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fic recs ✨| if you’re tae-biased, this is the list for youuuuu

you’ll see 4 categories below - I nearly had a meltdown trying to decide how to organise these but this is what I’ve settled on:

quick reads » less than or around 6k words

moderate reads » probs between 7k to 12k; drabble series’

fkn investments but they’re totally worth every second your time!!! » LONG AF BUT YOU’LL PROBABLY WISH IT WAS LONGER! 

smaus!

🌟 = all-time favourite, please please PLEASE check it out!

lumina by angelguk ╰  🐯 | warm and wholesome | 1.3k (+ another part)

jimin, alone by dom-joonie ╰  🐥 | neighbour!AU | fluffy | bite-sized drabble

beneath firelight by guksheart ╰  🐯 | childhood friends to lovers!AU | 5.1k

ours by hugseoks ╰  🐰 | roommate!AU | soft:( | 2.3k

the setup by jeongukk ╰  🐥 | bff!hobi is in this, you should already be sold | bite-sized drabble

drawing darcy by kpopfanfictrash ╰  🐯 | best friends to lovers | soft af | 3k

“guess we’re sharing that twin bed” by kpopfanfictrash ╰  🐯 | very cute | kpopfanfictrash aka master of flirty dialogue | bite-sized

cordially, jimin by kpopfanfictrash 🌟🌟 ╰  🐥 | words can’t explain how in love with this fic i was after reading it | effortlessly funny and cute | as expected from queen of dialogue | the format is also so original and creative, a must-read | 6.1k

untitled drabble by oilblotter* (now obiwrites on ao3 if you’re hungry for more) ╰  🐯 | f2l? | tae’s a stoner but he’s charming and cute and very him | will make you a lil emo | 1.8k

untitled drabble by oilblotter* ╰  🐥 | childhood friends!AU | heir!jimin | 5.8k | there’s no part 2:(

prompt game drabble by taetaesbaebaepsae ╰  🐯 | best friend!tae is tipsy, soft and cuddly :( | bite-sized

100 ways to say i love you drabble by underthejoon ╰  🐯 | fwb to lovers? | cuddly and soft af | bite-sized

happily glazed by yoonsgiggle ╰  🐥 | bff!jimin | fake date AU | 3.3k

extra cheese sauce, please by yoonsgiggle ╰  🐯 | f2l | college!AU | fuffy and cute :( | 3.2k

fifty ways to kiss someone by 94hixtape 🌟🌟 ╰  🐯 | roommate!AU | drabble series | incomplete:( ╰ the drabbles are short but you will get addicted and want to read them all.

jungkook drabble series by bangtanfancamp ╰  🐰🐯 | where guk’s in love w tae’s girl | series | 12 parts

just pretend by btees ╰  🐯🐰 | neighbour!tae | college fake dating au | 10.6k

schemes & tricks to win her heart by crystaljins 🌟🌟 ╰  🐯🐹 | best friend!tae | fake-date/moral support!jin | 5-part series

good luck charm by gukyi ╰  🐯 | bff2l | 12k 

love, guaranteed by gukyi ╰  🐯 | bff/f2l | cute af:( | 11k |

more than us (m) by jeongi ╰  🐯 | very physically affectionate roommates to lovers lmao | 11.3k

opposites attract (m) by kpopfanfictrash ╰  🐥 | slytherin!jimin aka the best jimin | series | 9 parts ╰ pretty sure most of the drabbles are shortish? but again, you’re probably gonna wanna strap in and devour the whole damn thing bc it’s by kpopfanfictrash and those are just the rules for when you read her works!

piece by piece (m) by underthejoon ╰  🐿🐹 | series | an emotional ride; strap in for this one folks | 15 parts

a monster crush (and how to survive it) by army-author ╰  🐯 | childhood friends (to lovers?) | mild horror!AU | part 1 is 12k | and only 2 of 3 parts exist rn

blooming days (m) by bluekyun 🌟 ╰  🐥 | best friends to lovers | pregnancy!AU | 15.3k

slight changes (m) by chiminiemoans 🌟 ╰  🐯 🐥 | bf!tae and jimin the angel friend | yall this series is an incredibly vivid & emotional rollercoaster | a must-read for vmin stans | 9-part series

four weeks by gukyi 🌟🌟 ╰  🐯 | e2l and also they’re living together oop | 10/10 will make you wish it was the holidays and you will fall in love with tae bye | super fluffy but also ANGST | 20k

V2 by honeyedhoseok 🌟🌟 ╰  🐯 | bff/ex/infidelity au | broooo this is another one of those that’s written so well that it just sucks you right into its universe til you have no choice but to read all the chapters | 7/11 parts | ongoing

the holi-date (m) by kpopfanfictrash 🌟🌟 ╰  🐯 | neighbour!AU | fake dating!AU | 40.5k of god tier writing

no strings (m) by kpopfanfictrash ╰  🐥 | bffs to fwbs? | another emotional rollercoaster my god | 10-part series

limerence by gukooky 🌟 ╰  🐯 | f2l | the first thing i ever read… uwu | smau | 30 parts

star crossed by gukooky ╰  🐯 | e2l | fake dating!AU | smau | 60 parts

empty apartment by jjkscafe ╰  🐰 | roommate!jungkook | no pairings, it’s a platonic household in this au! | a crack smau series for my crackheads | smau | 26 parts

love maze by sighobii ╰  🐰🐯🐹 | oop which boy prevails in the end? | smau | 30 parts

a word from our sponsors | knj

you’ve co-hosted a podcast with namjoon for three years; have known him even longer. the two of you have always been the picture of platonic, but that hasn’t stopped the internet from doing what the internet does. the shipping? a little weird at first, but you can understand it: two attractive twenty-somethings always in close proximity to one another, obvious (platonic!) chemistry—people have created ships for less. the fanfiction, though? also pretty funny… until you can’t stop thinking about it. 🎙️

pairing: namjoon x f. reader genre: podcast, friends to lovers au; crack, smut, fluff rating: explicit. minors do not interact. warnings: parasocial relationships galore, a m*n with a p*dcast, author abuses italics, swearing, alcohol, reader uses a pseudonym/nickname (piper) because writing the meta fanfiction scene would've been too weird without one and i refuse to use y/n, dialogue-heavy but it is a fic about a podcast, everyone is down horrendous, mentions of social media & fake r*ddit posts, ex-boyfriend yoongi but in a good, healthy way. let me know if i missed anything but mostly this is just two goofballs not realizing they're in love with one another. smut warnings: kissing, oral sex (f. receiving), fingering, unprotected vaginal sex (fiction), protected vaginal sex (nonfiction), a lil squirting, mild degradation, mentions of a p*ss kink but there is no actual pee i promise (...lest?), i didn't intend to write size kink but it's namjoon so it just showed up anyway, slight dom!joon, everyone orgasms. wordcount: 17.5k credits: this was entirely inspired by that one episode of the basement yard where frankie reads the smut fic of him and joe, so credits to both that author and that podcast. spotify, for their podcast name generator. astro-seek for helping me drag namjoon astrologically. an extra special, gigantic thanks to @effortandmore for writing the meta fanfic (3k of it, no less!) and not batting an eye when i said it could have pee in it as a joke. this is as much yours as it is mine. finally, @hot-soop and @the-boy-meets-evil for reading this over for me and telling me i'm funny. author's note: happy birthday, indigo! here i am to validate every fear you've ever had that the people you write porn about may one day read it. live and on air. :)

You’ve co-hosted a podcast with Namjoon for three years.

You can learn a lot about a guy in that amount of time.

None of it is especially salacious. You know all about his family and his dog and the brand of recycled paper towels he insists on buying in bulk. You know what he’d written his grad school thesis on and what he’d looked like in the thick of it, when he was staving off his fifth mental break of the week. You know how fidgety he gets when it’s closing in on Friday night and he’s got a date—how much he stresses over which restaurant to pick, which cologne, which expensive cashmere sweater to wear.

You also know what the internet thinks about him. Intimately.

Kim Namjoon, according to the internet, is peak husband material. He has cheeks ripe for pinching and thighs small countries would go to war to defend. He has a lap that doubles as a seat and dimples people want to get baptized in. He has Instagram selfies with hundreds of thousands of likes and comment sections full of intelligible keysmashes, especially the ones he posts from the gym.

Kim Namjoon, according to the internet, is a man written by a woman.

Looking at him now, you aren’t sure that’s true, you think people just need to raise their standards. Namjoon is just… Namjoon. He’s intelligent and kind and up to date on modern feminist theory, is all. And, sure, maybe in the current political landscape that puts him far above the rest of men, but the way the internet has latched onto him is a little concerning.

“There’s another post about whether or not we’re dating,” you say, pushing your glasses up the bridge of your nose.

sooo let’s be real here, we ALL think they’re dating, right?? Posted by u/pod-shipper 2 hours ago

Just like he always does, Namjoon huffs out a soft laugh, makes his way around to your side of the table. Puts his large hands on your shoulders as he leans in close to read from your screen, snorting every time he reads a sentence he finds particularly amusing. Whichever cologne he’d chosen this morning is, admittedly, very nice.

It’s sooo obvious, especially in the episodes they film and post on YouTube. The way they look at each other?? I don’t even look at my HUSBAND like that! (+1264) ↳ omg ur sooooo right! i could MAYBE buy that they aren’t full on dating, but they’ve def at least slept together. Namjoon is so 🔥🔥🔥 (+791) ↳ um how can namjoon be dating her when he’s already married to me 😌💅 (+3) ↳ For the millionth time, can we not speculate on their personal lives? This is weird and reinforces really harmful ideas that men and women can’t just be friends. (-51)

“How come they never talk about how hot you are?”

You can tell by the look on Namjoon’s face that he hadn’t meant to say that—or, if he did, he didn’t mean to say it like that, with an entire pout, eyebrows raised nearly to his hairline. “Cursed to be ugly and dumb,” you joke to ease the sudden tension, reading the comment that simply says you’d have to be the dumbest person alive to not sleep with Namjoon.

He scrunches his nose at that. Returns to his side of the table. “Yeah, I don’t think so, lots of people haven’t slept with me.” Starts to unpack all the gear from his bag before he says, “Hey, all that stuff—does it bother you?”

“What do you mean?” you answer, the corner of a protein bar stuck in your mouth. Namjoon always insists on recording at the most inconvenient times.

“People thinking we’re together,” he clarifies.

You shrug. “I dunno. Not really. Comes with the territory, I think, not to mention how much you love to overshare—”

“Hello?”

“I’m just saying,” you retort, hands raised in self-defense. “There really was no need for you to mention you blew your grad school stipend on a porn scam.” Namjoon looks affronted, like he can’t believe you’d stoop so low as to bring that up. “Or that you lost your virginity at fifteen.”

“We have a relationship podcast,” he states simply. “That’s kind of what we do, right? Talk about relationships? And the spectrum of human sexuality is part of that.”

You slump back in your chair as you quirk an eyebrow. “No one said it wasn’t, I just said you overshare. Which you do.”

“And that’s why there’s a dozen Reddit posts a week discussing whether or not we’re dating? Because I overshare?”

“Yeah, exactly. That’s the kind of behavior that leads to parasocial relationships. People latch onto that shit. Makes them think they’re your friend.” He glares. “Don’t give me that look, you know I’m right. It’s bad enough you’ve word-vomited all this highly personal information about yourself, but to not even do it under a pseudonym? It’s like you’re begging for trouble.”

Another comment he doesn’t even realize he’s making: “I don’t beg. For anything.”

To this day, you’re not sure why Namjoon asked you to co-host a podcast with him.

His reasoning had been simple: “You’re my best friend and we don’t agree on anything.” Hard to argue with that. Namjoon has seemingly endless patience, even in the face of things he shouldn’t entertain, and you… do not, to put it simply.

You’re not a cold person. Your fuse isn’t short. You’re just a little jaded, is all. Have far less propensity for bullshit than Namjoon does, so the two of you play well off each other. You end a sentence with a well-punctuated full stop and Namjoon’s right behind you to sigh and say maybe you shouldn’t be so hasty, not everything in the world can be so black or white.

Except some things are. Somewhere along the way, the podcast—which Namjoon had affectionately named Place Him Gently in the Garbage, even though some people should be shoved in there with force—had picked up a following. A big one. And now, every week, you’re inundated with emails ranging in severity. Sometimes people just want to vent after their tenth bad date in a row or share funny stories, and Namjoon lets you take the lead on those, but sometimes it’s a little more serious. That’s where Namjoon shines, all that endless patience, and people love him for it.

“What’s on the agenda today?” he asks, accepting a thick stack of papers from Jungkook.

Ah, Jungkook.

You aren’t sure what he actually does. Some kind of social media manager, which is obvious from the wildly out-of-context clips he posts of you to TikTok, and it’s his responsibility to go through the thousands of emails you get from listeners, but aside from that all you’ve got are your suspicions that he just sticks around to swindle Namjoon out of more and more money.

“I’m in a silly goofy mood,” comes Jungkook’s reply, and you let out a witch cackle as Namjoon winces. Nothing good ever comes of Jungkook being in a silly goofy mood, and that’s quite alright by you.

Fifteen minutes later finds you with a camera in your face that you greet with an unamused, flat stare. Jungkook is used to it by now. Just films for a few seconds before turning his attention to an unaware Namjoon. Head down, pen and highlighter going a mile a minute as he pores over the stack of papers with all the doggedness and eagle-eyed stare of a literature professor.

That’s the thing about Namjoon—he takes this really seriously. So do you, but not in the ways Namjoon does. He’s all skill and determination and you’re color commentary. It works. It clearly works, so you aren’t too bent out of shape about it, but sometimes you worry. Namjoon takes this really seriously and sometimes you worry that he takes it too seriously, that he carries the burdens and worries of all these strangers, that he’s trying to solve and fix things that aren’t his responsibility to solve and fix.

So he takes it really seriously and you don’t take it as seriously as you maybe should, and everything is by design. Balanced.

Twenty minutes later finds you staring across the table at Namjoon, who asks, “Are you ready?” and does one last equipment check before he launches into, “Welcome back to another episode of Place Him Gently in the Garbage with Namjoon and Piper. What’s new with you, Pipe? Any fun news?”

