#Man I know... Someone without naming any names had asked about making a thing with these two on HeroForge | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

asahicore · 7 months ago

Text

fast forward - pjs

pairing. jay x fem!reader

synopsis. After yet another romantic disappointment in the form of one Jake Sim, you go to the well you’ve always believed to grant wishes and ask for your one and true love to appear. That night, you go to sleep in your bed but wake up in a strange house. When you head downstairs, you find a man washing the dishes and telling you your favorite meal is waiting on the table for you. You’ve spent hours glaring at the back of that head, you could recognize it anywhere—it belongs to none other than Park Jongseong, your high school sworn enemy... and future husband, or so it seems.

genre+warnings. high school au, the type of e2l where they never really hated each other to begin with, they act like they're academic rivals even though they're not particularly academically gifted, jay has a thing about german the language, sunoo and kazuha besties, heeseung is a loser, jake and sunghoon are assholes sorry, ive liz is german, 02z get into a white-boy locker-room fight, attempts at banter etc, they're a little bit silly

word count. 26.6k

a/n. had the idea for this listening to fast forward by somi LAST SUMMER... and only wrote it this summer and only posting it now <3 i hope u guys enjoy reading this as much as i enjoyed writing it !!!!! jay is an absolute cutie here pls love him as much as i do.... as always let me know what u think and remember to vote for @zreamy president in the upcoming elections, shes the only one i trust to beta-read and hence to run a country <3 no it doesnt matter that shes scottish put this woman in the white house

There is only one thorn on the otherwise immaculate rose that is your life.

Every morning, you wake up feeling refreshed from eight hours of restful sleep. You go downstairs to the kitchen, a boiling cup of milky Earl Grey tea already waiting for you, and eat breakfast with your brother Jinwoo and father. Your mom dashes in, placing a kiss on your and Jinwoo’s foreheads, and on your dad’s lips, saying she’s late for work but will see you in the evening. “Have fun at school,” she bids every morning without fail. Your dad teaches Korean Literature at your school, so the three of you drive there together. He watches amusedly as you and Jinwoo bicker light-heartedly on the way there—even in the pits of his puberty, you and your brother get along like two peas in a pod. He still tells you about everything he learns at school and fills you in on the drama in his class, up-to-date with everything even though he pretends not to be interested.

You’re always one of the first to arrive at school, so you scroll through your feed or finish up some homework as you wait for your classmates to file in. Your friends circle your table and you chat about the last episode of the show you’ve been watching until the bell rings and they leave you for their assigned seat.

Class starts with your teacher handing out the math tests you took last week. “Jay and Y/N, great job, keep it up,” he says as he walks past you and the boy in front of you, and hands you your paper. Relief floods your body as you take in the bright red 82 in the top right-hand corner—not the best of the class, but enough for you to be satisfied.

Good friends, good grades—nothing extraordinary, but it’s a life you dare say any high school senior would want.

There’s just that one thing. The thorn in your side that won’t stop poking.

You glare at it as it whips around in its seat and takes a peek at the grade on your paper before you get to snatch it away from view. It only gives you three seconds to rejoice over your grade.

“Aw, Y/N. Good effort! Maybe you’ll do better next time!” Jongseong coos, holding up his test for you to see and glare even harder at. 85. Not that big of a difference, but it makes you want to punch the faux sympathetic pout off of his face.

You’re about to spit something just as petty back at him, but someone whispers your name, and you turn your head in their direction. Beside you, Jake is smiling at you as he asks what grade you got. Your attention is swiftly taken off of Jongseong, whom you don’t even notice dramatically rolling his eyes, huffing in annoyance, and turning around.

“82,” you whisper back, holding up your paper for Jake to see. His friendly, absurdly handsome smile makes your ears burn. “You?”

The corners of his lips fall down into a sad pout—the kind that makes your heart melt rather than gets on your nerves like someone else. “68,” he says. Leans in over the gap between your tables. Your heart jumps uncontrollably around your rib cage. “Do you wanna go over it together during the break? I think I need some help.”

One-on-one time with Jake Sim? You don’t need to be asked twice. You nod silently, almost mesmerized by Jake as his grin widens. He leans back in his chair. “Perfect. I’ll see you in the library, then.”

“Library, yeah,” you echo dumbly, but thankfully, your teacher tells you to all quiet down and starts the lesson.

You’re antsy all throughout the rest of your morning classes and lunch break, so nervous that you barely manage to finish your yogurt. Of course, your friends, Sunoo and Kazuha, have a field day with this, and even you can’t help but laugh along as they jump between reassuring you that it’ll be fine, slapping your shoulders with excitement and making fun of your uncharacteristic quietness.

Jake arrives at the library five minutes after you, looking around the room before he finds you at the big round table in the back of the library. Your brain is too riddled with anxiety for you to make more small talk than “Hey,” “Hey,” “How was your lunch?” “Good, yours?” “Good.” And so you just jump straight into it.

You’ve only had a couple minutes of quiet explanation on your part and heavy nodding on Jake’s when Jay appears at the entrance of the library. He spots you and Jake immediately, and without any hesitation whatsoever heads towards you and sits down at your table, right across from the two of you.

“Hey, Jay,” Jake greets in a friendly manner, but Jay only responds with a nod of his head.

“Oh, don’t mind me,” he says when he notices you glaring. “I won’t bother you.”

As if he could be anything other than a bother, you think, but courteously keep to yourself. The childish rivalry you and Jongseong have got going on has no business spoiling a rare hour of alone time you get with Jake. As you go over the exercises he had the most trouble with on the test with you, your eyes often drift over to Jongseong as if to check on him—you’re cautious like he’s a spider in the corner of the room that might spring on you at any moment.

And indeed, the moment your gaze leaves him for more than a minute as you explain an intricate theorem to Jake, he’s out of sight, and panic shoots through you. Where the hell has he suddenly gone off to? you wonder, but not for long.

“There’s a much easier way to do this, really,” says a voice from behind you, and of course, it’s none other than Jongseong himself, quite literally butting his way into your tutoring session. Right between you and Jake, he bends over and rests his elbows on the table, taking Jake’s pencil from him and describing the theorem in a way that isn’t that much simpler. Your eyes shoot bullets into the side of his face while he, unbothered, explains this and that to Jake, who glances at you a couple of times but otherwise does not seem so perturbed by the sudden change of tutor. Either Jongseong doesn’t notice your glare or doesn’t care, because he doesn’t budge.

Just when they’re done with the exercise and you think you’ll get Jake to yourself again, another voice appears from behind, a much higher, girlier one. You notice the hand on Jake’s shoulder first, until slowly, your eyes drift to the face—you recognize Yunjin, head of the cheerleading squad, and she’s smiling at you, a smile that at once tries to cover and betrays her surprise at seeing you and Jake together. She doesn’t acknowledge you any more than that, gaze going back to “Jakey,” asking him if he wants to head to class together. You check the time—five minutes before the first bell rings. What do they need so much time getting to class for? It’s not like any room in this school is more than a three-minute walk away.

But Jake doesn’t even look back at you, just says “Sure!” with far too much enthusiasm for your taste as he packs his stuff. “Thanks, you two,” he says, looking at Jay first, then at you. You think his eyes linger on you for a second, but just like that, he’s gone, him and Yunjin walking side-by-side.

You watch them leave—they look good together, the cheerleading captain and the soccer team’s star. The white Vans she’s wearing have a bunch of red love hearts on them that look drawn on, and you think, Of course, Jake is the type to date someone cute, someone fun, someone who would draw on their shoes. Not someone like you, whose idea of a good Friday night is lighting up a scented candle and reading your favorite novel for the nth time. When they’ve left the library, you slump in your seat, crumpling the sheet of paper you had drawn a bunch of graphs and formulae on to make things clearer for Jake. Jay awkwardly clears his throat and finally returns to his seat, looking at you with his lips pressed in a tight line.

“Y/N?” he asks tentatively, and the sound is too much to bear, so you pack your things and head to your next class early, too. Your mind is racing with a million thoughts a minute—who is that girl to Jake, how come you’ve never seen them together before, how come he was so eager to leave with her, what was that smile she gave you about? In the fifty-five minutes of your biology class, which you uncharacteristically don’t pay any attention to, you’ve convinced yourself that they are crazy in love and that none of Jake’s actions or words towards you had ever meant anything, that you’d liked him so much you’d dreamt up the possibility of his liking you back, too.

Your next lesson starts—the smile Jake gives you as he walks into History is so bright, it dissipates any clouds hanging over your head. You do believe in male-female friendships, but despite yourself, you can’t help but think that anyone in a relationship wouldn’t give someone else such a perfect, warm smile. It just wouldn’t be right. And so, you reason with yourself that simply walking to a class together didn’t mean two people were a couple.

For an hour, you stare at the back of Jake’s head, and although you do eventually come to the more sensible conclusion that a smile may just be a smile, you also think it's unlikely that he and Yunjin would be a thing. If they were, why would they hide it? Jake is so nice, you wouldn’t be surprised if he’d exaggerated his enthusiasm upon seeing her. You’re sure you still have your chances. He even says see you tomorrow when class is over and slips out of the room to go to soccer practice.

You feel like you’re walking on cloud 9 as you head from History to your next class—but when you remember that the next class is German, your mood drops significantly. Because the universe has it out for you, you and Jay are two of just ten students in your year taking German as your second foreign language option, everyone else having gone for either French, Japanese or Spanish. Your reasoning for it is that your dad has had an obsession with Germany since his year abroad in Bavaria, and twelve-year-old you had wanted to make him happy. Eighteen-year-old you regrets it slightly, but at least now your dad is ecstatic every time you tell him in German that the dinner he made was really tasty. Why Jongseong decided to take it beats you—he’s probably just insane.

But because you don’t really know anyone else in the class, and because it’s your last period of the day, you have no friends to run off with once the lesson is over, and he gets to bother you all the way from the classroom door to the staff parking lot.

You’ve barely finished bidding Auf Wiedersehen to your teacher and Jongseong is already harassing you. “So, I didn’t take you as the type to be into guys like Jake Sim.” He says Jake’s name with such disdain, like he thinks he’s so much better than him, or like he hates him. It confuses you just as much as it annoys you; Jongseong didn’t seem to have a problem with Jake earlier at the library.

“And that’s your business, because…?”

You don’t look at Jongseong, who’s quickened his pace to keep up with yours, but you can feel the smirk on his face. It’s insufferable. “Oh, it’s none of my business. I’m just surprised, is all. You guys are so… I don’t know, different.”

You scoff. “If you think I’m not good enough for someone like Jake, I’d rather you tell me straight up, Jongseong. Or actually,” you say, looking up at him with a dry smile. “Keep it to yourself and leave me alone.”

He looks offended by your words, and it only adds to your already immense annoyance—he’s the one who just insulted you, so why is he looking at you with those stupid furrowed eyebrows?

“I never said that.”

“You didn’t need to.”

“No, Y/N.” He grabs your wrist and makes you face him, your stomach flipping in surprise that you quickly cover up. When he releases you, you cross your arms over your chest and wait for him to speak, keeping your eyes trained on a spot behind him. “I don’t think he’s too good for you.”

This makes you look at him. You have to admit, your curiosity is piqued. Not like Jongseong to say anything even vaguely in your favor. “He’s just…” He sighs, searches for the right word. “Well, he’s just a bit of a dick, isn’t he?”

You freeze for a second. You’re so taken aback, your scoff comes out more as a laugh—Park Jongseong, king supreme of all dicks at this school, just called Jake Sim a dick?

“I’m sorry?”

He sighs again, as though you’re the unreasonable one. “He’s so… smug. A wannabe class clown and thinks he’s the shit because he’s on the soccer team. Have you seen the way he swaggers around school?”

You look at him with fake sympathy. “Jong, are you jealous?”

“Pfft. No way. I just think it’s a shame you keep going after these dudes who are not even worth your time, or whatever, so yeah…” he says, voice trailing off and looking down at his feet as he speaks. Hands in pockets and blank expression on his face, you can tell he’s trying to look cool, but the way he’s avoiding your gaze is a dead give-away. Even his ears have turned red. Jongseong is having one of those shy moments he has when he’s trying to be nice to you. Clearly, a simple act of kindness towards you is so hard for him that it radically changes the way he behaves.

Like when you were fifteen and you just couldn’t get this stupid art project right, so he stayed behind for three hours after school with you, helping you draw and paint and cut and glue.

Like when you were sixteen and your grandma just passed away, making you miss a week of school, and without a word, barely looking at you, he gave you a stack of handwritten notes of all the lessons you missed. To this day, you’re not sure how he did it—you weren’t in the same class that year.

Like when you were seventeen and Park Sunghoon rejected you in the middle of a crowded hallway. You’d run off to the girls’ bathroom to cry it out, but Jongseong quickly found you and spent the entire period cursing Sunghoon out instead of being in English, like you were both meant to be. He was uncharacteristically nice to you for a few days after that, never starting an argument for no reason or interrupting you when you spoke. When you snapped at him, telling him it only made you feel worse that he treated you differently, he smiled and told you how stupid you looked when you cried. It made you laugh more than it should’ve.

Like now, when he suddenly decides that Jake Sim is also a wrong choice for you. “Him and Sunghoon are good friends, you know that?” he says. “Birds of a feather, and all…”

So you know that Jongseong is not all bad. He has his redeeming qualities. He can even be nice sometimes, when he so wishes. But those moments are so few and far between that when he returns to his usual insufferable self, you wonder if you’d dreamt it all up. Which is why you can’t quite take him seriously right now. You roll your eyes and resume walking towards the parking lot, but of course, he continues to follow you. “Why do you even care who I go after?”

“I don’t-”

“You clearly do, otherwise you wouldn’t be bothering me like this.”

“Well, if all your attention is taken up by that douche, who am I going to go up against?”

“That’s what you’re worried about? That I stop arguing with you?” you say, disbelief clear in your voice.

“I’m offended, Y/N,” he starts, his sarcastic tone making you roll your eyes again. “That our little rivalry matters so little to you.”

“We’re not even the top students of our class, for God’s sake, we’re not fighting over anything.”

“I’ve actually got the best grades in German, thanks very much.”

“Whatever. I wouldn’t call it a rivalry so much as a mutual dislike of each other, because one of us woke up one day and decided to start going against everything the other said.”

“At least you’re self-aware.”

The exit to the parking lot now appears to you like the gates of heaven. You don’t even bother replying to him, thinking that he’ll just leave you alone now that you’re here. But as you step outside, he places himself in front of you and blocks your path, arms splayed out, eyes wide like he’s just seen a ghost.

“What are you-”

“Have you done the German homework for tomorrow?”

The sudden change of subject gives you whiplash. “What? No, Miss Schumacher assigned it just now-”

“Well, given your tendency for getting the word order all wrong, I can already tell you you’re not gonna have fun with it-”

You pinch the nose of your bridge, trying to calm yourself down before you lose what’s remaining of your mind. “Jongseong, were you actually dropped on the head as a baby? Go away. My dad’s gonna be here any second.” You try to walk around him, but he steps in front of you again. You peer up at him, undisguised annoyance in your eyes. Where are your dad and brother when you need them?

“I’m just saying, you’ll probably need help with it-”

“I won’t. And if I do, I’ll just use Google. Now get out of my way,” you say, and manage to duck under one of his arms.

Then you see it.

Well, actually, it takes you a second to understand what it is you’re seeing. At first, you think it’s one of those horny couples thinking they’re being really discreet by going to the staff parking lot to make out, when in reality they could be caught by any one at any time. They’re just far enough that when you do a double take, you realize that you do know the back of that head; that fluffy mop of brown hair. You sit behind it every History period, next to it every Maths and English period.

The girl is up against the wall, and you can’t really see her, what with her and Jake’s tongues being down each other’s throat and his body blocking her from your view, his hands on her hips, her arms around his shoulders. All the works. She’s wearing a cheerleader uniform, so she could be any of twenty girls—but you’re pretty sure only one of them wears a pair of white Vans with red love hearts on them.

Your heart sinks to your stomach.

You’re frozen in place when a whistle rings in the distance, and Jake and Yunjin separate, giggling to each other as they jog to wherever the sound came from. The sports field, probably. It’s Monday; the cheerleaders and the soccer team share the field for their practice.

Jake spots you and Jongseong staring at them. He waves quickly, awkwardly at you, still smiling even when surprise coats his features. Yunjin tugs on his hand and just like that, they’re gone.

“Y/N-”

Jay’s voice fades in the background. You want to get away from this situation as quickly as possible—it’s embarrassing enough seeing the guy you like and thought you had a chance with kissing a girl that is arguably much more on his level than you are, but having Jongseong of all people not only witness it, but try to protect you from it, God knows why, makes it impossibly mortifying. You speed-walk to your dad’s car, huffing as you plop in your seat and slamming the door behind you. Your brother is already sitting in the passenger seat, and you don’t even argue with him about it. When you only give single-word replies to his questions, he shrugs and returns to playing Clash of Clans on his phone.

The moment you get home, you fish a five cent coin from your purse, change into mud boots and grab your dog’s leash. Desperate times call for desperate measures.

After half-an-hour of trudging through leaves and soft ground, muddy from many a rainy November night, you and Pablo, your massive, fluffy airhead of a German Shepherd, find yourselves at the well in the middle of the forest. Ever since you were little, you have attributed magic powers to the well—not that anyone told you any sort of myth about it, but you remember reading a story about a magic well and decided that your well would be magical, too. You’ve never wanted to abuse its powers, so you’ve used your wishes conscientiously: things like getting a certain present at Christmas (when you were nine and the most important thing ever was getting the Monster High doll you wanted) or not stuttering during your presentation in class (when you really didn’t want to embarrass yourself in front of Park Sunghoon and his cool friends). Every wish you’ve made has come true. Whenever a faint voice of reason tells you that it’s because you always ask for very realistic things, you squash it and continue to believe in the well.

Because today, you’re not asking for something realistic.

Today, you’re asking the well to show you the way to love.

You’ve grown up watching The Notebook and Pride & Prejudice. Your parents are high school sweethearts who are still, twenty-five years later, happily married. You devour romance novels and binge-watch Asian dramas, the more unrealistic and romantic, the better. You are convinced that soulmates exist, that love always finds a way, that it is there for anyone to see. That it can take form in a childhood friend, an archnemesis, a total stranger.

But for some reason, it hasn’t shown itself to you yet, no matter how valiantly you’ve looked.

You’re absolutely sick and tired of it. It is Jake kissing another girl, it’s Sunghoon leading you on for months and then rejecting you in front of everyone, it’s your ex-boyfriend-who-shall-not-be-named, your first love and first heartbreak, dumping you after a year and getting with the girl he had told you not to worry about a week later. At a party a few months later, he’d said, word for word, “At least I didn’t cheat on you.”

Coin lodged between your hands, you interlace your fingers and press your palms closely together, eyes screwed shut in desperation. “Hey,” you start simply, because you and the well are good friends. “It’s been a while since I’ve asked for anything, so I hope you can indulge me… This is gonna sound so cliché, but I’m really tired of getting fucked over by boys — excuse my French — and I just wanna meet the person who’s right for me, you know? Mom’s always reminding me that I’m only eighteen, and that I’ve got plenty of time to meet someone, but I just feel like if I don’t find someone now, I never will. And if I get fucked over again — sorry — I’ll just lose hope and write off men for the rest of my life. So help a girl out, will you? I’ll leave it to you how you wanna go about it, but… just show me that there’s someone out there. Please.”

When you open your eyes, you need a few seconds to adjust to the darkness. You toss the coin in the well. It doesn’t make a sound as it hits the bottom, as if it has been absorbed within the old brick walls. You know better than to question it—the well works in mysterious ways.

You’re quiet that entire evening, making up an excuse of a tiring day at school when your parents ask. Really, you’re just thinking about your wish, whether it’ll work, what might happen. You half-ass your homework—Jay was right, the German exercises throw you into a bout of despair, so you quickly close your textbook and bury yourself in your sheets, falling asleep hours earlier than you usually would.

For some reason, the first thing you notice when you wake up is that it’s still dark outside. It must be the middle of the night, you think. It takes you a few seconds to realize that you’re in a completely strange room.

Instead of your floral-patterned sheets, you find yourself covered by delicate silk sheets that your parents would never agree to buy you, no matter how adamantly you argued for the benefits of silk for your skin. If skincare experts online had convinced you of one thing, it was that silk would do wonders for your obstinate acne. You slide out of bed and find a pair of slippers on the floor, as if waiting for you. Even the pajamas you’re wearing are fancier, more grown up than the ones you have at home, a set composed of a pinstriped button-up and shorts. You look around, for some reason more surprised and curious than panicked. You could’ve been kidnapped, for all you know, but all you care about right now is this room. Rather than the pink and white walls that have surrounded you since childhood, covered with pictures of you and your friends, postcards of artwork bought at museums, and posters of your favorite movies, the walls here are beige and mostly bare, except for a painting of Japanese cherry blossoms above the bed and a family portrait on the opposite wall, above a wooden chest of drawers.

The family portrait. A woman, a man, and what you can only assume are their children. They look like twins—two girls. Can’t be older than three years old. Out of the four faces, you recognize two of them. You recognize them far too well. One of them is yours, of course. You look slightly older, by a decade, maybe? You’re glad to know that you won’t fall off after twenty-five, like much of social media has led you to believe.

The other face you recognize immediately, too, but it takes you a few seconds to truly believe it.

It belongs to none other than Park Jongseong.

A dry chuckle falls from your throat, as if someone has just made a very insulting joke at your expense and you have to pretend you find it funny. The well has a very odd sense of humor, you think. It’s probably just a prank, a magic-induced nightmare before the real thing. Except this already feels real, disorientingly so. The fabric on your skin, the picture, the room. It all feels too real, more tangible than any dream you’ve ever had.

You take a step closer towards the picture, as if looking at it harder will make Jongseong’s face fade into that of another man, the real man that will become your husband and father of your children. But alas, his features remain the same, frozen in time by the photographer’s camera. He, too, looks older—and not only does he not fall off after twenty-five, he becomes all the more handsome for it.

Is this how you find out that Jongseong was handsome all along? You stare at it until the familiar face becomes practically unrecognizable, like repeating a word so much it stops feeling like one. The straight nose, the almond-shaped eyes that seem to have softened overtime, whereas his jaw has remained as sharp as ever. Have his eyebrows always framed his face so perfectly? Has that dimple always been there?

You look around again, and the bright numbers on the bedside alarm clock catches your attention. They read 9:57 p.m., but it’s the date that makes your stomach sink—today is still the 18th of November, but ten years later. You stare at the clock, at the unfamiliar number, a date so far into the future you can’t wrap your head around it. You could barely envision life after high school.

Downstairs, the sudden clang of pots and the sound of a tap running manage to rip your gaze away from the alarm clock. An overwhelming curiosity tells you to follow the noise. This is all a dream, so there are no consequences if you explore a bit more, right?

You’ve never been in this house before, and you have no idea where your feet are taking you until you find yourself in the kitchen. It’s the only lit room in the house, and you’re creepily standing in the dark under a wide archway that connects the kitchen to what looks like the dining room. A man has his back to you, washing dishes and putting them out to dry on a rack next to the sink. He’s wearing a white cotton sweater, one that you feel you recognise without ever having seen before, and a brown apron is tied around his neck and waist.

The first thing you think to yourself is Oh, his haircut hasn’t changed. In almost every class you share with him, Jongseong has made it a point to sit either next to you or right in front of you, so you’ve spent a lot of time glaring at the back of his head. You wouldn’t be surprised if he started developing two eye-shaped bald spots there. His hair is still short and spiky at the back and on the sides, longer on the top. When he lets it grow too long, it sometimes covers his eyes, and he obnoxiously keeps having to push it back like a heartthrob in an 80s movie.

Something like a memory flashes through your mind, blurry like those images you aren’t sure came from a dream or from real life. Your surroundings are unclear, but Jay’s face is nestled against your neck, your hand in his hair. You can feel the softness of the close shave against your palm as clearly as if you were touching it right now. You ask him why he’s always kept it that way, and he replies that it’s simple to maintain. Then in classic Jay fashion, he adds, “And it makes me look awesome.”

Another memory, a clearer one, this time—this definitely happened. It’s halfway through sophomore year, a random Tuesday, and Jay walks in, holding his head high and looking smugly around himself. The bastard got a new haircut. Long gone, his messy, unorganized flop of black hair that looked like it didn’t know what it was doing; hello, sleek undercut. It accentuates all of his best features, which is terrible news for you. You had never even thought of Jongseong as someone having “best” features, but now they’re being thrown in your face. His nose. His jawline. His smile.

It ruins your day, and a few after that. You can’t quite put it into words when your friends ask what’s wrong at lunch—or rather, you don’t wanna face the humiliation of uttering something along the lines of “Park Jongseong looks good with his new haircut, and it’s bothering me.”

Here, it’s a familiar sight in an unfamiliar environment, the back of his head. Without really thinking, you take a step forward. Jongseong starts at the sound of your slippers against the marble floor tiles, but his face relaxes into a smile when he sees you.

“Oh, it’s just you, honey. I thought you were sleeping.”

Just you. As if the two of you being in the same kitchen is normal. You guess it must be, to this version of Jongseong. To him, you’re not the annoying girl he strives to best in every class—you’re honey.

“I was,” you say, walking around the kitchen island to join him by the sink. Something in you needs to look at him, really look at him, maybe pinch yourself or pinch him to be sure you’re not going crazy. Maybe you caught wafts of some ancient algae that lives in the well and made you hallucinate?

“I left a plate out for you in case you woke up. Made your favorite. The girls weren’t so happy, seeing as it’s the third time this month,” he says with the special kind of smile reserved for parents talking about their children. The girls. A mention so casual, so obvious, your heart hurts. “But I think I got it really right this time,” he continues. “Honestly, it might even be better than the original.”

He goes back to washing the dishes and you watch the sponge in his hands as it scrubs away tomato sauce, the soap as it runs from the plates into the sink. A knot forms in your stomach, something like a deep sadness that overwhelms you all of a sudden, and tears form in your eyes, threatening to fall any second.

When you haven’t budged in almost a minute, Jongseong starts to say, in an intimate, almost worried voice, “Aren’t you going to eat, honey?” but when he sees your wet eyes, the tremble in your lower lip, he shuts the water immediately and dries his hands. With his thumbs, he wipes away the tears that have started falling from your eyes. “What’s wrong?” he whispers.

You can’t reconcile the man in front of you with the image you have of the boy that torments you in every class you share. You can’t reconcile the genuine concern in his voice with the snarky tone you’re met with every day. And yet, they respond to the same name, their features are identical, if not for the years that separate them, the stress of adulthood on one and the carefreeness of youth on the other.

Your body reacts automatically to the soft touch—never in a million years would you let the Jongseong you know come near you like this, but here, nothing feels more natural than his hands on your face, your shoulders, your hair, as though they’re just as much his as they are yours. You realize the emotion in your stomach is not sadness—tears fall, but you’re not sad. You’ve never felt as home as you do now, and if one thing romantic novels have taught you, is that this must be love.

You look up at the man in front of you, eyebrows furrowed as you search his face for confirmation or some sort of an answer. There’s a tremble in your voice when you speak next. “I just… I think I love you, Jongseong.”

He chuckles. “Well, we established that a while ago, didn’t we? What with getting married and having kids. But I’m glad you still feel that way.”

The mention of marriage and children doesn’t faze you nearly as much as it should. You’ve only got one thing on your mind. “Do you love me too?”

You expect him to laugh—not out of cruelty, but because the answer is so obvious, it almost doesn’t deserve to be answered seriously. Like when your brother asks if he can have one more of your cookies and you tell him you’ll cut his hand off. Sometimes you think it’s easier to be sarcastic than be unabashedly nice to someone. Especially with Jongseong, whom you don’t expect kindness or patience from, you wait for him to stay something like, “No, that’s why I’ve stayed with you these eight years.”

So when instead, he says, “More than anything on this Earth,” voice low and vulnerable, tears flow even harder.

“Sorry, it’s probably just my period,” you say through sobs, although you have no idea where in her menstrual cycle this version of you is.

Jongseong chuckles again, pressing a kiss to your forehead. “You do get emotional around this time.” And you cry more, because you can’t believe someone other than your mother knows you so well that they know what your period symptoms are.

Rubbing soothing circles against your back and whispering soft words in your ear, he holds you for as long as you need to calm down. When you finally do, he tells you to go sit on the couch, that he’ll finish up the dishes then heat and bring your food for you. You think you’ve got your emotions under control, but the moment you bite the pasta, cooked to perfection with the most succulent tomato sauce you’ve ever had, sweet with a little kick of spice and a generous amount of parmesan cheese, tears start to fall again as if you had an endless stock of water behind your eyes.

“This is so good,” you mumble.

Jongseong smiles, his gaze full of affection miraculously directed at you as he tucks away strands of your hair so they don’t get in your eyes or in your food. “I’m glad, baby.”

You react to the nickname viscerally, words tumbling out of your mouth before you can even understand them. “You haven’t called me that in ages.” You widen your eyes at yourself, wondering how this was something you even knew. But when you look at Jongseong, all he does is smile more.

“You’re right, I haven’t. I guess I was reminded of college. You cried all the time back then. As much as it pained me, I can’t say I wasn’t happy to be the one you always came to for comfort.”

You haven’t been through college yet, so you should be unable to tell whether this truly happened or not—and yet, the memories of the body you’re in all confirm what Jongseong just said. But it feels impossible—going to university with him, letting yourself be vulnerable enough with him to not only cry in front of him but let him comfort you. Whatever could have happened in the years between the present you know and your time at university for things to change so drastically?

But before you can make sense of any of it, Jongseong speaks again. “Why? Do you like it when I call you baby?”

Your stomach flips. Heat rises to your face at his words, the tone with which he said them, the things he was alluding to—you know that having children means you’d popped your cherry at some point, that you’d had sex with Jongseong specifically, but to be confronted with the fact was something else.

“Maybe,” you mumble, and proceed to stuff your mouth with pasta so that you can’t incriminate yourself further.

He puts on a recent movie, something you should arguably be paying attention to, since you’re literally getting a glimpse into the future of cinema—you could steal the idea, go back to your present and sell it for an outrageous price.

But Jongseong’s presence next to you makes it impossible to concentrate on anything but him. The warmth emanating from him, the scent of his perfume envelop you, give you a sense of just how real this all is—despite how comfortable being with him like this feels, you’re still not convinced you’re not just in an unsettlingly vivid dream. You take one of his hands in yours, examining each finger, turning his hand over, tracing the lines of his palm, smoothing your thumb over his nails—it’s an undeniably human hand. Warm against yours, slightly rough. He’s started using hand cream, you think, all these winters when his dry hands would crack because of the cold coming up to your mind, teenage Jongseong’s hard refusal to wear any sort of cream to protect himself. Memories bob up to the surface: fixing his cracked hands up with a plaster, your tear falling on his hand, the both of you in your school uniforms in what looks like the school infirmary; awkwardly gifting him some hand cream the Christmas of that year, not looking at him as you hand him the small package. Saying, “It’s a waste of plasters for something that could be fixed so easily.” Him treating you to warm, spicy tteokbokki because he felt bad for not having gotten you anything, even though this was the first time either of you had ever given the other one a present.

As your fingers trail up from his hand to his forearm, his shoulder, his jawline, more memories flood your mind. Clumsy first kisses; squabbles of the kind you were already used to; lazy mornings in bed; hours spent in your kitchen or his, before you shared one, cooking dinner together; the way you felt when he proposed, a feeling so intense remembering it is almost unbearable now. Your eyes and fingers examine his face in detail—even though you’ve seen him almost every day since the start of high school, this feels like the first time you really perceive him. The delicate bow of his lips, the strong nose, the softness in his eyes when he looks at you. Your heart beats uncontrollably as you hold each other’s gazes, but you feel inexplicably relaxed at the same time, two nearly opposing realities fighting each other inside of you—one in which you and Jongseong regarding each other with such affection is unthinkable, the other in which it is daily routine.

“Movie not to your taste?” he asks, voice gentle, breaking you out of your stupor.

“Hm?”

He nods towards the TV screen. “I see you’re not paying much attention.”

“No. I have… things on my mind.”

He raises an eyebrow, a smirk slowly growing on his lips. “Yeah?” You think your heart might actually flatline when he brings you in closer to his chest, and, face buried in your hair, says, “You know, I’ve been thinking that the twins might want a younger sibling to play with soon enough…”

You’re not sure whether he actually wants a third child or if this is weird dirty talk that apparently turns parents on—all you know is that this is something future you will deal with, not high school senior you.

You whip up your head at him, eyes wide in panic that he mirrors immediately. “Or—or not. Later. Later?” You nod fervently, and the worry dissipates from his handsome features. “Okay, later,” he whispers, kissing the top of your head before returning his attention to the movie.

A couple hours later, you’re laying in bed in the dark together—you can tell Jongseong is falling asleep by the regularity of his breathing and his stillness, but you’re wide awake. You don’t know how you’ve managed to spend all this time with him, acting like the wife he knows and loves, without imploding. But suddenly, the idea of waking up in your childhood bed, surrounded by your pink-and-white walls, going downstairs to be greeted by your brother and parents, sends a wave of panic through you. You haven’t felt this comfortable in a long time—Jongseong’s arm draped over your waist, the fact that you could reach over and feel his skin against your palm if you wanted. You don’t want to go back to a time where you hate him. In fact, you don’t know if you could hate him after this.

“Jongseong?” you say softly, the syllables unfamiliar on your tongue, even though the name rings brusquely through your head for the best part of every day.

It takes a few seconds, but he reacts eventually. “Hm? Did you just call me Jongseong?” he murmurs sleepily, as if you’d just called him Robert or Christopher and not the name his own parents gave him.

“Yeah.”

He chuckles. “Now that’s something you haven’t called me in ages. Makes me feel like you’re mad at me,” he says, turning over and burying his face in the crook of your neck. His hair tickles your skin, and one of your hands comes up reflexively to feel the softness of his close shave.

“...Jong?” you try.

“That’s a step up, but not quite what I want,” he mumbles.

You’re silent for a few moments. “Honey,” you say tentatively, voice a mere whisper.

“That’s better.” You can hear the smile in his voice.

“Will you be here in the morning?”

“Mh-hm. It’s Saturday tomorrow.”

“No,” you say, feeling out of breath. “I mean, will you be here?”

You’re aware you’re not making much sense—and yet, Jongseong needs no further explanation. “Of course, baby,” he starts, voice soothing. “I’ll be here tomorrow, and the day after that, and every day afterwards. ‘Til death do us part, remember?”

You let out a shaky breath. “Okay.”

“I love you, Y/N.”

“I love you, too,” you find yourself saying, and, more importantly, meaning. It’s the last thing either of you says before falling asleep.

Tears are streaming down your face when you wake up the next day. When you open your eyes, pink and white obnoxiously stare back at you. The clock reads 7:12, just three minutes before your alarm goes off, and unfortunately for high school you, the night hasn’t given in to Saturday morning—it’s Tuesday, and you have to go to school and act as if you hadn’t just had the weirdest, most realistic dream of your life. You don’t even get a weekend to shake this weird feeling in your stomach off, you’re going to have to face Park Jongseong full force. At least, this will become your friends’ favorite bit for the foreseeable future.

They’re already sitting in the classroom when you get there, animatedly chatting to each other. You plop down in your seat in front of them, and when they see the sullen look on your face, ask you what’s wrong.

“Did you wake up during the night to play Hay Day again?” Kazuha asks, eyebrows knotted with genuine worry.

“I’m not that person anymore,” you reply. “No, I just had a really weird dream. More like a nightmare, really. It feels like I didn’t get any sleep.”

“What was it about?” Sunoo asks.

