I think you're plenty distracting on your own.”

Now, he lets himself look at you. Really, properly look at you, and not even half-trying to hide it. You're smiling now, shoulders relaxed, holding your drink with fingers wrapped loosely around it, and in the warm lights of the bar there's a golden glow on your skin, and something breathless at the bottom of his stomach is aching to get closer to you, to touch you, to see if his hand would fit on your waist as well as he thinks it would, to see how you would react to that, if he could make you smile in a different way, what sounds he could get you to make for him–

“Agree to disagree,” he says, averts his eyes, and takes a sip of his drink.

Tries to tell that wild-hungry purring thing in him to behave.

Someone reasonable comes to talk to you – and it's about work, which is…something, probably, he has to stop himself from thinking it's better than those earlier idiots, because who's he to decide that for you? He gives you a casual wave and a nod as you depart with a smile and get swept up in the conversation about new ideas and solutions and this-new-thing you've been looking at. And he watches as you start talking excitedly, all golden and glittering, easy conversation and confident smiles, and quietly (not-so quietly) he concludes that maybe you hadn't had many worthwhile conversations with any of the guests that night because you were the most worthwhile person in there to talk to.

He stays there sipping his drink and wondering what would be the closest appropriate time to slip out. He'd made an appearance, and technically nothing could be expected from him beyond that point. Sure, Jayce might tell him he could've stayed a bit longer, he could use the support, but nothing dramatic would happen.

The party drones on, and he makes no effort to move – and really, he tries not to think about it too much, but that was at least in part because he wanted to keep looking at you. He promptly ignores this, even when you're laughing at something someone else said and that heavy-dark-purring something at the bottom of his stomach doesn't like it very much.

Someone comes to ask for his opinion on something, and with a tiny sigh, he lets them pull him into the loop of conversations again. Yes, we are trying to simplify the design, no we can't cut back from the materials, they are what they are for a reason.

Somewhere around his third ‘Why would you think that?’ of that particular conversation, he's had enough. People were stupid, and he's had enough. He's just trying to come up with ways to get out of the conversation preferably without starting a scandal of some sort, when he feels a gentle hand on his shoulder. He turns around to look at who it belongs to, and then everything in his head is quiet for a moment.

“Hey,” you say, smiling, “sorry to interrupt, but can I steal you away for a moment?” you ask, slipping your hand feather-light down his arm, and he has to suppress a shiver.

Viktor furrows his brows and opens his mouth, and then, like an idiot, says nothing. But he turns to leave, thankful for the window of opportunity.

“You remember that thing we talked about before?” you continue as you steer him away from the earlier group smoothly, “I found someone who's interested in those three escape routes you had up your sleeve.”

“Who?” he asks, because that's the only thing he can think of. You've linked your arm with his, and you're leaning on him, and you're soft and warm and you smell good, and he doesn’t trust his ability to form a full sentence.

“Me,” you answer, “and judging by how you just looked out there,” you continue, “you.”

Viktor swallows, and something in him purrs at the idea.

“This way,” he says, nodding towards an old stage exit, and honestly, he doesn’t even care why you want to leave, he's just grateful for the distraction and the company and drinking in every warm square inch of skin contact that you're willing to give him, even if it is just walking with your shoulder pressed against his.

If it turned out to be a plot where you actually wanted to whack someone unconscious, he'd worry about that later. For now he was just happy to leave, and happier that you were leaving with him.

It's easy to slip away from the crowd, and into the space between the stage curtain and the wall, if you know where you're going. You effortlessly fall a bit further from his side but keep his hand on yours, letting him pull you along, and quietly he wonders how and why and holy shit. He decides not to question it though, and keeps walking through the dim space between the cold old wall and the cascades of warm heavy velvet curtains.

“Do you want to leave the party,” he asks, voice quiet now that the background buzz of people was muffled by the curtain, “or just get away from it?”

You hmm behind him, clearly through a smile, and he makes the mistake of looking back at you. Surrounded by the dark red velvet curtains and only slivers of light from each side, his head – and the rest of his body – get entirely the wrong idea of what you're doing in there, because you look like a goddess in the small dim space, and he might crumble into ashes if he keeps looking at you, or he might do something stupid like pull you closer and press you into the wall, to see if your eyes would widen, if you'd gasp from the cold wall, if he could find other ways to make you gasp–

so he turns his eyes away and keeps talking.

He quickly finds he has to clear his throat before he can do that. “There is a staff entrance that goes past the kitchen a little ways further,” he says, and motions forwards, “or there is a disused indoor balcony surrounding the stage. You would be able to see the party, but it'd feel…removed.”

You lean closer, close enough that when your voice is muffled by the surrounding velvet, it feels like you're speaking right in his ear, and he has to swallow and remind himself that that's just situational coincidence, nothing more.

“Why do you know so many ways to get out of here?” you ask, “You sneak out a lot?”

“I am a fan of interesting architecture,” he answers, “and not as much a fan of pretentious social gatherings.”

“Fair,” you answer, then lean your chin on his shoulder, and he feels like his spine might spontaneously melt. “In your expertise, what would you recommend?”

“Well,” he says, trying to make it sound casual and like he wasn't breathless at all, “I think the balcony has some fairly interesting architecture.” And the lights of the party would look pretty from there. And you'd both get a breather away from the crowd. And he'd get to keep talking to you a little bit longer. And, as selfish as the thought felt, he couldn't deny it; he'd get to keep having you to himself for a little bit longer.

“Show me the balcony,” you smile, and he obliges. Happily, he obliges. So he pulls you into a narrow staircase, and then, up.

At the end of it there is a room that could, only by technical definition alone, be called a balcony – it was more like a hole carved into the wall, having at some point been used for seating or equipment space at events and concerts, and now just served as half-forgotten extra storage. It had, he supposed, once upon a time looked like the banquet hall did, all smooth surfaces and warm lights and thematically switched-out decorations, but now it was mostly the standard red velvet and dark wood and light marble, forgotten by the party and some of the golden light from the hall spilling into it by pure coincidence. There were velvet curtains on each side of the room, and you drop his hand to go look over the railing, and down at the party.

His hand instantly feels cold without yours in it, but he tries his best to ignore this, and follows you to look down at the party, too.

It looks much smaller from up there. Less chaotic.

“I didn't know there was a space like this here.” You say quietly, “can they see us?”

“Part of the design,” he answers, “you're not supposed to notice these spaces unless people want you to. Good place to hide extra orchestra pieces and make it feel like the sound is coming from nowhere. And–” he looks over at the people, colorful and mingling, “no, they can't. Not unless you want them to.” Then, he smiles, just a little. “But they'll be able to hear us, if we direct our voices upwards and wait for things to quiet down there first.”

You turn to look at him.

“Sloped ceilings,” he explains with a shrug, “again, good for a hidden orchestra accompaniment.”

“But they can't hear us talking?*

“Not over themselves,” he answers, “ironic, I know.”

You hum thoughtfully and turn around, with your back to the railing, and then you look at him and he needs to kick his brain back in line. You were gorgeous in the dim lighting, all relaxed and smiling, and–

He grips the handle of his cane a little tighter.

“Good,” you say, and the way you say it – all quiet and warm and liquid – makes something in him purr again, entirely against his better judgement.

“Why is it good?” he asks, because he has to hold on to some semblance of logic here, because otherwise he might just vaporize out into the atmosphere.

“Why do you think?” you ask, slowly turning to face him, and oh that just isn't fair. You're just there, just a warm breath of space away, all soft and pretty and languid–

He doesn’t know what to say, so he goes with what feels like the safest course of action.

“In case we want to plot any more ways to violently derail the evening's program?”

You exhale a small laugh and lean back.

And then you lift a hand on his chest, and he's pretty sure his heart might be overheating soon.

“Sure,” you answer, “that.” You inch closer, and Viktor is having a hard time remembering how to breathe. “Or anything else we might not want them overhearing.”

“Like?” He exhales, careful not to break the moment, and then you smile, warm and private and for him, and his insides liquify into warm, honey-thick goo, and oh, he’s not going to recover from this.

“Like,” you repeat slowly, and then you push yourself away from the balcony railing, just slightly, into the side of the wall covered by the velvet curtain, and he lets you pull him with you, he's not stupid. His brain – along with the rest of his body – might be in the process of actively melting, but he's not stupid. If you wanted to pull him into a shadowed, velvet-covered corner, he would follow no questions asked, especially on a night like this when his insides were buzzing and you looked like that. When you looked at him like that. You smile again, and stop moving when your back hits a wall, and then you pull him just close enough to whisper into his ear. “...Anything else we might not want them overhearing.” you repeat, and, yeah, Viktor is close to becoming the best documented case of human combustion in recorded history.

In the dim lighting, he searches your eyes into his, and you watch him, waiting, radiating heat between him and the velvet-covered wall. He's not sure why you were acting like this, but all signs were pointing towards you wanting the same thing he did, and he's not sure what he did to get this lucky, but with his every cell buzzing and vibrating and keening over to get closer, he wasn't about to let the opportunity pass.

He wants to ask ‘why me’ or ‘are you sure’ but what comes out is a broken, desperate whisper of a “can I touch you?”, and you answer with a grin and with your fingers tangled to the front of his shirt, pulling him closer.

“Yes,” you breathe, “please.”

And really, he wouldn't have thought it would be so simple, but it's the please that does him in – just one whispered word and his brain short-circuits in an overflowing flash of white-hot need. Need to trigger that again, need to please, and need to finally give in to the pleasure waiting to boil. And then it all comes rushing out; the hunger.

His hands are on your waist in an instant, and his cane clatters to the ground as he leans his weight on you and the wall and for a moment, he has the sense to hope the curtains don't come tumbling down, and they don't, which is good enough for him, because then he can let go of that particular worry and focus solely on finding your lips to his and making the most of every second of this that you're willing to give him.

The sensations hit his brain like flashes of bright light; how soft you are under his fingers, like he'd hoped, the fabric smooth and silky, giving away easily under his touch. How warm you are, warm and breathing in a fluttered little gasp, the dusty old velvet mixing in with your sweet scent, and then when he gets his lips on you–

After that it's just golden-dark-velvet-honey-thick bliss. You breathe out a small sound that drips down his spinal cord and goes straight to the purring pit at the bottom of his stomach, and he swallows it with a hungry, greedy, desperate groan that comes from somewhere deep inside his chest, and his head is swimming with warm and real and soft and for me–

He is happily overloading his brain with this, and he doesn’t even care. He presses closer to you and you exhale another sweet little sound that makes him bare his teeth, and then his lips are on your neck and he doesn’t know anything except that he wants you to keep making those sounds and he likes the way your hands tangle in his hair and tug.

“Tell me what you want,” he mutters to the skin of your neck, pulling you closer by the waist, and absolutely relishing in the way your chest rises and falls with short little pants he can hear you take in and out. In and out, and as he tugs at your waist again, just a bit closer, and drags his teeth against your pulse lightly, one of those exhales turns into a sweet little whine.

He grins against your skin.

He doesn’t waste the time or energy pretending he isn't an absolute mess over you, right now – his own breathing ragged and fast and his heart hammering in his ears, his whole body buzzing with want – but that didn't mean seeing you react that way didn't make him want to purr.

Didn't make his insides heat up with I did that. I got her like this. She made that sound for me. For me. It's mine.

You take a breath, slow and rugged, and then you tug him towards one of the velvet-covered seats. And he moves like he's floating, letting you guide him, because what else is he going to do? You tug him into the seat and he sits on it, gladly, and stays there looking up at you with his eyes wide and only half-lidded and his heart hammering, waiting for more.

You give him another one of those small, private, knowing smiles, your eyes hazy, and then you step to stand right in front of him.

And then you hover over him, just waiting for him to pull you into his lap. He does, because he is selfish and greedy and burning, and he's pretty sure he's going to implode if he doesn’t get that delicious pressure on him soon, and his hand fits your waist perfectly, and then when when you do straddle him, your hips pressing down on his, he whines. He lets out a breathless little whine, he can feel it in the base of his spine, and it makes that hunger in him want more.

“Only the voices directed upwards travel down there, right?” you ask, voice quiet and dripping right into his ear and pooling at the bottom of his stomach.

He swallows. “Yes.”

You hum thoughtfully, and press your body closer to his, all soft and warm and perfect, sinking your lips down to his neck and he shivers, instinctually tilting back his head with a sigh, exposing more of his neck to you.

“Better keep quiet, then.”

#viktor x reader #viktor arcane x reader #viktor x fem!reader #viktor x female reader

551 notes · View notes

sirfrogsworth · 5 months ago

Text

I spent a lot of energy writing a follow up post to the Trump portrait. I explained how the lighting was done and how that sinister effect was achieved. And I theorized why they lit it like that.

I was writing from the perspective that a seasoned professional photographer took the presidential portrait.

But roughly 50% of my post ended up being dead wrong.

It turns out Trump's photographer had never used studio lights before in his life. He was studying a beginner photography course on YouTube to prepare for the shoot. And he had no idea how to place the lights.

In other words, he didn't really know what he was doing.

I don't know why I didn't consider that possibility. Everyone in Trump's orbit is incompetent.

I want that energy back. I'm running on fumes and I was duped by a guy who shined the key light at Trump's hair instead of his face.

I guess the post will just die in the drafts now.

256 notes · View notes

palefacestudentlove · 6 months ago

Text

kintsugi - lewis hamilton

lewis hamilton x reader

summary: it wasn't until an 'almost' happened that lewis realized what kind of love he is fighting for.

In Japanese culture, there is an art form that provides solace with sacred touch. Kintsugi. A broken object is put together again, glued and repaired with gold. A proof of how the deepest wounds and the darkest days have no power in destroying what one chooses to fight for. A story, telling the power of healing that love and care holds. Highlighting the flaws of the object with a golden shine. Unleashing the beauty of the history that every unique piece carries. Kintsugi. A symbol of solace even in the middle of chaos the world offers. The same kind of love we are about to learn from two beautiful souls.

Mercury. The planet that orbits the sun the fastest. Glorious in its game. Beautiful to imagine. This one however, happened faster than Mercury’s game. It raced light and time, painting shame with bold colours on those two fastest elements. Swift. Quick. No longer than a blink. Everything muted the second his car hit the barrier. Everything went silent. As if the world had lost its music and the birds forgot how to sing. And it was suffocating, how the blue sky in its glory appeared mocking that afternoon.

He was smoothly weaving through the pack, making his way to the front as he overtook. One car. Two. Three cars. Majestically painting another masterpiece of his own on the track. A master leading and teaching the pack and the whole world, to engrave a beautiful story, carved by blood, sweat, tears, and respect. It was graceful, the way he danced on the track. Refined and poetic. And like all other dances, this one carried a story too, a plot of its own. One that is about to make the whole world whisper. One that would dull all notes of melody, even the most majestic orchestra. One that would make the dictionary lose its purpose in giving meanings to things. And definitely one that would make one person’s heart stop. Y/N.

Love, on its own, is a cruel game. It'll give you the most unimaginable. Painting a million different shades on the canvas of life. Building a huge tree house for you to lay in, safe from the danger and threat offered by the world below. Unfortunately, like every other thing this world has seen, it carries a darkness too. One second you look away, it'll rip out the carpet from beneath your feet, letting you fall into an endless abyss. Pushing you off the cliff even if your hands are clawing to hold on, to climb back.

Lap 50. A car slammed into the barrier of Turn 7 with a force that shook the whole track. Making every single garage went silent. And when the dust cleared, she saw it. She couldn’t even whisper when the world demanded her to scream. Car number 44. Red flags raised. Safety car and medical car deployed. Little Gracie was kept close to her hip. One hand drawing circles on the little girl’s back. She didn’t have the power to look down, to look into those same brown eyes the little girl inherited. Her gaze was on Bono. Unmoving. The man hasn’t looked at her yet, his hand on his headset. Calling. Asking. Checking.

“Lewis, are you okay?”

Trying to be as calm as possible, as demanded for his job, Bono’s voice broke through. Steady but still noticeably strained. A few seconds passed. Silence. A few more seconds stretched longer, carving an open wound in her chest that grew longer and deeper as the seconds passed. Loneliness tapping a gun to the back of her skull. Waiting to claim its desired bullseye. Every single second that passed, every single murmur, every single whisper, every single turn of head, she was hoping it's to tell her that this was all just a dream. A stupid nightmare she'll wake up from soon. But there’s nothing. Not even the faintest sound of his breath. He’s not hitting the radio button. He’s not moving. In vivid details, complete with their own music, her mind orchestrated every worst case scenario like a finale. Someone will always have to be the first one to leave. This story is a centuries long inevitable fate. No one holds the power to deny it. But even then, her heart begged. No, not yet. Not today. Give us more time, please.

In every single love story the world had witnessed, it always spoke of sacrifice. Things like: I would die for you, I would burn for you. But that wasn't the case with Y/N and Lewis. Never had been, never will be. For these two beating hearts, it has always been different. I would live for you. I want to try, for you. That's how it has always been for them. Y/N is a midnight storm. A dark cloud stood loyally on top of her head, wherever she went. She had long accepted and made peace with that. But Lewis. Oh Lewis. He had shown her and gave her every single reason to live. Teaching her that she deserves way more than just surviving.

So how? How will she find a way to survive this? If Bono turned his head toward her, and told her that they had failed Lewis. That they had failed her, Grace. How will she go through her Sundays at home? Waking up to his side of the bed cold and empty? Eating breakfast alone after sending Grace to school? God, Grace's first day of school without her daddy? Will his chair at her school's sports day be empty too? No one to carve a poetic line along her shoulder with soft kisses while she prepares breakfast? Every single one hitting the harbour in waves. And she's drowning. But Bono called again, more urgent, but still calm. There’s two people waiting inside the garage for Lewis, and he couldn’t, he didn’t even want to imagine how he’s going to face those two if this ends badly.

“Lewis, talk to me mate.”

As if the heavens saw the scenarios her mind orchestrated, a faint whisper of breath went through the radio. Say something. Please.

“Yeah mate, I’m okay. Just… thinking about how I’m going to explain that to Y/N.”

Bono turned toward her and Grace, nodding calmly, exhaling a tension he’s been holding in too. Only after that, she could finally remember how to inhale and exhale. A relief. Like a clueless tiny toddler who just conquered the world with their very first wobbly step. Her hold on Grace was tighter, grounding herself in the safety of her daughter’s hair. Closing her eyes, because fear still lingers at the corner of the garage, and silence still has its hands on her shoulder.

On the screen, the paramedics were rushing to his side as he carefully climbed out of the metal wreckage that no longer has the silhouette of a car. He was walking, but slow. Way too slow through the lens of her eyes as she watched in silence.

Lewis, on the other side of the page, was trying to not lay a single touch on his ribs as he made his way to the medical car. Don’t. She’s watching. His right hand however, raised two fingers shaped like a peace hand sign, before tapping it on the top front of his helmet, where his forehead should be. A sign. A language only him and her understand. A way of saying or showing i’ll be fine or you’ll be fine. She saw it. He knows she’s watching, witnessing. I’m living, Y/N. For you. For us. She turned her attention away, gathering their things, following Anthony who had stood beside her the whole time. Preparing for what would be a painful evening at the hospital, no matter how short or long.

Everything that happened at the hospital was a blur to her. Pale fluorescent lights, murmured conversations with the doctor. Something about bruised ribs and nothing broken but he’ll be sore for a while. The hospital room they were in was too cold. Was it just the temperature playing its part, or the eerie chill in her bones that refused to leave? She didn’t even know. Y/N stood stiff at the corner of his hospital bed, Grace nestled in the crook of her neck, dozing off. Anthony sat on one side of the bed, one hand on Lewis’ thigh as the two men spoke in hushed tones, not wanting to wake Grace up, or pushing Y/N more to the edge of the cliff.

