SHATTERED PUZZLES | 1

SHATTERED PUZZLES | 1

 PAIRING: Hyunjin x reader, slight Minho x reader

 CONTENT/WARNINGS: fluff, angst, a slight love triangle (i gotta stop with the skz love triangles–), amnesia!Hyunjin, Doctor!Chan, Rude!Hyunjin, car accident, trauma

WORD COUNT: 3.7k

 RATING: pg13

 SUMMARY: a rude and arrogant patient with no identification wakes up from a year-long coma and develops temporary amnesia. Assigned to you, a volunteer who’s not going to put up with his attitude, you’re both in for a rough ride.

SERIES SONG: I Don’t Remember Me (Before You)

 A/N: I know I suck at summaries but like, I needed one. If you have a better one I’m all ears lol. This is a multi-part fic which was originally going to be a oneshot, but it’s ending up longer than anticipated and I’ve got a plot that I wouldn’t be able to fit into a oneshot anyway lol. Anyway, lmk what y’all think with likes and reblogs please! HAPPY HYUNJIN DAY!

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His Sun, Her Moon

2.8k words, Angst, Romance, Non-idol AU, Fantasy AU, Royals! SKZ

Lee Minho X fem! Reader

Beware of Major Character death, fighting, description of injuries and pain, angst ( an actual warning oops-) 

Ella writes: I feel like I should apologize, but it's also pretty on brand of me to return with smack-in-the-face angst, so... here we go !

The world was pain. Writhing, lancing against torn, bloody skin. Dull, throbbing over bruised, battered bones. Sharp, pricking behind closed, exhausted eyes.

It was the only thing that told him that Death had still not opened her sweet arms to him. The only thing that kept him holding on to the current plane of existence.

Pain, and her.

“WHERE IS HE?”

Bodies stiffened, sights swivelled, weapons reached for, attentions captured.

A soulless smirk replaced the initial snarl that curled your lips you stalked further into the throne room, the silence of your entry stunning the entire chamber. You were not unfamiliar to being watched, observed, picked apart by strangers’ eyes- you revelled in it if anything. The flair for drama was always one you excelled in- right now, however, it was not your flair for drama that prompted the entrance.

The rage that you’d tamped under a thousand rocks slid through your veins again. It had been quite too long since you’d felt the warmth of your anger, always keeping it under lock and key lest it hurt, destroy, ruin. It focused you now, made your awareness blade-sharp and your words toxin-savage. You could feel every inch of it, from the dry burn behind your eyes to the clench of your fingers against the inside of your palm, from the weight of Kaeyara down the middle of your back in her scabbard to the aching throb in your ankle.

Kaeyara, his sworn-sword. She would be your saving grace today if it all went to hell.

There were throngs of people in that room, lined up and crowding against either side of the carpet that laid across the length of the room, cutting right through the center of the crowd to the throne- well, thrones.

The occupants of said thrones watched in silence as you approached them, each with a distinct expression marring their once-perfect faces. They were once beautiful, your mind’s eye reminded you. They were as exquisite as gods and goddesses not too long ago, from the inside out. Exquisite enough that you loved them with your whole heart, staked your loyalty to their thrones and their lives, went to the mat and beyond to defend them.

No longer were they alluring. No longer could you see them as the saviors of the world they hailed themselves as. No longer.

5 massive thrones lined up in front of 5 banners, each bearing a color and a signet, despicable creatures lounging on 4.

Sapphire blue. Sharp and angular, a direwolf. Bronzed hair hiding an empty eye socket and one half of a set of nerves-furrowed brows. Lilac. Golden like a rising sun. Eyes wide, a clicking, whirring mechanical hand covering his mouth in horror at the sight. Forest Green. Serpents of silver twined around a knife. Blank like an empty home, words stopping at a tongue that was no longer his. Slate Grey. Soft, foggy wings of an owl. Teeth gritted, lips pulled back in a snarl, head tilted towards the side which still had an ear. Black. A panther’s amber orbs inside a compass. Empty.

The sight of the empty throne loomed over you as you stopped in front of the 4 monsters, the lack of a bow not lost on anybody.

The whispers kicked up instantly- oh, the audacity! The Head of the Royal Guard declining to show deference?

“Where. Is. He.”

The soft, lethal words that echoed your first were not lost on anybody either.

“Who?” Sapphire rings glittered when Jisung rose, his one eye as sharp as the direwolf’s behind him.

“You can’t mean Minho.” He smiled, showing a row of too-perfect teeth. “You know as well as all gathered here, that he comes and goes as he pleases. Why is his absence a matter of surprise? Is there a matter for concern here?”

Kaeyara began humming at your back, almost like she was urging you to draw her. Not yet, my moon.

The world was pain. Until suddenly, all he could feel was fire.

Raging embers that skittered along his very bones, lighting him aflame. Smoldering, sparking against chains, heating him from the inside out. Blazing across his mind, urging him to sit up, take notice, fight, fight fight fight figh-

Not yet, my moon.

Obsidian eyes flecked with gold tore open, still hazy with pain and exhaustion.

The world was pain Until suddenly, all he could feel was her.

He heard you, you knew it. It was all that centered you as you tore yourself out of your thoughts and back onto Jisung’s words.

“Did you receive word from him?” You willed yourself to keep calm.

Felix cocked his head, his golden hair an angelic contrast against the lilac of his banner.

“Why is that any of your business, Captain?” Hyunjin’s voice was as soft as the grey fog, the smooth tenor skittering over the floor stones and into the listeners’ ears. “Are you trying to imply foul play amongst the Royals?”

The lethal edge of his tone pulled the cowering, silent commoner crowd out of their shock. One trembling commoner edged his way towards the exit of the throne room, the stench of fear slowly permeating the once crisp air. Still, you didn’t look away.

You wouldn’t look away.

“I can’t imply what is already apparent, my King.” The reverence slid off your tongue like a curse, Kaeyara almost singing a siren song on your back. The singular commoner became a steady stream, the exit doors flooded with the crowd that had, just minutes ago, been extremely invested in the drama you had dragged in with you.

The clamor of the commoners rushing out of the room didn’t shake the spear-like attention the 4 royals had fixed upon you at your words, but you weren’t done.

“You sent your people after him. All 4 of you.” The words were coming easy to you now, the rage finally loosening your tongue and your voice until you echoed off the high ceilings and the empty floor. “You intended to end him, the only one of you who was still Whole, the only one of you who hadn’t yet pawned his Heart and his Body away for power. You thought him weak, idealistic, stupid for believing that you needed a heart to rule.”

The 4 of them gave no indication that they heard you, aside from their preternatural focus spearing through you. It was just you and them in that accursed throne room now.

“The world knows what you did to him. The world knows how you tried to hunt him down like a criminal and put him in the ground. All because he saw his subjects as worthy of more than your tyranny. Because he treated us like equals and not lesser than. You tried to take his Heart and when you couldn’t, you let him for dead. And for that...”

The Royals were still motionless before you when you drew Kaeyara at long last, the obsidian blade gleaming clear and deadly and ready. Flames roared a battle cry in your ears, itching to be set free, itching to do what they were born to do- destroy.

A breath escaped your lips. The ground beneath you began to rumble.

Long Live the One King.

Another. All the Royals stood, the movements almost sinful and grotesque in its’ immortal grace. The ground’s rumble turned into a roar.

I’ve got you, my moon.

“And for that, you will all burn.”The world was pain. But it was nothing compared to the rage.

I’ve got you, my moon.

Oh, the rage.

He knew it like the back of his hand. Hadn’t he soothed it away with these very fingers, these very hands, despite the gut-wrenching burn? It washed over him, cloaking him, healing him, awakening him, forcing him to feel, feel, feel-

She was fighting. Somewhere far, far above him, she fought. The fire licked his collarbones almost affectionately in their heat, but there was an air of urgency around them- urgency and a lull, like the flames were slowing down, sputtering out- 

A grunt of pain escaped you as you fended off another attack from Hyunjin, the force of his assault nearly putting you to your knees. But you held on, as did Kaeyara. 

Lovely, death-kissed Kaeyara. It was almost like having him at your back, protecting you.

The 4 of them had descended upon you from all directions, the speed and force of their attack almost impossible for you to track and defend from, but it was like Kaeyara and the flames in your veins had taken control of your body. And Thank goodness for it, because it was only by sheer force of will that you were still standing, despite the bone-deep exhaustion weighing your sword arm down.

For him, you’d fight till the end. As long as it took for him to…to live. He had to live. He had to have heard you.  

Strike. Parry. Duck. 

“Did you really think you could win against all of us?” Jisung hissed, one arm wreathed with lightning and the other, a whip made of deadly metal.. Deadly. So, so deadly. You didn’t bother responding, not when that metal whip shot out towards you, the thin, tiny razors on the grooves of the metal aiming for your wrist, to slash through skin and sinew-

Duck. Block. Flame. 

“He was meant to lead us to a better world.” You screamed, a wall of flame erupting out of thin air, pushing all 4 of the royals back by a few feet. You were gasping for breath, your back against one wall of the throne room, the 4 royals having crowded you to it like a rat to a trap. But you were not a rat. Your own power might have been dwindling slowly, with the pressure of keeping yourself alive, while simultaneously burrowing through the castle to find him, awaken him, heal him- but it was no matter. You were no lost rat. You were Lady Revenge, and you would not be left unsated.

The flames began sputtering around him, the world beyond suddenly more ice cold instead of flame hot.

No. Not her. 

It was not just his own power of will that kept him from sliding back to his knees when he dragged himself to his feet. When he dove into the minds of the guards that watched over his cell to unlock the cell and then slit each other’s throats in tandem. When he staggered to the door, eyes squinting in the twilight dark of the underground dungeons. When he willed himself to shift, heal, become something Other, something Else, something that was worthy of what was thrumming in his own veins- 

In that moment, he would have sold his Heart and Body for the power he needed- 

Anything, anything, anything at all for.. For her.

Strike. Flame. Parry. 

“He did what none of you could. He united the people. Against you.” You leapt back, nearly slamming against the wall to avoid a freezing lance of ice that very nearly missed your shoulder. Hyunjin and his damn icicles. Kaeyara slashed wide, a ball of flame lobbed right at his face, followed by a series of slashes and parries that finally pushed him back, giving you some breathing space. 

“He did everything he did for us. For his people.” 

No ordinary mortal could have held their own against 4 Royals. Thankfully, you were anything but ordinary. You grew up training with these creatures, aware of every movement they could possibly make because they were your own. It paid to be a favored mortal’s daughter, especially if he was the Captain of the Royal Guard.

Between that, the kernel of flame that you’d inherited from your mother, and his Kaeyara… 

Maybe Lady Luck was shining upon you, because that singular tendril of flame that had been hunting for him…it sang. An 8-note whistle that reverberated through your very soul. It had succeeded. Kaeyara had confirmed it, her hum now more insistent. All you needed to do now was…

Flame. Dodge. Strike.

But that strike cost you, because Felix caught your distracted body in an almighty gust of wind- sweeping you off your feet and smack against the wall. There was no sound aside from the creak of your armor as you slid to the ground, landing on your knees. Too hard. 

And still, you had the audacity to not avert your eyes when the Royals looked at you, the rage simmering in your eyes giving even them a brief, uncharacteristic pause. 

“He did it for me.” Even on your knees from apparent defeat, you cut an impressive figure - injured, barely able to breathe, body riddled with injury, a forcefield of the thinnest flame just about keeping the Royals at bay as you kneeled against the wall, Kaeyara supporting your weight as you met the Royals eye for eye. 

Just a little longer. Just enough for him. Just. Enough-

Jisung stepped up to the wall of flame, half a thought dissipating the embers with a hiss of finality. 

“We all knew about his affection for you.” He walked up to you, your eyes still refusing to leave his. Defiant, to the bitter end. Even when Jisung grabbed you by your neck and slammed you against the wall. When Hyunjin’s ice pinned your wrists until you felt the burn of frostbite.

“We all knew about how Minho would trail after you like a lost kitten, looking for all the world like he was just another besotted mortal courting a pair of legs.” 

You snarled at the disrespect dripping from Felix’s tone, tapering off into a cough that left a trail of blood down the side of your lip. “Keep his name out of your sinner mouth.”

Keep them distracted. Kaeyara began to sing. His song. Just a little longer. 

“Sinner?” Jisung laughed, the sound as mirthless as it was dangerous. “He was the sinner. For thinking people like you deserved to have a voice. Look what you did with it. Wreak havoc, cause dissent and sow seeds of a rebellion everybody knows they can’t win.” 

A fork of lightning singed your neck where Jisung’s skin touched yours, a hiss of pain escaping you regardless of the defiance. 

“The Revolution isn’t one person.” you choked out, fighting and struggling against the haziness that was taking over the edges of your vision. Kaeyara lay on the floor below you, the hum from her almost deafening you- screaming at you to pick her up, run the monster through the neck with her, and then extend the favour to the rest- 

But you could barely keep your eyes open, your hands already numb from the cold. The lightning burn at your throat made it hard to breathe, to speak, but you held on- you’d hold on, for as long as it took.

“But the Revolution can die with one person.” 

Felix’s words chilled you. As you watched the unnamed cloak of forest green glide towards you, a lovely little knife sliding free in his hand as he stopped next to you at Jisung, you couldn’t help but smile a little. So this was how it would end.

“You said he did it for you, didn’t you?” Jisung smiled as he let go of you, watching you crumple to the floor again, only to be dragged up by Forest Green. Have the pretty knife positioned exactly on the line of your throat that his lightning had singed. 

“In that case, he died for you, too.”

When the knife glided its way through your throat, severing skin and bone, there was no pain. 

Because Minho stood at the doors to the throne room. 

Eyes wide in despair and depthless rage when he watched his brothers murder his..his sun. 

His sun had set on him. So would she set on his brothers.

You don’t remember dying. The world was pain, but the pain was far away. 

Because Minho was here. He was here, he was here, he was alive, he was here- 

And he was Other. Shadows of the deepest black onyx bled from his hands, spearing straight for the 4 people he had considered blood brothers. Shadows that promised terror beyond their deepest fears, nightmares beyond their darkest thoughts. Those eyes…eyes that had been as gold as the panthers’ on his signet was now swallowed by obsidian, the colour almost stark against the hue of his skin. When the Royals stepped towards him, possibly to placate him, likely to destroy him, a snarl of sheer animal fury escaped his barred lips. At the sight of yourself bleeding out on the ground, that stupidly small smile on your eyes, Kaeyara screaming at him to do something, ANYTHING-

 He was Minho, and he was Not- 

And then the screaming began. 

Finally, you could sleep. 

Taglist ( What I remember, atleast >.<

@delicatewerewolfsoul @aliceu @whiteprincessofnohr @mingkii @t-toodumbtocare @hongism @the7thcrow @chogiwow @http-wommy @dom--minnie @wingkkun-main @heresyourramen @fizzydrink698 @crispy-chan @iwillgiveyoumyhappiness @binniesthighs

@lxmilights @lavenderbexlatte @jl-micasea-fics @decembermoonskz @chvnnie @jeonwonhi

Ella Notes: ....Hello! I'm back <3

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This reads so natural?? Like the dialogues don't feel like dialogues.....I really like this series

QUEENMAKER | CHAPTER 10

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pairing chan x reader

genre ninth member au, enemies to lovers, angst, fluff, coming of age, social media, cancel culture, anxiety, depression, forbidden love,

summary To JYPE, the solution is simple; take the sole trainee that will not debut with your brand new girl group, and use her to replace the missing vocalist in your male group that insisted on starting as nine.