Pipe. It drives you nuts. Feels like nails on a chalkboard. “I see you almost every single day,” you respond dryly. “But for the sake of entertainment, I’m thinking about getting a cat.”

“A cat?” Namjoon parrots, and his eyebrows disappear beneath his fringe because he knows what that means.

You’ve co-hosted a podcast with Namjoon for three years, but you’ve known him even longer.

Since your first year of college, which is also when you met Yoongi. Yoongi, your ex. Yoongi, the person you’d been with for six years and had planned a life around. Yoongi, now one of your closest friends, because the two of you still love one another but no longer in that way, which is fine. But also—Yoongi, allergic to cats.

So, yeah. Namjoon knows what that means, and he has the good sense not to mention it. Unlike him, you’re intensely private and keep your cards close to your chest. Your listeners don’t even know your real name, let alone that you’d gone through a breakup a year ago.

“What kind of cat?” he continues, like his entire world hasn’t just been turned upside-down.

You shrug. “Eh, I don’t know. Probably one that’s been in the shelter a long time, I guess. I’m not too fussy, you know?”

“Right, a cat is a cat,” Namjoon says, thinking he’s done something. You and Jungkook gasp at the same time. “What? Why are you giving me that look?”

“Because that’s a fucked up thing to say! A cat is not just a cat. They have little personalities, just like people. You’ve got—”

“But you just said you’re not fussy,” he interjects. “And I know they have personalities and that you have to find one that suits your lifestyle! Like, you can’t have one of those really cool cats that likes to go kayaking and shit, it’d never work—”

“What does that mean? Why couldn’t I have a cool cat?”

“Hey, all you cool cats and kittens,” Namjoon mocks, and you can tell he thinks he’s done something again, but his impression falls flatter than flat. An awkward silence fills the studio. He coughs. “Anyway. Do you have pictures?”

“Yeah. I also have a list of candidates ranked by how cool their names are. Number five, Casserole.”

“That’s cute.”

“Mhm,” you agree, “but Casserole is a kitten, and I’m not sure I’m ready for that kind of responsibility.”

“They do say you should adopt kittens in pairs.”

“And that’s how they get you. You want one kitten and they talk you into two, and before you know it you’ve got, like, twelve cats. Number four, Party Girl.”

“Sick name.”

“Number three, Toddler.”

“Toddler?”

“Number two, Flat.”

“Just Flat? Understandable.”

“And, finally, number one: Human Torch.”

“Yoooo.” Namjoon laughs. “You have to adopt Human Torch. Let me see.” You pull up a picture on your phone and hand it over. “Okay, for our listeners—Human Torch is a young, male Domestic Short Hair. He has stripes. I don’t know what that’s called.”

“Tabby,” Jungkook chimes in.

“Jungkook says he’s a tabby. He’s cute. Adopt him.”

You return your phone to your pocket. “Maybe. I still think I want an older cat, but I’ll consider it. What about you, though? Any new dating horror stories to share?”

Ah, the dating horror stories. Your most dedicated shippers are convinced they’re fake, that Namjoon just makes them up on the spot to keep them off your trail. If only. Not in the if only they were fake and Namjoon and I were actually dating kind of way, but the holy shit one of my closest friends is a fucking disaster and it’s a little embarrassing kind of way.

“Not really,” he answers. “I’ve got a date this Friday, though. Trying to decide if dinner and a movie is too boring.”

“It’s a classic for a reason. What are you gonna see, My Big Fat Greek Wedding 3?”

“Three?” Namjoon emphasizes, truly sounding scandalized. “Since when are there three? I haven’t even seen one or two.”

“Okay, first of all, the original is a classic and it’s a crime you haven’t seen it.”

“And second of all?”

“There is no second of all. Repeat point one.”

He snorts. “I’m not gonna see that, anyway. Maybe the re-release of Howl’s Moving Castle.”

“Subbed or dubbed, though?”

“Are you trying to get me canceled?”

“Absolutely.”

“I like both,” he chickens out. “Now, let’s stop wasting time and get to the point of the show.”

“Talking about cats is a waste of time?”

“I—no, we’ve just got a lot on the agenda today.”

“Like what?”

“Well, there’s lots to talk about on the celebrity front—”

Namjoon loves this part. As esteemed and educated as he is, not even he is immune to good old celebrity gossip. (Inside him there are two wolves.) Lives for it. Texts you about it at all hours of the night. Sends you links to Reddit threads with hundreds of comments. Has more opinions on Celebrity Big Brother than he does on Ludwig Wittgenstein, sometimes, and when that’s the case you know you’re in for a long evening. You’ve never even seen an episode of Celebrity Big Brother.

But Namjoon loves it, so you’ve become fond of it by association. Reminds you a bit of Yoongi and his love for sports and sports anime.

“—one should we start with?”

“Whatever you want,” you answer, because you haven’t been paying a lick of attention and you aren’t sure it matters anyway. Namjoon can talk to a wall on a good day, but he’s an entirely different beast once mundane, innocuous celeb gossip gets involved.

And even though you hadn’t been paying attention, it seems like this was the right thing to say, because Namjoon smiles so wide his dimples crater his face. “Cool. Let’s start with Taryn Manning. Did you see that bizarre—”

“Who?”

“What?”

“Who is Taryn Manning?”

Namjoon looks a little dumbstruck. Even Jungkook’s arching an eyebrow at you. “Are you serious? She was in Orange is the New Black and Crossroads.”

“The Britney Spears movie?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh. Weird, okay. Continue.”

Your co-host shoots you a very pointed look. “I will, thanks. Anyway, she posted a video on social media talking about this affair she had with a married man. Like, she pulled over on the side of the road to record this. Said she can’t stand the man’s wife because she called her a quote-unquote lunatic.”

“I—huh, thought we weren’t supposed to say that anymore. Alright.”

“But wait, it gets even more bizarre. Listen to this quote—and this is direct. This is a direct quote from the video, I can’t stop thinking about it: ‘Don’t you ever threaten me when your husband came to me to get his butthole licked.’ Can you—”

“What? Namjoon, what in the fuck—”

“It’s crazy, right? She was gonna buy this guy a boat.”

“Namjoon, this is a family show, you can’t just talk about ass-eating unprompted.”

“No it’s not.”

“Well, you still shouldn’t talk about ass-eating unprompted. It’s unbecoming.”

“You’re unbecoming,” Namjoon fires back, because he can’t help it. The words are out of his mouth before he can think. “Sorry, that was out of line.”

You sigh. Know whatever look Jungkook is catching on his camera right now is exasperated and pointed, the corners of your mouth probably tugged up just a hint. “Unbecoming, like I said.” Namjoon scoffs. “Anyway, so this actress was gonna buy this married guy a boat and was eating his ass?”

“Yeah. Apparently it was her friend’s husband? They all went to a Taylor Swift concert together.”

“Jesus, this keeps getting worse. Big year for Hollywood cheaters.”

“It is, right? Cheaters and divorces. Something in the water, I guess.”

“I saw the astrology girlies saying a bunch of planets are in retrograde, so—”

“Can you explain that to me? Like, what does it mean for a planet to be in retrograde? Why is it causing divorces?”

“I don’t know, I’m not an astrology girlie. That’s why I said the astrology girlies. What are your big three, though?”

“What’s that?”

“Your sun, moon, and rising signs.”

“How do I find that out?”

“Ugh,” you intone, “don’t worry about it, I’ll do it myself. What time were you born?”

Namjoon rattles off a time.

You grab your laptop. Pull up the page, type in Namjoon’s date of birth and birthplace, and wait. Then you’re staring at a circle with a bunch of lines in it that also don’t make a lick of sense to you. You roll your lips to keep from laughing and school your voice into something deadly serious. “Bad news: it says you’re a virgin.”

“Virgo,” Namjoon corrects, not taking the bait. “I already knew that.”

You scroll a little further down the page. “Your moon is in Sagittarius. Oh god, listen to this, they’ve got you pegged: ‘The greatest need is to always search for something. In order to feel safe you need a philosophy or belief’—”

“Haaa, that’s not—”

“—’You need to have a goal or mission that gives your life meaning. Your faith must be voluntary and it is a paradox that fighting against dogmas may lead you to other dogmas.’ Yeah, that’s you.”

“That could apply to anyone,” he argues. “There are seven-billion people on this planet; I’d imagine a sizable amount of them would say that also describes them.”

“Hm, sounds like your faith in astrology is not yet voluntary. Did you know you’re a Scorpio rising?”

“No. I’m sure you’re gonna tell me all about it, though.”

You smile. “Correct. ‘People with Scorpio on the Ascendant need to fight against dark and destructive power in their life.’ Is that true?”

“Yeah, you’re the dark and destructive power. You keep sidetracking me and we need to get to the point of the podcast.” He grabs the stack of papers Jungkook had given him. Looks more highlighter than paper, if you’re being honest. “I guess Jungkook thought we needed a lighthearted kind of day.”

“That was nice of him, considering what he gave us last week. I guess we’re allowed to have faith in humanity today.”

To your left, Jungkook scoffs.

“Alright,” Namjoon starts, putting on his Very Serious Podcast Guy voice, “first up we’ve got a question from one of our listeners in Canada. It says, ‘Hi, Piper and Namjoon. I recently agreed to go on a blind date with a friend of a friend. She said he was a bit old-fashioned but really talked him up so I thought I was in good hands—and then he showed up to get me in a ‘67 GTO and exclusively referred to me as doll. He didn’t use my name once. I’m torn, because he was really nice and I had a good time otherwise, but this is weird, right? Should I see him agai—’”

“No,” you interject.

“Can I finish?”

“You don’t have to. This guy sounds greasy.”

Namjoon pinches the bridge of his nose. “And why is that?”

“Ignoring the fact that this guy has arguably one of the lamest classic cars around, he didn’t use their name once? Not once, in all the time they spent together? That’s really disrespectful.”

“Some people are just pet name people,” Namjoon argues.

“With absolute strangers, though? It’s really giving the impression that he didn’t even know it, not to mention some people are uncomfortable with pet names. The whole shtick is super lame.”

“I agree it sounds a bit misguided, but—”

Ignoring Namjoon, you say, “Sorry you had to go on a date with the ghost of less-cool James Dean. Into the garbage he goes.”

And, just like he’s done a million times before, Namjoon rolls his eyes and says, “If you really like this guy and want to see him again, a bit of communication will go a long way. Tell him the pet name made you uncomfortable—if it did—and offer to pick him up for the next date. I don’t think he’s completely destined for the garbage, yet.”

“You’re just saying that because you don’t have a license. You probably think a 1967 Pontiac GTO is the pinnacle of romance. That’s probably like picking someone up on a Specialized Aethos to you, eh?”

“That’s a fifteen-thousand dollar bike, I’ll have you know.”

You groan. “Oh my god.”

Ep: #183 - Namjoon is a Virgin

I think Namjoon had the right idea on this one. Sure, the car can be considered lame, but I think a lot of men are deeply insecure and therefore overcompensate when it comes to dating. Women are hard to impress when they have unlimited options. You have to stand out, so I’m glad he advocated for him. Piper can come off like such a misandrist sometimes. (-649) ↳ just shut up bro namjoon would fuckin hate u (+204) ↳ Imagine caring about something like this when they’re getting a cat together 🙄 (+19)

You think about the cat thing for nearly a week.

Adopting a cat is certainly not the worst idea you’ve ever had, and truth be told it’s been a little lonely, living by yourself. No more Yoongi in your space; no more Holly. So, having a new little friend around might do you some good.

It’s just—

It’s a big commitment, and there’s also the dog sitting-shaped elephant in the room. Ending things on good terms means you’re still Yoongi’s second-choice sitter whenever he has to go out of town, and while you love Holly dearly (the two of you had adopted him together, after all), he’s a lot like his father in a lot of ways.

Should I get a cat, you type out, and it’s only been in Yoongi’s inbox a few seconds before the most unflattering picture you’ve ever taken of him is flashing across your screen.

“Are you dying?” you ask, because Yoongi doesn’t call you for much else.

And you already know what his response is going to be. “We’re all dying.”

“Lighten up, Yoongi. One might say being so existentially nihilistic before noon causes wrinkles.”

There’s a split-second pause. “It’s nine p.m.”

“Sure, but it’s before tomorrow’s noon, so it still counts.”

“Whatever. Listen, before you adopt that cat, I need a favor.”

“You going out of town again?”

“Yeah. Shouldn’t be long, though. A week at the most, five days if I’m lucky.”

“That’s fine, bring him over whenever. Yijeong’s busy?”

This pause is far, far longer. “No,” comes Yoongi’s eventual response, but it’s slow. Unsure. A two-letter word has never taken so long to say in the history of ever. “He’s, uh. Coming with me?”

Oh, you think. This is where your ex awkwardly and hesitantly breaks the news of his new relationship. You’ve known this day was coming, and this is what you get for staying friends with him. “This is a fanfiction plot,” you accuse. “Hot, mysterious man moves into a gaudy apartment complex after ending a long-term relationship and meets his equally-hot and mysterious neighbor and they fall in love.”

“I—that’s not—my apartment is not gaudy.”

“Yes it is. There’s a giant gold bust of a weird bird in the lobby.”

“Weird bird?” he parrots. “It’s a swan.”

“I see you’re not denying the in-love-with-your-neighbor accusations.”

“Am I on trial?” Yoongi retorts, and it’s such a Yoongi thing to say when what he means is, is this okay? He means, are we able to talk about this without it being weird? He means, I won’t ever say as much out loud, but your acceptance means a lot to me, and I’d like for you to give me this.

So you lower your voice and soften the edges because it’s not really something to joke about, and you say, “No, of course you’re not on trial,” and Yoongi knows what you mean. “And if you were, you'd get locked up for fifty years. You can’t lie for shit.”

There’s a beat of silence before he clears his throat, mutters a thanks that is so quiet you almost don’t catch it. “Send me pictures of the cats.”