Your eyes dart back-and-forth between the two of them as you brace yourself for their reactions. Not wanting anyone else to overhear, you lean in conspiratorially. They mirror you. “I was married to Park Jongseong,” you whisper. As expected, they burst into laughter immediately, and you lean back in your seat, crossing your arms in annoyance. “It’s not funny.”

“It’s very funny,” Kazuha retorts. “It’s ironic, even, considering how much you hate the guy.”

“Exactly!”

“But I guess even you know how ridiculous it is that you hate him, if your brain is able to imagine yourself being married to him,” Sunoo adds, shrugging. “It’s a good reminder that you’re literally the only person in this school with a vendetta against him.”

Kazuha nods energetically. “He picked up a pen for me, once. He’s a nice guy.”

You look around the room in panic. “Keep it down, will you?” you hush, despite the fact that no one is paying any attention to the three of you. You sigh, resolving yourself to telling them the entire truth. “But guys, I’m scared. I think this might be a sign.”

Their eyebrows perk up. “A sign that your hatred of him has actually been disguising a crush this entire time?” Sunoo asks, feigning innocence.

“No—what? Where did you get that idea?”

“Nowhere. Go on.”

“Whatever. Come here,” you say, gesturing for them to huddle again. “It’s the well.”

“Oh my God, Y/N, you’ve actually lost it,” Kazuha says, fascinated by your stupidity.

“I’m not going to tolerate any well slander, this is serious. I just wanted it to reassure me that there was someone out there for me. And then I had that stupid dream.”

Kazuha and Sunoo exchange a look like they’re parents trying to announce to their daughter that she’s adopted. “Y/N…” Sunoo starts.

“This is crazy. Like, love philters and writing Park Sunghoon’s name a hundred times are one thing, this is…”

“Crazy,” Sunoo said, nodding along. “This is crazy. There’s no other word for it. Your eighteen years of boyfriendlessness have finally caught up to you.”

“You guys don’t get it. What about that time I asked it to give me a good grade on our Literature exam and I literally came first out of our class? Or when I told it I missed Jung Hae-in and his military discharge announcement came the next day?” you say, aware that the look in your eyes is only confirming their suspicions—but you need someone to believe you, or at the very least understand you.

“One, you’re a good student. Two, that was pure coincidence,” Sunoo explains.

“But girl, if you want to marry Jay, that’s fine. You’ve got our blessing,” Kazuha says, shrugging.

“Yeah. He picked up her pen, once,” Sunoo adds.

“And you know, you guys clearly have some sort of chemistry.”

You scoff. “If you think that him refuting my every word and finding every opportunity to make fun of me, then yeah, I guess you could say we have chemistry.”

“You guys have banter,” Kazuha says as if it’s obvious.

“Oh, please. Banter is cute. I want to kill him every time he opens his mouth.”

Your friends both roll their eyes. “While I understand that most men are better off staying quiet—no offense, Sunoo—”

“None taken.”

“You have to admit Jay is not nearly as insufferable as you make him out to be,” Kazuha says.

“Are you kidding me? He’s always acting like a child. Rubbing it in my face when he gets a better grade, trying to start arguments for no reason, sucking up to teachers, stealing my erasers, for God’s sake, you’d think he’s twelve. I know that I’m not on the majority's side, but I seriously cannot understand how other people tolerate him at all.”

Sunoo sighs. “Because he’s nice to everyone. He never hesitates to help people, he’s even funny, sometimes, and—well, look at him.” He nods his head towards the door, and when you turn around, Jongseong is indeed walking in the classroom. “He’s not a bad-looking boy.”

“Gosh, Sunoo, maybe you should marry him,” Kazuha says, but since you laid your eyes on Jongseong, you’ve stopped listening.

You feel weird. You look at him, and you feel weird. It’s the same feeling you had during your sleep last night, a feeling that paralyzes you from head to toe, that starts in your stomach and spreads to your entire body, weighs you down in your chair.

“Hey, guys,” he greets simply, and his voice wraps itself around your heart and squeezes. You can’t do anything but watch him as he takes his seat next to you, plopping his bag on the table and taking his notebook out. He looks at you, watches you watching him, then swivels around in his chair.

“What’s wrong with her?” he asks your friends.

“She had a dream that she m—”

“Do not finish that sentence, Zuha, if you want to live to see another day.”

“Yes, ma’am,” she replies, a satisfied little smile on her lips.

Despite yourself, you’re still staring at Jongseong, trying to figure out what the hell these emotions are that are raging up a storm inside of you. Instead of ignoring you, he turns to face you, resting his elbow on the table and his chin in his palm as he stares back at you, smirking. “What’s up, Y/N? Has it finally dawned on you how devastatingly handsome I am?” he asks, and you frown, because he’s not so far off from the truth.

“Please, kids, it’s 9 a.m., don’t flirt right in front of us,” Sunoo says, despair in his voice.

“She’s the one who started it,” Jongseong replies, still looking at you, his smirk growing.

For some reason, this startles you out of your trance, and you look away from him like you’ve been burned, preoccupying yourself instead with your notes for this class. “In your dreams, Jongseong,” you mumble.

“More like in yours,” Kazuha says, her and Sunoo giggling.

“Zuha!” you exclaim. Jongseong looks at you with raised eyebrows, and with his infuriating capacity to put two and two together, you’re scared he’s figured out what she meant, but you’re literally saved by your teacher who walks in at that moment and starts the class.

The second the bell rings to signify the end of the class, you hurriedly pack your things and mutter an excuse about needing the bathroom, trying to get as far away as possible from the boy whose all-too familiar scent had messed with your thoughts all class, whose every brush of his arm against yours had made your heart race uncontrollably.

It hadn’t just been a dream. It couldn’t have been.

Just like there was no doubt the 28-year-old Jongseong from last night had once been the annoying boy you knew, the 18-year-old Jongseong was sure to one day become the husband of your dreams. A devoted partner and father, his presence comforting, his good looks indeed devastating, unwavering.

There was no mistake to be made. The well had worked its magic.

Whether you liked it or not, you would end up marrying Park Jongseong. You, of all people; him, of all people.

Was there already something of your future husband in the boy that snickered when you mixed up your genders in German class, or would he one day spring out of nowhere? Apparently, you’d be around to find out.

But for now, how to act around him? It felt unfair that you were privy to this knowledge of your shared future while he was ignorant of it. Blissfully, perhaps. You couldn’t imagine that he would rejoice much at this news.

Your mind is somewhere else the entire day. At lunch, your other friends try to get the thing that’s obviously bothering you out of you, but Kazuha and Sunoo are there to tell them not to bother. You’d needed to tell someone about it, but you don’t want the entire school to know about your marital premonitions. The two knuckleheads you call your best friends are already doing a good enough job teasing you about it—”There’s your husband, Y/N,” when Jongseong walks past; “So have you thought of baby names? Kayleigh and Mackayleigh, perhaps?” unsolicited, during Physics. You turn around to check on the culprit — because yes, Jongseong is the culprit here, you, a mere a victim — and when he notices you staring, nods at you as if to say, What’s your problem?, trying to look threatening in his white lab coat that’s three sizes too big and protective goggles.

It doesn’t help that Jongseong has a way of hovering around you. Even in classes in which your teachers assigned the seats for you, he’s never far from your seat. The two of you sit next to each other in German, your last class every Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. But today, the seat next to you is empty—what would’ve been a cause for celebration just yesterday is now a source of worry. You’d seen him just two hours ago in your previous class together, so where the hell was he now? He’s lucky that your teacher is an old German lady who always spends the first ten minutes of the lesson rambling about something in dialectal German no one understands but nods along to anyway. When he walks into the room, five minutes late, she just says, “Hallo, Jay,” and continues with her story. It’s about her first school trip to Berlin when she was fifteen and the country was still divided. You think.

He winks at you when he takes his seat and you roll your eyes. You pretend to listen to your teacher for thirty seconds, then hit him gently with your elbow. “Where were you?” you ask without looking at him.

He doesn’t answer immediately, probably surprised you initiated a non-hostile conversation with him for once. “I was just hanging out with my friends, something you clearly wouldn’t understand.”

And your friends wondered why you hated him?

“Still having imaginary friends at eighteen is really concerning, Jongseong. You should see someone about it.”

When you glance at him, he’s already looking right at you, smiling. You’ve never felt so conscious of your side profile.

“Why? Were you worried?” he whispers, kicking your foot with his.

You look at him, horrified—where the hell had he gotten that idea? How was he so spot-on? You scoff, trying to diffuse the tension inside yourself. “No.”

He kicks your foot again. “I was five minutes late and you started to worry?”

“No. Stop.”

“I didn’t know you cared about me so much, Y/N.”

This time, you give him a harsh look, one that lets him know you really mean your words—“Stop it.” Finally, he relents, getting the assigned homework out now that the teacher has actually started the lesson. Your face softens—he looks hurt. Guilt tugs at your heartstrings.

Despite what you might say, you like the way things are with Jongseong. If some people always need to be crushing on someone, you always need to have someone you perceive as an enemy—it was Na Jaemin in elementary school, because he’d once made fun of your incapability to climb the monkey bars; Shin Ryujin, in middle school, for kissing your crush during a game of spin-the-bottle at your own birthday party; Park Jongseong, since freshman year, for simply existing. Your reasons for disliking him are trivial, you’ll admit. You weren’t sure you could even place a finger on what had first triggered your disdain towards him—one too many awful jokes, one too many times raising his hand in class and rattling off a perfect answer, then looking around himself proudly, one too many roars of laughter heard throughout the entire cafeteria. The fact that no one else seemed to be bothered by him only added to your aggravation. He just got on your nerves, and it seemed that you openly showing your dislike of him — him, who was so used to being loved by everyone around him, pampered by his family, praised by his teachers, popular among his peers — was enough to make him dislike you, too. So, after a few failed attempts at trying to be your friend, because Jongseong was unable to not be friends with everyone he met, he didn’t simply give up.

If he couldn’t be your friend, then fine, he’d be your enemy.

At least, that’s how it appears to you, still now. It’s never gone dangerously far, but if there’s an opening to tease you or get on your nerves, he’ll do it. Not passing you the ball during soccer, or conversely, only aiming for you during dodgeball, not sharing his textbook with you when you forgot it unless you beg, loudly clearing his throat when you speak in class. And, lately, pouring salt on your wounds in the form of reminding you how impossible you and Jake Sim are. His motto must be if there’s a will, there’s a way. And when it comes to making your life hell, his will is infinite.

Everything is upside-down now. The question of how your relationship can possibly go from this to that obsesses you. It feels like you’re more capable of sharing a funeral, dying at each others’ hands, than a wedding.

“Jong, your textbook.”

He squints at you. “Funny how I’m Jongseong when you hate me, Jong when you need a textbook,” he says, sliding his book closer to himself.

“It’s not my fault your name is a mouthful,” you retort, trying to pull it back to the middle of the table, but he’s quicker than you.

“Then maybe you should call me Jay, like everyone else on Earth.”

“Where’s the fun in that? Now give it here. Please?” you ask, mustering your best smile. Any other teacher would’ve scolded the two of you by now, but Ms. Schumacher is peacefully going on about the importance of word order and punctuation in the German sentence, oblivious to her two students bickering in the back row. Jongseong usually never sits at the back of the classroom—only here.

He gives in, smiling back, but there’s something behind it, something that tells you nothing good is brewing in his brain. “Only because you’re so pretty.”

Normally, this kind of remark would’ve warranted a slap on the arm or an array of insults, but if today is anything, it is not normal. You look at him like you’ve been stung, visions of your not-dream coming to you in flashes like you’re the titular character on That’s So Raven—the affection in your husband’s eyes, the kindness in his words, the sincerity in his smile. Again, you’re left to wonder if this man is already taking root inside of the boy next to you, if Jongseong’s future capacity to love you presently exists in his heart.

Does your future capacity to love him already exist in your heart?

You watch as his smirk softens into a grin, your flusteredness and lack of a response clearly amusing him, then as he circles the exercises Ms. Schumacher is assigning for the lesson. She seems to have forgotten there was homework due—Jongseong will be sure to remind her of it quickly.

He kicks your foot again, tells you to focus. His ears have turned red.

You wonder if those capacities haven’t existed from the start.

As much as you love a good friends-to-lovers story, characters hiding their feelings out of fear of ruining the friendship have never failed to frustrate you — just tell her, you dummy, it’s obvious she likes you too — and yet, you’ve never related more than now.

Whatever it is that you and Jongseong have, you don’t want to lose it. It adds entertainment to your otherwise average life.

“Good thing she didn’t pick on you while we went over the homework, ‘cause you clearly put zero effort in. And I wouldn’t have helped you, even if you’d asked, by the way.”

You hum absent-mindedly as you put your notebook and pencil holder in your bag. Are you sure that these are even your feelings in the first place? Just because the well put a silly idea in your head doesn’t mean you have to believe it like it’s scripture. If what you saw is real, then it will happen in its own time. Things don’t have to start changing right this instant.

“Gosh, Y/N, what’s up with you today? You’re so boring,” Jongseong continues, following you out of the classroom.

“Just tired,” you reply. Wouldn’t it be unnatural if you were to radically alter the way you behave with Jongseong? Love should come about organically. Sure, his presence has always provoked some kind of reaction within you, but that’s usually been annoyance. Whether he’s stealing the fifth eraser you’ve bought that month or running on the soccer field, beads of sweat running down his temples, hair sticking out everywhere, victoriously smiling when his team scores—you’re annoyed. Whether he’s sticking up his hand higher than yours or going to the school dance with Ahn Yujin—you’re annoyed. When you learned that she’d been his neighbor since infancy and that she had a boyfriend, who went to another school and only trusted Jongseong to take her to the dance, you were still annoyed—this time at yourself for feeling even the tiniest bit relieved that nothing was going on between them.

And this — his quick steps trying to keep up with yours, his dumb story about yogurt coming out of Heeseung’s nose today at lunch when they were laughing too hard — yes, you’re still annoyed. But you realize you’re not annoyed at him.

You’re annoyed at how he makes you feel.

“Y/N?” he says, but you’re too deep in your thoughts, only vaguely registering the sound until he repeats it, louder this time, and grabs your hand, making you abruptly stop walking. “Are you sure everything’s okay?” he asks with genuine concern in his voice. “You’re barely listening to me. I mean, it’s not like you usually really do, but you’d have told me to get lost, like, five minutes ago now…”

He chuckles self-deprecatingly, but despite his words, you’re focusing on something else yet again. His hand on yours, his loose hold on your fingers. Your brain is yelling at you—hold his hand, hug him. It’s like there are still traces of the 28-year-old version of you you visited yesterday, urging you to behave like her and not 18-year-old you.

So, the well had let you know that you need not look much further to find what you wanted. Here it is, in the form of a boy you have convinced yourself you hated, and hated you, and yet, he’s holding your hand, asking you if you’re okay, worry knotting his eyebrows together.

Hold his hand. Hug him. Instead, you retract your hand, let it fall limply by your side. Jongseong’s eyebrows shoot up.

He’s so close, the supposed love of your life. You don’t know how to reach out to him.

For now, you smile. “Get lost, Jong.”

you guys how the hell do i act around jongseong now that i know our fates are romantically intertwined

kazuha i think not treating him like the number one public enemy would be a good start

you so what… be nice to him? how do i do that

sunoo oh my god y/n when she has to treat another person like a regular human being

you he’s not just another person!

sunoo okayyyyy i see you little miss repressed feelings

you i hate u

kazuha just don’t roll your eyes at everything he says anymore and don’t start arguments for no reason

you he’s the one who starts them… but okay i’ll try

“Let’s pair up for the reading analysis today. You can stay with your deskmate or pick a partner, I don’t mind as long as you get the work done. I’m talking about you, Chaewon and Yuri. This is English class, not a gossip session.”

The second your English teacher has finished speaking, Jongseong swivels in his chair. “Let’s partner up, Y/N?”

“What about me?” Jake asks, eyes darting back-and-forth between the two of you.

“You can partner up with Minju,” Jongseong replies, pointing to the girl he’s usually seated next to. “Look. You guys will be great together. Say hi, Minju.” Minju waves shyly at Jake, braces on display as she smiles ecstatically. It’s not everyday that she gets to talk to one of the most popular guys in school.

Jake reluctantly switches seats with him, glancing back at you and Jongseong who just grins at him, fake friendliness plastered on his lips, until he turns around again. Your new partner’s smile softens and reaches his eyes when he looks at you. “Hi.”

You have to look away—you feel your face burn under his gaze. “Hi, Jong.”

He tilts his head. “What? Do you hate me so much that you can’t even look at me now?” he asks, and you can’t tell whether he’s joking or genuine.

You frown. “I don’t hate you.”

“Oh? That’s a recent development.”

“I guess,” you mumble after a few seconds. Is it really? You suddenly can’t remember if you ever really hated him, or if you’d exaggerated your own feelings.

His smile widens. “Well, good. I mean, you were going to have to realize at some point that I really am funny, smart, endearing, handsome-”

“Back to hating.”

“Let��s start the assignment.”

You agree on reading the passage first, but you realize halfway through that not a single word has been absorbed. “Hey. Why did you switch seats with him?” you ask, whispering so as not to be overheard.

Jongseong shrugs. “I thought you wouldn’t want to work with him, considering…”

“Right.” You’re silent again, but only for a bit. “What’s it to you?” you mumble.

He scoffs. “Sorry for trying to be considerate.”

“That’s not—”

“Let’s just focus on this.”

His sudden coldness vexes you. You know you should let it go — don’t start arguments for no reason, and all that — and you know it’s childish, but you can’t help yourself. You have certain reflexes you’re not particularly proud of when it comes to one Park Jongseong. “Let’s just focus on this,” you repeat, mocking his grumbling tone of voice and shaking your head like a puppet.

He glares at you. “Can you not act like a toddler for once?”

“Can you not be a dick for once?” you bite back.

“Y/N, Jongseong, I’m sure you’re having a fascinating conversation on the use of chiaroscuro in the text?” your teacher asks, a look of warning on his face.

“Yes, sir,” you reply, embarrassed.

“Yes, so much chiaroscuro,” Jongseong mumbles, resting his cheek on his knuckles. When the teacher has turned away, he kicks your foot. “See, you’re getting us in trouble.”

“Do you even know what chiaroscuro is?”

He hesitates. “That’s not the problem here. You are.”

“Well, maybe if you didn’t-”

“Y/N, Jay, final warning.”

“Sorry,” you both say at the same time. With one last glare at each other, you finally get to work.

So your plan to start getting along with Jongseong isn’t in full-force yet. On the drive back home that afternoon, you reassure yourself that these things take time. When the moment is right, the two of you will grow closer.

But increasingly, it feels as though the right moment will never come.

Two months have passed since your visit to the well, and things between you and Jongseong have not changed. Not really, at least.

You still bicker like cat and dog — it goes without saying that you’re the cute puppy and he’s the heartless cat — and he gets as much on your nerves as ever, especially now that you know that the potential to be nice to you, to love you, even, exists somewhere inside him. Somewhere deeply hidden perhaps, but somewhere nonetheless. Of course, after telling yourself that what must come will come of its own accord, you haven’t done much to change the dynamic between the two of you. But if you used to see your retaliations against him as necessary to your survival, you now find some sort of enjoyment in them—some might call it Stockholm Syndrome, you perceive it as a step in the right direction. You’ve followed one of Kazuha’s pieces of advice: you don’t roll your eyes at him anymore, simply because you don’t feel the need to. You argue with him with a smile on your face, his attempts at insulting or annoying you have started to make you laugh.

He doesn’t say anything but seems to gladly welcome this change. If you get a lower grade than him on a test, he doesn’t try to stick the knife in further, but genuinely offers to go over it with you later. If you give in after two hours of tearing your hair out over a German exercise and text him for help, he doesn’t make fun of you. If he says something particularly arrogant or makes a really bad joke, all you need to do is give him a look, and he’ll mumble an apology.

Could it have been like this the entire time? you wonder, watching him across the schoolyard as he and Heeseung hunt for Pokémon. Just a couple months ago, you would’ve scrunched your nose at the sight, making fun of him for his childish interests. Now, you notice the way he laughs, audible all the way to where you sit with Kazuha and Sunoo, the way he jumps excitedly and points at things only he and his friend see, and all you feel is endearment.

“Look at you, look at that,” Sunoo says as he hits you on the forehead with his metal spoon, startling you. He tuts. “You’ve got love dripping from your eyes, sweetie.”

“Sunoo, that’s disgusting.”

“Love? I know.”

“No, your spoon. Your saliva’s all over that,” you say, and all he does is eat another mouthful of his yogurt while staring wide-eyed right at you. When you look back at Jongseong, he’s high-fiving Heeseung. You wonder which creature he’s caught now. In the library yesterday, he spent thirty minutes showing you every single one he had captured so far instead of revising for the upcoming Physics test.

“Yeah, we know you’d like someone else’s saliva more,” Kazuha chimes in, and the two of them snort.

“It’s not like that,” you say, biting into an apple slice.

“Oh yeah? What’s it like, then?” Kazuha asks.

“We’re… becoming friends,” you say, but you’re not sure who you’re trying to convince more.

“Y/N, I’ve had to watch the two of you giggling to yourselves in the library one too many times to believe you’re friends. I know your homework’s not that funny,” Sunoo argues.

“Friends can giggle with each other!” you exclaim, but your friends are inflexible.

“I would tell you to get yourself together if you giggled at me like that,” he says.

“I saw you twirl your hair the other day,” Kazuha adds.

“I never—When?!”

She shrugs. “The other day.”

You deflate, crushed under your friends’ accusations. “I wouldn’t twirl my hair…” you mumble. You decide to busy yourself with your apple slices, not even bothering to find out what Kazuha and Sunoo start snickering and elbowing each other about.

“Hey,” a familiar voice greets, making you look up. Jongseong smiles at you and steals an apple slice from your tupperware as he sits down next to you, Heeseung across from him.

“Hi, Jong,” you say, sitting up straighter. You offer a piece of fruit to Heeseung but he declines, saying he doesn’t like apples without peanut butter.

In front of you, your friends exchange a look, and you’re immediately terrified of what they’ll do next. Leaning in, they place their elbows on the table, and Kazuha starts them off. “Jay, you and Y/N know each other pretty well, right?”

Jongseong glances at you, eyes wide. “Uh, sure.”

“Have you ever noticed her, say, twirling her hair?” Sunoo asks, tilting his head innocently at the poor boy by your side.

You’ve never seen him look so confused. “Um, yeah, she does that when she’s concentrating on something, sometimes…”

They lean back. “Huh,” Kazuha says, studying Jongseong’s face.

“Interesting. Very interesting,” Sunoo says, slowly nodding.

You glare at your friends. “See, that’s different,” you tell them. “I was concentrating on something, not doing… whatever you guys had in mind.”

Jongseong looks at you. “What did they have in mind?”

You answer before either of them can dig your grave any deeper. “Nothing. It’s nothing. We were just having a stupid conversation.” You muster your most convincing smile, and the subject is finally dropped.

No one says anything for a few moments, until Heeseung decides to speak up: “You should’ve seen Jay earlier, Y/N. He caught this super rare version of Pikachu earlier, it was awesome.”

“Dude…” Jongseong murmurs.

“What?” Heeseung asks, his enthusiasm quickly dissolving into confusion. Jongseong just shakes his head. Thankfully for all of you, the bell rings then, and you head to class. The three of them walk in front of you while you and Jongseong fall back a step.

“Why were you guys sitting outside? It’s freezing today,” he asks you. Walking side-by-side like this, you can’t help but notice the inches he has over you, the broadness of his shoulders in comparison to yours.

“They turned the heat way too high in the cafeteria, so we came outside for some fresh air,” you explain. He’s right, the air is chilly today—it’s a few days into December, and the temperatures have been accordingly low.

“Aren’t you cold?”

Your heart skips a beat. One of the side effects of not being at each other’s throat anymore was that you got more and more often to be privy to this side of Jongseong—attentive, considerate, kind. What you once thought were his moral attempts at not being so mean to you all the time, you found out was actually his real nature. He wasn’t a prick who was sometimes nice, he was a nice person who turned into a prick with you. Whether the fault lay on him or you was another debate.

“No, I’m alright,” you say, but your body decides to betray you and makes you sneeze three times in a row.

“Bless you,” Jongseong says, laughing. “Here.” You try to stop him, pushing his hands away, but he takes his gloves off and forces them in your palms.

“I’m going to be inside for the next four hours, Jong, I’ll be fine. Keep them.”

“No, it’s okay. Just so you can warm up quicker.”

You eventually give in, putting the gloves over your hands, laughing at the extra fabric that hangs off the tip of your fingers. But when you look at Jongseong’s now-bare hands, something catches your attention. Stopping in the hallway, you grab one of them, examining the cuts on his knuckles. “You need to wear hand cream, Jong, your hands are too chapped.”

He lets you turn his hand over, smooth over his skin, do the same thing with his other hand. “Men don’t wear hand cream,” he says, a grin on his lips.

You burst out laughing. “I think that’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard you say.”

“Seriously, though, I don’t like the way it feels. Too sticky.”

“You just need to get a quick-absorption one.” Then, you make the terrible mistake of looking up from his hand and meeting his eyes—you gasp silently, his gaze and soft smile transporting you right back to that night, the images of 28-year-old and 18-year-old Jongseong mixing into each other, becoming indistinct from each other. Your gaze drifts down to his lips — chapped, too, when they’re usually plumper, rosier — and his hand, still in yours, balls into a fist. The second bell rings and you both take a step back, eyes meeting again for a brief moment before looking down at the floor. With uncharacteristically shy, embarrassed words of parting, you make your separate ways to your next classes.

“That was beautiful, Y/N,” Sunoo says, waiting for you by the door, and you walk past him without so much as a glance.

“I don’t wanna talk about it.”

sunoo jay and y/n almost kissed earlier

kazuha WHAAAAT

you KIM SUNOO.

kazuha WHEN?????

sunoo right before class after the lunch break y/n was sooo embarrassed afterwards lol

you we did NOT almost kiss you’re talking out of your ass

kazuha i can’t believe i missed this fml

you YOU DIDNT MISS ANYTHING NOTHING HAPPENED

sunoo be serious u guys we’re standing inches apart

you were* and no we weren’t

sunoo oh stfu it was autocorrect i saw it w my own eyes y/n… you WERE literally holding his hand and staring into those beautiful eyes of his

kazuha sunoo…?

sunoo what can’t a man acknowledge another man’s objective attractiveness if i was y/n i would’ve folded the moment i saw him

you literally one of the first times he talked to me was to make fun of my handwriting

sunoo yeah he’s on his tsundere shit i fw it

you …

sunoo anyways zuha you shouldve seen it when the bell rang they practically leaped away from each other and u didnt know what to do w yourselves afterwards likeeee it was so obvi what you both were thinking of

kazuha cuuuute

you i resent these accusations.

sunoo istg if u dont kiss him next time i will

kazuha ???

you SUNOO?

sunoo WHAT

Something happens a few days before the start of winter break.

Ms. Schumacher is absent, gone off to Germany to visit her family there—she has enough seniority in the school that they let her abandon her responsibilities as a teacher once in a while. A week is too short a period of time for them to bother finding a substitute. It’s usually your last class of the day, but you have to wait around for your dad to be done working, so while most of your classmates have gone home early, you sit with about six other people in the unsupervised study room, absent-mindedly jotting down tid-bits of dialogue for your new story idea, too preoccupied with Jongseong’s absence to really pay attention to anything else. It’s fifteen minutes after the hour, but he’s nowhere to be found, although you know for a fact that he takes those weird Molecular Gastronomy cooking classes your Chemistry teacher offers for extra credit every Thursday after school, so he should be here. And anyways, if he’d gone home, he would’ve texted you something like, Have fun sitting around for an hour, I’m gonna go do awesome stuff with Heeseung, even if awesome stuff meant playing Mario Kart or drinking Sprite and holding a two-person burping contest.

You’re so engrossed in your own thoughts that you pay no mind to the sudden ding of a phone in the room, followed by some gasps and heated whispers. The exchanged words go through one ear and out the other—There was a fight? In the locker rooms? It must be bad if they were sent to the nurse before the principal… Huh? Over who? So he took both of them on? Damn, I didn’t know Jay got like that. He seems so well-behaved.

Your head whips up at the mention of your friend’s name. “Jay? Did something happen to him?” you ask out loud, the whispers dying down immediately as everybody stares at you.

Gaeul, who was in your class last year, is the only one who answers you. Holding up and waving her phone, she says, “They say he got into a fight.”

Jongseong? A fight? It sounds like a practical joke. He admitted to you he once started crying watching Heeseung playing Call of Duty, it was so violent. You shake your head. “He-he did? With who?”

Gaeul and the girl next to her exchange a concerned, almost guilty look. “Jake and Sunghoon.” The crease between your eyebrows deepened. You don’t need to ask anything else before she adds, “They’re at the nurse’s station. It sounds pretty bad…”

That’s enough for you to leap out of your chair and run to the nurse’s station. It seems the news has spread impossibly quickly among your year group—even Kazuha and Sunoo are already blowing your phone, asking you if you’ve heard, if you know how Jay is. You ignore them, reminding yourself to text them back later, until one message from Sunoo in particular catches your attention: It apparently started because Sunghoon said something about you, Y/N. They’re saying Jay got angry.

The nurse is busy on the phone when you get there, her back to the entrance, so you’re able to slip in unnoticed. You head to the adjoining room where the beds are, all three of them taken—you walk by Sunghoon first, his arms crossed over his chest and pointedly not looking at you, then by Jake, who calls out your name. You glare at him and pull on the white plastic curtain that separates his bed from Jongseong’s. They’re already going to hear you, you don’t need them seeing you on top of that.

Jongseong sits up with a grunt when you appear at the end of his bed. The sight of him makes your stomach flip, and not in a good way, for once—his left eye is swollen and circled by a deep purple bruise, shiny with ointment, there’s a cut on his cheek, his lower lip is busted, his right hand is wrapped in bandages. “Oh my God,” you whisper as you help him up, voice breaking. He stares at his hands, jaw locking when you gently place one palm on his good hand, the other on the side of his face, moving it this way and that so you can take a better look at his injuries. He winces, and you let go, resting your hand on his shoulder instead. “What the hell got into you?” you whisper vehemently, unable to decide if you’re worried or angry or both as tears form in your eyes.

He tries to shrug, but even that seems to hurt. “Don’t shrug, Jongseong, tell me what happened.”

“I’m Jongseong again now?” he says, attempting a smile, but only one corner of his lips rises.

You sigh. Even in this state, he has to be a smart-ass. “You’re Jong when I need a textbook, Jongseong when you get into stupid fights,” you reply, and he smiles wider but immediately winces, hand coming up to the cut on his lip. You notice that his hand is still riddled with cracks, and whether they’re due to their dryness or to this fight doesn’t matter—”Wait here,” you say, and go rummage through some drawers for plasters. “She forgot some spots.” You feel Jongseong’s eyes on your face as you patch him up to the best of your abilities.

“I don’t want to tell you what happened. I’ll do the job of hating these idiots for the both of us, so don’t concern yourself with them,” he says, apparently not caring that the idiots in question can hear his every word.

He keeps his promise—you never hear another word from him about the cause of the fight.

Later, you find out through other means, namely Sunoo’s questionably remarkable ability to unearth any and all gossip, that in the locker rooms after Phys Ed, someone had started Jake on the topic of Yunjin, who had been recently revealed as his girlfriend. They’d apparently kept it secret because it was just fooling around at first, and only later had gotten serious enough for them to parade around the school as the couple.

It had been an unremarkable conversation until Jake said, “You guys know Y/N from our class? She saw us in the staff parking lot once, and I was sure we’d be busted then. But she didn’t tell anyone.” And just like that, the conversation turned to you, someone who was usually never a topic among these boys, jocks, soccer players, “the kind of people who peak in high school and still have a superiority complex at forty,” as Sunoo describes them.

He has a harder time explaining what happened next, can’t quite look you in the eye as he recounts what was said. “So, this is what they say, apparently someone said that you used to be obsessed with Sunghoon, then with Jake, and Sunghoon said you… Well, he said you were pathetic, that asshole, and that you had been so easy to lead on, then Jake joined in, saying the same things, basically, how funny it was seeing you so obviously in love with him when he would never give you a chance…” He looks at you worriedly, but you tell him to go on. “And so that’s when Jay got up and just straight-up punched Jake in the face. And while Jake was trying to figure out what happened, Jay punched Sunghoon, and then they both got on him, pushing him, but when he wouldn’t stop throwing punches, they started fighting, too. I think they all got some good ones in before the other boys were able to break them apart and the P.E. teacher arrived…”

But that would be later. Now, sitting with Jongseong in the nurse’s station, tears falling onto the plasters you place on his hand, nothing matters but him. You don’t need the details—he’s hurt, he got hurt over you, you feel as though every cut on his body may well have been done by your own hand. You’ve never felt so guilty for something you didn’t do. Your voice trembles when you speak; you’re unable to look at him, at his busted eye. “I just don’t want you to get hurt for me.”

Without missing a beat, he says, “What else would I get hurt for?”

You can only meet his eyes for a split second. Even like this, he manages to look at you with the same softness that has haunted you since the night you met 28-year-old Jongseong, that has rendered all thoughts of anything other than him meaningless since the day your gaze drifted down to his lips just weeks ago. “Jong…” is all you can mutter as you look down at your hands holding each others’, your lips trembling.

He raises his bandaged hand, still not used to his dominant side being ineffective for now, then lowers it when he realizes. Clumsily, he pats your hair with his left hand. “Don’t cry, please…”

Jake’s head pops out from behind the curtain. “Y/N, I’m really sorry—”

“Not right now, man,” Jay quickly interrupts. Jake pathetically disappears behind the curtain again.

“Just promise me you won’t do this again.”

“Y/N…”

“Promise me,” you say, more demanding this time, sticking out your pinky finger. Jay, hesitant, looks between your outstretched finger and your face a few times, but eventually gives in.

The nurse, upon coming to check on the boys, catches you with Jongseong and chases you out immediately. You sulk back to study hall, where everyone’s head perks up the moment you walk in. “They’re okay,” you reassure vaguely, and unenthusiastically answer their many questions. It’s only a few minutes until the bell rings, and you’re free to go then.

jong so… guess who got a five-day suspension

you you idiot what did your parents say?

jong they’re not happy i have to do all the household chores for a month

you boo-hoo

jong not sure why i came here thinking i’d get some comfort…

you … are you feeling better?

jong a little bit the nurse gave us some really strong painkillers but i’m okay because there’s a pretty girl that’s going to drop off the homework for me after school every day :)

you oh did you ask chaewon to do that?

jong um no i was talking about you ..if that’s okay

you haha i know i just wanted you to say it straight up

jong ykw maybe i should just ask chaewon

you i’ll see you tomorrow jong!!

jong :) see you tomorrow pretty

The months that separate your return to school and graduation come and go in the blink of an eye. Jongseong can’t come to school the last day before the holidays or the first four days after, and he’s grounded in-between. Things change bit by bit with every day you visit him—To give him the homework, you tell his parents, although there isn’t much to do when the semester isn’t in full swing, and you could’ve easily sent him pictures. The first time, you spend more time scouring the pictures and trinkets in his room than actually talking to him, and awkwardly give him a half-hug when he tells you he won’t be able to hang out at all during the break before practically running out of his house, your heart beating a thousand miles a minute from the innocent contact. By the fourth time, you lie together on his bed and talk about your plans for college, your hands sitting centimeters apart on the navy sheets. You haven’t dared touch his hand since that day in the nurse’s station.