Unfortunately, to the fans and the members themselves, it isn't that simple.

status ongoing

taglist OPEN

previous | masterlist | next

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The studio is silent when you enter, the door clicking softly shut behind you. Neither of its occupants stir, even though Chan had just called out for you to come in when you'd knocked; he's staring at his computer screen now, fingers hovering over a keyboard as he listens. Han is on the other side of the room, fast asleep on the sofa with him mouth hanging half-open. 

A coffee cup sits in the ground next to him and his phone dangles from relaxed fingers, dangerously close to falling. You lean over and grab it just as it starts to slide from his grasp; Han doesn't stir, not even when your shadow falls over his face. You catch a glimpse of his phone screen before your thumb locks it, long lines of lyrics set out in a basic notes app, the top bar lined with notifications; you put it down hurriedly on the armrest of the sofa, not wanting to pry.

When you look up, Chan is watching you, an unreadable expression on his face.

"Hi," you say, turning your back on Han. Your hands are awkward after touching his phone - you fold them in front of you, one hand twisting at the fingers of the other.

"Hi," he replies softly, and smiles - something that's meant to be encouraging, you think, but this is so far out of your normal routine that you don't think there's anything that would let you just relax, rather than standing here awkwardly in the middle of the room with nothing else around to draw his attention.

"There's another chair over there," he says, pointing to the corner behind you. "Come and listen to this."

A clear goal. An easy one to achieve too - the breath rushes from your chest as you drag the chair over to his desk, some of the tension in your limbs draining out with it. You sigh again as you sit down, this time as your tired body presses back into the seat and finally finds relief - you've been engrossed in practise all day, sliding right past lunch and nearly dinner too, barely stopping for a break. Not that you'd meant to, you knew better than that, but when you'd felt like you were actually getting somewhere-

"You look tired," Chan comments as he hands you a set of headphones, one hand idly untangling the wire as it stretches out to you. His voice is decidedly neutral, his tongue lazy as it lets the English syllables slide past one by one. He talks to you in English almost all the time recently, you've noticed; ever since the album released, or maybe a little before. Not that you mind. English is...comfortable, in a way that Korean sometimes isn't. It's always been easier for you to be Australian.

"Practise was good today, though," you reply. "I feel like I might actually be able to dance in the group without sticking out now."

"You've been doing that for a while," Chan says, bemused. "Lee Know didn't have anything to say at all the other day."

You can't help the derisive snort that escapes your mouth, swallowing the acerbic laugh that tries to follow it before you can make even more of a fool of yourself. It's so rude; maybe you are tired. You certainly aren't as careful as you usually are, even though you know that can preclude trouble. "I don't think he's being as hard now that I'm not debuting in two weeks," you blurt out, and then drop your eyes down to the headphones in your hands. 

"That doesn't mean he's lying," Chan insists. His hand pats your knee - just a brush of his fingers, there and there and gone again. "You don't really need all this practise anymore, you know."

A shrug works its way up to your shoulders, though it feels more like a defensive hunch than anything else. "I'd rather practise than waste my time sitting around," you answer, and at least the words are strong, even if your body is not. "Especially when there's still a chance I could end up sitting around in Australia by the end of the year."

Something flashes across Chan's face, twisting at the edges of his mouth for just a moment before disappearing - disappointment, or frustration? It twists at your gut twice as hard, whatever it is, upsetting the delicate balance you'd found for just a moment while sitting here. "Do you want to listen to this song?" he asks, changing the subject before you can say anything to defend yourself. "We recorded it roughly, but I need a real version of it, and I think you'll like it..."

His voice trails off as he turns to the computer, pulling up whatever he's been working on. You take that as a sign to pull the headphones over your ears, offsetting one side slightly so that you can still hear him. Music fills your ears - a slow, roundabout beat and a heavy bass, overstrung by lyrics about bravery and fear and the darkness of being alone. Beautiful, in a way you're not sure how to express, and artistic, winding its way into your chest where you won't easily forget it.

You really like this song, so much that you're almost afraid to admit it; because if you did, you'd have to admit too, how its spiralling beat brushes against that dark spiral of anxiety that always lives in your chest, and the cold memories that the words stir up-

"I like that," is all you say when the music ends, one final downbeat cutting through the instruments abruptly.

"Really?" Chan asks, like it's unexpected, or unbelieveable.

"Of course," you insist, headphones sliding down around your neck. "You really want me to sing that?"

"Well, if you're going to spend all of your time working anyway, you might as well do some of our work for us," he says, the tone of his voice and the way his head tilts to point at Han's sleeping form informing you that he is joking. "Listen to it a couple more times, I'll see if Han has the lyrics written down on his phone, and then we'll try it."

"Why wouldn't you be able to sleep?"

Chan's voice startles you, loud after a long period of silence. You hadn't even seen him turn to look at you, or even stop working to check the messages that are popping up in the group chat, his phone propped loosely between his hand and the table. "What?" you ask, one hand coming up to stifle a yawn as it tugs at your jaw.

Chan glances down at his phone screen as another message pops up, and then back at you. "Earlier, you said you wouldn't be able to sleep if you went home," he says, by way of explanation.

"Oh, right." You'd forgotten about that text. You hadn't really thought about it being something that might raise questions at the time; you'd been more focused on the sudden worry you'd had over him assuming that you were regularly here all day and all night. "My house is just too quiet sometimes, I guess. I'm not really used to living alone."

His head tilts, curiousity flaring in his eyes. "You know, I've never actually asked where you live," he says. "Are you still in the dorms?"

"They gave me an apartment," you answer. "I think we're in the same building, actually. That's what they told me, anyway."

"Really?" His eyebrows shoot upwards in surprise. "And you've never come over for dinner? Changbin hasn't dragged you to the gym? No one's run into you in the hall?"

"Lee Know sat in my living room for like ten minutes once?" you offer weakly, though you know it's not nearly what he's looking for. You've got nothing to offer him - even Minseo hasn't been over in a few weeks, each of you too busy on your own trajectory to cross paths. You'd had lunch in the cafeteria twice, and that was all, far from the silent walls of your empty house and it's too-big rooms.

A smile ghosts across Chan's face, strangled by the constant turn of his thoughts back to the problem he thinks he has identified. "On his way back from the store?" he questions knowingly, and you nod.

"He said no one was home at your place."

"If he went into our house, why did he-" he starts, and then cuts himself off halfway, shaking his head. "You should come over for dinner or something. Watch one of Han's animes. If I'd known you were in the building, I would have invited you ages ago."

Apprehension rises in your chest at the openness of the invitation, the way he's able to simply pick it up and throw it out there without even a moment of hesitation. Not that you should feel dread over something as simple as an invitation to dinner, with a group of people you now see every day anyway...but you've never really seen them outside the studio, and you wouldn't know what to expect even if you sat here and tried to guess. 

And even this, sitting here in the dark talking to Chan, is something you've never done before, the reason why you'd sat here so quiet when you'd first come in; if your body wasn't so tired, if the night wasn't dragging on into morning as you spoke, you don't think you'd have been able to sit so still in this chair at all.

"Maybe," you say, acknowledging the invitation with a dip of your chin. "When there's time. I'm really busy practising for debut right now, and I don't want to miss anything."

You're surprised by the look that passes over his face, the tightening of his mouth and the corners of his eyes. "You spend a lot of time in that studio," he says - and you're not sure what to think about the tone of voice that he uses, switching back and forth between stern and...soft, like he's worried he'll say the wrong thing or something. As if he could do something wrong here, when he is the leader and you are-

Well, nothing. You're nothing. God knows what he sees when he looks at you, other than the trainee he was unwillingly saddled with.

"Yeah," you acknowledge, because there's no use in denying it when you know they know the kind of hours you've been pulling. There being eight of them just means it's impossible to avoid running into one of them at every strange hour of the day. "If these are the last three months I have here, I don't want to waste any of it."

"You said that at the concert," Chan recalls. "You still feel like you're not going to debut?"

The memory sits awkwardly in the air of the room; you shift in your seat, shrugging as lightly as you can pull down the movement of your shoulders, trying to play it off. "Do you still think I'm scared of you too?" you question, trying to play it off easily rather than having the words slide heavy from your tongue.

Amusement dances in his eyes. "Maybe not so much," he answers. "You made a joke earlier."

You frown. "Is that...weird? I make jokes all the time, don't I?"

"Not as often as I'd like," he says, and then his face softens. "It was nice, though. So is this - us, talking."

"Mm," you hum, your mouth closed around several sentences that spring immediately to mind. The instinct to measure everything you say and watch your mouth is burnt into you, caution wrapping its cold little hands around your throat every time you start to relax. And now you don't know what to say, when it feels too pointed to make a joke after he's just pointed it out, and too crass to pull out excuses for why this sort of one-on-one rarely happens - and then silence stretches too thin, and time ticks too far onwards, and you've missed-

"Can I tell you what I think?" Chan says and leans back, his arms reaching towards the ceiling as he stretches.

A breath hitches in your chest, apprehension freezing it still. "Okay," you say, your hands twisting together.

His gaze is steady when it returns to you, his hand still where it comes to lie flat on the surface of his desk. In the background, Han shifts in his sleep, the couch cushions shifting underneath him. "I think you're scared to be one of us," he says, every word carefully measured against some weight you cannot see. "And you're scared to trust us. Maybe just me, specifically."

Your heart leaps into your throat in surprise, tears pricking at the back of your eyes. "I'm not-" you begin, but his hand lifts in the air, stopping you short.

"I don't mean in a bad way," he hurries to add, before you can go on. "I understand why; I wouldn't trust anyone either after what happened to you with Midnight. And I've been there before, you know, so...so I know why, I promise. But...I wish you would let me help you. I really want to help you."

You swallow hard, but the lump in your throat remains, the tears threatening to gather in the corners of your stinging eyes. Your stomach feels like its been turned upside down, your equilibrium shaken and turned around. "I..." you begin, as if you have a response, but nothing follows it, your mind racing to catch up in a conversation you hadn't expected to have and didn't plan for. "I...this is my last chance. If I stop, if I..."

"Hey," Chan says. "I understand, okay? And I'm not going to kick you out, or yell at you, or whatever it is you think a leader does. I like having you around, it's too late for all of that now, okay?"

The joke is light, struggling to lift itself in the oppressive air of the studio, but it makes its way to you anyway, lifting a little of the weight off of your shoulders. "I really like your music," you tell him, and push a deep breath down into the bottom of your lungs. "I want to be one of you, really, and I don't - I don't think you would do that, I swear, I just...I know that it's not always up to you. The company can do what they like, and if they think I don't look like I fit in, or I'm not working as hard as you do, or they just don't like how-"

"You shouldn't worry about that," Chan says over the top of you, his face changing. "That's my job - you leave that to me, and focus on the things your working on."

You look down at your hands, then over at Han - anywhere but his gaze, when you say, "I can't trust them to listen to you. Not until I make it to debut."

Chan falls silent, long enough that your eyes stray back to him, unable to look away for any longer. You find a mess of emotions written across his face, lit by the illumination of his computer screen as he messes with the mouse, his attention far away from the track he's idly playing with. 

"Okay," he says when he's done, forcing his hand to move away from the keyboard. "I meant to talk you out of burning yourself out, but I don't think that's going to work."

"Sorry," you say mutely, and feel your shoulders hunch.

"It's okay," he says, before you can retract into yourself completely. "It's okay to be scared. It is scary. So, let's come to an agreement."

There's an unintended challenge in his voice, a way that his eyes watch you that incentivises you to sit up straighter and swallow down all that cold anxiety that freezes in your veins. "Okay," you say willingly. "Like what?"

You like the silent approval you see in his face, the way his mouth relaxes and starts to untwist from the frown it had turned itself into several minutes ago. "You promise me that you know how to take care of yourself, and you can practise as much as you feel like you need to until debut and we won't stop you," he says, "but after debut, you promise you're going to slow down. And you're going to trust me."

It's funny - you hadn't thought anything but the result at the end of these three months would make you feel better, but somehow, he strings together the exact right words to lift that weight off your chest and shine a light down the tunnel. You hadn't thought anyone would be able to do that. Maybe that's why you'd been locked away in the dance rooms, all alone; maybe he was right that you didn't trust anyone, and that maybe you should start.

"I can do that," you say, nodding in agreement. "And I can take care of myself. I won't debut if I'm injured, or I collapse or something."

"Good," he says, satisfied, and then adds, "And you come over for dinner, whenever we invite you. And you go out with your friends again. One of the girls from Midnight chased me down the other day to ask about you, and honestly I'm kind of scared of ignoring her."

"Minseo," you say and, inexplicably, you smile. "Sorry. She's...an extrovert."

"Two jokes," Chan points out, and then laughs at the look on your face, turning away to shut down his computer. "It was fine. She was cool. You have good taste in friends."

"We've been here together for a long time," you say, your eyes idly tracking the movement of his mouse. You glance at the clock in the corner of his screen just by chance - and then do a double take when you see the number there, squinting as if you've misread it. "Is it four AM?"

"It is, actually," Chan sighs as the screen goes dark, closing the laptop and pushing his chair back towards the couch. "Time to go home, I think. Do you want to walk with us?" 

His hand reaches out to rouse Han, the other reaching for the boy's phone, left abandoned on his desk. His coffee still sits abandoned on the ground, long gone cold since that first conversation in the group chat that had led to all of this. Funny, how that one little thing, left forgotten on the floor, had led to a night you wouldn't soon forget. 

"I'd love to," you reply, and reach for the coffee before anyone can knock it over, throwing it in the trash. 

TAGLIST

@kokinu09 @rainfallingfromthesky @lixie-phoria @mysweethannie @chlodavids @hanniemylovelyquokka @tfshouldidohere @lauraliisa @puppysmileseungmin @kalopsian-thoughts @puppy-minnie @readerofallthingss @dvbkie099 @kthstrawberryshortcake-main @acker-night @d-chagi @lynlyndoll @borahae-reads @ihrtlix @yienmarkk @minhwa @i2innie @jinnie-ret @conwunder @amesification @starssongs98 @weirdhumanbeinglol @morinuu @the-weird-mold-in-the-sink @bokkiesplace @amyyscorner @jiisungllvr @skzstaykatsy @blackhairandbangs @jungkookies1002 @hyuuukais @imsiriuslyreal @thatonedemigodfromseoul @gini143 @mercurywritesstuff @splat00z @filmbypsh @palindrome969 @crabrangoongirl25 @enzos-shit @jabmastersupriseee @kayleefriedchicken @slutfortits @duhgurl @cheshireshiya @worcesheshestershiresauce @defnotfertilizedtoesw

look at this gem of a fic, banter is my favorite trope and this one hit all in the right spots. I'm in LOVEEE with their dyanamic and will make up false scenarios on this for the foreseeable future. I absolutely devoured 15k words without my mind deviating once. I love this site, no seriously how do authors put out this good content for free?? I want this as a book so bad

𝐚𝐜𝐞・h.h.