She heard it all, as the words floated freely in the cold air of the room, but her eyes were too focused on the floor. And it’s torturous, how his eyes kept darting to his wife even as he was talking to his dad. Searching, calling, yearning, but her eyes refused to meet him. She couldn't even bring herself to even whisper. When all he wanted at that very moment was for her to scream in his face. Yelling. Telling him how worried she was. Put the blame on him. But she couldn't. Maybe, if she loved him less, her mouth would be able to do its job, spitting words, sentences.

He had so much power over her. One that no one possesses. One that would make even the mightiest knights to lay down their shields on the ground, surrendering in defeat. She gave him that power. Handed it to him in a delicate box, wrapped with a fragile ribbon of love. Anthony’s gentle voice broke her unmoving gaze, offering her to take Grace into his arms, noticing how she hadn’t let go of the little sunshine since they left the track.

“No. She’s fine here. I’m fine.”

Hesitantly, Anthony nodded. Because he understood. She needed Grace in her arms. Not only because the little girl needed her, but also and mainly because she needed something to keep her from breaking down. Something to hold on to, to hide her shaking hands, to silence the trembles in her fingers. What isn't a part of ourselves will never hold the power to disturb us in any way. And maybe, just maybe, that's why all this shit disturbed her so much. Because it's a part of her that the track threatened to silence earlier today. Him. Her Lewis. That's why every tick, every breath, every whisper disturbed her mind so deeply, like a tsunami claiming its dominance through the alley it keeps on swallowing. So when Lewis called her name, she abruptly walked out in a careful manner. Leaving the room without sparing a glance at her husband. Something about wanting to check everything with the nurse before they leave, she said.

The flight home was unbearable. The luxury of the private jet did little to ease the tension. Nothing changed during the car ride home too. Suffocating him harder than his bruised ribs. Her eyes never left the window. Arms and hands hugging and caressing Grace’s back as she fell asleep in her arms. A rare occasion whenever Lewis is present.

His brown eyes however, never left her tired face. Flickering to her every few minutes. His heart further declined, stretching its descent deeper and deeper as the tension in her jaw became apparent to him. The same one his lips had traced a thousand times in between the sheets, in the mornings where he would hug her from behind as she prepared breakfast.

Once the car pulled into the driveway of their house, Y/N immediately got out, carrying Grace inside without waiting for the man who had been waiting to see her eyes, hear her voice. Lewis stayed in the car for a silent few minutes. Weakly, his head fell back against the headrest that felt harder and rougher than the gravel. A long breath was exhaled. Shaky. His tears were pooling in his eyes. This wasn’t how he wanted to come back to her. This wasn’t what he meant every time he promised her to come home safe before every single race.

Come home safe. A phrase that she never missed to whisper in his ears as she hugged him, before every single race. Since the first race she attended after he handed her his heart, body, and soul. A promise. One that he would always reply with a soft I will, before kissing her lips and leaving another one on her forehead.

Time. That’s what she needs right now. So that’s what he gave. When he finally stepped inside the house, he beelined his way straight to their bedroom. She wasn’t there. Probably in Grace’s room. In the kitchen maybe. Anywhere but close to him. Anywhere but in his arms. The shower he took was longer than usual. His body was in pain, but the wound in his heart was the one that digs deeper, through the flesh, deep into the marrow. Marking its territory in his heart with a bold move.

When he came down, the smell of curry hit him. Warm, but still unsettling. She had cooked his favourite dish. As he stepped into the kitchen, she was already placing his plate out. Just one. On his seat at their dining table. For him alone and him only. She’s not eating with me. He hesitated as he sat down, heart clenching. Eyes not meeting her. The soft hum from the kitchen light was the only calming thing in the room. It mingles with the clinks and clatters of the dishes and kitchen appliances as she moves mechanically. Creating a melody he never heard before, hating it as soon as the first note hit.

“Love,” a call to her. Soft and gentle. Even while his hands are clammy, shaking, to reach her skin. Not a single spoonful had gotten into his stomach ever since he sat down.

“Eat, Lewis.”

Even while her heart was breaking, leaving cracks as it declines and descends, she still prepared him dinner. Straightaway once they’re home, not caring about herself not getting even a single beat of rest. Making sure he’s not eating his meds on an empty stomach. But god, he hates how it sounded when that “Lewis” fell out of her soft lips just now. He always loved how his name sounded when she said it. How it sounded when she’s ‘mad’ at him for stealing her chocolates, how it sounded whenever he came up with stupid unhinged ideas, and how it sounded as he slipped in and out of her, pouring himself empty for her.

So he willed himself to finally find her, her eyes. A silent but loud plea.

Look at me please.

She didn’t

Y/N please, look at me. Please.

Again, nothing. But the knife plunged deeper this time. Because this time, he saw it. She was deliberately dancing around the kitchen, keeping her hands and mind busy. Cleaning, rearranging, wiping every single useless thing in the kitchen. Even the ones he had never seen or touched before. And it was so bright and loud. In visions and sounds. How she wasn’t even half as delicate and gentle as she usually was with everything. She’s retreating. He knows she was silently retreating into that one dark place in her beautiful mind. The one place she only pays a visit when the whole world is too much, when she feels like she is not safe. As if not a single corner on this earth is safe for her anymore. Not even in their house. Not even in his arms. She’s not feeling safe. He couldn’t let her retreat and seek shelter there. And he needs her eyes. Hell, he missed them.

“Sweetheart.”

The sweet nickname fell out of his mouth softly, but still stern. Enough to catch her attention, forcing her to slowly turn her tired body around, facing him. The man she almost lost. The man that made her almost lost herself. Finally, that pair of eyes. Those deep beautiful eyes that never failed to draw him in, calming him. Those eyes that hold so many layers he never wanted to stop peeling and discover. Those eyes that made him surrender, leaving him breathless. Finally, those exact same eyes that he fell in love with and still, will always be in love with landed on him. Soft and warm, a gentle kiss from the sunrise, before they shifted in just one swift blink. A cold flame, scolding him, scorching his face, leaving him no place to seek refuge.

But fuck. She’s… beautiful.

“Come here please…”

She sighed, running her hand through her hair, pushing it back. Her hair is getting longer. A beat of silence. Please, come to me. And slowly, very slowly, she walked over to him. Crossing the small physical space between them that felt a thousand miles away emotionally. Once her body was close enough, reachable to him, he reached for her. His hands crawled its way back to one of their homes, her waist. Reminding him what he almost lost today. Tattooing a thought in his mind, about no matter how often his hands had laid there, it would never be enough. He pulled her closer to him, leaving no space in between except for the thin material of her soft blue shirt. His eyes were threatening to cry in relief, when she didn’t even fight him as she claimed her way in between his legs. Weakly, he let go. He let his head fall onto her soft stomach. I should have kissed it longer this morning. Breathing her in, inhaling a deep one. Unbelievably grounding and calming. Her right hand that hung loosely on her side now made its way into the collar of his white t-shirt. A soft caress before softly massaging away the tension in his left shoulder.

Oh gosh. Her touch. Her scent. Her.

It’s still not enough. These weren’t enough. If his body wasn’t sore and screaming in pain, he would have begged her to let him give and pour. He would have been on his knees tracing his favourite path inside her thighs whispering his apologies again and again like a broken record before carrying her into their bedroom. So he moved his hands to her small back, drawing soft and gentle circles against it. She got it. The whole exchange was him talking. It’s him laying down his apologies. It’s him pulling her out of that dark place in her mind, saving her. A knight, even in his low point. It’s him asking her to be with him, right here, right now.

I love you. I need you. Please.

“Eat with me.” “I’m not hu–”

Immediately, he raised his throbbing head. Don’t lie. He was looking her deep in the eyes, silencing her mouth and mind. Staring and reminding her. I know you. Reminding her he knows her. His wife. His last love. His home. The mother of his child. His safest place. He knows that her throat hasn’t swallowed a single drop of water since they left the pale and sickening hospital, let alone touching the tiniest bit of food. Even in this weak and fragile state, he cares. About her, more than himself. So please, let him care and lay down the safety net she needed. Let him catch her like she always does for him without a miss, not even once. Let me take care of you, love.

It’s a losing game, this whole exchange. This whole conversation that they are having only with their eyes. Honest. Open. It’s a game she should have surrendered before she even started playing. He’s patient. Persistent. Always the same strategy. Always the same tactic. Although this time, it took him more and longer to claim the gold medal. She swallowed an empty lump.

He won.

“The food is getting cold.” “Sit down with me then.”

Her hand reached the nearest chair, placing it next to his before sitting down. His eyes never left hers. Not even for a second since they were laid on hers just now. His right hand found a way home to her small back as she started with the food. Gentle circles, ups and downs under her shirt, against her skin as she fed him the first spoonful. Warm. Safe. Soft. She stared at him after the first spoonful, waiting for a reaction. He gave her a soft wholesome smile. It’s delicious.

But her stare lingered, hands unmoving, not preparing for a second one. He stared back, delicately.

She nodded. You’re okay.

He nodded. I’m okay.

She had no strength left to hold it in anymore. The dam had been destroyed. Freeing her tears that were flooding. Her head nestled into the crook of his neck. A lost traveler taking shelter and seeking solace under the shade of an enduring tree canopy. Stopping the downpour of her fears. Letting time pass without a worry. Like Neptune travelling its orbit. His arms wrapped around her. A blanket draped over her trembling figure. Silencing the noise outside. Not forgetting to kiss her long on top of her head. A constant so grounding and reassuring.

He saw it today. It wasn’t the first time. But today, it shone brighter, sang louder, danced bolder, and stood stronger. Her strength. Her trying to keep it all in her together, all alone, for him, for little Grace. But at that moment, he didn’t want her to. He wanted her to lay her fears and worries bare and naked in front of him. He wanted her to feel safe, be safe. Here, in his embrace. The only place where he will give everything to silence her storms, leaving them weakened, lifeless.

His wife. The woman who has a hold of his whole heart. Had fought herself violently today. Baring her teeth to her own emotions. Drowning it down with all her might. All because of an almost. But this moment, right now. Her, safe in the hold of his arms, the fog finally cleared out. Both of them had no hold on perfection. And the world won’t sit still. At any time, at any given moment, it will send down cruel war and games to make them crack. Today however, it became clear as a sky. Bleed if they must, cry if they have to, but neither him or Y/N will ever let go. With her, it’s worth it. With his Y/N. Every crack worth a story to tell.

This is the kind of love Lewis and Y/N fights for. Fractured with cracks at times, but made and built stronger, more historical, more beautiful, through the tears and smiles they pour empty to mend it. Their own piece of Kintsugi.

“You came home.” “For you.”

#lewis hamilton x reader #lewis hamilton imagine #lewis hamilton fanfiction #lewis hamilton oneshot #lewis hamilton fanfic #lewis hamilton fic #lewis hamilton #f1 x you #f1 x reader #f1 imagine #f1 fic #f1 fanfic #Spotify

157 notes · View notes

apod · 7 months ago

Photo

2024 November 29

Messier 4 Image Credit & Copyright: Steve Crouch

Explanation: Messier 4 can be found west of bright red-giant star Antares, alpha star of the constellation Scorpius. M4 itself is only just visible from dark sky locations, even though the globular cluster of 100,000 stars or so is a mere 5,500 light-years away. Still, its proximity to prying telescopic eyes makes it a prime target for astronomical explorations. Recent studies have included Hubble observations of M4's pulsating cepheid variable stars, cooling white dwarf stars, and ancient, pulsar orbiting exoplanet PSR B1620-26 b. This sharp image was captured with a small telescope on planet Earth. At M4's estimated distance it spans about 50 light-years across the core of the globular star cluster.

∞ Source: apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap241129.html

146 notes · View notes

luminafights · 10 months ago

Text

░ 𝐃𝐢𝐫𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐎𝐫𝐛𝐢𝐭: 𝐋𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝟓𝟎 ⠀ 𝐆𝐚𝐦𝐞 𝐕𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝟏.𝟎 ⠀ ① ᴄᴏᴍᴘᴀɴɪᴏɴ: Evol Police Xavier ⠀ ① ᴡᴇᴀᴘᴏɴ: Hunter Firearm ⠀ ② ᴄᴏᴍᴘᴀɴɪᴏɴ: Evol Police Xavier ⠀ ② ᴡᴇᴀᴘᴏɴ: Hunter Claymore

⠀⠀-------------------------------------------

⠀⠀⠀☑ Stella Match⠀⠀☐ Brute Force ⠀⠀⠀☐ Video

⠀⠀-------------------------------------------

No helpful context for these stats sadly, as I never posted them anywhere. Woops!

𝐕𝐢𝐜𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐲── .✦

𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐭𝐬── .✦

𝐍𝐨𝐭𝐞𝐬── .✦

2024-09-11 2:25 PM

No helpful context for these stats sadly, as I never posted them anywhere. Woops! These screenshots were dated March 29, 2024 1:21 AM.

#queue #love and deepspace combat #deepspace trials #light orbit #light orbit 50 #evol police xavier #xavier love and deepspace #hunter firearm #hunter claymore #dark myst #myst #stella match #game version 1 #love and deepspace #lumina fights

5 notes · View notes

sineala · 3 months ago

Note

Hi Sine,

You know comics much better than I do. Where does Bucky and/or Steve reading the Hobbit come from? Is that just fannon or is it from comics?

thanks so much

The short answer is that MCU Bucky has canonically read The Hobbit (as established in the FATWS show), and 616 Steve has canonically been a Tolkien fan since the early Avengers comics. We see him reading the Lord of the Rings trilogy over the course of a recent series.

I brought panels!

The main piece of evidence that 616 Steve is a Tolkien fan is that he explicitly says so. Here in Avengers #46, Pietro has suggested to Steve that they should go to a baseball game and Steve says he'll go as soon as he finishes this chapter of Tolkien. "I always was a sucker for far-out fantasy," he explains.

This image, which is generally the one you will see circulating, is a detail from this larger panel:

The Lord of the Rings novels were originally published in the mid-50s in both the UK and US, but -- as various reference sites will tell you -- they didn't really take off in the US until 1965, when Ace Books published unauthorized paperback editions of the novels, which then meant that Ballantine Books went and put out actual authorized paperback versions, which became massively massively popular, particularly among college students; LotR finally hit the NYT bestseller list in late 1966, a decade after its publication. I mention this because this issue of Avengers, as you can probably guess from the slang, is from 1967, which is when LotR would still have been riding the wave of extreme popularity. IIRC, 1967 is about when Marvel Comics also was starting to get popular among college students (as opposed to children), so it makes sense that they're trying to be cool and culturally-relevant to the college kids. So of course Captain America's going to read far-out fantasy.

(There are references in other comics to Steve clearly liking SF/F books and movies -- like, he reads pulp SF in MA:A -- but this is when we see him reading Tolkien.)

So, as far as I know, for about fifty years, this was the only canon reference to Steve being a Tolkien fan, but then Kurt Busiek's series The Marvels came out in 2021. (This is a twelve-issue series that has nothing to do with the 1994 Busiek & Ross miniseries Marvels. Comics names are just confusing.) If you're familiar with Kurt Busiek's comics writing, you know that he is really into putting comics references into his work. Sure, a lot of comics writers do that, but Busiek in particular does it in such a way that you wouldn't necessarily catch it if you didn't know it was a reference, but if you do, you know exactly why it's there. Like, there's bit at the end of Avengers v3 #1 where the Avengers are being magically teleported; the narrator tells us that the last thing Steve thinks is that Iron Man would hate this. The issue never explains why Steve thinks this. But if you're an Iron Man fan, you know that Tony hates magic; "I hate magic" is, in fact, a statement he has repeatedly made for decades. So if this happened to Tony, he would think "I hate magic." And it makes perfect sense that Steve would know Tony would think this. So a lot of Busiek's work has little canon references like that.

So, yeah, in The Marvels, Steve is very quietly, in the background of the series, reading Tolkien.

In The Marvels #1, we see Steve preparing to make a space-jump from orbit. While he's waiting for the green light, he's reading The Return of the King; he then hands the book to the person next to him and asks them to save his place.

Here's a close-up:

You might at this point wonder if he's still reading this book later in the series. Actually, this particular scene is set -- as the page tells us -- ten days in the future, so the entire rest of The Marvels actually predates this moment. So as we go through the series, we do see that he is actually reading the whole trilogy!

A little later in The Marvels #1, we see Steve and Carol hanging out in a park eating delicious sandwiches:

But check out what Steve is reading:

Yep, it's Fellowship. So here, ten days in the past, Steve is reading the first book. Presumably rereading it; I suspect, given that this is all because of the reference in Avengers #46, that he's supposed to have read it before.

Does he also read The Two Towers, you might ask? He does! Here in The Marvels #5, that's what he's reading:

Close-up:

He blew through the whole trilogy in, like, ten days. While also saving Earth! Go him. That's a pretty quick reread even if you're not saving Earth.

So, yes, 616 Steve is canonically a Tolkien fan, and a fantasy fan in general. Hope that helps.

I don't know if there's any evidence for 616 Bucky being a Tolkien fan, but MCU Bucky, in episode two of The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, has a conversation with Sam in which he references Gandalf; when Sam is surprised that Bucky has heard of Gandalf, Bucky tells him he read The Hobbit in 1937.

As this article points out, this is actually a really weird claim for Bucky to make. While 616 Steve is reading Tolkien in 1967, at the time Tolkien's work became wildly popular in the US -- this was not the situation in 1937. Tolkien was not, at this time, a world-famous fantasy writer; he was a philologist at Oxford, specializing in Anglo-Saxon, and he was a guy who had just published this children's book, The Hobbit. The Hobbit was in fact not published in the US until 1938; 1937 is its original year of publication in the UK, and its first print run was not large. So in order for Bucky to have read it in 1937 in the US, he has to have read an imported copy at some point in the last three months of 1937, since it was only published at the end of September. So make of that what you will. I mean, my guess is that the MCU writers thought it would be a great "gotcha" moment, looked up when The Hobbit was published, and didn't think that hard.

In case you are wondering whether the Tolkien references in The Marvels were inspired by the MCU -- as you can see a Steve & Bucky themed article asserting -- I am pretty sure that Busiek was actually inspired by Avengers #46. The FATWS episode in question was released on March 26, 2021. And while The Marvels #1 was not released until a month after that, on April 28, 2021, The Marvels is actually a series that got pushed way, way back due to the pandemic. The series was originally announced in February 2020, and the announcement included, as a preview, the page of Steve and Carol eating sandwiches in which Steve is clearly reading Tolkien. So this exact page existed over a year before the FATWS release, and was probably created several months before that. So, yeah, despite what clickbait articles will tell you, I don't think Kurt Busiek was making a cute Stucky reference; I think he was being a big ol' Silver Age Avengers nerd.

But, yeah, anyway, 616 Steve has canonically been a Tolkien fan since 1967.

However, some Marvel comics writers don't actually know that. In JMS' recent Cap run, in issue #12, another character makes a LotR reference when Steve hands him a magic ring, and Steve asks if that's from Star Wars:

This is deeply weird, not just because we now have multiple comics supporting that Steve is a Tolkien fan, but also because it asserts that Steve might actually think it was a Star Wars reference. And that's weird because in issue #8, four issues earlier, JMS has written Steve quoting The Empire Strikes Back and saying it's one of his favorite movies:

Even if you accept the idea that Steve isn't a Tolkien fan, because JMS clearly did not know this deep-cut canon reference, Steve would presumably know that this was not part of his favorite movie! His favorite movie that the guy who wrote this very comic has just established as his favorite movie! I just. What. No.