You’re window-shopping with Kazuha when you spot the hand cream you had seen yourself gifting Jongseong in your well-given vision. Buying it is one thing, actually giving it to him is another, an awkward, stuttery situation in which the wrapping done by the store employee suddenly seems over-the-top and out-of-place. But Jongseong seems to like it—it’s the last day of his suspension, his black eye is now a yellow-ish color, he can smile without risking splitting his lip in two. He applies it immediately, tells you he’ll make sure to wear it every day until the end of winter. You find yourself wishing there was something you could give him for every season so he wouldn’t go a day without thinking of you. When you leave, he bashfully thanks you for making sure he doesn’t fall behind and says he’s excited to see you at school the next day. You hardly know what to do with yourself, so you squeak out a “me too” and slip out the door.

His first day back is a Friday. It starts with Mathematics, a class in which you sit by each other. You remember the first week of classes when Kazuha and Sunoo had ran to sit with each other, expressly because they knew that if he saw you were sitting alone, he’d take the seat next to you, just to better torment you all year. You’d resented it then; it couldn’t make you happier now. Your body is humming with nervous energy, your foot tapping relentlessly against the tiled floor. When he appears in the doorframe, you wave at him as if he’d forgotten his seat in three weeks of absence. His elbow brushes against yours as he sits down.

Between the two of you, friendship blossoms over these months. To the detriment of everyone around you, you continue to bicker as you always have, but it’s now clearly done out of habit, out of affection, even, than out of actual dislike of each other. He and Heeseung slowly integrate your small group of three, and before you know it, it feels as though there have always been five of you. Together, you welcome spring.

In January, to thank you for helping him to pick out his mom’s birthday present, Jongseong treats you to some tteokbokki, which you said you’d been craving all week. He orders the spiciest one, then has to take a sip of water between every bite. You laugh at his teary eyes and red face while you devour the bright red rice cakes easily.

In February, he makes a show of giving you and Kazuha and Heeseung and Sunoo some homemade chocolates, saying it’s a friend thing. You find out that evening that the others each have five in their box—there are twenty in yours. It’s one of the things that makes you second guess what sort of feelings he has for you. For years, you’ve been convinced he harbored strong feelings of disdain for you; now, he seems to enjoy your friendship. You’re scared to read too much into anything, because if Jongseong is well-liked throughout school, it’s for a reason: he’s nice. To everyone. Even to you, too, nowadays. But if nice is giving five chocolates, what is giving twenty?

A sudden realization hits you in March—Jongseong appears at your door, drenched from the rain, a bag of your favorite snacks in hand. “You weren’t at school today. I had to find out you were sick from Kazuha,” he says as if she was a random classmate of yours and not your best friend, as if he should be the first to know about these kinds of things. Your mom rushes him in, finds him so charming in the five minutes they converse that she decides he should stay over for dinner, and as you watch him laughing with her, you think, I haven’t thought of 28-year-old Jongseong in ages. I’ve only thought of you. And although you can trace the start of your feelings to that dream-like experience you had, you can now say with confidence that it’s not the only reason for them.

College application results come out in April, right on his birthday. The five of you celebrate together at an American-style diner, gorging yourselves on crispy bacon and chocolate chip pancakes. Kazuha is going back to Japan, almost a decade after moving to South Korea—”I’m gonna miss you guys, but I miss takoyaki and my grandma more right now.” Heeseung has been accepted into the Engineering department at the country’s top university. You, Sunoo and Jongseong are all heading to the same place: you for Screenwriting, which you’ve known since you were one of the winners of the scholarship contest last October, Sunoo for Communications, whatever that is, and Jongseong for European History and Literature with a minor in German, that freak. It’s a good university, and it’s not far from home. The way Jongseong tells you about his acceptance sticks with you: he doesn’t say, They accepted me, too, or, I’m going to the same university as you. He says, We’ll be together.

May is filled with afternoons at the park when you should all be studying for exams. Your mom keeps asking when she’s going to see “that wonderful boy” again. Your friendship with Jongseong has given him new ways of teasing you—after four years of near-kleptomaniac tendencies, he’s finally stopped stealing your erasers and has instead started to let his gaze linger on your face, to call you pretty when you least expect it, to tuck your hair behind your ear. You hate it most when he asks you whether there’s something from your romance novels or movies that you want him to recreate. “Is there a field big enough nearby that I can walk through at the break of dawn, Mister Darcy-style?” he’ll say, or “I’ve always wanted to try that upside-down kiss from Spider-Man. It’s a classic, really.”

Summer comes early in June. You need to bring a two-liter water bottle and a hand fan to your exams, and you’ve never felt such relief as when it was all over. After endless pictures with your parents and siblings, just your parents, just your siblings, then Kazuha and Sunoo, together, then separately, then with Heeseung and Jongseong as well, Kazuha forces you and Jongseong together, watching with a smile as he shyly wraps an arm around your waist and you awkwardly throw up a peace sign. It’s your first picture of just the two of you.

In July, you and Jongseong unlock a new first: saying goodbye. He’s leaving to stay with his American family as he does every summer. You show up at his house the day before at four p.m. “to help him pack,” you say, but it’s Jongseong, and he finished packing two days ago. So instead, you sit on his desk chair, he on his bed, and you fight back tears. “You’re coming back, right?” you ask, like he’s leaving to go to war and not Seattle. Amusement and affection flicker in his eyes. “Of course I am. I wouldn’t throw four more years of being a pain in your ass away, would I?” he says, and you smile, because you know it’s going to be much more than four years.

But he doesn’t just leave you with a few nice words. Avoiding your gaze, he hands you an envelope. Inside is a single ticket, a two-month membership for your city’s arthouse cinema that you can only go to when they have student deals or when your parents have had enough of your begging. You can’t even begin to imagine how much this must’ve cost. “Jong…” you murmur, in awe at the thin slip of paper between your hands. “This is incredible. Thank you so much.”

Jongseong looks down at his feet, fighting a smile as he kicks the invisible rocks that obviously litter the floor of his bedroom. “I thought you’d get bored without me around, so, that way you can entertain yourself, I guess… And if you run into any film bros next year, you’ll have seen as many pretentious movies as them.”

You burst into laughter then, and, without thinking, wrap your arms around his neck, thanking him over and over again. It takes him a second, but he wraps his arms around your waist and says it’s no big deal.

As you walk down the path from your house, he calls out your name. “Don’t be a stranger,” he says.

You smile. “Never.”

So, he’s not here for summer. Kazuha is working in her parents’ ramen restaurant to make some money before leaving, even Heeseung leaves two weeks into July for Seoul to visit some relatives there and get accustomed to life in the big city. You only get to laze around with Sunoo, but even he eventually leaves for his grandparents’ house by the sea, making you promise you’ll come visit him at some point, otherwise he’ll “die of boredom.”

It’s August now, and your brain and body alike buzz with restlessness. You go to the cinema almost every day, making the best of your subscription. If you’re not going around your house looking for spider webs with your vacuum cleaner, you’re riding random bus lines and discovering parts of your town you’ve never set foot in before. If you’re not making your way through your never-ending pile of unread books, you’re creating your own stories, finally taking the time to properly outline and draft the one-line ideas you’ve had sitting in your Notes app, preparing yourself for the start of your degree. Your mind is taken up with love stories. From Romeo & Juliet to Dirty Dancing to Book Lovers, you can’t get enough of the genre. You become particularly obsessed with stories involving time travel, rewatching After Time and Lovely Runner like they contain some precious knowledge. By the end of the month, you’ve turned your life into an eight-episode TV series—a desperate girl makes a wish on a star only to discover she is fated to marry the one boy she hates most. You know you’d watch that. You send Sunoo and Kazuha the pilot, and after calling you insane numerous times but also heaping on praises, Sunoo says this: lol your going through jay withdrawals.

It shakes you so much you’re not even compelled to message back you’re*.

But he’s not wrong. The more you let yourself admit it, the more you realize how true it is: you miss Jongseong. You text once in a while, you’ve even stayed up late talking on the phone a couple of times, but you miss him, his corporeal form, having his gaze on you, having the possibility but never the courage to touch him. Every day, there’s something you want to tell him about. The cats huddling around a young neighborhood kid as he pours milk into a bowl, the clearance sale at your local library, most books for one buck only, the actor from an 90s Hong Kong film you swear has the exact same smile as him. You don’t want to bother him, so you write letters instead. Some you send, some you don’t—the ones you keep hidden in your drawer usually hint too obviously at your feelings for him. Some of them don’t just hint and contain lines of your declarations: I miss you, everything I see reminds me of you, I want to check that your bruises have healed completely even though the last trace of them faded months ago. You keep these letters a secret, even from Sunoo and Kazuha, who would never let you live down such woebegone, down bad behavior.

You do it because it feels good, getting all of your feelings out on paper. You’re a romantic at heart, so you’re prone to over-exaggeration when it comes to things like these—but everything that you write remains based in truth. You’d started with a postcard of your hometown, jokingly writing, Don’t forget where you came from. How is it over there? and he’d actually replied with a postcard of his own, filling it from top to bottom. You easily went from these small postcards to multiple pages of stream-of-consciousness-like writing. You think it’s the most romantic thing you’ve ever done—although you’re not sure he feels the same way, considering he still writes to the German pen pal Ms. Schumacher had assigned him in your first year of high school. No one else’s correspondence had lasted more than four months because she’d immediately forgotten to make sure you kept in touch regularly.

I ran into Jake Sim at the city library, you write one day. You’ve replied to everything in his latest letter, so you’re now catching him up on your recent adventures. He was checking out some books about Linguistics, of all things—he bought me bubble tea afterwards and told me that the injury he got last April was actually a relief. Did you know his father was a big name in soccer here? Apparently, he never wanted to be a soccer player that badly, and he wants to do Linguistics and Social Anthropology, who would’ve guessed it. He’s like Troy Bolton if High School Musical was about Humanities and not singing. Anyways, you probably don’t want me to go on and on about him, so I won’t, but we did talk about that fight you guys had back in December. He apologized for it, to you and me both, although he didn’t go into much detail — Sunoo is still the only one who’s had the balls to tell me exactly what happened, and he wasn’t even there! — and I was reticent at first, but he seemed genuine. He said he didn’t even hang out with Sunghoon or Yunjin or any of those people anymore, that it was only out of convenience really, and that he hopes starting university will be like turning over a new leaf. Well, he could be full of shit, who knows. As I sat there listening to him I wondered what it was I used to see in him. He’s nice enough, but we only spoke about him for the entire hour. He asked me no questions that weren’t “and you?” so it was a bit exhausting.

But it got me thinking about your fight again. Reflecting on it now, I can say that it was a turning point for me in my perception of you.

You look at your words, smiling to yourself—this is one of the times where you find yourself erring from the topic at hand, instead indulging in sappiness and nostalgia. You write about how your opinion of Jongseong has changed over these months, how it wasn’t seeing him as your husband in all those years that had really shaken things up, but rather that day in the nurse’s station, the frightening colors around his eye, his attitude like it was natural that he would get hurt like this for you. You write, Have I been wrong about you this whole time? I thought you harbored the same negative feelings towards me as I had you since the moment you’d laid eyes on me, but all of a sudden, here you were, bloody, bandaged hand holding mine. Even with your busted eye, you looked like an angel next to all that white in the nurse’s station. I’ll never forget your words that day. Would you really not get hurt for anything else, Jong?

“I’m going to the Post Office for a package soon, Y/N. Are you done with your letter?” your mom calls from the staircase landing.

“Give me five minutes!” you call back.

You forage through your drawer for a new sheet of paper and re-write your letter, making sure to leave any compromising parts out and fold both letters into neat squares—one that will cross the seas and reach Jongseong, one that will live out its days in the darkness of your crowded drawer. You’ve run out of envelopes, so you go look for one in your parents’ office. Your mom calls out your name again, impatient to leave — if she sends her package off before twelve p.m., it will get to the receiver tomorrow, and she’s hell-bent on getting perfect five-star Vinted reviews — so you hurriedly put your letter in the envelope, close it, stamp it, and write Jongseong’s name and address on the back. The other letter you absent-mindedly throw in your drawer with the dozens of other letters in which you’d crossed the line.

A few weeks later, like an apparition, Jongseong stands before you again.

He’s tanner from months under the Washington sun, from afternoons spent at his family’s lake house, on their boat. His hair is slightly shorter and suits him even better; you don’t recognize any of the clothes he wears. He grumbles as his mother goes back-and-forth between hugging him, staring at him worriedly and reminding him to call at least twice a week while his father unpacks the trunk. “I’ll only be a thirty-minute train ride away, Mom,” he says.

He’s still Jong.

You moved in yesterday, and you’re now waiting for your new roommate, who, after five minutes of deliberating whether she should bring a jacket or not and finally decided against it, changed her mind the minute she stepped outside.

It’s been two months since you last saw him. Shortly after sending your letter, you’d gone to stay with Sunoo’s grandparents for a week, just a day before he was set to come back from Seattle. Amid packing and other preparations, you haven’t had time to see each other. Is it okay if I respond to your letter in person? I think I’ll be too busy these two coming weeks, he texted you. You replied that it wasn’t a problem, you told him which dorm you’d been assigned and found out his was the one next door.

When he notices you staring, he does a double-take. You wave at him, and even from this distance, you see the blush that creeps up his neck and takes over his face as he shyly waves back. You’ve never seen him like this—he’s always been either arrogant or friendly, never… flustered. He makes a motion as if to say, I’ll text you, and heads inside the building with his parents and all of his luggage.

Indeed, he texts you some hours later while you’re sharing a piece of strawberry and matcha cake with your roommate Liz, whom you find out is half-German—Jongseong and your dad would probably love her for that simple fact. Some of the first things she’d asked you were what your astrological signs were and whether you wanted her to pull tarot cards for you when she was all done setting up her side of the room. Between that and her dyed blonde hair, you’d felt comfortable telling her all about Jongseong, the well and your dream. Unlike your skeptical and sarcastic friends, she’d nodded along to your every word, a serious expression on her face. “A sign from the universe,” she’d called it, and she gasped in excitement when his name appeared on your screen.

He sends you a link to a freshers’ week event, some potted plant sale happening on the main campus square, and asks if you’re free to go with him tomorrow. I need something to liven up that depressing room, he writes.

So that’s how you find yourselves among green plants of all shapes and sizes, searching for one that’s both low-maintenance and appealing to the eye. You’re glad that you have something to actually do—if you were just sitting at a café and having a conversation, you’re not sure you’d be able to stand the awkwardness. You’d chalked up his behavior on the day of his move-in to nerves, or to surprise upon seeing you so unexpectedly. But apparently, it wasn’t a one-time thing. He keeps clearing his throat as if he were sick with some cold, won’t look into your eyes for more than split seconds at a time, and in complete opposition to his usual confident, deliberate speech, talks in a quick and disorderly manner. And he’s either really caught a cold, or his ears have just permanently turned red. You ask him if something’s wrong a couple times, but he violently shakes his head, says, “No, what could be wrong?” then looks at you as if you might tell him what’s wrong.

When you’re alone again, you wonder what on earth could have happened over the summer that could make him change his behavior with you so radically. Did something happen in Seattle? Maybe he met someone there and doesn’t know how to tell you. Maybe you went overboard with your letters, he doesn’t want to be friends anymore, he wants to let you down easy but doesn’t know how to tell you. Or maybe—maybe you got impossibly pretty during those two months, and absence does make the heart grow fonder, as they say, and every thought you have about him, he has about you, but he doesn’t know how to tell you.

In any case, he’s hiding something.

The theory that he might want to stop being friends soon falls flat—the invitations to other freshers’ events keep coming, be it free wine & pizza taster sessions from the Wine Society, karaoke nights with the Taylor Swift Society or a shark movie marathon with the Bad Film Society, and he never turns you down when you tell him there’s something you want to visit in this new city of yours, even when the thing you want to visit in question is a bakery you have to queue in front of at seven a.m. if you want to get a pain au chocolat. In your defense, they turn out to be the best ones you and Jongseong have ever tried—although, to be fair, neither of you has been to France.

Things progressively return to normal. He’s able to make eye contact for more than three seconds again, he listens carefully and laughs along when you tell him about your week by the sea with Sunoo, he fills you in on what Heeseung’s been up to. One thing remains different, however—when you throw quips at him, he usually would’ve delighted in coming up with a better, wittier response, but now, he’ll roll his eyes at best, look at you amusedly and stay silent at worst. “Won’t you even entertain me?” you ask him once, to which he replies that you’re doing a good job entertaining yourself as is.

Instead, he becomes more earnest. As per usual you badger him with questions like Aren’t I so pretty right now? or Isn’t my outfit so cute today? to get a reaction out of him, and if during your high school days he’d either fake a puking sound or look you up and down and grumble I guess, he now smiles and simply says Yes, you are, Yes, it is. It seems impossible to keep track of his attitude: one day, he’s one thing, the next, he’s another person entirely.

It annoys you. You take his changing demeanor to mean that now that he’s a college student, he won’t indulge in your childish squabbles anymore, as though he was above all of that now, when just three months ago he was stalking your parents’ Facebooks to find unfavorable photos of you from when you were thirteen and using them as reaction pictures in your friends’ group chat. You think of your graduation day, of the box he’d given you, all done up in wrapper paper and a bow—he had filled it with every eraser he’d stolen from you over the years, he’d even gone so far as to date every single one of them, from the second of October freshman year to the twenty-eighth of November of your senior year. You didn’t count them, but there had to be at least a hundred. At the time, you’d just thought it was funny—but what if the gesture had meant something deeper than you’d realized? What if he was marking the end of something with that box? No more playing around, we’re adults now. But classes have barely started, you don’t know your way to the off-campus library, you aren’t a different person to who you were just weeks or even months earlier. Why is he acting like he is? You look at him, and you see the boy whose fault it was you had to buy a new eraser every week—who knows how many books you could’ve bought with that money. But when he turns to look at you, too, and your eyes meet, you’re suddenly assailed with the memories of that night, the kind eyes, the soft smile.

Does his future capacity to love me already exist in his heart?

Your heartbeat speeds up and you have to look away.

From your letters, it seems to be much hotter back home than in Seattle—you talk of sunburns, of afternoons spent inside with the fan on maximum speed, of ice melting instantly and watering down your Coke Zeros, whereas Jay can walk around the city pleasantly and needs to bring a jacket if he’ll be out until late after sundown. And yet, as he reads your latest letter, his skin prickles feverishly, from the top of his head to the tip of his toes. He’d excitedly torn the envelope open the second it arrived in the mail, heart thumping as he counted the pages, at least three more than usual — he was always happy that you wanted to talk to him at all, so the fact that you had this much to tell him sent him over the moon — but he would have never expected what was awaiting him inside.

With a smile on his face, he read your replies to the questions he’d asked you last time, your reactions to everything he told you about, the live Mariners game, the lake house, the rides on the boat. He imagined you as you sat at your desk in your room he’d only seen once, when you’d held a small party for your birthday and he, having arrived first, was honored with a tour of your house. He imagined your smile, the way you played with your hair when you focused on something, wondered whether you pondered every word before you wrote it down as he did or whether you poured your thoughts out onto the page without hesitation. His smile faltered when Jake Sim’s name appeared in your neat handwriting, but he was relieved to find out your description of him now was miles away from the one at the start of the school year.

Then you start writing about him. Him, Park Jongseong, and your words startle him so much, it’s like he’d forgotten he was the recipient of this letter in the first place.

But it got me thinking about your fight again. Reflecting on it now, I can say that it was a turning point for me in my perception of you.

He’s been lying comfortably in his bed, but he sits up the moment his eyes take in these words. If there is one topic the two of you have practically never broached, it’s this exactly: your relationship, the changes it’s gone through this past year. Except for a few mentions made in jest here and there, you’ve always conveniently ignored the fact that not so long ago, you were at each other’s throats. At least, you were at his throat, and Jay let you be, let you think the hatred went both ways, when in reality all he wanted was to keep you close one way or another. To him, anything was better than indifference.

But here you are, writing about how you feel about him, not in hints, not in jokes, but actually telling him black and white what goes through your head when you think of him—in other words, everything he’s been dying to know ever since he met you and especially ever since you started warming up to him a few months ago.

I have never told you about that night because I know it’ll just be more fodder for you to endlessly tease me, and I haven’t even mentioned it in these letters that I write and don’t send. Sometimes I debate the ethics of it—if I know something about our futures, isn’t it right that you know, too? But then again, I still hesitate whether what happened was real or not. As with anything, the more time passes, the more I forget about it. What kind of cheese you’d put on the pasta, the movie that played in the background, whether the stairs were carpeted or wooded—these details have evaded me by now. All I clearly remember is your face and how I felt, seeing it then, seeing it the next day at school, ten years younger, the same exact person in what felt like a different universe. As much as I tried to deny it, I know now that it was no coincidence—I was talking about it with Sunoo and he said that sometimes, we want something so badly, we conjure it up for ourselves. He’s not always a dimwit. And he’s right, the kind of love I felt from you in that dream — or not-dream — I’ve yearned for it ever since I first watched Pride & Prejudice, the 2005 film to be precise, when I was ten. But with you? That was what I couldn’t believe at first. I don’t think I need to explain why—you were there, I think you knew how I felt about you for over three years, it’s not like I tried to hide it.

Then you turned up and the sight of you was enough to bring back all the feelings from that dream. You must’ve wondered why my behavior with you switched so suddenly—well, a glimpse into marital bliss is sometimes enough for a girl to make some changes in her life. Yet I valiantly tried to convince myself that any flutter of my heart around you was due to this stupid dream, to a version of you my brain had conjured up because it was starved for affection, and you happened to be at the forefront of my mind, even if not for the right reasons. But it was no use. I had entertained the possibility that this future was really mine, and I couldn’t go back to seeing you as the boy who annoyed the living daylights out of me.

But Jong, if you weren’t you, I would’ve been confused for a week and then I would’ve gotten over it. I stayed confused for a while, and everything you did only served to confuse me further. I started to notice you more, to see you for who you were and not for the idea I had constructed of you in my head, I stopped taking note of only the things that reinforced this idea. And that changed everything.

Let’s get it out of the way: as much as I hate to admit it because it proves you right, I saw that you are indeed devastatingly handsome. It devastates me every time I have to look at that stupid, wonderful face of yours. And if aging is something you’re worried about, don’t be. I’ve seen you at 28, and let’s just say that your jaw somehow only gets more chiseled. I’ve realized that you don’t just participate in class to be a prick — except for when you contradict me in Literature, I know you only do that to piss me off, and yes, it works — but that you actually care about what we learn and that you don’t want the teacher to feel like they’re talking to a classroom full of students made out of bricks. I’ve also realized that you didn’t specifically pick German to be the one subject where you must beat me at all costs, you just actually really like German, even if I’m still undetermined as to why. And I can finally admit to myself—you are funny. Sometimes. There were so many times I had to stop myself from laughing at one of your idiotic puns because I could not bear to give you the satisfaction. That feeling when the worst person you know makes a funny joke, and all that. And as much as I’ve mocked you for it, I do actually like your laugh. I like that you’re only loud when you laugh, or sneeze, or get excited over something. You don’t scream, you don’t get angry, and I think that’s a lot for a boy fresh out of puberty. Or for any boy, really.

But above all, you’re kind, Jong. I think it’s the best thing about you. I think it’s the best thing anyone can be. I see it in your patience with Heeseung when he starts one of his rants better reserved for Reddit than real life, I see it in the way you took Sunoo and Kazuha in stride, even though they’re a bit rough around the edges sometimes, I see it in the way you guide the freshmen at the start of every year, when all anyone does is complain about them, I see it in the gentleness with which you let down the girls who confess to you, even the more persistent ones. I used to think they were crazy, but I understand them more than ever now. I also used to think that all those kindnesses meant that the ones you occasionally showed me meant nothing more than that—occasional kindnesses. You were just a nice guy, occasionally so to me. But you sort of ratted yourself out when you gave me those twenty chocolates for Valentine’s.

Or, really, what made things clearer was that fight in December. I guess I was wrong—you do get angry. I remember a thought I had at the time: just when I think I know you, you do something to shake it all up. You punched two of the star soccer players of our school in the face because they said some mean, unimportant things about me. Thinking about it now, I still don’t understand it. Was it another one of your acts of kindness?

And then I thought of those other times you helped me out. Do you remember them—the art project, the handwritten notes after my grandma passed away, you tearing Park Sunghoon a new one in the girls’ bathroom. I’m sure there are many more that I’ve dismissed simply because I did not want to see you in any other light than the one I’d decided to shine on you.

Maybe I’m rewriting the past here, but I’ve been thinking about something lately. The theme today seems to be honesty, so I’ll lay myself bare and tell you something I haven’t told anyone yet, not even myself. The more I write, the more I become aware of its truth. I like you, Jong. I think I have for a long time, longer than either of us thinks. Maybe that’s why I kept buying erasers.

I don’t have the best memory — I suspect iron deficiency, it runs in my mom’s side of the family — but I do remember this. The first time I saw you. I haven’t noticed your face changing in real time, but I’m sure I’d laugh at how much of a baby you looked back then. Although I didn’t fare much better, I’m sure. Well, you’re the one that has all these embarrassing pictures of me, you freak, so I’m sure you could tell me. Moving on…

I found you really cute. You were chatting to the person next to you, maybe it was Heeseung, I didn’t look properly—I only looked at you. Don’t laugh at me. It was the first day of high school, there was a nervous energy in the air, but you seemed happy to be there. You know I don’t have hordes of friends like you do, I don’t walk through life with people naturally gravitating towards me. I’m okay with it now, but it was something I struggled with back then. Kazuha, Sunoo and I have had each other since our elementary days, and I never needed more than that—but fifteen is the prime age for comparison, and as the weeks passed and we got used to being high schoolers, I listened to everyone sing your praises, I watched as you talked with all of our classmates, even our teachers, like you were old friends. But we sat next to each other in a couple of classes, and you wouldn't talk to me outside of partnered work. I, who wanted to be easily charmed by you like everyone else was, who thought maybe you’d help me come out of my shell. But it felt like sitting next to me was torture to you, like the boy whom I watched speak with ease to everyone else disappeared when I was around. And so — and I’m not proud of this — every smart remark in class, every joke that had the entire class roaring, every high five you gave out in the hallway, I started to despise them. And by association, I started to despise you. After that, it was easy to find fault in everything you did, my contempt was only enhanced by everyone’s admiration. But I’m not alone here. It went both ways, didn’t it? I don’t think you liked that I didn’t like you and openly showed it, so used to being everyone’s favorite person you were. I remember how you showily tried to be nice to me after that, maybe you just wanted another friend, but I didn’t let you. I don’t blame us for how we acted, only for taking so long to get our heads out of our asses.

(I have to say, I also have a thing for hating people. Remind me to tell you about Na Jaemin and Shin Ryujin one of these days.)

Anyways, I think it’s because I had liked you so much at first that I could then seemingly hate you so much. But I never hated you, Jong, not really. I’m sorry if I gave you that impression. Can I take it all back now?

Now that we’re entering university soon, I can’t help but look back on high school. This is what I want to know, but I’m not sure I’ll ever have the courage to ask you, because if your answer is the one I suspect, I don’t know how I’ll handle all the regret in my heart.

Have I been wrong about you this whole time? I thought you harbored the same negative feelings towards me as I had you since the moment you’d laid eyes on me, but all of a sudden, here you were, bloody, bandaged hand holding mine. Even with your busted eye, you looked like an angel next to all that white in the nurse’s station. I’ll never forget your words that day. Would you really not get hurt for anything else, Jong?

Your letter abruptly ends here, no concluding remarks, no wishing him a fun time in Seattle and looking forward to his next letter, no sign-off. It was as if someone cut you off before you could say everything you wanted, but then why send him this seemingly unfinished letter? It is all the more bizarre since your letters are usually meticulous: you write on every other line, it looks like you take your time with every single letter, the only disturbance in your otherwise perfect handwriting is your going back-and-forth between cursive and script s’s. But this particular letter looks rushed, your lines are sloppy, some words need to be read a few times over to be understood. What kind of state had you been in, writing these words? Jay’s heart swells, thinking that you were as moved writing as he was reading. He even looks through your letter again, wishing to find a tear stain somewhere, but there are none. Maybe he’s been watching too many of these romantic period dramas you always go on about.

He has to pace his room when he’s done reading your letter, but he feels trapped inside these four walls, so he dashes outside, saying that he’s getting some air when his relatives ask him where he’s off to in such a rush, and walks around the block five times. When he’s back in his room, he rereads your letter, eyes taking in each and every word slowly and carefully, making sure he doesn’t misread anything.

You like him. You, Y/N, like him, Jongseong, it’s a fact, it’s real, you said so yourself, you went into quite some detail about it, he can’t believe it, but it’s real, it’s written right there on the page, if anyone dares tell him he’s fooling himself, he can prove them wrong, you’re the one who said it.

The smile doesn’t leave his lips for the rest of the day, he can barely eat, he’s already full of happiness. He reads your words over and over before falling asleep, committing them to memory, dreaming about them, about you.

You. How should he respond to this? Are you even expecting a response? You seem to know he’s not impartial to you, either, although that’s an understatement.

In the following days, the thought that you hadn’t meant to send him this letter nags at him. The abrupt ending, the absence of your usual Love, Y/N. The fact that this had come out of left field—none of your previous letters had even a romantic undertone, no matter how he tried in his own to hint at his missing you, the most reference to seeing each other again you would give him was It’ll be better to show you this in real life. The act of sending letters itself didn’t feel very platonic, but you never went there, so he didn’t, either. He had secretly yearned to have you this close all these years, he would never forgive himself if he ended up chasing you away now with his over-eagerness.

You had landed on something very real in your letter: I don’t think you liked that I didn’t like you and openly showed it, so used to being everyone’s favorite person you were. I remember how you showily tried to be nice to me after that, maybe you just wanted another friend, but I didn’t let you. He cursed his fifteen-year-old self, that idiot who couldn’t even speak to a girl no matter how much he wanted to, just because she was so pretty, he was afraid of saying something stupid and messing it up before it even had a chance to start.

On days when you’d had particularly nasty or petty arguments — it could get pretty bad, at the start, before you both started maturing and realized how ridiculous you were, especially with your classmates telling you to keep it classy — he’d stay up all night, wondering why you hated him so much in the first place, what on Earth he could’ve done to warrant such vitriol. Now, finally, he knew, and he could only resent the fact that no one had invented time machines yet, so he could nip his useless ego in the bud; so he could tell younger Jay not to take it personally, that you had your reasons for disliking him, that even if you hadn’t, the world won’t end if someone doesn’t like him like everyone usually does.

Because, he hates to admit, that was what had done it for Jay. He couldn’t stand that someone — not just someone, but one of the prettiest girls he’d ever seen, a girl he’d been hyping himself up to talk to every day, but never found the courage to — didn’t immediately fall for his charms. And not just that, but even showed just how much she disliked him. You looked him up-and-down with disdain, made disgusted faces at his jokes, rolled your eyes when he spoke up in class. It made him burn with anger, but he also weirdly enjoyed it—at least, you were paying attention to him. So, he amped it up. Talked louder, laughed louder, hovered around you. He even stole your erasers, wrote the date on which he’d taken them, kept them in a box on his desk that he looked at every time he studied at home. He aimed to beat you in every class you shared, even though neither of you cared that much about grades—the annoyed look on your face when he boasted about the two points he’d gotten over you was enough satisfaction.

All in all, he behaved like a child, and you reciprocated in like.

Until you didn’t.

It was a random Tuesday when something in your attitude towards him shifted. It wasn’t a complete 180, but he noticed everything about you, so even a slight change of your tone was obvious to him. You started using your nickname for him more often than his full name—he never told you, but of course he loved that you didn’t call him Jay like everyone else, that you had your own way of addressing him. It was a sign to him that the two of you had something special, even if it was on the opposite end of the spectrum of what he wanted with you.

He again spent sleepless nights wondering what had caused this change: was it something he had done, or something within you? It was a welcome change, that much was sure, but he was initially too confused to take it in stride. He’d long made peace with the fact that he’d never have you the way he really wanted, so he was fine with whatever this was—but now, you were changing, your interactions were tinged with something like shyness, the distance between you felt greater than ever. He tried to keep up his smart-ass appearances around you, but you only indulged in your old habits once in a while, as though you had grown tired of arguing with him, even of giving him the time of day.

So he resolved himself to adapting his behavior to yours. If you stared at him intently like his face was a puzzle you were trying to solve, he let you, rested his head on his palm and smiled as he stared back at you. Finally, he had an excuse to look at you without you threatening to punch him or saying a picture would last longer. He knew they did, he’d had to resort to scrolling through Sunoo’s and Kazuha’s Instagrams to find any photos of you. Yours was private and at the time, you would’ve probably cursed him out if he’d sent a follow request. If you seemed too annoyed or upset over something, he’d leave you alone, he’d do something nice to let you know you didn’t need to have your guards up at all times around him. If you seemed to silently call for a truce of hostilities, he easily complied.

Then, after a few weeks, your petty arguments resumed, but those too were different—if before they felt filled with real disdain and irritation, they now seemed to be a comfortable habit to fall back on, almost like a fun hobby. Those, too, Jay readily welcomed.

And so things changed in a direction Jay had never thought would one day be possible. You gave him no explanations, nor did he ask for any, and soon he stopped losing sleep over the why’s and the how’s and simply let himself enjoy the fact that you now had the semblance of a friendship, that he could compliment you and pass it off as amical teasing, that he could learn things about you like what you spent your weekends doing, what your relationship with your family was like, whether you were a dog or cat person, whether you wanted to visit his farm in Stardew Valley.

Unsurprisingly, this only enhanced his already pathetically strong feelings for you. He worried over how to make sure this wasn’t some sort of 30-day friendship trial you had wanted to test out. He reveled in the fact that his top university of choice was the one you had already been accepted to. He now knew what it felt like to have you smile at him, smile because of him, and he never wanted again to live in a world where this was not a daily occurrence.

He now sort of has an answer—your letter doesn’t make it very clear, it makes him think again that you really had not meant to send it, but you seem to have had a dream. A dream of him, 28-year-old him, to be precise, of your life together—he’s not sure. At this point in time, he doesn’t care much, either. Whether it was a dream or a real vision of the future that you had, all that matters is that it allowed you to see him in a new light, a light which he had hoped for years would one day appear to you, and it had changed things. And now, you liked him.

You said so yourself.

He’s at a loss for words. He can’t concentrate for long enough to put all his thoughts in order, he can’t make himself calm down and write his feelings down. He has to pack to go home, once he’s home, he’ll have to pack for university. But it’s only two weeks from now to the day you meet again, and it’ll be better to say what he wants to say in person, anyway.

Is it okay if I respond to your letter in person? I think I’ll be too busy these two coming weeks, he texts you.

And then those two weeks pass like two seconds and you’re there, a few meters away from him. All the speeches he’d prepared in his head, from grand declarations of love to laid-back admittances of Yeah, I like you too, you’re cool, I guess, they all vanish from his head. For fourteen days he’s been going through scenarios upon scenarios of your reunion, what you’d look like, what he’d say, how you’d react. But now that he can actually see you, now that he would just have to walk a few steps if he wanted to touch you, hug you, kiss you — hoping that was something you wanted to do — he freezes. He forgets how his body works, the part in his brain that’s meant to manage language ability fails him. HIs mom calls him over, urging him into his new dorm building, and all he can do is wave back at you like an idiot.

When finally he musters the courage to text you, what he hopes will be the day that starts your romantic relationship turns into the day Park Jongseong realizes how much of a loser he is. For the first hour, he can’t look at you, he can’t get through a sentence without stuttering out half of his words, he runs out of things to say in record time. All he can think of is how easy it’d be to grab one of your hands, hold it in his and walk around this stupid potted plant sale as if the two of you were two halves of a whole. He doesn’t even want a potted plant, his roommate already has five, he just wanted an excuse to see you. He steals glances at you when you’re looking elsewhere, and he notices everything about you tenfold now that he can, now that caring about you doesn’t need to be in vain any longer. He tells himself that he just needs to calm down a bit, even when you have the confirmation that the person you’re about to confess to already likes you, revealing your feelings to someone is always nerve-wracking, the two of you haven’t seen in each other in a while, he’ll talk to you once his heart gets out of his throat.