— in which volleyball superstar and your personal hell hwang hyunjin proposes a trade-off you can't refuse: his matchmaking services for a passing anthropology grade. the plan is foolproof in theory; in practice, it is something else entirely.

words・15.2k

pairing・volleyball player!hyunjin x tutor!reader (gn)

genres・college!au, sports!au, fake enemies to friends to lovers, fluff, humor, hurt/comfort, slice of life, mutual pining, slow burn. hyunjin is a huge flirt. mc #DGAF. two polar opposites sharing one soul. a seungjin fic if u squint. loosely inspired by the manga/anime haikyuu!!

warnings・mentions of anxiety, fear of failure, heartbreak, loneliness, and self-image. course language and callous banter (as always) ft. suggestive flirting and one kms joke. some of the referenced players and coaches are real; this fic is not.

playlist・collision by stray kids・midnight city by m83・eternity by bang chan・waiting for us by stray kids・value by ado・dreaming by smallpools

a/n・writing this felt like returning to my roots tbh. i love volleyball and i love sports aus and i love, love hwang hyunjin. thank u to my sahar for bringing this fic to life with me, as always; i can no longer write for him without also writing for you. i hope u guys enjoy reading this as much as i adored writing it. happy late birthday, our jinnie, our hyunjin, our forever ace; you are so unbelievably loved ♡

“Not a word out of you,” you say, tossing your backpack onto the floor of the lecture hall with a heavy-handed flick. “I’m serious.”

Hyunjin glances up at you with a frown. “When did people stop saying good morning?”

Your lack of an immediate comeback tells him the situation is dire. He observes you for a moment, his mouth falling open, hanging still, then curving into a slow, serpentine smile.

“Look at me.”

“No.”

“Look at me.”

“No.”

“Please, angel.”

“No! Leave me alone.”

Hyunjin slumps back into his seat, thinking hard. The solution occurs to him with a poke of his tongue into his cheek. “Coffee on me for a week.”

At this, your hands stop rummaging in your bag. You cock your head, your interest piqued. Got you. 

When you finally humor him and turn around, you’re flinching like you’re in pain, eyes closed and breath held and all. He giggles and leans in for a closer look. Tendrils of your perfume reach him from here, floral and light like a tropical coastline. He could’ve counted your eyelashes if he wasn’t so flummoxed by the state of your forehead.

“What the hell did you do?”

“Tried to cut my own bangs,” you sigh. “It didn’t go very well and now I look like Rock Lee.”

Hyunjin lets out a forceful laugh. “You’ve seen Naruto?”

You open your eyes. Only then does Hyunjin remember how little distance he left between your faces, when he’s staring straight into them and all the strange, starry speckles they hold.

The air between you curdles like sour milk.

Things are awkward between you often, he’s realized recently. What’s more, he didn’t think he was capable of being awkward with anyone anymore until he met you. It was your ill-fated seat that he chose to sit next to on the first day of ANTH 111, your ill-fated lap onto which he chose to spill his Americano, and the rest was history (or, in this case, anthropology). His tongue ends up in sailor’s knots with every smart-aleck comment and pitiful laugh you’ve given him since. Maybe there’s more to it, maybe there isn’t—Hyunjin doesn’t think about it much. He doesn’t like thinking in general.

You pull away from each other in unison. You clear your throat, glancing elsewhere. 

“Of course I’ve seen Naruto,” you quip, and everything is normal again. “Why do you seem surprised?”

“Because you’re so scholarly.”

“I am not scholarly.”

He raises an eyebrow. “You go to a park to play chess with old people on weekends.”

“I need to get my steps in somehow.”

“You didn’t know what Urban Dictionary was until I told you to look up—”

“Ugh, I learned too much about you that day.”

“Your favorite social media platform is Quizlet,” he bursts, exasperated. “Quizlet.”

“It is not.” An introspective pause. “Is it?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised.” Hyunjin throws his feet up on the chair below him, jabs in your direction with a bandaged finger. “There is no way you enjoy watching 2D men beat each other up in your free time. I don’t buy it.”

“Honestly, I thought you’d have more to say about my current appearance than my hobbies.”

He does, though. Matter of fact, he’s been curating a list since this conversation started: Vector from Despicable Me, Dora the Explorer’s hot older sibling, Spock. You face-planted into a lawnmower. You mistook a paper shredder for a hat. It goes on.

But then his head turns. Your eyes meet again. It’s hard to sustain an inner monologue and look at your face at the same time.

He reaches up, nudges a lock of your hair over a centimeter or so, and gives the patch of forehead a gentle flick.

“Watermelon,” he mumbles with a sickening smile.

You divert your attention to your lecture notes with a disappointed click of your tongue. “You’re getting soft.”

He spends the entire lecture daydreaming about tropical coastlines.

“I only get coffee from that one place on the east side of campus, by the way,” you say as you’re strolling out the building together, “and I get it a very specific way. Can you handle it?”

“Your faith gets me out of bed in the morning,” Hyunjin deadpans. “I’ll handle it, love. Text me your order.”

All of a sudden, you position your hands close to your stomach, the lapels of your jacket casting them in shadow. Your fingers begin to move in a sequence that he’d recognize anywhere.

“Body flicker jutsu,” you whisper, and then you’re scurrying off without another word—but you do glance back at him to gauge his response. Your smile is purely effulgent, your laugh but a faint sigh against the main quad’s busy thrum.

Hyunjin gapes at your retreating figure for so long that phosphenes start prancing around his field of view. Then he heads to the gym. His heart is pounding against his ribs like a battering ram.

“Hwang, I need you in my office.”

Hyunjin stops lacing up his shoes to see Coach Bang standing on the court’s sideline with a grim air about him. He glances at his captain, confused.

“Don’t look at me,” Minho says mid-stretch. “Godspeed.”

“Thanks, cap.” Useless.

Head volleyball coach Christopher Bang’s workspace reminds Hyunjin of a morgue. It’s all fluorescent lights and spotless white walls, the only decorative fixture a picture of his siblings, parents, and dog in front of the Sydney Opera House, framed and facing him atop his desk. Hyunjin once snuck the thing into the bathroom, an innocent plot to satiate his curiosity, and promptly discovered the man’s propensity for violence. He’s packing beneath those dry-cleaned polos, by the way.

Hyunjin closes the door and takes a seat. Bang taps a knuckle against the tempered glass of his monitor. “You can read, right?”

“Yes, coach,” he sighs. Everyone’s expectations for him are subterranean.

From: Jinyoung Park «asiansoul_jyp@snu.edu» To: Bang “Christopher” Chan «cb97@snu.edu» Subject: Not good

See email from Hwang’s antopology professor below . He submitted the complete script of the Trolls movie instead of his final paper and now he’s failing the class . Not good . Sort out ASAP

JP Sent from my iPad

Bang snatches up his mouse and scrolls, his ears turning scarlet. “Wrong email.”

“Yep.”

From: Kyeyoung Kim «kyeyoungkim@snu.edu» To: Jinyoung Park «asiansoul_jyp@snu.edu» Subject: Regarding Hwang Hyunjin

To Director of Athletics Park,

I am writing to inform you that, as of yesterday, Mr. Hwang Hyunjin has a D- (64.9%) in ANTH 111: Cultural Anthropology, due to his submission of the complete script of a kids’ movie instead of his final paper.

It is disappointing to see Mr. Hwang trivialize and ridicule my class to such a degree. Please see to it that he reorganizes his priorities lest his Student-Athlete Participation Agreement do so for him.

Regards, Kyeyoung Kim Professor of Anthropology

“That’s bullshit!”

“We’re in agreement there.” Bang folds his arms over his chest, throws his foot over his knee. “Do you know what your Student-Athlete Participation Agreement says, Hwang?”

“Does anyone?” Hyunjin scoffs. Bang whips out a form and brings it to eye level, the thing covered from top to bottom in microscopic Times New Roman.

“No way you just had that.”

“I had it delivered ten minutes ago,” Bang confesses, then clears his throat and begins to recite. “All student-athletes must complete the academic term with a C or higher in all courses, should they wish to continue their participation in athletics thereafter.”

Hyunjin stiffens. “What the fuck? I’ve never heard of—”

“If any Department of Athletics personnel,” Bang continues, raising his voice, “have reason to believe that a student-athlete will not be able to satisfy this requirement, they are encouraged to utilize resources such as academic advising or peer tutoring in guiding said student-athlete back onto the correct path.”

He shoves the piece of paper across his desk. “Read that name aloud for me.”

Hyunjin stares at the signature at the bottom of the page, scrawled so carelessly that most of it deviates away from its designated line. There is a rare hollowness in his chest that he recognizes as anxiety. With it comes a glimpse of a life without volleyball, the question of what little of him would remain.

“Hwang Hyunjin,” he says under his breath.

The office goes silent. Bang tucks the form back into his drawer. It closes with a gentle click.

Then comes the yelling.

“The Trolls movie, Hwang Hyunjin? Trolls?! Are you fucking with me right now?”

“It was a cultural reset! The pinnacle of modern media! How’s that for anthropology?”

“BAD!” Bang explodes, gesturing to the email emphatically. “VERY, VERY BAD!”

Hyunjin slumps over, dejected.

“You’ve never had trouble with school before.” He leans over his desk imposingly. “What the hell happened this semester? What changed?”

Nothing is the first answer that comes to mind, but Hyunjin’s pulse spikes like a lie detector. Upon the inside of his eyes replays a scene of a certain someone with watermelon bangs doing teleportation jutsu at him from a few yards away, wearing a smile made of some kind of space dust that astronomists haven’t discovered yet.

He grits his teeth, annoyed. This is what happens when he thinks.

“Beats me,” he lies. “Graduation stress, maybe.”

“Does any of it have to do with Piazza?” 

Hyunjin shudders.

It just might, actually.

Modesty has no place in the career he’s had: high school national champion turned ace hitter in both the South Korean U21 roster and regular rotation for Seoul National University, the best collegiate volleyball team in the country. His name has lived at the top of ranking lists and the center of gold medals since he turned old enough to qualify for them; the press believes him the instigant of South Korea’s imminent volleyball revolution. It’s a mouthful, he knows.

It was never a question that he would go professional; the question was who he should talk to and where he would go.

At the start of the school year, Bang, acting in place of the agent he was advised to find and never bothered to, gave him a list of people to reach out to. On the very top was none other than Roberto Piazza, the chairman and head coach of Allianz Milano, one of the most eminent club teams in the world—and current home to Hyunjin’s personal idol, outside hitter Ishikawa Yuki.

Hyunjin thought his poor coach had finally succumbed to his old age. The thought of stepping onto the same court as Ishikawa felt sacrilegious, let alone donning the red, white, and navy blue of Allianz Milano with him. But Bang slapped him on the back of the neck and reminded him that going professional was equal parts preparation and opportunity; he was never going to know the answers to questions he didn’t ask. Hyunjin was coerced to fire off an introductory email despite his reservations.

Piazza replied to his email within the week.

For the last five months, Hyunjin has been fighting with tooth and nail to manage his expectations. He scrolls past the team’s social media posts like they burn his eyes. He replies to Piazza’s emails right before working out with Changbin under the assumption that whatever the shredded libero does to him will eviscerate his brain. If his world is made of dreams, this is the one at its very core, imbued with destructive potential the second it became attainable.

But that’s the last five months. The last five weeks have been you kicking him in the shin because he’s laughing (or trying to make you laugh) and the professor is staring; you listening to him rant and rave about volleyball when he knows you couldn’t care less about the sport; you relaying the contents of your class readings like hot gossip, your eyes wild and hands flying around because you can’t contain your excitement. You, you, you.

He cards a hand through his air, regaining his focus. “You know how I feel about Piazza.”

“Expect the worst, hope for the best.” Bang’s chair skids backwards as he stands up. “I think it’s a good approach.”

Suddenly, he is directly in front of Hyunjin, low enough to meet his eyes. His hands rest upon his shoulders firmly.

“But hope is hungry, and it will consume you if you let it,” he says. “Do not let it, Hyunjin. I’m not asking.”

Even while being squeezed to a pulp and regarded with the cold intensity of a statue, Hyunjin can’t help but feel anchored, somehow, to the floor of this miserable office. Protected.

Bang lets go of him. “I’m not asking you to find a tutor by the end of the week, either.”

Hyunjin groans. “Yeah, yeah. I’m on it.”

A set of bandaged fingers appear in your periphery to place a paper cup onto your laptop. Accompanying the smell of fresh coffee is that of smoky rose, as decidedly douchey as ever.

“I thought you said your order was complicated.”

You look up from your phone to see Hyunjin plop into the adjacent seat. His long, caramel-colored hair is damp and unstyled in the aftermath of a morning shower, droplets of water pearling on the lapels of a navy blue windbreaker, layered over a white long sleeve. You recognize the outfit by now as game gear.

“Was it not?” You ask.

“It was an Americano, love. I walked up to the cashier and placed an order for an Americano.”

“Well, I wasn’t sure if you could handle that much.” He flips you off as you squint at the cup. “Someone wrote their number on the lid, by the way.”

“What? Really?”

“No.”

He shoves you hard enough for your upper body to drape over the opposite armrest. You’re still cackling by the time you’ve straightened up again.

“Why did you get this, anyway?” Hyunjin grumbles. “I thought you had a sweet tooth.”

“I do, but you don’t.”

Only then does the fool understand that you had no intention of charging him in coffee just for a haircut reveal. He takes back the coffee hesitantly.

“Thanks,” he says at last. “Nice of you.”

“I know, right? Hated it,” you respond, and he almost chokes on his first sip.

You almost choke on nothing when Kim Seungmin materializes in the aisle adjacent. He holds out a hand in Hyunjin’s direction. “Yo.”

Hyunjin dabs it up without putting down his Americano. “I fully forgot you were in this class.”

“Well, I’m due for my weekly appearance.” Seungmin slips into the seat directly below you, glancing at you over his shoulder. “Hey, Y/N.”

“Hi,” you say, somehow managing to stumble over the single syllable the word has. You thank your lucky stars that you fixed your hair yesterday.

You like Kim Seungmin. Not just in the cutesy, crushy way, but in the “I relinquish my rights” way where you spend every waking moment cursing out whatever stroke of misfortune placed Hyunjin in the seat next to you instead of him. He’s funny, gorgeous, and talented—a vocal performance major with a student-athlete contract—and you think your infatuation is more than justified. Hyunjin thinks it’s hilarious.

You side-eye your blonde adversary, prepared to see one of three things: a suppressed laugh, a dramatic eye-roll, or a mature kissy face that usually results in the first option. You’re met with something far more worrisome.

He’s thinking.

That can’t be good.

Suddenly, his phone screen lights up with a text that temporarily wipes the conspiratorial gleam from his eye. Hyunjin scans it over and groans. “Can this guy do his fucking job?”

“He wouldn’t have to if you didn’t quit,” Seungmin answers. “I’ll never forget you, Manager Hwang.”

“Shut up.” You peer at Hyunjin, silently requesting an explanation. “Our captain is forcing us to help him look for a new team manager. We need one for playoffs because of some stupid U-League rule—Seung, why do you look morose?”

“I’m mourning.” Seungmin does look morose indeed. “Hyunjin committed larceny last year and our coach punished him by making him our team manager for the rest of the year. It was so funny.”

Hyunjin slides down his seat. “It was the worst experience of my life.”

Neither man seems inclined to elaborate on the larceny thing. You choose to digress. “Can I ask why?”

“He had to be responsible,” Seungmin whispers. “For other people.”

The top of Hyunjin’s head stops right next to your armrest. You reach over and pat his hair in faux sympathy. “Poor thing.”

“Hardass refused to do it again this year, so now we’re recruiting.” Seungmin props an elbow upon the back of his chair, looks at you contemplatively. “I don’t suppose you have four hours to spare every day.”

Hyunjin scoffs from below you. Loudly. “This one? Team manager?”

“I can see it.”

“I can see killing myself, maybe.”

The next time you reach for him is to smack his forehead. A crisp smack resounds around the barren lecture hall, and Hyunjin cusses into his seat cushion.