So, yeah, the only way this works at all, I think, is if Steve is just trolling these kids by asking if it's Star Wars. It's one of the several things from this JMS run that are dead to me.

In conclusion, yes, 616 Steve is a Tolkien fan, and MCU Bucky presumably is as well.

#replies #writergamermom

52 notes · View notes

armpirate · 2 months ago

Text

Like We Were || Choi San

pairing: San x fem!reader || Forgotten love

w.c.: 15.6k

Warnings: smut, dirty talk, car sex, protected sex (Minors DNI! Refrain from reading if you're not +18, and ignore if you don't like this type of content), angst

Aprox. time of reading: 40 / 50 minutes

Summary: San's world turned upside down after the accident, but he felt it completely broke the moment he knew about your state. You forgot everything. Him, your relationship, everything you had built together... For a while, he thought letting go would be the best choice. The thought of him turning into a stranger after you two were each other's lives was something hard to handle. But living without you was a worst kind of pain. That was why, he'd help you remember, without you knowing the cute guy that you met at the bar was the person you hugged to sleep every night.

MASTERLIST

The music was loud -some mix of funky beats and synth pop- but San could still hear the soft clink of the ice in your glass from across the bar. You were seated at the far end, alone, just like that first time. Just like before.

You weren't laughing now.

You looked... calm. Pretty. Like nothing was missing.

Except everything was.

You didn't notice him. Not yet.

And just like the first time, some guy, button-down open too far -smile too wide-, saw you sitting there and made his move.

San stiffened, exhaling slowly through his nose.

It was the beginning of everything.

So this had to work.

San felt the sharp stab of something he didn't want to name.

The guy leaned in, too close, and San couldn't stay back anymore. He pushed off the wall and crossed the bar with purpose in his step, heartbeat hammering, sweat pooling at the base of his neck. He rehearsed his lines a thousand times in his head.

Same as before. Same as before. Same as before.

He stopped at your table, resting his hand on the back of your chair like it belonged there.

"Hey, baby," he said, trying to keep it light, teasing. "Sorry I'm late. You didn't wait long, did you?"

You blinked up at him, surprised. The man sitting across from you frowned, shifting in his seat.

"Excuse me?" you said, brows furrowing.

Your voice was soft, unfamiliar even in its familiarity.

San's smile didn't falter. He had practiced it in the mirror, wanting to do it just like that first night. "You know I hate it when you start drinking without me" he gave the other man a polite smile that didn't reach his eyes. "Mind giving us a minute, bro?"

The man looked between you both, clearly annoyed. But you didn't say anything. You just looked at San like he was an inconvenient glitch in your night, not someone your soul used to orbit around.

"Whatever," the guy muttered, grabbing his beer and walking away.

Silence settled between you and San, heavier than the bass vibrating through the walls.

He expected you to be angry, confused. Maybe even impressed like last time. But instead, you stared at him with narrowed eyes and a bemused smile.

"That was... bold," you said, tilting your head. "Do I know you?"

The words punched the air from his lungs like a second car crash.

Those were the words he was so scared to hear when he first knew of your state after the accident.

You in that pub wasn't a coincidence. Not at all.

He chuckled softly, looking down for a second to hide the devastation in his eyes. "Kind of," he murmured. "We've met. Once or twice."

You looked at him for a long beat. Not with recognition. Not with love. But... curiosity.

"Well, if you're going to crash my night, you might as well sit down."

He blinked.

You gestured to the seat across from you, and he moved slowly, cautiously -as if the world might fall apart again if he moved too fast.

He sat.

You sipped your drink, watching him over the rim of your glass. "So... is this a thing you do often? Pretend to be someone's boyfriend to scare off competition?"

San let out a soft laugh, rubbing the back of his neck. "Only when I'm desperate."

There was a pause. You tilted your head. "And are you?"

He met your gaze. For the first time in weeks, you were looking directly at him. Really looking.

His voice was low, gentle. "I lost something important. I'm just trying to find it again."

"Okay, mystery man," you said, tapping your glass against his. "Tell me the story of that thing you're missing, then."

He looked at you, breath catching in his throat. And this time, he let himself hope.

"So?" you asked, lips quirking at the corners. "Are you gonna tell me your name, or are we doing the whole mysterious stranger at the bar thing tonight?"

He smirked.

God, it was exactly like the first time.

"No names," he said smoothly, leaning forward with his elbows on the table. "It ruins the fantasy."

You raised a brow, playing along without thinking. "Oh? And what fantasy is that?"

"The one where you fall in love with me for the night," he replied, not missing a beat. "No expectations. No promises. Just... this."

Your heart skipped, maybe from the way he said it, or maybe from the way he looked at you, like he was seeing more than what was on the surface. It was unnerving, but oddly comforting.

You didn't know him. But something about him felt like déjà vu.

"Hmm," you said, swirling the last of your drink. "Sounds like a line you've used before."

He chuckled under his breath. "Once or twice."

You narrowed your eyes. "Do I look like the kind of girl who falls for strangers in bars?"

"You look like the kind of girl who pretends she doesn't," he said, a hint of challenge in his voice. "Right before she steals the guy's lighter and walks out with his heart."

You laughed before you could stop yourself, and it caught you off guard. It felt... real.

"So you think you've got me all figured out?"

"Not yet," he murmured, gaze softening. "But I'd like to."

The words hung between you like a dare.

You leaned back in your seat, crossing your legs, testing him. "Then why don't you tell me something about yourself? Something small."

He hesitated. Not because he didn't want to, but because every answer he had was yours. Every story he could tell was tied to memories you no longer carried.

So instead, he reached for a lie wrapped in truth.

"I box," he said.

You tilted your head. "Box?"

"That's not true," you said quietly, before your brain caught up with your mouth.

He looked up sharply, for a second, excited about you possibly remembering something. You blinked, confused at yourself. "I mean, you don't look like someone who only has one skill."

A small smile crept across his face. "You think I look talented, huh?"

"I think you look like you think you're talented."

He let out a breathy laugh and pressed a hand to his chest. "Oof. Beautiful and brutal. You really haven't changed."

You froze for a split second.

"What?"

"Nothing," he said quickly, waving it off. "Just... déjà vu."

You stared at him, something prickling at the edge of your mind. That look again. Like he knew you too well for a stranger. Like he was holding a secret in his mouth, keeping it safe.

"Alright, mysterious boxer," you said, sitting up straighter. "If we're doing this no-names thing, then I get to make up your backstory."

He grinned. "Oh yeah?"

"Yeah. Let's see..." you tapped your chin, pretending to study him. "You're probably a spoiled rich kid, dropped out of business school, got into the underground fighting for the thrill."

"Interesting."

"You can drive a car" you continued, "but you ended up with a motorbike because it makes you feel free. You say you hate attention, but you love the way people look at you."

He laughed again, but this one hurt a little. Because it was true. All of it. You were remembering pieces without knowing you were.

"And what about you?" he asked, trying to push through the lump in his throat. "What's your story?"

You looked down at your empty glass, suddenly quiet.

"I don't know yet," you said, half-joking. "Still figuring it out."

He swallowed hard.

"Then let me stick around a little," he said softly. "See how it turns out."

You looked at him, eyes searching. Something pulled inside your chest, like the faint echo of a melody you used to dance to in the dark.

"Okay," you said. "But no names. Just for tonight."

He smiled, genuine, heartbreakingly sweet. "Deal."

And as the bartender slid two more drinks toward your table, San let himself fall into the lie a little deeper. Because if he couldn't make you remember, he'd make you fall in love again.

San had chosen the same quiet little café for your "first date", the place where you'd spent hours sipping overpriced lattes, talking about everything and nothing all at once. He'd kept it simple, just like that night. The table by the window, the soft hum of the city outside, the warm, golden glow of the café lights wrapping around the two of you like a blanket.

It was perfect, or it should have been.

He'd prepared for this moment. Everything was planned. Even the awkwardness that he had to recreate.

But as soon as the waitress dropped off the drinks and San reached for his, he fumbled. His fingers brushed against the edge of the cup, and the entire thing tipped over.

Splash.

The coffee spilled across the table, splashing onto his lap and soaking the front of his white shirt. San pressed his lips together, omitting the huge sigh after he managed to ruin the t-shirt you bought for him.

He went through the same, although this time, it wasn't accidental. He spilled the coffee on purpose and he was wearing the same t-shirt you bought him.

But now, instead of laughing, you stood up, your face immediately flooded with worry.

"Oh my God, San, are you okay?" you reached across the table, instinctively grabbing a napkin, your hands trembling slightly as you dabbed at the wet spots on his shirt.

He watched you, caught between confusion and guilt. This was supposed to be fun. This was supposed to be a game.

"You're supposed to laugh," he said with a nervous chuckle, his tone strained as he shifted awkwardly in his seat. "You always laugh when I do this."

But you didn't laugh. You were too focused on him, on making sure he wasn't hurt.

"San, you're burning up!" you looked down at his shirt and noticed the red splotch from the coffee. The way his face twisted in discomfort made something in your chest tighten.

"I'm fine," he lied, wiping at the coffee stain with his napkin, still trying to brush it off like it was just another part of the act.

You didn't pull back. Instead, you leaned closer, your fingers brushing against his skin as you carefully checked the burn mark, trying to gauge how serious it was.

"Please, let me take a look at it," you said quietly, your voice shaky with worry.

San's chest tightened, and his heart hammered in his ribcage. This wasn't how it was supposed to go. He was supposed to make you remember. He was supposed to recreate the fun, the banter, the way things were before.

But instead, he felt like he was falling apart in front of you.

"Hey, it's really nothing," he insisted, trying to pull away, but your grip tightened.

"No, it's not nothing," you said, your voice softer now, almost as if you were reassuring yourself. "This could leave a scar. What if it gets worse? You're not fine, San."

You met his gaze, your eyes full of something, something close to panic.

"Are you sure you're okay?" you asked again, more insistent now. "Maybe you should go to the hospital and..."

"No," he interrupted, his voice tight. "I'm fine. Really. It's not as bad as it looks."

"I think we need to get you cleaned up," you said, standing up. "Come on. I'm taking you to the restroom."

When you reached the restroom, you immediately pulled paper towels from the dispenser, and as you handed him a few, your fingers brushed his. The smallest touch sent a shiver through his spine.

"You're not making this easy," he muttered, his voice laced with that same nervous humor he'd used to cover his discomfort, but there was no bite to it now. Just a soft, vulnerable edge.

You gave him a smile that didn't quite reach your eyes, but it was warm, and you were still checking him over.

"I know," you said, your voice gentle. "But I need to make sure you're okay, San."

And for the first time since everything had shifted, since the accident, since the loss of memories, San wondered if maybe, just maybe, you were remembering him in a way he could never fully understand.

He was disappointed at first, but not anymore.

The city buzzed quietly around you, muted streetlights casting gold halos across the wet pavement, the air still damp from an earlier drizzle. San walked beside you, his hands tucked into the pockets of his jacket, his shoulder brushing against yours every few steps.

He was quiet.

You were too.

The kind of silence that felt almost sacred. Like something was waiting to happen.

But this time, the orbit felt unfamiliar to you. You didn't recognize the gravity between you. Not logically.

Only emotionally.

There was something there. Something unspoken.

"I'm not gonna ask to come up," he said softly, almost repeating the words he'd used the first time. "That's not how I do things."

You tilted your head. "But you want to come up, don't you?"

A small, surprised smile tugged at his lips. "Yeah. But... Eventually."

"Eventually... That means you're confident on a second date" you teased him.

"I know there will be"

He licked his lips, suddenly nervous.

"I wish I could kiss you right now" he whispered out loud.

And then, softly: "You wish... Is there something stopping you?"

His breath caught.

You were looking at him with new eyes.

And still...

You hadn't pulled away.

So he whispered, "I'm going to kiss you now," and you nodded before he even finished the sentence.

The kiss wasn't like the first time.

It wasn't playful. It wasn't bold.

It was quiet.

Tender.

A question instead of a declaration.

San kissed you like he was saying please remember me, and you kissed him back like you were saying I don't, but I feel you anyway.

And when he finally pulled back -breathless, eyes wide and glassy- you stayed close, your forehead pressing against his, like it was the only place in the world that made sense.

"That didn't feel new," you whispered, your voice soft and trembling. "That felt like... like I've done it a thousand times before."

San let out a broken laugh, one that sounded suspiciously like a choked sob.

"You have," he whispered back. "You have."

And for the first time, he let go of the script. Stopped trying to make you remember by recreating the past.

"I mean, maybe... you dreamed about it" he corrected himself quickly, as soon as he was aware of the confused look.

San sat at the end of the table, eyes fixed on the untouched glass of beer in front of him. The bar was the same. The booth was the same. Even the playlist hadn't changed much, still throwing out old songs that reminded him of shared nights, loud laughter, your hand under the table laced in his.

But this time... your seat was empty.

"You did it?" Wooyoung asked quietly from across the table, voice careful not to trigger whatever thread was barely holding San together. "You brought her here again?"

San didn't respond right away. He dragged a hand through his hair and exhaled slowly, the breath shaky and uneven. "It's where we used to hang out all the time. If there's a chance it triggers something..."

Yunho leaned forward, concern etched into every line of his face. "You can't keep doing this to yourself, man."

"I'm not doing this for me," San said too quickly, then caught himself.

He was. Of course he was.

"She used to sit right there," San muttered, tapping the empty cushion beside him with his knuckle. "She'd steal fries off my plate even though she ordered her own. Called it a 'tax for good company.'"

The group chuckled softly, but no one really smiled.

"She used to kick me under the table when I made bad jokes," San went on, his voice cracking ever so slightly. "And whenever someone flirted with me, she'd hold my hand tighter. Not because she was jealous. Just to remind me she was there. And now..."

He looked up suddenly, eyes rimmed with red.

"She is here," he whispered, "but she's not. She doesn't know she was my everything."

No one spoke. Mingi reached out first, a quiet hand on San's shoulder. Seonghwa slid his beer across the table without a word, just as he had the night San told them you were in the hospital.

"I brought her here last night," San continued, staring ahead like he was talking to someone far away. "Sat in this exact spot. Tried to recreate the night we celebrated her getting that job at the museum. Even told the waiter it was her promotion night again. He just looked at me like I was insane, and I had to tell her it was an excuse to get a discount."

He laughed bitterly.

"She smiled at everyone but me."

Another beat of silence passed.

"Why don't you just tell her?" Yeosang asked quietly. "Tell her who you are. What you were to her."

San shook his head violently, the muscles in his jaw twitching. "Because if she really doesn't remember... then it's not her choice to love me again. It's just pressure. A story she doesn't recognize. She deserves to choose me. Even if it means she doesn't choose me."

His voice broke completely on the last word. No one had seen San cry in years, not like this. Not with his head down, fists clenched, eyes burning with grief that hadn't found closure.

Wooyoung reached across the table and grabbed his hand, squeezing once.

"We'll help you," he said quietly. "Whatever memory you want to bring back, whatever moment you need to recreate next... we've got you. Even if she doesn't remember yet, we do."

San swallowed hard.

His voice was hoarse when he whispered, "The picnic. The one in spring. With the wildflowers."

Yunho blinked. "The one where you both got locked out of the car and had to hitchhike back?"

San gave a weak laugh through the tears. "Yeah. That one."

The friends all exchanged looks.

"God, she teased you for weeks after that," Mingi smiled.

San's eyes turned to the door. "I just need to see her laugh like that again."

San laid the blanket down carefully, pressing the corners with rocks just like he remembered. Every detail had been replicated: the chipped thermos filled with cold brew, the half-burnt cinnamon muffins, the little Bluetooth speaker already playing the playlist he'd made for you back then. Even the weather was working in his favor like the universe just wanted things to work out.

He glanced toward you as you stepped barefoot on the blanket, your shoes left somewhere in the grass. You looked peaceful -curious, but peaceful.

"This is... beautiful," you murmured, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear. "Feels like déjà vu."

San smiled, carefully setting down the sandwiches. "You... I mean, a friend said that exact same thing I brought him here." he lied.

You looked up. "Really?"

"Hmm." he plopped down across from you, legs crossed and heart pounding. "Y.... He also told me I'd probably forget the sunscreen and get a sunburn on just my nose."

You paused. "...Did you?"

He pointed to his nose with a sheepish grin. "Roasted like a marshmallow."

But it wasn't any friend, it was you who warned him, and it was you who started teasing him for looking all red for days.

You hummed along to a song playing through the speaker, one that wasn't particularly popular. San had added it to the playlist on a whim, years ago. You shouldn't have recognized it.

For a moment, it felt like everything was working out. Like he was making a good job on just reliving everything that happened.

But then... the keys.

He was about to whine about the car being locked out, but you stopped him before he could, swinging the keys in your hand up in the air.

San froze, confused about the sound. Confused about the fact that you had picked them up.

"Hey," he said slowly, cautiously, "why'd you grab the keys?"

You blinked, caught off guard. "What?"

"The keys," he repeated, nodding toward your bag. "You took them out of the car."

You hesitated, frowning faintly. "Oh. I don't know. Just... reflex, I guess."

San's chest tightened.

It had been the most ridiculous, uncomfortable, hilarious afternoon of his life.

And now -this time- you had stopped it from happening. Without realizing. Without remembering.

Something in you had changed the outcome.

"Are you okay?" you asked suddenly, your eyes scanning his face.

San quickly shook himself back to the moment, forcing a smile. "Yeah. Yeah, I just... I was kind of looking forward to getting locked out again."

You tilted your head. "Again?"

He grinned, half-teasing, half-choked with emotion. That was the first time you held his hand for more than five seconds without making a joke about his rings. But now that chance was gone.

"I mean... getting locked out. That's it. Not again"

You stared at him, lips parted, like you didn't know whether to laugh or ask questions.

But you didn't ask. Not yet.

Instead, you reached out and grabbed his hand, quietly, gently. No jokes. No teasing. Just fingers threading through his, like you'd done it a hundred times before.

San swallowed hard and looked away, blinking back the sting behind his eyes.

"I really like being around you," you said softly, thumb brushing over his knuckles. "It's strange... but comfortable. Like... like I've missed you, even though I don't know you."

And with that, the tension in his shoulders gave out.

He didn't say anything.

He just nodded, eyes closed, clutching your hand like it was the only tether he had left.

"You don't need to lock us out of the car for us to spend more time together" and there it was, the teasing. "You should just... ask".

San sat in the passenger seat, one leg propped up, his shoulder brushing against yours every time he shifted. Outside, the air had cooled, the windows fogged slightly with your breath and the temperature drop, casting a soft haze over the world beyond.

You were both laughing, genuine and unfiltered.

"I still can't believe you tried to impress your professor with a meme," you giggled, hugging your knees to your chest.

San groaned, burying his face in his hands. "It was intellectual humor. I was ahead of my time!"

You nudged him, and he looked over -smiling, disarmed.

He knew all your stories by heart, he swore he could tell them by himself. But he just loved hearing them from you again.

There was something different in the air now.

The kind of quiet that only comes after hours of sharing too much. The kind where words run out, and the silence doesn't feel awkward. It feels close.

The car had grown dark. Only the faint glow of the overhead light lingered, and the soft ambient music, now long into the playlist's more intimate side, filled the small space with low, lazy beats.

Your gaze lingered on his profile.

You didn't speak as your hand reached for his.

He took it like he always had -with ease, like it was second nature. Like your fingers belonged between his.

"I don't really understand what's happening between us," you whispered, voice barely audible over the music. "But I don't want it to stop."

San's breath caught.

He turned toward you slowly, his expression unreadable for a moment -like he was caught between joy and heartbreak.