But you’re acting normal. Suspiciously so. You’re acting like you never told him you liked him, like nothing has changed between you. He rereads your letter the second he gets back to his dorm. He’s not crazy, it’s written right there, I like you, Jong. I think I have for a long time, longer than either of us thinks. He knows the words by heart now, but he checks them anyway. So why are you acting like you never said anything? Had you really not meant to send that letter? Did Jay actually intrude on your private thoughts by reading words that had never meant to be seen by another soul?

You continue to behave as you usually would around him, but if he couldn’t go back to vicious bickering when things changed the first time, he can’t go back to friendly bickering now that things — for him — have changed a second time. He doesn’t even want friendly to be in your shared vocabulary anymore.

So he stops giving in. If you make fun of him, he just stands there with an unimpressed if amused look on his face. If you pedantically correct him on something, he just nods his head and accepts it. He can tell you’re bothered by it, but he needs to show you that he doesn’t want to go on being just friends with you—he wants to compliment you without having to pass it off as teasing, he wants to stare at you with hearts in his eyes without having to look away when you catch him, he wants to spend every waking second of every day with you, he wants to hold your hand, hold you.

He could wait for things to change slowly again, but why wait when he could help things along?

It’s nine p.m. on a Saturday and you’re sneaking Jongseong into your dorm. Liz is away for the weekend, gone back home to celebrate her aunt’s birthday, so you have the room to yourselves. It took some convincing to get him to come — What if we get caught coming in, What if your T.A. sees us, What if I get reported to campus police — and so when your verbal reassurances failed to work, you resorted to blinking up at him through your lashes and that did the trick.

Jongseong was in many ways unlike any other man you’d ever met; in some other ways, he was the exact same.

Plastic bag of the tteokbokki you’d asked for in hand, he looks around the deserted hallways like someone might jump out of nowhere and beat him to a pulp at any given moment. At this time of the week, everyone’s out partying or holed up in their dorms, presumably either to rest or because of a lack of friends so early on in the semester. You grab his free hand and hurry him along to the elevator—once inside, it takes you a few seconds before you realize you’re still holding it, and you retract your hand quickly while he just smiles.

You settle yourselves on the floor—comfort is not worth getting gochujang sauce on your white sheets. You sit criss-cross in front of each other, the food between the two of you, and catch up on your first week of class in-between bites of spicy, gooey rice cakes and fish cakes. You wonder, if one day you and Jongseong are no longer friends, how long you will keep associating tteokbokki with him.

When you tell him that you and Jake share a class, Introduction to Film Studies, he gives you a look. “What’s that face for?” you ask.

“Did you guys sit next to each other?”

You chuckle. “Of course. We only knew each other in that room, it would’ve been weird not to.”

He continues to stare at you. After a while, he muses, “You’re not…?”

You halt in your tracks, rice cake at the end of your plastic fork hanging in the air, halfway between the container and your mouth. “Whatever you’re thinking, the answer is no.” Still in love with him, interested in him again, you don’t know the exact details of Jongseong’s thought process, all you know is he has nothing to worry about—if it’s something he worries about.

When a smile slowly grows on his lips and he nods, saying, “Okay, good,” you let yourself think it might be.

Later, you’re ten minutes into a senseless blockbuster movie when he suddenly pauses it. It snaps you out of a trance—his hand was awfully close to yours, so is his shoulder, his thigh, his knee, everything, really, and you haven’t been able to concentrate on anything but the warmth radiating off his skin and the intensity with which you crave to feel it intentionally rather than accidentally. When he speaks, there’s something serious in his tone that makes you nervous. “Y/N,” he says as he turns to you, and now his face is awfully close, too. There’s still many centimeters separating you, but in this tiny, barely lit-up room, he feels closer than ever before. “Do you remember when I said I’d reply to your letter in real life?”

You tilt your head. “Yeah, that was ages ago.”

“Well, I thought I’d do it now.”

“Now?”

He takes a deep, shaky breath. “Now.”

And then those safe centimeters suddenly disappear, and Jongseong’s lips are on yours. It’s a brief, chaste kiss, so quick you wonder if it even happened when he leans back again.

“I like you, too,” he says, and your heart stops.

“W-what?” is all you can say back, eyes wide like he’s just admitted to killing someone rather than reciprocating your feelings.

His confident facade quickly crumbles. “God, this was so much cooler in my head, I-I’m sorry.” He pulls something out of his sweatpants pocket, pages folded over and over into a tiny square. As he unfolds them, you recognize your paper, your handwriting—but what do your letters have anything to do with him kissing you, of all things? “I don’t think you meant to send this. But I’m glad you did.”

He hands you the pages and your eyes skim over the words, not detecting anything out of the ordinary, until—But it got me thinking about your fight again. Reflecting on it now, I can say that it was a turning point for me in my perception of you. You remember this line, because you had made sure to strike it and everything that came afterward out when you rewrote the letter that you would actually send Jongseong. So how was he giving you this?

“I-How do you have this?” you ask, voice trembling. You feel as though your heart overflows with all kinds of emotions, and so your eyes follow, tears staining your lower lashes.

But Jongseong is not one to let you hide things from him. “Hey, no, it’s okay,” he says, warm hands coming to cup your face. “Look at me.” You have no choice but to oblige—his gaze is somehow both soft and stern, a mix of concern and determination. “Did you mean what you wrote in here?” You nod. “Then everything’s okay. You don’t know how happy I was reading this.”

The tension in your body slowly starts to fade. “Really?”

“Really. I cherish every single word in there.”

“Really?” you repeat, and he chuckles.

“Really.”

Your heartbeat speeds up as you gaze into his eyes, as you let yourself bask in the affection and endearment you find there. You can’t quite comprehend what’s happening. The letter, the kiss, his confession, your inadvertent confession, it’s all a mess in your head; so sudden, but such a long time coming at the same time. You never imagined that things would change so quickly—less than a year ago, you thought Jongseong was the most irritating person on this planet. After meeting his 28-year-old self, you thought it’d take ages for the two of you to be on such good terms. But now, just a week into your first semester of university, belly full of tteokbokki and Sprite, you like each other enough not only to be in the same room without hurling insults at each other but to actually be smiling at each other, willingly at that.

Your eyes drift down to his lips, just like in the hallway all those months ago, and the words slip out before you can stop them. They’re a mere whisper—”Kiss me again.”

Jongseong doesn’t need to be told twice. Still cupping your face, he bridges the gap between the two of you again, and this time, when your lips meet, they don’t come apart so quickly. It’s your first kiss, and it’s nothing short of magical, better than any romance novel could’ve prepared you for. His lips are warm and soft against yours, moving slowly, gingerly; as if he’s scared to take any wrong step, he lets you control the pace, follows every tilt of your head this way and that. It’s a relief that he seems to know as little about this as you do—his hands haven’t moved from your face, yours are on his knees, all you can do is focus on the movement of your lips, to think of anything else at the same time would be overwhelming.

“I’ve liked you from the start,” he suddenly says, face still so close you can feel his breath on your lips as he speaks.

“Hm?” you hum, body reeling from the kiss.

“I’ve liked you from the start,” he repeats, grinning—he looks relieved, like he’s been waiting to say these words for a long time. “I can’t believe this is happening after all these years. Or at all, really.”

“I think I did, too.”

“Yeah, you mentioned that in your letter.”

Your eyes widen and you bury your face in your hands as Jongseong laughs. “You’re never going to let me live that down, are you?” you mumble.

He smooths over your hair with one hand, brings your face back up with the other. “Don’t worry. I won’t ever make you regret this.”

Your brain and heart are too all over the place for you to come up with a coherent answer, so you lean in and reconnect your lips to his. It’s already becoming your favorite sensation, feeling him smile into the kiss, threading your fingers in his soft hair.

Time passes delicately like this, the two of you on your single bed, in the sheets that you bought three weeks ago. A lot of it is spent kissing and learning how to fall into each other’s rhythm, but you also spend hours talking, comparing situations and how you’d experienced them. You thought his occasional acts of kindness were done out of guilt, evidence that he did have some morals; he was trying to show he cared about you. He thought you’d despised him from the moment you saw him; you reiterate in more detail than your letter what really happened, you say you wish you knew then what you know now.

“But I never hated you, Jong. I think I wanted to believe that I did, but I never actually did.”

“You glared at me everytime I walked past like I killed a member of your family.”

You groan, ashamed of yourself. “I did, didn’t I?”

“You did,” he says, chuckling, placing a kiss on your forehead. His arms are around you, your head rests atop his heart—you’ve never felt more comfortable in your life. “But it’s okay. We’re here now, and I don’t want us to have any regrets about high school. We had a good time, didn’t we?”

You tilt your head up to look at him. “I’m sure you did, stealing all my erasers.”

He lets out a hearty laugh. Clearly, he’s very proud of his feat. “Hey, I gave all of them back.”

“And what am I going to do with a hundred erasers, Jong?” you ask, laughing too, pecking his cheek aggressively—your way of punishing him for a grave deed.

“Keep them as a token of my love for you,” he says, and your breath falters at the mention of that word. “In fifty years, it’ll be a sign that I’ve liked you since the beginning, I just had a funny way of showing it.”

“Fifty years, huh?”

He grins. “Fifty, a hundred, whatever. You’re not getting rid of me.”

“I wasn’t planning to.”

You’re both smiling so wide, you can barely manage a kiss. He trails kisses from your lips to your ear. Holding you close, he whispers, “It’s always been you, Y/N. Always and only you.”

There may be thorns on the otherwise immaculate rose that is your life, but Park Jongseong was never one of them—all along, he was a bud waiting to bloom.

The more time passes, the more you wonder whether that night you had seen in your vision will ever come. There’s been evenings similar to it—crashing the minute you came home from a long day on set, telling yourself you’d take a fifteen-minute power nap only to wake up three hours later and coming downstairs to find your husband cooking dinner, cleaning the kitchen, taking care of your son or simply watching TV, but waiting for you, always waiting for you. He seems as happy now watching you come down the stairs as he was then finding your face among all the students flocking out of lecture halls.

The details are blurry now, but many small things seem to be different from what you’d seen. He still tries to recreate your favorite meal, but it’s not pasta all'arrabbiata, it’s laksa, because your first date as an official couple was to a Malaysian restaurant, not an Italian one. He’s still the best father you know, but you have one son, not twin girls—although that offer to “give him a younger sibling to play with” is always on the table. Even the house you live in is different from the one in your dream, which has now become nothing more than a funny anecdote you share with people when they ask you the story of how you and Jongseong met.

You think of Sunoo’s words from all those years ago: Sometimes, we want something so badly, we conjure it up for ourselves. Had 18-year-old you been in such denial over her feelings for Jongseong that she’d had to convince herself a magical well had bestowed a crazy dream upon her to admit that, yes, there was something there, something other than childish hatred?

It doesn’t matter anymore. Months pass without you thinking about that well, anyway.

Tonight, you come home late from work after having had to do last-minute changes to the script for your current project, a movie that starts shooting in a few days. Jongseong texted you that he was going to bed an hour or so again, so you’re greeted by a plate of japchae covered in film paper. The post-it note stuck to it reads, I’m afraid of the repercussions of too much curry consumption on our son, so no laksa tonight my love. Hope you like it. Come to bed quick. You were starving a second ago, but you decide food can wait—other things can’t.

You tiptoe up the stairs and into your son’s room, breathing in the scent of his hair and placing a kiss there. His hair is still worryingly sparse, but if he’s anything like his dad, it’ll come in a bit later than the other kids. You always thought babies with a full head of hair were freaky, anyway. He doesn’t budge a bit, sleeping like a log—his dad is another story, shuffling in bed the moment you step into your shared bedroom. He opens his arms wide, a silent invitation.

“You’re home,” he says as you attach yourself to his body, your leg hiked up over his, your face buried in the crook of his neck, your thumb caressing the start of stubble on his cheeks.

You smile. “I am.”

permanent taglist: @zreamy @sunghoonmybeloved @lalalalawon @sd211 @w3bqrl @raikea10 @wntrnghts @moonlighthoon @4imhry @rikisly @loves0ft @iamliacamila @theboingsuckerasseater9000 @chaechae-23 @baekhyuns-lipchain @hyuckslvr @vernonburger @amorbonbon @fluerz @jakeflvrz @enhastolemyheart (ask to be removed/added!)

#enhypen x reader #jay x reader #jongseong x reader #enhypen fluff #jay fluff #enhypen fanfiction #jay fanfiction #enhypen au #enhypen imagines #enhypen scenarios

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gaysindistress · 1 year ago

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Things that I feel like would happen when you’re in a relationship with Simon Riley.

Simon Riley masterlist

1. First off he hates the word ‘boyfriend’.

Maybe it’s because he’s in his mid thirties or something but he can’t stand being called your boyfriend. He’s more than that but also not at the same time. You live together, have access to each other’s bank accounts (which is only because he hates it when you try to fight him about him giving you money), and you’re each others emergency contact. He thinks of himself as your husband. The man wears a silicone ring when he’s home and a necklace with the ring that’s totally not a wedding band when he’s working. Price has seen the chain once or twice and smirks, shooting him a knowing look but never says a word.

Simon cannot stand it when people get nosy and want to know what your relationship status is. You’re together and that’s all that matters. No one needs to know that you’re the beneficiary of his will and life insurance policy or that he’s put you on all of his accounts. No one needs to know that he buys you anything you want but has only ever bought you two rings; a thin gold band with a flower engraved on it and its twin a matching emerald ring. No one needs to know that when he gifted them to you, there were tears and promises of safety, love, and happiness whispered against feverish skin. No one needs to know that he has your name woven into his chest tattoo.

No one needs to know any of that because your relationship is between him and you only.

2. You are not some submissive little house wife. You are a strong independent woman and he prefers it that way.

I know this one goes against what most people say but hear me out on this. Simon has been independent since birth practically. He’s only had himself to count on for years. Even in the military, he’s only been able to rely himself. Sure the others watch out for him but if it came down to it, he’s the only one who’s going to get himself out alive.

The thought of someone else relying on him in that way is terrifying. He can’t even fathom what it would be like to look at another person and fully trust them in that way. Half the time he feels like he can’t even be trusted to take care of himself let alone another human. In theory a sweet docile housewife is great with the meals and clean house but not for him. He needs to know that you can hold your own. He needs to know that you can be independent and carry on without him if something happened while he was working. He needs to know that you will be okay if he doesn’t come back.

You have to be okay without him no matter how much it pains him to think about it.

Like I said before, he’s made you the beneficiary of everything so he knows you’ll be set financially but that’s not enough. He’s made Price promise to keep an eye out for you. He’s made you promise to let Price do that and you agreed because it’s Simon who’s asking but you’d tell anyone else to fuck off.

In addition to all of that, he’s installed the best security system the government has to offer in your house. You have a very expensive and large safe in your shared closet that he’s instructed you to only open if you feel unsafe. While you might not like it, you agree to go shooting with him so he can sleep at night knowing that you could protect yourself if he’s not home. He’s gone as far as to make sure you have all of the licenses and certificates that are needed to legally own firearms in the UK.

He’s not leaving any opportunity for you to be vulnerable or have your ‘safety checks’, as he calls them, taken away.

3. Simon Riley is a godless man…until he meets you.

Now this is entirely my own headcannon with no evidence to support it so bear with me.

Simon had a shitty childhood where his mom would pray to a god who never listened and his dad would shout verses at him when he was drunk. God was a mythical figure that he was told stories off with nothing to show for it. He did believe at one point but then his dad never got better, his mom wore bruises of every shade, and his brother found comfort in drugs.

He found himself praying when he was being tortured by the Mexican cartel. Between the flashbacks of his abusive past, he prayed to a god who had failed him so many times before to help him. He prayed again as he dug himself out of that Texas grave with the major’s jaw bone. He wailed his prayers when he found his family executed after Sparks tried to kill him.

After that he deemed himself a Godless man. Years of praying had passed with nothing. This god had decided that Simon was not worthy of a miracle so why would he continue to worship him?

That was until he met you. He finds himself praying before every mission, every time he has to leave you, every time he’s on his way home, and just about any other time he thinks of you. He doesn’t know what exactly he’s praying for other than for you to be there when he gets back.

He whispers his prayers to an absent god against your skin as he worships your body, soul, and heart. He promises to be devoted to you until his last breath and vows to find you again in whatever afterlife awaits you. He pledges to find solace in you and only you when his haunting nightmares return. He makes an oath to your heart that it will never weather another storm alone again for his will take whatever beating that comes your way. He shows you that he will love you in the same manner as a Hozier song; putting you above all else because you have become his religion, his faith, his beliefs, his life.

You have become all that he is and he thanks the god he once believed in for you. He prays again but to you, his heart, his love, and his beacon through the enteral storm of life.

#simon riley x you #simon ghost x reader #simon riley x female reader #simon riley imagine #simon riley x reader #simon ghost riley #simon riley #ghost imagine #ghost call of duty #ghost x reader #ghost cod #ghost #ghost x female reader

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plethorawrites · 2 months ago

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(A/N, I know this is absolutely stretching it, but a lot of you like the secret relationship trope as much as me and I can't get this idea out of my head so...)

---___---___---___---___---___---___---___---___---_

Jason Todd who, despite fixing his relationship with his family to an extent, still maintains distance from them. He remains amicable, showing up when asked, never straying terribly far and always still including himself whenever someone mentions the 'family'.

But...he's still a bit of a loner around them, not always entirely honest all the time. He doesn't stick around very long unless asked and will make up obvious lies to get out of things he doesn't want to do. One of the ways he does this, is by claiming to have a date.

Yes, it was ridiculous to them. If he really wanted to get away from them, he could just say that. But hey, it was his life. And it was hilarious to see the lengths he would go to.

Unbeknownst to him, you were entirely real.

At first Jason worried that they would pry for more information, maybe insist on meeting you or try to run a background check. Bruce had done that on multiple girls Dick went out with and even made a file on Bernard when Tim got involved with him. He never mentioned your last name, usually calling you his girlfriend, or some nickname his had for you, in hopes of them keeping their distance. And they did.

He didn't realize it was because they didn't actually believe him when he said he was in a relationship. He never really gloated about it much, but he never hid it, either. He'd mention you moving in, mention you were working late so he could stay for dinner, or say you were sick so he had to leave early.

To them, it was all one elaborate lie that kept him away from the family.

Even when he introduced Alfred to you, legitimizing you in the butlers eyes, everyone just groaned, telling the man not to encourage Jason's charade.

When Jason said he had to leave patrol early because he planned to propose to you, they found it even funnier, honestly. He was really keeping up with this lie. It had lasted years. Sometimes, for months he didn't mention you, but then he'd casually say he got married to really cement that he was still putting up that wall between him and the family.

He even had very convenient reasons for all the things that didn't add up, like why he never wore a wedding ring (Which he would surely have if he had actually gotten married) or why he never went on a honeymoon (Which no one could live without, right?)

Truthfully, you didn't care about that, as long as he kept coming home in one piece with minimal bleeding. As for the ring? Well, he only wore it at home, otherwise he kept it on a chain under his suit.

At one point, he even claimed you were pregnant.

That one? That was a lie filled with meat to rip off the bone. Doctor appointments and sudden emergencies let him excuse himself from any meeting he didn't want to attend or leave early and come late for practically anything.

He would even purposely read baby books or pretend to be on the phone with you when he didn't want to talk to them or engage in conversation at hand/pay attention to a briefing.

In the middle of patrol he had disappeared, claiming you were in labor, when really, they just thought he wanted to go home and sleep. He had been acting awfully exhausted lately. He claimed it was from taking care of you.

Then, after that night, he oddly enough dropped all contact for a while. A long while, actually. No red hood activity, no returning phone calls, no one had heard from him. Except for Alfred who came over to bring you a care package and Roy who was there to see his goddaughter the second she came home from the hospital.

It was nearly two months later that they finally heard from him, after starting to truly worry. He had dropped off the map before when he got the urge to be alone, but never for this long. Now suddenly he was inviting the entire family over for dinner at his apartment?

He had NEVER in his life done that. Hell, they didn't even know where he lived. Probably because they would show up unannounced and he didn't want to deal with them sleeping on his couch.

Still, regardless of their hesitation they showed up.

Imagine their surprise when he opened the door and just past his shoulder they could see you, sitting on the floor, having tummy time with newborn baby girl who couldn't stop laughing.

Their eyes were wide, they couldn't stop staring, barely even moving.

Bruce probably seemed the most shocked. He was a grandfather after all and had not only missed his granddaughter's birth, but didn't even know he had a daughter-in-law.

The ring on Jason's finger was suddenly quite prominent, as was the matching one on your hand as you picked up the baby and carried her over to them, introducing yourself.

You had apparently heard a lot about them.

They had heard...well, enough about you that they shouldn't be surprised when you fit the exact description of who they thought had been Jason's imaginary escape wife for over two years.

It all came out in that moment and both Jason and your eyes were reflecting the same confusion and disbelief as they confessed to not believing you or the baby existed.

"You...thought I made up having a wife?" he repeated slowly, frowning as his arm wrapped around your waist. "AND I lied about her having a baby?"

He had always wondered why none of them seemed to really even care about the fact that they were going to be aunts and uncles. Bruce had barely even congratulated him at all, which stung a bit, but he brushed it off.

"Well...yeah?" Tim confessed, motioning to him. "It's you! You don't even like people."

Who would ever associate Jason Todd with domestic life? No one.

He shook his head in utter disbelief. "Unbelievable," he muttered, turning to you as you started to laugh uncontrollably. "What? You find that funny?"

You nodded, trying to stop chuckling. "It's so absurd," you chortled, your laugh making the baby coo in your arms. "And I get it, I do," you admitted. "You're all tough and brooding. Not exactly father material."

He frowned further. He liked to think he had been doing a pretty good job. Maybe not perfect, but he was trying his best for both of you.

"Hey!" he exclaimed, offended, taking the baby from you. "I know I'm not a professional or anything, I haven't dropped her yet."

Emphasis on the yet.

"Of course not," you agreed, kissing the baby's head and then his cheek. "You're a very father. Even if the baby isn't real," you added with another huff of amusement, running your hands through his hair as you walked past him into the kitchen. "Put her down for her nap, would you? I want to check on dinner."

He gave another confused, inquisitive glare to his family, especially his father before nodding. "Make yourselves at home," he muttered, still confused. "I'm going to put my fake daughter down in her fake nursery," he told them before walking off.

#headcanon #x reader #plethorawrites #dc comics #batboys #jason todd x reader #jason todd #jason todd imagine #jason todd x you #jason todd imagines #jason todd x fem!reader #dad jason todd

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girl-lostconnection · 3 months ago

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So..forgive me you're the first person I'm ever asking anything on Tumblr (Kinda new and I usually like to describe it like hiding in the corner and just watching everything quietly and leaving likes and I love your work) but I was thinking about your concept with 141 and reader dying and the notebook. Would there ever be a case where the others stumble upon it? Whether Price forgets (somehow) to put it away or someone's in the midst of searching for something and stumbles upon it?

Again, love your work, feel free to ignore this tho

Yeah, I think this type of readers people call “lurkers” which is cool🙂‍↕️you guys are usually the backbone of the audience, I enjoy you tremendously.

And that’s a really good question, anon!

You know what? Why not turn the heat up a little more for this pot with the frogs.

I can imagine Price not exactly forgetting it somewhere but harbouring it so close to himself that people start to notice. This specific notebook is always with him — under his armoured vest and in the front pocket of his shirts, on top of the stack of documents, edge of it peeking out of his pants pocket.

It’s always there when before he didn’t carry it with him. It’s small and simple, technically it shouldn’t rise any questions but Kyle is the first who notices it. Maybe because after your death he’s so sharply attuned to everyone else on the team, it’s practically unhealthy.

Kyle who watches John fumble with the leather bound corners of the little thing and wonders…what’s inside of it? They have been all grieving but your things have been taken by them all and shared fairly.

Simon doesn’t withhold your pictures or books with your annotations. Soap doesn’t say no when Gaz asks for one of the keychains. Kyle himself lets Simon and Johnny take one of your things each. Simon takes the big oversized T-shirt and Soap whisks away one of your hoodies, clutching it hard to himself, knuckles white with tension.

(Kyle will never admit but when he walked in on Johnny in hoodie with your name and rank on the back of it his knees buckled. For a moment a traitorous part of him thought you were there. For a moment he could breathe again)

So Price keeping something of you to himself almost felt unfair. It wasn’t, of course, no, Captain had every right to grieve and mourn in a way that made it easier for him.

But-

But Kyle missed you. Everyday and every morning he’d wake up, realisations hitting him again that you aren’t coming back. You are never coming back.

You disappeared so suddenly you were now everywhere.

The unwashed cup they couldn’t bring themselves to wash, the clothes and trinkets, the books and pictures. The notebooks.

Kyle remembers how you two played games in it, drawing X’s and O’s when debrief would get too long and your brains too sluggish to keep awake without external stimulation.

Kyle remembers you writing in them, so focused you oftentimes wouldn’t notice him getting closer until he’d plop himself down in front of you, pretending to pose. Your favourite model, wasn’t he?

Kyle remembers you smiling at him, eyes flickering to his face for a moment, your gaze so impossibly soft he feels like choking and burying himself next to you.

There is a whole life ahead. Kyle isn’t sure how to live it with a hole in this chest the size of your love.

It’s a selfish thought, maybe. Maybe he is selfish.

Maybe he should have been content with what he has been given. But he wasn’t.

So now he slips the notebook off Price’s desk when the man himself is so wrecked he can’t see straight. John’s drinking got worse after your death. Not yet enough to cause disciplinary action but enough to make them all worried.

Gaz has never seen him like that.

Why were they all lucky enough to meet you but not lucky enough to save you? Would the outcome be different if one of them went with you on that deployment? Could they save you if they knew how it ends?

Could they try?

Kyle’s fingers skim over the pages, your hoodie on him and if he pretends hard enough it almost feels like a hug. It almost feels like his body heat seeping through fabric is yours. Like you were just wearing it.

Like you didn’t leave at all.

Like you are coming back.

Kyle flips through the pages, gurgling wet laughter in his throat when he notices that you have been writing Simon’s jokes down and coming up with your own. (The “just got hospitalised due to peekaboo incident. They put me in ICU” joke almost makes Kyle choke).

Some part of him gets why Price has been guarding this specific journal so hard. Why he wasn’t letting anyone else close to it, because this right here is you.

Everything that’s left of your thoughts and feelings, of your humour and love, of your plans and scribbles.

It’s tangible proof that you were here. You lived, you loved, you thought. You were there and you were a person. Their favourite person. Their beloved one.

Maybe that’s why your small note hits him harder than he could have ever expected. A small resigned “I’m not sure I fit in. I’m not sure I’m not second…or fifth best in this case. Don’t even know if I wanna talk about it. Just plain stupid” splits Kyle’s scull open and leaves him bleeding and aching and shaking.

What…what did you mean “fifth best”? Why would you say that? What- no. Nonononono. No, it’s not fair. It’s not true, it has never been true.

Kyle feels like driving back to the cemetery and wrapping his car around the poll.

Kyle feels like clawing at the ground and sobbing-sobbing-sobbing.

Kyle feels like begging.

Please, no. Please, come back. Please, let him fix it, let him tell you the truth, let him tell you.

Kyle understands why Price was guarding the journal this fiercely. Kyle is so mad he feels like demolishing John’s office and yelling until his voice is raspy useless thing, vocal cords damaged, headache pounding inside his head and he’s burning from inside out.

Kyle looks at the page, his whole core so hollowed out you could feel an echo if you’d knocked.

Kyle doesn’t know what to do because you are gone.

Because he wants to say “I’m sorry, love, I’m so sorry, I’d be better if I knew”, he wants to say “come back and scream at me, come back demand attention, come back and hurt me in return just please please come back”.

He wants to say “I love you” in a hundred different ways, he wants to kiss it better, he wants to hold you again, he wants you back, why can’t you come back, why can’t he get you back? He will change, he will do better, he will pay attention, he’s sorry, love, he’s so sorry.

Soap finds him just blankly staring at the page and he doesn’t understand at first, concern sharpening his features like one of the razors he uses for his drawing pencils.

Johnny sinks down next to him, lips pressing to Kyle’s temple, breath panting when Gaz doesn’t respond because he can’t.

He doesn’t know what to say.

How do you live knowing you may never change what already happened? How do you keep going knowing your tenderness is decaying six feet underground, that your love is springing with flowers when they should have stayed above the ground and picked them? How do you get over it? How?

Johnny’s eyes skim over the page and Gaz can feel when the realisation sinks in, when the body next to him is getting poured full with raw ache and ice sharp panic.

Johnny asks “Gaz whose journal is that”, Johnny pleads “Mate, talk to me, where did you get it?”, Johnny whimpers “Kyle tell me it’s not theirs, Kyle please, Kyle say something”.

Kyle doesn’t know what to do other than wrap himself around Soap and hold him despite the thrashing, despite the disbelieving laughter that descends into gasping for air and clawing at his back and shoulders.

Kyle doesn’t let him get out and do something stupid, like drive to the cemetery and wrap a car around the poll and curl near your gravestone.

There is an awfully loud gulp and the journal is getting carefully taken off Kyle’s lap, Simon’s fingers long and scarred — things broken too many times to grown back straight and narrow, calloused pads of his fingers catching on the paper of the notebook.

Kyle has to drag him down to them, he has to practically kick the ground from under Ghost’s feet because the man looks like he will get the shovel and get you out of the coffin.

(Kyle doesn’t want to think how Simon refused to let them bury you, how he sat with you for days, until the decomposition became evident. Kyle doesn’t want to think how Simon placed a phone in your coffin despite knowing that you are not coming back. Kyle doesn’t want to think that Simon was terrified the 4 of them might bury you alive).

Ghost looks like the sky just fell on his head, crashing his spine and grinding down his nerves. Ghost looks like he wants to cry but doesn’t know how.

Ghost looks like how they all feel.

Kyle forces the man into their cuddle pile and forces his hand to wrap around Johnny, because Soap digs his fingers into them like he’s falling-falling-falling. System crashing, bomb ticking, Rome burning down.

Funny how Ghost never understood the phrase “going mad with grief”, always felt like it was a bit of dramatisation. People die every day after all, don’t they? It’s statistically impossible to never lose a single person.

Funny how Soap gets it now perfectly. The shift of tectonic plates in his brain, the rewiring of the whole system, pain so intense he might have ash for heart now.

Funny how it’s not funny at all but Gaz still laughs, face wet when Simon tightens his grip and pulls Kyle in, letting him hide his face.

Taglist: @synthe4u

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luveline · 6 months ago

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Shy!reader and post prison Spence - the first time he calls her a pet name? I love that your Spencers always use “honey” or “dove” or “love” and we know she’d be a mess.

P.S. completely agree with how much I love the gentleness of your characters. The way you write Spencer in love is literally my favorite

ty for requesting <3 fem

“Are you sure it’s okay?”

Spencer holds a hanging strap. You hold your own, core tense with the movement of the train. “I think I would’ve mentioned it before you got on the train if it weren’t.”

You nod, glancing around the traincar at the other passengers. There's a stout lady wearing a large fluffy sweater, turquoise with two white kittens at her chest nuzzling one another in knit. A man with three bags of groceries sits just beside her. Further down, a teenage girl listens to music through leaking headphones, her phone reflecting blue light on her cheeks.

“But are you sure I won’t be an imposition?”

“You aren’t usually. I guess we won’t know until we get there.”

“Maybe I should just find a hotel for the night.”

“Y/N, I’m kidding. You’re not an imposition, it won’t be a problem. There’s enough room at my apartment for you to stay however long you want. Between all the books, that is.”

It’s just not something you pictured asking him for. Your kitchen flooded in your apartment and the landlord had to put you up in a hotel until he could get someone in to make sure the stove wasn’t about to explode or catch light. But the idea of a hotel is rough torture —somewhere unfamiliar, living out of a suitcase, surrounded by people you don’t know without a door that locks properly. Spencer caught you sweating over it at your desk, pulling the story from you in reluctant drags with a hand on your shoulder.

It’ll be okay, he said, you can just stay with me.

Which is relieving and somehow a new can of worms to deal with. At least at a hotel there was no chance of seeing Spencer in a towel. Spencer seeing you in a towel, in your pyjamas, without your formal office protections.

The worst part is the excitement.

Terrified he’ll see it on your face, you stare at your shoes next to his. Spencer… Everyone told you he was a dork. When you joined the team in his absence, not once did you get the impression that the man who’d be coming back was like this. You feel like he’d been infantilised. Which isn’t to say he isn’t a dork, he is, he tells you the strangest things, facts or statistics to accompany each topic of the day, and he has all the manners and chivalry of someone who knows what it’s like to be as painfully shy as you are. But he isn’t shy.

Autistic, he’d confided once. Probably. I’m better at dealing with it now.

“You okay?” he asks.

“Nervous.”

“I know.” He grasps your arm as the train screeches on tracks, turning a tight bend. You’re grateful, but immediately flushed with heat.

“I don’t want to embarrass myself.”

“You couldn’t. I think I know you too well already.”

“You’ve known me for less time than the rest of the team, but you were the first person to offer me a place to stay.” You clench the rickety handle of your suitcase. “Thank you.”

“That’s okay, angel.” He says it simply and softly, like you really are an angel. Something breathless to wait with.

Angel, you think, heart skipping a beat, pulse slow and then suddenly ramped.

His arm slips behind your back. “I don’t want you to stay in a hotel if it’s going to scare you. Besides, it’ll be fun. Like a sleepover.” He laughs. And you, despite your flush, heat sinking across your chest like a bruise, manage to laugh back. “I’ve never had one before.”

“What?”

“Never had a sleepover. I didn’t have any friends in school, and I haven’t had a girlfriend stay the night before.”

You look up at him with wide eyes, expecting a retraction. Not that you’re my girlfriend, not that you’re anything like that at all.

He smiles at you. “Should we get takeout?”

“What were you thinking?”

“There’s an Indian restaurant between the station and my apartment? We can stop in. Or we can order something to come. Or I can cook, if you want home cooked.”

“No, it’s fine, you don’t have to cook–”

His lips turn to a quizzical pout. “I don’t mind.”

You want him to call you angel again. You want him to take you home, make you dinner, and you want to sleepover. Like a girlfriend, you want to wake up in his bed.

“Sorry,” you breathe, “I think I’m just tired.”

“Are you sure?” You nod. “Alright. I was worried you didn’t like the pet name, but your pupils dilated when I said it–”

You can’t escape him. One hand in the hanging strap above, the over on your suitcase handle, you have no choice but to stand there with his arm around you to keep you from falling, face so hot with it that you’re sure you’d be feverish to the touch. “It’s fine,” you say, too afraid to look at his face that you end up staring at the nice shape of his throat, his black and purple tie. “Call me what you want. Um, I think we should get Indian.”

“Good choice, angel.”

#spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid x you #spencer reid x y/n #spencer reid x fem!reader #spencer reid imagine #spencer reid fluff #spencer reid fanfic #spencer reid oneshot #spencer reid scenario #spencer reid drabble #spencer reid fic #spencer reid fanfiction

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sqgeism · 2 months ago

Text

𐙚 𓏵𓏵𓏵 𐙚 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐝 𝐢𝐭 𝐩𝐮𝐩𝐩𝐲 𝐥𝐨𝐨𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐞 ❤︎ | mark grayson x gender neutral reader

love mail — romantic + super self indulgent hcs about mark :D if this does well, rex will get the same treatment)

mark grayson with the sweetest, most perfect s/o.. he's so incredibly down bad that even the team is embarrassed. you have the famous hero, invincible — a man posessing incredible powers and strength — weak in the knees. and you don't even know how tightly you have him wrapped around your finger.