“Seems like a great candidate to me,” Seungmin muses, and the warm smile he gives you mirrors onto your face before you can think better of it. God, it’s pretty. You wonder how it would feel pressed against your own.

Hyunjin is now completely out of sight and halfway onto the floor. “I miss when you didn’t come to class, Seungmin.”

Eighty minutes later, you’ve just emerged from the classroom when Seungmin calls out to you. You come to such a sudden halt that Hyunjin almost trips over you, but you barely notice him stumble, utterly enraptured by the hand Seungmin brings to the strands of hair by your ear, the fingers that dust your cheek as they pluck a small piece of lint from out of the tresses.

“Sorry.” He flicks it away with a sheepish smile. “I couldn’t unsee it.”

You manage to thank him just before your whole body ceases to function. Hyunjin sidesteps the two of you, yawning.

Seungmin excuses himself not too long after you reach the main quad. You also turn to leave, sparing Hyunjin a curt farewell in the process. He hooks his pointer finger around the handle at the top of your backpack and lugs you backwards with infuriating ease.

“I didn’t like that at all.”

“I don’t care. I have something to tell you.”

“You have a child, don’t you?”

“Hello—who do you think I am?”

“The one-night-stand’s poster child,” you reply. “The champion of the contraception industry.”

“Yeah, contraception industry. It’s right there in the name.”

You can’t argue with that.

“What do you have to tell me?”

A shadow of hesitation flits across Hyunjin’s face. Your smile falters. Is it possible that you’re about to have a serious conversation with him for the first time? Maybe you should’ve saved the secret son bit for another time.

“I’m failing anthro.”

So much for a serious conversation. 

“Come again?”

He repeats the mystifying statement.

“You’re joking.”

The look on his face says otherwise, though, and your eyebrows disappear into your hair.

“You’re failing anthro?”

“I just said that, yes.”

“You’re failing anthropology?”

“Mhm.”

“Just so we’re clear—you’re failing Introduction to Cultural Anthropology?”

“Yes. I’m glad you’re having fun.”

This is the best day of your life. “I didn’t even know that was possible.”

“Yeah, well, our professor has no media literacy,” he mutters.

“What?”

“Nothing.” Hyunjin clears his throat. “Anyways, I was thinking—”

“Wow! Congratulations. That’s a big—oomf—”

Hyunjin puts his entire hand over your face. Your mangled noises of protest go unacknowledged.

“I was thinking,” he continues, pushing your head around like a stick shift, “you and I can work out some kind of deal.”

You shove his wrist off you with a revolted groan. “I think I just ate some athletic tape.”

“Happens. You wanna hear the deal or not?”

“Does it involve ingesting more sports equipment?”

“Do you want it to?”

“Just tell me the deal, boy.”

“Alright.” He takes a deep breath. “If you help me pass this class—I’ll set you up with Seungmin.”

Your head performs a triple-axel on your neck. You are unable to respond for what feels like multiple hours. Finally: “I’m gonna need you to elaborate.”

“On which part?”

“All of them. Everything.”

Hyunjin sighs, then scans the courtyard. His gaze settles on the student union a little ways off. “Are you hungry?”

You pick up a sandwich and a smoothie in a state of nervous stupor. One would think it’s the prime minister you’re about to have lunch with and not an imbecilic left-side hitter eating from three different entrees at the same time.

He’s chosen a table a few yards away from a planter of flowering cherry blossom trees. You feel jealous eyes on the side of your face as you take a seat across from Hyunjin, but they don’t know that his telephone pole legs still bump against yours even with them drawn as close to your body as anatomically possible. Or that he’s drawing up a literal Ponzi scheme on your sandwich wrapper. You wager you’ve had better company.

“You like anthropology. I like listening to you talk about anthropology.” He traces over the wrapper’s left corner. “And I kinda want you to boss me around. That weird?”

“Yes, definitely,” you mumble around a mouthful of bread. “Please continue.”

“Conclusion one: you should be my tutor.” He taps in place as if applying a finishing touch, then swaps to the opposite side. “You also like my teammate, but he’s neck-deep in volleyball and music this semester, which makes him hard to get a hold of—for most people.”

“Let me guess. Not for you.”

“Ten points to Ravenclaw.” His British accent is nightmarish. “Seung and I live in the same building. We get dinner when we go back from practice together. Conclusion two: you should come with us.”

“To dinner or to practice?”

“To both. Which brings us to my third and final conclusion—”

He slams a fist onto the center of the wrapper.

“—you should manage our team.”

“I knew it!” You slam the table as well, your smoothie wobbling upon impact. “You’re trying to swindle me! You can’t pay for my labor with more labor. What do you take me for?”

“It’s not labor, dumbass! Ask our last manager! He didn’t do shit!”

“Yeah? Who was your last manager?”

“Me!”

Oh, right. “But you hated it!”

“I hate everything that isn’t playing volleyball. Try again.”

You fold your arms over your chest. “You said you’d kill yourself if I managed you.”

Hyunjin starts balling up your sandwich wrapper. “It’s true. I thought about you and my coach getting along and promptly got a rash. But it makes so much sense: you do whatever you want during practice, tutor me afterwards, and then you and Seung can eyefuck over ramen or something. My coach hops off my dick, you hop on Seung’s—”

“STOP!” A girl drops her receipt not too far away, startled by your outburst. “Stop right there. I get it. Stop.”

“It’s a good plan.” He flicks the paper ball towards the nearest trash can. It drops into the hole without so much as a brush against the rim. “You know it is.”

You’re loath to admit that you do. “When did you even come up with all this?”

He flicks a thumb in the direction of your anthropology class.

“No fucking wonder you’re failing.”

“What is this, mock trial?”

The owner of this voice is the third man you’ve seen today donning that navy windbreaker, white long-sleeve combo. He has a face that reminds you of your neighbor’s cat from back home, sleek and sharp and only slightly sinister. There’s a dash of humor in his expression as he approaches your table like he’s enjoying the company of a court jester.

“Slamming tables like fuckin’ tariff lawyers,” the cat-man hums, lifting a hand in Hyunjin’s direction. “I could see it from all the way inside.”

“Captain!” Hyunjin crows, dabbing him up without missing a beat. They really do that like breathing. “Just the man I was hoping to see.”

“Really? I thought you’d be avoiding me like the rest of our homunculus team.”

“I would never.”

“You did. Yesterday. When you saw me and started running in the opposite direction.” He pauses for emphasis. “As fast as possible.”

“Well, that was yesterday. Today is a new day.” Hyunjin tosses you a proud glance. “And today, I bring you a new team manager.”

You stiffen. “I haven’t—”

“Is that so!” When the stranger smiles at you, you feel the same satisfaction you did every time the cat let you scratch her on the chin. “Music to my ears. What’s your name, cutie?”

You catch Hyunjin’s eye across the table; he nods enthusiastically as if saying go on, then. You briefly picture yourself strangling him with his own athletic tape. You then picture yourself hopping on Seungmin’s—

Rigidly, you throw a hand out to the cat-man, your face aflame.

“Y/N,” you grumble. “I’m looking forward to working with you.”

He shakes on it heartily. “Likewise. I’m Minho. Welcome to the team.”

“Yes, welcome to the team,” Hyunjin parrots, looking positively jolly. You gnash your teeth together so hard your jaw throbs.

He’s lucky that his proposal holds so much water. He’s lucky that you don’t plan to strangle him until after you try that eyefucking thing.

You do kick him under the table, though.

The team has five weeks to prepare for the Korean University League, the biggest college-level volleyball tournament in the country. You have five days to learn how the hell athletic tape works. You can’t tell which is the bigger endeavor.

“I’m going to cause him irreversible skeletal damage,” you tell Changbin.

The team’s libero is twice as kind as he is talented, a full-time sweetheart working part-time at the university’s sports medicine clinic. Only your first week on the job and you’ve already decided he’s the only person on Earth you would permit to usher you through the gym at 6:45 A.M., a roll of athletic tape pressed to your back like a pistol.

“You will not,” Changbin answers. “One, because this won’t involve his skeleton, and two, because I wouldn’t ask you to help if it did.”

“You’ve misunderstood me,” you return as the two of you stop in front of an examination room. “I want to cause him irreversible skeletal damage.”

“Oh.” He opens the door with a frown. “Oh dear.”

Inside, Hyunjin is sitting cross-legged on top of a taping table, fitted in a loose gray tee and athletic shorts. He watches in pessimistic silence as you enter the room and beeline straight towards the shelf on the right. You slip a thick binder into your hands and bury your nose inside it without so much as a greeting.

“I am going to get maimed,” Hyunjin tells Changbin.

“Have some faith, both of you,” Changbin replies sternly. You find the pages you’re looking for and begin poring over them like you’re cramming for an exam. “You’ll be fine, Jinnie. Y/N studied.”

“Studied?” He repeats. “For this?”

“I’m pretty sure a Quizlet was made.”

“Three, actually,” you interject, sticking out your hand. “Now tape me.”

Hyunjin mouths the words tape me in baffled silence. The latter obliges your request with a smile. “See? What could go wrong?”

The answer to that, actually, is a lot. Especially after Changbin gets called away to help stretch out a teammate named Felix who allegedly “sprained his ass,” leaving Hyunjin to you and your binder.

You detect no smoky rose in the air around him today, just the subtle smells of cedar and cypress—laundry detergent or shampoo, maybe. Figures he doesn’t wear that insufferable cologne to practice.

“Go easy on me, yeah?”

While Hyunjin’s tone is teasing, yours is downright somber.

“I can’t promise anything.”

With that, you turn your palms face-up in a silent request for his hand.

A few strands of hair fall into your face as you lean in for a better look. It’s the first time you’ve seen his fingers untaped; they’re pretty, long and slender and surprisingly manicured, but also battered in their delicacy, the veins running over the back of his hand and forearm prominent, his bottom knuckles discolored from the healing bruises they bear. His hard work is palpable upon the smooth skin as evidently as if tattooed.

Hyunjin says your name in close proximity. You respond with an absent hum.

“You’re not nervous, are you?”

“No. Maybe a little.” You let his hand fall free and go to rummage for supplies. “Fine, yes. Very.”

“But you made Quizlets. You’re prepared for anything.”

“That’s what I’m saying!” You realize only after spotting the gentle smile on his face that he’s making fun of you. “I hate you.”

“Actually,” he hums, “I think you care about me, love. That’s why you’re nervous.”

“Nonsense—I care about disappointing Changbin. That’s it.”

“And me. And hopping on Seungmin’s dick. All these things don’t have to be mutually exclusive.”

You try to tackle him. Hyunjin catches your hands a few inches away from his face, fingers closing around your wrists with obnoxious agility.

“Have you lost your mind?” You whisper-shout, your face on fire. “Don’t bring that up here. I’ll maim you for real.”

The laugh that explodes out of him throws his entire body backwards, turns his eyes to crescent moons and his mouth into a little rectangle. You hate that you don’t hate when that happens.

“My bad, my bad. It slipped out. I won’t—”

One incremental shift of Hyunjin’s body later, you find that you’re precariously, alarmingly close to one another.

So much so that you notice the mole beneath his left eye for the first time, that you're nearly cross-eyed looking at it. That the tip of your nose actually brushes against his before you pull away with a quiet intake of breath. 

Things are awkward between you often, you’ve realized recently. You’re both professional yappers, always quick to digress, quick to find a new topic to bicker about before the awkwardness marinates. But hours later you’ll look back on the interaction and still remember how the air shifted: like a layer of dust had been blown away and something untouched and unknown was discovered just underneath.

Since you’ve met him, Hyunjin has spent more time on your nerves than on your mind. You’re not exactly losing sleep over such a circumstantial acquaintance; you know that his presence in your life will end the way it began, naturally and anticlimactically and inside the ANTH 111 lecture hall. Still, it doesn’t go unnoticed when your heart and stomach launch into an elaborate gymnastics routine in the wake of something he says or does, just as they’re doing now.

Hyunjin glances into your right eye a moment, then your left. The mole just below his left eye disappears when he smiles, the expression soft, saccharine, and sincere. How anyone casually looks the way he does is beyond your abilities of comprehension.

“Thank you,” he murmurs.

Your face continues to burn, now perhaps for different reasons. “What for?”

He lets go of your wrist, sweeps the lock of hair that keeps getting in your eyes behind the cuff of your ear.

“Caring about me.”

Then he flicks your forehead. You recoil with a quiet ow.

“Now stop stalling and tape me, dumbass.”

“Okay,” you mutter, rubbing the injury tenderly. “No need to get violent.”

It turns out the arduous taping procedure described in the instruction manual is for serious hand injuries. Hyunjin splints his fingers together for support, not rehabilitation, so it takes all of five minutes for him to talk you through his process. You finish taping both of his hands with nineteen minutes to spare. So maybe the Quizlets were overkill.

As you’re walking him down to practice, you take his hand and lift it to eye level, scanning your craftsmanship dubiously. “It’s not too tight, is it?”

“It’s perfect.” He swivels the hand around and grabs onto your entire face, the sensation by now eerily familiar. “Want another taste?”

You shove him down the stairs that remain. Unfortunately, there are only two. “You are truly grotesque.”

The gym has come to life since you arrived earlier this morning, now illuminated by shining ceiling lights in addition to the sun spilling through high, narrow windows. Most of the team has yet to step onto the court, still stretching or jogging along the sidelines: Minho and Coach Bang are talking strategy on the bench, the coach taking notes on a handheld whiteboard every now and then; Changbin is leaning over a recumbent Felix below the scoreboard, presumably trying to fix his ass.

The only one already with a ball in hand is Seungmin, setting to himself by the net. Once, twice, thrice straight up in the air, and then he glances in your direction and sends the fourth towards the left side of the court in a buoyant arc.

You only glean bits and pieces of the next few seconds. Hyunjin is at your side one moment, making a break for the net the next. His arms draw backwards in perfect synchrony. Feet hit the floor with laserlike intent. His entire body unravels like a fraying chrysalis as he rises to meet the ball, pounds it over the net and into the ground at an angle so clean that the sound of its landing resounds within your ribcage. It rebounds over the railing of the second floor and barely misses the doorway of the examination room you just emerged from.

Hyunjin drops lightly back onto his feet, following the ball’s tumultuous trajectory with proud eyes. A leftover breeze tosses a strand of hair over the bridge of your nose, and time starts moving again.

“Oi, this isn’t your backyard! Go pick that up!” Their coach booms, though his words lack their usual bitterness after what he just witnessed his ace hitter do.

Hyunjin swivels towards Seungmin first. “Crazy bitch. What the fuck was that?”

“Lower and faster. Further from the net too,” Seungmin returns. “How’d it feel?”

The grin on Hyunjin’s face reminds you of a wildfire, untamed and all-consuming and frightening in its fervor. “Like we just won everything.”

He tousles your hair as he jogs past you and back up the stairs to fetch the volleyball. Seungmin waves at you with one hand and palms another ball into his other. His face is warm and bare, his slim build flattered by his volleyball gear. You’ve witnessed few people so nice to look at and even fewer things as elegant as his setting form. But you are still thinking about Hyunjin—and you can’t move.

It is debilitating, watching somebody do the very thing they were destined for.

A little less than a week later, Hyunjin is approaching hour three of spewing hot garbage into a Word document when he decides to give up and call you. 

“Hello?” He immediately starts laughing. “Where the fuck are you?”

You poke the top of your head into the shot of your ceiling, gesturing to your headband. “My face is preoccupied at the moment.”

“Oh, you have to show me. Please.”

You flip your phone up for no more than half a second. A camera shutter goes off, followed by a shriek so loud that it peaks your mic.

“Motherfucker!”