"You don't have to understand it," he said softly, "just... stay in it."

You nodded. "Okay."

San sighed against your lips, his hand cradling your face like he was scared you might disappear if he let go. The kiss deepened slowly -lazy, warm, like hours of conversation had been leading to this single moment of surrender.

Good lord, he loved the way you always arched for him.

San cupped your breasts, his thumbs momentarily twirling around your nipples as he leaned down to kiss you again. Your tongues tangled together, and the taste was so intoxicating but pleasant that you could only find yourself holding onto him even tighter.

"It's the first time I like the taste of cigarettes so bad" you admitted out of breath with a smirk.

His lips went back to yours, crashing against your mouth as he dragged you on his lap, arms wrapped around your waist.

I love you. I love you. I love you.

His mind kept screaming, but he kept his lips sealed, forcing the kiss to grow even rougher as a way to keep those words from slipping and scare you away.

"Wait... Let me..." you broke the kiss, trying to readjust yourself on top of him.

Neither of you could help but giggle the moment you looked into each other's eyes as you shifted on his lap.

You weren't in love with him. Not yet. But your body moved like it still was.

Your hips met his with the perfect depth and synch, like the two of you were dancing to a dance you had practiced several times before.

And you had.

San couldn't move his eyes away from you. His arms remained wrapped around your waist, just enough to pull your torso close to him and have his lips closing around one of your nipples, one hand teasing the other, while his free hand squeezed a spot below your ribs that made you squirm and moan.

It was like he had studied your body, like his only aim was to make you feel good.

"San" you moaned with a cracked whine.

With a rough movement, he moved your hand away from the window to place it over his face. "Touch me, Y/n. I need your hands on me" he almost begged.

And for that one night, in the backseat under a thousand quiet stars, San let himself fall again. Silently. Without hope or demand. Just the sweetness of closeness, of skin on skin, of your breath in his ear whispering his name like it still meant something.

When it was over, tangled together under the soft cotton of his jacket, you fell asleep on his chest, heart steady against his. San didn't sleep. He just held you, eyes fixed on the ceiling of the car, wondering how long he could keep pretending that fate would give you back to him.

For the first time, San didn't feel like recreating everything that happened between you two. It wasn't necessary. He was so caught up in taking the old you back, that he forgot about the possibility of him falling for you all over again under a whole different circumstance.

Your relationship was bound to happen again.

You stirred first.

Your cheek was pressed against the bare skin of San's chest, rising and falling with every slow breath he took. His arms were still around you, protective and steady, and his heartbeat -low and calm- drummed beneath your ear.

You didn't move.

There was something safe about this. About waking up here, wrapped in a warmth that didn't feel foreign. Even though it should have.

Your fingers shifted slightly, brushing against his ribs, and he tightened his hold just a little, as if even in sleep, he was scared you'd slip away.

San was awake.

He had been for a while.

You didn't know him.

Not really.

Not the way you used to.

Still, when you tilted your face up and blinked sleepily at him, your mouth barely parted, skin still kissed by the warmth of last night, San let himself pretend. Just for a second.

"Hi," you whispered.

His heart squeezed. "Hey."

A quiet smile tugged at your lips. "Did we actually...?"

He gave a soft laugh. "Hmm. We did."

You leaned back slightly, your eyes scanning his features. The messy hair. The tired eyes. The little indent on his lower lip where he always bit when nervous. "I don't usually do that."

"I know," he said gently, gaze never leaving yours.

There was something in the way he said it -too sure, too knowing-, but before you could question it, he reached out, brushing a strand of hair from your face. His fingertips lingered on your cheek.

"You're cold," he murmured.

"I'm not," you replied, but you didn't stop him when he pulled his hoodie over your head and helped you into it, even though it was far too big and still smelled like him.

You let yourself curl into his side again as if you'd done it before. Like you knew how.

Eventually, you tilted your head toward him again. "I feel like I'm always a step behind around you."

San swallowed. "What do you mean?"

You shrugged, fingers absently tracing the tattoo on his arm. "Like you know something I don't. Like... I'm supposed to understand all this, and I just... don't."

He didn't answer right away. Instead, he turned his face toward the window, eyes catching the sunlight like it might burn away the truth if he held it too long.

"I guess," he said slowly, "some things just need time."

You nodded, even if you didn't really understand. "Is it crazy that I trust you?"

"No," San replied, his voice so soft it could have shattered. "Not crazy at all."

And in that moment, you reached out and laced your fingers through his again.

No questions. No demands.

Just skin on skin. A touch that said, I don't remember, but this feels right.

San closed his eyes and let himself stay in the dream for one moment longer.

The theater was quiet.

Not empty, just quiet. One of those midweek showings where only a handful of people were scattered across the seats, too far to hear or care what anyone else was doing.

You sat next to San with a bucket of popcorn balanced between you and the sleeve of your drink pressed against your thigh. The previews flickered across the screen, too loud, too flashy, but neither of you really cared what movie was playing.

He'd picked the film. Something fun. Light. Familiar. But you kept sneaking glances at him instead of watching.

Maybe he had.

You just didn't know it.

While the next trailer blared on screen, San leaned forward, checking his phone. Probably a text from a friend -you hadn't met any of them yet, but he talked about them often. Warmly.

He always spoke like there were pieces of you in his stories, but never named them.

You glanced over casually... and paused.

But you had no memory of it.

You didn't remember the shirt you were wearing. Or where you were. Or him being there.

Your chest tightened, breath caught somewhere high in your throat.

It was just a photo. But it was proof of something bigger, something you couldn't quite reach.

"You okay?" he asked suddenly, turning to look at you.

You blinked, startled. He must have seen your face. Or maybe the way you were staring at his phone a second too long.

You nodded quickly, brushing it off. "Yeah. Just... tired."

He didn't press, but you could feel it. That slight shift in his posture. That tension in the air like he knew you'd seen too much. Or maybe... not enough.

You leaned your head on his shoulder. He smelled like something soft and earthy. Familiar. Like you'd worn his hoodie once, weeks ago, and the scent had never left your skin.

"I like being with you," you murmured, almost a whisper.

San's grip tightened ever so slightly.

"I like being with you too," he said, voice hushed, almost cracking.

After the movie ended, you both chose to take your love somewhere else.

You were back at your apartment now, San leaning against the kitchen counter, sipping on that awful canned iced coffee he swore by, while you sat cross-legged on the couch, scrolling through your phone.

He was telling you a story, something about a prank his friend -Yeosang- had pulled at a wedding. It was strange, telling you a story you were once part of, as if you had never been there. But he had grown used to it.

But your mind wasn't really on it, because the image had stuck with you.

The lockscreen.

That photo of you on his phone.

You chewed your lip and finally cleared your throat. "Can... can I ask you something?"

San stilled, the can pausing mid-air. "Sure."

You stood, walked to him slowly, and held out your hand. "Your phone."

His brows lifted. "Why?"

"Just wanna see something."

He hesitated, just for a second, before unlocking it and handing it over. You navigated to the lockscreen, pulling it up again. Your heart gave a strange little flutter.

"This picture..." you started softly, holding it out between you. "Where did you find this?"

San looked down at the screen like it was something fragile. His thumb twitched against the seam of his jeans.

"No, it's just... I was surprised after seeing myself on your phone" you admitted. "I didn't expect it".

He nodded. "You don't mind it?"

You frowned slightly. "No. I actually look good" you teased with a chuckle. "I look happy there".

San swallowed hard, his gaze lowering as he murmured. "You were."

You studied his face for a long moment. Then your lips curved upward, just a little. "Your taste in screensavers is nice, I guess."

He let out a soft chuckle, but the sound didn't quite reach his eyes.

"Funny, though," you added, unlocking your own phone. "Mine's kind of similar."

San stared at it. Everything in him stilled.

"That's... a coincidence," he said, voice almost too calm.

You nodded slowly. "Guess so."

But neither of you said anything for a while.

You left the photo up a little longer, as if trying to feel something stir in your chest. Some sense of connection. But all you felt was the silence between you -quiet, waiting, fragile.

Then San smiled softly, stepping forward and brushing your hair behind your ear.

"Maybe we just like the same places," he said gently.

You tilted your head, searching his face. "Maybe."

"It was the lockscreen I had when I woke up" you frowned.

San froze when he heard that confession, but he remained silent, waiting for you to speak, waiting for the next thing you'd say.

"I haven't told you before... Well, it isn't something I go around telling" you nervously chuckled. "Some months ago... I had an accident. A pretty bad accident. I was in a coma for a few weeks, and when I woke up my mind was completely blank from the past five years and on. I didn't recognize my friends, or my workplace... I didn't even expect to be living here. But, somehow, that lockscreen was the only thing that made sense and gave me calm when everything was upside down. And it’s ridiculous, because I can’t see his face, or know who he is, but it just makes me… feel relaxed. Like nothing will be wrong".

San felt his lip trembling. For the first time in weeks, he felt guilty. Because he left you alone when you needed support, because he abandoned you when you needed guidance, only because he was scared of his own feelings when you looked at him differently. And now, he was scared of how you’d react when you remembered things.

"Why are you crying?" you scoffed, feeling your own eyes filling up with tears.

"Oh?" he asked, brushing the reverse of his fingers against his cheeks, finding them wet.

"You aren't feeling sorry for me, aren't you?" you asked, wrapping your arms around his waist.

"Never, bunny".

The nickname slipped from his lips before he could hold it back. And he noticed, the flash of surprise, the sparkle in you eyes under the tears.

That nickname stirred something in you.

"Bunny?"

He remembered the way you’d always jump around when excited, the way you’d make small jumps instead of just walking or running, and that nickname made complete sense for him back in the day.

"It's a nickname. It just... slipped out"

"I like it" you confessed with a giggle.

The sun was dipping low behind the skyline as San waited outside your office building.

But his thumb hadn't moved in two minutes, because his entire body was tense. Stomach in knots. Eyes flicking toward the doors every few seconds.

You were running late.

Again.

Which gave his mind far too much time to spiral.

"San?" a familiar voice called.

He stiffened. His eyes snapped toward the sound, heart dropping like a stone.

She approached, smiling wide. "Oh my God, it is you! Wow. It's been a while. Y/n didn't say you were picking her up today... Are you two back together?"

San felt his blood turn cold.

His mouth opened, then closed again. "I... uh..."

"She looked so lost after the accident," Julie kept going, oblivious. "But I always had a feeling you'd come back. You two were like..."

"Hey, sorry," San cut in suddenly, eyes locked on the entrance.

You were walking out. Right. Now.

Shit.

"Can we not... talk about this right now?" he muttered, voice urgent but polite, already stepping away.

Julie blinked, confused. "What? Wait, aren't you...?"

"I'll text you," he said quickly, already turning his back.

And then he was moving, crossing the pavement fast, intercepting you before your eyes could sweep over to Julie's side of the street.

"There you are," he said with a practiced smile, pulling open the passenger door. "Rough day?"

You blinked at the sudden warmth, distracted by the way he touched your lower back, guiding you gently into the car like he'd done it a thousand times.

"Exhausting," you muttered as you slid in.

"How was your day?" you asked casually.

San gave a small, breathless laugh.

"Almost perfect."

The drive was silent for a few minutes, until you broke the silence again, curiously looking at him while turning your body to him.

"Do you know Julie?"

"What?" he nervously eyed you, his glance on you lasted less than two seconds.

"Julie, you were talking to her before I got out"

San sighed, trying to come up with an explanation. "Oh, yeah. She's a friend of a friend. It's been a long time since I saw her last".

Three weeks slipped by like honey in warm tea -slow, golden, and somehow too sweet to be real. You and San weren't official, but something between you had rooted itself deep. You texted constantly, called often. He picked you up from work most days. You spent weekends together now: grocery shopping like old lovers, laughing too loudly in parks, falling asleep on his shoulder without even realizing it.

You didn't know why you didn't ask, maybe you were afraid of the answer.

That night, and after too much arguing, you finally managed to convince San on going out. The pub looked just like you remembered it: old brick walls, low golden lights, the constant hum of music and conversation thick in the air.

"Déjà vu," you said, stepping in beside him. "This place feels... familiar. And I don't mean it because of the day you brought me here a few weeks ago."

San smiled, a little sad, a little hopeful. "It should."

You glanced up at him, eyes narrowed. "Why?"

He shrugged like it didn't matter. "It's just the kind of place that feels like a memory."

You were led to the same table. Same corner. Same view of the bar. San even ordered the same drinks for you both, though you didn't notice that part. You were too busy scanning the room, trying to place this strange pull in your chest.

"Have you been here a lot?" you asked.

He took a sip of his beer, staring at the spot where, once upon a time, he'd stepped in to save you from a stranger's wandering hands. "A few times before" he said "and it kind of stuck with me."

You smiled. "Because of the atmosphere?"

He met your eyes. "Because of the person I came with."

Your gaze faltered at the heat behind his words. You swallowed hard, suddenly shy. "She must've been special."

"She still is."

You laughed awkwardly, not sure how to reply to that -if you were misreading the moment or if he meant exactly what your gut whispered he did.

"Hey," you said, trying to shift the tone. "You keep saying all these mysterious, romantic things and then changing the subject. Should I be worried you're secretly married or something?"

San grinned, but it was the kind that didn't quite reach his eyes. "I'm not married."

"But?"

"But some things are hard to explain."

You nodded slowly, reaching for your drink. "Well... I guess I don't need everything explained. Not if it keeps feeling like this."

He looked up sharply at that.

"Like what?" he asked.

You hesitated.

"Like I've done all this before," you said quietly. "With you."

And San -heart breaking and healing all at once- only whispered back:

"You have."

But you didn't hear it. Or maybe you just didn't let yourself.

So you smiled again, tilting your glass toward his with a playful smirk. "To familiar strangers."

San clinked his glass against yours. And for a moment, everything in him screamed to tell you the truth. But instead, he just said:

"To second chances."

As the night went on, you had shifted in the booth beside San, your hand brushing his every now and then, and neither of you moved it away. The world felt slower tonight, like it was holding its breath around you.

The conversation had dipped into quiet comfort when a voice sliced through it, casual and familiar:

"San?"

He turned quickly. A tall man with honey-blond hair and a denim jacket was approaching with a grin, Mitchell. You didn't recognize him, but the smile on his face said he recognized you.

And worse, he knew you.

"Dude! I didn't know you two were back together!" Mitchell laughed as he reached them, clapping San on the shoulder before turning toward you. "Y/n, you look good! How's your head, by the way? That whole accident thing was a shock for everyone..."

"Hey," San said sharply.

His voice was low. Controlled. But his hand gripped Mitchell's arm with a pressure that meant stop talking now. He blinked, confused.

You glanced between them, eyes narrowing slightly.

"Sorry, do I... know you?" you asked, trying to place the man's face.

Mitchell looked stunned for a beat. Then opened his mouth again to speak, but he was interrupted before he could make a sound.

"She's not who you think," San cut in, voice firmer now. "You're probably confusing her with someone else."

Mitchell's eyebrows shot up.

"What? San..."

San stepped closer to him, almost blocking you from view. "Drop it," he muttered through clenched teeth. "Please."

Mitchell froze.

And in that moment, something passed between them -something heavy, like grief and fear woven together. Then, after a pause too long to be casual, Mitchell gave a tight smile.

"Oh," he said finally, turning toward you. "My bad. You just... reminded me of someone. Sorry about that."

You laughed softly, but something about the exchange had stiffened your spine. "No worries. I get that a lot, apparently."

San's hand slid to the small of your back. Warm. Protective. A silent plea not to ask more.

You didn't.

Not really.

But as Mitchell waved goodbye and disappeared into the crowd, you glanced up at San with a quiet curiosity in your eyes.

"Is he an old friend?"

San smiled gently, like nothing had just happened. "Yeah. Known him for a long time."

You nodded slowly. "He seemed... surprised to see us together."

There was a pause. Just for a breath.

"Guess I surprise people sometimes."

"How did he know... about the accident though?" you furrowed your eyebrows, looking at him cautiously.

"It's... that other person had a light accident, too. It's just a coincidence".

A coincidence, again.

You watched him a second longer before looking away. The conversation moved on, but the moment stayed with you. Like a thread you weren't quite ready to pull.

The room was quiet, too quiet.

San's arm lay across your waist, his breath feathering warm against your shoulder, the rhythm steady, soothing. But your mind was anything but.

Your fingers grazed over the sheet as you slowly shifted his arm off your waist. He mumbled something incoherent, but didn't wake.

Barefoot and quiet, you slipped out of the bed and stood in the middle of the room, arms crossing over your chest, heart pounding like a second heartbeat.

Mitchell's voice rang in your ears."That whole accident thing was a shock for everyone..."

Another accident, where the main person also got hit on the head.

"Back together".

And San's eyes, how fast they had darkened. How quickly he had shut it all down.

The question you'd buried for weeks finally pushed its way to the surface: Was he hiding something? Or someone?

Your stomach churned. What if he had a girlfriend he wasn't telling you about? What if this whole time, this strange intimacy you'd fallen into with him wasn't yours to fall into?

You were pacing in the dark before you realized it, your steps soundless on the cool floor. Back and forth. Breath uneven. Thoughts louder than your heart could handle. And then... thud.

Inside were pieces of a life that didn't belong to you. And yet, they did.

A photo lay at the top. You, smiling in a way you'd never seen in the mirror. Your cheeks flushed, your hands cupping San's face like he was the only thing that existed. His eyes were shut in the photo, a smile tugging at his lips. Pure joy.

Your breath hitched.

Beneath it were dozens more. A photo booth strip of four blurry, laughing frames, a candid of you asleep against his shoulder, a selfie with his nose pressed to your neck, his eyes closed, and a faint lipstick mark on his cheek, you found one where your friends where also in the picture -and, by the way Yeosang was hugging San, you could tell they were close. And then, at the bottom, you found a familiar photo that made your stomach turn. You were wearing the exact same outfit of the picture he had as his lockscreen, and he was wearing the same clothes as the man in yours, same background... The only difference was that, this time, you two were together, kissing.

You didn't remember any of them. But your heart... did. Then, tucked beneath the photos, letters.

You picked up the top one. Unfolded it with trembling fingers. It wasn't long.

You forgot me.

I smiled through it. You said "nice to meet you" like it was nothing.

It almost killed me.

But I'll wait.

I'll wait forever if it means you'll smile at me like you used to.

Your vision blurred. You blinked quickly.

There were more. Pages of thoughts, of love, of ache. Some had dates, weeks ago. Some looked like they'd been written the day of your accident. One had a smear in the ink. A tear, maybe.

Day 9.

They said you might be able to hear me. So I'm here. Again.

I haven't left, not really. I go home to shower, sometimes. Eat if I remember. But I'm always back before sunset, just in case you wake up and wonder where I am.

I should've driven slower. I should've seen the turn. I should've...

You wouldn't be here if it weren't for me.

I replay it in my head every time I close my eyes. Your voice. The sound. The silence after.

I hold your hand and pretend you're just sleeping.

I talk to you like you'll answer.

Sometimes I pretend you do.

Everyone says to give it time. That you're strong.

But I know you're tired.

If you hear this, if anything inside you still remembers me, please, just come back.

I'll start everything over. I'll do it right this time.

I love you.

Come home.

Your breath came in shallow bursts. Your knees buckled. It was like everything was turning around you the more you read.

Day 37.

You opened your eyes today.

I should be there. God, I want to be there. But I can't. Not yet.

They told me you didn't ask for me.

That you didn't recognize anyone.

And I know it's not your fault.

I know it's the injury, the trauma, the healing.

But it felt like the last piece of me cracked open when I heard it.