"baaaby? i need your..—" without the chance to finish, he's already at your side in seconds and awaiting your request. it makes him all giddy when you call him pet names; baby, sweetheart, darling.. all of those things have his heart running laps, and he doesn't ever want it to stop. rex says he's making a fool of himself, mark argues by saying he's being a fool for you. making it perfectly fine to be one.

he LOOOVES, loves, loves kisses! he doesn't need it to be a make-out sesh, or if he's giving or receiving, it's just his favorite form of physical affection. if you're sleepy, he gives you a forehead kiss. if you're sad, kisses all over your pretty face. and his favorite is if you're happy, you have this tendancy to just kiss him over and over till mark's letting out smitten sighs of content. it's a bonus if you wear any type of lipstick/gloss, he wears your little marks like a PROUD boyfriend. period

mark grayson is a man who treats you like ROYALTY, carrying your bags, buying you all the pretty brands, and all he asks is to go on long, detailed rants about seance dog. he usually has to fight the urge to giggle and kick his feet cause you look at him like he's your boyfriend, and NOT a totally big nerd. which he is, who says you can't be both? infact, you're sure you love him for BEING a nerd. something about a big, tough hero.. liking a comic like seance dog. cute, sooo cute.

his favorite time of day is night time, when you're all sleepy and he pretends to be too, only to be wide awake and stifle his giggles at your sleepy clingyness. he loves the way you just.. stick to him, almost like glue. or GOD, when you run your hands through his hair — he's just got it sooo bad for you, a lovesick puppy at your side always. don't get mad at him when he shows you all the pictures he takes of you while you're sleeping, it just makes him wanna do it more, all to see that pretty look of frustration on your face.

and of course, with being a superhero, an older brother, AND a college student.. mark gets exhausted too, unimaginably so. and when he gets home, greeted by a homecooked meal, comfy clothes, his favorite movie and you, in the midst of washing the dirty dishes in his shirt — he forgets why he was in a sour mood to begin with. hell, he's got stars in his eyes as he excitedly asks you if you've prepared this all for him. dinner goes cold though, too busy pressing you up against the counter and showing you how grateful he is with his lips. ♡

totally the kind of guy to buy a polaroid camera just to collect pictures of you, and best believe he has MANY. in his wallet, in his phone, on his desk in his room.. and in fact, he had jokingly made you a shrine. realistically, it's just got all the gifts you've gotten him over the years.. but he loves it, his little corner of love, his love. his personal favorite picture is the first photobooth you two went to, he's got you carried bridal style and pressing his nose against you, causing you to have the sweetest burst of laughter — the moment perfectly captured in a single photo forever. he's sure that he'll use it to brag to every single person that he's taken, that you're his.

b4 you two were together, mark DEFINITELY tried on multiple ocassions to impress you. posted gym pictures on main (rex laughed at him for weeks), tried to dress 'cooler', and overall tried to become someone he honestly wasn't. to his surprise (and dismay), you noticed him at a cafe on a random weekend, wearing a shirt he didn't realize had a hole in the back, reading a seance dog comic. cue mark's embarrassed mumbling for excuses, before you kindly laughed off his flustered-ness, and offered to listen to him to talk about the comic he was reading.

you.

interested.

in his favorite comic.

it's like you've set off some sort of bomb, cause the boy you found interesting on campus just became ten times more attractive. again, just to highlight, a strong man with the kindest personality is just — it's immediately attractive. or it's the fact mark is just.. hot. he's undeniably a force to be reckoned with and you wanna ROCK his force deadass (sorry 🙁)

worked out in the end <3 now he deals with all your biting of his arms and fixation on messing up his hair. seriously, the whole messy hair thing can not be this serious to you...!

but it is. absolutely. put that hair gel down 💔

and for all the shit that mark's been put through, you've learned to understand him in a way he thought was impossible. for all the times he missed dates, that you slept alone in bed, when he'd disappear for months.. you always waited. patiently, lovingly, for the man you cherished so dearly.

so when he cries in your arms, murmuring how he wishes he could be a better man — you tell him there's no point. he is a better man, the best, in your words. and you wouldn't want anyone else.

#♡ — 𝐖𝐑𝐈𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆 #mark grayson x reader #mark grayson variant x reader #mark grayson #invincible s3 #invincible x reader

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whoreforsexymen · 6 months ago

Text

The VIP Booth | Vander Smut Oneshot 🫗🤎

(Gif creds: me <3)

Pairings: Husband!Vander x Wife!Reader

Pronouns: Fem!Pronouns

Rating: NSFW, 18+, MDNI !! You WILL be blocked! 🤺

Word Count: 3.1k (whoops. got carried away with storybuilding)

Tags: Cunnilingus, Fingering, Face Fucking, Finger Sucking, Hair Pulling, Semi-Public Sexual Acts, Established Relationship, etc.

Summary: You coax your husband into eating you out in the only private area The Last Drop has to offer.

Notes: AAAA!! Idk if this idea is ANY GOOD but it came to me in a moment of delusion. The last bit was probably a little rushed, too. SORRYYYY. I’ll make it up to yall later.

Also, tell me I’m wrong when I say that Vander will go to any length to eat some pussy. Do it, cowards. I dare you. YOU KNOW JUST AS WELL AS I DO THAT THIS MAN WOULD HAPPILY DIE WITH HIS FACE IN BETWEEN A PAIR OF THIGHS.

Asks/Request fics are coming soon, as well as a few more special treats for y’all!! Enjoy, my lovelies, & stay tuned. 🤍

(I can see you, minors!! Get outta here 🤺🤺. BACK! BACK, I SAY!)

Inside the walls of The Last Drop, there was one booth unlike any other—a private, exclusive spot tucked away behind the bustling central room. It was a booth reserved for those willing to pay for top-tier service, offering a secluded escape from the usual chaos of the bar’s environment. But as co-owner of The Last Drop—and wife to the main owner—you didn’t need to fork out any cash to reserve it. Especially not on a night like this. No—tonight, luck was on your side. The booth had gone unclaimed by any paying customer.

Truthfully, the undeniably significant feature were its curtains. The enormous maroon tapestries that enveloped the entrance ensured complete privacy, shielding it from prying eyes. After all, that’s what made it the VIP booth—an oasis of solitude amidst the drunken chaos of the crowd.

With the booth left unreserved, its privacy ensuring a rare moment of seclusion, and the crowd blissfully distracted by their own drunken revelry, the opportunity was simply too perfect to pass up. You had concocted a devilish plan—one that had been simmering in your mind all night. It wasn’t just about messing with your husband—it was about messing around with him.

Your overwhelming desire for your husband was impossible to ignore on any given day, but tonight, it seemed even more intense—an insatiable hunger that gnawed at you, its cause elusive and beyond your comprehension. Whatever the reason, it gripped you with a force you couldn't obstruct, leaving you restless and consumed by pure unadulterated lust.

This, naturally, allowed your plan to unfold effortlessly, as if guided by an invisible hand, bringing it closer to fruition.

To carry out your devious plan, you had carefully cultivated the trust of one of the few individuals who worked for you and Vander. They weren’t exactly employees in the traditional sense, but rather a handful of people you kept on the fringes, offering a few coins in exchange for their occasional assistance. Their loyalty was fleeting, bought with small tokens, but it was enough to serve your purpose. Especially in a moment such as this. A seemingly crucial one—at that.

You kept things vague, framing your request as though it were purely concerning a business discussion needing to be had. You asked your employee to discreetly inform your husband that someone was calling him from behind the velvet curtains of the VIP booth. You also made it clear that the employee should mirror your discretion, avoiding any mention of your name or your connection to him.

The employee appeared curious, even somewhat uneasy, at first. That was, however, prior to you slipping a generous cash bonus their way, eliciting their cooperation without room for protest.

"Go on, please," you plead with your unsuspecting employee, your voice laced with a blend of urgency and excitement. "But remember—don’t tell him it’s me."

As the employee slips into the bustling crowd, you struggle to contain the surge of excitement building within you, all while fighting to maintain a sultry—yet composed, demeanor. You adjust your hair, breasts, and clothing, making subtle moves to enhance your allure and mystery. Every gesture is deliberate, designed to keep you as collected and captivating as possible, cultivating an air of intrigue about you as you desperately await the arrival of your beloved husband.

They fulfilled your agreement as you waited—approaching their boss and informing him that someone had entered the VIP booth, insisting on speaking with him directly.

"VIP booth? Thought nobody booked it tonight," Vander remarks, raising an eyebrow and crossing his arms over his chest as he takes a moment to process the information. Normally, you were the one who handled the VIP booth, and he’d have gladly passed this task off to you—if the employee hadn’t mentioned that the VIP “customer” specifically requested Vander. Looks like he’d have to put on a more hospitable facade and give them what they wanted.

If only he knew just what this "customer" truly wanted from him.

After a series of grunts, groans, and huffs, Vander finally made his way to the booth. After forcing a welcoming smile onto his face, he slowly pushed aside the curtains.

"Sorry for the wait. You wanted to speak to the owner—"

His voice faltered, trailing off faster than it had taken him to summon the words.

You feel your own response threaten to catch in your throat, but you won’t cave. You abandon your nerves.

"Why yes, I did. Although..." you drawl, your tone laced with playful mischief, "...'speak' isn’t exactly at the top of the list of things I want to do to the owner."

Your sultry gaze locks onto his, deliciously teasing. Vander, already an imposing figure, looms even larger from your vantage point in the booth. Seated as you are, you find yourself craning your neck significantly just to meet his eyes, the angle only amplifying his commanding presence.

A slew of unidentifiable emotions cross his face in a mere flash before fading into a singularly—equally mischievous to yours—-expression.

“Well. Seein’ as how you are the VIP patron of the night, how can I oblige you?” He queries, his eyebrow raising once more.

Your heart stutters beneath your breast as his expression shifts, his eyes darkening with a lust-filled intensity that sends a shiver through you. The chemistry between you two never failing to baffle you.

"...Serve me," you murmur, your voice soft yet determined to keep the air thick with seduction.

"And what, if I may be so bold to ask, can I serve you with?" he inquires, his voice dipping low, the provocative edge in his gaze unwavering.

"Your body." you quip, your voice steady despite the flutter of nerves stirring in your gut, desperate to make it quiver.

Vander eyes you carefully for a moment, savoring the way your confidence wavers. He deliberately toys with the knowledge of how easily he can unsettle you, his gaze lingering as if relishing every flicker of hesitation you try to hide. A smirk slowly spreads across his mouth—the very one you ached for—his eyes glinting with an all-knowing, deviously sexy twinge. He nods softly, his hand rising to casually caress his beard as he watches you, the tension thick in the air.

“Mmhmm. I see," he murmurs, his tone laced with teasing amusement. "Who am I, if not a man willing to care for his loyal customers?" He phrases simply, the words carrying a heavy, unspoken promise before he moves, gracefully lowering himself to his knees across from you. There’s a moment of silence, the air thick with anticipation, before he slowly begins to push himself beneath the table that had kept you both apart.

You don’t dare look beneath the table, almost afraid to meet his gaze at this moment, unsure of what you might see on his face now that the situation has shifted. The tension coils tighter, each passing second amplifying the anticipation that overwhelmed your senses.

You practically jump at the brush of his shoulders against your shins as he crawls to them, the rush of anticipation making every nerve in your body jolt. The aching desperation pulling through you draws attention to your core as you feel his strong hands gently caress your legs, the heat of his touch settling on your knees, sending a shiver through you. The way your teeth begin to tug at your bottom lip seemed like the only way you could physically process your eagerness.

Vander remains silent, his hands moving deliberately in opposite directions, the gesture designed to spread your legs—yet he did so with enough force to split you down the middle if he hadn’t been careful enough. It isn’t until he successfully parts them that he speaks again.

“No bottoms? My. What a dirty girl you are, my dear customer. What if someone else had walked in here, hmm? Did you plan on flashing your bits to any bloke who popped his head in?” He teases, practically groaning some of his words, the guttural tone an unintentional yet instinctual reaction to the sight of you so bare—-so clearly prepared for whatever scenario it was you anticipated happening in this little corner of the establishment.

It was obvious to your husband, from the way you were reacting, that the possibility of him crawling under the table to bury his face between your thighs hadn’t even crossed your mind. The surprise and hesitation in your twitches and subtle movements told him everything he needed to know.

The distant, familiar chatter of real customers beyond the thin barrier tightened the knot in your stomach, throwing you into the reality of the moment. It became an unrelenting presence, grounding you in the tension that hung in the air. Meanwhile, the hot, damp breath of your husband seethed against the cold slickness seeping from your cunt, a stark contrast that deepened the unease coursing through you.

A shiver ran up your spine, your body trembling as nervous spasms raked through your bones when he edged even closer—his hair grazing your skin in that familiar way you knew so well. It wasn’t uncommon for your husband to spend most of his time down here, yet no matter how often it happened, the anxiety it stirred within you never waned.

You had an even harder time controlling how your body writhed as you felt the warmth of his tongue flush itself against your sopping heat. Your nails pressed into the soft wood of the table, digging in as you braced yourself, your body jerking. The spasms faltered for a moment, your body going rigid once he started violently lapping his tongue against your aching clit. The abrasing way his beard rubbed against the skin of your thighs sent you into a spiral.

You had expected him to fuck you directly on the table, to take you in the way you were used to—but instead, he toyed with you from beneath it, the unanticipated choice leaving you bewildered. You had been aching for what felt like ages, the desperation almost unbearable. It was a struggle to keep your mouth from parting—your head tilting back, eyes closing as your husband began to ease the tension that had gripped you for so long.

All you wanted was to whimper, to cry out for him, but you couldn’t—not with the patrons so close, just beyond the curtains. If he had only fucked you as you’d expected, he would’ve easily pressed a hand over your mouth to keep you quiet, as he had in similar situations before. But this time, you knew he had chosen this path deliberately, testing whether you could hold your composure.

It was his unspoken way of making you atone for the ploy you used to get him here. He was a patient lover, understanding that even though you had pulled him away from his work—which he didn’t mind as much as he let on—you were just too eager to be patient. Always attuned to your needs, he was more than willing to satisfy the cravings of his most cherished wife, finding joy in fulfilling your desires—no matter the time or place. The absence of his familiar presence behind the bar, and the slight potential for upsetting customers, felt like a small price to pay in exchange for the chance to fully indulge in you. To unravel and claim you in ways only he could.

His tongue was relentless. He sloppily sucked and licked at your needy clit, his nose rubbing against the mound of flesh above as he devoured you. His hands were as equally hungry as his mouth, and in need of something to grab. He manhandles your legs, draping them roughly over his shoulders, his fingers gripping at your plush thighs as he curls his arms around them. In doing so, he pulled you closer, your back slipping against the booth as he guided you down, drawing you nearer to him with a purposeful force. His cock was begging to be set free from its cloth prison as he sunk his tongue deep into the void of your cunt. The rhythmic, wet sounds became a melody more captivating than any song he'd ever heard, especially when paired with the soft mewls of you struggling to stay collected—and most importantly—silent.

You can both hear and feel his laugh against you, a deep, low chuckle that carries a mix of arousal and amusement, vibrating through you with every huff. He found the way he could make you squirm incredibly sexy, the reaction sparking a deep sense of pride within him. There was something about the ease with which he could unsettle you that thrilled him, and he took great satisfaction in knowing how little effort it took. He knew all too well that it only took something as simple as a certain look to have you coming undone—and right now, he was determined to make you come undone. All over his tongue.

Vander knows just how wild his fingers can make you on their own— yet especially so when paired with the mastery of his expertly quick and thoughtful tongue.

He wasted no time in combining the two, intent on making you crack under the pressure. While Vander didn’t particularly want to be caught by patrons, either—or, for that matter, by one of your employees—his desire to make you scream was always his top priority.

He grips your thighs with more gusto than before, continuing to pull them further apart in hopes of expanding his ‘workspace’. He releases one of them, the fingers of that hand moving to replace the tongue that was working its familiar magic inside you. He doesn’t give you so much as a single moment to collect your thoughts as he makes the exchange, effortlessly ramming and curling two up into your cunt as his tongue continues its prior attack on your clit.

You swore you were seeing stars behind your eyelids, your grip on the table faltering just like your efforts to stay in control. You couldn't even attempt to cover your mouth, not with the relentless—yet unintentional—way your hands found their way under the table, tangling in his hair and gripping with enough force to pull some strands loose.

You greedily buck your hips down to meet the thrusting of his digits, pulling his head as far into your cunt as possible. He doesn’t complain. He never would. Maybe it was his own type of preferred masochism, but he’d consider suffocating and perishing in between your legs in this way, a noble death.

Your toes ache from the force with which you’re curling them, your legs clutching and winding around his shoulders and neck like a python.

By now, you had abandoned all caution, hope, and effort to moan quietly. You were practically screaming over the deliciously knowing way he prodded his thick fingers into your cunt. He had long forgotten to move them in and out. He knew exactly what spot drove you mad, and he made his most conscious effort to curl them into it as rapidly and frequently as possible.

As much as Vander adored your cries, they were truly becoming far too loud. He really didn’t want any curious folks to come wandering in to spoil the moment when you were so close to your inevitable peak. He has no choice but to silence you. With the hand that remained on your other thigh, he removed it from its resting place, reaching up from beneath the table as he gazes up at you. With a smirk against your cunt, and his eyes studying how your head was still thrown back against the booth, eyes shut tighter than a steel trap—-he shoves two of his free fingers into your mouth. Your eyes shoot open. You look down at him, earning a wink from your husband as he smirks harder against your cunt. The eye contact was filthy, in the most erotic way possible. It always made you feel slightly awkward, in an oddly arousing way, when you made such a type of contact with him in the heat of a moment like this.

You willingly sucked on his fingers, now understanding the purpose for his actions after a thoughtful moment. He groans against your cunt, luckily the sound being muffled by how much his mouth was buried into it. Your tongue swirls itself rapaciously around the digits, drool falling from your mouth as you did so. Vander simply can’t tear his eyes away from such a sight. He groans more as you lower your own gaze, your expression deadly with seduction. He was almost pissy that both of his hands were occupied at the moment. He was anxious to palm at his cock, desperate to find friction of his own now.

His tongue and lips were still working their relentless job on your clit, suckling every few seconds amidst the slurping. The way his facial hair brushes against it every now and then almost sends you into hysterics—bordering on a full blown frenzy.

Your legs are quaking, twitching and spasming with every harsh lick to your clit. It was so sensitive, you couldn’t help how it shocked your nerves, causing them all to fire simultaneously. Electricity burned in your veins, desperate to chase your orgasm as it made your hips flick against his mouth faster than he could lap at you.

Your orgasm burrowed itself into the pit of your stomach, commanding you to follow it down to your cunt.

It didn’t take much longer for you to keel over the edge of your impending climax. It burst through you, your legs clamping shut around his face—a move which Vander was used to by now—-hips mindlessly gyrating against his face as you brutally cum around his fingers. Vander can feel your walls clenching and relaxing back to back with each additional thrust he gave, your voice begging to slip past his fingers as you come undone. He thought you had been dripping wet at the start of this—but he had been sorely mistaken. Your arousal was seeping out of you despite his fingers plugging you up.

“Attagirl..” He whispers against you, giving your clit a few final licks before reluctantly pulling away. The grip on his hair finally loosened as your body went almost completely limp. Your breathing came in rapid, shallow gasps, just as desperate as Vander, himself, now was. His cock was so hard, it felt like it was being choked by his trousers. But he had the patience of a saint. He could wait as long as needed for you to collect yourself once again.

“So, was the service to your liking?” he asks, his tone teasing—and entirely rhetorical—as he wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. The fingers that had been in your mouth slide free as he takes a moment to compose himself.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” he chuckles, clearly amused by how speechless you’ve become.

“Just don’t forget to tip your server..” He teases, alluding to the painfully obvious fact, that this situation is far from over.

#arcane smut #arcane x reader #arcane #vander x reader #arcane imagine #arcane x reader smut #vander arcane #vander x reader arcane #vander x reader smut #Vander smut #Vander smut imagine #Vander x reader imagine smut #Vander smut Drabble #Vander x reader smut oneshot

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shanastoryteller · 6 months ago

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Dean’s minding his own business, sipping on a beer and leering at the bartender, when a guy that admittedly has about four inches and a good twenty pounds of muscle on him storms over and shoves him in the arm.

He tenses, getting to his feet and preparing for a fight even as he’s wondering what he did to piss him off. Maybe the bartender’s his girl? Jesus, Dean was just looking, he can’t get mad at just looking when his girl look likes that.

“Dude, what the hell?” the guy demands. “I know you’re pissed at me right now, but just leaving me back there – do you know how many bars it took to find you? You’re a jackass.”

He’s not taking a swing, instead standing with crossed arms – fuck, this guy is huge, he’d really like to avoid a fight here – and scowling at him, his long hair falling into his eyes as he looks down at him. Dean wishes he had any idea what was going on right now. “Look, man, relax.” The guy’s eyes narrow, his shoulders lifting and expanding as he takes in a deep breath, as if he needs any help to look bigger. Before he can say anything, Dean adds, “I think you’ve got me confused with someone else.”

He rolls his eyes. “Yeah, okay. Fuck off.” He presses his lips together, somehow appearing smaller in the next moment without actually moving. “Look, I know you’re mad about heaven, you’ve made that pretty fucking clear, but you can’t just walk off and turn off your phone. I figured you were just being an ass, but something could have happened to you. If you’re ignoring me, at least let me know you’re ignoring me.”

The guy doesn’t look like he’s tweaking, or suffering some sort of head injury. His eyes are clear and his voice is steady. But Dean has no idea what he’s talking about. “Dude, you’ve really got me confused with someone else.”

“Dean!” he snaps, which woah, okay, he wasn’t expecting that. “This isn’t funny.”

“I’m not laughing,” he says. “How do you know my name?”

He stares at him, uncertainty entering his eyes for the first time. “Are you feeling okay? You didn’t come across Zachariah or a witch or something in the past couple hours?”

He doesn’t know who Zachariah is, but the casual mention of witches makes him frown. Is this guy a hunter or something? He figures he’d remember meeting him, but maybe not.

“Everything okay over here?” Dad’s hand lands heavily on his shoulder, and Dean shifts enough to see him giving the guy a hard stare that has sent more than one man running in the other direction.

Dean almost rolls his eyes – he’s thirty one years old, he doesn’t need his dad coming over to save him – but he makes the effort so rarely that Dean can’t help but be warmed by it.

The guy pales, mouth dropping open as he stares at Dad like he’s seen a ghost. “You – Christo.”

Okay, definitely a hunter. Dad raises an eyebrow. “I’m not a demon.”

The guy grabs for Dean, yanking on his hand. Dean jerks back, but he’s already gotten his long fingers around his ring. He pulls it off and Dean is about to break his jaw to get it back, but he tosses it to Dad, who catches it on instinct. Dean doesn’t get it until he does. His ring is silver. He’s checking if Dad is a shifter, which okay, that’s one thing. Dean’s more concerned about how he knows his ring is silver. The guy’s voice cracks when he says, “Dad?”

Dad raises an eyebrow. “I think you’re a little confused.”

“Dean, what’s going on?” he asks, grabbing onto the sleeve of his jacket. Dean should push him off. “What,” his gaze drops down, and if possible he goes even paler. “Oh. Oh, fuck.”

Dean looks down, sees the guy’s eyes stuck on his amulet. “What?”

“I don’t understand,” he says, biting on his lower lip. “Is this some sort of – but you’re still hunters. Is Mom alive?”

Dean flinches.

“Okay,” Dad says. “That’s enough. You walk this off or whatever, but you do it somewhere else–”

“Dad, it’s me,” he says plaintively. “It’s Sam. Your son.”

Dean doesn’t remember moving, only that the next moment his hands are fisted in the front of this asshole’s shirt, his blood thrumming under his skin. “Shut up. Shut the fuck up.”

He puts his hands on Dean’s wrists, stupid earnest and soft and Dean’s going to kick his ass. “Dean. It’s me. I have to exist in this world, right? The demon was after me, if I wasn’t here then there wouldn’t have ben a fire, Mom wouldn’t have died, you guys wouldn’t be hunters. I have to be around somewhere.”

Dean tries to shove him away, but he won’t let go of his hands. “Shut up! You don’t – don’t talk about my family.”

The worst thing he ever did, his biggest failure. Sometimes the weight of it gets to be so heavy that it feels like it should be cracking his ribs, pressing his heart until it bursts. Sometimes he wishes it would.

He swallows before letting go with one hand and reaching into his pocket to pull something out. It takes Dean a moment to see it’s his amulet, the one he’s worn since he was twelve years old, back when Bobby still talked to them. “My name is Samuel Winchester. I was named after my mother’s father. I was born on May 2, 1983. When I was eight years old, Bobby gave me this amulet. He said it was a protection charm. I was originally planning to give it to Dad for Christmas, but he didn’t show up. Another in a long line of disappointments, right? So I gave it to you instead. Because even when you’re being a jerk, you’ve never let me down.”

Dean’s eyes are burning. He tries to shake off his grip, but he won’t let go. Why is Dad just standing there? “Stop! Stop. I don’t know what game you’re playing–”

“No game,” he says, gentle voice a counterpoint to the grip that’s absolutely going to bruise. “I need you to believe me, Dean, please–”

“My brother died when he was six months old,” he cuts him off. “Samuel Winchester is dead. He’s been dead for twenty six years.”

His fault, his fault, all his fault. If he’d just listened to Dad –

“Not where I’m from,” he says, and it’s crazy, it’s all crazy. “Please. Ask me anything. I’ll prove it. Hell, let’s go to a clinic, we can take a DNA test. I’m Sam. I’m your brother. And I need your help.”

“You mentioned a demon,” Dad says quietly.

The guy, who’s not Sam, who can’t be Sam, tears his eyes away from Dean to look at Dad. “Yeah. Azazel. The yellow eyed demon.”

Dad rubs a hand over his mouth. “I never told anyone about that.”

Dean snaps his head towards Dad. “What? You said you didn’t know what killed Mom! That we were searching for it!”

“We are,” Dad says. “It never resurfaced again. I’ve been looking for the signs.”

The guy frowns. “He started up again when I was twenty two.”

“Not here,” Dad says, looking him up and down, something hungry in his eyes.

Dad believes him. Dad thinks that this is Sammy.

“Let’s discuss this back at the room,” Dad says. “Come on.”

He heads towards the door, sure that he’s going to be followed. The – Sam, maybe Sam, he rolls his eyes, but goes after him. He only stops when his grip on Dean’s wrist jerks him back, because Dean’s not moving, can’t make himself move. He flushes, letting go of Dean finally, but he takes a step closer. His eyebrows pull together in concern, and now that Dean’s looking, he sort of sees it, sees the planes of Dad’s face and his eyes in this stranger with his brother’s name. “Hey, are you okay?”

No.

“Let’s go,” he says, striding forward, shoulders hunched.

Sam falls into step beside him easily, matching his strides like it’s second nature. Dean swallows around the lump in his throat and tries to pretend it means nothing.

#zachariah dropping sam into an alternate universe where he's dead like this will solve ... something #sam earnestly trying to convince dean he's in the better universe because all sam does is ruin everything around him #he tells dean every terrible thing he would have had to endure if sam had survived the fire #all dean hears is that there's universe out there where he's not alone #supernatural

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wooyoungiewritings · 11 days ago

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Borrowed Time - Seonghwa x Reader (Part 2)

Summary: You didn't think you'd find someone after your husband of 8 years suggested an open marriage. A few weeks after matching on a dating app, you find yourself swept away on a surprise getaway with none other than Seonghwa: your husband’s boss, and the man who’s been quietly turning your world upside down. The chemistry is undeniable, the tension electric, but you made a promise to be honest with your husband before things go too far. Still... what’s the harm in finding a few loop-holes? If it’s not technically sex, does it really count?

Word count: 13.1K

Genre: Fluff, Rich Seonghwa, a little angst, slow burn, smut (they do something so many times in this chapter lmao sorry i got carried away)

warnings: Seonghwa with reader (fem pronouns), TEASING, dom Seonghwa, fingering, oral (male/fem receiving), grinding hard (omg i don't know how to explain it, they're literally millimeters from just going at it), lmk if I missed anything! Author's note: I'm in a good mood. And you guys are literally so sweet and supporting, I can not NOT post chapter 2 already!? so here it is! I hope you have an amazing day <3

PART 1 PART3

This is all for fun and is not meant to represent Seonghwa in any way.

You’re not sure how it’s been two weeks.

In some ways, everything feels exactly the same. Same apartment, same unread texts from your husband, same untouched conversation that’s been looming over you like a cloud.

But then there’s Seonghwa.

And somehow, everything feels different.

You talk every day. Constant check-ins, sweet little texts, voice notes when he’s driving, memes he knows will make you laugh. Sometimes he calls at night just to hear your voice before bed. And you don't think you're imagining it, that softness in the way he says your name, the unspoken want in his pauses.

You’ve seen him a few times. Nothing dramatic, no grand dates, just… him. His space. His voice. A mug of tea pressed into your hands. A blanket he tugged tighter around your shoulders without saying a word. Quiet dinners where you talked about the stupidest things, where you teased him until he cracked up, eyes crinkling, hand squeezing your knee under the table like he couldn’t not touch you.

And still, he never pushed. Never asked for more than what you were ready to give.

But that didn’t stop you from kissing him.

You kissed him on his couch after laughing too long at something dumb he said. You kissed him in his hallway when you were saying goodbye and didn’t want to leave. You kissed him once in the middle of a sentence because you couldn’t stop yourself.

Every time, it left you both breathless.

And every time, his hands stayed respectful, cupping your cheek, holding your waist, letting you choose how far. Letting you feel safe.

You don’t think he knows how much that means.

You’re still married. You still wear your ring as a reminder. And even if that feels like a technicality at this point, you haven’t had the conversation. Not the real one. You’ve tried texting your husband more than once, saying you needed to talk. Said you weren’t okay. You meant to say more, but what’s the point when all you get back is a thumbs up or "we’ll talk soon"?

He hasn't been home. He hasn’t asked how you are. You’ve stopped waiting for him to care.

So when your phone buzzes on Friday morning with Seonghwa’s name, you unlock it fast, too fast. Already smiling before you even read it.

Seonghwa: I need you to trust me. Pack a small weekend bag. No heels. Cozy clothes. Something to sleep in. Maybe a swimsuit. Pick you up at 5.

You stare at your phone for a full minute, grinning like an idiot.

You: Is this a kidnapping?

Seonghwa: Yes. But the softest, coziest kind. With snacks.

You: …Fine. I’m in.

Your smile falters, but in the softest way. Your heart melts.

Packing is easy. The hard part is waiting.

You toss in leggings, sweaters, that shirt of his you still haven’t returned. You throw in your swimsuit, mostly because you’re curious. And maybe because you like the idea of his eyes on you. And when you zip the bag closed, you find yourself hoping the quiet weekend isn’t too quiet. That maybe you’ll get to kiss him again, this time in a place where no one else exists but the two of you.

When he picked you up, he had two coffees in a cup holder and your favorite granola bars in the passenger seat. And the second you buckled in, he turned to you, eyes warm and voice soft.

“Hi.”

That it is. Just that one word. And your whole heart melted.

The two hour drive is filled with talking, laughing, and the occasional hand on the thigh from Seonghwa. You don’t know what to expect when he starts driving outside of town and into a wooded area, but when a lovely, aesthetic cabin comes into view, your mouth drops. The inside of the cabin wraps around you like a hug, but Seonghwa’s already moving, dropping both your bags by the coat rack and stretching with a groan that makes his hoodie ride up slightly.

“I should give you the grand tour,” he says, glancing over his shoulder at you with that boyish smile that makes your chest do a weird little skip. “Even though it’s not really grand.”

You follow him through the cabin as he gestures casually, left to a small but cozy guest room, across to the bathroom with a deep old tub and brass fixtures, and then finally his room at the back of the cabin.

“This is mine,” he says, flicking on the light in his bedroom. It’s simple, wooden floors, navy sheets, a stack of books on the nightstand, but it’s very him. Soft and clean, masculine without trying.

You hover by the door. “Feels weirdly like you.”

He chuckles. “That’s either a compliment or you’re calling me boring.”

“Oh, definitely a compliment,” you murmur, eyes scanning the room. “You’ve got good taste.”

“Mm, well, let’s see if that still holds up.”

You raise a brow as he turns and heads toward a door at the end of the hall. “There’s more?”

“It’s technically the basement,” he says, grabbing a light switch and flipping it on, “but it’s my favorite part.”

You follow him down the short staircase, and the moment you step off the last stair, your mouth parts slightly.

The space is warm, not just heated, but glowing. Soft lighting reflects off the water of a wide, in-ground pool, steam rising lazily above it. The air smells faintly of eucalyptus and cedar, and the entire room is surrounded by smooth, stone-textured walls and plush seating tucked into corners. A wall of glass windows looks out into the forest beyond, the trees dark silhouettes in the fading light.

You turn to him, wide-eyed. “You have a pool. In your cabin.”

He shrugs a little, but the corner of his mouth pulls up. “Was kind of a present to my family. First thing I bought when things started going well.”

“Seonghwa.” You step forward and dip your fingers in the water, it’s warm and silky-soft. “We are absolutely coming back down here later,” you say.

He grins. “I was hoping you’d say that.” He watches you a beat longer, something unreadable behind his eyes, then says, “Gonna grab some firewood before it gets too dark. You okay here?”

You nod, but as he heads out, you drift back toward the living room, standing near the wide back windows.

He’s outside now, rolling up his sleeves as he stacks firewood like it weighs nothing. His jaw clenches when he lifts the heavier pieces, eyes narrowed, brow furrowed in focus. It’s almost criminal how good he looks like this. The sky’s turning gold behind him, making his skin glow, casting a soft light through his hair. And you just… stare.

Because this is the same man who ran his fingers gently through your hair on the couch, who kissed your forehead like it meant something, who told you to pack your bag for a weekend away without ever asking for anything in return.

But damn, he’s hot.

He glances toward the window and catches you watching. Raises a brow. Smirks. Doesn’t break eye contact as he sets the last log down and brushes his hands off on his jeans, and God, you feel like your skin is warming faster than the fireplace he’s about to light.

By the time he’s back inside, shaking the cold from his clothes, you’re in the kitchen, pretending you weren’t just ogling him like a teenage crush.

“See something you like?” he says as he walks by, voice low and teasing.

You scoff. “Relax, lumberjack. Just making sure you didn’t freeze to death.”

He grins but doesn’t say anything, just slides up behind you as you start pulling ingredients out of the bag he brought. His arms wrap around your waist loosely, his chin resting on your shoulder.

“You cook, right?” you ask, leaning into him just a little.

“I survive,” he answers. “But for you, I’ll follow any recipe you give me.”

The kitchen fills with the soft sounds of chopping and the simmering of sauce, your bodies constantly brushing. He’s touchy in the most subtle ways, hand guiding your lower back as you switch places, fingers brushing yours as he hands you a spoon, lingering way too long when you try to rinse a dish and he steps in just to “help.”

At one point, you drop a piece of onion and groan, bending to pick it up, and he makes a soft, playful noise behind you.

“Dangerous territory,” he mutters.

You glance over your shoulder. “You're in my space.”

He tilts his head, impossibly smug. “It's my cabin.”

You roll your eyes but you’re smiling, heart full in a way you didn’t expect to happen so quickly again.