Later on, once you’re freshly-showered and tucked into bed with a candle and a book (Eloge de l’amour by Alain Badiou at Namjoon’s insistence and request), your phone buzzes with a text from Yoongi—

Yoongi: toddler is a fucking hilarious name for a cat but so is flat Yoongi: it’s a tie for me You: Okay well pick one 🙄 Yoongi: yijeong says get both You: Both???? Is he paying my vet bills? Yoongi: kinda out of line to proposition him for money. flat is also good with dogs, js You: If he’s now being raised by you two, my perfect, well-behaved son is probably long gone. Does he even count as a dog anymore? Yoongi: me and yijeong both say fuck off Yoongi: holly too. he says he doesn’t miss you anymore and he’s not coming over now Yoongi has added Yijeong to the group Yoongi has changed the group name to #ThirdWheelChat Yijeong: Please don’t drag me into this. Also I did not say “fuck off” You have changed the group name to People Who Have Seen Yoongi Naked Yoongi: fuck you

You should’ve known something was going on with Jungkook, because it’d started like this:

(When you and Namjoon started the podcast three years ago, it was in the living room of his apartment.

Surrounded by books and plants. He loved to record in the afternoons back then—Namjoon loved to say it was because of his grad school schedule, but you’ve always suspected he just wanted to preen in the golden hour light, much like he’s doing now.

“Is this really necessary?” Jungkook whines from his spot on the couch. He’s already swindled Namjoon out of two bags of microwavable popcorn and three cans of sparkling water. “It’s a Saturday afternoon; I could be doing something so much more fun than this.”

Namjoon scoffs. “Are you saying this isn’t fun?”

“Yeah. It sucks, actually. This could’ve been an email.”

And because Namjoon is accomplished, mature, and absolutely incapable of not taking Jungkook’s bait, the space between his brows creases as he sends a murderous glare Jungkook’s way. “Stop eating my food, then. And drinking my drinks. And lounging on my couch like that—”

“I’m not lounging,” Jungkook argues.

“You’re manspreading all over the leather!”

“This is how I sit!”

“Well, knock it off! My couch is only for fun and people who think I’m fun!”

Jungkook rolls his eyes. “So you fuck on it?”

“What?”

“What other fun things could you possibly do on a couch?”

Namjoon blinks. “Watch… watch a movie?”

Jungkook groans, throws himself backwards against the pillows as if he’s suffering a Victorian ailment. “Jesus. No wonder you can’t score a second date.”

“Okay, that was a little uncalled for. There are a ton of reasons a person might not want a second date, and no one is obligated to go out with me—”

“Uh-huh. Anyway—”

You clear your throat. Try to hide your own can of seltzer you’d taken from Namjoon’s fridge in the midst of his and Jungkook’s bickering. “Not trying to be rude, but I have an appointment at the shelter at three. If, y’know. You wouldn’t mind speeding this up a little.”

“Oh! Yeah, of course—”

“Oh, so you’ll speed this up for her but not—”

Namjoon pinches the bridge of his nose. “She,” he begins, jerking his thumb in your direction, “isn’t needlessly complaining and actually has someplace to be.”)

It was just a quick little rendezvous in Namjoon’s living room to come up with a rough draft for the following month’s episodes. He couldn’t do it over text because he’d fallen down the steps at his office and landed on his ass on the corner of a step and his phone had been in his back pocket. Cracked clean in half. And he couldn’t do it over email because he—rightfully—knew Jungkook would ignore them because he has his inbox set up to send all of Namjoon’s personal emails to the trash.

But Jungkook holds onto things like that. Grudges. Loves to let Namjoon think bygones are bygones and pop up a few days later with some evil scheme. Hence:

“What is this?”

Jungkook smirks. Rocks back on his heels. “It’s fanfiction.”

“I can see that, but… why?”

This is where Jungkook shines: the ominous, cheshire cat grin; the aw, shucks demeanor that gaslights Namjoon into thinking Jungkook couldn’t possibly be fucking with him. “Well, you were having trouble coming up with ideas for episodes, and there’s an email in there from someone whose partner reads really expli—”

“Jungkook, this is fanfiction about me.”

You can’t help the laugh that escapes you. Of all the weird shit you’ve seen on the internet (and there’s been a lot), fanfiction of people you know—your friends—was something you’d managed to escape. Probably by virtue of not knowing anyone famous enough to warrant fanfiction being written about them.

But you should’ve known. You really, really should’ve known.

“Oh my god?”

You’re not sure who says it. Could be you or Namjoon, but the sentiment is the same. He mouths a what the fuck at you that’s met with a shrug. You’re in uncharted territory now, too. “Where did you even find this?” you ask, taking the stack of papers from Namjoon. “And why did you print it out?”

“Because I’m going to track down whoever wrote it and get them to autograph it. Then I’m going to buy a nice frame and hang it on the wall behind him, so we never forget this historical moment in Place Him Gently in the Garbage lore.”

“It’s a podcast,” Namjoon deadpans, “how can it have lore? And how much lore can there possibly be?”

“It’s the internet,” you concede. “The lore possibilities are endless. Don’t tempt them.”

Jungkook nods sagely, well-versed in the degeneracy of the internet. “Yeah, that’s how you end up with shit like 4chan.”

“4chan? There’s Space Jam porn on there.”

As the youngest, all Jungkook can do is roll his eyes. “Sometimes explaining this shit to you feels like trying to teach old people how to rotate PDFs—”

Namjoon scoffs. “I’m not that bad. I know how to rotate a PDF.”

Wow, Jungkook mouths. “Anyway, back to the fanfiction—”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Namjoon interjects. He looks at you. “It’s weird, right? Like, it’s weird that people have written this about us?”

About us.

Your scope of the world narrows to the size of a pinhead. It’d just been about Namjoon before. This is fanfiction about me, he’d said, and you hadn’t been included in that. Now it’s written about us and you’re included.

“I—what?”

“It’s about us,” Namjoon repeats.

Jungkook rolls his lips. “It’s about the two of you fucking, to be specific.”

“Can you not—”

“Fucking a lot,” Jungkook continues. “So much fucking.”

Namjoon looks at you, and it’s all you can do to keep from laughing. The look on his face is pure bewilderment, both that Jungkook has cooked up this idea and is hell-bent on executing it and that he remains employed. And maybe it’s a little bit of nerves, too, because neither of you are ignorant of the risks. Reading fanfiction about yourselves—about the two of you as a couple, specifically, or at least two people who have sex—is weird. Not something you can unread.

And maybe it’s because you’re so determined to not make it weird that you send Namjoon a cheeky, exaggerated wink, shrug your shoulders, and say, “I’ll need a couple drinks, but I’m down.”

Jungkook throws his head back and cackles wildly, and that look of bewilderment on Namjoon’s face morphs into something else. Trepidation, maybe; definitely disbelief, because sometimes he lets himself get swept away in Jungkook’s schemes, but it’s rare that you follow suit.

As Jungkook continues to laugh, you wonder if you should’ve said no.

Namjoon has two stipulations: the two of you have to film the episode completely alone, and he, too, needs to be a little drunk.

The latter? Piece of cake, considering Namjoon has become some sort of whiskey aficionado in recent years. His drinking is streamlined and to the point—he knows exactly how much and what to drink to get him where he wants to be. You can’t say he isn’t efficient.

The former, though? Borderline impossible. From the second Namjoon states his terms, Jungkook is having none of it. Argues that he’s the one who found the story and the one who cleared it with the author, so he deserves to witness the fruits of his labor.

“No,” Namjoon repeats for the nth time, “no way. I’ll barely be able to do this with just her, let alone both of you.”

And that—that doesn’t bother you, right? You force a laugh, because why would it bother you?

There are few secrets between you and Namjoon, except your respective sex lives have been staunchly off-limits. Namjoon could be a virgin for all you know, and as you study him—the way he keeps bobbing his leg, the slight shake in his hands—you wonder if that’s the reason he’s being so weird about this.

It’s just a story.

Fiction.

Most people don’t have to worry about someone writing stories about them fucking their friends. If they do, you reckon even less actually read them. So, sure, it’s a little strange, but people from all over the world send in stranger stuff all the time, don’t they? It’s literally the reason you’re in this predicament.

Eventually Jungkook agrees. His whining has gotten him nowhere, so he just throws up his hands. Posts a cryptic little “u guys won’t believe what the next patreon ep is lmao” that sends the internet into a frenzy. Doubles your Patreon numbers almost immediately, and both you and Namjoon do a good job of pretending the pressure isn’t overwhelming.

Jesus. You have to read explicit fanfiction about yourselves. On camera.

Namjoon gets caught up with work and isn’t available until the weekend, so you’re forced to sit with the nerves for a few days. Not too bad at first, but you’re nearly coming out of your skin by Thursday with the need to know. You’re well-versed in the world of fanfiction, but this is fanfiction about you: your name, your likeness, maybe even your personality.

What will they know of Namjoon, though?

Will they get it right, the way he looks with his jaw clenched? How impossibly deep his voice can go, both when it’s raspy with sleep and when he’s fully at ease? Will the Namjoon in the story be closer to the Namjoon you know, or the version of himself he presents to the public?

And you’ve known him a long time—long enough that there are few secrets between you, but you don’t know the most intimate parts. All the parts the internet loves to speculate on. All the little gaps that, apparently, need to be filled in by fanfiction.

Will they know what Namjoon looks like when he gets off?

No, you scold yourself, jerking awkwardly like you’ve been burned, and neither will you.

Because you are not going to think about this. Your thoughts are not going to go there. Namjoon is your friend, and you’ve listened to him scold an endless amount of men on the podcast for exactly this behavior. Sexualizing their friends. You’re not going to do it, too.

Maybe that’s why you’re kind of seeing double when it comes time to record. Namjoon needed an extra shot and offered you one as well. You’d necked it without a second thought and now you’re here, trying to ignore the slight tilt of the room as Namjoon adjusts the camera.

“How’s the shot look?” he asks, gesturing vaguely behind him at his laptop screen because Jungkook had refused to lend you his fancy cameras if he wasn’t allowed to be involved.

It’s a completely normal question.

It’s a question you’ve asked and answered a million times.

Except—there’s something horribly distracting about Namjoon in this moment. The outline of his back muscles through the thin fabric of his t-shirt. The way the sleeves are tight around his biceps. He’s always been a gym rat, always carries around a protein shake that smells and looks completely foul, but you can’t remember it ever being this obvious.

And you take too long to answer, because Namjoon straightens up just enough to send you a concerned look. Which does not help. You are not imagining what else might cause his brows to pinch like that, what might have his lips parting, have sweat dotting his hairline.

You swallow. Hard.

“Looks fine,” you manage to say. He’s still staring. Are you on fire? You feel like you’re on fire, which would make sense. Would explain Namjoon’s sweating and concerned stare and the fact that he cannot stop staring at you. “Maybe a tiny bit to the right if we’re being picky,” you tack on, hoping it’ll break whatever spell the two of you are ensnared in.

It works. “To the—the right, yeah, makes sense,” he rambles.

He moves it an inch to the left.

—

Things are tense, to say the least.

Recording hasn’t been this awkward since your first episode, or maybe ever. You’re sat across from one another like you always are, and usually Namjoon would be making quip after quip by now, talking endlessly until Jungkook shushed him long enough to get the intro filmed. Now, there’s just silence.

“Should we…?” Namjoon startles. Bangs his knee on the underside of the table and drops a string of curses. “Sorry, are you—”

“I’m fine,” he says, cutting you off. He gestures vaguely toward the camera. “I’ll just… yeah.”

Showtime.

You wipe your hands on your jeans, unsure of when they got so damp. Unsure of when you’d grown so nervous, too, because you’d been fine an hour ago. Had strolled in with two cups of tea and a little too much confidence, giddy at what you were about to do.

Maybe the nerves had shown up alongside the alcohol. This sounds reasonable, and you do not, under any circumstance or for any reason, think about Namjoon’s back. Or his biceps.

Namjoon makes it through the intro, dimples deep and wide as he smiles, and you also don’t think about the way his voice cracks and gets a little breathy when he introduces you. It’s only because he’d been drinking, and the flush on his cheeks attests to that. The same flush that creeps down his neck, still a little sweaty; disappears beneath the hemline of his shirt.

“—Jungkook had. Right, Piper?”

Now it’s your turn to startle, and there’s not much you can do to hide the obvious except ask Namjoon to redo the shot. Because it’s bad enough the internet already overanalyzes every move you make, every word choice, every instance you’ve stared at Namjoon a second longer than they thought you would—this is a blatant display of… affectedness.

“Sorry,” you say, “I wasn't paying attention. Can we redo it?”

You’re expecting a playful scolding. A ha ha, get it together, because that’s what you usually get. But there’s nothing aside from Namjoon studying you and nodding. Asking if you’re okay. Saying, “Is this—this is weird, right? Is it too weird? Maybe we shouldn’t—”

An out. Namjoon is giving you an out, and you should take it, you know you should take it, so there’s absolutely no reason at all you shake your head and say, “No, no, it’s fine! I think I’m just a little, uh. Drunk?”

“Are you sure? We can—”

“It’s fine, Joon,” you insist. “Besides, it’ll be good content, right?”

“Good content,” he parrots. “Yeah, for sure.” He fidgets in his seat, runs his hands down the span of his thighs. Very, very thick thighs. “I’ll grab us some water.”

You faceplant onto the table as soon as he’s out of the room. When did his thighs get so thick?

But the water helps. Cures whatever strange, insatiable thirst has come over you, because you feel much more human after a few glasses. Less drunk, too, which makes sense. Yoongi could barely escape your drunken, horny wrath when the two of you were together, so you chalk it up to a Pavlovian response.

Namjoon does the intro again. Introduces you strong and steady, not a hint of nerves, and explains, with a fresh blush taking over his upper body, what the episode’s going to be about. “Someone wrote fanfiction about us,” he says, scratching at the back of his neck. “It’s, uh, pretty explicit. Jungkook thought it’d be funny if we read it.”

You snort. “He might get fired, depending on how this goes.”

“He should get fired regardless,” Namjoon deadpans. “Anyway, we have permission from the author to read this so don’t come after us, and, as always, we’ll put all the credits in the video description.”