How do I look at you and pretend we're strangers?

How do I sit beside you and not touch you the way I used to?

How do I call you Y/n when every part of me still aches to say baby?

I've spent weeks memorizing our history in case I had to remind you of it.

But now... I don't know if you even want to remember.

I'm scared. Not of losing you.

I'm scared you've already let me go.

Maybe I'll see you tomorrow. Maybe I'll walk past your door and keep going.

But I'll always be waiting, just in case something in you still knows me.

The box fell from your hands as you lost the last bit of strength to keep reading, the pictures scattered at your feet like a life spilled out.

You were the girlfriend.

You had been his.

He hadn't just found you by coincidence. He had been waiting. Recreating. Hoping.

A quiet sound behind you broke the silence. Then his voice -rough with sleep, confusion curling in its edges.

"Y/n...?"

You didn't turn around, you couldn't. Not yet.

San stopped, reaching for the switch to turn on the lights, wishing he had never done it in the first place. All the pictures he tried to hide were around your feet, all the contents of the box were exposed. "Baby?"

Your fingers curled around the corner of a photo -your face in it, laughing so hard your eyes had shut. San had his arm around your neck, tugging you against him like he never wanted to let go. The kind of moment that couldn't be staged.

Slowly, you turned. He was halfway inside the living room, shirtless, hair tousled, his eyes going from sleepy to wide open the second he saw what you were holding.

His mouth parted. But no words came out.

And then you whispered: "...It was me."

He didn't move. Didn't speak. Just looked at you like everything he had worked so hard to bury had been laid bare, and now, there was nowhere left to hide.

You looked down at the photo again, your fingers brushed the smile you didn't remember, but somehow still felt.

"I was the one you were waiting for."

His throat bobbed. You were crying now, but it didn't feel heavy. It felt like truth cracking open, like light breaking in.

"Why didn't you just tell me?" you whispered.

San swallowed hard. And finally, he stepped forward -eyes burning, voice trembling, as he stopped right in front of you.

"Because if I told you the truth..." he reached for your hand -hesitated- then wrapped his fingers around it, pressing it to his chest. "...I was terrified you wouldn't want to come back."

You didn't look at him. You couldn't. Your chest felt tight, each breath shallow and sharp.

"Why?" you asked, your voice low and sharp like a blade.

He sat up, the sheets slipping from his torso, pooling at his waist. "Y/n..."

"Why did you lie to me?"

Silence.

San's throat bobbed as he swallowed. The guilt had already settled deep in his face.

"I didn't know how to tell you," he admitted. "I didn't want to scare you off."

"Scare me?" you repeated, voice cracking. "You didn't want to scare me, so you thought pretending none of it happened was better?"

He opened his mouth, then closed it again. You could see the words scrambling in his brain, but none of them made it out.

"You thought it would be better to lie to me? To manipulate me into remembering you? Not even to remember you, but to force your way back into my life" your hands were shaking now. "You robbed me of my own story, San. You made me feel crazy every time I caught something familiar in you."

"I was terrified," he said finally. His voice broke around the edges. "You looked at me like I was no one. You smiled like we'd just met. And I... I was scared you wouldn't want to come back."

Your breath caught in your throat.

"That wasn't your decision to make," you said, each word clipped, each syllable deliberate. "You should've told me the truth. You, my friends... someone should've told me."

"They wanted to," he said quietly. "I asked them not to."

You laughed bitterly. "Of course you did". You stopped for a second "Why don't I have anything about you in my h...?"

But you didn't need to finish the question to know that he and your friends had something to do with all of that.

"My social media?" San just looked down at your question, knowing one of your friends also managed to delete the two years of relationship off the Internet. "Of course..."

You stared at him, so many feelings surging at once it made you dizzy.

He stepped forward slowly, as if afraid to shatter what little remained between you. "Y/n..."

"You let me doubt myself, San. Let me question why everything felt like déjà vu. You watched me struggle and said nothing"

He looked like he might fall apart right in front of you.

"I didn't need to be protected," you said, softer now. "I needed the truth. I needed support, help."

San's expression twisted with grief. "I didn't know how to live in a world where you didn't remember me. I didn't know how to be near you and not be yours."

"You know, there's something I remember..." your voice wavered.

He looked at you hopefully.

It crushed him. You saw it happen. You watched his shoulders fall, his chest cave.

You shook your head, eyes brimming with unshed tears. "Now all I feel is that every moment between us lately was a lie. And I don't know how to trust anything you say anymore."

He reached for you, but you stepped back.

"Don't," you whispered.

"I need time," you said, already walking toward the door.

"Y/n..." he called after you.

But you didn't stop, and you didn't look back.

He sat across from Wooyoung, shoulders hunched over a cooling cup of black coffee, staring blankly at the chipped ceramic like it held the answers he couldn't find in himself.

Wooyoung didn't speak right away. He never rushed San in moments like this. Just sat there, sipping from his own cup, watching him with that steady, quiet patience that only came from knowing someone too well.

"She's stopped talking to all of us," Wooyoung finally said, his tone low but careful. "You know that, right?"

San gave a tired nod. "Yeah."

"She won't answer my messages. She ignores Mingi. I think she even blocked Yeosang."

Another nod.

Wooyoung leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. "You think she hates us?"

"No." San's voice was rough. "But she doesn't trust us. And I don't blame her."

Wooyoung stared at him. "She trusted you, though."

A muscle in San's jaw jumped. "Until she found out."

"She found out because she tripped over a box full of the truth," Wooyoung said, more gently this time. "Not because you told her."

San rubbed at his face, hands dragging over tired eyes. "You think I don't know that?"

"I think you do," Wooyoung said. "I just don't know if you've let yourself know it."

There was a long pause.

"She asked me once," San said quietly. "If I had a girlfriend."

Wooyoung didn't respond.

Wooyoung looked away, lips pressed into a thin line. "You were scared."

"I was a coward," San corrected. "I thought if I could just make her fall in love with me again, I wouldn't have to tell her how much it wrecked me to lose her. But she's not stupid. She noticed everything. The bar, the photo, the letters... and then I watched it all snap together in her eyes."

Wooyoung was quiet for a moment before he asked, "What did she say?"

San's laugh was low and sharp, completely humorless. "She asked me why everyone lied. And I said... I told her I was terrified she wouldn't want to come back."

He paused. Swallowed again.

"And the worst part?" he looked up, eyes wet, voice shaking. "She didn't deny it."

Wooyoung exhaled, leaned back in his chair. "She's hurt. Give her time."

"What if time's the thing that takes her even further away from me?" San whispered. "What if every day she spends without me is a step closer to forgetting everything we were?"

Wooyoung reached across the table, gripped his wrist. "Then you wait. You wait for as long as it takes. You loved her enough to lie, fine. But now, love her enough to let her be angry, let her feel what she needs to feel. That's the only way this ends in something real."

San didn't answer. He just nodded once, slow and hollow, like his body had finally caught up to the weight his heart had been carrying all along.

Meanwhile, you weren't able to go on.

The worst part was... he wasn't wrong.

Your phone buzzed once. His name.

You stared at the screen until it faded back to black. A few more minutes passed before you turned it off completely.

You had trusted him.

That was the ache now, the hollow pit in your chest. Not just the lie, but the feeling that he'd stolen your choice.

You should have felt anger. And you did. But beneath it was something deeper and more painful: grief.

Because now every memory you'd made with him -every laugh, every kiss, every moment where your heart had fluttered- was tangled with the question: Was it ever really real?

Unable to keep that pain on your own, you finally called her. Jazmin picked up on the second ring. "Y/n?"

You didn't say anything at first, just breathed, your voice caught in the place where pain sat too deep to speak.

"Are you okay?" she asked, softer now, like she already knew the answer.

"I need to talk... Can you come?"

"I'm coming."

When Jazmin arrived, she didn't knock, just stepped in like she used to, like her body still remembered where the spare key was and how your apartment smelled in the morning. She looked at you, standing there in San's hoodie, eyes rimmed in red, and said nothing at all, just wrapped her arms around you. And for a second, you let it break. The dam. The wall. The composure.

You sobbed into her shoulder, and she didn't ask questions. Not yet.

"I thought I was going crazy," you finally said when the tears had dulled to hiccups. "I kept thinking, maybe I was the other woman. Maybe he had a girlfriend he hadn't told me about."

Jazmin pulled away just enough to look at you, brushing your hair from your face. "You were the girlfriend. You are the girlfriend."

"Why didn't anyone tell me?"

She hesitated. "He asked us not to. Said he wanted you to come back to him on your own. That if it wasn't real, if you didn't choose him, it would crush him."

"But what about me?" Your voice broke again. "What about what it's done to me?"

She flinched, and you hated that you made her look like that. Like this pain had spilled over into someone else's bones too. But you couldn't take it back. Couldn't shrink it.

"I know," she said, pulling you in again. "God, I know, Y/n. I wanted to tell you so many times. But he looked so lost. So afraid. We all thought he'd break if you didn't come back to him."

"Maybe I needed to break too," you murmured, pressing your forehead to her shoulder. "So I can figure out who I really am without everyone else deciding it for me."

Jazmin nodded. Her fingers carded gently through your hair. You stayed there, the two of you curled into a silence that felt like a bandage over an open wound.

It had started to rain before you even realized where your feet had taken you.

The bell chimed above your head as you stepped in.

You let your eyes scan the space and saw it: the corner booth near the window with the chipped table and the crooked lamp above it.

It called to you.

You didn't know why you sat down. You just... did.

You took a breath, your fingertips tracing over the wood. A divot near the corner snagged your nail, like muscle memory. You pulled your hand back.

A minute later, the bell above the door chimed again. You glanced up casually, and froze.

San.

For a heartbeat, neither of you moved. Then his eyes widened, and yours did the same.

"I didn't know you came here," you said, unsure why that was the first thing that came out.

He blinked, stepping in further. "I didn't think you even knew this place."

"I didn't," you replied. "I was just walking and... I don't know. My legs brought me here."

He gave a small, breathless laugh. Not mocking, just stunned. "Yeah. That... that sounds about right."

You both hesitated, hovering in two different worlds that used to be the same one. Then, without asking, he crossed the room and sat across from you. You didn't stop him.

"What?" you asked.

He shook his head. "Nothing. Just... you remembered."

You frowned. "I didn't. I guessed."

He didn't argue. Just gave a tired, tender smile and murmured, "Good guess."

The silence stretched between you. Not tense, exactly. Just... full. Like everything you hadn't said was sitting in the space between your cups, waiting for the right moment to rise.

You stirred your coffee even though it didn't need stirring. "Why didn't you tell me?"

He stared at the chipped edge of the table. "Because I was scared."

"Of what?"

Your heart twisted. "That doesn't make what you did okay."

"I know," he said instantly. "I know that. I lied to you. I took away your choice. I tried to rewrite something instead of... letting you read it again. On your own."

You watched him closely. There was no act. No polished version of himself. Just the raw, tired ache of someone who had held his breath for too long.

"And the accident?"

His eyes flicked to yours, and something flickered through them, shame, mostly. Pain.

You swallowed. "And after that?"

"I came to see you," he whispered. "Every day. For weeks. I sat beside you, read to you, talked to you even though you couldn't hear me. I brought you the cactus from your studio. I..."

You looked away, eyes stinging. "But when I woke up..."

"I stopped coming," he said, his voice barely audible now. "Because I thought... it would hurt less to disappear than to watch you forget me."

The words settled between you like ash.

"I didn't forget you," you whispered. "Not really. You were everywhere. In things I didn't understand. The way I reacted to you. The way I looked for you even when I was mad at you."

He watched you like you were saving him and tearing him apart at the same time. You exhaled, slow and unsteady. "You weren't a stranger, San. Not really. I didn't know why, but I kept choosing you anyway."

His lips parted, but no sound came out. Just a breath. Just gratitude.

"Let me take you home," he said gently.

You didn't respond right away. You just nodded, slowly, carefully, like your body was making a decision your mind still hadn't caught up to.

He looked you dead in the eye. "Anything. Everything."

And for the first time in a long time, when you both stepped into the rain and toward his car, it didn't feel like running. It felt like returning.

"What were we like... before the accident?"

He didn't answer right away.

You watched the side of his face, the soft twitch of his jaw, the way his eyes stayed locked on the road a second too long, like he was organizing memories in a drawer he hadn't opened in a while.

Then, slowly, he reached toward the glove compartment and pulled out a small leather-bound notebook, its corners frayed from use. He held it out to you without a word.

Your handwriting.

Your drawings.

"Is this mine?" you asked.

He nodded. "You were working on it all the time. You said you wanted to make a comic about a normal couple. No drama, no perfect endings, just real life. Ours."

You flipped through the pages, stunned. You had no memory of drawing these, but the style was undeniably yours. Every detail made your chest ache with something you didn't know how to name.

"I don't remember any of this."

"I know," he said softly. "But you loved this project. You were going to publish it. You even had a name for it."

You looked at the front page. In your own messy cursive: "Monday Mornings."

A breath caught in your throat. You didn't even know why, but that title felt like something you'd once whispered in someone's ear, laughing under the covers.

"I didn't support you enough," San said suddenly, voice low and raw. "You wanted to take it public. You had this pitch ready, you were so excited. And I... I said we should wait. That, maybe, it wasn't the right time. I thought I was protecting you. I didn't realize I was just making you feel small."

You didn't answer, you just kept turning the pages.

A drawing caught your eye: the girl kissing the boy's shoulder while he made coffee. A heart drawn above them. Underneath, you'd scrawled:

"You always said mornings were cruel. So I made us soft."

Your fingers trembled.

"You said something before the accident," San continued quietly. "You said, 'Why does it feel like you're always patting my head instead of holding my hand?'"

You looked out the window. The trees blurred past in green shadows. Your heart thudded somewhere in your stomach.

"I never forgot that," he said. "I never stopped hearing it."

You closed the notebook and held it close to your chest.

He glanced at you, uncertain. "Are you okay?"

You nodded. But you didn't feel okay. You felt like you were standing at the edge of a memory that had just started to turn around and look at you.

The days blurred.

You tried.

God, you tried.

You woke up each day with hope clawing its way up your throat, searching the mirror for a spark, a flicker, something familiar in your own reflection. And sometimes, there were moments. A smell, a certain playlist, the way San's fingers traced lazy circles against your wrist when he thought you weren't paying attention. Sometimes it hit you like déjà vu, but soft, like the memory itself was holding its breath.

Other times, though, it felt like you were pretending to live someone else's life. Walking through a home filled with photos you couldn't remember taking, laughing at inside jokes you didn't really get, wanting to reach for San, only to stop midway, unsure if the heat in your chest was real... or borrowed from a version of you who no longer existed.

San didn't push. Not in words, anyway.

That morning, you'd had another flash.

You sat on the floor and cried.

San had found you there, and he didn't ask questions. He just sat beside you and held you close until your breathing slowed.

But he didn't say anything, either. And that was almost worse.

You both had grown used to that type of scene, where you just broke down and he held you until he made sure you were breathing properly again.

Now, in the car, your fingers fidgeted in your lap. "I hate this."

He blinked. "Hate what?"

"This... in-between. Not remembering. Remembering too much. Never enough. It's like I'm stuck between two mirrors, and I keep seeing myself, but never fully."

He nodded slowly, keeping his eyes on the road.

"I'm trying," you added, barely a whisper.

"I know you are," he said.

Silence again. Just the tires splashing over wet asphalt.

"But it's hard," you admitted, voice cracking. "It's hard needing space from someone who makes you feel safe. It's hard needing time from someone who clearly never stopped loving you."

"Sometimes it feels like you expect me to be her again. That girl I was."

"I don't," he said quickly, sharply. "I just miss her. That's different."

"Is it?" you asked. "Because it doesn't feel different when I look into your eyes and all I see is disappointment every time I get something wrong."

"I'm not disappointed in you..."

"Yes, you are!" you snapped. "Every time I forget something, you look away. Every time I hesitate, you sigh like it's breaking your heart."

You laughed bitterly. "But it's not that simple. You can say that all you want, San, but I see it. I see you looking for her in me. In every little gesture. Every place we go. You're always chasing the past. And I'm scared I can't give it back to you."

The air in the car turned cold.

That silenced you.

His voice cracked. "I would give anything to forget how you used to love me, because maybe then, this wouldn't feel like being stabbed in the same place over and over."

You turned to him slowly. His knuckles were white on the steering wheel. His shoulders were tight with things he wasn't saying.

You stared at him. "I don't know who I am anymore. What if there's nothing to go back to?"

The words cut deep. You hadn't meant for them to come out like that. But now they hung in the air, heavy and irreversible.

His jaw tensed. "So what, Y/n? You want me to let go? To pretend none of it ever happened?"

You pressed your lips together, looking away again, knowing there was something cooking in his brain before he happened again.

You hesitated, but you were thinking of the best answer to that. And just as you were ready to turn to him to speak again. It happened.

CRASH.

The sudden screech was the only noise in your ears for a few seconds, the blur of headlights the only thing you could see.

Your body snapped forward, seatbelt biting into your chest. San's arm instinctively flung in front of you, shielding, even as the car spun once and thudded to a stop against the guardrail.

Silence.

Rain tapped against the cracked windshield.

You gasped, chest heaving, eyes wide as your hands scrambled to reach him.

"San..."

"I'm okay," he croaked, already undoing his seatbelt. "Are you hurt? Look at me, are you okay?"

Your lips trembled, but you nodded.

He exhaled in shaky relief. His forehead had a small gash, bleeding into his eyebrow, but he was alert. Breathing.

"I'm fine," you whispered, touching his face. "You... you're bleeding."

He gave a strained laugh. "You should see the other guy."

But to you, it felt like an echo. Like lightning returning to the same scar in the ground. Your fingers trembled as you unbuckled your seatbelt. San looked at you, and for a second, neither of you moved.

"God, I thought..."

A birthday.

Candles.

His laugh in the dark.

His hand brushing your cheek.

A yellow plastic ring.

It was small, barely a second, but it hit you so hard you flinched.

San caught the look in your eyes.

"What is it?" he asked, still breathless.

You shook your head slowly. "I... I think I remembered something."

He paused.

You closed your eyes.

"I think... you asked me to marry you once."

San's heart stopped. And then he smiled. A fragile, aching smile, like something inside him had cracked open.

"You said no," he whispered. "And then you made me ask again with a yellow plastic ring."

Your hand trembled over your heart. The ring in the drawer, the one that made you cry without knowing why.

You looked at him again, really looked, and for the first time, he didn't feel like a stranger.

After a few months, spring returned to the city in full bloom -and so, in your own way, did you.

After the second accident, everything shifted.

Little by little, pieces returned.

Not all of them. You still forgot some dates. You still couldn't remember why Hongjoong always called you "Captain," or what made Yeosang cry-laugh the first time you met. But the important things? You held onto those with everything you had.

You remembered how San's hand fit at the small of your back, the way he used to hum when he thought you were asleep, the soft way he'd whisper your name when he was half-asleep and needed to make sure you were still there.

And now, months later, you were there.

The bar buzzed with warmth and celebration, full of your friends, full of light. Outside, fairy lights glittered across the rooftop. Someone had already smashed the cake. There was a karaoke battle happening in the corner. Seonghwa had taken over the music, and Wooyoung was trying to get everyone to pose under a banner that said you were celebrating the publication of your comics.

Your first printed volume. A comic book. A real one.

And even though you smiled at everyone and thanked them with full sincerity, there was only one person you were truly looking for in the crowd.

He was watching you, eyes half-lidded, that little smirk on his lips he didn't even realize he had when he looked at you.

He choked.