He basically sprints to his camera roll. His prize: you with your face slathered in cleanser, hair pinned back by a Miffy headband, looking like the abominable snowman if he liked cute merchandise.

“Thank you,” he says earnestly. “I’ll treasure this forever.”

“You’ll be punished, Hwang.”

“Don’t threaten me with a good time.”

You brandish your middle finger at him in response. He props his phone up against his computer screen with a chuckle. 

“Aaanyways, I have a thesis statement to run by you.”

The first thing you did as Hyunjin’s tutor was help draft an email to Professor Kim, begging her to let him resubmit the two essays he royally botched. She replied with a lengthy quotation from her syllabus, specifically the section that talked about (and prohibited) resubmissions, but ended up making an exception for Hyunjin on account of the “truly piteous timbre” of his email. You fell out of your chair laughing when he read you her response.

“You should’ve opened with that,” you grumble.

“I tried! Someone distracted me.”

“Read it before I change my mind.”

You spend a few minutes at most on the thesis itself, advising him to avoid passive voice, answer the prompt, establish a refutable argument, the works. Then he asks you a question about the research topic itself, allusions to the afterlife in Ancient Egyptian artwork, and the tutoring session takes a turn into what feels like a podcast episode.

You talk about the God of Death, Anubis, and his connections to the underworld; the elaborate, lavish funerary rituals intended to ensure the souls of the dead traveled safely; the vibrant murals that flanked their final resting spots as pictorial requests for divine protection. And you talk about them all with such confidence, such eloquence, that it’s as if you’re leading him through a history museum rather than talking to your phone as you do your skincare. He could listen to you for hours. He does, actually.

Around 1 A.M., Hyunjin stops typing mid-sentence when you come into frame for the first time, collapsing into your bed with a sigh of relief. Your eyes are soft and sleepy as they blink at your screen, strands of damp hair clinging to your cheeks. He feels his heart physically shift inside his ribcage when your mouth stretches into a yawn. It is the same sensation as the time you shot him a smile over your shoulder and he couldn’t move for ten minutes.

With that, his attention span has run its course.

“Baby,” he interrupts gently. “Let’s stop here, okay? You seem tired.”

You open your mouth as if to protest, only to yawn again.

“I suppose I am,” you concede. “Will you keep working tonight?”

“I think so. I hit my stride.”

“Text me if you have questions, then. I’ll respond when I wake up.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

Your lips curve into the smallest of smiles. It copies onto Hyunjin’s face incurably quickly. 

“I had my doubts about this tutoring thing, you know,” you murmur.

“Why is that?”

“Well, you told me this class was the closest thing to daily naptime you’d experienced since preschool.”

“It really is.”

“You also told me you would rather slam your tongue in a car door than read more than three sentences in one sitting.”

“I really would.”

“And you once referred to academia as ‘Virgin Village.’”

“Didn’t you come up with that?”

“No, hello? I live in that village.”

He grins. “I know. I just wanted to hear you admit it.”

“Fuck you.”

“Ah, don’t threaten me with a good—”

“What I’m trying to say,” you cut in, “is that I didn’t think you would take this seriously, but I’m happy to be proven wrong.”

Hyunjin leans back. “Well, turns out I might give a fuck about anthropology after all.”

“Really?”

“No.”

You pretend to punch him through the screen. It’s so cute that he forgets to think before he opens his mouth next.

“But I do give a fuck about you.”

There’s nothing crazy about the statement. You’re friends, sort of. You manage his team. It would be strange if he didn’t. But the seconds that follow are terrible, a silent prophecy of something disastrous, like a cloud of rubble before an avalanche, the standstill during a star’s final breath. And Hyunjin’s heartbeat is hounding against his ears like a performance of traditional taiko.

He says good night in a haste. The call ends. He stares at the wall of his bedroom in a muddled haze for who knows how long.

Then he opens his texts.

Hyunjin: We have team bonding tomorrow btw Hyunjin: Don’t forget Y/N: i forgot. Y/N: pick me up at 6:45? Hyunjin: 🫡

He picks you up at 7:53.

You approach his car with your fists balled and your eyebrows knitted together like a mean old curmudgeon and he’s walking too close to your lawn.

“His fault,” Hyunjin says before you start yelling.

Minho simpers at you through his open window. “Hey! So glad you could join us!”

You fix the man with a judgmental glare as you slide into the backseat. “Aren’t you the captain? Why are you this late?”

“Whoa, okay. I would’ve scheduled this for earlier if I knew right now was honesty hour.”

“You did schedule it for earlier,” you say. “You scheduled it for way earlier.”

“Yeah, well, you’re fired.”

“You can’t fire me, Minho.”

“I can too. Tell ‘em, Hwang.”

“I want nothing to do with this.”

When you step through the doors of the arcade, you’re met with a surge of sensory input that you haven’t experienced in years. The air hangs thick with the smells of greasy concessions; everywhere you look are flashing screens and neon signs, stuffed animals and fading posters; clamoring against your ears are the sounds of games being won or lost, of balls being pocketed or launched, and of a horde of fully grown men spectating a match of Dance Dance Revolution so passionately (and loudly) that they’ve scared everyone away from that side of the room. You recognize the current competitors as Changbin and Jeongin.

“I’ll go pay,” Hyunjin says. “How much time do we want?”

“Infinity,” Minho answers. Hyunjin doesn’t move. “Two hours.”

He flashes him a thumbs-up. “And you?”

“I’m okay, I think.”

“No you’re not,” the two men answer in perfect unison.

You glance between them warily. “I don’t mind watching, seriously. I don’t even know how most of these games work—”

“There’s Tetris,” Hyunjin cuts in.

You purchase an hour.

One would imagine the point of the evening is to break the SNU men’s volleyball team, not to bond them. You’ve never seen so many strained blood vessels in your life. Nor have you heard of half the insults they spew at each other as the night goes on. Felix has to pay a fee for lodging an air hockey puck in the side of the MarioKart machine. Changbin loses at skee-ball and has to down an XL slushie like it’s a shot. It’s a scary amount of boyishness expressed in scary ways.

But they’re happy. You’ve picked up on it when they’re on the court, noticed the raw elation they emanate just from playing together. Yet, their closeness has never been more evident to you than tonight. The men are either laughing or making someone else laugh, arms draped over each other at all times, equally happy to celebrate victories as they’re eager to punish losses. It dawns on you at some point that you’re glad to be here with them, grateful to be a part of something so special—especially because there’s Tetris.

“Have you ever considered going pro?” Hyunjin asks over your shoulder.

You waited until most of the team was distracted to slink off to your beloved machine. Hyunjin tagged along, undoubtedly with the intention of making fun of you, only to be rendered speechless by your mastery. He’s been watching in a state of stupor, forearms propped against the back of your chair.

You don’t respond for a while, too focused on a precarious patch to even blink, let alone partake in conversation.

“I already did,” you finally answer.

“Sorry, what? You played professional Tetris?”

“In middle school. Then I got bored and switched to backgammon.” You pause. “Then I got bored again and switched to chess.”

“How do you look like this with these hobbies?”

Your run ends a few minutes later with a somber sound effect. You turn around in your seat with an anguished groan. “I think I’m washed.”

He looks at you like you’ve lost your mind. “You just set a new record by three hundred thousand points.”

“It’s a small pond,” you say, and an idea occurs to you. “Do you wanna try?”

“I get the feeling I don’t have a choice.”

“Then you’re smarter than you look.”

“Well, you look—”

His eyes move between your shoes and your face, and then his voice is an inaudible mutter as he sinks into your seat. You think you hear something along the lines of unfair.

“What was that?”

“Ugly. I said you look ugly.” He cracks his knuckles. “Now let’s break some fuckin’ blocks.” 

When Hyunjin learns that the pieces can be rotated (so six or seven attempts later), a man walks into the arcade. 

He has hair the color of dark chocolate the face of a fairy prince—and he’s with someone. The two of them appear arm in arm, laughing at something he said. He looks at this person the way astronomers do to the sky.

Something shatters inside you like old porcelain.

Your hands loosen around the back of Hyunjin’s chair. You can’t watch. You can’t think. You can only feel a void of disappointment rip open, stretch over you like an elongating shadow.

“Seung!” That’s Jisung, you think. “You made it!”

“Yo, sorry we’re late.” That’s Seungmin. That is undoubtedly Seungmin. “Dinner took longer than I thought.”

“Min, are you sure I’m allowed to be here?” You don’t know who this voice belongs to and you’re not sure you want to. “I feel like I’m intruding—”

“Hwang,” you say suddenly. “I have to go.”

He turns around, confused. An unattended block falls into a terrible spot on the screen behind him. ”Already?”

“I forgot I had an important call to make.” You turn away, training your eyes on the patterned carpet. “Sorry. I’ll see you on Monday.”

You have touched Hyunjin’s hands many times. He’s asked you to tape his fingers every day since the first; he likes the way you cut off his circulation, says it helps him hit harder. But you never hold his hand so much as you examine it, the act stiff and unfeeling, cordoned within the professional pretense of athletic treatment. 

Now, Hyunjin catches your hand like a gardener repotting their favorite flower: delicately, careful of leaving its roots intact and petals untouched, but firmly, securely, so the flower continues to stand tall even when it’s been extracted from the soil, not even a speck of dirt slipping through the cracks between their fingers. That is the image you conjure when he slips his between yours, his metal rings cold where his fingertips are warm.

He says your name. There is a pinch of pain in the word, and you know that he knows.

“Do you want to be alone?”

You have never been asked such a thing—you have never asked to be asked such a thing—but, for some reason, the question brings tears to your eyes. 

“Yes, please,” you whisper, and you pull your hand away.

When you stalk past him, you hear Jisung notice you, call out to you, a note of worry in his question. You also count three pairs of eyes on your back: one concerned, the next confused, and the last you are wholly incapable of meeting. 

Unknown to you is the fourth pair fixed upon the top of the Tetris machine, where you’ve left your phone.

You emerge into the parking lot. The frigid air stills your mind for a fraction of a second, the last moment of mental quietude you will allow yourself that night.

Hyunjin’s right; the team manager doesn’t have to do much.

Coach Bang allows you to come to whichever practices and games you feel like, during which you might at most lug around a ballbag or fill someone’s waterbottle before holing up somewhere to do your own thing. But you like the people you work for too much to do so little for them, so you attend everything  your schedule allows. 

Last week, you could be found helping Minho put down the volleyball nets, your laughter echoing throughout the spacious gym as he complained to you about his biochemistry professor’s distinct “cabbage scent.” Or running to grab materials for Changbin as he treated his teammates’ injuries like you were assisting an orthodontist giving someone a root canal. The dinner invitations you extended to Seungmin were always turned down, but his teammates were more than happy to assist you and Hyunjin in your quest to establish the best kimbap joint in the area once and for all. You even had a heart-to-heart with Coach Bang during one of the team’s water breaks, in which you managed to get half a smile out of the guy; Hyunjin was convinced that was his way of asking you to elope. You’d spent more time in the gymnasium in those ten days than you had in the last ten years.

Then came the arcade.

Five days have come and gone. You haven’t attended practice since, but you still see Hyunjin every morning at anthropology. The two of you sit in uncharacteristic silence for most of the lectures. You’ve taken the best notes of your life. He doesn’t mention the previous weekend; he doesn’t mention much of anything. 

In person, that is.

That Friday afternoon, you’re reading on the terrace of the library when you receive a text. It’s from Hyunjin, a two-minute voice note. You hesitate for a moment, stick a pencil into the gutter of your textbook to save your place, and slip your earbuds in. You listen to it.

Then you listen to it again.

And again as you wrap up your study session and go home. Again as you cook yourself dinner and load the dishwasher. Again as you shrug on a jacket and pocket your keys, setting off on the familiar trek to the gym.

As for what you plan to do there on a Friday night, long after the team has finished practice, you haven’t the slightest clue. You continue to move regardless, fueled by the feeling that there is where you need to be.

Coach Bang is leaving the building just as you’re approaching it. He halts in his footsteps and raises his eyebrows when he notices you. The man has always been difficult to read, but his face is exceptionally opaque now. Maybe it’s the shadowy landscape; more likely it’s the uneasiness that began to mount within you once you noticed the lights in the gym were still on.

“It’s been a while,” he greets.

“Coach,” you return, lowering your head. “I want to apologize for—”

“Save it,” he says, not unkindly. “There’s nothing to apologize for, alright? The team is lucky to have you.”

You manage a grateful smile. “I’ll be back starting next week.”

“I’m glad to hear it.” He starts to walk away, stops himself, and glances into the illuminated building. “I would give him some space, by the way.”

Your uneasiness morphs into anxiety as you watch his broad back retreat into the shadows. You remain outside the gym for a few minutes more, accompanied by the distant melodies of cricket chorales and the muffled squeaking of shoes against laminated hardwood, the harsh sounds of flesh meeting leather.

Briskly, you walk home, rummage around, and return to the gym ten minutes later with your textbook tucked beneath your arm. This time, you unlock and enter the building without a moment of hesitation. 

Hyunjin is positioned multiple yards behind the service line, rotating a volleyball in his hands. A high toss, two resounding steps, and a collision like the crack of a whip. The previous ball has barely landed in the furthest corner of the court when he’s picking up the next, retreating to the same spot to do it all again. His tank top is the color of charcoal over his sweaty skin, his hair auburn where it’s plastered to his neck. He’s alone.

You only catch sight of Hyunjin’s face when you descend the stairs. His expression is crystalline, hardened with concentration and fortified by courage, but fragile all at once, rendered delicate by fatigue and fear, spilling from his every seam and splintering off his person like a broken vase. You recognize it as clearly as if you were looking at a picture of yourself from the worst years of your life.

“I was told to give you space,” you call out, and Hyunjin drops the volleyball he’s holding.

His lips fall apart. Nothing comes out of them. The only sounds to follow are your footsteps as you make your way towards the bleachers, a vertical wall of plastic now that they’ve been retracted for the night. You fold your legs into a criss-cross as you take a seat at their base.

“Is this enough space?”

More silence. You gesture to the volleyball nervously.

“Don’t make me go further, please. I’m not ready to die.”

Finally, this earns you a smile. It’s not much, but it loosens the nervous coils in your heart, permits your lungs to contract once more, and it remains on his face as he swipes the ball back into his hands. You open your textbook.

The rest of the night elapses in turning pages and soaring volleyballs. You don’t care for minutes or hours; you give him all the time in the world, as he did you.

The only time you glance at the clock on the wall is around midnight, when Hyunjin hobbles to the middle of the court and collapses. You’re worried at first. Then he rolls onto his back and releases a guttural groan into his hands, and your held breath comes out a laugh. You set down your book and stand up.

There’s a lake of perspiration forming around him. You pay it no mind and flop onto the floor, your eyes instantly narrowing beneath the fluorescent lights. 

“How do you see under these things?”

“I don’t,” he returns. “I complained about it to Coach once.”

“And?”

“He made them brighter.”

“Sounds about right.”

He spends the next few minutes catching his breath, his chest rising and falling in your peripheral vision. You sift through your mind for phrases of consolation or gestures of support and come up empty. You wish you had Hyunjin’s way with words.

But you think about the way his smile reached his eyes as he thanked you for caring about him, the tenderness with which he caught your hand at the arcade, the I give a fuck about you he blurted before ending the study call. You think about the voice note. It’s not that Hyunjin has a way with words; it’s that he’s brave enough to break the silences that you can’t, like he perceives your anxiety for the aftermath, shouldering the responsibility so you won’t have to.

This cannot be his burden alone.