“Special shoutout to Jungkook, though, who was not allowed to be here with us for this momentous occasion.”

Namjoon laughs. “I’m sure he’s having plenty of fun at home.” You both pause. “That’s not—I’m not implying anything with that! I just meant—you know, like. He’s hanging out and enjoying his day off.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Moving on. I have two copies of this. Do you want your own?”

You grin, wicked and wide. “Nah, just read it to me.”

“Making me do all the work,” he huffs. “Typical.”

“There’s a stack of papers in front of you that might say otherwise.”

It’s clear you catch him off-guard. He cocks an eyebrow, opens and shuts his mouth a few times like a goldfish. An obvious question sits on the tip of his tongue: You think you’d be in charge? Instead he coughs, jerks his head to the side, and says, “I guess we’ll see.”

It sounds like a challenge.

Thirty seconds is all you get before Namjoon’s shuffling his stack of papers and clearing his throat. Asking if you’re ready and jumping right into it once you say you are. Reads the first few lines like they’re some old lecture notes, and they’re conservative and safe-for-work enough that you start to relax.

And then Namjoon reads, “A louder one wonders if Namjoon is a pet name person—if he’d call her ‘honey,’ or ‘gummy bear,’ ‘babe,’ or ‘baby,’” and you choke.

“Gummy bear?”

Namjoon laughs along with you—the weird one that almost sounds like a dog panting. “You want me to call you gummy bear?”

“I want you to call me a Lyft,” you snark. “I’m leaving.”

He continues:

And that’s how it starts, wandering thoughts, wandering fingers—the first time Piper comes to the thought of Namjoon calling her baby, pushing inside her, showing her that he definitely doesn’t beg, but she does… Well, she’s a little ashamed. She’s apparently got a reputation to maintain, anyway, not to mention a friendship.

His eyes leave the paper and lock onto you. “Or maybe you’d prefer baby?”

“Fuck off.”

Weeks after that first time, it’s become a habit, thinking about Namjoon as something more than a friend. It’s confusing and a little mortifying and it’s starting to affect her in ways she hadn’t expected. When they record, she feels fidgety—she’s jumpy when he gets close, has all the stupid obvious tells of an unwanted crush: her breath hitches when he whispers (why the fuck is he whispering in her ear, anyway? Doesn’t he know what that does to a person?) inside jokes to her so Jungkook can’t hear, her heart rate spikes when their fingers accidentally brush, she feels itchy and hot and a little embarrassed whenever he holds eye contact with her. It’s terrible, and it’s only made worse by the way he’s doing all of those things more than usual. Or, at least she thinks he is, thinks she’s not imagining the way his eyes linger on her more than she can remember happening before or the way she’s caught him staring at her lips when she chews on the end of her pencil mindlessly. 

You’ve completely forgotten how to breathe.

Namjoon’s staring again. You need to salvage this. He’s only on paragraph three and you’re already squirming in your chair and imagining things that are not appropriate. So you roll your lips, return his teasing. “Well? Do you stare at my lips?”

It works. “No,” he scowls.

“You sure?” you joke, morphing your face into something half-pout, half-duck face.

“We’re never gonna finish this if you keep making comments.”

“You started it,” you point out. “Go on, then.”

There’s some dialogue. Some prose that hits way too close to home, has you wondering who on earth wrote this and how they plucked every single thought from deep within your psyche. A pang of fear that maybe you haven’t been as subtle as you’d thought all these years. A moment to confirm to yourself that, no, you haven’t been harboring a secret, deeply-buried crush on Namjoon.

Then he reads—

And then he kisses her. It’s greedy and hot, his lips like a branding iron. She moans a little against her better judgment when he licks at the seam of her mouth, and in return, she can feel Namjoon’s lips curve into a smile against her own. It’s better than she’d been imagining it, really. He’s a good kisser—firm at the right times, soft when she needs it, careful but not cautious. He holds her jaw with one hand and keeps her right where he wants her beneath him (as if she’d want to move, anyway).  When their lips finally part, he rests his forehead on hers. It’s intimate in a way she hadn’t expected, and he looks at her as if she’s the answer to every question. Finally, he whispers, “What’re we doing, Piper?” His lips are still wet and pink and a little swollen from kissing, and she barely hears the question—she’s too busy thinking about kissing him again, about pulling his plump bottom lip between her teeth, teasing and…  “Kissing,” she says finally.  “What do you want?” he asks, sinking to his knees in front of her. And if that alone isn’t an answer to his question… “Whatever you’re willing to give,” she replies. It feels like she’s wanted this forever, this and so much more. Once she got the idea in her head, it’s hard to know if she ever felt differently, ever truly thought they could just be friends. Or, if in the back of her mind, in the dark corners that she never lets see daylight, she always knew she wanted Namjoon. Always knew she loved him.

—and everything goes right out the fucking window.

Namjoon sits with those words for a moment. Scans the paper in his hands and frowns a little when he confirms what you already know. “The rest is, uh. Porn.”

“That is why we’re here.”

“Last chance to back out.”

“I’m not scared,” you lie. “Are you? You’re the one who keeps stalling.”

He huffs. “You’re a pain in my ass,” he retorts, and then nothing is all that funny anymore.

Because Namjoon was right: the rest is straight-up porn. He’s barely able to read the part where he goes down on you with a straight face, turning a deep shade of crimson. Stutters through the part where you pull his hair, and that is not something you needed to know about your friend. You think he loses his grasp of language entirely when he reads, “When he slides a long finger into her and brushes past her most sensitive spot, she arches into him and lets his name fall from her lips in a soft cry. Piper, notorious skeptic, is a babbling, trembling mess as she gets closer to her orgasm,” because all the words are garbled together, producing nothing but gibberish. You think he’s ready to keel over and die when he reads, “Namjoon pulls away briefly, lips slick with her juices, and licks over his top one, pausing to tell her how good she tastes before he dives back in.”

“That was nice of them to include. I appreciate their attention to detail in regards to my personal hygiene.”

“This is so embarrassing,” he whines.

You roll your eyes good-naturedly. “Gimme. I’ll finish it.” He hands over the papers immediately.

Except you regret it immediately. The words you’re staring at are not words you ever thought you’d read or recite in your entire life. Not even for a million dollars. “Oh,” you say instead.

“See? Not as easy as it looks.”

“This is really embarrassing,” you confirm. “I might need another shot.”

“Y-yeah. Alcohol sounds good.”

Namjoon staggers forward obligingly, looks completely fucked out and pliant, willing to do whatever she asks. She remembers the sounds he made when she pulled his hair, wonders if he likes being bossed around, if he wants her to tell him what to do, to be a little mean to him. Maybe it’s different from her dreams, maybe he will beg her. She wants him so badly, she’d do anything for him. So, she pulls his briefs down to expose his absurdly large member, already mostly hard, and slaps it. Gently at first to see how he’ll react, and when he shudders and jerks his hips, she does it again, a little harder. “Look at you,” she whispers, “such a needy boy.”  He whimpers at that, eyes pleading. “Please, Piper…” he whines.   “Please what?” “Please let me fuck you,” he begs. She wants to, wants him so much, wants to feel him stretch her open, and from the looks of his cock, thick and long and drooling with precum, he could. “Should I?” she asks. She musters all her confidence to keep the condescending tone up. It feels wrong given how desperate she is to get him inside her, but it also seems to be getting him worked up and equally as desperate. “Do you even know what to do with that big, stupid cock?”  Namjoon’s cock twitches, and he begs, “I—I’ll fuck you so good, Piper…. I know how, I promise. Just… please?”

“Oh my god,” the two of you say in unison.

You so badly want to ask if this is biographical. How Namjoon feels about a little degradation; what he’d do if someone actually called his cock stupid. Ifsomeone has called his cock stupid. You dare a glance at him and conclude that someone’s had to. Namjoon just has that kind of energy.

But you can’t ask because it’d be weird, so you keep reading.

“How do you want me?” she asks softly when their lips part. There’s a wild look in his eyes, like he’s processing all the possible options out of everything he’s considered. And then it occurs to her. “Have you imagined this before? Thought about how you’d fuck me?” she teases him as she stands, stepping into him. Piper pushes one hand through his hair, brushing it back off of his forehead and wraps her other around his dick, squeezing a little for emphasis on her words. “Yes,” he groans as she strokes him, thumbing at the head of his cock. “Tell me what you want, then. Want me on all fours for you? Want me to show you how it’s done, to let you lay back and ride you so you don’t have to put in any work?” Namjoon’s breathing is getting heavy, pupils blown wider with each suggestion. 

“I told you!” you shriek, laughing in between the words. “I told you I’d…” And then your gloating tapers off, because what happens next has your brain malfunctioning.

“All of that,” he whines as she lets go of his hair and brings her hand down to run a fingertip over his perineum. “Want all of that. Want to bend you over the table and fuck you right here. Hear your sounds in the microphone.” Even in her dirtiest thoughts about him, she hadn’t considered the microphone, hadn’t considered recording it. When she thinks about it though, it makes sense. Namjoon is exactly the kind of person that would get off to someone’s voice. So, she does. She makes a show of turning around and slowly bending over the table, sliding her upper body across it carefully until she can reach her microphone and turn it on. When she says into it, “What’re you waiting for?” she sees over her shoulder the way that Namjoon shivers.

This is… not good. You’re never going to be able to look at a microphone the same way, which is extremely not good for a person who supplements their income with a very popular podcast that requires them to speak into a microphone for extended periods of time.

This is very, very bad.

Namjoon must be thinking the same, because he lets out a strangled a-haaa that’s less of a laugh and more a plea to God, the gods, the entire gamut of higher powers that might be able to save him. No one’s going to, you think, staring down at the paper again. This godless piece of fanfiction will be preserved on the internet forever, will be seared into your mind forever, and no amount of praying is going to erase it.

“I should, uh. Just read the rest, yeah? Get it over with?”

“Mhm. Yep. Yes, please.”

Don’t say please, you almost say. You can’t take it; not after what you’ve just read.

So you put on a show. Steel your expression and your nerves and take it seriously. Use voices and sound effects and desperately try to stave off the awkwardness you know is inevitable because a smut fic is probably only going to end one way, and that’s with you acting out Namjoon having an orgasm.

Maybe you’ll have another one, too, if the author is nice.

It’s sweet, she thinks, the way he’s easy for her, takes his time with her. Strokes his fingertips along her sides and kisses the back of her neck reverently. As much as she loves it, part of her hopes he’s not always like this—hopes he’ll give as good as he takes, hopes he’ll put her in her place. She can feel his cock hard against the cleft of her ass, not even inside her yet, and still, she thinks about next time and the time after that. “Still okay?” He breathes into her ear as his tip rubs against her cunt.  “Yeah—want you, Joon.”  “Never thought I’d hear you say those words.”  “I never thought you’d record them,” she teases, eyes glancing up to the flashing light showing the mic picking up all of this as he starts his slow slide into her.  Piper falls even further forward when he bottoms out, letting her forehead rest on the table. He’s whispering filth in her ear, about how he has something to prove, how she’ll never want anyone after this, how no one can fuck her the way he does.  She hates that he’s right.  Each stroke brings a new sensation: sparklers, butterflies, nerve endings on fire as he fucks into her and licks and sucks at her neck, her shoulders, her ear. Piper can’t even think, and this is what people mean when they talk about being fucked stupid, she decides.  It’s perfect.  Every time she thinks she’s getting close again, he changes something: fucks her a little shallower, moves his hips just a little, slows down, speeds up… It’s driving her crazy.  “Come on,” she whines. “I’m so close…” At least she can tell he is, too. No longer able to sustain the dirty talk, he’s breathing heavily, letting out broken moans and sighs of her name. He’s moving rhythmically now, thrusts consistently faster.  “Oh, fuck, Piper,” he groans, “Gonna cum.” One of his hands finds her clit and he rubs careful circles over her, bringing her to her peak along with him, no more teasing.  When she comes, it’s with a loud moan into the studio mic, and that seems to be what tips Namjoon over the edge, too. His hips stutter into hers as he comes, her cunt clenching around him for what feels like forever.

You deserve an award, you think. An Oscar. You didn’t even groan when you had to read the word “cunt,” and that’s a feat in and of itself.

“Is it over?” Namjoon asks, words muffled by the hands covering his face.

“Not quite,” you answer. “There’s some aftercare, and at the end you ask if I’ll piss on you.”

Namjoon gags. “I asked you what—”

“Today’s episode has been brought to you by Stamps-dot-com—”

HOLY SHIT THE NEW PATREON EPISODE???????? Posted by u/pod-shipper 4 minutes ago NO WAY. NOOOOOOO FUCKING WAY DUDE THERE’S NO FUCKING WAY THEY DID THIS AS AN ACTUAL EPISODE WHAT THE FUCK WHAT HTE FUCK WHAT EHTU FKF DFGLKDG;L (+705) I wasn’t sure if they were messing around before, and I was quite critical of the “shippers,” but now I’m pretty convinced. (+423) ↳ we’ve been telling y’all for YEARS 😤 (+197) ↳ Glad you’ve seen the light, u/RandomAcorn2058! (+5) ↳ ugh. they weren’t messing around before and they aren’t messing around now. do you guys not listen to what they say? namjoon’s been dating, and piper got out of a six-year relationship just over a year ago. if they’ve had something going on for “years” that means they’re both cheaters, and that’s a really shitty thing to assume about them. not to mention it makes the entire point of the podcast moot. (-63) Why do you guys think Jungkook “wasn’t allowed” to be there? (+314) ↳ So they could fuck lmao it’s so obvious (+329) ↳ because it’s awkward af? would you wanna read porn about yourself w all your coworkers in the room? (+2) ↳ the “it’s awkward” excuse is sooooo lame he’s the one who found it and is the one who edited the episode, he’s gonna see it regardless. (+15) ↳ Tbh I’m more curious about how he even found it to begin with? Do they have a throuple thing going on? Like, why was he looking for smut fic about his bosses? (+38)

You do not get through recording unscathed.

You are very scathed. Perhaps the most scathed a person has ever been.