You could feel the sharp inhale beneath your palms as his hands gripped your waist, stunned. "What... what did you just say?"

You pulled back slowly, watching his face twist with disbelief.

"Bedroom floor," you said. "You were freezing but you wouldn't move until I got the curve of your shoulder right. You were so dramatic."

His eyes filled with something raw.

"No one else knew that," he said hoarsely.

You shrugged softly, nose brushing his. "I told you I'd come back to you. I'm not all the way there yet, but I'm close. I feel it."

He stared at you like you were the answer to every prayer he'd never spoken out loud. Like you were a miracle wearing your own skin.

And then he kissed you.

There, in the middle of the rooftop, with music in the background and your friends around you and the stars blinking quietly above, he kissed you like the world had finally come back into focus.

"You remembered the sketch," he whispered against your mouth.

You smiled. "I remembered you."

And as his arms wrapped around your waist, holding you as if afraid to blink, you knew one thing for sure:

You weren't just returning to your old self, you were becoming more, you were rewriting everything with love in your hands.

The apartment was quiet, washed in golden lamplight and the soft shuffle of sheets.

You sat cross-legged on the bed, sketchbook in your lap, pencil smudged between your fingers. San lay beside you, one arm bent under his head, the other lazily tracing patterns along your thigh, like he couldn't stand to stop touching you, even for a second.

"Is that me again?" he asked, voice low and a little sleepy.

You smiled, not looking up. "No. It's us."

"I look good," he said, grinning.

You rolled your eyes. "You always say that."

"Because it's always true." he leaned in, brushing his lips over your shoulder. "But also... because you draw me the way you see me. And that version of me? That's my favorite."

You paused, pencil hovering mid-air.

Then, quietly: "I think I'm happy again."

His smile faded into something softer. "Yeah?"

You nodded. "Not just because I remember things now. But because I feel like myself again. Like... we're back. But not just back... better."

San turned onto his side, pulling you into his arms until your cheek rested against his chest. His heartbeat was steady beneath your ear.

"You know," he whispered, "you could forget everything all over again, and I'd still find my way back to you."

You pulled back slightly to meet his eyes. "You don't have to."

"I know." he kissed your forehead. "But I would."

The sketchbook slipped from your lap, forgotten. The city murmured outside the windows, but inside -here, in this room, in his arms- you had everything you needed.

You curled into him, your breathing syncing with his. And as the night folded around you like a favorite page in a well-loved book, you knew you'd never forget this feeling again.

Home.

Him.

You.

#armpirate #ff #smut #one shot #reader insert #san #choi san #san smut #ateez #choisanxreader #sanxreader #ateez smut #choi san smut #sanxreader scenarios #ateez scenarios #choi san scenarios #forgotten love #amnesia

398 notes · View notes

tanadrin · 1 month ago

Text

So the coolest known main-sequence star according to Google is 2MASS J0523−1403, an L2.5V red dwarf 40 light years from Earth. As an ultra-cool red dwarf this is kind of a fun star to play with from a conworlding perspective. Obviously any planet close enough to 1403 here to be habitable is going to be tidally locked; in fact, for a planet getting insolation comparable to Earth its orbital period (and rotation period) is going to be just a couple of days or less. At those orbital-periods-slash-rotation-periods the planet rotates fast enough to keep much of the night side nearly as warm as the day side; it will be almost barren of life because of the lack of solar energy, but it also won't be an extensive icy highland like tidally locked planets around bigger stars.

One thing I think is very fun about such a planet is that 1403 would also be truly enormous in its sky, subtending nearly 30 degrees. You could set up some kind of orbital resonance with a slightly more distant planet to give its orbit some eccentricity, and apparently also there are ways in which even tidally locked planets can retain significant obliquity if you wanted to increase the size of the day side further, but I quite like the aesthetic of a single immense orange sun staring down at the landscape, still and pitiless in the sky. Except it wouldn't be that pitiless, because the surface temperature of 1403 is only about 2000 degrees Kelvin. It'd be more of a giant, friendly perpetual sunset, like Ursa Minor Beta in The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, where it's always Saturday afternoon just before the beach bars close.

If you want to maximize for "size of the local sun in the sky," you can probably push a planet even closer--I prefer my tidally-locked planets to maximize habitable area, but as long as you're OK with the habitable regions being confined to small circumpolar zones I think you could get a sun as big as 40 or 50 degrees across in the sky. Maybe bigger with a brown dwarf--but apparently planets around brown dwarfs are likely to be water-depleted carbon planets, and brown dwarf habitable zones are unstable, shrinking as they age and cool. Also red dwarfs are already considered dubious candidates for habitable planets, due to the flare stage early in their history which would be quite rough on nearby planets. Flares from a brown dwarf would be even more dangerous, because the distance to the star would be very small indeed.

#conworlding #astronomy #exoplanets

48 notes · View notes

caramel1mochi · 8 months ago

Text

ㅤㅤPlasma [ Yoru x F! Reader ] [1] [ part 1 / part 2 ] words: 5k / TW: blood, fighting / Please refrain from stealing my work.

ㅤIt's known that earning Yoru's attention is a futile struggle. Still, the first to achieve it is you — a woman who plans for nothing beyond the optimal spot to doze off.ㅤ

note: Mum said it's my turn to wish you all a happy Halloween!!ㅤ Anyway I watched the cinematics 50 times and still mistook the Scions' clothes for robes. But now it's too late to change it so yay.ㅤ Also, this story is pretty lore-heavy so it takes place after the Abyss cinematic. I'd start there hahaㅤ

Dividers by @saradika! Future credits will be in tags.

It all started with one gentle assassin.

An assassin who possessed eyes so innocently bright, a build so friendly and personality so amiable that his recruitment prompted the bosses to question their decision.

'What started?' I hear you ask. And to that, the answer would be a little organisation dubbed the 'Scions of Hourglass'. An organisation with power and control so vast, they managed to hide the discovery of radianite for an undisclosable amount of time. Presumably millennia. As naturally as the planets orbit the sun, every member of this group was brainwashed by their adept commanders. So much so, to entertain the very concept of their underlings having autonomy — or even a sound state of mind — would be beyond laughable.

And Iso was a lovely example of that.

Nevertheless, it led to a rabbit hole. And it was a rabbit hole that proved just how much damage the Scions of Hourglass could do. Indirectly or not, many agents were still affected by it even if they were no longer associated with it — whether it be Omen, Iso, Viper, Reyna… But Clove was one of the few who found it very fun. Mostly because it involved them killing these guys left and right.

Emerging from a smoked off corner, the wee Scot held up their Spectre and immediately began spraying down the one masked soldier in front of them.

Given that he was caught off guard, it didn't take long for the man to fall to his death.

ㅤ

"Agh, that's gotta hurt." They scoffed as they began reloading. "These lads are helpless."

ㅤ

Clove jumped once another soldier appeared. However, before he could take the shot, a few bullets from behind dug through his back. Just as he sank to the ground, it revealed their friend, Iso, who appeared from the darkness. His gaze followed the butterflies that previously burst from Clove as they travelled upwards.

For a moment, he was mesmerised by them, but he was quick to meet their gaze once more.

ㅤ

"Maybe we should go easy on them."

ㅤ

His tone was too monotone to register as sarcasm to anyone who didn't know him. Thankfully, Clove wasn't a part of that crowd. They took their time to reload as they approached him, and the two began slowly walking off towards one of the doorways.

ㅤ

"Ya reckon we jump off and make this fair?"

ㅤ

Iso lightly smiled, though it was more of an awkward acknowledgement than anything else.

ㅤ

"What is it with you and jumping off things?"

ㅤ

"Dinnae make it sound weird, Iso−"

ㅤ

Gunfire suddenly rang out from behind them.

Caught off-guard, Iso instinctively put up a wall of hexagons to shield them from the storm of bullets that emerged. For a moment, the barrier swallowed every bullet, and the ones that were spared flew past them.

The duo readied their weapons just as it stopped.

When Iso's wall came down, however, the two noticed Omen standing over the corpse of one of the soldiers. They could tell that, by his tense posture, he was angrily glaring at them.

ㅤ

"Focus."

ㅤ

Omen growled, causing Clove to stiffen up as several more butterflies escaped them in anxiety.

Satisfied with their non-verbal apology, Omen took a step away from the doorway they were headed towards. There, he unwittingly approached the sharp rays of the sun, now bathed in the light coming in from the opening above. They could see the particles of dust as they fell.

ㅤ

"I sense something…"

ㅤ

He noticed how the particles shifted towards one direction. But before another word could be exchanged, the three heard the awry static in their radio, moments before a familiar and gentle voice took over their ears.

ㅤ

"Team, I need an update. How are you all holding up?"

ㅤ

Amidst the chaos that had only slightly lessened by now, her voice felt like a much needed break for Iso and Omen.

ㅤ

"I'm detecting an unfamiliar presence."

ㅤ

"Of course, I'll run a quick scan."

ㅤ

Silence promptly befell them.

Clove was about to speak, but they shut themselves up once they heard a hum in the distance. The tense quiet amongst them helped them isolate the noise with ease. But it was so quiet considering how far away it was.

ㅤ

“I’m picking up an… abnormal presence of radiancy in the area.”

ㅤ

Sage noted.

Omen noticed something cut off the sunlight that previously illuminated him. And just as he was about to look up, the answer to his question deafened all three of them. If the unbearably loud whirring accentuated by the enclosed cavern wasn’t enough, the shadow that engulfed them from above forced the rest of the team to also glance up.

There, they finally saw the number of helicopters that were entering the area from above.

Omen brought up a hand and unmuted the radio.

ㅤ

“They’ve brought backup.”

ㅤ

One of the helicopters’ doors swung open, revealing a peculiar soldier who stood at the edge of the vehicle.

This one seemed to be dressed in different apparel; as opposed to the previous soldiers who donned simple brown armour, these ones wore midnight blue robes with silver patterns across, and an unfamiliar marking on the black mask that covered their face. The soldier lifted his hand, and there was a misplaced glow emerging from his palm. It almost mimicked Sage’s.

Only one second passed before the trio were forced to jump out of the way. They narrowly dodged an attack of what seemed to be a massive mound of… ice? Snow? No, it wasn’t either. But it was solid and pure white.

Particles of cyan emerged from the massive shards. It began suffocating them, the massive influx of it creating a burning fog that irritated their lungs with every inhale. Only Omen seemed unharmed by this.

ㅤ

“Team, report! What happened?”

ㅤ

Sage cried out, her voice barely audible in the sudden ruckus.

ㅤ

“They’ve brought radiants this time. Weapons ready.”

ㅤ

He cocked his gun as he explained.

And unlike the two of them, who continuously cleared their throats in a vain attempt to clear their airways, Omen peeked and began shooting the first thing he saw. The thick cyan 'smoke' successfully obscured anything that could be seen. Due to this, he had to rely on his hearing to infer whether or not he hit anything, and the bullets from each side made sure to make that even more difficult.

With one more cough, Clove readied their own Spectre and fixed their posture in preparation for the upcoming rematch… as they called it.

ㅤ

“These people have radiants working for them?!”

ㅤ

“Do they really?”

ㅤ

Clove rolled their eyes at Iso’s cheeky remark.

ㅤ

“Agh, whisht. I’m nae keeping track of yer backstory.”

ㅤ

Clove promptly revealed themselves once more. And although they began rapidly shooting at whatever they could see, they made use of the thick haze to reposition themselves and cover more area. Nonetheless, Compared to Omen's, their voices were dangerously gravelly and weak. Something Sage quickly noticed due to them forgetting to mute their radios earlier.

ㅤ

“All of you must get out as fast as you can! We’re sending backup to–“

ㅤ

“There’s no need for backup−!” He peeked once more and shot, gunning down a soldier just as he noticed him. “What difference do radiants make? We can take care of this ourselves!”

ㅤ

His words were now laden with the fury he lugged around the moment he discovered who he really was. It lacked the serenity he was attributed with mere weeks ago. There was no way to reason with him currently.

However, Iso’s thought process was interrupted once the ground rumbled beneath him, and he looked down to see the area he stood on violently cracking, almost like a mini-earthquake. A massive spike of concrete shot out from under him, but he quickly jumped out of the way.

Thankfully, he landed beside Clove behind a massive pillar.

He only had a few seconds to catch his breath and regain his balance. There, he saw the spike revert back underground, having defiled the exact part of the concrete Iso stood on. He knew he'd be dead if he were a second too late.

ㅤ

“Careful,” he started, “some of them could detect our locations, as well.”

ㅤ

“Ya know them?”

ㅤ

He muted his earpiece. Since he attempted to steal a glance once more, he didn't note the curious glimmer in Clove's eyes behind him. Not when he was too busy struggling not to reveal himself to the enemies by accident.

ㅤ

“I know of them.”

ㅤ

Clove laughed, almost amused. In conjunction with them pulling out a smoke from their dimension, a small glow promptly emitted from their hand; its pale complexion now shifting to a purple, pink and white hue.

ㅤ

“It's fine, Iso. I’ve nae problem killing yer loved ones for you!”

ㅤ

“No, that’s not, uh… that’s not necessary; I can do it myself.”

ㅤ

He wasn’t that soft, was he? Besides, they weren't his loved ones.

ㅤ

“If ya say so. Well then, I’ll be out killing these numpties.”

ㅤ

Iso turned to meet Clove's gaze to nod, but he was caught off guard by the massive cloud behind them.

Clove, clearly happy with his reaction, saluted him with a wide grin and disappeared into the dome of colourful smoke they proudly formed behind his back. It felt like his mind was slightly contorting. Iso would attribute it to anxiety if he weren't surrounded by radiants who worked under this cursed organisation.

He had to act fast.

ㅤ

“Iso, you seem to know them, what can we expect?”

ㅤ

Sage’s voice perked up over the radio.

He peeked and surveyed the area. But for now, there was nothing. He still had to watch out for any misplaced shadows. Some of them can turn invisible, right?

ㅤ

“Uh… Well, violent radiancy.”

ㅤ

“Violent?”

ㅤ

“My bosses have a tendency to search for the… the dangerous radiants.” He quickly shot, killing one blue-robed soldier. “If my memory serves me right, one of them can control our minds if we’re exposed to them long enough.”

ㅤ

Iso immediately hid back behind the pillar when another soldier emerged. The misplaced confusion in his mind slipped just as he shot. So, hopefully it was that one, he mused. But he was too overwhelmed by anxiety and adrenaline to think about anyone else.

ㅤ

“This is worse than I thought. I have to send back-up. Try to stay alive until we’re there, okay?”

ㅤ

Clove’s voice emerged in the radio after that. However, in the midst of all the chaos, he deprioritised their conversation and peeked once more.

But then, Iso saw it.

He saw a soldier, also wearing those blue robes, pull his own blood out from his left hand with a twist of his fingers and… He promptly used it to heal the other one he’d just shot, the fluid entering their gaping wound with relative ease.

Now that he saw this from far away, the sight was macabre.

However, Iso was swiftly caught off guard when a soldier emerged from what he assumed was a locked door behind him.

Though he took aim and shot, his enemy was significantly quicker; the bullets missed no thanks to him being stripped of his ability to move.

He wasn’t too concerned with someone sneaking up on him since he had his shield up, but this man, weaponless, only needed one hand to completely disarm Iso. The clatter of his Vandal as it fell on the ground grew to a mere muffle. It only took a few seconds for Iso to begin losing all control of himself.

For a moment, it was blank. All he could hear were the rapid beats of his own heart.

The enemy in front of him became a lump of midnight blue and vague patterns of silver. Time became slower, his pulsations grew weaker, and breathing devolved into a repetitive task he was urged to drop by whatever remnants of cognitive coherence remained in his decaying mind.

It felt like his blood stopped travelling across his body, and the connection between his nerves grew weaker and weaker. So much so, all sensations were no longer being processed.

Thirty seconds before his brain activity finally ceased. With that over with, the soldier promptly worked away at his brain stem.

Then, there was a flash, and Iso fell to the ground. All of his nerves reconnected within the span of a picosecond.

ㅤ

“Iso, are you with me?”

ㅤ

A voice called out, but he couldn’t respond.

He forgot how to speak. Heck, everything he was used to mere seconds ago felt like an assault to his senses. Light, sound, even the sensation of his clothes as they wrapped around his skin, each cloth harbouring a vastly different texture compared to the last.

Omen placed a hand on his back in an attempt to catch his attention. But in the face of the incomprehensible stabbing pain in his abdomen, it did nothing.

ㅤ

“Iso!”

ㅤ

Omen growled once another soldier presumably appeared, quickly rushing in front of Iso to cover him and gun the enemy down as soon as he could. The fight was easy to slip his mind. Nevertheless, he sat up and sighed, finally catching up.

ㅤ

“I’m, uh…” he wiped the sweat from his forehead, “I’m here, I’m here.”

ㅤ

“What did he do to you?”

ㅤ

Omen asked as he reloaded.

But, for a moment, there was only silence on Iso’s end. It felt like many of his systems were shifting inside of him, mainly his digestive and respiratory system. Almost like they were…

Well, he wasn’t a bloody doctor.

ㅤ

“I– I don’t know.”

ㅤ

“I’ll give you time to recollect yourself.”

ㅤ

A smoke of purple suddenly enveloped Iso, but Omen himself stepped out and continued down towards a doorway. Iso heeded his words; he took his time and let his body catch up.

He had forgotten why he was here, or where he even was. All he knew was that there was something they wanted. Worst of all, there was this peculiar... thing he could control, but he just couldn’t remember what it exactly was.

Although he sat there for a bit, an unfamiliar shout from outside of the smoke caught his attention. The distortion of the voice let him know that it was nobody from his team. Right, right. The mission. He and Clove and… uh, someone else, they all came here for something…

He promptly clutched his weapon, stood up and followed without second thought.

His body felt heavier than usual. Each step required an exponential amount of effort to lift every part of his foot, and holding his heavy Vandal was unbearable. But that didn’t matter.

Not now.

Iso turned the corner and mindlessly gunned down the first thing he’d seen.

One soldier fell, revealing another. But Iso wasn’t quick enough to release the trigger; this led to a bullet piercing his target’s thigh and forcing him to tumble to the ground. His weapon escaped his grip, as well.

Iso's thoughtlessly brought him in front of the soldier he'd just injured. He stopped in front of him, aiming his Vandal right on the centre of his concealed face.

His index finger rapidly tapped on the trigger, almost begging him to shoot already. But… something was wrong.

Iso's eyes were firmly locked on the soldier's sash. His brain wracked itself, desperately attempting to understand why this little detail shut his mind down when it could mean life and death. But the way it was tied was different.

ㅤ

“I know you.”

ㅤ

He muttered.

Decades of training pushed Iso to never hesitate. He didn’t even know why he was killing these people, his instincts told him to. Yet, for some reason, he kept scrutinising the midnight blue sash.

It hung loosely around the soldier's waist. As opposed to the others, who meticulously tied it to make it look both elegant and efficient, this one was simply haphazardly tied together.

With a shake of his head, Iso snapped himself out it and firmly held his gun once more.

ㅤ

“Take the mask off.”

ㅤ

There was naught of a response from the soldier. Impatient, Iso shot inches away from his head.

ㅤ

“I said take it off!”

ㅤ

He shouted, his typically soft voice echoing harshly within the walls that surrounded them. Hearing something like this was so awry coming from Iso. It seems that the soldier also knew this, given the sudden tension that coursed through him.

So, he slowly lifted both hands and used one to push off the hood, letting his platinum-blonde hair loose. Then he clutched the black mask and slid it off, revealing… a very familiar face.

Iso’s eyes widened once he was finally allowed to observe your features. And nothing’s changed. You looked just as tired as the last time he saw you.