You inhale. “What’s on your mind?”

Hyunjin doesn’t answer right away. You give up on squinting and close your eyes; the lights are still bright enough to dance around the murky darkness.

“I don’t think I know how to put it into words.”

You nearly laugh; you know how that feels. “Don’t think, just talk. I’m here.”

The same advice you gave yourself seems to work on him as well.

“Do you remember Ishikawa Yuki?”

“Your role model?”

“He’s currently playing for a club team in Italy called Allianz Milano.” He blows out a deep breath. “I’ve been talking to their coach, Roberto Piazza, for the last six months.”

The gears in your head creak in their effort to process the implications of these words. “Holy shit, Hwang.”

“He emailed again, this morning. Said he was coming to the tournament later this month, he’s excited to see me play in person, whatever. And it hit me, finally, that this is all real. Like, this is actually happening to me. I spent all of today freaking out and asked Coach to let me stay back after practice. Usually, it wears out my brain if I tire my body, but it only half-worked today. I couldn’t wrap my head around anything. I still can’t.

“I am who I am because of that man, and now…I have a shot at playing with him. I keep asking myself why I’m not—not happier. I should be bouncing off the fucking walls, no? If I told my past self that this would be happening to him one day, he would—”

You open your eyes, confused by the sudden silence.

Hyunjin is sitting up next to you, staring intensely into the bleachers. You first notice the tip of his tongue prodding into his cheek, then his shuddering breath. He lifts a hand to his face, pressing against his eyes.

You stop thinking after that.

You sit up with him. When you settle your fingers around his wrist, he allows you to pull his hand back to his side. But he turns away as if trying to hide from you; he squeezes his eyes shut as if that would obstruct your view of his pain.

You reach to cradle his face, bringing him back to you. The cuff of your sleeves wipe at the saltwater on his cheeks, push the hair off his forehead with gentle sweeps. The two of you are close, close enough for your lips to meet the space between his eyes if you so much as lose your balance. His gaze traverses to your face, but you resolve not to meet it. You know you will traipse into uncharted territory the moment you do.

“Don’t fight it.” You trace over the hill of his cheek. “Healing becomes easier if you let yourself hurt. Trust me, Hyunjin.”

His first name should feel foreign on your tongue, yet you suspect the syllables have accompanied you all your life.

“You don’t have to continue if you can’t.”

“S’okay.” Hyunjin lifts your hand away from his face, presses a kiss to the base of your palm. “I want to.”

You feel yourself stumble ungracefully into the uncharted territory from before. Does he do the same?

“I used to play volleyball on this expanse of cracked blacktop, behind my primary school. It was pretty brutal on my feet—I blew through so many different pairs that my mom almost made me quit.” He smiles at the memory. “But every time I came close to quitting, I’d go home and rewatch the same USA vs. Poland match from the 2008 Summer Olympics I asked my dad to record, and I’d promise myself it would be me on some other kid’s screen someday.

“That kid would tell everyone who’d listen about how cool I am. That I’m a secret superhero. That I’m living proof humans can fly if they really, really try—just like I talked about the volleyball players I grew up watching on my TV.

“The other day, Coach told me that hope would consume me. I thought it was just some senile drivel at the time, but..I think I get what he means now. I would do anything and everything to make that kid proud—even if it meant losing myself.” He lowers his head, auburn strands falling into his eyes. “That’s what’s on my mind.”

Amidst the ensuing pause, a storm approaches. It does not come in the form of rain or snow, sleet or hail, no; it is a gathering of words unsaid and emotions unacknowledged, all emerging from the deepest chambers of your heart in synchrony. The same entities you used to scapegoat for all the times things were awkward between you and Hyunjin when you were the culprit all along. You and your blind cowardice.

The storm tears open the seam of your lips. You do not resist; it’s long overdue.

“Every time Changbin sees you, he turns into a smitten schoolgirl,” you say. “He is physically unable to contain how endearing he finds you. He told me so himself.”

Hyunjin looks at you with widened eyes. You think you can see your own reflection in them, and you are the spitting image of a lighter dropped into gasoline, unstoppable in your vehemence.

“Jeongin comes to you for advice before anyone else,” you continue, “even for things related to school—which I still find hard to believe, I’m not gonna lie. But you have his best interests in mind, and it shows in everything you do for him. Of course your opinion matters more than anything in the world.

“I know you think he can’t stand you, but you are the reason Coach Bang loves this job, why he loves this sport. It’s written all over his face every time he calls you something mean, every time he makes you run another lap, every time he looks at you. You’re like a son to him. Everyone sees it but you.”

“Then there’s me.” You pause to catch your breath. “When I think about what my life used to be, I remember a lot of things. I remember loneliness. Insecurity. I remember my books and my backgammon boards and the way I taught myself to disappear inside them so the world would never find me. I remember avoiding mirrors like a vampire because I didn’t like seeing my own reflection. I remember feeling like I had to put on someone else’s personality every time I left the house because nobody would want to know me for me. All I ever wanted was a place where I could be myself, love myself, without consequence. I have yet to find that place.

“But I found a person. Someone who wouldn’t know time and place if they kicked his dick into his body. Someone who thinks instant ramen is high in nutritional value because it comes with dried vegetables. Someone who sweats the same amount of rain the Sahara Desert receives yearly—your body is not normal, by the way.”

Hyunjin giggles; it is soft and short, a small, tearful huff into the quiet air that makes you feel like you’re flying.

“Don’t get me wrong,” you say. “Your sense of humor sucks and your taste in coffee is so boring and you are the one with no media literacy, not Professor Kim. But I love spending time with you. I love who I am when I’m around you. And none of that has to do with volleyball.”

The next time you blink, you discover that he’s not the only one with tears in his eyes. How long has that been going on?

“There’s so much about you to be proud of, Hyunjin.” You give him a watery smile. “That kid will be spoiled for choice.”

When Hyunjin pulls you into his arms, you fall into each other like going to bed after a long day. Your face burrows into the crook of his neck in your embarrassment; he is laughing and crying at the same time when he mumbles something into your shoulder: “I knew you cared about me.”

You are so happy for the comedic relief you could sob. It helps that you already are.

“How the fuck are you still sweaty?”

You think you like his cologne after all.

Six days later, Hyunjin opens the door of his apartment.

A fun-sized flurry of black and white barrages into the hallway outside and almost runs headfirst into the figure waiting there. You fall to your knees like you’ve just been gravely wounded, emitting an ear-piercing wail to match. All it takes is a few good head scratches for Kkami to stop yipping bloody murder and start whining for attention instead. 

Upon minute five of watching you and his dog cuddle in the hallway directly outside his home, Hyunjin sighs.

“Can you come inside, please? My RA will think I’m doing some freaky shit again.”

You side-eye him as you walk into his apartment, Kkami perched happily in your arms. “What, exactly, does freaky shit entail?”

He smirks as the door falls shut. “You want me to tell you or show you?”

You turn to Kkami, disgusted. “Your owner’s a bit of a pervert, my dear.”

Kkami licks you on the chin. Hyunjin’s eyes narrow to slits.

“Traitor.”

Naturally, Hyunjin’s parents chose the eve of his final anthropology exam—and the week before the tournament that will determine the trajectory of his career—to ask him to look after Kkami for a few days. He nearly canceled their plane tickets himself, but his impromptu roommate is currently ransacking your face with kisses on his couch, and he thinks your laugh complements his studio better than any decoration. 

“Do you want anything to drink?” He calls from the kitchen area.

You meander over, Kkami (still) perched happily in your arms. “What do you have?” 

“Alcohol.” He opens his fridge far enough so you can peer over his shoulder. “Americanos.”

He stops speaking.

“Is that all?”

“Yes. Wait—and apple juice.”

“You are about to be a professional athlete.”

“What the Italians don’t know won’t hurt them. You want apple juice, don’t you? I can see it in your eyes.”

“Maybe. Can you open it for me? My hands are full.”

Hyunjin does so with far less reluctance than he feigns. You thank him jubilantly, popping the straw into your mouth.

“Let’s get this over with.”

At 10:32 P.M., all is calm. You are sitting on the floor, your back against the side of his mattress. Hyunjin is where the universe intended: curled up in bed, both him and his laptop lying on their sides. You have studied eight out of ten units in only two and a half hours, and the night is still young. Kkami is but a fluffy, sleepy Oreo by your waist.

At 10:33 P.M., the Oreo begins to retch.

You startle a foot into the air. Hyunjin is out of bed and on his feet in the blink of an eye, the very image of a dog dad on duty. He grabs three different things off the kitchen counter with one hand and scoops up the long-haired chihuahua with the other, and then he’s kicking open the door.

Seungmin appears out of thin air carrying two heaping bags of groceries. Hyunjin nearly knocks him and a month’s worth of fresh produce down four flights of stairs.

“Hyun—Kkami?” Seungmin swivels. “Yo, what the fuck is—”

Hyunjin is already out the door.

A few minutes later, Hyunjin squats off to the side, pouring fresh water into a portable dog bowl. A little ways away, Kkami is throwing up ebulliently; a set of footsteps approaches.

“What is this thing?” Seungmin squats down next to Hyunjin, picking up the piece of patterned fabric lying on the grass. 

“Kkami gets sad after throwing up,” he sighs. “His blanket makes him feel better.”

Seungmin watches the chihuahua for a few moments, a soft flinch crimping his features. “He ate too fast again?”

Hyunjin rakes a hand through his hair. “I don’t get it. Nobody’s gonna take his food from him.”

Seungmin laughs. “I didn’t even know he was on campus.”

“I picked him up last night. My parents are traveling for work—they say hi, by the way.”

“I say hi back. I miss your mom’s cooking.”

“Me too,” Hyunjin says, smiling. “She would love to cook for you again—she’s always saying you’re too skinny.”

“She really is.”

A beat passes; it is then that Hyunjin has an epiphany.

Seungmin was the one who put a volleyball in his hands for the first time. Back then, Hyunjin was the lesser troublemaker between the two of them—a concept that neither of them can wrap their heads around to this day. Seungmin suggested they use the clotheslines in Hyunjin’s backyard as a makeshift net, despite Hyunjin’s dissuading; half of Hyunjin’s father’s wardrobe caught on fire, Seungmin had a black eye for a week, and nobody knows what happened to that volleyball. The two of them have been attached at the hip ever since.

It is a crazy thing, having your best friend as a teammate; a singular flick of the wrist or a point of his shoe and Seungmin will know exactly Hyunjin wants the ball down to the net’s fraying fibers; Hyunjin will be exactly where Seungmin needs him down to the flecks of paint on the volleyball court. Hyunjin has always been Seungmin’s hitter—Seungmin, always Hyunjin’s setter. Nothing will ever change between them so long as that remains the case.

At least, that’s what Hyunjin used to think.

Learning that Seungmin was in a relationship was as much a wake-up call for Hyunjin as it was for you. At first, he was just fucking pissed; how could Seungmin be so stupid as to turn down someone like you, especially when Hyunjin had shot his mouth off about his wingman services? More importantly, how long had his best friend of eighteen years been in love, and why was he the last to know? 

Only now, as they wait for his nine-year-old chihuahua to finish barfing, does Hyunjin realize that he can’t remember the last time he and Seungmin talked. Not “talked” as in a brief exchange inside the locker room or the lecture hall, about a new approach he wants to try or what Seungmin got on number four or if he wants a ride to practice—“talked” as in talked, about Hyunjin, about Seungmin, about the eighteen years they shared, about all the years yet to come.

Hyunjin sees his setter every day; he stopped looking for his friend a long time ago. 

“Yeonwoo, right?”

He senses surprise in Seungmin without having to look at him. But he also senses a smile, a subtle show that Seungmin recognizes what he’s trying to do—and forgives him.

“Yeonwoo,” Seungmin affirms. “We’re in the same songwriting intensive this semester.”

“Also a singer?”

He shakes his head. “Piano player. Performed at the Carnegie Hall in the United States at, like, seven years old. I don’t think I’ve ever met someone so talented.”

“Wow, that’s—hi, old man. You done?”

Kkami walks over with his head hung low and tail between his legs, and Hyunjin hurries to drape the pup in his favorite blanket, pulling the bowl of water in front of him in tandem. Seungmin runs a hand over the top of Kkami’s head as he hydrates.

“You’ve suffered,” he tells him solemnly, and Hyunjin snorts.

“As I was saying—that’s crazy to hear, coming from the most talented person I know. You guys looked so good together.”

“Thanks. It’s weird. I’m happy.”

“You deserve it. You really do, Kim.” They exchange smiles, and Hyunjin gives Seungmin a playful nudge. “When are you introducing us?”

“The arcade wasn’t enough?”

“Don’t insult me.”

“Whenever you want, then.”

“Dinner with my mom, dinner with Yeonwoo,” Hyunjin recounts. “I’m holding you to it.”

“Bet.”

They shake on it. If Hyunjin wasn’t already reassured by Seungmin’s smile, he knows by his clasp around his hand that they’ll be okay.

“What about you?” Seungmin asks. “Are you together yet?”

Hyunjin knew this was coming. “What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean.” Seungmin strings his hands together, letting them dangle in the space between his knees. “Someone you have questions for that you’re too scared to ask. Someone who’s lived in your mind since the day you met. There’s someone like that, isn’t there?”

Hyunjin pokes his tongue into his cheek. 

Ever since that night on the gym floor, Hyunjin’s been having these dreams. By the time his alarm goes off in the morning, every detail of the dream has eluded him, leaving behind only a ghost of emotion, akin to the breeze that grazes your face moments after walking past another person.

But then he’ll get out of bed, and walk to that café on the east side of campus, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. There, he’ll order a vanilla latte with extra sweetener, then turn around to see you standing five feet away, holding an Americano and trying not to laugh. And he’ll just know, with everything in him, that you are where his head goes when he’s not keeping watch.

He still addresses you by the pet names you hate. He still finds any excuse to be close to you; he still pesters you like a child with a crush. But now, he calls you his baby like one wishes on a star; his eyes drift to your lips every time you’re within two feet of each other; he makes fun of your likes and dislikes only because he’s happy to know about them at all. Ever since that night on the gym floor.

It’s impossible for nothing and everything to change at once. Two people teetering on the precipice of something cannot withstand a gust of wind so powerful. He’s already hanging off the ledge, losing his grip; where are you?

Next to him, Seungmin lets out a soft laugh. “There is.”

Hyunjin doesn’t know what to say.

“It might’ve been me, at some point,” he hums, returning his hand to scratch the back of Kkami’s ears. “But it has always been you, Hyun.”

Four floors above them and inside Hyunjin’s place, you are pacing between his fridge and his bed, nervously awaiting his and Kkami’s return.

Something catches your eye, wide and flat and hung on the wall by his bathroom door. You approach it curiously, your lips pulling into a fond smile the moment you realize all that’s in front of you.

Many of the photographs are of Hyunjin: him in his preteens, dead asleep in bed while dressed head to toe in volleyball gear, braces visible because his mouth is open; an action shot taken at what must’ve been a U21 match, the South Korean flag stitched into the shoulder of his jersey; him with half a birthday cake in front of him and the rest smeared all over his face. There are headlines, too: Underdog team earns district’s first high school volleyball state title; Hwang Hyunjin proves himself worthy of “ace spiker” label at South Korea V. Croatia U19 match; Coach Bang “Christopher” Chan leads Seoul National University to second consecutive KUL championship. There’s one—Who is Hwang Hyunjin? Meet the twenty-year-old instigant of South Korea’s imminent volleyball revolution—beside which he’s written the singular word “mouthful.” You laugh; you agree.