Jungkook texts the group chat sporadically throughout the week, cracking jokes and making memes at your and Namjoon’s expense which is par for the course and shouldn’t have you off-kilter, but something inside you feels deeply wrong. Feels like someone’s given you devastating news; feels like it used to back in uni when you knew you’d failed an exam and were just waiting to see how badly.

It both helps and doesn’t that the internet is so invested. All the clips Jungkook keeps posting have re-doubled your Patreon numbers, and jumping up a tax bracket never hurt anyone, you included. But all of those jokes and memes largely went unanswered by both you and Namjoon, still too close to the incident to find the humor in it from the other side.

The two of you had sex.

Not literally, of course, but you figure you might as well have with the way you’re feeling. The way you’re avoiding one another. Someone wrote a story about the two of you having sex and you both read it and something about that, days later, feels really fucking unsettling.

In a bad way? You aren’t sure. It’s not like you’re mad or upset or any other synonym. You just feel… off. Itchy from the inside out, and that’s far from the norm in your and Namjoon’s friendship. In all the years you’ve known one another, you’ve never once avoided each other, including the time you’d set him up with a close friend and he showed up 45 minutes late to their date and ghosted after.

(Unsurprisingly, that friendship had not lasted.)

Maybe it’s because Yoongi had always been there as a buffer. You aren’t of the belief that men and women cannot be platonic friends, but being in a years-long committed relationship nixed a lot of awkward interactions and assumptions off the bat. Even Namjoon had known Yoongi first. Had introduced himself to you in your shared 100-level psych course with a, “Hey, you’re Min Yoongi’s girlfriend, right?” because they ran in the same underground circles and Namjoon had idolized him from afar for years.

Pretty fucked up, then, that Yoongi’s off in Los Angeles with his hot new boyfriend and you’re on your couch, Holly at your feet, pointedly ignoring your texts.

“I’m gonna get a cat,” you say to the dog, trying to redirect his attention when he starts chewing on your sock again. Holly doesn’t offer any input, of course, and he’s a lot like his father in that way. “I can’t believe you have a stepfather. You’re a proper child of divorce now, Min Holly.”

There are a pile of unread texts you continue to ignore in lieu of showing Holly pictures of adoptable cats. A few more memes from Jungkook, one from Namjoon’s new phone asking to move the recording date a few days because “something came up at work,” one from the food delivery service you admittedly use too much offering 10% off your next order, and two from Yoongi. This reminded me of you, the first one says beneath a picture of an ice cream cone on the ground, and another one of him holding a water gun that says send me a picture of my son or else.

You eventually reply back with a picture of your middle finger, Holly nothing but a blurred brown blob in the corner of the frame.

That’s how it goes for the better part of a week. Namjoon’s work issue lasts four days. He doesn’t offer an explanation and you don’t ask for one, you just wait for the all-clear text and try to quiet the nerves once you get it.

You’ve never been nervous to see Namjoon before.

The more popular the podcast became, the more money rolled in. The more money that rolled in, the more you could afford nicer things. That meant going from recording in Namjoon’s living room to a bona fide office space. Third floor, an expanse of windows and natural light, thirty-five minute commute by train.

Today, it feels more like thirty-five seconds.

You can hear Jungkook’s witch cackle from the stairwell, and your mind fills in the blanks of Namjoon’s exasperated sigh. It helps, your brain reminding you that you know these people. You know this is Jungkook’s late gym day, so he’ll be in a pair of sweats and a hoodie that drowns his frame. You know that when Namjoon has work issues and feels like an inconvenience, he always shows up with two boxes of baked goods from the bakery near his place, and you know both of them will save the best donut for you.

So you walk in and Jungkook’s in a hoodie and sweats just like you expect him to be, and there are two boxes of baked goods next to the coffee machine. Both of them say hello and wave and, for all intents and purposes, everything is normal.

Except it isn’t.

Because Namjoon looks… different.

Not in a bad way. Not in a bad way. He almost always dresses nicely, always looks polished and put-together, usually because he’s either going to or coming from campus—fitted shirts, either of the tee or dress variety, and earth-toned cardigans; tailored trousers that are sometimes corduroy; polished loafers. Sometimes, if he’s feeling extra casual, a stark white pair of tennis shoes.

Today, he wears none of those things.

No, today torture comes in the form of form-fitting jeans and a t-shirt a little oversized so he can roll the sleeves. His hair is brushed back off his face instead of parted down the middle. He’s wearing gold jewelry that glints in the sun. A pair of off-white Converse high-tops. And, much to your horror, he’s also wearing his glasses.

According to the internet, Kim Namjoon is peak husband material, which you can usually ignore, but not when he’s wearing glasses.

You avert your gaze, convinced you’ll burst into flames if you stare too long, not to mention Jungkook will notice and that’s a ribbing you’d rather die than take. So you avert your gaze and pointedly ignore Namjoon, who’s talking about his work crisis to no one in particular. Something about a co-worker going on an unexpectedly early paternity leave, and Namjoon being asked to cover some of his courses until they could find a more permanent fix.

Jungkook asks a question you don’t catch. Because paternity leave means his co-worker and his partner had a baby, presumably via old-fashioned methods, and it’s not a direct mention of sex but it’s close enough to send you into a coughing fit you have to blame on your donut. Neither of them buy it, but Namjoon is a good enough person to look genuinely concerned. Reaches out, probably to slap your back, but the thought of him touching you is just… too much.

So he barely gets out an, “Are you o—” before you choke down whatever’s left in your mouth and cut him off with a, “Yep, all good!” before you’re scurrying off to the opposite side of the room like a little rat.

It doesn’t get any better.

Both of you are so stilted and awkward during recording that Jungkook has to be the voice of reason and call it, suggest trying again tomorrow. Luckily he has enough b-side stuff he can release if need be, Namjoon’s work emergency providing a decent cover, and he sends the two of you home for the afternoon with all the exasperation and incredulity of a disappointed parent.

Thirty-five minutes back home.

Thirty-five minutes to sit in the embarrassment of not being able to do your job. Thirty-five minutes to catastrophize and wonder what you’re going to do if you can’t get it together. Namjoon will keep the podcast, of course; you’ll be replaced with someone else. Maybe someone less cynical, maybe someone more, but undoubtedly a man. After this mess, you can’t imagine Namjoon would want another female co-host.

But as embarrassed as you are, your traitorous brain keeps thinking about Namjoon.

Thirty-five minutes to think about his glasses and his rolled-up sleeves and the way the denim of his jeans contoured perfectly to his thighs. Thirty-five minutes to think about, “Please let me fuck you,” he begs. Thirty-five minutes to squeeze your thighs together and overanalyze the way he stumbled over his words today; how he could barely make eye contact. Thirty-five minutes to draft a dozen resignation texts and delete them all.

You groan, head thunking against the train window. You’ll take a cold shower as soon as you get home.

That’ll cure you.

You get home and walk Holly so long he gives up halfway through and you have to carry him back to your apartment. You take a cold shower and actually find it pleasant once the initial shock wears off, so it doesn’t work to keep all your rogue Namjoon thoughts at bay. You make a simple dinner and don’t think about Namjoon sitting you on the counter and having his way with you. You tuck yourself into bed far too early and consider going back to therapy, because clearly something very, very bad has happened to your psyche.

Needless to say, nothing cures you.

But it’s a new day, and you’re determined to get your shit together. Yesterday was a fluke, because you’re so normal and so capable of being in the same room as Kim Namjoon.

Except—you’re not.

Jungkook’s there when you arrive, mindlessly scrolling through his phone. Barely looks up at you to say hello, and barely returns it when you do. You double-check the time, because you can count on two fingers the amount of times you’ve shown up and Namjoon wasn’t already there, jotting down extensively-detailed notes, circling and highlighting and chasing down Jungkook to ask questions.

“Where’s Namjoon?”

Jungkook shrugs. “Dunno. Not here.”

You roll your eyes. “Super helpful, thanks.”

Jungkook rolls his eyes right back. “You don’t pay me enough to also be his handler.”

You bite your tongue. Arguing with Jungkook means you’ve already lost the war. Not worth it. But it still eases your worries a bit that he doesn’t know any more than you do. That Namjoon hadn’t only texted him to say why he was running late because he didn’t want to—or couldn’t—talk to you.

So you wait. And you wait and you wait and you wait. Jungkook lets you talk to people on his dating apps and tells you about his new gym routine until your eyes are glazing over. Orders food delivery for the two of you because he gets hungry after an hour and had already eaten what was left of the snacks before you arrived. Cracks a joke that isn’t really a joke about calling the police, because Namjoon still hasn’t shown up and he hasn’t said anything and none of your texts are showing as delivered.

You’re halfway to hour two when the office door bursts open and Namjoon stumbles through, soaked with sweat and stammering over apologies.

“I am so sor—I broke my phone again so my alarm never went off and then I missed my bus? And apparently they’re not running the regular bus schedule today so the next one was a half-hour wait, but then I…”

You don’t catch the rest, because Namjoon is covered in sweat and breathing heavily and a week ago you could’ve survived this. A week ago you would’ve cracked a joke and handed him a towel and told him to get to work. A week ago you would not have been paralyzed in your seat, transfixed on the sweat rolling down the side of his neck.

You are fucked beyond belief.

Jungkook elbows you in the ribs, bringing you back to reality. “...even paying attention?” You startle, face warming in embarrassment. Namjoon still isn’t looking at you. “This is so sad to watch,” Jungkook mumbles, and thankfully it’s only loud enough for you to hear. “Like some stupid shit you only see in nature documentaries.”

Well, you can’t really argue with that, now can you?

But you’re a professional above all, so you hum an acknowledgment and take your regular seat. Pointedly ignore Jungkook. Wait for Namjoon to assume his position as well, and you’re surprised to see the space in front of him empty. No notes. No script. There’s just… nothing.

“Are you okay?” you ask, gesturing to the space in front of him when he seems confused. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you without a stack of notes in front of you.”

“I forgot them.”

“Don’t think I’ve ever seen you do that, either.”

Your tone is light and airy, not at all accusing or confrontational, but Namjoon’s jaw clenches nonetheless. He scoffs, fires a shitty little, “Were you not paying attention when I was talking about what a horrible fucking morning I’ve had?” at you that makes even Jungkook flinch. A few moments of stunned silence, and then, “Oh fuck, I’m so sorry, that was rude—”

“Yeah, it was,” you agree, and all of a sudden you feel too big for your body. Feel like there are ants beneath your skin, feel like everything is wrong, and you don’t want to be here anymore. “It’s fine. Let’s just—”

Namjoon looks like he wants to argue, but he just sighs and says, “I—yeah, okay.”

This is where Namjoon would usually launch into the intro, a dimpled smile already plastered on his face that’d drop as he discussed another failed first date with that brand of self-deprecation that makes him so endearing. This is where he’d say what have you been up to, Pipe, and you’d try not to groan because how hard could it possibly be to add one more letter, another syllable, but Namjoon seems incapable of it. This is the part that, for three years, has been seamless and easy and instinctual, just two friends having a conversation.

There’s a red light on your microphones that indicates you’re recording. It’s on and it mocks you, because Namjoon is not doing the intro or telling you about a failed date. He doesn’t use that cringey nickname. He doesn’t say anything at all. His mouth opens and shuts and no words come out. What’s worse is that you know exactly why he can’t speak, because you’re thinking about it, too.

“So, uh,” you begin, and Jungkook makes a gagging sound from behind you. “Come here often?”

Namjoon ignores you. “Right, right, the intro…” He sucks in a breath. “Welcome back to another episode of Put Him in the Trash, I’m—”

“Joon—”

“Namjoon, and my co-host here is—”

“Joon, that’s not—”

“Piper. Wait, why are you looking at me like that?”

“That’s not the name of our podcast.”

“Huh?”

“You said Put Him in the Trash.” Namjoon just blinks. “It’s Place Him Gently in the Garbage.”

“Is it? Since when?”

“Since forever?”

He looks at Jungkook, who is hiding behind his hands. “Is she right?”

A beat of silence. “I can’t do this,” he half-shouts, half-whines. “Are you two going to be like this forever? Because if you are, I’m quitting. I’m so serious. I’m gonna quit. I can’t take it anymore. The two of you are insufferable.” Another beat of silence, before Jungkook stands at full height and lords over you and Namjoon. “Forget today. Just go home and try again on Monday. This is so—I’m seriously gonna quit.”

Yoongi comes on Saturday afternoon to pick up Holly.

Yijeong isn’t with him, which is almost disappointing. Now that he’s dating again, you were looking forward to seeing just how awkward it could get with the three of you in the same room, but he looks good. Refreshed. The trip clearly did a world of good for him, and you can’t even bring yourself to crack a joke at his expense.

He, however, has no such hang-ups. “You look like shit.”

“Weird way to say thank you.” You click your tongue and look down at Holly. “Do you see how your father treats me? You should bite him.”

“My son would never. But also, thank you.” He flops onto the sofa. “You do look like shit, though. You wanna talk about it?”

“Not with you, preferably.”

“Oh, gross, is it a dating thing, then?”

“I—no.” You pause. It’s not a dating thing, but you still feel like you’ve got motion sickness whenever you think about it. How would you even begin to explain this to Yoongi, anyway? Someone wrote a porn fic about me and Namjoon. You remember Namjoon, right? Namjoon, that I’ve known and have been friends with since college. Yeah, that Namjoon. Anyway, someone wrote fanfiction about us having sex, and it fucked me up so bad I can no longer be in the same room as him.

No fucking way.

“You look like you’re holding in a fart.”

“You know, I’m getting really sick of you. Did you just come here to insult me?”

He snorts, but his smirk dissipates a few seconds later, a familiar seriousness filling the void. “We’re okay, right? Was the Yijeong thing too soon?”

“No,” you answer immediately, leaning over to flick him on the forehead. “We’re fine, and if you’re happy, then I’m happy for you.” He still looks doubtful. “You want me to start singing ‘I Will Always Love You’ or something? It’s just… weird work stuff.”

“Depends. Are you singing the Dolly Parton or Whitney version? And real work or podcast work?”