Sickly pale skin, droopy eyes, and…

Looking at you made it feel like all of those months never passed. It was as if he just came back from another assassination and went to see you like usual. It took Iso a few seconds before he could even form an appropriate response.

ㅤ

“…Y/N?”

ㅤ

“Hey, Zhao Yu. How's grandma?”

ㅤ

Instinctively, he dropped his weapon and rushed to your side.

ㅤ

“My God, you’re alive! I– I thought I’d never see you again… Why didn’t you say anything? I could’ve killed you!”

ㅤ

“We don’t die that easily, remember?”

ㅤ

“But I– I shot you. I shot your leg.”

ㅤ

He lifted a hand, as if he himself was going to tend to your wound, but you were quick to gently push it away.

ㅤ

“I can take care of it, Zhao Yu.”

ㅤ

He faintly nodded, taking his time to observe you. Looks like he forgot.

ㅤ

“It’s been so long. I’m… I’m sorry I never got back to you. Everything happened so fast, and I just–”

ㅤ

“Hey, be glad you left. The new regulations would drive you insane.”

ㅤ

He averted his gaze as he wiped his forehead. It took him a moment to comprehend you were still here, or how things worked at the organisation before he left.

One month… felt like a decade.

ㅤ

“But you could’ve left… We could’ve left this place together.”

ㅤ

“No hard feelings.”

ㅤ

Using your index finger, you began to heal the injury on your thigh with some sort of radiancy Iso just couldn’t remember. He sounded a bit woozy, now that you thought about it.

ㅤ

“It’s surreal seeing you on the job.”

ㅤ

…

He awkwardly smiled and met your gaze.

ㅤ

“Really? I hope my… my performance wasn’t too bad.”

ㅤ

“Fine at first. It got sloppy fast.”

ㅤ

“Oh… That’s– I’m glad it didn’t– I’m glad it didn’t go… uh…” he shook his head. “What’re we talking about?”

ㅤ

You glanced at him.

ㅤ

“You alright?”

ㅤ

Iso stared at you for a few seconds. Then, a crooked smile painted his lips.

ㅤ

“Huh?”

ㅤ

You lifted a hand and stroked his cheek, collecting a few droplets of sweat that were rapidly dripping down his chin. His skin felt hot and he looked weak. That wasn’t to mention how deathly pale he was becoming.

ㅤ

“You’re ill.”

ㅤ

Iso chuckled awkwardly, almost as if he were drunk.

ㅤ

“Am I really? That doesn’t, uh, That sounds…”

ㅤ

The rest of his words were incomprehensible gibberish even you couldn’t decipher. You clutched his shoulder and shifted his blood to inspect all of the surrounding organs.

This inspection, however, was quickly interrupted when you detected multiple unknown particles floating around in his bloodstream. Worst part is that their erratic structure wasn’t anything you could recognise.

And a healthy body wouldn’t have cluttered blood like this.

Great.

You placed your finger on his neck, gradually moving it down to detect where all of these foreign bodies were coming from. The lower you got, the closer you were to the source.

And it was mostly around the upper abdomen.

ㅤ

“Your organs aren’t working, Zhao Yu; you’re dying.”

ㅤ

You averted your gaze to the healed wound in your thigh. Reactivating whichever organ that was shut down would take more blood than one measly shot to the thigh could ever hope to produce.

ㅤ

“I can fix this. I can fix you."

ㅤ

You clutched the handle of the knife he had concealed on his hip, taking it out. But just as you aimed at your thigh again, an unfamiliar voice rung out from down the hallway, accompanied by rapid sets of footsteps.

ㅤ

“Get your hands off of him!”

ㅤ

You jumped at this order.

But you were quick to react; the blade was tossed away in favour of Iso’s Vandal. You clutched it and stood up, aiming it at the group. More specifically, their leader, who seemed to be a woman with a large ponytail. All you needed was a split second to take aim. Then, without hesitation, you promptly pulled the trigger.

However, the bullets were eaten up by a wall of lilac hexagons formed by your former co-worker. It blocked both your line of sight and any hope of self defence.

You promptly shot Iso a glare.

ㅤ

“What’re you doing?”

ㅤ

For a moment, he stared at the wall he’d created, almost as if he was mesmerised by it. Then, he stood up, peering through the wall and watching the weirdly familiar-looking group grow closer and closer.

Everything was so…

ㅤ

“I, uh… I don’t know.”

ㅤ

The hexagons suddenly came apart.

The group of two you were ordered to kill now morphed onto a group of three, that same phantom man now accompanied by many other faces you hadn’t seen in the briefing. All of their guns were pointed directly at you.

ㅤ

“Hands up, drop the weapon!”

ㅤ

“Make me.”

ㅤ

You hissed in response to a very short Scot. And your reply evidently ruffled their feathers. Or their scales. But another was quick to speak before either of you could shoot.

ㅤ

“This doesn’t have to end violently, okay? Just put the gun down, and we won’t hurt you.”

ㅤ

The one with the ponytail said, holding up one hand towards you as a peaceful gesture. This statement felt like such a slap in the face. So much so, you couldn’t help but cock your rifle specifically in the face of the lady who said it, even when the contingency of death was dangerously probable.

ㅤ

“You don’t get to have peace after what you’ve done.”

ㅤ

“You can’t comprehend what atrocities your superiors committed! They must be dealt with.”

ㅤ

Omen replied... and the sight of him stopped you from being able to respond. But during this conversation, the one with the ponytail began moving towards Iso, and it swiftly caught your attention. She approached Iso with one hand outstretched, and a glow of serene yet saturated shade of teal began forming in the palm of that hand.

Before she could touch Iso, however, a shriek escaped her when an immense amount of pressure suddenly overtook her wrist and forced her away just as you waved your hand.

This allowed you to stand between the two of them and force space.

ㅤ

“Don’t touch him!”

ㅤ

You spat out.

The woman clutched her wrist in an attempt to soothe the pain; her two partners seemed like they were just one nod away from gunning you down then and there. But she only stood there, staring at you in surprise.

ㅤ

“Do you… know him?”

ㅤ

The question caught you off guard. And for a moment, you hesitated, narrowing your eyes.

ㅤ

“…Do you?”

ㅤ

“Yes! We’re the ones who took him in!”

ㅤ

You stared at her. And given his silence as he stood behind you, you knew that Iso wasn’t capable of confirming anything at the moment. He must be seconds away from death, you’re sure of it.

ㅤ

“We’re not against you, okay? We’re with you. Let us help.“

ㅤ

As much as you wanted to kill them all then and there, you weren’t capable of doing such a thing given your measly role. And you knew it would probably upset Iso. He did stop you a minute ago, didn’t he?

So… you had no choice but to take her word for it.

ㅤ

“Zhao Yu’s dying.”

ㅤ

“What?”

ㅤ

You dropped the gun and rushed to his side. This also allowed her to move to him and start healing him alongside you.

ㅤ

“My partner shut down his organs. I think one hasn’t recovered.” You pushed your hand against his chest once more. “Check his abdomen.”

ㅤ

She complied. And there, she felt the same heaviness that tipped you off earlier.

ㅤ

“It’s a large organ… I– I’m not sure, but it could be either his lungs, or his liver… or spleen?”

ㅤ

The phantom stepped up just as you moved elsewhere, accompanied by the tired-looking Scot. They slid their gun back in their holster and held Iso’s left arm.

ㅤ

“Iso! Can you hear me?!”

ㅤ

“We need to get him back on the aircraft.”

ㅤ

The phantom started, but the healer shook her head.

ㅤ

“He could die if we wait for too long. His blood is already full of toxins. We must stay until he’s in a functional state, at the very least.”

ㅤ

“You have to go. Now. The others will kill you.” You called out, holding the mask you left on the ground moments prior. “I’ll tell them you escaped.”

ㅤ

“Yer lads cannae do nothing! We can take them all.”

ㅤ

“We have a different execution procedure. It’s why you have holes forming in your bones.”

ㅤ

You tied the mask back on and lifted your hood, oblivious to how the Scot’s face blanched.

ㅤ

"Aye, maybe we should, er…" they awkwardly chuckled, a few butterflies escaping them, "we should go."

ㅤ

You lifted your hand and went to unmute the radio.

ㅤ

“Wait…” The healer spoke. “Why don’t you come with us? We could use someone with your expertise.”

ㅤ

…

You glanced at her in confusion.

ㅤ

“Are you suggesting I quit?”

ㅤ

“Yes, just like Iso! Whatever abuse you’ve endured, it’ll all end if you decide to join us.”

ㅤ

You paused. The offer sounded seductive, but only to a lower rank like Iso. You were in a much worse position being in a higher one.

ㅤ

“I… won’t live if they catch me.”

ㅤ

“We’ll keep you safe from them. I assure you, they won’t lay a finger on you if you come with us.”

ㅤ

You stared at her for a few seconds, weighing this decision. And you weren’t really sure if it was worth it, even though you knew she wasn’t lying.

On one hand, you’d be freed of the shackles of the Scions of Hourglass, and you probably wouldn’t be indoctrinated every day. And you’d also reconnect with Iso. On the other, you’d have to live in constant anxiety of the contingency of being caught again.

You went to reject her offer… until you glanced at the half-dead Iso.

The kid would never survive without you, would he? He could barely navigate being both a student and a hitman without you or his grandmother’s help. Actually, his grandma probably missed you, huh?

You smiled fondly at the thought. So, you sighed, ripped off the mask, and threw it it on the ground. This allowed the screen to pitifully shatter to a dozen pieces.

ㅤ

“Let’s go.”

ㅤ

Just doing that cemented your path with these new people. The penalty for letting your mask break was severe, especially from Jess. But you weren’t here to endure it.

Not anymore.

With that confirmation, all of you left the base through an exit you were sure nobody was guarding. Unlike Iso, you yourself had enough information on this place to navigate it.

All of you boarded what you presumed was their aircraft and disappeared into the sky.

You were impressed with the speed of the vehicle… for a few seconds until you had to tend to the spaced-out Iso once more. The other healer, Sage, was now working on freeing Clove from whatever hold one of your colleagues had on them.

Apparently you weren’t lying about their bones.

ㅤ

“This is horrible. I’ve never heard of radiants who can manipulate the human body like this. How could such a thing possibly exist?”

ㅤ

Among your efforts to heal him, you were also gently guiding the circulation of Iso’s blood. Not fully controlling it, but instead pushing it to move to encourage his pancreas to start fully functioning again. Or spleen, you didn’t know.

But you could tell that it was working. His blood felt much cleaner than before.

ㅤ

“Our bosses take powerful radiants and brainwash them. They teach them the most effective ways to kill.”

ㅤ

You remembered Luca, and how he acted when he was first being trained. It was hard not to laugh at his face when he discovered his ability could be utilised in such a way; that he himself was capable of rendering someone brain dead so fast.

But it ceased to be funny when your friend was now on the other end of it.

ㅤ

“…Is that what happened to you and Iso?”

ㅤ

You opened your mouth to answer, but Iso’s face slightly shifting at this question made your voice falter. It wasn’t hard to tell he was very uncomfortable at this topic, despite his state.

So you opted to leave him out of the conversation.

ㅤ

“Happened to me.”

ㅤ

“That’s horrible.” Sage averted her gaze. “These people are horrible.”

ㅤ

You contemplated her words for a second, and promptly began to question whether or not Iso told them everything.

Sure, you were a much higher rank than him and thus had more information, but surely he remembered their ritual when it came to recruiting specific radiants? Oh, his memory was shoddy. You couldn’t expect much from it.

You sighed and continued your work. But then, a deep voice interrupted you from your thoughts.

ㅤ

“Your bosses…” Omen started, “what do you know about them? Can you name who’s at the top?”

ㅤ

Your heart skipped a beat.

For a moment, you assumed that Omen wasn't speaking to you, but given the fact that he was looking right at you… You braced yourself before finally responding.

ㅤ

“I… only know those way below them.”

ㅤ

“How does that work?”

ㅤ

You stopped and leaned back, stretching your fingers in an attempt to ease the soreness, a vain attempt to take your mind off of the fact you were talking to Omen.

ㅤ

“It’s a hierarchical structure; information gets lost the further down you go. Nobody knows who’s at the top.”

ㅤ

Omen faintly nodded.

And yet, he seemed incredibly unsatisfied with this answer. Your words seemed concordant with Iso’s, albeit a bit more detailed. He himself never mentioned the hierarchical structure of this organisation. But now that they thought about it, it made sense…

So, that meant that Iso was a low rank? Sage mused to herself. But another question took priority in her mind.

ㅤ

“I presume you’re a healer as well?”

ㅤ

“I am.”

ㅤ

“Wonderful! How do your powers work, exactly?”

ㅤ

“I control blood.”

ㅤ

Sage went to reply, but she paused at your response. Control blood? That didn’t seem to match what she was seeing.

ㅤ

“Ah, but, wouldn’t that make you just as capable of manipulating the body as your… um, your former partners?”

ㅤ

“No. It’s suppressed. I can only heal.”

ㅤ

“Really? How–”

ㅤ

“Can we save this conversation for when we land?”

ㅤ

Iso suddenly interrupted. His voice, though monotone, still caught everyone in the aircraft off guard. To the rest, it was incredibly surprising. Clove and Sage’s concerned expressions gave it away.

But to you? You knew that he loathed these questions; combined with your presence, they were digging up too many unbearable memories. This particular aspect of the legendary and feared hitman must be new for them.

Sage promptly cleared her throat.

ㅤ

“Your recruitment should yield… very fruitful results. On both sides.”

ㅤ

Sage said with a smile. Though friendly, you could tell she was just as taken aback as everyone else in the room. You couldn’t help but stare at her blankly for a few minutes.

Then, you turned back to Iso and continued healing him, all while Sage focused on Clove.

67 notes · View notes

scripts4dreamers · 6 months ago

Text

Leave a light on pt. 3

AN: Part 3 is heeeeeerreeeee! My little 50 page fic has turned into an 87 page fic (and counting), so these are going to keep coming. Thank you again to everyone who's said nice things about this fic. it means a lot.

Part One, Part Two, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight

Solas’ healing was remarkable. It took several days for him to get his mobility back to where he had been before the battle with the archdemon but, considering that Amala had been planning to track his healing in weeks, if not months, she considered it a marvel. Sometimes, when they ate together, or when Solas consented to sit still long enough for her to manually check on the progress of his wounds and burns, she could physically see them healing over. It was like…well, it was like magic.

Outside of that things had been progressing slowly. Solas was giving her space, which she appreciated, and they had fallen into a comfortable routine. Every morning after they woke and prepared for the day, they would meet in the library for breakfast. After breakfast, Solas would wish her well and leave, slipping through the Eluvian into the wider fade. He was searching for something, though whether it was a physical something or more of an emotional something she wasn’t quite sure. If she asked she knew he would tell her, but every time she opened her mouth to actually do that, she hesitated. Amala would then spend the day exploring the lighthouse, building bridges to the surrounding islands and learning as many of their secrets as she could. They would meet in the dining room for dinner, spend hours discussing their various findings and then slowly make the walk back to their respective chambers and say goodnight. On her own in her chambers, Amala would then document the things she had seen and felt around the different islands and read through her past entries to see if she could figure out any patterns. She would bathe, dress for sleep and then lie awake in bed and replay every interaction in her head, painfully aware that Solas was just a short walk away.

Things between them were still fragile. After the day when she’d helped bathe him, touch between them became infrequent and always happened in passing. It was as though they had both realised how dangerous that kind of physical closeness was and they were afraid to shatter one another. At first that made sense. After all they were both recovering from more injuries than they could count but, as time continued to pass and even their darkest bruises faded from black, to purple and then to green, the softness began to feel strained. They orbited around one another, trading looks and smiles, but never quite closing the distance. Occasionally she would touch Solas’ shoulder as she moved around him to reach a glass, or he would place his hand on the small of her back and usher her out of his way in the library. When they walked back from the dining hall they were close enough that the backs of their hands brushed, but it never went further than that. It was almost funny. If someone had told the Amala who snuck into Solas’ tent every other night that one day she would hesitate to hold his hand in the dark, she would have laughed right in their face, but here they were.

Part of it was Solas giving her space. She knew that. Part of it was him wrestling his own demons and part of it was a personal discomfort she had over what she called “the Mythal of it all”. It hadn’t always been a problem. At first Amala had barely even noticed but, as the days wore on… Mythal was everywhere. Statues, murals, books. Everywhere Amala turned there was some depiction of Mythal, and right by her side, every time, was Solas. At first Amala figured that she must be jealous, but it wasn’t quite that. Even when her and Solas had first met she had known that he was older than her and probably more experienced. There had never been any sort of illusion that they were each other's' firsts. It wasn’t even hard for her to accept that Fen’Harel may have had a romantic relationship with Mythal. It was translating that romantic relationship to her, and to her relationship with Solas that Amala couldn’t wrap her head around.

Solas had tried holding her hand once. They had been leaning against the wolf statue in the courtyard, admiring the night sky and discussing nothing of importance when she had felt him shift closer, his fingers brushing against hers and staying there. As always, his skin against hers had made her feel like she was touching the stars. Her whole body had shivered. She had wanted to let him hold her hand. She had wanted to close that last bit of distance and kiss him but, as she decided to, she caught sight of one of the Mythal statues, towering over the stairs, watching her with its blank, featureless face and Amala had pulled away instead.

It was one thing, she figured, for the love of your life to have loved someone more than you once. Sure, fine, that made sense. It was one thing to learn that you were not the love of your life’s love of their life. Sure, fine. Hurtful maybe, but not ultimately too much of a problem. Amala could accept that. It was another thing entirely for the love of your life’s love of their life to be Mythal, the Protector, the All-Mother and to be constantly surrounded by depictions of them together thousands and thousands of years before you were even born. It was more than an emotional crisis, it was an epistemic nightmare. So, yes, maybe she was being a little more distant than she wanted to be.

In these moments of crisis, Caretaker had become her saving grace. They were not the most emotionally responsive confidant, but they always managed to make her feel better and they always listened.

“The Wolf would be able to answer your questions more effectively than I can, Dweller,” they always said, “perhaps when he returns from the Crossroads, you can ask him.”

“Perhaps,” she always agreed, with absolutely no intention of following through.

If Caretaker could have sighed, they certainly would have.

—-

The peace couldn’t last forever. Something eventually had to snap. It happened at dinner, after Amala had just finished explaining the magic of a nearby island that held a seemingly bottomless pool in the centre. Solas had been listening intently, as he always did, smiling as she spoke and asking relevant questions, basking in the simple pleasure of being with her, of hearing her happiness.

The wine was strong, the food was good and Solas was starting to feel the slightest bit tipsy when something Amala said caught his attention, “You should come see it. There are flowers and ancient willows all around. It’s beautiful if you can get past the Mythal of it all.”

The moment the words left her lips, he could see that she wanted to die. She pressed her lips together and she avoided eye contact, clearly hoping to pass it off as nothing. Solas, of course, knew her far too well for that.

“The Mythal of it all?” he questioned with a confused smile, “What exactly is the Mythal of it all?”

Amala shrugged, “It’s nothing. Ignore me. The pool is beautiful and you should visit if you have time.”

“Amala-” he started to insist

“The Dweller is referring to the various depictions of you and Mythal that are scattered around the lighthouse, Dread Wolf,” Caretaker spoke up, refilling Solas’ glass and seemingly pretending not to see the daggers Amala was staring into their head, “she finds them difficult, emotionally and intellectually she finds her emotional reaction to them confusing. It has been causing a great deal of distress.”

“Thanks for that, Caretaker,” she grumbled, her face so hot with shame that it looked like it must physically hurt.