But pinned to the corkboard is also a photograph of Minho, surrounded by stray cats in the alleyway outside a K-BBQ restaurant; his parents cradling Kkami in an apple costume; his high school volleyball team silhouetted against a pretty sunset. Him and Seungmin as kids, covered in grime and scrapes but beaming nonetheless; him and Seungmin at age nineteen, stadium lights on their backs, unadulterated elation on their faces as they charge towards each other, beaming still. Changbin piggybacking Felix through the hallways of the gym, neither of them wearing a shirt; Jisung offering Coach Bang a beer while the latter looks direly unamused (you make a mental note to ask about that one later); what looks like a Rock Lee cosplayer in the middle of your anthropology classroom.

You rush forward as if decreed by gravitational force. Not too far away is another picture of you, in which you boast a Miffy headband and a face full of foaming cleanser. Then another, your eyes narrowed like that of a sniper taking aim as you’re playing Tetris; you with so many volleyballs piled into your arms that you can’t see your own face; your cheeks squished by a bandaged hand after you lost a bet about pandas (they can swim); you clutching your stomach on the library floor, brought to hysterical tears by Professor Kim’s email. You, you, you.

You bring your pointer finger to this last image, tracing it over the curve of your own cheek. You see a dimple on your face you didn’t know you had. You realize it only comes out for him.

It has always been him.

The front door opens. A man with telephone poles for legs and a long-haired chihuahua in his arms appears behind it. You sense in him that something has changed since you last saw each other. The two of you lock eyes. 

It’s not awkward this time.

Multiple yards behind the service line, Hyunjin is rotating a volleyball in his hands. It feels solid and sentient, an extension of himself held in cotton-clad fingers. He knows how this story will end.

He moves his eyes to his best friend’s back. Four fingers flash back at him twice, signaling a high lob set to the left, the very play they’ve practiced tirelessly for the last five weeks. The breath Hyunjin blows out of his cheeks seems to crystallize in the air, almost solid in all its exhilaration. 

He bends low and throws high. His arms drop behind his body like a spread of feathered wings; his feet fall into place below him like a meteor shower, two consecutive strikes against the earth that fissure its mantle. The lights overhead are bright. His palm pulls taut when it slams into leather. He knows how this story will end.

The volleyball tears towards the ground. It trembles as if scared by all that it holds: the guarantee of a flawless denouement, the catalyst of a radiant future. Hyunjin’s heart is beating hard enough to crack his ribs when he lands back on the ground, when the volleyball lands in the furthest corner of the court. He’s not scared at all.

He balls his fingers into fists.

“JUST LIKE LAST YEAR, BACK TO BACK ON AN ACE—”

An arm seizes Hyunjin’s neck; another drags him onto the floor. His head thuds onto the hardwood with a sound he hears over the whole world detonating. His vision fills with the faces of the people he cares for most, some covered in tears and others rivaling the ceiling with their blinding smiles. He can’t feel most of his body; his sweat drips into his mouth. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t care.

“—DEFENDING THEIR TITLE AS YOUR NATIONAL CHAMPIONS FOR THE THIRD CONSECUTIVE YEAR—”

His eyes find Seungmin’s among the fray. Their hands clap together with such force that Hyunjin cusses at the impact. Seungmin’s gaze burns into his with a ferocity that Hyunjin plans to take to his grave. His setter. His best friend.

He says something inaudible, but Hyunjin reads the words off his lips, and his eyes fill with tears: we win everything.

“—WE PRESENT TO YOU: SEOUL NATIONAL UNIVERSITY!”

Hyunjin’s post-game interview is a nightmarish affair. He is allowed at most half an answer before a new teammate is barreling over with an animalistic screech or a new friend is screaming congratulations from out of frame.

The reporter is visibly agitated by her final question, unpursing her lips to ask: “Is there anyone you’d like to thank?”

Hyunjin exhales. “You want the short answer or the long—”

Changbin seizes him by the head. Hyunjin bursts into a peal of high-pitched laughter as the libero litters kisses all over his face, nearly crumpling to the floor in his attempt to escape.

“Love you,” he yells before hurrying off. 

“Love you too, Bin.”

Hyunjin turns a sheepish smile to the reporter.

“The short answer,” she deadpans.

He starts counting off his fingers. He thanks his family—his first and last teammates, his eternal anchors. His other family, his actual teammates, the best boys he’s ever known. His coach, who will let him call him Chris someday. His best friend and setter, Kim Seungmin, who set a clothesline on fire once and changed his life forever.

In the distance, a figure emerges from the locker rooms. There’s a navy blue SNU banner draped over your shoulders, two overflowing duffel bags in your hands. Jisung and Jeongin run over to take them from you, and the smile you give them is wide and flushed, a remnant of the elation you shared from afar. The three of you start walking out of the gym.

Hyunjin thanks you.

You didn’t ask for the position, he tells the reporter, but some idiot roped you into it, and they’re all so grateful that you decided to stick around. You know the team better than they know themselves—it’s hard to believe you’ve been with them for five weeks instead of five years.

What are you like? What aren’t you like, is the better question. You’re caring, smart, strong; you see so much goodness in the people around you, all while unaware that it is your warmth that brings it out of them. Flowers only bloom in the sun’s doting radius, and so did he.

You have the sort of soul that incurs the scorn of the stars. You’re wasting your potential among humans, they’d argue, when it should exist in the heavens. They are the only ones to deserve you. They’re right.

Hyunjin pokes his tongue into his cheek, suddenly annoyed.

“Why the fuck am I still here?” 

“Pardon?” The reporter returns, but Hyunjin is already vaulting over the bleachers, making a mad dash for the exit. She gives her cameraman an injured glare. He shrugs.

He explodes onto the concrete, looking around in a frantic haze. He finds the blue banner heading toward the team bus and flanked by his teammates with ease.

He calls out to you.

You glance backwards. Your smile is purely effulgent, your laugh but a faint sigh against the area’s busy thrum. His heart is pounding against his ribs like a battering ram again, but he’s used to this feeling by now. Jeongin and Jisung make themselves scarce.

You’re beautiful. God, you’re fucking beautiful. That was the first thought to enter his mind when he spilled an iced Americano on your lap all those months ago and you looked at him like he hailed from another planet. And it is the first thought to enter his mind now, when he runs up to you and cradles your face in his hands, his touch infinitely, impossibly gentle, and you look at him like he’s everything that has ever existed, everything that ever will. 

Tendrils of your perfume reach him from here, floral and light like a tropical coastline. He could’ve counted your eyelashes—if he didn’t have something far better to do.

“Tell me now if you don’t want me to do this,” he whispers.

A stupid smile crosses the face of the smartest person he knows. “My lips are sealed.”

Hyunjin kisses you. He kisses you until the banner around your shoulders is wrinkled under his touch, until your hands are tangled in his hair and aching his scalp, until the breaths you take are breaths you share, passed between your mouths like a puff of smoke before they’re colliding again.

He kisses you until he’s crying, again, until he’s no longer tasting your lips but your grin, and he kisses you only harder when those scornful stars start to dance before him, for you are his, not theirs, and he’s really won everything, now.

“Hwang, I need you in my office.”

Six months later, Hyunjin sees Coach Bang standing a few yards away with a grim air about him. He stops in his footsteps and glances at his captain, confused.

“I know nothing,” Seungmin says, walking away. “Good luck!”

“Thanks, cap.” Hyunjin swears he’s had this exact exchange before.

Head volleyball coach Christopher Bang’s workspace still reminds Hyunjin of a morgue. But there are two picture frames on his desk now: one of his family in front of the Sydney Opera House, the other of a band of boys clad in navy blue, draped over one another in exhausted bliss. The latter lends the room a much-needed sense of vitality. Too bad it still houses a rusty cyborg.

Hyunjin closes the door and takes a seat. Bang taps a knuckle against the tempered glass of his monitor. “Read.”

From: Nicola Daldello «ndaldello@pvm.com» To: Bang “Christopher” Chan «cb97@snu.edu» Subject: Re: Allianz Milano V. Pallavolo Perugia practice game

Christopher,

Allow me to apologize for my delayed response as I shared your request with Chairman Piazza.

It is my great pleasure to inform you that we would love for Mr. Hwang Hyunjin to participate in our practice game versus Pallavolo Perugia. The match is scheduled for Monday, October 7th, 5-7 P.M. CET in the Giurati Sports Centre in Milan. Mr. Hwang will be playing for Allianz Milano as an outside hitter alongside Mr. Matey Kaziyski, Mr. Osniel Mergarejo, and Mr. Ishikawa Yuki.

Please let me know of your availability to call regarding Mr. Hwang’s travel logistics. His transportation and lodging costs will be paid for by the club.

I’m looking forward to speaking with you and welcoming Mr. Hwang to Italy once and for all.

Yours, Nicola Daldello Assistant Coach, Allianz Milano

“I told you, some opportunities just present themselves,” Bang says, turning his monitor back around. “As for next steps, I need a holistic calendar view of your entire month of October, including social ev—Hwang, is that foam coming out of your mo—NOT ON MY CARPET! HWANG!”

In a park about a ten minute walk away, a small crowd of elderly people are scattered across a few stone tables, hunched over the fading chess boards painted into the granite surfaces. Mrs. Choi whisks away Mrs. Baek’s king with a triumphant yelp.

“I knew it, I knew it, I knew it! That opening is unbeatable!” She swivels towards you, shaking a fist threateningly. “You! Get over here. Your reign is over.”

You are sitting cross-legged in the shade of a broad magnolia tree, clearing out your storage. You tried to take a picture of a particularly rotund pigeon to send to Hyunjin earlier and couldn’t even do that. It was then you decided you can’t live like this anymore.

“As excited as I am to beat you again, Mrs. Choi, I need ten more minutes,” you call back. 

She presents you with an unpleasant hand gesture. You turn your attention back to your phone, grinning. Two new notifications sit at the top of your lock screen.

Hyunjin: Omw now. Sorry had to talk to Chris Hyunjin: Same park? Y/N: yes Hyunjin: Who’s the opp today Y/N: mrs. choi Hyunjin: Not that bitch again Y/N: ?

He’ll be here in eight minutes.

You return to the task at hand. You’ve already cleared out your apps, your documents, and videos; all that’s left is the audio files. You conduct a quick mental review. Surely you’ll live without your downloaded music and accidental voice memos.

Instead of hitting the “delete” button, you extract a pair of tangled earphones from your jacket pocket.

You go back to your texts with Hyunjin, open the shared attachments tab, and scroll for a long time before you find the voice note he sent you seven months ago.

He finds you a sobbing mess.

“Hey, hey, whoa.” He’s on his knees in an instant, gathering your hands into his, a world of concern in the brown of his eyes. Your earbuds fall out and clatter onto the cement below. “Baby, what’s happening? Are you okay?”

“Yes,” you say in a flustered haste. “Yes, I’m okay. I don’t—I don’t really know what’s happening.”

“Did that hag do this to you?” He asks this question so seriously. “I’ll beat up a senior citizen, I don’t give a fuck—”

“No!” You let out an ugly laugh through your tears. “No, no. Leave Mrs. Choi alone.”

“Then what is it? What’s wrong?”

Eventually, your vision clears enough for you to look at the man kneeling in front of you. His roots grow out longer every day, his hair by now nearly equal parts gold and black. A spot of sunlight infiltrates the magnolia leaves and lands on his left eye, turning it the hue of melted bronze.

Your fingers drift to the sides of his beautiful face as you lean in close; he smells like a combination of smoky rose and tropical coastlines.

“I’ll tell you later,” you murmur, pressing a kiss to his hairline. 

He is dissatisfied with this, hooking a pointer finger beneath your chin, guiding your face back to his. He laves the saltwater from your lips, your tongue, and then you’re smiling again, barely able to remember why you cried in the first place.

You rest your foreheads together. “Have I told you that you look like a bumblebee these days?”

He smiles. “Does that make you my flower, then?”

“Because you’re irresistably drawn to me?”

“No, because I wanna put my pollen in—”

You shove him away. “You are grotesque.”

He returns in a flash. “You love me.”

You kiss him again. And again. And one more time for good measure, during which you mumble I do against his lips, and then you remember something.

“Why did Coach hold you back, by the way?” You pull away, tuck a strand of hair behind his ear. “Are you in trouble again?”

“No, no. The opposite, actually.”

Your brow furrows. “The opposite? What—”

“In this lifetime, please,” Mrs. Choi hollers from the chess tables. You roll your eyes. Hyunjin smiles helplessly.

“Duty calls, my love.”

“Tell me your thing later too?”

“Of course.”

You dust yourself off and stand up, making your way to the battleground. But not before you whisper to Hyunjin, “now watch me beat up a senior citizen.”

He laughs with his whole body, his eyes the shape of crescent moons, his mouth a little rectangle.

“Hypocrite.”

Hyunjin: [1 Audio Message]

This is my seventh take and I’m not recording an eighth. What you get is what you get. I don’t care anymore.

I understand if you don’t wanna talk about what happened at the arcade. I wouldn’t, either. I just wanted to say that you don’t have to do this tutoring thing anymore. I won’t be able to fulfill my end of our deal, so…yeah, it wouldn’t be fair to you. You’ve already done so much for us. For me.

As for team manager, you’ll have to talk to Minho and Coach Bang if you wanna quit. Doesn’t sound like a fun conversation, I know—but if that’s what you decide, I’ll have your back. They don’t scare me. Well, they do. Sometimes.

You’ve been…distant, this week. I’ve known peace and quiet for the first time since we met, and I fucking hate it. I realized I couldn’t care less if you’re my tutor or my team manager or whatever—I just don’t want you to be a stranger. Maybe that’s selfish of me to say, but I’m tired of pretending the idea of losing you doesn’t terrify me. It does. It truly fucking does.

I’m gonna end this here, because I almost just stopped recording on accident and I would’ve committed first degree murder if I had to do this all over again. Sorry that this got so long, and…I’m sorry about everything. You deserve better.

Come back to me whenever you’re ready, okay? I’ll be waiting.

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Animals Without Direction

Chapter Twenty Four - Dagger

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Masterlist

The sun isn’t brightening the sky yet, but you’re awake. 

Laying on your side in the magnificent bed, the plush covers tucked up around your chin to ward off the morning chill, you let your mind wander.  

With bleary eyes, you stare out of the window across from the bed. Mourning Doves coo softly just outside the glass. 

Frost lines the panes, it crackles against the heat coming from inside the room. 

Both you and Seungmin were so tired when you arrived last night that when the house staff showed you to your room, you both collapsed into bed without a second thought. 

Truly, you didn’t even have an opportunity to gawk at the single bed in the room. But, at this point, part of you was desensitized to it. 

It seems the only place you don’t share a bed anymore is back in Miroh; and that’s becoming a rarity too. 

Not that you were complaining; it was nice having another presence to wake up to. It had been too many years of sleeping on your own.

There’s some shuffling on the bed behind you as Seungmin turns over in his sleep and readjusts the blankets. You keep still. 

He settles again and his breathing evens out once more. 

His soft puffs through his nose are barely audible over the sound of the fireplace in the room on top of the Mourning Doves, but you can hear it if you really focus. Out of all the men you’ve slept beside, he’s definitely the quietest. 

Jeongin, on the other hand, was definitely the loudest. There was one morning you contemplating shoving cotton in your ears to block the snoring; or shove a pillow over his face. 

But like he is in his everyday life, Seungmin is silent. His sleepy calmness rubs off on you so you bask in it. 

And in just a few hours, you were going to be whisked away by ladies maids to get you primped and pressed for the masquerade. 