“Podcast work, and obviously the Whitney version.”

Yoongi seems surprised by this, eyebrows disappearing beneath his fringe. “Like, the podcast with Namjoon?” He presses his tongue into the fat of his cheek when you nod your head. “Not gonna lie, I didn’t think that was possible.”

“Like I said, it’s weird. It wasn’t, like, an argument or anything.”

“How weird?”

“You’re so fake, Min Yoongi. You act like you’re so distinguished and above drama, but really you’re just as hungry for gossip as the rest of us.”

He shrugs. “I’m not denying it.”

God help you, you’re going to rip off the band-aid. “Someone… Jesus, this is so embarrassing. Someone… wrote? Fanfiction? About us.”

“About you and Namjoon?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh my god—”

“About us… uh. Having sex? Specifically.”

“Oh my god—”

“Jungkook found it and thought it’d be funny if we read it for an episode.”

“Oh my god?”

“So we did? And it was really weird, which I expected, because I’ve known Namjoon for a long time, and I never, ever thought about having sex with him because we were together and me and Namjoon are friends, so yeah, it was fucking weird. But now… I don’t know. I can’t stop thinking about it? And now we can’t even be in the same room as one another.” Yoongi is a concerning shade of red. “So our show is gonna get canceled, because we can only release b-side stuff for so long until people realize something’s up, and it was Namjoon’s podcast to begin with so obviously I’ll get fired—”

“Oh my god, you want to fuck Namjoon.”

Yoongi sounds like a strangled cat when he says this, which does not help the way you feel like you’ve been hit square in the face with a frying pan. “No,” you argue, though it sounds more like a question. You do not want to fuck Namjoon. “No, no. No. It’s just because it was weird.”

“Did you forget I dated you for six years? I know what you look like when you want to fuck someone.”

“You’re telling me you wouldn’t be weird if someone wrote fanfiction about you fucking your friend?”

“Not if I didn’t actually want to fuck them, no.”

“You’re a liar. Get your dog and get out of my apartment.”

Yoongi laughs as he stands. Pats you on the back in the most condescending way you’ve ever had someone pat you on the back. “Let me know how it goes. No need to give me credit for your moment of horny clarity.”

Min Yoongi is a bastard.

Unfortunately, as you come to find out, he’s also a correct bastard.

You want to fuck Namjoon.

Which is… not great, you have to admit, considering he can barely stand to be around you, so you take another cold shower and decide you’re going to take this to your grave. You’re going to spend the rest of the weekend getting your shit together, and you’re going to show up on Monday and be a consummate professional. You’re going to look at Namjoon and say, ha ha, isn’t it so funny someone thought we would have sex? I don’t think about it at all because I am so cool and normal about it.

You’ve got it all planned out. You’re going to show up fifteen minutes early with your own box of pastries. You’re going to look nice, if not a little pretentious—maybe a nice sweater. You’re going to be prepared with notes of your own. You might even be nice to the villain of the week so Namjoon doesn’t have to pinch the bridge of his nose and sigh at you.

And then someone knocks on your door.

You find Namjoon on the other side, and all your plans immediately go to shit.

Has he always been this tall? You can’t remember. You can’t remember a lot of things, including how to speak, because Yoongi had launched you into a crisis of epic proportions and now here’s the source of it, standing right in front of you. With all of his… height. And thighs. And that heady, musky cologne he always wears, that you can still smell now even though there’s an unfortunate amount of distance between you.

“Uh, hi.”

You blink. “Hi,” you parrot, and it’s a little insulting how one single word seems to have sucked up all of your brainpower. “Namjoon,” you tack on, not awkward at all.

“Sorry to just show up,” he says, scratching at the back of his neck. Very bad idea; makes his biceps bulge. You barely swallow your whimper. “It’s just—my phone’s still broken, and it felt bad leaving things how we did? So I was hoping we could talk.”

Talk. Namjoon wants to talk to you. Normally: not a problem. Currently: big problem. You manage a nod, open the door wider to let him in, and you don’t think about how jarring it is to have Namjoon in your space. You don’t think about how your legs feel like jelly all of a sudden, or what it’d be like if Namjoon bent you over the couch, or the kitchen counter, or the—

You cough. “Do you want anything to drink?”

“Oh, sure. Maybe just some water if you have it.”

If you have it. What kind of person doesn’t have water? But you tell him to make himself comfortable and get him some anyway, and you mull too long over the size of the glass. Ultimately decide on a smaller one, because if things get unbearably awkward you can excuse yourself to the kitchen to get more.

“I haven’t been here in a while,” Namjoon says from the living room, and when you look up he’s sorting through a stack of books near the window. Some he’d lent you months ago, notes jotted in the corners, sticky notes in the shape of sea animals on important pages. “You ever wind up reading this?”

The Idiot. Namjoon had raved about it when he was in the midst of his 19th century Russian phase, right after he’d read a bunch of Tolstoy and Pushkin. You shake your head—though, judging from the title, you wonder if someone hadn’t written your biography.

“It’s good. If you have the time, you should definitely give it a shot.”

“Yeah, of course,” you say, handing over his water. You take a seat in an armchair, pull your knees to your chest. Namjoon’s still looking through your books, isn’t looking at you, so it feels safe to say, “You wanted to talk?”

“Yeah.” He moves to sit on the floor, massive thighs spreading until he’s comfortable. Thank god he can’t see the look on your face. “I just wanted to make sure we’re alright. Things have felt pretty weird since we filmed the, uh.” He coughs. “Thing.”

“Right, yeah.” You realize he’s waiting for an answer, and you offer up a very rushed, “We’re fine, Joon.”

“Are you sure?”

Yeah, you’re sure: sure you absolutely cannot be having this conversation in the safety and sanctity of your own home. It’s tainted now, contaminated by all your uncontrolled horny thoughts about the man in front of you. You’ll have to fumigate. Might have to pick up and move, actually, or call an exorcist.

“I’m sure,” you assure him. “The… thing… was weird, but it’s fine. Temporary.”

“Do you think we shouldn’t have done it?”

That’s the million-dollar question, isn’t it? Because, in isolation, reading a porn fic about yourselves wasn’t a big deal. No one got hurt. Everyone who needed to be consulted was consulted. The episode made the two of you a lot of money, and Jungkook even promised to send some of it to the author, so your bases are beyond covered.

So, should you have done it? There wasn’t a good enough reason not to, because the story itself was never the problem.

The problem is staring you right in the face. It’s sitting on your floor, a book cracked in half at the spine and forgotten in his lap. The problem is looking at you like you hold all the answers to the universe’s secrets, and it’s no small thing to be looked at like that. The problem is that Namjoon is looking at you like that from across the room but you’re wondering what it’d look like from on top of you.

The problem is that you’ve co-hosted a podcast with Namjoon for three years, have known him even longer, and you’ve just realized today that you want to have sex with him.

And you can’t say that, can you, because Namjoon came here to fix things which really does not lend itself to a hookup. Namjoon cares about your friendship and your working relationship so much he came here to try and salvage it, so you’re going to keep your mouth shut. You’re going to say, “I think it’s okay that we did,” and leave it at that. Because it is okay.

Because you’re the problem.

It feels like a small victory when Namjoon sags in relief. When he exhales and says, “Okay, good, because I think so, too.”

“It made us a lot of money,” you tack on.

Namjoon’s eyes widen as he laughs. “Right? Like, that was almost too much money. Just to watch us read porn?”

“About ourselves. I think that was the selling point.”

He stands. You do, too. “Never thought I’d be doing that,” he says, returning the book to where it belongs. “Definitely the most embarrassing thing I’ve done for money.”

“Being a man with a podcast wasn’t embarrassing enough?”

He snorts. Gets closer to the door. “Hey now.” You’re going to survive this. “Thanks for entertaining me, by the way. For a second there I was really worried we’d fucked it all up.”

Just the ending. Just one more thing to say and you’ll be done with this, and then you can take your third cold shower in recent memory and triple text Yoongi with a full-fledged mental breakdown. Maybe he’ll bring Holly back and you can register him as your emotional support animal.

And Namjoon must sense the awkwardness that’s crept back in, because he tries to cover it with a joke. Says, “Haaa, like you’d actually piss on me, right?”

Except it sounds like he’s got a mouth full of marbles.

It’s no wonder you mishear him.

Because he says like you’d actually piss on me but you hear like you’d actually kiss me, and there isn’t a universe that exists in which the following makes sense: you, stunned into silence in the doorframe, Namjoon saying his goodbyes, you thinking fuck it, last chance and saying, “Yeah, I’d kiss you.”

Namjoon stops dead in his tracks. “What?”

Your entire body is on fire. “Is, uh. Is that not what you said?”

“I don’t think it matters anymore what I said.”

“I’d argue that it does, for the sake of my digni—”

“You’d kiss me?” Namjoon… doesn’t look put off of the idea, which is surely a point in your favor. Interesting to note that his diction is crystal clear, now. Bastard. “You’d kiss me right now?”

There’s also no explanation for the way you say: “It’s only been an option for ten seconds and you’re already begging for it?”

You’d say there’s no explanation for the way Namjoon’s jaw clenches, the way he repeats I don’t beg for anything, but maybe the simple fact is: the two of you want to fuck each other. And, judging from the way Namjoon crowds your space, keeps dropping his gaze to your mouth, it seems very likely to happen.

All that fixating you’d done on Namjoon’s thighs was wasted, you think, as you take in the shape of his mouth. His lips. The way his tongue darts out to run along the bottom at the last second before he reaches out, tilts your head up, and finally presses his mouth to yours.

And you’ve got to laugh, because no piece of written fiction could ever accurately portray what it feels like. How soft his lips are. The way he touches you—gentle, but still dominant enough to have you moving the way he wants, have you backing up into your apartment so he can smile against your mouth as he closes the door behind him.

No piece of fiction would get it right, the way you’re unsteady on your feet, breathless at the way Namjoon’s kissing you. How he only breaks apart long enough to ask where do you want me in that throaty, deep voice of his. How you’re so overwhelmed you can’t decide: unsure if you want to waste the time it’d take to get to your bedroom, but if it’s only going to happen once, wanting to make it count.

So you decide to risk it. Plant your hands in the middle of his exceptionally broad chest and push him in the direction of the hallway, and if the two of you can’t wait, can’t control yourselves, well.

But the story had gotten one thing right: Namjoon does kiss like a branding iron, hot and greedy. Namjoon kisses you like there’s nothing else he wants to do in this lifetime, and it makes you dizzy. Has you off-kilter, stumbling into the wall as you try to remember where the fuck your bedroom is and why it’s so far. Just like the fictional version of you, you also moan when he licks into your mouth.

“Should I do it the way we did in the fic?” Namjoon asks as the two of you cross the threshold into your bedroom, a cheeky grin on his face. “Do it like this?” he questions, pushing you gently until you’re on the back in the middle of your bed, chest heaving as you lift your head to look at him.

Namjoon is so, so big from where you lay, just hovering at the foot of your bed. Cheeks ruddy, bulge prominent. “What’d you say you wanted?”

Takes a second to remember how to breathe, let alone what you’d read. What do you want, Namjoon had asked, right before he’d sank to his knees in front of you. “Whatever you’re willing to give,” you answer.

Namjoon smiles. Puts one knee on the bed, and the way it dips beneath his weight is unsettling. Why does he have to be so fucking large. “That’s right, baby.” Christ, you think, because there’s another thing that fic had gotten right. No one on earth would be immune to Namjoon calling them baby in that tone of voice.

The riposte biting at the back of your teeth gets swallowed whole as Namjoon grabs your ankles and drags you to the edge of the bed. “May I?” he asks, hands poised above the waistline of your leggings. You nod, and Namjoon drags down your underwear with them. “Fuck, look at you,” he groans, awe creeping into the edge of his words.

“You want me to do it the same way? Hm? You’re being awfully quiet; thought you were giving me shit about being the one in charge,” he chides.

Because you’re short-circuiting. Namjoon’s on his knees, just like you’d envisioned, and his mouth is dangerously close to your cunt. How can you be expected to think and speak under these conditions? But if Namjoon can find the brainpower to be a bastard, so can you, because what you’d read and the way he’d reacted can both never be forgotten. So you thread your hands into his hair and pull. The resulting moan is enough to sustain you for years.

“Are you gonna keep running your mouth, or are you gonna make me come on it?”

He blinks. “Jesus Christ.”

There’s precedent. Fictional Namjoon ate you out like a man starved, like he couldn’t get enough. Had fictional you writhing and insatiable, so it’s a lot to live up to, but it doesn’t deter him in the slightest. He hesitates for only a second, giving you one last chance to back out before the two of you set every last boundary on fire, and then he’s settling between your thighs and making you see stars.

Now you know what it’s like. Now you don’t have to rely on fiction, and it doesn’t matter because it’d never compare to the way Namjoon feels as he works to bring you to your ruin. The way he flattens his tongue to lick long, thick stripes; the way his lips suction around your clit. The way it feels when he groans against your core. The way he says, “Fuck, you do taste good,” like that’s a completely normal thing to say. Like he doesn’t know exactly what he’s doing to you.

But you need more and Namjoon knows it. His mouth doesn’t leave your cunt for a second, but his fingers find your mouth, so you put on a show. Wrap your lips around them, suck on them the way he’s doing to you, make sure they’re slick. Namjoon groans again, doubles his efforts. Slides one thick finger inside of you and barely lets you adjust before he’s adding a second.

In an embarrassingly short amount of time, Namjoon has you unraveling. Presses incessantly on a spot that has your vision whiting out. Has you trembling, a little panicked as you say, “Joon, fuck—Namjoon, wait—” as it builds and builds and builds.

You might black out for a second, because you come to and Namjoon looks… stunned. He looks like he can’t believe any of what just happened, and you blink a few times, try to come back into your body, and when you regain enough consciousness, you’re extremely aware of the large wet patch beneath you.

“Um—”

“Holy shit.”