And maybe he feels it too, because he kisses your temple again before stepping away to stir the pot.

But underneath it all is the quiet awareness of what hasn’t been said yet. The unspoken weight of your still-husband, and the fact that Seonghwa, for all his charm and sweetness, hasn’t pushed you to talk about it.

So the touches stay light. The kisses stay soft. Neither of you cross that line.

But once the dishes are done, and the fire crackles in the hearth, the cabin feels like a world of its own.

The pool room is already warm when Seonghwa walks in, steam curling through the air in soft waves. The glow from the underwater lights dances on the ceiling, casting shifting shadows over the stone walls. He moves quietly, setting fresh towels on the bench, lighting a couple of the wall sconces to soften the ambiance. His t-shirt comes off first, then his sweats, revealing black swim trunks that hang low on his hips, and he paces a little, half-distracted as he runs a hand through his hair.

He’s calm until he hears footsteps on the stairs.

When you step into view, wrapped in a towel, his breath catches.

Your fingers grip the edge of the towel a little tighter. You hesitate. The bikini you’re wearing is simple, but it’s more skin than you’ve shown in months, more than your husband ever really looked at, anyway. There's a flicker of hesitation, a flare of insecurity rising uninvited. You almost say something to brush it off, to deflect, but then your eyes find Seonghwa.

And he’s staring.

Not in a way that makes you shrink, but in a way that freezes him in place. Your breath hitches. You glance down and away, trying to ignore the flush creeping up your neck, and drop the towel, stepping toward the pool. You slip into the water, letting the heat rise around your body, washing away a bit of that self-consciousness with it. Seonghwa joins you, smooth and slow, his eyes still lingering.

“You’re staring,” you murmur, voice smaller than usual, almost embarrassed.

“I know,” he says, not even blinking. “I couldn’t stop if I tried.” His gaze doesn’t flicker. It’s steady, reverent. Like you just knocked the air out of him.

You swim around a bit first, exchanging light, almost flirty conversation. It's relaxed, warm, his presence does that to you. Grounding you, calming that nervous swirl in your chest.

Then, eventually, you stop in the deeper end. You tread water in front of him, breathing just a little heavier than before. Your hands rest on his shoulders, tentative, and he lets you come closer.

Your legs slide around his waist. He catches you easily. Neither of you moves for a beat.

The water sloshes softly around you. His hands settle on your hips, anchoring you, but careful, not grabbing, not pulling. Just holding. You look at him and something in your chest flutters.

“You okay?” he asks softly, eyes scanning your face.

You nod. “Yeah. Just… haven’t worn something like this in a while. Feels weird.”

He tilts his head, fingers brushing your side gently under the water. “You look beautiful.”

You don’t answer, but you lean in, resting your head on his shoulder, enjoying how calming and safe you feel. His hands flex slightly against your hips, like it takes everything in him not to pull you closer. The tension between you simmers. Quiet, patient, but unmistakable. He smells like clean skin and chlorine, his wet hair slicked back, droplets sliding down the strong line of his neck.

You You don’t meet his eyes at first when you speak. “Can I tell you something kinda… embarrassing?”

That gets his attention instantly. His brows lift, and he leans in slightly, voice warm and gentle. “You can tell me anything.”

You pull back to be able to look into his eyes.

“I’ve only ever been with him. My husband.” The word tastes heavy in your mouth. “I’ve never been with anyone else, and I don’t know… that feels weird to admit.”

He doesn’t flinch. He just blinks once, tilts his head a little. “It’s not weird,” he says, quieter now. “It just means you trusted someone. That’s not a bad thing.”

You bite your lip. “I guess. But now I’m here, with you, and-,” your cheeks grow hot “I feel like I don’t know what I’m doing anymore. I don’t know how to be good at this. What if I’m awkward? Or don’t know what you like?”

His hands squeeze lightly at your hips. “You think I’ve been touching you like this because I’m not into it?”

That makes you laugh, and he grins, leaning in just enough that his nose brushes yours. But he doesn’t kiss you. Not yet.

You glance down at the way your chest rises and falls in your bikini top, the water gliding over your skin. “It’s been a long time since I felt wanted like this. And it’s a little scary, to want something but not be sure how to ask for it.”

Seonghwa’s voice drops, eyes tracing the droplets clinging to your collarbone. “You’re asking just fine.”

His gaze lingers on you, openly, hungrily. His hands are still on your hips, but they inch upward just slightly, thumbs brushing the skin just under the hem of your bikini top. “You don’t have to be perfect. You just have to want it. The rest we’ll figure out.”

Your breath catches. “I do want something.”

His eyes flick up to meet yours again. “Yeah?”

You press your lips to his cheek. Then his jaw. Then lower, teasing a line down his throat. “I’ve been thinking…” Your voice is practically a whisper now. “It doesn’t count as sex if it’s… other stuff, right?”

He groans, head tipping back. “You’re playing with fire.”

“Maybe,” you murmur against his skin, “but I haven’t had anything in months. You expect me to behave?”

His grip tightens at your waist, and you feel it, the slow, undeniable shift in him.

“You keep grinding on me like this,” he warns, breath uneven, “and I’m not gonna be able to play nice.”

You grind a little harder.

“Oops.”

Seonghwa growls low, then turns swiftly, your back pressing against the warm tile wall of the pool. He doesn’t kiss you right away. He just looks at your parted lips, your damp lashes, the water beading on your chest.

“You’re sure?” he breathes. “No sex. Just this?”

You nod. “Loop-hole.”

He huffs a laugh against your lips, and he finally kisses you. Hungry and hot and messy in the best way. You arch into him, his hands roam freely now, one trailing down to your thigh to hold you in place, the other teasing along your side.

And then he drops lower.

He doesn’t hesitate, not even a second.

Seonghwa shifts your weight in his hands, lifting you like it’s nothing. The warm water laps at your thighs as he sets you gently on the smooth tile ledge that curves around the inner rim of the pool, half in, half out of the water. Your calves stay submerged, but the rest of you is gloriously exposed, slick with heat and nerves and want.

Your breath hitches. You’re not used to being seen like this. Vulnerable, bared, soaked in every way possible, but his eyes never leave yours.

“Is this okay?” he murmurs, hands still on your thighs, thumbs stroking gently back and forth. “You tell me to stop, I’ll stop.”

Your fingers curl against the tile. “I don’t want you to stop.”

That’s all it takes.

The second you nod, breathless, trembling, your thighs already spread for him on the edge of the tile, Seonghwa dives between your legs like he’s been dying to breathe you in. He pushes your bikini bottoms to the side and when his mouth finally meets you?

It’s filthy.

A guttural groan leaves his throat the second his tongue makes contact. Dragging through your folds like he’s savoring a rare delicacy. Deep, slow, deliberate. He doesn’t just taste you; he devours. He laps at your cunt like a man starved, tongue dipping in and out with obscene precision, like he’s memorizing every part of you by feel.

Your hands shoot to the tile behind you, head falling back against the damp stone as your thighs instinctively try to close, but Seonghwa growls and grabs your thighs with a bruising grip, holding you wide open.

“Don’t hide from me,” he rasps, voice wrecked and wet. “You gave this to me. I’m gonna take all of it.”

He buries himself in you, face pressed so deep you can barely breathe from the feeling. His nose nudges your clit, tongue sliding through your soaked heat, and he groans into you like you’re feeding something dark in him. You feel the vibration all the way through your spine.

“Fuck, Seonghwa-” you gasp, your voice wrecked, barely above a whisper. “I- I can’t-”

“Yes, you can,” he growls, not even pausing. “You’re gonna fucking come for me, and then I’m gonna keep going. I wanna hear how beautiful you sound.”

His hands slip beneath your ass, dragging your body closer, tilting your hips so he can really taste you, and then his mouth locks on your clit.

And he doesn’t stop.

He sucks it between his lips like he’s addicted, swirling his tongue, then flattening it, then flicking fast and filthy until your legs are shaking, your moans are spilling uncontrolled, and your fingers are desperately gripping at his wet hair.

His eyes flick up to watch you come undone, and the look on his face is wild. His mouth is soaked, his jaw flexing with how hard he’s working you, but he doesn’t stop. Not when your thighs begin to tremble. Not when your voice breaks in a moan. Not even when you cum with a sob, practically screaming his name.

He pulls back slowly, lips glistening, eyes locked on you with nothing short of adoration and something far more possessive.

“That,” he pants, voice low and full of heat, “was fucking divine.”

You’re breathless, shaking, completely undone.

And he? He just smirks, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, his voice smug and dark as he stands in the water, towering over you. When he kisses you, it’s slow. Deep. His hand cradles the side of your face like you’re something breakable, even after what he just did to you.

You taste yourself on his tongue, but you don’t pull away.

You kiss him back harder.

Because it’s not just filthy.

It’s intimate.

“I’m lost for words.” You say, panting and trying your best to catch your breath.

He looks deep into your eyes with a smile and says; “And I haven’t even fucked you yet.”

***

The smell of coffee drifts into the cabin bedroom before anything else.

You stretch beneath the soft duvet, your body still humming with the aftershocks of last night. Every inch of you feels different, warm, electric, awake in a way it hasn’t been in a long time. You roll over, expecting to see him there beside you, but the space is empty. Still warm.

And then you hear him in the kitchen. The low sound of a cupboard closing, a quiet curse when something clatters, the faint hum of music from his phone. It makes your heart flutter for no good reason at all, just the image of him out there, shirtless and half-awake, trying to make breakfast like it’s something you’ve always done together.

You wrap the sheets around yourself and pad out to the kitchen.

Sure enough, he’s standing by the stove in a pair of sweatpants, hair messy and damp from a quick shower, one hand stirring something in a pan while the other scrolls his phone, probably checking a recipe.

He glances up the second he senses you. And when he sees you still wrapped in his sheets, skin kissed with leftover waterline marks and sleep in your eyes, he grins. Slow, soft, too fond for someone who’s only seen you for a few weeks.

“Mmm,” he hums, eyes trailing over you. “That’s a good look on you.”

You smile, tugging the fabric a little tighter around your chest. “So is that,” you say, gesturing at the way the waistband of his pants rides low, revealing the curve of his V-line. He doesn’t even flinch at the comment, just raises an eyebrow, like he knows what he’s doing to you.

You walk over to him, slipping behind the counter and stealing a peek into the pan. “What are we making?”

“Scrambled eggs,” he says, “but I’m winging it.”

“Dangerous,” you tease. “Let me help.”

He moves aside without protest, but not without brushing against you as he does, his bare chest ghosting your shoulder, his hand resting briefly at the small of your back.

You make the eggs while he butters the toast. At some point, he leans in to steal a kiss at your temple. It’s sweet, until his fingers skim your hip beneath the sheet, slow and deliberate. You look up at him, your breath catching. His eyes are darker now, the atmosphere suddenly thick again.

“You keep looking at me like that,” you say quietly, “and I’ll burn the eggs.”

He only smirks. “Burn them, then.”

It doesn’t matter that you’re just making breakfast. Every second feels like foreplay. Eventually, you sit together at the kitchen island, knees brushing. He makes a show of complimenting your eggs, teasing you about how domestic this all is. The whole thing feels… too good. Too easy. And you’re both very aware of it.

At one point, he leans back in his chair and studies you, like he’s committing you to memory, like he wants to trace every line of your smile and lock it away.

“You’re different today,” he murmurs, voice soft.

You shrug, suddenly shy under his gaze. “So are you.”

He reaches over, thumb brushing your cheek. “In a good way?”

“In a really good way,” you say. And you mean it.

Because even with all the heat between you, even with how badly you want to climb onto his lap and pick up where last night left off, there’s something sweeter here, too.

Like maybe this isn’t just heat. Maybe it’s something more.

The day has been blissfully quiet, a perfect mix of soft sunlight streaming through the windows and the warm, fresh air of spring. After breakfast, you and Seonghwa take a slow walk down to the lake, the tension between you two still palpable, but there's a sense of ease too.

Later that afternoon, you played cards on the couch. He was terrible at it. Mostly because he couldn’t concentrate.

“I think you’re cheating,” he accused, narrowing his eyes at you.

“I think you’re a sore loser,” you shot back, grinning.

He lunged for your cards, and you yelped, scrambling away, laughing. He tackled you into the cushions and tickled your ribs until you screamed. Then everything shifted. Suddenly he was on top of you, your legs tangled with his. His breath fanned across your lips. His hands, once playful, were now still. Firm. Intentional.

He looked down at you like you were the only thing he’d ever wanted.

Then his voice dropped. “Kiss me.”

You did.

It wasn’t soft this time.

It was desperate.

His hands slid beneath your shirt, palms flat against your stomach, and you arched into him without thinking.

Your hips rocked.

His jaw clenched.

And just when it got too hot, when you were seconds away from completely unraveling again, you broke the kiss.

“Stop,” you whispered, breathless. “We can’t.”

He pressed his forehead to yours, eyes shut tight. “I know. But god…”

You rolled onto your side, pulling him with you, your bodies still flush. “This is torture.”

“Sweetest kind,” he murmured, kissing your shoulder. “But I’ll wait. I’ll wait as long as you need.”

He always knew what to say.

The cabin is warm, the fire crackling quietly as you and Seonghwa lay tangled together on the couch. His arm is around your waist, your head tucked into the curve of his shoulder, both of you half-asleep, breathing in sync. The quiet, the closeness, it’s almost too good to be real. You feel his heartbeat under your cheek, steady and slow, and let your eyes drift shut.

Until your phone buzzes against the coffee table.

You freeze for a second, not wanting to move, but Seonghwa's arm loosens slightly. His eyes stay closed. Thinking he’s still asleep, you carefully slip away and pad into the kitchen, grabbing your phone.

When you see the caller ID, your stomach twist.

Husband.

You answer anyway, voice low. "Hey… yeah, I'm gone for the entire weekend..." You lean back against the counter, glancing over your shoulder at the couch. Seonghwa hadn’t moved. "Well, how was I supposed to know that you'd be home? You didn't tell me..." you said, trying to keep your voice neutral. Light.

Seonghwa opens his eyes, sitting up slowly. He rubs his hand over his face once before pushing himself off the couch and walking quietly toward the kitchen where he hear you talking. He stops in the doorway, leaning a shoulder against the frame.

You don’t see him. You’re facing the counter, head bowed slightly, twirling the hem of your hoodie between your fingers as you talk.

"Alright... yeah... mhm..." Your voice is too polite. Too... detached.

He can tell it’s him.

Your husband.

Of course it is.

Seonghwa’s jaw clenches. He doesn’t want to hear it. Doesn’t want to be reminded. But he can’t tear himself away from the sight of you, standing there, trying to sound okay.

"Wait, really?" you say, surprise flickering in your tone. Seonghwa’s brow furrows. You give a soft laugh, but it doesn't reach your eyes.

"No, I'd love to, I just, yeah..." Another pause. Another sigh. "Alright... okay... have fun... love you..." you say softly, out of habit more than anything else. Seonghwa’s hands curl into fists at his sides.

You hang up and stand there for a second, phone still in your hand, like you need to collect yourself. When you finally turn around, you’re startled a little at the sight of him. Your mouth opens, maybe to explain, maybe to apologize, but Seonghwa shakes his head lightly. No need.

You tuck your phone into your hoodie pocket and give him a weak smile. "Husband" you say, voice almost too casual.

He doesn’t move, just tilts his head, waiting.

"He... he called to tell me about the upcoming company dinner," you say. "He wants me to go with him like last year."

For a moment, Seonghwa doesn’t respond. Just blinks at you slowly, processing. You see it, how he didn’t expect that. How it threw him off.

"He does?" he finally says, his voice low, unreadable.

You nod, hugging yourself a little. "Yeah. Guess he forgot to tell me before," you joke, trying to laugh it off. "He said it’ll look good if I’m there."

Seonghwa’s heart twisted.

Look good.

Not because he misses you. Not because he wants to share the evening with you. Because it will look good.

"She’s coming too, I’m imagining" you add, tossing it out like it doesn’t matter that your husband’s girlfriend would be in the same room as you. Like it doesn’t tear something inside you open.

Seonghwa’s jaw ticked.

You hurry to fill the silence. "It’s fine. I mean-, it’s not like I didn’t expect it, right? It's just a dinner. No big deal."

But it is a big deal. And you’re a terrible liar.

You keep rambling. "Honestly, it’s probably good. It might make it easier, or whatever. Seeing them in the same room together, maybe it’ll help me... you know, feel better about everything." Your laugh cracks at the edges. You tuck your hair behind your ear, blinking hard. A moment of silence spread between you, letting you mind do horrible things to you. “Can I ask you a question?” your voice is barely above a whisper.

His voice is soft, warm with understanding. “Always.”

You don’t mean to ask it, but it slips out anyway. “Do they look good together?”

Even Seonghwa seems caught off guard. He doesn’t answer, not with words. But the way his expression falters, the way his eyes search yours… it’s enough.

Regret hits instantly. You let out a dry laugh and shake your head. “Right. Stupid question. You can’t answer that.”

You rub your hand down your face, trying to gather yourself, trying to make it easier by asking again, differently. “Do they… act like a couple at work?”

He hesitates. Thinking. Choosing words that won’t hurt more than they have to.

“Not at first,” he says, his voice measured, careful. “It was… gradual. The kind of closeness people notice but don’t talk about.”

You exhale, eyes closing.

“I didn’t want to assume anything in the beginning,” he continues. “She’s friendly with a lot of people. And I try not to get involved in anything that doesn’t concern work.”

You nod. “But it was obvious.”

He pauses. “Enough that I… thought he might’ve been single.”

Something sinks inside you, cold and heavy.

“No ring. No mention of you. He brought her to a few events at work. I didn’t ask questions.”

You swallow, not sure what hurts more. The confirmation, that he doesn’t wear his ring outside anymore or the fact that it makes sense. Of course he would act single at work. That’s part of his charm.

Seonghwa’s expression is gentle, eyes scanning yours like he’s checking for fractures he can’t see.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I don’t want to upset you. If this is too much-”

“No,” you interrupt, voice thin. “I asked. I want to know. I need to.” You stand in silence for a beat, and then you murmur with a broken smile, “But it’s fine. It’s all fine.”

"You don't have to pretend with me," Seonghwa murmured.

You squeezed your eyes shut, trying to swallow the lump in your throat. Trying not to let the kindness in his voice shatter you completely.

"I'm fine," you whispered.

Seonghwa watches you from across the kitchen. You’re smiling, but he knows better. He sees the way your shoulders curl inward, the way your eyes won’t quite meet his.

"You’re not," he says, just as soft. "And that’s okay."

You glance up, startled, but before you can form a response, he moves toward you, not fast, not forceful, just steady. His hands find your hips with gentle certainty, and he lifts you with ease, setting you down on the counter as if you’re something precious, not breakable.

"Seonghwa-" you start, breathless.

But he’s already there, grounding you. One hand settles gently on your thigh, the other brushing a loose strand of hair from your face. His forehead touches yours, and he just breathes with you for a moment. He stays close but doesn’t move further. His forehead drops lightly to yours, his palms warm against your thighs.

"Look at me," he says, voice low, like he’s scared to spook you. His voice is soft but sure. "I don’t want you pretending you’re fine around me." He leans in. "You feel whatever you need to feel," he murmur, voice thick with emotion, “I’m here. I’ll hold you through it. For as long as it takes.”

Your fingers tremble as they clutch at the fabric of his shirt. Your voice is just a whisper. “I don’t want to fall apart.”

“Then don’t,” he says gently. “Just lean. I’ll catch the rest.”

You make a soft, broken sound before you can stop yourself. He kisses you, slow, deep, devastating. Not just because he wants you. Because he adores you.

He breaks the kiss only to press a featherlight one to your cheek. Then your jaw. Then the corner of your mouth. Each one slower than the last, reverent, like he’s tracing the pieces of you he’s afraid might slip away.

"You want me to take your mind off it?" His mouth brushes just beneath your ear, not suggestive, not rushed, just offering.

You blink at him, your heart pounding in your chest.

"Only if you want to," he murmurs. "Only if you need it."

You nod before you could second-guess yourself, fingers curling into his shirt.

"I want you," you breathe.

Relief floods his features, softening the tension in his jaw. He kisses you like he had all the time in the world to love every part of you. His hands slide up your sides, mapping you like a man learning his favorite song by heart. He kisses the corner of your mouth, your jawline, the shell of your ear, soft, worshipful kisses that leave your skin burning.

"You’re everything," he whispers, pressing his lips to your throat. "You don't even see it, do you?" He kisses a path lower, murmuring against your skin, his hands skimming down your sides to the waistband of your leggings.

He pauses, looking up at you again.

You nod, heart hammering.

Slowly, carefully, he peels them down, helping you kick them away. His palms roams back up your bare thighs, rough and warm.

His fingers trace along the seam of your underwear, teasing the edges, making you squirm. He drags a single finger up the center. Slow and deliberate, feeling the heat of you through the fabric.

"So fucking soft," he mutters under his breath, almost reverent. When he finally eases your panties to the side and slid two fingers through your folds, he curses under his breath. "Fuck," he groans, forehead falling against your shoulder. "You’re gonna ruin me."

He kisses your throat, your collarbone, the dip of your neck, worshiping every inch of you while his fingers find your clit, stroking it slowly and carefully. Drawing circles, light and teasing at first, just to feel you shake.

You whimper, your hips jerking toward his hand, desperate for more.

He smiles against your skin.

"Patience, my love," he whispers. "I wanna savor you."

A slow, steady glide of his fingers, spreading your wetness, pressing a little deeper. You whimper, hips twitching, and he kisses you again, swallowing every sound like he can’t get enough of you. One finger slides inside you, stretching you deliciously, the heel of his hand rubbing steady against your clit. He moves carefully, gently, but there is a hunger beneath it.

"You have no idea how good you feel," he whispers against your throat, his voice breaking.

Another finger presses in, a little rougher this time, and your mouth falls open in a gasp, and he kisses it, swallowing every sound. He starts a slow rhythm, steady, deliberate thrusts of his fingers, curling just right, dragging sweet friction along your walls. The wet sounds fill the kitchen, obscene and beautiful.

Your head drops back, a soft moan escaping you, and he kisses your throat, licks at your pulse, holding you steady as your body starts to tremble. His fingers work deeper, faster, rougher but never cruel, like he wanted to drag every ounce of pleasure from you, like he needed to prove to you what you deserved.

You whimper, rolling your hips into his hand. He groans low in his throat, as if the pleasure you’re feeling feeds his own.

"That's it," he whispers, pressing kisses along your cheek, your temple. "Take what you need, baby. I’m right here."

He presses his thumb against your clit again, this time firmer, drawing slow, perfect circles as his fingers thrust deeper inside you. Your hands clutches at his shoulders, digging into his muscles, and he lets out a low moan, loving the way you hold onto him.

"That’s it," he says, kissing your ear. "Let go for me, baby. Give it to me."

You can’t hold it anymore. When he angles his fingers just a little differently, brushing against that devastating spot inside you, it breaks you.

Your orgasm builds like a tidal wave, overwhelming and sharp, and when it finally hits, you sob his name, shaking violently against him. He keeps fucking you with his fingers, milking every last drop of pleasure from your body, kissing you desperately the whole time.

"You’re fucking perfect," he whispers between kisses, voice raw with it.

He slowly eases his fingers out of you, kissing you breathless while his hands smoothed up and down your thighs to soothe the tremors. He doesn’t rush it, doesn’t push for anything more.

He just kisses you, adores you, holds you like you were the only thing in his world. "You’re mine here," he murmurs, voice rough, mouth hot against your skin. "Only mine."

The world outside the cabin didn’t exist anymore. No husband. No company dinner. No expectations. Just Seonghwa, tasting you, touching you, worshiping you like you were the only thing that had ever mattered.

And you can’t get enough of him.

The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur of soft touches and easy laughter. You don’t talk about anything serious, don’t need to. Instead, you lounge together on the couch, stealing lazy kisses. You walk barefoot through the woods behind the cabin, the air fresh and cool, your hand tucked tightly into his. When night falls, you both end up tangled under a blanket by the fire, the room warm and golden, his heartbeat steady against your ear.

Eventually, sleep starts pulling at you.

"Come on," he murmurs against your hair. "Bedtime."

You let him lead you to the bedroom, too tired and too comfortable to protest. You don’t even bother changing, you just collapse onto the bed, pulling the covers up with a small, content sigh. Seonghwa climbs in beside you, and the moment you feel the mattress dip under his weight, you shift closer instinctively, pressing your body against his chest, your head tucked beneath his chin.

He wraps his arms around you tightly (maybe tighter than he should have) but you only sigh again, relaxed and trusting in his hold. And within minutes, you’re asleep.

But Seonghwa isn’t.

He stays awake, eyes tracing the shape of your face in the dim moonlight seeping through the window. You look so soft, so beautiful, your mouth slightly parted, your brow relaxed. You have no idea. No idea what you’re doing to him. How badly he want to freeze this moment, to stay like this forever.

His fingers brush your back slowly, barely there, memorizing the feel of you. He can smell your shampoo, the faint sweetness of your skin.

You aren’t his. You’re married. Tied to a life he can’t touch, no matter how much he wants to. And he wants to. God, he wants to. He wants to steal you away, keep you tucked against him like this, safe and warm, without the weight of your sadness, without the ache of your pretending.

But he can’t.

He isn’t your husband. He isn’t your first choice. Maybe he will never be.

So he just holds you closer, selfishly. Just for tonight.

He whispers your name against your hair, so quietly you can’t hear it. He presses a kiss to your forehead, letting it linger far longer than he should have.

And when his chest tightens painfully with everything he can’t say, he closes his eyes and buries his face in your hair, breathing you in like he can keep a part of you with him, even when you eventually slip away.

Because deep down, Seonghwa already knows: You aren’t his to keep.

But he would love you. Quietly, carefully, hopelessly, for as long as he’s allowed.

***

Real life came back like a wave crashing onto the sand. By Monday morning, the cabin already felt like a dream. Something you both clung to a little too long before the world tugged it from your fingers. There were alarms again. Meetings. Responsibilities. But still, he stayed. In every little way he could.

The following week became a quiet dance of stolen moments. Texts during the day, sometimes silly, sometimes tender. Late-night calls that stretched until one of you fell asleep mid-sentence. A few visits squeezed between everything else, a lunch together, a surprise appearance at your door when you least expected it. You lived in your separate worlds, but threads kept tying you back together, weaving something stronger, even if neither of you dared name it yet.

It’s Thursday afternoon when Seonghwa shows up at your work, two iced coffees in hand. He didn’t tell you he was coming. He just wants to see you.

Standing in the lobby, he catches a sight of you through the glass doors. You’re at the front desk, clipboard in hand, speaking to a group of junior employees. Except you aren’t just speaking. You’re commanding - calm, polite, but firm enough that everyone was standing straighter under your gaze.

"No, the Peterson file needs to be signed by the end of day, not tomorrow," you say firmly to one employee, then turn to another. "And double-check the Johnson numbers. I’m not sending anything out with mistakes." There’s no edge to your voice, just clear, confident authority. You’re the kind of person who expects things to get done right, and people respect you for it.

The group nodded quickly before scurrying off. You look completely in control, completely at ease, and it hits Seonghwa in a way he isn’t prepared for.

He shifts his weight, adjusting the cups in his hands, feeling the low, slow burn start in his stomach. Watching you like this; confident, a little strict, completely unbothered. It made something hot and possessive stir in his chest.

Fuck, he thought, you have no idea what you’re doing to me.

Finally, you notice him. You turn, blinking in surprise before your face lights up in a smile.

You cross the floor towards him, walk through the glass doors, your expression softening in a way that made it even harder for him to stay composed. "You," you say, stopping in front of him, a breathless little laugh escaping, "are not supposed to be here."

"Couldn't help myself," he says, offering you one of the coffees. His fingers brush yours, and it’s ridiculous how much even that made his chest tighten. "You looked like you needed rescuing."

You laugh again, bumping your shoulder lightly into his. "Thanks," you say, sipping your drink with a low, satisfied sigh that just about broke him. "Seriously. Today’s been hell."

He stares at you for a second longer than necessary. "You’re killing it, though. Watching you just now..." He lets the words trail off, his voice dipping a little lower, his eyes dragging down to your mouth before flicking back up. "You’re very…" His voice trails off, then he gives a quiet chuckle. "Efficient."

But the way he says it, the way his jaw tightens just slightly, makes it very clear that isn’t the word he is thinking.

You cock your head innocently. "You okay there?"

He exhales sharply through his nose, shaking his head as if trying to clear it. "I'm fine. Perfect." Only he doesn’t look perfect at all.

And you definitely notice.

You sip your coffee, pretending not to see the way his eyes linger on you a beat too long. You smile sweetly. "You sure? You look a little… tense."

His mouth twitches, something dangerous flashing in his eyes. But he only hums low in his throat and says, "Busy morning." His hand tightens around his own cup for a second before he quickly hides it behind a sip.

You turn and walk away, tossing a look over your shoulder like a lure. And sure enough, Seonghwa follows. He catches up to you just as you slip through a doorway into a smaller side room, deserted this time of day.

"You shouldn't," he says, shutting the door behind him.

"Shouldn't what?" you ask, wide-eyed and fake-innocent.

"Shouldn’t look at me like that." His voice is already cracking at the edges, walking slowly towards you with dark eyes. "Shouldn't tempt me when you know exactly what you're doing."

You shrug, looking up at him like he’s speaking nonsense. "I don’t know what you’re talking about." you whisper, all wide eyes and fake innocence. You lean up, slightly tip-toeing to place the softest kiss on his lips, barely even touching him.

You smile against his mouth, slow and deliberate, feeling how tense every muscle in his body is like he’s fighting an invisible war.

“Poor thing,” you whisper teasingly, dragging your fingers lightly up his chest, feeling the way his heart slams against his ribs. “You looked so composed out there. All that self-control…”

Seonghwa lets out a low, broken sound when you roll your hips slowly against him, barely brushing where he’s hardest. His head falls back in agony, but he doesn’t touch you yet. Can’t. If he did, he knows he’d lose it.

“Don’t test me,” he grounds out, voice a low warning, but there’s no real threat behind it. Only desperation.

His breath hitches hard, his hands finally snapping up to catch your wrists and pin them lightly against the wall above your head, firm, not rough.

His mouth crashes into yours, messy and starving, hands still holding your wrists pinned. Every movement is frantic and tender all at once, like he’s trying to show you what you do to him without crossing the line.

But somehow, he pulls back. Chest heaving. Heart pounding.

"I can't," he whispers, like it physically hurts him. "You deserve better than me losing my mind over you in some office." Seonghwa lets go of your wrists and brushes your hair back, his hands gentle now, lingering, almost reverent.

"You’re gonna be the death of me," he whispers, finally pulling back just enough to look at you properly. "I should…" he starts, voice hoarse, clearing his throat awkwardly. "I should get back soon. I have some meetings to prepare for."

You nod, pretending to sip your coffee again, trying to ignore how hard your heart is hammering against your ribs.

“So... the company dinner is on Saturday,” you say, your voice casual, but he could sense the slight tension behind your words. “I guess I’ll see you there.”

His lips quirkes in a soft smile, but his eyes stay gentle. "Yeah, I’ll see you there." He pauses for a moment, letting the silence linger between you two, before he adds, "But, I know it’s not going to be easy for you. I’ll be here, it’s up to you when you need me, yeah?”

You nod, the simple reassurance settling somewhere deep inside.

“You’ll handle it like you always do,” he says, his voice almost like a promise. “Just…” He pauses, his words weighing a little heavier now. “If you need to talk or vent or even just distract yourself, I’m not going anywhere.”

You can feel the sincerity in his words, and for a brief moment, you allow yourself to lean into them, feeling that small spark of comfort. But you also knew that Saturday will come with its own set of challenges, ones neither of you can ignore.

“Thank you,” you say softly, “I’ll look forward to seeing you.”

Seonghwa hesitates before a small smile plays on his lips. “Can’t wait to see you.” He leaves a soft kiss on your lips before you both leave the room.

Seonghwa steps out of the building, his fingers curling into fists at his sides as the cool spring air hits him. He takes a deep breath, trying to clear his head, but all he can see is the way you looked at him in that small room. The way your eyes darkened, how your lips parted ever so slightly like you were daring him to lose control.

He doesn’t know how he’s going to make it through the weekend. Saturday was going to be fucking torture.

Seonghwa steps into the elevator, the cold glass walls reflecting his composed expression as the doors close with a soft chime. As the elevator descends, the doors suddenly open on the floor above, and in walks your husband.

The man who had promised to love and protect you, who had chosen to disregard you for the company of another woman. Seonghwa’s jaw tightens.

He could see right through your husband and his intentions. Why he wanted to open up your marriage. Why he convinced you seeing other people was a good idea. He was doing this for no one but himself. He didn’t care about your future together, he just wanted to screw around without feeling guilty.

Your husband’s smile is too wide, a little too confident.

"Mr. Park," your husband says, his smile a little too smug for Seonghwa’s liking. "It’s been a while."

Seonghwa nods curtly, his lips twisting into a polite, controlled smile. "Yes, it has."

The elevator jolts briefly as it continues its descent, and Seonghwa can feel the tension building between them, unspoken but thick in the air. Your husband isn’t aware, of course. He’s too wrapped up in his own world, too comfortable in his position.

"Have you been well lately?" the husband says, his voice slightly offhand but probing. "I haven’t seen you much."

Seonghwa can’t help but smirk. He can’t help but think of the way you call his name so desperately, the way your body responds to his every touch.

Instead of responding directly to that comment, Seonghwa lets a small, knowing smile flicker across his lips. "I’ve been preoccupied," he says smoothly, his voice low. "Had a lot on my hands."

The elevator jerks slightly, making the conversation shift just a little.

With a cool smile, Seonghwa turns toward him, his tone dripping with polite curiosity. “So, are you bringing your wife to the company dinner on Saturday?”

Your husband looks at him with a raised brow, clearly not realizing how pointed the question is. “Of course, I think she could use some time out of the house,” He gives a smug little chuckle, clearly feeling proud of himself. “My wife’s always at home,” he repeats like it was some inside joke. “I think I owe her to spend some time with her..”

Seonghwa fights back the grimace forming on his face. The way your husband speaks about you like a joke, a thing to be handled or dealt with. Seonghwa can’t stand it.

He takes a deep breath, his hands casually resting at his sides as he turns his gaze back toward your husband, locking eyes. “Right,” Seonghwa says, his voice steady, controlled, almost too polite. “I’m sure she’ll be a sight to see.”

As the elevator doors open to Seonghwa’s floor, he takes one last glance at your husband. “I’ll see you at the dinner,” Seonghwa says, his words cold, his expression cool as he steps out.

The husband nods. “See you then, Mr. Park.”

But as the elevator doors closed behind him, Seonghwa’s mind was already back on you. On how you moan his name in the quiet of the cabin, how you came undone beneath his touch. He wonders if your husband has ever been able to make you feel that way.

Seonghwa knew the answer.

***

The ballroom is already alive with chatter and the clink of glasses when you arrive. You hold onto your husband's arm, letting him guide you through the doors, even as your stomach twisted itself into knots.

The room is elegant, bathed in warm lights that bounced off the champagne flutes and silverware. Laughter rises from different corners, easy and polished. You pass on your best smile, falling into the practiced rhythm of it all.

You mingle for a while, polite small talk with your husband's coworkers, nodding along as he introduces you around. It’s almost easy, almost. You let him guide you in, your heels clicking over the marble floors, the soft hum of chatter rising around you like a tide.

You smile easily when necessary, playing your part, his polished, perfect wife. But the second you feel a shift in the air, you know. You don’t have to look to know Seonghwa has arrived.