Another first for you. 

A part of you wants to balk at the idea of getting dressed up and squeezing into that gown; it wants to puff out your chest and say you’re a warrior, you don’t need to do any of this. 

But the other part— the much larger part— is giddy beyond belief. Your whole life you’ve read stories about girls getting ready for balls, dancing the night away, eating and drinking fancy foods and wines and you’ve pined for it. 

You can still remember one particular book where the main character ate oysters with champagne strawberry mignonette. For weeks, your mouth watered just thinking about it. 

Will they have food like that here? 

Butterflies swirl in your stomach and you let a smile split your face as you curl into the covers more. 

You fight the tiny giggle that tries to bubble to the surface. 

Just a few more hours until you can pretend to be a lady for an entire night. 

Lady Sigyn Reylar. Engaged to Lord Skye Heivan.

Carefully, you turn and look behind you at the sleeping lump of blankets that is Kim Seungmin. 

Like you, he’s laying on his side, his cheek pressed into the pillow, puckering his lips a bit. His hair is tousled and sticking out in different directions. 

His eyelids twitch and his throat bobs with a swallow. A soft puff of air comes out of his nose with an exhale. 

Smiling, you turn slowly to face him more. 

Your eyes scan all over his sleeping face. He looks like a slumbering baby like this, not a hardened rogue who slinks around in the shadows. 

Before you can stop yourself, your fingers come up from under the blanket and up to his peaceful face. 

With a featherlight touch, you brush his bangs from his eyes. 

You don’t even get to complete the gesture, your hand is snatched up in a tight grip like a cobra striking out. Seungmin’s eyes snap open, obviously alarmed and still confused. 

His other hand slides under his pillow just as quickly. 

“Seungmin!” You hiss between your teeth before he can do anything. 

If a rogue reaches under his pillow, you can only guess what he was about to pull on you. 

Recognition lights up in his sleep heavy eyes and he pauses his jerky movements to stare at you. His breathing now heavy. 

You both stare at each other for a long moment.

“It is just me, Seungmin.” 

The grip on your hand unclenches, but he doesn’t drop it completely. He keeps your wrist held in his long fingers and brings both of your hands back down to the bed. 

While keeping your eyes on him, you’re watching his brain come back to life. Obviously, you ripped him out of a very deep sleep. 

Seungmin blinks a few times, eyelids getting heavier and heavier each time. His brain pulling him back to dreamland. 

“Sorry,” he mutters, it comes out slurred. 

“It is quite alright,” you whisper back. “I apologize for startling you.”

His eyes close. “Do not fret. I am just not used to sharing a bed with anyone.” He face nuzzles into his pillow. 

“I was not trying to kill you.”

His fingers lace with yours and he pulls them under the warmth of the blankets. 

“I have heard that one before,” he teases. A pause. “I have said that one before, too.”

You snicker quietly and keep your eyes trained on his face. 

“Go back to sleep, Y/N, the sun is not up yet.” His voice is weaker as he drifts off again. 

You respond with a hum. 

After a few moments of watching the rogue fall asleep, you feel your own eyes begin to close. Seungmin’s hand is still wrapped around yours, twitching every once in a while. 

With a smile, you drift off again.

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Oh, you could get used to living like royalty. The scented bath you relaxed in for a bit was just the beginning of your pampering journey. 

Various lotions and tonics were slathered all over your skin, making every inch of you soft and perfumed. 

Unfortunately, that meant that eyes were all over your naked skin.  

“Oh! My lady, what happened?” A chamber maid asked, pointing to your leg wound. 

“Ah,” you swallowed, mind reeling with possible excuses. “I had asked one of my father’s guards to train me in swordplay. It did not go well at all.”

The three helpers cooed and continued their work, being very careful of the wound.

Layers of makeup covered your face, two sets of hands worked on pinning your hair up in an elegant style. Various braids of all sorts of length and thickness are pinned up and around your face. A hod rod curls more of your hair before it's pinned up as well.

By watching the mirror in front of the vanity, you’re able to see the entire process of your transformation from start to finish.

“That lord of yours is easy on the eyes, hm?” One of the ladies giggles down to you while working on your hair. “I saw him in the hall earlier, I had to look thrice, I thought my eyes deceived me.”

“I saw him earlier,” another adds while she rubs more blush onto your cheeks. “The mysterious type.”

You smile softly to yourself. Might as well play the part, no? 

“Aye, he is rather good looking, I sure know how to choose them.” Partaking in their gossip makes you feel a tad bit giddy. 

Sitting on the stool in front of the vanity, you’re only wearing underclothes and a plush robe. Slipping into the dress is the last step of the process apparently. 

“Is he good to you?” The third asks, she’s more in front of you, curling pieces of hair that frame your face.

“Oh, he is very good to me.” You watch yourself in the mirror, allowing your eyes to study your own face. “He is always looking out for me, he makes sure I eat well and that I am taking care of myself.”

The ladies squeal and giggle.

“That type of man is so rare to come by these days,” she sighs dreamily. “Maybe one day I will find someone like him.”

“He seems like he is nothing like that ambassador.”

Your interest peaks immediately. 

“Is the ambassador bad to his women?”

The lady doing your makeup rolls her eyes. “Not necessarily bad, no. He just only cares for himself and his needs, let us put it that way.”

“He is a selfish man.” Another says blatantly. You look up at her; both of her eyebrows are furrowed and her lips are pursed angrily.

“Be careful,” the one closest to her hisses and smacks her arm.

“It is alright, I will not say anything,” you reassure them. 

“It is true, though. The ambassador moves from woman to woman so fast I can hardly keep up! The new one in the house has only been here for a few months and any day now, I am telling you, there will be a new tart walking the halls and giving us orders.”

The other lady smacks her arm again, this time it’s a bit harsher. “These walls have ears and unless you want to lose your job I suggest you be quiet .”

A bored, flirty, insatiable man is the perfect target for you tonight. It almost seems too good to be true. 

“Fine, fine.” She looks down at you with wide eyes and mouths: “ It is true, though. ”

You giggle to yourself and look back in the mirror.

Everything just looks so… perfect. Down to the very last detail. Every twist and bend to your hair is calculated and gorgeous, the paint on your face highlights every beautiful contour of your face.

You’ve never felt this confident about your appearance before– never cared to, either. 

“Alright, then,” the one lady says happily, leaning back to admire her work on your makeup. “I think we are ready to get you dressed then.”

Your heart leaps in your chest and you look behind you at the gown on the mannequin, everything laid out around it. You suppress the urge to bite your lip nervously, not wanting to ruin the makeup that was just painted on it.

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Okay, maybe corsets were not everything you thought they would be.

It took two of them to get you laced into the deathtrap while you held onto the back of a chair for dear life. 

Aren’t you supposed to be able to breathe? It feels like something you shouldn’t have to sacrifice in order to look good for a gala. 

One of the ladies carefully adjusts the mask over your eyes.

The only thing missing from your outfit was the holster on your thigh. That was going to have to wait until you had a moment to yourself to put on. There was no way you would be able to explain that to the ladies that were helping you. 

“I know we spoke about how you were lucky to have Lord Heivan, but…” she trails off and takes a step back from you, looking over your appearance from head to toe. “I think that he is the lucky one, no?”

The other two ladies maids watch from behind her with easy smiles on their faces. They both nod in agreement. 

As if on cue, a sharp couple of knocks hit against the hard wood of the door.

“Come in!” you call out. 

Seungmin’s voice enters the room before his body does. “Is my lady ready for me to steal her aw–?”

His voice catches in his throat when he sets his eyes on you in the middle of the room. You’re lucky you weren’t mid sentence either otherwise you would’ve done the same thing. 

Chan had mentioned that your dress was going to match Seungmin’s suit, but you didn’t quite grasp how much he was going to match, or how well the suit was going to be tailored to him.

A majority of the suit was all black: the jacket, pants, and undershirt. But the vest was made out of the same dark purple material that your dress was, his tie as well. A purple pocket square was folded neatly near his lapel. 

Hanging from one of the buttons was a long silver chain that ran down to his pocket, most likely connected to a pocket watch.  

A mask identical to yours– just a bit more masculine– sat on his face. His bangs brushed out of his eyes and styled just as perfectly as your hair is.

With wide eyes, Seungmin stares at you for a long few moments, his hand still holding the handle on the door. 

His grip tightens on the brass door handle, you can see the tendons in his wrist flex a bit before he finally lets go. Slowly but surely he’s trying ro regain his composure. 

“She looks gorgeous, right, my lord?” One of the girls teases.

Seungmin clears his throat quickly. “Aye,” he answers quickly, his voice is hoarse and taught. “Gorgeous is… an understatement.”

By The Six, he’s laying it on thick, isn’t he?

“Well,” one of the ladies maids says, her tone is teasing, like a mother would talk. “We will leave you two to make any… last minute adjustments before heading down to the masquerade. I am sure the festivities have already started.”

The three of them make their way to the door. 

You’re still holding intense eye contact with Seungmin. 

“It was a pleasure, Lady Sigyn.” They all curtsy at you. “Lord Heivan.” Another curtsy.

Seungmin steps out of the way as the three of them exit the door. Once they’re out in the hallway, he shuts the door behind them. It settles in the frame with a resounding click .

Holding your gaze, Seungmin steps closer to you, the heels of his shoes click against the stone floor of the room, reverberating off the stone walls. 

Fidgeting with the dress beneath your fingers, the velvet slides around under your touch.

He stops right in front of you, looking down through his mask with stormy eyes.

You drop into a small bow-like curtsy, “My lord.” You tease, your gaze dipped down to the floor.

Seungmin gently reaches out and places a finger under your chin, tilting it up to meet his gaze. “You look breathtaking, Y/N.”

Sheepishly, you try to look away from his intense, dark eyes, but his hold on your face is strong. “Thank you, Seungmin.” Your eyes venture down to his suit once more. “I have to say, I rather like your suit as well.”

He smirks. “Does it suit me well?”

“Aye, the color purple does wonders for you.”

He hums with a smile and drops his hand. “Why thank you, my lady.” He holds out his arm to you. “Shall we?”

You hold up a hand. “Ah, there is one last piece I need to adorn before we can go down to the ball. I could not have the ladies' maids help me with this, I am afraid.”

Stepping away from him, you walk over to the large chest and rifle through the inside, pulling out the thigh holster.

“I may need your assistance with this, I cannot really move in this blasted corset.” 

“Of course.” Again, his voice sounds strained. But, you decide not to think anything of it as you walk closer to him.

You hand the holster over to him, he takes it gingerly.

“Maybe you should take a seat so that you can bunch up the skirts?” He proposes looking down at the gown. 

“Oh,” you start and look down. “No need.” You run your hand down the fabric and pull the slit aside to reveal your leg.

Seungmin makes a choking noise in the back of his throat. Your head snaps up to look at him. A prominent blush covers the bridge of his nose and spreads up to his ears. If it weren’t for the mask, you’re sure that you would’ve seen an entirely new expression on his face. 

“Is everything alright?”

Before you can get the entire question out, he nods sharply and toys with the leather holster in his hands. His throat bobs with a gulp.

“The slit was clever, no?” You look back down at it, your fingers running down the split and toying with it. “It was Minho’s idea, it is for a dagger.”

Another hoarse hum comes from the rogue. “Aye, it is very clever, indeed. Remind me to give Minho my thanks when we return to Miroh.”

Slowly, Seungmin kneels down in front of you. His gaze stays on your leg. 

“I owe him… many, many thanks, it seems.”

It’s not until his knees hit the floor that you fully grasp what is about to happen. 

He reaches up slowly to move the fabric away from your leg. An involuntary shiver leaves your lips at the intimate action. He brushes it away with featherlight gentleness. 

With one hand, he reaches forward and wraps his fingers around your knee to pull your leg forward a bit. His touch sends goosebumps right up your skin.

Your jaw clenches. 

Leaning your balance on one leg, you let Seungmin pull your foot up to rest your fancy shoe on his clothed thigh. To stabilize yourself even more, you grab onto one of his shoulders for support. 

His face is so close to your exposed skin, you can feel his slightly shaky exhales all over. It does nothing to get rid of the goosebumps plaguing your entire body. 

Nimble fingers reach up and wrap the holster around your thigh. His fingers brush against your leg entirely more than you think to be necessary. 

He adjusts the height higher and higher, his knuckles brushing against every inch of exposed flesh.

Seungmin buckles the holster around your thigh, the leather strap sliding into place and sitting comfortably on your skin.

You can’t help but stare down at him while he fastens the holster to your body.

A shiver runs up your spine like a zipper when he lets out a particularly deep exhale. He licks his lips and pulls his bottom lip between his teeth for a moment. 

From the floor, he looks up at you and meets your searing gaze with his own. One of Seungmin’s hands is still on the side of your thigh, the other slides down the entire expanse of your leg, memorizing every curve and bump until it rests around your ankle, fingers wrapping around it and squeezing gently.

“How is that?” he whispers up to you with bright eyes and pursed lips. “Secure?” His breath is so hot on your already searing skin. He tugs on the holster slightly. 

Gulping, you nod down to him. “Aye, it is perfect.”

Seungmin hums and looks down at the holster, still empty. He cocks his head to the side. “Almost.” 

In a fluid motion, he reaches into his suit jacket pocket and pulls out his own dagger. It’s simple in design with a silver handle. It’s beautifully clean and classic– like him. 

The grip on your ankle tightens a bit.

Painfully slow, Seungmin drags the dagger up your long leg. You can hear the sound of the metal scratching lightly against your skin. The coldness of the blade is a stark contrast to the heat of your skin. 

He slides it up the entire length of your leg and to your thigh before sheathing it into the holster.

By the time the dagger is put away, your entire body is flushed and quaking with an unknown want. 

“There,” he says under his breath. “ Now it is perfect.”

Every inch of your skin feels like it's on fire. 

He looks back up at you from the floor, the hand by the holster splays out over your entire thigh, fingers pressing into the flesh, like he wants to brand his very fingerprints into your body.

You reach up and brush away one of the strands of hair that had fallen down over his forehead.

Absentmindedly, he leans into your touch.

The way he’s looking up at you through the holes in his mask leaves your mind in shambles. 

“You are too good to me, my lord,” you murmur down to Seungmin. Your fingers card through his styled hair.

His grip tightens once more. 

“Nay, my lady.” He squeezes your thigh. “I am simply treating you how you deserve.”

His hand runs down from your thigh to your knee, helping you find your balance on the floor once more. Fuzzy feelings still wrack your nerves as Seungmin stands to his full height above you once more.

Like before, he holds out his elbow for you to take.Your hand slips through his arm, Seungmin brings you closer to his body.

“Are you ready, my beloved Lady Sigyn?” He smiles down at you. 

“I was born ready, my darling Lord Skye.”

Let’s Fall in Love, IRL | Prologue

pairing: Jisung x fem reader

genre: smau, crack, angst, fluff, non!idol au, Pen pals to lovers, friend of a friend to lovers

pov: 1st/2nd person (depending on how you view it)

warnings: swearing, mention of food

summary: When she was a child, L/n Y/n was in a horrible accident that left her face disfigured.  After getting bullied relentlessly by her classmates for her appearance, Y/n escaped to the digital world where she meets Felix. Now an adult, Y/n has be come a complete social recluse, only talking to her 4 childhood best friends and roommates and her only friends. When Felix goes AFK one day in the middle of a game, Felix’s roommates decides to step in. Is this the start a new relationship or will Y/n’s crippling social anxiety get in the way?

taglist: CLOSED

word count: n/a

screenshot count: 12

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