“Namjoon, that’s not—that’s embarrassing—can you grab a—”

He shuts you up with a kiss. Presses the taste of you into your skin, and all those silly protests die in your throat, because if Namjoon was needy before, he’s desperate now. Covers your body with his own, hips dipping down low enough to press his erection into the juncture of your thigh, and the weight of him is delicious. Has you fisting the fabric of his t-shirt to pull him closer, has you pulling it over his head, his pants following. Has your hands skimming down every thick part of his body until you reach his cock, hard and aching and slick with pre-cum.

“I need to suck you off later,” you say, done with overthinking. Time to just be honest, and Kim Namjoon has a dick you need to feel down your throat. “Remind me.”

He whines, thrusts into your hand a little harder. “How could I forget that?”

“Don’t know. Didn’t know if this would be the only time,” you answer. “Did you bring a condom?” Namjoon nods, fetches one from his wallet and rolls it on.

He hovers above you again. Looks nervous, all of a sudden, like he can’t tell his lefts from his rights. All out of sorts. You’re about to tell him it’s fine, you don’t have to do anything he doesn’t want to, don’t have to do anything at all, when he says, “It doesn’t have to be.” You just stare. “The only time.”

There’s a conversation to be had. You know that. Both of you clearly have feelings you need to talk about and sort out, but you reckon they can wait. They’ll still be there in the afterglow, in the morning. So you nod, say okay, Joon, and kiss away the insecurities that still linger.

You think about the fic. Think maybe Namjoon would appreciate it if you cracked a stupid joke, just like he’d tried to do earlier. “Has anyone ever called your cock stupid?”

He laughs, breath fanning against your skin. “No. Wanna try it and see what happens?”

Might as well. You try to remember the exaggerated tone of voice you’d used. Repeat the line—“Do you even know what to do with that big, stupid cock?”—and wait.

There’s a beat of silence, and then—

Namjoon swallows thickly. “I, um. Unfortunately, I think that really works for me.” You laugh. Pull him closer. Wrap your legs around his waist as he starts to move against you. Has jokes of his own. “Please. Please let me fuck you.”

You roll your eyes, laugh tapering into a giggle. “Do you know how?” Namjoon nods, looking all too much like a puppy eager to please its owner. “Do you promise?” He nods again. “Okay. Okay, come here.”

You expect him to move fast; expect the first time to be frenzied and a little awkward. It isn’t. Namjoon lines himself up and pushes the smallest bit inside, and then he’s leaning down to kiss you. Threads your fingers together, squeezes your hand. Pushes further inside and mumbles praise just beneath your ear.

It’s dizzying, the amount of care Namjoon handles you with. How soft he is. Does nothing to ease the discomfort of the stretch, the overwhelming fullness, but he talks you through it. Tells you how good you feel, how beautiful you look. Spills a lot of words you’d probably be embarrassed to hear and he’d be embarrassed to say if this was any other time, but in the heat of the moment it all just works to unravel you faster.

He bottoms out. “Okay?” he asks, and you’re rewarded with a dimpled smile when you say you are. Namjoon is a devastating kind of beautiful.

But, as he gives you time to adjust and you give him the all-clear, he also fucks like a demon. What once was hand-holding is now your wrists pinned to the bed, your body caged beneath him as he rolls his hips at a pace that has your eyes rolling back into your head. You’ve been deceived. Lured into a false sense of security.

It’s almost a shame this isn’t being recorded, because you want to memorize all the sounds Namjoon’s making. Want to hear them for the rest of your life. Don’t want anyone else to be the reason he sounds like this, and as he ups his pace and presses his lips to your neck, you don’t want to sound like this because of anyone else, either.

Maybe one of those times in the future, you can talk him into it.

Namjoon reaches down, rubs circles into your clit. Every time you think you might be close, he pulls his hand away, smiles like the devil. You let him have his fun for a while, let him think you’re keen to lie back and take it, and then you tighten your legs around his waist and flip him onto his back.

He doesn’t think it’s very funny. Looks up at you all bewildered. “What’re you—”

“You were taking too long,” you snark. “Figured I’d take matters into my own hands.”

“Yeah? Shit,” he says as you begin to move. “Fuck, baby, like that. Ride me just like that.”

You do. Don’t change a thing, because Namjoon’s cock is long and thick enough to hit exactly where you need it to. You can feel yourself clenching, feel yourself getting wetter, and the sight of Namjoon beneath you does nothing to stave off the inevitable. He looks even better than you’d imagined: skin flushed, eyes squeezed shut, head thrown back, sweat-slick. You want to make him cry. Want to give him the entire world. You will.

Namjoon thrusts at the same time you roll your hips, and that’s what does it. Has you crying out, has stars flashing behind your eyelids. Has you saying fuck, fuck, fuck as he drives you over the edge for the second time. Has you on the brink of oversensitive as he thrusts a few more times to chase his own end, almost delirious at the way Namjoon moans as he spills into the condom.

Has you swooning, just a bit, at the dopey way Namjoon smiles at you, eyes half-lidded and crinkled at the corners.

“Was that okay?”

You snort. “Yeah, I’d say it was decent.”

“Maybe next time you could pee on me,” he jokes.

You whack him on the chest. “Sure. Or we could record it.”

Has you a little shocked at the way his cock twitches inside of you at the mention of it.

On Monday, you don’t wear a pretentious sweater.

When you stroll in, Jungkook’s already got the best donut shoved halfway into his mouth because he’s a shithead. He eyes you warily, probably hoping with all his hope that you spent the weekend finding God and getting your shit together.

And then he realizes you’ve got on Namjoon’s hoodie and he nearly chokes to death.

“What the fuck are you wearing—”

Namjoon appears at that very moment, and it’s so hard not to take credit for the way he’s glowing, the dazed smile on his face. But Jungkook notices, because Jungkook notices everything, and his gaze darts between the two of you: your hoodie, Namjoon’s face, your face. He opens his mouth, something inappropriate bound to spill out, but Namjoon beats him to the punch. “Ready?” he asks you, and you nod.

It’s seamless.

No hiccups, no awkward stuttering. Namjoon gets through the intro without a hitch, and it feels exactly like it used to. Just two friends having a conversation. It’s obvious Jungkook still wants to say something, but after suffering through last week, he stays quiet lest he makes it worse and sends the two of you back to the bad place.

“How was your weekend, Pipe? Do anything fun?” Namjoon rolls his lips, tries not to laugh.

So you play along. “No, not really, just some dog sitting. How about you?”

“Oh, you know me. Had another first date on Saturday.”

“Did you? How’d it go?”

“Perfect.”

It’s a blessing Jungkook isn’t filming this, because your eyebrows raise so far they nearly disappear from your face altogether. There isn’t even a hint of hesitation in Namjoon’s voice, and although you would’ve described it the same way, hearing him say it with such conviction has you a little stunned. “Wow. You gonna see her again?”

“Yeah,” Namjoon says, sharing a private smile with you. “I think I am.”

who the FUCK is namjoon dating Posted by u/pod-shipper 7 minutes ago This has honestly ruined my entire day. I thought all the stories he told about dating were a bit… Like, what kind of guy has a podcast about relationships but can’t seem to be in one? But you could just HEAR it in his voice how much he likes this woman he went on a date with over the weekend and I’m sick to my stomach. (+2195) ↳ bro you and me both 😭 i genuinely thought him and piper had something going on fr (+1302) ↳ Seriously might stop listening because of this! Any woman with self-respect would never let their partner host a podcast with someone they’re obviously in love with. If he gets serious with this woman, Piper will be gone within 6 months, mark my words. (+927) ↳ I wouldn’t worry about it too much! My cousin works at a really nice restaurant in the same city Namjoon lives in, and she said she saw this “date” on Saturday and that it wasn’t anything serious. (+788) ↳ Piper got a cat and Namjoon finally got a second date. Face it, it’s over. (+325) ↳ cannot believe him and piper aren’t dating.. do you think i should delete all my tiktok edits? (+4) ↳ this is unhinged lmfao i thought y’all hated piper? you’re in here bitching abt her being a “misandrist” every week and now ur gonna stop listening bc namjoon isn’t dating her? pick a lane and stay in it (-64)

Thank you so much for reading! I'd love to hear your thoughts, and reblogs/shares are always welcome! I appreciate you very much~ ♡

ALL AT ONCE // JJK

seven moments later

+

jungkook confesses and you're in denial

navi | m. list | ask me ! | send an ask to be on the taglist ! i will not be responding to taglist requests anywhere else !

pairings: unhinged jungkook + shy oc

au/genre:

uni au

friends to lovers

fluff & crack / smut (x) & angst if u squint

mini series

parts:

1: the confession

2: the avoiding

3: the favourite snacks

4: the cold

5: the oblivious (x)

6: the madness

7: the yes or no

end.

+ prologue

+ 3: msgs

+ 5: msgs

+ 6: msgs

+ 7: msgs

🎞️ Cam&Em Studios Presents...

Cam [ @highvern] and Em [ @gyuswhore] are proud to welcome you into the 2024 academic year with the Seventeen TA Collab! Take a look at our Course Options collated by your favourite writers, taught by your favourite members!

📆 Choose your Class Times and Professors below!

‼️Some classes contain NSFW content, remember to check the warnings on each lecture before registering!

register for classes so you don't miss out 📌 join the taglist with a visible age indicator on your blog!

🎓MSc Economics: Choi Seungcheol & TA!reader

📋Course Name: ex-conomics by @ugh-yoongi

📚Lecture Posted Here!

🖇️Course Overview: you supported seungcheol through years of being an aspiring athlete, and all you got to show for it was your undergraduate degree and an awkward, stuttered apology when he dumped you to go semi-pro. now he’s back after an injury derailed his career, and there’s only one problem: you’re the only one available to tutor him. you - 0; the universe - 1. talk about no return on investment.

🎓MSc Structural Engineering: Yoon Jeonghan & TA!reader

📋Course Name: building blocks by @the-boy-meets-evil

📚Lecture Posted Here!

🖇️Course Overview: agreeing to be the teaching assistant is the last thing you want in a semester where you're already swamped with work. but, you need a letter of recommendation from the professor and you're out of other options. enter jeonghan, the menace who signs up for the class seemingly on a whim and disrupts your entire routine.

🎓M.A. Spanish: TA!Joshua Hong x reader

📋Course Name: How to be a Latin Lover by @haologram

📚Lecture Posted Here!

🖇️Course Overview: the dreadful semester has started — meaning your summer vacation has come to end, and so has your summer fling…or has it?

🎓MSc Human Anatomy: Wen Junhui & TA!reader

📋Course Name: pulse points by @wheeboo

📚Lecture Posted Here!

🖇️Course Overview: Being the TA for your anatomy class has always been really rewarding, especially stemming in your passion for the medical field. But as it’s approaching the peak of the school semester and labs have gotten more intense, you aren’t surprised to be dedicating your time to tutoring your strangely handsome, dorky, yet enigmatic classmate during after school hours — and reassuring him how to not be afraid of dissections.

🎓MSc Zoology: TA!Kwon Soonyoung x reader

📋Course Name: Aranae by @haologram

📚Lecture Posted Here!

🖇️Course Overview: when you realize your friend (with benefits) actually has feelings for you, a tangled web of lies and avoidance ensues.

🎓MSc Chemistry: TA!Jeon Wonwoo & TA!reader

📋Course Name: endpoint by @highvern

✂️Course Outline 📚Lecture Posted Here!

🖇️Course Overview: Senior year of college is meant to be full of celebration and smooth sailing. Years of work culminating in the final semesters that will send you off into the real world where clubs, sports, and weekends packed with hungover volunteering to pad your resume no longer mattered. It’d be a piece of cake if it wasn’t for your fuck buddy turned coworker having the same plan. But only one of you can get the department’s most coveted recommendation that all but guarantees your acceptance. Tension rises and the nearly four year thing you’ve had with Wonwoo approaches its endpoint.

🎓MA Classics: TA!Lee Jihoon x Reader

📋Course Name: WASP-ish by @cheolism

📚Lecture Posted Here!

🖇️Course Overview: when your advisor puts you in classic literature instead of its easier counterpart, contemporary literature, you know it’s the end. especially when your ta is the one and only lee jihoon, known campus-wide for his sweet looks and harsh tongue. you can’t feel anything but irritation towards him – so much so you swear you could make a list. a “ten things i hate about you” au.

🎓MSc Astronomy and Astrophysics: TA!Lee Seokmin & TA!reader

📋Course Name: Do Stars Collapse Into Black Holes, or Fall Into Something Unknown? by @idyllic-ghost

📚Lecture Posted Here!

🖇️Course Overview: Starting your second year of your master’s degree in astrophysics, and your first year as a TA, you were stressed enough - but the universe knows no bounds for your suffering. Seokmin, your handsome and annoyingly smart classmate, just had to become your colleague. As if you weren’t hard on yourself already, Seokmin’s presence only proved to fuel your self-loathing. But does he hate you too, or do you need to open your eyes and come back down to Earth?

🎓MSc Psychological Research: TA!Kim Mingyu & reader

📋Course Name: Statistically Speaking... by @gyuswhore

✂️ Course Outline 📚Lecture Posted Here!

🖇️Course Overview: In all your years of academic endurance, you’ve never failed. A 100% success rate, despite you cutting it close at times. However, the line graph that is your life starts tanking somewhere around the time you began taking this hellsent Statistics in Psychological Research class. With a professor that wouldn’t know his ass from his head, and an overworked, overenthusiastic, and overcaptivating TA, it couldn't possibly get any worse than this. However, statistically speaking,…it could.

🎓MFA Studio Art: TA!Xu Minghao x TA!Reader

📋Course Name: Perspective by @tomodachiii

📚Lecture Posted Here!

🖇️Course Overview: Xu Minghao hates you. You've been sure of it ever since you met him. And when you find yourself working alongside him as a teaching assistant for your painting professor, you think you might hate him too. But one late night, two semesters, and three exhibits later, you find your perspective beginning to shift.

🎓MSc Creative Writing: Boo Seungkwan & TA!reader

📋Course Name: Put It In Writing by @bitchlessdino

📚Lecture Posted Here!