When you finally let yourself look, there he is. Seonghwa moves through the crowd like he owns it. His black suit is perfectly tailored, the crisp white shirt underneath open just enough at the collar to suggest he isn’t as buttoned-up as he pretends to be. His hair, artfully tousled, is just messy enough to hint at how easily he can come undone.

Your breath stutters. He’s all sharp lines and quiet fire, heartbreakingly beautiful, dangerous in the best way.

You watch him, barely breathing, as he slips through clusters of people, smiling, exchanging greetings. Until his eyes finds yours.

A second, no more. But it’s enough.

Heat licks up your spine.

You look away first, pretending to adjust the strap of your dress on your shoulder, willing the blush crawling up your neck to stay hidden. It doesn’t matter. You can still feel him watching you.

You mingle for a few more minutes, caught in some lazy conversation about vacation homes and quarterly reports, when you feel another ripple, closer now.

Seonghwa is joining your circle.

"Mr. Park!" one of the men says warmly, reaching to clap him on the back. "Glad you made it."

Seonghwa offers a practiced smile, but when his gaze slides briefly to you again, it softens. Just a fraction, before he tucks it away.

Professional. Perfect. Lethal.

Your husband, oblivious, tugs you a little closer against his side, his hand slips familiarly over your hip.

"Babe," he says, smiling, "you remember my boss, Park Seonghwa?"

You turn, offering a smile so polite it feels like a mask. "Of course," you say lightly, extending your hand. "We met at last year’s dinner."

Seonghwa’s fingers close around yours, warm and steady. But his thumb drifts, just barely, over your knuckles. It’s the softest touch, fleeting enough to pass for nothing.

But you feel it. And he knows you do.

"I remember," he says, voice even, with just the faintest undertone that makes something low in your belly tighten. “Nice to see you again.”

He steps back politely, turning to engage someone else in conversation, and you pretend to listen in as well, nodding where appropriate. It’s almost effortless, this performance you’ve both slipped into, two people with nothing in common but a forgettable introduction at a company event. Except for the way your body is suddenly too aware of his presence. The faint scent of his cologne. The way his shoulder moves when he shifts. The tiniest curve of a smile when he senses you glance his way.

You try to be distant. Be in the moment with your husband. View Seonghwa as a polite acquaintance. But your skin tingles. Your body betrays you.

Because when you're alone with Seonghwa, there's nothing careful about him. When it’s just the two of you, he doesn’t look at you like this, distant, indifferent. He looks at you like you’re the only thing that exists. His hands aren’t steady and restrained; they’re greedy, reverent. When he touches you, it’s with purpose, with heat, with worship. He traces your collarbone with his mouth like it's a map he’s memorized. He drags his lips down your spine like he’s praying. His voice isn't calm then. It's wrecked. Raw. And it’s only for you.

The memory makes your thighs shift, pressing together subtly. You blink yourself back to the moment as he turns away to greet someone else, perfectly composed. A phantom smile plays at his lips like he knows exactly what you’re thinking.

Then your husband shifts beside you again, dragging you in closer, thumb making small, familiar circles against your hip. Your spine straightens slightly, not from discomfort, but from how sharply aware you are of Seonghwa’s eyes flickering in your direction. Just for a second. Controlled, unreadable. But you know him now, too well, and you catch the subtle set of his jaw, the way his breath comes slower, steadier, like he’s keeping something under control.

He doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t react. He nods at the right times, smiles when expected. But there’s something charged beneath his calm exterior. A restraint that hums quietly under every breath you both take.

No one else notices. But you do. And he knows you do.

You barely survived the first ten minutes. And the night had only just begun.

You and your husband move through the crowd, chatting idly with some of his colleagues. It's polite, surface-level stuff, nothing that makes your heart beat faster. Your eyes keep darting to Seonghwa, who is now across the room, talking to a group of people. But it's your husband who finally draws your attention back to the situation at hand.

His voice breaks through your thoughts, an edge of casualness you don’t quite trust.

“Oh, and this is… well, you probably know her already.” He gestures towards the woman beside him, who flashes a smile that you can’t help but feel is too bright, too rehearsed.

Her. His girlfriend.

Your husband’s words hover in the air, unspoken but clear, as though it’s just a natural thing. "My girlfriend". But he doesn’t need to say it for you to understand. He doesn’t need to make it official when the meaning is already obvious in his tone, the way his hand rests a little too possessively on her lower back.

She’s taller, prettier than you would have imagined, and the first thing you notice is the way she’s looking at him. The adoration, the way her eyes soften. You feel a tug in your chest, a quiet pain that you try to ignore. But it’s there. It’s always there.

She extends a hand, and you take it, forcing a smile. "Nice to meet you." you say.

Her grip is firm. She’s confident. She’s everything your husband seems to want right now.

"Of course. I’ve heard so much about you," she says, the words warm, but the slight edge makes your stomach churn. She looks at your husband with a teasing glint in her eye, but you notice how her gaze flickers toward you, assessing.

As they stand there, chatting, you feel the smallest stir of discomfort in your chest. You want to look away, but you can’t. And maybe you’re just imagining it, but it feels like Seonghwa is watching you from across the room, his eyes fixed on you like he can sense the unease in the air.

Just as you're lost in the tension building between you, a voice calls out from behind. It's one of your husband's colleagues, reminding everyone to take their seats for dinner. As you take your seat, you instinctively glance around, seeking any form of solace in the crowd. And then, your phone buzzes in your bag, breaking through the fog of discomfort in an instant.

You glance down at the screen, your heart skipping a beat when you see the familiar name.

Seonghwa: Are you okay?

The simplicity of his message stirs something in you. Just seeing those words, knowing he's thinking of you, makes the tightness in your chest ease, just for a moment. You take a deep breath, heart hammering in your chest, but you can't help but smile at the message.

You: I'm fine. Just a little distracted.

It’s not a lie, but it’s not the full truth either. There’s a part of you that wishes you could confide more, tell him exactly what’s running through your mind, but you hold back, not wanting to let everything spill out in a text.

Just as you're about to lock your phone and tuck it away, the screen flashes with a new message from him.

Seonghwa: I’m here if you need me. Don’t forget that. ❤️

Seonghwa isn’t placed near you. Of course not. He is several tables over, seated with executives and higher-ups. But you can feel him. God, you can feel him across the room like a second heartbeat.

You catch his eyes once, mid-conversation, and it’s like the air thickens between you. His gaze dips for a split second, dragging over you before lifting again, back to his polished, unreadable facade.

You quickly look away, cheeks burning.

Dinner is served. Conversation at your table buzzing with casual energy: talk about vacations, investment portfolios, harmless gossip about coworkers. Your husband is in his element, laughing too loud, talking to a specific woman close to him and pouring more wine into his glass than he probably should.

Meanwhile, you barely hear a word.

You pick at your food, your appetite gone. Across the room, you feel the weight of his stare.

When you risk another glance, he’s watching you again. His fingers drumming lightly against the side of his glass, a slow, restless rhythm. His tongue darts out to wet his lower lip as he listens to the person next to him, eyes still locked on you.

Your husband nudges you, laughing about something you hadn’t caught. You give a small, polite smile, pretending to sip your wine.

The night drags on. Courses are served. Toasts are made. The CEO stands up to make a long speech about company growth, partnership, community, all the usual talking points. You clap when appropriate. You smile when you should. But the only thing you feel is the pull.

The memory of Seonghwa. The way he looks at you across the room like he’s already planning exactly how he’d have you again the moment he can. You toy with the stem of your wineglass, letting yourself imagine, just for a second, what it would be like to slip away from this table, to find him in some quiet corner, to let him catch you.

When dessert was finally cleared and the crowd began to loosen with alcohol and relief, you catch Seonghwa rising from his table, jacket slinging lazily over one shoulder as he excused himself.

He gives you a glance. A very telling glance.

You know. You know he is giving you the chance to follow.

Your heart hammers wildly against your ribs. Your husband is mid-conversation with someone else, not even glancing your way. You set your napkin down on the table, slow and careful, pretending to smooth your dress as you stand.

You move carefully, pretending to head toward the restrooms like you had a dozen other times at events like this. No one pays you any mind. Not even your husband, still busy with a drink in his hand and a story on his lips.

But you aren’t going to the restroom.

You slip through the crowd, heart thudding so hard you can barely hear the noise around you. Your heels click softly against the polished floors as you follow the path Seonghwa has taken. Down a quiet hall. Past the coat closet. Around a corner, where the light dimmed and the buzz of the party fades into the background.

And there he is.

Waiting. Like he knew you would come to him.

He stands with his jacket slung over one shoulder, dress shirt immaculate, tie slightly loosened at the throat like he’s only barely containing himself. But it’s his eyes that stops you.

Dark. Starving. Fixed entirely, absolutely, on you.

God, the way he looks at you.

Like you’re some kind of forbidden miracle.

You can see his throat work as he swallows hard, his hand tightening slightly on the jacket. His gaze trails down your body like he couldn’t help it. From your shining eyes to your lips, to the delicate line of your neck, the curve of your waist in that dress that fit you like a secret made just for him.

“You’re too beautiful,” Seonghwa says under his breath, almost like it hurts him.

You step closer, heart hammering against your ribs.

"You shouldn't have left," you whisper.

He gives a low, ragged laugh. "And you shouldn't have followed."

Finally talking to him after hours of pretending, after meeting your husband's girlfriend, you finally feet like you can breathe.

A door clicks somewhere nearby and you’re startled. Seonghwa reacts faster, grabbing your hand and pulling you through the nearest door. The small conference room is empty, dim, quiet except for your heavy breathing. He closes the door behind you both, and you stand frozen in the center of the room, trembling, watching the muscles flex in his jaw.

"You have no idea what you do to me," he whispers, voice rough, almost pained.

Slowly, Seonghwa pushes off the door and approaches you, each step measured but strained, like he’s holding himself back with everything he has.

You lifted your chin slightly, daring him. You can feel it, feel the moment his control cracks. One hand reached up, brushing a lock of hair from your face with agonizing care. His fingers trail down the side of your throat, featherlight, barely touching. You shiver.

"You look like this..." His voice broke. "And you expect me to walk away?"

You smile, sweet and dangerous, tilting your head so his fingers could touch more.

It wrecks him.

With a growl low in his chest, Seonghwa cups your face and kisses you, finally. The kiss hungry and aching and furious all at once. Your hands clutch at his shirt, feeling the hard line of his chest beneath. His hips pins you against the conference table behind you, but he still keeps it controlled. Barely.

He kisses down your jaw, the column of your neck, breathing hard.

"Say the word," he rasp into your skin. "Tell me to stop."

You don’t.

You whimper instead and his hands slide under your thighs, lifting you easily onto the heavy table in the center of the room. The second you’re perched on the edge, he stepped between your spread legs, crowding into your space.

You cling to him, kissing him back with just as much desperation. But then you feel it: the thick, heavy press of him against your thigh, straining against his pants. You pull back just enough to look down.

The outline of him is huge and thick and impossibly hard, the shape of his cock straining at the zipper. So tempting it made your mouth go dry. You stare for a heartbeat too long, your breath catching.

"Sweetheart," he breathes, almost warningly, but you lift your hand before he can stop you and palms him through his pants. Seonghwa chokes on a moan.

"You're so hard," you whisper, in awe. "You always take care of me," you say softly, your hand stroking him slowly, feeling how big, how impossibly hard he is for you.

"Fuck," he groans, hips jerking slightly into your hand before he catches himself, caging you against the table with his body. "You're going to kill me."

You smile a little, emboldened by how wrecked he sounds, and kiss the side of his head tenderly.

"Let me make you feel good," you murmur against his hairline.

For a moment, it seems like he might resist, like he might be too strong. But then your fingers give a slightly firmer stroke, and Seonghwa whimpers against your throat, a raw, broken sound he can’t hold back.

You slide the zipper down carefully and push his pants down just enough.

Your breath hitches.

Seonghwa is thick, his cock straining hard against the black fabric of his briefs. A wet patch already darkening the front where he’s leaking for you.

You brush your knuckles up the length of him, feeling how hot and real he is under the thin barrier. Seonghwa’s head tips back, his throat working around a broken moan. Emboldened, aching for him, you slide your fingers under the waistband and free him. His cock springs out into your hand. Flushed deep red at the tip, thick veins running down the heavy shaft, already leaking beads of clear precum that drips onto your fingers.

You barely manage to wrap your hand around him, he’s so thick your fingers don’t even meet. Seonghwa curses under his breath, his hips twitching forward into your hand.

"Fuck, baby," he pants, watching you through half-lidded eyes, "look what you do to me."

You give a shy, wicked smile and stroke him slowly from base to tip, feeling the way he jerks in your palm. So sensitive, so desperate.

But you want more than just to touch him. You shift on the table, spreading your thighs wider.

The wet heat between your legs was unbearable. Your panties completely soaked, sticking to every contour of your cunt, leaving nothing to the imagination.

Slowly, deliberately, you use the head of his cock to brush against your clothed folds. He hiss between his teeth as you guide him, dragging the swollen tip up and down your slit, the slick heat of you soaking through the thin barrier of lace. The contrast of the rough, leaking tip against your swollen clit made you gasp, hips bucking up into him.

Seonghwa's fingers dug into the table, muscles straining, trying so hard not to just lose control and shove into you.

"You’re so fucking wet," he groan, his voice wrecked. "I can feel it through the fabric. God, you’re ready for me, aren’t you, my love?"

You nod, breathless, rocking your hips forward so his cock slid along the seam of your panties, right over your aching clit. Every pass made your head spin.

And then, without warning, he shifts his hips, pressing the swollen head of his cock right against your entrance.

You gasp, clutching at his shoulders.

He pushes forward just a fraction, just enough to feel the desperate clench of your body trying to pull him in, but the soaked fabric of your panties holds him back, stopping him from sinking inside. It’s so hot, so thick, stretching you in ways you’ve never felt before, and he hasn’t even really entered yet.

"Fuck," he whispers harshly, grinding himself against your entrance with slow, dangerous rolls of his hips. "You’re gonna feel so fucking good wrapped around me."

Your panties stretched taut between you, the thin barrier rubbing against your clit, your folds, trapping the thick heat of him perfectly against your neediest parts.

"You want me to tear these off and fuck you right now, don't you?" he rasp, voice wrecked with restraint. "God, I could just push a little harder, you'd open up for me so easily."

As if to prove it, he gave a slow, brutal grind of his hips, pushing the thick, leaking head of his cock right against your entrance. So firm, so hot, you could feel yourself clenching down around nothing as you moan.

"Feel that?" he murmurs against your ear, lips brushing your skin. "One more inch, baby. One fucking inch, and I'd be inside you. Filling you so deep."

You sob his name, grinding helplessly against him, the rough drag of his cock against your panties and your throbbing clit driving you insane.

Seonghwa chuckles darkly, drunk on the sight of you falling apart for him. "You like teasing yourself with it, don't you? Feel how fucking hard I am for you?"

He rocks his hips again, pressing his entire length against you, up and down, letting the thick vein along his shaft rub right over your most sensitive spot.

"You're gonna cum just like this, aren't you?" he whispered roughly.

Seonghwa groans, thrusting against you with a little more force, letting the fat tip of his cock push the fabric deep between your folds, rubbing, pressing, teasing your clit. He pressed the tip of his cock against your panties again, and this time, he hooked a finger under the soaked fabric, dragging it aside.

You gasped, because now there was nothing between you.

Seonghwa’s cock slid along your bare, dripping folds, dragging over your clit with slow, devastating precision.

But the angle, the filthy rub of him dragging along your clit, your folds, almost pushing inside. It was dangerous. It would take nothing, nothing, for him to slam forward and bury himself balls-deep inside you.

"God, sweetheart, you feel so fucking good," he growled, rubbing the swollen, leaking head of his cock directly against your clit in slow, devastating circles. "I could just, fuck-, I could slide inside you so easy right now. Fill you up so deep you'd feel me for days."

Your thighs tremble on either side of him. He moves his hips, grinding his cockhead against your clit, dragging it up and down, side to side, filthy and raw.

"You want that, don’t you?" he whispers harshly. "You want me to split you open on this fucking table?"

But you knew you couldn’t let it happen like this. You were already dangerously close to crossing every line. You whimper, grabbing the edge of the table to stay upright, hips bucking helplessly.

"That's it," Seonghwa growles, voice dark and hungry, his cock dragging sloppily against you. "Grind on me, baby. Rub that pretty little pussy on my cock. Fuck, you feel so good."

Your thighs are trembling, muscles locking up as the rough head of him keeps hitting your clit perfectly, again and again, the thick veins of his shaft dragging over your folds, your entrance.

The noises between you are filthy, slick, messy, obscene.

You gasp, trying to pull away, scared to come and make a mess, make too much noice from this room, but Seonghwa grabs your hips and pins you against him, forcing you to take every devastating drag of his cock.

"Don't fucking run from it," he hisses against your ear. "Take it. I want you to come all over my cock, baby."

Your body locked up, and with a strangled moan, you came, hard and messy, soaking him, soaking your panties, soaking the fucking table. You cry out, clenching around nothing, hips jerking helplessly as your orgasm rip through you.

"That's it," he murmur, watching you fall apart. "Good girl. Such a good girl for me." Seonghwa hisses through his teeth, his cock twitching against you.

"You look so fucking beautiful when you cum," he buries his face against your neck, trembling with restraint. You can feel how close he is, his cock throbbing, his breathing ragged, his hips jerking forward in little, helpless thrusts against your slick center.

But then, you feel it.

The wet heat gathering against your panties, dangerously close to making a mess neither of you would be able to explain. Panic flares, but so does something brave, bold, utterly wicked inside you. Before Seonghwa can react, you slide off the table and drop to your knees in front of him.

"Fuck-, baby, what are you-"

He chokes on his words as you wrap your hand around him, guiding his slick, throbbing cock to your mouth. Seonghwa slaps a hand against the table, a broken, wrecked groan tearing from his throat as you close your lips around him.

"Jesus-, fuck," he gasp, his whole body trembling violently.

You look up at him through your lashes, hollowing your cheeks around him, and the sight makes him come undone. With a low, guttural groan, Seonghwa spills into your mouth, hot and salty and desperate. You swallow every drop.

When you finally let him go with a soft pop, Seonghwa stares down at you, eyes black with lust, lips parted, chest heaving.

Seonghwa watches you straighten up, his gaze flicking to your lips as you wipe them, the corner of his mouth curling into a smirk. There’s a spark of admiration in his eyes, mixed with something darker that he can’t hide.

“Wow, ” he murmurs, more to himself than to you, his voice rough with a hint of surprise. He takes a step closer, his tone softer but no less impressed. “That was… hot.”

Seonghwa’s gaze lingers on you, a soft chuckle escaping his lips as he notices your slightly flushed cheeks, the warmth of the moment still hanging in the air. He could hardly believe how effortlessly you turned everything around, and the look of awe in his eyes didn’t go unnoticed.

Without saying another word, he cups your face gently, his thumb brushing over your lips as if he can’t resist. His touch is tender, a stark contrast to the intensity of what just happened. Slowly, he leans in, his lips capturing yours in a soft kiss. The kiss is a promise, an unspoken understanding that this isn’t over, that there’s so much more to explore between the two of you.

As he pulls away just enough to look at you, he whispers, “Thank God for loopholes.” He pulls back, his eyes lingering on you with admiration, a playful smile tugging at the corner of your lips.

“I’m gonna tell him tomorrow,” You say, finally being ready to tell your husband about you dating Seonghwa, his boss, knowing he’ll be home then. “I’m going to tell my husband about you,” you say, softer now. “About us.”

You don’t say why. You don’t need to. Because you both know why you’ve been holding back saying it, and you both know how desperate you both are to get the truth out.

He nods once. “Are you sure?”

“No,” you admit with a strained smile. “But I don’t want to keep hiding this anymore when he flashes his relationship in front of me,” you look at him through your lashes. “And I don’t want to hold back from you anymore.”

He tilts his head, watching you with something that feels like awe.

Still, the fear bubbles up in you. “What if he reacts badly? What if he says something at work? I don’t want to ruin things for you…” Your voice cracks at the end, and you look away. But he doesn’t let you.

“I’m not afraid of him,” Seonghwa says quietly. “Let him talk. Let him try.”

You huff a tiny laugh, but your eyes sting.

“I’m serious,” he says, voice gentler. “If he wants to make it ugly, I’ll deal with it. But I’d rather deal with that than watch you shrink yourself to protect me.”

You bite your lip.

“If he suggests you have an open relationship, then he has to understand the consequences of it,” he tugs a piece of hair behind your hair in the most caring manner. “So tell him. Let him know you’re mine now, too.”

Your heart jumps, even though neither of you says what this really means. That he’s not just a fling. That you don’t know how to untangle yourself from what’s happening between you and that maybe… You don’t want to.

“Give me five minutes,” he murmurs, voice low and amused as he glances at the way his tie hangs messily. “You go ahead. I’ll catch up.”

You smile despite everything, still breathless from what just happened, still burning with nerves. You nod and smooth your dress, feeling like something irreversible has just shifted.

As you open the door to leave, his voice stops you again.

“And for the record?” he says, just loud enough for only you to hear. “I’m proud to be the one you’re choosing.”

TAGLIST: I only have one main taglist, so if you wish to be added/removed, then let me know! xx @lveegsoi @vixensss @yizhou-time @imgenieforyou-boy @life-is-a-game-of-thrones @ateezswonderland @cozypaint @blutiny @aerangi @arigakittyo @femaholicc @queenofdumbfuckery @mingiatz @hwaskookies @vent-stink @desanslogique @taestrwbrry @hannahstacos @tinyteezer @gold--gucciempress @zhangyi-johee @sunnysidesins @spenceatiny18 @yunhoswrldddd @beljakovina @soso59love-blog @trivia-134340 @skzfangirl143 @spicxbnny @h0rnyp0t @mingimangomu @no-nottoday @roguesthetic @hwas-star @tsuukamori @londonbridges01 @nayutalvr @purplelady85 @lover-ofallthingspretty @awkward-fucking-thing @luvbgy @thuyting @p1ecetinyzen @eumpappasmom @marsofeight @maidens-world @girlblogger-04 @renapersa @lol-imtrash2000 @melitadala

#ateez fic #ateez smut #ateez fluff #ateez fanfic #ateez scenarios #ateez au #kpop fanfic #ateez x reader #atz fanfic #ateez #kpop smut #ateez seonghwa #park seonghwa #kpop imagines #kpop scenarios #kpop fic #ateez imagines

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justcat-judging · 3 months ago

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₊ ⊹𝐂𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐭𝐞 𝐎𝐩𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐞! ⊹ ₊

˚ʚY/N told them her ideal type which was the complete opposite of them. ɞ˚

˚ʚNagi Seishiro x Reader, Reo Mikage x Reader (seperate!)ɞ˚

˚ʚpt.1, pt.2, pt.3, pt.4, pt. 5ɞ˚

₊ ⊹𝐍𝐚𝐠𝐢 𝐒𝐞𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐫𝐨 ⊹ ₊

Nagi Seishiro was not a man of effort. He liked things easy, simple, and preferably with minimal movement involved. So, of course, falling in love with Y/Nwas an absolute nightmare.

You we're everything he wasn’t. Full of energy, constantly moving, and always finding new ways to make his life unnecessarily complicated. Like now.

“Come on, Nagi, aren’t you curious?” you teased, a mischievous glint in your eyes as you leaned forward.

Nagi blinked at you, fighting the urge to yawn. “Not really.”

You huffed, but your grin didn’t falter. “Too bad. You asked me something yesterday, so it’s only fair I answer.”

He didn’t actually remember asking you anything, but he nodded anyway. That was easier than arguing.

You clasped your hands together dramatically. “Alright, my type is—” you paused for effect, waiting until you had his full attention. “A guy who’s hardworking, super ambitious, and always pushing himself to be better.”

Nagi’s brain short-circuited.

Hardworking? Ambitious? That was the complete opposite of him. You might as well have described Mikage Reo.

“...Huh,” was all he said, but internally, he was already lying face-down on the floor, mourning his non-existent love life.

You grinned, nudging his foot with yours under the table. “What? Surprised?”

“Not really.” He shoved a piece of bread into his mouth, chewing slower than necessary to mask his disappointment. He should’ve known. You we're always looking for excitement, for someone who would match your energy. Nagi, with his love for naps and bare-minimum effort, didn’t stand a chance.

You watched him, your lips twitching as if you were holding back laughter. “Nagi,” you said slowly, dragging out his name.

“Mm?”

“It was a prank.”

He froze mid-chew.

You snickered. “I just wanted to mess with you. Did you really believe that?”

Nagi swallowed his bread and stared at you. His brain was still rebooting.

You rested your chin on her palm, tilting your head slightly. “I don’t actually care about all that. If I like someone, I like them. Simple.”

Simple? Nothing about this was simple. His heart was beating annoyingly fast, and he was suddenly aware of how warm his face felt. He was too lazy to deal with emotions, especially confusing ones like this.

“Oh,” was all he managed to say.

You laughed, and Nagi had to look away before you noticed the way his ears were turning red.

“Dummy,” you said fondly, and he felt like maybe—just maybe—falling in love with you wasn’t such a nightmare after all.

₊ ⊹𝐑𝐞𝐨 𝐌𝐢𝐤𝐚𝐠𝐞 ⊹ ₊

Reo Mikage prided himself on being composed, confident, and always in control. At least, that’s what he liked to believe—until you came along and threw him off balance without even trying.

You weren't just any girl. You we're his best friend. The one person who could match his wit, challenge his patience, and somehow make his heart race with nothing more than a smile. Not that he’d ever tell her that.

No, Reo Mikage wasn’t about to risk their friendship over some dumb crush.

Except, today was testing him in ways he hadn’t prepared for.

“So, what’s your type?” you asked casually, twirling a strand of hair around your finger as you leaned forward on the table. It was an innocent enough question, one he could dodge if necessary. But before he could turn the conversation back on you, you smirked and added, “I’ll tell you mine first.”

Reo swallowed. He wasn’t sure why, but he had a terrible feeling about this.

“I like guys who are quiet and mysterious. You know, the brooding type. Kind of cold but secretly really soft when you get to know them,” you continued, tapping your chin in thought. “Oh! And he has to be a little clumsy, maybe even bad with money—”

Reo nearly choked on air. “What?”

You nodded as if completely serious. “Yeah! Like the kind of guy who forgets his wallet all the time or gets lost easily.”

He gawked at you. “That’s the opposite of me.”

“I know, right?” you sighed dramatically. “I guess it just can’t be helped.”

Reo didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. You had to be messing with him. Right? But what if you weren’t? What if you really liked someone who was the complete opposite of him? That was a problem. A big problem.

You took one look at his expression and burst into laughter. “Reo, I was kidding! You should’ve seen your face.”

His jaw tightened. “That wasn’t funny.”

“It was a little funny,” you teased, grinning up at him.

Reo sighed, dragging a hand through his hair. He should have known. Of course you we're messing with him. But still, the relief that washed over him was embarrassingly strong.

“You’re such a pain,” he muttered, shaking his head.

You rested her chin on your palm, still smiling. “Why? You worried you didn’t fit my type?”

Reo scoffed, looking away so you wouldn’t see the light dusting of pink creeping onto his ears. “As if I care.”

You hummed, unconvinced. But for now, you let him pretend. Little did Reo know, you had her own little secret—one that involved him and your not-so-fake type after all.

˚ʚhad this on my draft for like weeks and haven't posted it. I'm currently making a Rin and Sae Itoshi one.ɞ˚

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jackce · 1 month ago

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I was commissioned by a mysterious person to work on 6 Prussia themed months 🖤🤍🖤 First is February was inspired by Valentines day ofc, but the main focus is Prussia's dissolution 😭 (That's a funeral flower arrangement, he's a prisoner after WW II and has just been informed of his fate) I wrote an small one shot in case you want to read it, it's Prussia's POV (English first / Español al final):

FEBRUARY

— The celebration is not on time, true, but you still have to look presentable.

I didn't ask what was so special about celebrating Valentine's Day on the 25th, in the Soviet Union they don't even celebrate that date, they said it's because it is a capitalist invention, but if you ask me, I think it's because they don't understand what love is.

Is not like I wasn't curious while they cut my hair the way it was when I arrived, while they shaved my beard and handed me a suit that could barely hide the kilos I've lost. But I learned the hard way not to open my mouth too much, something that I'm sure everyone who knows me would have wanted impossible. Ivan is miraculous, I suppose.

— You'll receive the visit you've been waiting for, see? I'm not as bad as you think — Still, Russia seemed eager to pique my curiosity.

"He's playing with me," I tried to convince myself. But when I mentioned it to Ukraine after she brought the first decent meal in years to my cell, she reacted with joy.

— It's your brother for sure!

She doesn't know, but even though my heart twisted with joy, the hope was painful.

But two years had passed already... And even though Russia had played me in other ways, it was the first time he tried too hard to make me look presentable, as if he wanted to cover up the dealings he's been having with me. "You're the only person who has a villain role and who he can vent to," Belarus had excused him once.

I tried not to think, but I still couldn't get rid of that bad habit. I was going to show myself to someone, that was for sure. But who? Maybe it wouldn't be one of us... Maybe just a politician, or even some errand boy. But... What if it was West?

Surely my brother had been asking about me all these years, if there's one thing he has, it's that he's tireless. I'm sure he hasn't given up, I'm sure this little meeting is the fruit of his efforts, just a glance to know that I'm fine, that despite the division of my territory, that every day I'm more just a name... I'm fine.

— I'm fine, West —I murmured to the broken mirror they lent me, joining the theater that Ivan wanted so much to present. Despite everything, I didn't want to worry Ludwig... I didn't want him to see me with pity.

— Let’s go. —Russia in person came for me, and for the first time in a long time I left my cell without chains or ties to hinder me.

He took me to a dining room where three places were set, my heart tortured me again when I confirmed that it was a visit.

Ivan asked me to sit down while he went to get the guest, he knows well that I no longer try to escape, besides, I don't want to escape, not now that I'll see...

— West... —I got up as soon as I heard the door open.

But it was just Russia, his victorious smile.

“I'm so sorry, it seems he's had other more important matters... But don't worry, he sent you a present.” He was hiding something behind his back, but I could see the flowers from there.

I managed not to make any expression, neither anger, nor shame, nor sadness, I wasn't going to give him the pleasure of knowing that his stab was accurate. Braginsky didn't wait for me to say anything and showed me the decoration of lilies and chrysanthemums. It was a wreath that followed the shape of a heart, a ribbon with my name crossed through the center...

I must have lost the ability to hide my emotions, because the smile of the man in front of me widened.

The funeral arrangement could only mean one thing...

... I'm not even a name anymore.

----

FEBRERO

— La celebración se atrasó un poco, sí, pero tienes que estar presentable. No pregunté qué tenía de especial celebrar San Valentín el 25. En la Unión Soviética ni siquiera celebran esa fecha, que por qué es un invento capitalista, pero si me lo preguntan creo que es por qué no entienden lo que es el amor. No era que no sintiera curiosidad mientras me cortaban el cabello a la manera en que lo tenía cuando llegué, mientras rasuraban mi barba y me entregaban un traje que poco podría disimular los kilos que he perdido. Pero aprendí por las malas a no abrir demasiado la boca, algo que seguro todos los que me conocen habrían creído imposible. Iván es milagroso, supongo. — Recibirás la visita que tanto esperabas ¿Ves? No soy tan malo como crees — Aun así Rusia parecía ansioso por pescar mi curiosidad. "Está jugando conmigo" intenté convencerme. Pero cuando se lo mencioné a Ucrania luego de que trajera a mi celda la primer comida decente en años, ella reaccionó con felicidad. — ¡Seguro que es tu hermano! Ella no lo sabe, pero aunque mi corazón se retorció por alegría, la esperanza fue dolorosa. Pero habían pasado ya dos años... Y aunque Rusia había jugado conmigo de otras formas, era la primera vez que se esforzaba demasiado por qué yo me viera presentable, como si quisiera tapar los tratos que ha estado teniendo conmigo. "Eres la única persona que tiene un papel de villano y con quién puede desahogarse", lo había excusado Bielorrusia una vez. Intenté no pensar, pero aún no lograba quitarme esa mala costumbre. Iba a mostrarme ante alguien, eso era seguro ¿Pero quién? Tal vez no fuera con uno de nosotros... Tal vez solo un político, o incluso algún recadero. Pero... ¿Y si si era West? Seguro que mi hermano había estado preguntando por mi todos estos años, si algo tiene él es que es incansable. Seguro que no se ha rendido, seguro que está pequeña reunión es fruto de sus esfuerzos, solo un vistazo para saber que estoy bien, que a pesar de la repartición de mi territorio, que cada día soy más sólo un nombre ... Estoy bien. — Estoy bien, West —Le murmuré al espejo roto que me prestaron, uniéndome al teatro que Iván tanto quería presentar. A pesar de todo, no quería preocupar a Ludwig... No quería que me viera con lastima. — Andando —Rusia en persona vino por mi, y por primera vez en mucho tiempo salí de mi celda sin cadenas o ataduras que me entorpecieran. Me llevó hasta un comedor donde estaban puestos tres lugares, mi corazón volvió a torturarme al confirmar que se trataba de una visita. Ivan me pidió que me sentara en lo que iba por el invitado, sabe bien que ya no intento escapar, además, no quiero escapar, no ahora que veré a... — West... —Me levanté en cuanto escuché que la puerta se abría. Pero solo era Rusia, su sonrisa victoriosa. — Lo siento mucho, parece que ha tenido otros asuntos más importantes ... Pero no te preocupes, te mando un regalo —Escondía algo tras su espalda, pero podía ver las flores desde allí. Conseguí no hacer ninguna expresión, ni rabia, ni vergüenza, ni tristeza, no iba a darle el gusto de saber que su puñal fue certero. Braginski no espero a que dijera nada y me mostró el adorno de lirios y crisantemos. Era una corona de flores que seguía la forma de un corazón, un listón con mi nombre atravesado al centro... Debí haber perdido la habilidad para ocultar mis emociones, por qué la sonrisa del hombre frente a mi se amplió. El arreglo fúnebre solo podía significar una cosa... ... Ya no soy ni siquiera un nombre.

#my art #hetalia #hws prussia #aph prussia #hetalia fanart #hetalia fanfiction #fanart #fanfiction #fanfic #hetalia fanfic #oneshot #hetalia oneshot

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1d1195 · 4 months ago

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Pucking Rookie II

Read Pucking Rookie here | ~8k words

From me: sloooooowwwwww burrrrrrrnnnnnnnn

Warnings: angsty, fluffy, douchey ex-boyfriend, a little violent

Summary: Harry is one of the most annoying people she's ever met. It's unfair he's talented, hot, and way nicer than her ex.

“So getting to the side of the ice before the puck is there is offsides?” Marc asked.

She nodded watching the Warriors center faceoff against the Bears on her TV screen. They were in the third period with only five minutes to go and the defenseman from the Bears was in the penalty box for a foul against the center. She thought it was a death sentence. “Correct.”

“They have that in other sports,” he sounded like a child remembering a fact from preschool. She smirked.

“Yes,” she laughed. “Are you sure you want to date this guy?”

“I want to date his dick,” Marc shrugged. She snorted and shook her head.

“Fair enough.”

Her phone lit with a message from Kael. He wanted to see her when she was in town with The Chargers. It was the last thing she wanted to do, but it would have been nice to get some of her stuff back. If he kept it.

“Are you speaking to Harry again?” Marc asked.

It was impossible to keep the smile from growing on her face. She rubbed a hand over her mouth to hide it. “Yeah...” she nodded. “It’s kind of hard not to talk to anyone on the team.”

“The fact you went a whole week without talking to that hot as hell man is beyond me. You’re a better woman than me.”