Solas was stunned. Without meaning to, he began sorting through his memories looking for signs of discomfort in his Inquisitor. He tried to put himself in her shoes, but there were so many factors that just didn’t transfer that he couldn’t help but think he did a poor job of it. How had he missed her unhappiness? How had Caretaker seen something that he, himself had not?

He was quiet for a while, long enough for Amala to force herself to look at him to see his reaction. He avoided her eye, feeling a strange mixture of confusion and shame. He walked through the lighthouse in his mind, flushing with embarrassment as he realised the true extent of Mythal’s presence. He had grown so accustomed to this place that he barely noticed anymore. His attention was always so squarely on one of two things; Amala, on where she was and how she was feeling, or on how he could atone for his endless list of sins that he hadn’t even noticed the giant stone elephant in the room. He sighed, feeling his age for the first time in ages and braced himself for a conversation he did not want to have. It seemed that, no matter how hard he tried, he was always making some sort of mistake.

He finally said, “Amala, I am so sorry. I had not considered that being here might be uncomfortable for you.”

Amala opened her mouth to speak, closed it and then pushed her chair away from the dining room table, disappearing into the pantry. His chest clenched with panic. She was slipping through his fingers again. She had realised the mistake she had made in loving him. He had finally pushed her too far. He-

Solas started to ask where she was going but, before he could finish, she returned, carrying four bottles of wine.

“If we’re going to do the relationship post mortem, I am going to need to be a great deal more drunk,” she announced, “you’re welcome to join me if you wish.”

Relief. Palpable, irrational relief.

“Oh I do wish,” Solas immediately agreed, uncorking a bottle and pouring them each a very full cup.

In unison they each downed it, pulling faces as the wine burned its way down their throats. Solas immediately refilled their cups.

“This is such a bad idea,” Amala said, drinking deep.

Solas shrugged, downing his second glass, “We’ve had worse.”

Almost immediately, he began to feel the effect. That was the problem with the fade, it heightened things, made them more vivid and alive. Usually that was something Solas appreciated but, as he physically felt the alcohol start to loosen his muscles and go to his head, he could acknowledge that it was also fairly dangerous

Amala laughed, watching him pour a third glass and gesture for her to get on finishing her second, “Oh now this is a surprise. You almost never drank with us back in the Inquisition days.”

He finished his glass in two deep gulps and poured another one, “During the Inquisition days I was trying to hide the fact that I was a secret elven god and also the cause of all our troubles. Being drunk would have made that significantly more difficult.”

She raised her eyebrows incredulously and the look - that look of fond exasperation - was so familiar that Solas had to physically hold himself back from leaning forward to press a kiss to the corner of her mouth, on the spot where he could see her smile just starting to form.

Too soon, he told himself. Far too soon, but someday…

The thought alone made him shiver.

“What, the Dread Wolf can’t drink and lie?” She asked teasingly, snapping Solas out of his daydreaming, “I’m disappointed.” She took a deep drink from her cup, seemingly as an excuse to break eye contact before continuing, “And, wait a second, aren’t you the one who’s constantly harping on about how you’re not an elven god?”

“I never said I couldn’t drink and lie,” he replied, “I only said it would make it more difficult. What I couldn’t do at the time was drink, lie and remember all the very good reasons I had for not sleeping with the Inquisitor. I’ve been told that’s a common problem with alcohol.”

Amala snorted, “Isn’t that the truth.”

“And, alright, I’m not an elven god, I’m a very old, very powerful immortal elven mage who waged war on the Titans and then the Evanuris, locking them in a prison I built by creating a veil that separated our world from magic. Somehow I don’t think that distinction would have mattered much when Bull stuck a horn through my stomach for giving the orb to Corypheus.” Solas pointed out, realising with growing mortification just how drunk he was becoming.

It was worth it though. She threw her head back and let out a roaring laugh, the exact laugh he sometimes caught just a hint of in his dreams. His Inquisitor had always had the kind of laugh that made everyone around her laugh as well, like she made things brighter just by seeing the humor in them.

“Alright, alright, that’s fair,” she conceded, still chuckling, “damn, I forgot how sassy you can be.”

“I am not sassy!” Solas insisted.

“You are sassy, and you’re a lightweight,” she continued, finishing her glass and giving him a nod of thanks when he immediately refilled it.

“I prefer the term sardonic,” he corrected, “and you, my dear, are deflecting.”

Amala pulled a face, “I am not! I’m just not drunk enough for all of that yet. Keep teaching me what words I should call you instead of sassy while I drown my inhibitions in this-” she looked at the bottle, which had no label, “what even is this?”

Solas shrugged, feeling warmer and lighter than he had in ages, “There’s no way to tell. Some of the bottles here date back to before the fall of the Evanuris.”

Amala, who had just taken a swig, choked, “What?” she spluttered, coughing, “You’re telling me that this wine could be over a thousand thousand years old?”

He took the bottle from her hands and inspected it, “Probably not this specific bottle, but that one-” he gestured to one of the others she had brought out, “that one I distinctly remember.”

“Well then fuck this bottle,” she said, turning to the one he had pointed at, “I want to try the pre-veil wine.”

Solas couldn’t help but laugh, delighted by how fearless his Inquisitor always was when faced with the unknown world. It had never stopped surprising him how she approached everything with curiosity, with the sincere hope that the next thing around the corner would be something wonderful rather than something terrifying. If he had ever been that way then it had been so long ago that he couldn’t remember it. She passed the bottle to him, her eyes wide with reverence as he twisted the cork off. It opened with a loud pop and Amala let out a burst of laughter, clapping as though the bottle had just performed some sort of delightful magic trick. He poured them both a glass of the pale golden liquid, pleased to see that the bubbles had not dissipated over the years and handed one to her. She accepted with a smile, a real, unguarded one and Solas felt his heart stutter in his chest. Their fingers brushed, electricity shot through his body and he felt the instinctual urge to pull away. Luckily, the contact only lasted a second.

“So,” he asked after she had taken a sip, “what do you taste?”

She closed her eyes, humming with pleasure as the flavor coated her tongue and slid down her throat. Solas felt his face get hot.

“It’s-strange,” she eventually said, her eyes still closed, “I guess it tastes like that moment when you’re out with friends and you’re all drunk and you’re all walking home together and someone starts to sing. Like that specific kind of fuzzy, hazy togetherness, with your feet echoing on the ground as one and your voices getting all tangled up in the air.” she opened her eyes again and looked at him, “What was that?”

“Wine,” he answered simply, “before Elgar’nan burned away so many of the things our people used to feel. What you just experienced was the specific emotion the winemaker infused this vintage with. It used to be that sampling wines was like sampling the memories of the winemaker themselves. Each one was completely unique, completely singular.”

Amala stared into her cup with pure wonder, “That’s incredible. I can see now why our nights at the Herald probably seemed tame to you.”

“Oh no,” Solas assured with a laugh, taking a deep swig from his own glass and sighing as the feeling pulled him in, “I tried whatever it was the Iron Bull kept drinking. Once.”

She chuckled, “Ah, Bull. He was always such a riot.”

“He did keep one on their toes, yes,” Solas agreed.

“And he never gave me shit unless I deserved it,” She said, “he never let all the Inquisitor stuff scare him off.” She was quiet for a moment, teetering on the edge of sad, “I’m going to miss the big lug.”

He wanted to say something, but there were no words. If it weren’t for him, she would be home right now. She could pack up and visit the Iron Bull whenever she wanted. There would be a whole world full of people who adored her right at her fingertips. Instead she just had him. A poor substitute. A bad deal. He swallowed hard around the lump in his throat and drank deep.

“Do you want to know something terrible?” She asked, something dark and intriguing flickering in her eyes.

Solas held her gaze, letting her see his sincerity, “Nothing you say could ever be terrible to me.”

She scrunched up her nose, but he could tell she was pleased, or at least placated.

“I don’t think I’ll miss much.” she admitted, “A handful of people, my favorite bakery and that’s it. Everything else can go fuck itself. The Inquisition, the Imperium, Orlais, Ferelden, the Free Marches, the Chantry, the Templars, the Grey Wardens. Everyone who ever forced me to risk my life cleaning up their fucking messes only to blame me for it afterwards can piss right off. I’m done.”

She pushed herself up, swaying ever so slightly as she made her way to the fireplace, leaning against one of the stone wolves that stood guard at its side. Solas turned in his seat, following her with his eyes and feeling the thrumming pulse of tension as it started to swim right below the surface. Her anger, even subdued like it was now, was magnetic. He had always loved seeing her like this, taking charge of herself, taking charge of her destiny and flinging the expectations of others right back in their faces. Solas had learned long ago that you could push and push and push Amala, and she would try to be accommodating. To a point. Once that point was reached, you had better pray to the gods and take cover, because nothing in all of creation could keep her down.

“Good,” he said honestly, “I always thought that people were far too comfortable asking you to die for them.”

She scrunched up her nose again, “For the cause, technically.”

Solas rolled his eyes, “For them. If others could make the sacrifice and they continuously expected it to come from you then they were asking you to die for them.”

“You died for me once,” she said, so softly that Solas almost missed it.

The simmering tension spiked to a roiling heat and he could feel her gaze on him, heavy with expectation. This time it was him avoiding meeting her eyes as he floundered for the right words. He thought about that lost year often but they had almost never discussed it, at Amala’s insistence. Whenever Solas had tried she would clam up, blinking back tears and ask him to please just leave it alone. Except once.

It had happened right at the beginning of everything, when he was still struggling with his feelings for her, when he had started to accept that it was a pointless fight, that he was already drowning. Still, when he’d found her sobbing her eyes out on the battlements in the pitch black and she’d broken down enough to tell him the full story of what had happened, it had shaken him. It is an odd feeling to stand in front of a woman you have not even kissed yet, who you have barely even touched outside of your darkest and most private dreams, and know that in one year’s time you would lay down your life to save her without a second’s hesitation. In a way it made things much simpler. It had forced him to stop fighting his feelings, anyway.

He took another deep drink and refilled his cup, “I would have died for you a thousand times over if it were necessary.”

Amala sighed and let her eyes drift shut, though whether it was to ward off his words or to better drink them in, he couldn’t say. The wine made everything soft and beautiful, made his already fragile sense of self control feel like an unjustifiable weight on his shoulders that he itched to just throw off, but he held himself back. The last thing he wanted was to shatter the fragile peace they had carved for themselves.

“You can’t say things like that to me,” she said, “not while I’m drunk. You’re going to give me ideas.”

Fuck it, Solas was nothing if not an opportunist. He pushed himself up and made his way towards where she was standing and leaning against the fireplace. He moved slowly, reaching for her while still giving her plenty of time to pull away if he was overstepping. She stayed, her eyes sharp and wary as he moved closer.

“What kind of ideas?” he asked, feeling his blood thrum under his skin as his hands found her hips.

She closed her eyes again, “Bad ones.”

“Tell me about them.”

She laughed, meeting his gaze and leaning ever so slightly forward, into his touch, “They’re really bad.”

“I highly doubt that,” Solas teased, “outside of your inexplicable choice to continue to believe in me, you have world class judgment.”

“Not this time,” she assured.

He pushed his luck, leaning in so that his lips almost brushed her ear when he whispered, “Tell me anyway.”

Amala shivered and Solas felt a deep, primal sense of satisfaction at still being able to draw out those kinds of reactions from her. Perhaps all was not lost, perhaps things between them were not so broken that he could never hope to fix them. They still had chemistry, they could still talk.

Agonizingly, she pulled away, putting that dreaded, hated space in between their bodies again. Solas wanted to scream, but the pained look in Amala’s eye soothed the rough, fraying edges of his control. He was not alone in this pain. She still wanted him, there was just something in the way.

“I think I’m drunk enough to talk about it now,” she said with a resigned sigh.

It? What were they-? It took Solas a second to remember how their conversation had started - damned wine - but once he did, the pieces started to slot into place.

“Mythal.” He said.

“Mythal,” she agreed. She downed the rest of the wine in her cup in one, “I’m not uncomfortable per say,” she eventually started, “I just-” she gestured helplessly, “she’s everywhere, Solas. I can’t go five seconds without seeing some picture, or statue or mural of the two of you together. The walls are painted with your deepest regrets about hurting her. There’s a room whose key is literally just turning giant statues of the two of you to make them look at one another.”

Something in his chest pinched and he couldn’t help but smile. Of course she figured out the statue puzzle. Of course she had uncovered another one of his secrets, “You found the music room, then?”

“I unlocked a door, yes, but I never went inside.” she admitted.

“Why not?” he asked, cocking his head to the side, “I had thought, with your curiosity, you wouldn’t have been able to resist.”

Amala crossed her arms over her chest, something Solas knew she did when she felt vulnerable, as though her arms could create a barrier between her and the world, “I figured that, if you had wanted people to see what was inside there, you wouldn’t have hidden it behind a door that was locked with a massive statue puzzle.”

“A very fair observation,” he smiled, “but now I’m deflecting, we were talking about Mythal.”

She sighed, “It really isn’t important, Solas.”

That stung. She hadn’t meant anything by it, he knew that, but every time she pulled away, every time he asked her what she was thinking and she brushed him off he was reminded of how easy things used to be between them. There had been a time when Amala would just appear in his room and they would spend hours talking about nothing. They had been each others’ confidants. Sometimes Solas longed for a return to that closeness so much that it actually hurt.

Give her time, he reminded himself. You both need time to heal.

“If it is important enough that Caretaker has noticed, that means it is important to you. If it is important to you, it is important to me.” he replied simply, leaning forward slightly to catch her eye, “Tell me what’s on your mind, Vhenan.”

The wine was strong. He could see it affecting Amala. He could still feel it affecting him, loosening his tongue, lowering his carefully constructed inhibitions and heightening his emotions. He clenched his hands into fists at his side to keep them from reaching for her again.

She took a breath, her brow furrowed as she carefully selected each word through, what he could only assume was, a thick fog of drunkenness, “I just don’t quite know how to deal with all of this,” she finally admitted, “I don’t know where I fit. The two of you together, that makes a sort of sense, doesn’t it? You were spirits together, gods together. You forged a body out of lyrium because she asked you to, you went to war for her, you killed Titans for her. She was the great love of your life, it makes sense that she would be memorialised here.” she paused, thinking again before she continued, “But I don’t know where that leaves me, exactly. For most of my life, Mythal was the All-Mother. We prayed to her, we left offerings in her name. I have family members who still wear her Vallaslin. Comparatively, I’m just some woman who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Conceptualising Mythal as a real person, as the man I love’s great love…I suppose I’m just struggling with my place in it.”

Her words fell like stones and settled hard in Solas’ chest. They weren’t meant as a condemnation but hearing her talk, hearing the twists and breaks in her voice, the pain and confusion, it made him flush with shame nonetheless. Was there no end to the damage he had done? Amala had always been head strong, confident in her capabilities but measured in her judgments. The way she spoke about his relationship with Mythal…it was like it was an incontrovertible fact, like she had always been second to Mythal, like she belonged beneath Mythal. It was familiar. It was heartbreaking. It left a bitter taste in his mouth.

Solas tried to keep his voice gentle when he spoke again, “You believe that Mythal was the great love of my life?”

She shot him an incredulous look that was undercut in its severity by the soft sadness in her eyes, “Don’t do that. I’m not arrogant enough to believe that a year with mortal, Dalish, non-mage me measures up to a goddess you spent centuries with. Look at all you did for Mythal.”

“I did do a lot for Mythal,” he admitted, “I also murdered her, if you remember,” he countered.

“Alright, fair,” she conceded.

“And what makes you think I care about you not being a mage?” He asked, “I understand I haven’t always been the kindest about the Dalish, which is unfair of me, and you being a mortal did raise some concerns but-”

“You are terrible at comforting people,” Amala interrupted with a sad chuckle. She raised her hand to her eye and, to Solas’ horror, wiped away a single sliver of wetness, “any other ways I was deficient then?”

“Vhenan-”

His resolve cracked and he stepped towards her again and gently touched her shoulders. She turned her head so that he couldn’t see her face, but she didn’t push him away, which Solas took as a good sign.

“Look, I get it,” she said, her voice just the slightest bit shaky, “you loved her, she’s gone. I get to spend an eternity in a shrine to you both. Let’s just move on, alright?”

“You are not deficient,” Solas insisted, “I am drunk and you know I can get caught on little details but what I was trying to say-”

“It doesn’t matter, i-”

“Yes it does!” he interrupted, “It does because it is clear to me now that you have no idea what you mean to me. It’s my fault, of course, I was so hell bent on keeping my distance and minimizing the fall out that I never actually said the words. I am so sorry, Vhenan, truly. My only defense is that I thought you knew.”

“Knew what?” she replied, her eyes locked downwards, away from him.

He wanted to give her space. He wanted to back away, to fold his hands behind his back and explain calmly and clearly. He wanted to be Wisdom in that moment, because wisdom had never steered him wrong but, with his Inquisitor - his Amala - so close and the wine pumping through his veins, he was just a man.

“Look at me,” he said quietly. Her eyes stayed trained on the ground. Solas sighed and cupped her face with his hands, tilting her head up to meet his gaze, “I will not lie to you and say that I did not hunger for Mythal’s approval. I did. I always have, but she was not and will never be the great love of my life. After the way I have treated you, it’s only natural that you would feel as though I valued your love less than Mythal’s. I see that, I understand it, but please hear me when I say that I have never loved another as deeply or as ruinously as I love you. I may have forged a physical body for myself to please Mythal, but I had never felt like it was truly mine until I touched you. For centuries I had felt ugly and twisted and wrong in this body. It was a constant reminder of my failures, of my weakness, but you-” he shook his head, “you changed everything. You change everything.”

“You’ve said that to me before,” Amala said softly.

“I know,” Solas smiled, “but it bears repeating. Amala, when I called you my heart for the first time, I did not do that lightly. I have lived a very long time, and I have loved very many people, but I am still a man. I still have only one heart, and it belongs to you. If it will make you happy, I will tear down every statue in this building and repaint the walls. Hells, I’ll build you an entirely new lighthouse if you want me to.”

She chuckled, “That is perhaps a bit excessive.”

“Well,” Solas conceded, letting the tension break, “no one has ever accused me of thinking too small.”

Amala laughed gently again and he savored the simple pleasure of being the person that made her smile.

“True enough,” she agreed, taking a step back and sheepishly meeting his eye again, “I’m sorry for ruining our night.”

He let her go, though every centimeter between them felt like a mile.

“No, Vhenan. You ruined nothing. We have…” he considered his words carefully, very aware that he was still drunk, “it had to be said.”

“Ten years apart is a long time,” she agreed, taking a seat at the table.

Something in his chest softened with relief. She wasn’t leaving him yet. He followed her example and retook his seat.

“Too long,” he replied.

“Is that so? And whose fault is that?” she continued, with a hint of her old teasing tone.

He raised his glass, silently swearing that she could mock him for the rest of time so long as she kept looking at him like that, “Add it to my list of sins.”

“Where on the list?”

“The very top, of course,” he teased back, taking another sip and relishing her fond, if exasperated, smile.

So long as he could keep her smiling, he thought to himself, everything will have been worth it. Maybe it was the wine talking but, in that moment, Solas could not think of anything he would rather do with his existence than make Amala Lavellan smile.

#dragon age #datv spoilers #solas #solavellan #dragon age the veilguard #dragon age inquisition #solas dragon age #solas x female lavellan #inquisitor lavellan #dragon age solas #solas x inquisitor #solas x oc #solas x lavellan #solas fanfic #dragon age spoilers #dragon age fanfiction #solavellan fanfic

37 notes · View notes