She snorted. They were coming down to the final two minutes and the goalie skated to the bench and another player glided across the ice. “So, when the team is down by a goal or two, they send the goalie off the ice so they can get another scorer in position. But it leaves the goal open. It’s risky.”

“You are seriously doing that team a disservice by not dating them,” he murmured. “If I was into women I wouldn’t let you out in public. You’re so perfect.”

She laughed. “I am not perfect.”

“Babe, you are stunning, you know hockey, and you make the best cookies I’ve ever tasted.”

“It’s not enough,” she told him sipping her water and standing up. But sure enough, The Warriors scored without their goalie in the next. She had to get to the rink for the night game. She smirked, wiggled eyebrows at Marc, and turned off her TV.

“You should bet money on these things.”

She put on her regular outfit for a night of taking pictures at the rink. Her hands had to be free (and yes, they would freeze) but she wore a thick sweatshirt below the jersey. It had Niall’s name on the back. She figured he was the least likely to make a big deal of wearing someone’s name on her back. She honestly hoped no one noticed that she picked it. She didn’t want to make it seem like she had a favorite on the team. Because she didn’t. And it definitely wasn’t Harry Styles.

Truthfully, she stole Niall’s old jersey out of the bin in the locker room. It got ripped in a game where someone got a little too irritated with Niall’s good goal tending. There was a significant tear along the seam because Harry was the first one to get to Niall when the incident occurred. Harry accidentally tore at it while trying to get his hands on the opponent and wound up in the penalty box for two minutes because of it.

She spent part of the following evening sewing it carefully back together while watching a movie on Netflix.

Once her winter boots were on, she slipped her camera bag and press pass over her shoulder and neck respectively. She was ready for the evening. Marc walked her down to her car. They both waved at Michael who was pacing outside while smoking a cigarette. “Hey Sweetheart,” he called. Michael was about five years younger than her and way too grumpy for his own good. But he often perked up on her behalf. “Good luck to the team.”

“Thanks!” She smiled as if she had any responsibility for how well they did.

Marc made sure she got in the car safely and winced when her car took two turns to start because of the cold. Once assured her car would remain running, Marc went to Michael’s side and bummed a cigarette from him as she pulled out of the lot in front of the building. What a weird little family she was creating in a weird part of town.

Her car seemed angry that it was being asked to do its job, and she worried that one day it was going to die on her way there. If it did, she was nervous it would be a thing and Uncle Charlie would be pissed. She could see it now. But instead, she listened to her music, stopped to splurge for a coffee made by someone else, and headed to the rink.

At the very least, she was happier than she had been in a very long time. There was no weight around her worrying she wasn’t the perfect girlfriend, the perfect arm candy for her hockey boyfriend. She didn’t worry about looking weird or awkward. She felt more like herself behind the lens, at the rink, and at The Locker Room, and at her apartment with her new friends than she had in years.

Maybe she didn’t need any of her stuff back from Kael. If she never spoke to him again, then she would be okay.

“Niall you lucky motherfucker!” Asher yelled.

She wasn’t paying much attention as the boys finally arrived for their game. She was in the middle of a conversation with Uncle Charlie as she went over the pictures she was planning to submit to the news outlets, looking over the tiny screen in her hands. She showed off her non-athletic photography skills. This included the senior pictures she took of her cousin (Charlie’s daughter), and she told him which ones she thought were best. This naturally led to discussing the holidays. Her hope was he was willing to carpool to her parents’ house. It was selfish, mainly because she didn’t think her car would make it the three-hour drive out of the city. Not that she was going to tell him that.

But the boys interrupted before she could get that far. She turned, smiled brightly at her team of restless twenty-something-year-old puppies. She set her coffee on the ledge of the window of an office for one of the team assistants and gave the boys a proper wave. “Are you all ready for gameday?” She asked.

But no one was paying any attention to her greeting. Instead, their gazes were focused on the number on her body. The black-and-silver-lettering and logo was riveting it seemed even though it was on all their own jerseys as well.

So much for it not being a thing. “Sweetheart, I’m honored,” Niall chuckled. Were his cheeks pink in embarrassment? That was cute—he looked so nervous. Niall was adorable. She could see why Harry was so protective of him. In the time she had gotten to know him, she seriously didn’t know how someone so sweet and nice could be roped into a rough and tumble sport like hockey.

“What?” She asked curiously, hoping that if she acted confused, they wouldn’t make it a bigger deal than it needed to be.

It seemed there was little chance of such a thing. “You’re wearing my jersey,” his grin remained shy and so, so adorable.

Well, maybe she could use it to her advantage. “Well, don’t tell the others but you’re my favorite,” she winked.

But it wasn’t quiet and everyone heard it. The gasps and scoffs of disbelief echoed loudly as they entered the locker room to drop some of their stuff. First there would be game day entrance photos, the boys looking dressed in not quite formal but not so casual attire. The stuff that made hearts throb to look at them (and other organs throb if she was honest). They would pose as if they hadn’t already walked in, and no one would know except for them.

Niall turned a shade redder and headed in. “Don’t break my goalie,” Charlie warned.

“I would never break Niall!” She pouted petulantly at her uncle. “Why are they all up and arms about the jersey? It was free and I fixed it. Is it not allowed?”

He shook his head. “Don’t worry about it, Sweetheart,” he chuckled. “It’s just a dumb hockey-guy thing,” he patted her on the back and headed into the locker room.

“Harry’s running late,” Lang said as he returned with just a duffle bag and an overpriced water bottle that was part of his sponsorship deal. “Hit some traffic or something. So, you might not get his game day entrance,” he told her with a shrug.

She nodded. “That’s fine,” she shrugged and snapped a picture of him while he wasn’t really focused, testing the lighting and frame once more now that she had a subject. “There’s enough of you guys to suffice as eye candy for the day we probably won’t need everyone’s picture.”

Lang laughed, covering his mouth. “Sweetheart, please say that in front of Harry while I’m around and you’re wearing that jersey,” he begged. She frowned unsure what he meant by that specifically. Instead, she shook her head and began ordering the captain and his teammates around to get the first part of her evening’s tasks done.

Harry showed up just as she took the last shot of the team walking into the locker room. He was pouring the last bit of his protein shake into his mouth while she examined her camera once more and sipped her coffee that she left on the ledge of the window. There was so much more activity back by the locker room as game time approached. There were team doctors, athletic trainers, assistants, and more milling around.

Harry hated being late. It messed with his pre-game rituals. But there wasn’t anything he could do about traffic. Plus, Hayden lived on the exact opposite side of the city. He really shouldn’t have bothered with trying to sneak a quick hook-up in before the game. But he needed something to take the edge off and nothing was working.

Granted the hook-up left him feeling unsatisfied as well. Although it wasn’t Hayden’s fault. She was lovely, truly. It was all Harry’s brain. Something was off and he couldn’t quite place it.

But one look at the pretty photographer wearing the number thirty-one on her body reminded him that he was much more aware of the issue than he was willing to admit. He blinked hoping his eyes were mistaken. But no, the name Horan was on her back.

“Rookie!” He called.

What the fuck was he going to say? It didn’t even make sense for him to be mad. She didn’t do anything wrong. God, Harry was an idiot. She was off limits. For all he knew she had one of everyone’s jersey and was going to rotate through.

It was probably not a good sign that she looked up when she heard that nickname, right? It wasn’t good to get used to knowing it was Harry calling her the moment she heard his teasing. But right then, Harry didn’t look teasing. His gaze was laser-focused on her torso (and not the way she would expect him to be focused on her chest). “Hi Harry,” she smiled, sweetly; hoping vehemently that this wasn’t about the jersey. “Do you want a game day photo?” She asked gently holding her camera up.

“What the fuck are you wearing?” He snapped.

This hoping thing ain’t shit. She thought. Glancing down at her outfit once more, she frowned. “I thought I looked cute,” she pouted.

Harry was all but half a foot in front of her. “You’re wearing Niall’s jersey.”

“It’s from the locker room, it was going to get thrown out, so I just sewed it,” she shrugged. “Is that not allowed? No one said anything.”

He seemed to bristle but settled at the same time. She really didn’t get what the big deal was. “S’fine,” he grumbled. “Y’do look cute. You always look cute,” he rolled his eyes and pushed the locker room door open with a little too much power. She shook her head and heard laughter from behind the door.

“Boys are weird,” she sighed and headed for the tunnel to get to the ice.

She texted Michael from her car when she got back to the apartment at one in the morning. It was dark, cold, and she had a weird feeling as she pulled into the small lot. He hurried out yawning as he did. He was wearing only shorts, a t-shirt, and slippers. “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you,” she frowned and hurried to the front of the building. He waited patiently for her to lock her car.

“S’fine, Sweetheart,” he shrugged and yawned.

“Thank you,” she said gratefully. She really needed to find a new place, so she didn’t have to bother them. But she swore she could feel someone’s eyes following her as she closed the entry door to her building. Michael headed down the first-floor hall to his place without another word. She stopped at her small little mailbox, locked on the inside. Only a slit in the wall from the outside to get in. It was all junk and bills. She didn’t give her address to anyone. Not even Uncle Charlie had her real address. She mentioned some apartment complex on the good side of town. But when pressed, she immediately diverted and asked if he would be okay with shipping her Amazon packages to his house. It did the trick, fortunately. Her parents didn’t think much of it either because they knew Charlie was keeping an eye on her.

It was all she could afford after not working much because of Kael and his weird obsession with making sure she played the proper part of picture-perfect hockey girlfriend. This was a sketchy part of town, and she knew it and didn’t like living here either. But what could she really do? Making friends with Michael and Marc was easy and she was lucky. So very lucky to have people keep an eye out for her when she got home late and felt like she was being followed.

So, when she turned to the stairwell behind the little mail room and saw the very angry hockey player outside the door of her building peering through the glass, she practically jumped back a foot and immediately and nearly screamed.

She clamped a hand over her mouth and pressed the other one to her heart, dropping her mail in the process. “What the fuck are you doing?!” She whisper-screamed opening the door.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” Harry hissed stepping inside. He gathered up her mail handing it to her. He continued glaring as he took in the run-down place. “Do you live here?”

“Yes!”

“Rookie, this is not a safe area. Why are y’living here?”

“Because I can afford it? What kind of fucking question is that?”

Harry looked so good having just played a grueling game that included overtime and a shootout. His hair was still damp from his shower. His face glowing that way he managed to do in the dead of winter that was so unfair to her. He smelled good—too good. He wore a black hoodie, black pants, and black sneakers. Like he was trying to blend in with the night. The only not good-looking thing about him at the moment was the sour expression on his otherwise extremely pretty features. The furrow between his eyebrows looked angry. The green of his eyes appeared darker, almost black to match his clothes. His mouth was pressed in a flat line.

But even angry, Harry looked hot. He had been angry all evening. Since he set foot in the arena. He didn’t relax when they all went to The Locker Room either. He hardly spoke to Niall and barely acknowledged his good goal tending. “Does coach know you live here?”

She shook her head. “Harry, shut the fuck up. Why did you follow me home like a creep!?”

“Because s’one in the morning and y’said y’were exhausted and that your car was a piece of shit! I was making sure y’made it home. I didn’t know home was even scarier!”

“Hey babe, everything alright? Michael texted you would be on your way up and to keep an ear out.” Marc called as he approached them descending the stairs.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” she whispered and rubbed her temples.

“Holy shit,” Marc gaped.

“Harry, this is Marc,” she introduced the pair, but lacked any enthusiasm. “He’s my neighbor.”

Harry glared at him—even though he didn’t deserve it. “Hi,” he said curtly.

“I’m fine,” she told Marc. “Harry followed me home.”

“Great game today, man,” he looked awestruck; no longer concerned about her well-being at all and entirely concerned about the beautiful man in front of him. “That was a bogus penalty in the second period.”

“I said the same thing,” she nodded in agreement hoping it would remind Harry that she made her own little place here and he didn’t need to worry. That he was her friend.

Harry softened just a little. His shoulders untensed ever so slightly. “Thanks,” he nodded curtly, trying to remain polite to a fan when he wanted to shake the sweet photographer. “Rookie, show me your place,” he ordered.

“Michael and I keep an eye on her,” Marc offered sensing there was a deeper issue.

Harry eyed him up and down and then turned back to her. “Show me your place,” he repeated.

“No!”

“Jesus, babe, show the hot man your apartment!”

She pressed her fingers to her forehead and slid them down her nose and over her lips as she spoke. “Marc,” she sighed. “Go away.”

“Huge fan,” he held his hands up in surrender and made his way upstairs.

Harry was staring at her in disbelief. “You’re not living here.”

“Harry,” she sighed.

“I’ve had a shit day, Rookie. Don’t fucking test it,” he snapped and headed up the stairs figuring he would find it on his own because he would just know? She shook her head.

“Third floor,” she mumbled following behind him. He sighed with relief from ahead of her.

“Take that stupid fucking shirt off,” he said once the door was shut.

“Why are you so angry today?” She shed her camera carefully setting it on the small table. Then her badge. She dropped her keys on the table too. Quickly, before he could get angrier, she rid herself of the jersey and her hoodie.

Harry sighed again, relieved it seemed of what she didn’t know. Without broiling in irritation over his friend’s name all over the girl he had a massive crush on, he was able to focus a little more. Glancing around he inspected the small place. It was cute, adorable even. Just like her.

She bent to take her shoes off. “Do you want water or something? You’re so keyed up... Maybe you want a sedative?” She rolled her eyes at him.

He snorted. “Pass,” he continued looking around. “S’nice, really,” he murmured

“It is,” she agreed. “I don’t plan on staying here forever, but it’s what’s affordable right now. Not all of us make seven figures a year for their talent.”

He ignored her and wandered around the little rooms she had. On all of her walls were more photos she had clearly taken. It didn’t take much for him to figure out her style. It was natural and lovely. “S’cold in here.”

“Heat’s expensive,” she remarked. “Do you want some tea?” She asked.

He shook his head. “No, thank you, Rookie,” he mumbled relaxing more as he inhaled deeply. Everything was so intoxicatingly her in this room. It smelled so good. She smelled so good. “Is Marc in love with you?” He asked offhandedly.

“Not unless I identify as a man, which I don’t.”

He smirked, unable to hide the amusement. She was so funny, it was unfair. Beautiful, talented, kind, and funny. She was made in a lab and meant to tempt every one of Harry’s desires. “What ‘bout the guy that walked y’in?” He picked up the book that was on her coffee table and read the back of it, wondering what kind of books she was into and if she liked the same things as him. He set the book down carefully.

“Michael? No. He’s a baby.”

“He’s taller than you,” he murmured.

“He’s not in love with me. Well, actually, I do make him cookies. So maybe,” she shrugged.

He shook his head wishing he could focus on his own questions. But she was too quick and Harry was too tired.

On the wall of her living room was an array of small frames. Probably fifteen or so four by six photos that his mom would have put in a photo album. He recognized Charlie and Ray. A man he could only assume was Charlie’s brother and her dad as they looked like twins with different hair and eye coloring. Girls in their teens, a dog that never seemed to age even though the family around it did, and her gorgeous smile.

There was also a stupid fucking picture of Niall on her wall beside a team photo which made him want to yank it down and stomp on it like a psychopath.

Poor Niall did nothing to deserve Harry’s wrath. The team teased him the moment he went into the locker room telling him all about how she said Niall was his favorite. It wasn’t surprising. Niall was nice and sweet. He didn’t hook up with a bunch of girls nor did he go from city to city hoping to be entertained by a different girl. He was a nice guy. Probably the kind of guy she did deserve. Especially after whatever it was that Kael did to arguably ruin his life by losing her. He barely congratulated him on his saves in the game. Didn’t even buy him a drink at the bar either. To Niall’s credit, he didn’t take it too harshly. Merely smirked at him as he glared. Knowing it really had nothing to do with him at the heart of it.

But the picture of his best friend on her wall just made him grumpier all over again. It didn’t help that Harry was exhausted. He dreaded having to drive home this late. Especially when he was mad on top of everything else. But having seen where she lived, he was glad he followed her home. Didn’t care that it was creepy. It would have made him insane to know she wasn’t safe.

There wasn’t much he could do but turn his attention to her kitchen so he could avoid the stupid picture of his stupid friend who he didn’t like very much at present.

Right there on the fridge door was one of her family photos—clearly taken at a wedding or something. A quick glance showed she wasn’t in it which made him sad. How often was she left out of pictures because she was always the one taking them? Beside her family was the side-by-side duo picture of herself that he saw on her website. A photo of her parents’ dog next to that. A couple landscapes of the ocean and sun.

Right in the middle of all her photos was a picture of Harry.

He swore time stopped. All his anger towards Niall disappeared. Why was he on her fridge? It was the picture of when he scored a goal, from one of the first games she photographed this year. The one she sent him the first time she texted him. “Why’s this on the fridge?” He asked, straightening it alongside the others it. There was a magnet on the back and Harry felt his chest constrict a bit knowing he wasn’t on the wall, but he was in her house. She cared in some way enough to put him among her pictures of family and friends.

She shrugged. “I put all of my favorite pictures on the fridge,” she said it so simply. It wasn’t a big deal to her. The pictures belonged there and that was it. It just was.

His heart sincerely skipped a beat. Like if he were a cartoon, a graphic of a little heart monitor would appear in a cloud bubble, and it would show an irregular rhythm representing the way she made him feel. His gaze flickered to her briefly, but he was worried he would stare and never look away. He cleared his throat and looked toward her wall of photos. “What ‘bout the wall over there?”

“Those are nice pictures too, but I don’t really look at the wall much. It’s behind me when I sit on the couch, you know...? The fridge however,” she had a smile in her voice. “I love snacks and cooking and baking. So, I’m in the kitchen a lot. So, I like to look at my favorites.”

Harry felt softer. Relieved. Less mad and annoyed than he’d been in hours. Maybe even days if he was honest. Harry was one of her favorites. Even if she didn’t mean he was her favorite and merely the photo.

“Bunny?” He asked softly staring at the other half dozen or so of her favorites.

She didn’t miss a beat answering to the nickname that she didn’t really like. But she did really like the way it sounded when Harry said it. “Yeah?”

“Would y’ever wear my jersey?” His voice was quiet, he felt stupid for asking. The question wouldn’t leave his brain until he said it. Whatever the answer was, he had to ask it.

She frowned and sighed. Harry hated that. It seemed like a terrible question, and he was dreading her answer immediately. “I hate to say it, Harry, but I can’t afford a Styles jersey.”

He rolled his eyes. “Would y’wear it?”

“Of course I would, Harry. You’re my friend just like Niall is. And Asher, Callie, and Lang. I really only wore it because you guys were throwing it out.”

Harry rubbed a hand on the side of his face. He could live with that. “Alright.”

“Did I miss something?” She asked. But he knew how perceptive she was. She had to know how much it bothered him that she wore his friend’s name and number on her body today and not his. She had to know he had a crush on her. Even if he couldn’t do anything about it.

“Nope,” he shook his head not wanting to get into it further.

“Are you sure I can’t get you something to drink?” She asked again. “You seem really out of sorts...maybe you need something without alcohol?”

“Sure,” he sighed. She could give him whatever she wanted. She wouldn’t be able to tell, but he was relieved now. He didn’t need anything else. “Tea would be nice...” She nodded, gently nudging him out of the way to get a pitcher of water from her fridge. “Can I stay here?”

“You want to stay in my crappy little apartment? After you went on and on about how unsafe it is?” She questioned filling the kettle on her stove.

Fair point, Bunny. “M’exhausted, Rookie. I told you I had a bad day.”

“I see that,” she pouted and scanned him up and down. “Of course you can. You have to take my bed though; the couch is too small for you.”

He shook his head. “M’not kicking y’out of your bed when I barged in.”

“Well... it was... kind of nice that you made sure I got home safely. I’m glad it was you, but I was pretty nervous... so if it wasn’t you...” she shook her head and looked at her hands wringing them awkwardly. “I’m sorry you got stuck here,” she pouted.

More of him softened somehow. It seemed impossible that she could make him feel any softer. He was certain he never felt softer than when she said that his picture was one of her favorites. The way she spoke was so gentle.

“I fall asleep most nights on the sofa anyway,” she shrugged, unaware of the thoughts rolling through Harry’s head. She probably hadn’t a clue how she made him imagine her adorable body curled into the small sofa with a blanket around her. What it would be like for him to come home from a game and find her snuggled into a sweatshirt with his cologne on it, the TV playing the post-game highlights, and her hands tucked under her cheek. Did she snore? Harry ached to know.

God he was fucked. How did she walk into the arena and do that? Harry thought of nothing but hockey and hookups. Now he wondered if she snored at night.

She carefully poured the hot water into a mug with The Charger’s logo on the outside and dipped the tea bag in and out a few times letting the water do its thing. She slid it across the small counter before she poured her own mug. They stood silently for a moment, sipping tea.

“I might have something of Kael’s for you to sleep in.”

“I’d rather die than sleep in that piece of shit’s clothes.”

She smirked around the edge of her mug and shook her head. “Are you cold?” She asked.

He shook his head. It was cold but he wasn’t cold. He would be fine with a few blankets. A warm body beside him would be good too, but he wasn’t sure he could convince her.

She put her mug in the sink and went to the bathroom without warning. After a few minutes, she returned. Her face was washed of makeup, her hair pulled back, and she wore a pair of sweatpants instead. She grabbed a pillow off her bed. “Normally I’d change your sheets, but... It’s too late. I hope you don’t mind.”

Wrapped up in sheets, blankets, and pillows that smelled like her? Fine by him. “S’fine, Rookie. Thank you.”

She grabbed more blankets from under her sofa cushion; a space for storage hiding in plain sight. She placed them at the end of her bed and then went to the sofa. “Make yourself at home,” she offered. “Night, Harry,” she yawned and settled into her pillow and blanket, nuzzling into the warmth just as he imagined, her hands tucked under her cheek.

“Night, Rookie,” he mumbled and climbed into her bed. He was practically asleep before he was fully settled.

It couldn’t have been more than a couple hours later—it was still very dark out. Her bed was warm, soft, and smelled so fucking good he thought he might sew himself into the sheets just so he never had to leave. But it was undeniably cold. Even in his hoodie and sweats.

He glanced across the room and could barely make out the shadow of his pretty crush curled into the sofa. She looked chilled and Harry felt so immensely guilty. He got out of bed, his feet nearly stinging on the cold floor. Without more thought he scooped her up. His arms looping around the back of her knees and the other around her waist. He tried to move her without jostling her too much. Her head fell toward him, pressing into his chest as he carried her back to the bed. He settled her under her sheets and blankets. He wanted nothing more than to cozy up to her, but he wasn’t going to ruin the progress he made that night. Instead, he slipped between the sheet and blanket, draped the pair of them in the other blankets.

She sighed loudly in her sleep. Like she was comfortable.

Harry didn’t think there was anyone cuter than her.

Harry woke up to her burrowed into his side. He didn’t dare move. If she wanted out, she would have to make the move. There wasn’t anything that would get Harry to remove himself from her warm body in the same bed as him. It was almost too warm, but well worth it.

“Jesus,” she whispered suddenly and scooched back in the bed. “Harry!” She hissed.

He smirked. “Good morning, Rookie,” he yawned. “Sleep well?”

“How did I get here?”

“Y’must have tucked yourself in with me,” he smiled.

She rolled her eyes, shook her head. “Shut up,” she mumbled.

“Y’jus’ looked cold,” he shrugged. “S’plenty of room.”

She sighed. “Well thanks, it was cozy,” her cheeks turned red. “Do you want something to eat?” She asked, immediately pivoting from their little late-night cuddle.

“Y’make breakfast too?”

“It’s actually my favorite meal...” she trailed off pushing the covers off. “I love going out to breakfast,” she got out of bed and grabbed a sweatshirt from her dresser. Harry sensed there was more to that, but as soon as he saw her sweatshirt, all previous thoughts left his mind.

Niall’s number and name on her body made him mad.

The words Glacier Wolves across the front in it’s hideous font was going to send him to an early grave.

“No,” he shook his head immediately. “Take it off.”

“You’re awfully bossy about my outfits, Harry,” she rolled her eyes. “It’s cold. I need a sweatshirt.”

Harry pulled the one he was wearing off. “Here.”

For a moment she eyed it. Harry couldn’t figure out her expression or the pause that lasted as she examined it. “Harry it’s like ten degrees out,” she pulled the hem down and walked toward her bathroom again.

He pouted, grumbling to himself as he put his clothing back on. “M’burning that,” he mumbled.

“I heard that!”

Harry left after breakfast. He didn’t bug her about her sweatshirt. But he did beg her to turn the heat on for a little bit. He helped her with dishes and not once did the conversation feel forced, awkward, or like there was a lull that lasted too long. He watched her take pictures of her food, then the way the light streamed in through the window, so it hit her coffee table just so. She adjusted her book to an open page and set a hot cup of tea beside it.

With a couple of snaps, Harry watched her while biting into his toast. “Can I see?” He asked.

“It’s nothing special. I just take random pictures sometimes for practice,” she explained.

He wiped his hand on his leg and held it out expectantly for the priceless equipment. It felt weird, awkward. Tentatively, she handed it to him. Not only had she captured the beauty of the early morning in her little place, she took another picture of Harry drinking tea in between bites.

He smiled. “Aw, Rookie, me?” He teased. She didn’t say anything, looked anywhere but him while her pink cheeks spoke for the emotions she was feeling. “M’not sure why but m’still really impressed,” he tabbed through the pictures she took on the little screen.

She must have faced the camera backwards because her pretty smiling face with the ice rink as back drop behind her illuminated the screen. Harry loved everything about the photo. It had her and his beloved hockey rink. “Can I have this one?” He asked.

“I was going to delete that,” she blushed. Harry frowned.

“No way, Rookie, y’look adorable. Let me have it, y’got me on your fridge.”

She looked away shyly, nodded silently. “I’ll text it to you.”

Harry was unbelievably talented and attractive. He could outthink his opponents on the ice and he was sweet enough to make sure she got home safe. Carried her to bed in the middle of the night to keep her warm.

It wasn’t fair that she couldn’t have him. Even if it was her own doing.

Around ten or so, Harry had to head out and she hated to admit it, but she really missed him almost the moment he left.

The following day she headed to practice taking pictures for the team’s social media posts. Ray and Charlie were at the center of the ice waiting for the team to file out of the locker room. She took a picture of her uncle and surrogate uncle. Then she setup for some detail shots while waiting. The score book and pen on the bench. A stick propped up behind the bench. She laid flat on the ice and got a shot of the coach’s shoes on the center of the ice.

“Hey Sweetheart!” Callie called from across the rink—first one on the ice. Ray threw a puck at him, and he shot it into the net. Charlie threw another and he pushed the puck back and forth near him. “Laying down on the job?”

She snorted, shook her head with a smile. “Come here!” He glided over and stopped in front of her without getting ice all over her and her equipment. “Put your stick flat on the ground,” she ordered. She reached out and touched the puck and pushed it in front of the slight bend at the end of his stick. “Take your helmet off, and your gloves.”

“You gonna tell me to take more of my uniform off, Sweetheart?” He teased but followed her directions.

“You wish.”

“I do wish, Sweetheart, I do.”

She shook her head while centering her view on the shot she wanted. “Don’t move.”

“Yes ma’am,” he sighed dreamily. He was enjoying her bossing him around too much and she couldn’t help but smile while she clicked the shutter taking several of the same photo.

“Okay, thank you,” she carefully maneuvered so she would flop awkwardly back on the ice. Callie immediately grabbed her camera and then took hold of her arm to help her up. Once righted, she brushed the ice off the front of her body. She was quite chilled from lying on the ground for so long. Plus her apartment was cold, naturally her car’s heater was chilly, and it felt like she never quite got out of the cold ever because of it.

“Can I see?” He said excitedly.

She turned the camera to show him. Her teeth chattered a little more than usual. Callie put an arm around her shoulders to add some warmth. He was tall and lean like most other hockey players. And undoubtedly attractive too. “You’re pushing it, Kian,” she shook her head but didn’t mind how warm he felt.

“No one calls me Kian except my mother, Sweetheart,” he reminded her. “You’re cold. Don’t read into it,” he took the camera from her and thumbed through the photos pressing the buttons beside the screen to view them. “Wow,” he murmured. “That’s so cool, Sweetheart. It looks really beautiful.”

She blushed with pride and ducked her face. “Thank you.”

“You know... I’m not sure what he did, but Kael is an idiot to lose you,” he affirmed clicking through more of the photos. “Can we take one?” He asked.

“Yeah, sure,” she turned the camera around and pointed where Callie needed to look. He squeezed around her a little tighter as she clicked the shutter. He immediately took the camera back and examined the photo. “Cute, Sweetheart,” he grinned and continued flipping through all her photos. Including the ones from her breakfast with Harry the day before. “Ooh... what’s this?” He cooed. “Did you and Styles have a sleepover?!” He gaped.

She took her camera back. “No,” she didn’t even blush. It wasn’t his business. She didn’t want Charlie to hear.

And she definitely didn’t want Harry to hear.

Harry slid onto the ice his eyes zeroing in on his teammate’s arm wrapped around her almost immediately. She felt a little awkward knowing that he seemed to be a bit territorial about her even though it wasn’t really within his right. He glowered at the puck that Charlie tossed to him, and it sailed almost immediately into the net from where he stood. “I can’t compete with him, Sweetheart,” Callie frowned. “Please tell me you don’t actually like Styles.”

“I like all of you, Kian,” she rolled her eyes, tearing her eyes away from his broody skating.

“But you like me most, right?” Asher appeared seemingly out of nowhere.

“She likes you least,” Lang said assuredly skating by just as quick. She laughed and shook her head.

“I like you all equally,” she promised.

“Bull shit, you can’t sell a twenty-way-tie!” Asher frowned.

She loved her little family away from her real one. This team made her feel more loved and appreciated than Kael ever did. It was eye-opening in so many ways. Was it just because she took pictures on the team? Would they behave this way if she was just a girlfriend? Or the coach’s niece without special treatment? She got special treatment from the other girlfriends and wives of the Glacier Wolves simply because she was Kael’s girlfriend.

At about the same time she started to feel drained by her relationship (the last six months before it ended), she overheard two of the significant others talking about her in the bathroom. While she was using the bathroom... They said Kael was an idiot to stay with her. She was a leech and nothing more. For three years she had been nothing but a good girlfriend. She attended every game, catered to Kael’s workout schedules, practice schedules. She monitored his calendar and made sure his stunning, penthouse apartment was cleaned. She hosted parties for his teammates. For three years post-graduation she didn’t take photography gigs, skipped family parties, and let her degree sit on a shelf unused to it’s full potential.

Maybe The Chargers boys were just being kind because she was the coach’s niece. Maybe her skill really was subpar. Wasn’t she really just a leech in a new way now? Her uncle got her this job and they didn’t really need her.

Kael fucked her up good. Made her feel worthless. He didn’t value her skill and made her believe she wasn’t good enough in any part of her life. “Hey Sweetheart?” Callie asked, giving her a squeeze, bringing her mind back to the present. “You good?”

She nodded. “Sorry, just daydreaming.”

“About me?!” Asher grinned. She smiled. At least for now, this family she had was sweet. She wanted to believe they valued her for her and savor it for however long she could.

While the boys practiced, she went to the locker room and tidied up, brought the dirty uniform hamper to the laundry room, and brought the clean laundry back. She took more detail shots without the boys around. It was fun to get them in the shots, like the ones she took with Callie. But ever-like puppies, it was easier to get pictures without them milling around eagerly. She took some really nice shots of their locker space. With the right lighting, it would look like they were ready for battle—she could see it in her head, and she couldn’t wait to get the shots of their numbers alongside equipment on her computer to play with the settings.

But after about an hour of that, she ran out of things to do. She sauntered back to the rink and watched from the bench. Ray and Charlie stood at the center dictating where they should go and what to do next. It was mesmerizing. The beauty and graceful agility these tall, lean, padded men exuded was incredible.

“Take a picture it will last longer!”

The team burst into laughter as Callie called out to her. She shook her head but certainly did just that.

“Hey Sweetheart,” Niall grinned coming over during another break. “Heard you had Harry over. Hope he wasn’t too much trouble.”

She smiled. “No, he was good,” she assured him. “It was nice he followed me home. To make sure I was safe.”

“Yeah, he’s decent like that. His sister Gemma made him a real gentleman,” he agreed. “He didn’t like you wearing my jersey,” he told her.

“I’m well aware.”

“I won’t say no if you wear it again.”

She laughed. “Will do.”

“Want to make him madder taking a picture?”

“Maybe tomorrow, Kian made him pretty mad today with that one already.”

“Who?” Niall furrowed his eyebrows. She shook her head and silently laughed. “Is that what the silent treatment was for?” Niall asked with a laugh and skated off to rejoin his team.

At the end of practice, she took shots of them leaving the ice, the empty net. In her head she had a series of photos. The sequence of a hockey game and maybe she would put it into motion one day. She sat on the bench looking at her camera screen and sifted through some of the multiples she didn’t need.

“Hey Rookie,” Harry said softly.

She looked up and smiled. “Hi, Harry.”

Dangling from his fingers were a pair of figure skates. All white, pink guards, pink anterior cushioning, and pink laces.

“I got you these.”

She blinked. “Why?”

“To practice.”

“Harry, I cannot accept that. I know how much ice skates cost. Those have to be close to 400 dollars.”

He shrugged. “That’s what a good pair cost.”

“Harry, I can’t even stand on the ice. Return them. I’m not taking a 400-dollar pair to ruin because I can’t even stand still while wearing them... And they’re practically giving me blisters from just looking at them. I don’t have the right socks..." Harry looked disappointed and he frowned. "But... that... that was very sweet of you,” she added. Because she hadn’t said thank you yet, and it was sweet. It was extremely thoughtful of him. “Thank you,” she added gratefully. “That was so nice of you.”

“Do you like Callie?” He blurted.

“Do you think I’m in love with every man I meet?” She countered.

“You two looked cozy,” he mumbled.

“I was cold,” she admitted. “He offered his jersey, but I didn’t want a repeat of the other night,” she quipped. Harry smirked and looked away from her. “I’m not dating hockey players, remember?” She grabbed her camera and bag ready to leave the rink.

“Yeah...” he sighed, rubbed the back of his head. “I know, Rookie.”

There was a knock on her door later that evening. She assumed it was Michael asking if she had baked anything after feeling a bit on the munchier side of life. It probably wasn’t Marc because he had a date with the hockey lover. But maybe it was an early night for them, so who knew.

Instead, Harry was there. A pair of skates dangling from his fingers once more. The guards were still pink, there were scuffs on the toes and heels. The interior was cushioning was a light brown. “They’re a good brand. Used, so they didn’t cost a lot. But full disclosure, they were the most expensive used pair I could find because m’not gonna let y’skirt on the quality because of the cost. They won’t hurt your feet with blisters being brand new.”

Harry, with used ice skates, was the last person she expected to see. There was a tug in her chest where her heart would have melted for Kael to do something as kind as that. But she couldn’t fall in love with Harry. It was just a bad idea. He was a celebrity. There were millions of women he could choose from.

“Have you had it with dragging me around the ice or something?” She asked.

He chuckled and shook his head. “No, but... I want t’help you, Rookie. Y’should know how t’skate. Think of the pictures y’could take even if y’jus’ learn t’skate a little,” he shrugged.

That tug in her chest felt an awful lot like Harry worming his way into the center of her universe. But she didn’t want to do that again. Not really. She didn’t want to dote on Harry the way she did only for it to backfire on her. She still had a lot of time, but she felt behind. Kael made it so she didn’t have tons of money. She ‘didn’t have to worry about it’ because he made plenty. But it wasn’t about money. It was about her independence and now she felt like she literally paid the price. “I got y’some socks too,” Harry added.

Goddammit.

She was going to fall in love with him.

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