🖇️Course Overview: You keep things professional--as you should--even if one of your students is someone you hooked up with one night before the college semester started. Meanwhile, Boo Seungkwan is anything but honest--he's a writer after all--but if he is honest about one thing, it's about wanting to write a new story with you.

🎓MS Computer Science: TA!Chwe Hansol x TA!Reader

📋Course Name: love between the lines by @etherealyoungk

📚Lecture Posted Here!

🖇️Course Overview: despite the initial nerves of your new gig as an english literature TA, you’re ready to tackle the new job. that’s where you meet vernon, the computer science TA, and he’s interesting to say the least. he’s all about coding and numbers while you live and breathe poetry and novels. it’s clear that you both have contrasting interests and personalities - but they say opposites attract, right?

🎓MSc Mathematics: Lee Chan x TA!Reader

📋Course Name: rates of change by @wqnwoos

📚Lecture Posted Here!

🖇️Course Overview: Your first semester as TA throws your previously unassuming college life into disarray, fuelled almost entirely by the brown-eyed and charming student who’s slipping closer to failing with every lecture. And in return for your mathematical assistance, Lee Chan decides he’s going to set you up with the guy you’ve been persistently pining over for a year and a half. It’s a simple equation: you teach him calculus, and he’ll teach you how to flirt. Except, as you’re both quick to discover, mathematical equations don’t translate over to real life as easily as you’d expect.

Hiiii

Hope you’re doing well. It’s been two years I think ? but I still keep reading the Seokjin and omega teaser again and again🤣🤣

I am doing well! Also. You know what is crazy about this…. Kim Seokjin and the Mean Omega is like… basically done. There are maybe 2 scenes left to write and honestly I should write them. I am powerfully considering it BUT—

Since you’re so nice AND you keep reading it… SO here’s a little taste of what comes directly after that teaser…

“This is NOT FUNNY!” you hissed from underneath your blankets.

As soon as Seokjin revealed his identity, you dropped the knife (and your dignity) and ran straight back to your bedroom.

Okay. Well maybe not straight back.

For some reason you also ran into Jin’s room, stole a stuffed Yoshi toy, deliberately knocked over one of his custom “busty Peach” statues, and THEN ran straight to your room.

Currently you were curled up in the fetal position cuddling both Yoshi and Toad while Kim Taehyung—your former best friend—howled with maniacal laughter over the phone.

“—and you said he was a mafia boss! Bahahahaha—”

You rolled your eyes.

“Well what else was I supposed to do?! He didn’t look related to you!” (His features were rather hard to make out in his current condition.) “He was just a strange man covered in dirt!”

“Jin’s house flooded this morning. He’s been slogging around in two feet of disgusting water trying to salvage his stuff since 7 AM.”

“I guess that also explains why he smells like a sewer.”

There was a slight pause and then—

“So you haven’t smelled him yet?”

“I could barely smell anything under that awful flood stench.”

“Good… that’s good.”

Your nose wrinkled in confusion.

“Why is that good? Taehyung, you’re not making any sen—”

“I heard a new boutique opened up on Main Street last month. Why don’t you go check it out? Just—you know… get out of the house for a while. Have some fun and stuff—out there. For a couple hours—like three hours.”

“Uh… okay?”

What the heck?

“Excellent. Jin should be gone by the time you get back—

“He what?!”

“I have to catch this flight. Love you! See you soon! Go shop!”

Then the line went dead and you went scrambling back down the stairs.

————————

“KIM SEOKJIN!”

The man in question was trying to butter some toast (in peace) when your sudden shrieking caused him to drop the knife.

He sighed wearily, watching it clatter to the floor with a depressing little clang as you charged into the kitchen—still half naked.

“You can’t leave!”

Jin didn’t bother looking up at you. He just continued to stare forlornly at his butter knife.

“Oh, I am definitely leaving,” he mumbled eventually.

“But I’ll be by myself!”

He shrugged and bent to retrieve his knife.

“You were by yourself when I got here.”

“Exactly! What if someone else breaks in?!”

You weren’t too proud to admit that the incident had shaken you.

Sure, this time the intruder was supposed to be there, but what about next time? You were far too beautiful to be murdered in your sleep, surely Jin could see that.

Not to mention… the thought of him leaving was unexpectedly unsettling. You had the oddest urge to keep him close and frankly you saw no reason to deny yourself in this situation.

(You rarely encountered situations which required denial.)

“I didn’t break in,” he reminded you, turning to fetch himself a clean butter knife. “I have a key.”

Your eyes narrowed irritably. It was time for the big guns.

“So… so you’re just going to leave me here? A defenseless omega all by herself?”

Jin’s hands froze. He was mostly angled away from you but you could see a muscle beginning to tick in his jaw.

Now for the grand finale.

Tears welled up in your eyes and you whined pitifully.

Jin dropped his new knife.

“Please… don’t leave me.”

After a long moment of silence, the tall dirty man leaned his forehead onto the cabinets in front of him and groaned.

“Okay...” he ground out tightly. “I won’t leave you. Just—please—don’t say another word.”

Then he abandoned his breakfast all together and took off directly for the stairs.

Huh…

A puzzled expression settled over your face.

You got what you wanted, but he seemed almost… pained? Normally people were thrilled to spend time with you.

The smell of sausage and toast suddenly tickled its way under your nose, reminding you that Kim Seokjin had interrupted your snack.

You were just about to take a bite when a loud—vehement—shout of profanity echoed from the second floor followed by the sound of Jin’s footsteps pounding back down the stairs.

“Were you in my room?” he asked as soon as he swung back around the corner. Your eyes widened momentarily, but you caught yourself just in time.

“No. Why would you think that?”

Perhaps you should feel bad about lying, but how could you even begin to explain your actions when you yourself didn’t totally understand them.

Besides… it’s not like he could prove it.

Tae had mentioned specifically that there were no omegas in his family and a beta’s nose was far too weak to detect latent scents like yours could.

A muscle ticked in his jaw as he considered your response. After a moment his eyes began to travel slowly over your body, taking in the feigned innocence of your expression and the mouthwatering expanse of your soft exposed curves…

A strange foreign heat twisted eagerly in your belly under the weight of his regard and you shivered involuntarily.

What the—

“Are you eating my breakfast?”

Oh whoops.

Hii can you rec some writers who wrote social media aus??🥺 (just the writers is fine, i’ll go through their masterlist!!🥰)

🌷 Hello, anon! Apologies for the late response, I’ve been kind of slow catching up on asks/request. But here you go! 

The first smau I’ve read is Love at First Oink by @glodenclosetau. This is just the cutest 🐷! I even got my friends who are not into fanfics to read this =) . Check their other fics too!

SMAU Fic Recs | Author Recs 🥕

posted: 2021 Feb

updated: 2022 Feb (new additions are highlighted)

primarily SMAU writers (they have other written one shots/drabbles too)

@kimnjss 

@v-hope 

@bloomsuga - reading Cursed (deactivated 🥺)

@firebettercallnct (I don’t think they have a new fic out)

@bts-reveries 

@bbangpanmen - reading new Jimin SMAU

@woozibby - moved account (some works discontinued)

@gukooky - couldn’t be tagged, so here’s their masterlist also @lovelyyyoongi 

@omot7 - subscribed to Skin (deactivated but rebranded new blog) now at @muniimyg

@smaubts - new Yoongi fic No Trouble

@theunknowncryptid 

@bangtann-bangdamn - reading Not Like the Movies

@yonkimint - reading All I Need is Me 

@lysjeon - now @jeonvely (reading Stuck Together)

@inclebtsmix 

@bts-celestials

@bangtan-nugget - just read Cypher, Tattoo

@jjkscafe - just read Empty Apartment

@srwbrycke - hiatus but they have the old smaus posted

@dreamercatcherjiah - Bubbles! 🥰🥰

@maravillamin - Daylight!

@frgt-me-not - I just remembered Marguerite is one of the first smaus I’ve read too!

@sopebubbles - reading Serendipity

Other writers to check out (

@bangtansbun - reading End Game

@adorajoon - spilled milk

@writerforkpop - currently subscribed to Sorry to Tell You This

@selfcontrol-idkher - Neighborhood & On the Road

@jjk-biased

@minbbyy

@burningupp - commitment phobic just concluded

@na-na-na-nanna - reading Catching Feelings (MYG) and they wrote Catfish (KTH)

@yoongiiverse - reading Just Facts

@sereni-rose - reading Caffeine and Roses! (deactivated)

@hxseok-honee - I just discovered their Modern Hogwarts smaus!

@honey-boyyoongi - reading Oh Baby

@taeyegu - excited for Dream Girl; reading candy girl, do re mi (masterlist)

@knpjpr - reading devoted to you

@crownjimin - just read Coffee

@dejayoonw - check their smaus like loser baby, hold tight, and more

@03mistress30 - Would you rather

@httpsolros - euphoric

@herherteartear - Soul, mean girls finish last

These are writers who write smaus every now and then (please check their masterlist for the list of SMAUs)

@kookiesjoonies - Risk It (ugh this got me so stressed. exes!au with written parts)

@njssi

@suhdays - currently reading Made of Honor (deactivated, remade an account but not posting SMAUs yet)

@jjeongukkie - Why We Broke Up (hiatus, but this is also gripping #angst

@purpletaecup - the devil koo smau

@jooniesrose 

@cinnaminsvga - currently reading Dorm Duels

@ppersonna - agent of love

@yoontaethings  - reading smau: best man

@tteokggukk - reading waiting game (on hold)

@xpeachesncream - will be reading Plot Twist

@moon-write - Tyrant Love

@bangtanloverboys - good bad choices!

@bts-bookstore - read private & delinquents

@btsrunmylife - I read some of the fics on ao3 but SMAUs are here on tumblr! upcoming Dancer’s Heart, Call Me Naive just concluded

@dragunjk​ - exchange

@bangtannguk-au 

Enjoy! 🥰 

other fic rec lists

feel free to chat about fics =)

We Were Destined To Fall (But I’ll Catch You) [Masterlist]

Pairing: Jeonghan x fem!reader, Seokmin x fem!reader

Featuring: Seokjin, Joshua

Synopsis: In which Yoon Jeonghan traded the fate of humanity for your love.

Genre: Angst, betrayal, greed, hint of fluff, greek myth!au, reincarnation, modern dystopia, historical, time jump/travel(?), one-sided pining/jealousy/implied love triangle (w/Seokmin), bestfriend!seokmin, fallen angel!jeonghan, sinner!reader, blacksmith!seokjin,  angel!joshua

Warnings: PG-13, may contain smut (pending), additional warnings specified per chapter. Contains inaccurate representations of history and time.

Disclaimer: Though the intent of this drabble seriesis not meant to be religious, there are religious references (e.g. angels, heaven vs hell, devil, Greek mythology, mentions of multiple deities rather than one). They are not accurate nor do they necessarily represent mine or SVT’s beliefs. All religions are welcomed here.

A/N: Important notes for this series under the cut!

Keep reading

Shameless (M)

pairing. step-son Jeno x step-mom reader

genre. stepcest, infidelity, Jeno hates his dad, young trophy wife step-mom

wc. 10k

warnings. dubcon, profanity, exercise/body talk, Jeno has a thing for sweat, smut warnings under cut. minors DNI.

now playing. Shameless//Camila Cabello

smut warnings. masturbation, mommy kink, coercion, a lot of breast focus, reader has large breasts, oral, improper use of a cucumber.., raw fucking, noncon filming, wet messy etc..

“She’s a little too young, even for you.”

Jeno’s tongue drags along the backs of his teeth peering over his father’s shoulder for the last 10 minutes as he idly scrolled through various photos and short video clips. Most innocent enough, cute selfies showing off your pretty fanned out eyelashes, a new lip gloss shade, or just an adorable smile.

The videos his dad took time to watch made Jeno’s breath hitch, looping the few seconds of you showing off a new bikini for summer, filming yourself in the mirror and turning to show off a scandalous yet feminine pattern right above the indentation of bikini bottom scrunched between your pert buttcheeks.

“I work very hard, son, believe I deserve a pretty young thing.” He snickers, having noticed the youngers reflection on his phone screen a few minutes ago. “Something about this one..”

“Where’d you find her? Another sugar baby app you had to pay to join?” Jeno crosses his arms, glaring daggers into the back of his father’s head. Pathetic, working hard for what? To blow your funds on women who probably gag over your shoulder while you fuck them and lose your stamina after two minutes?

His father chuckles, swiping the social media app shut to open his messages. “You’re going to hate this but she approached me first.” With a proud smile he turns to face his son, showing off back and forth messaging between the two of you. Majority of the context is similar to how two cute shy teens would chat, nothing racy despite knowing his father’s likely buying time to pounce and unleash an arsenal of embarrassing boomer dick pics.

“You’re lying.”

Standing up, his father sneers, a smile hidden somewhere behind his resentful expression. “Believe it or not, your old man’s still got it. Now, if you don’t mind— I have a date with your soon-to-be step-mom.” He winks, purposefully bumping roughly into his son’s shoulder on his way out of the living room; leaving Jeno standing there rubbing at the spot mindlessly, jaw tight as he recounts your username to conduct his own investigation.

His first summer home in years and this is what his asshole father wants to pull? Jeno grimaces, plopping down on the couch to commence his search and find your other social media platforms.

“Twenty-fucking-two? He’s out of his mind.” Muttering to himself, he quickly taps in and out of various videos. The fact that you follow dance trends is enough to make his eyes roll, concentrating harder than he should have to on your face and the quirky silly wide eyes you make at the camera instead of the obscene way your breasts bounce freely beneath a much too tight and thin crop top, braless. Of course.

Jeno bets you did approach his dad first, he can picture it now. A sweet little helpless thing miraculously bumping into him at Whole Foods or some other ridiculously overpriced grocery store, batting your big doe eyes irresistibly after calculating the worth of the ludicrous gold Rolex adorning his wrist. No doubt adding the sum of his Gucci loafers and Dior sunnies; undoubtedly pushed up into his salt and pepper hair as he read over the nutritional information of a new all-natural all-organic sugar free gluten free energy drink.

You probably struck up conversation from there, perched yourself on his dad’s arm striking up flirtatious charm about the product in his hands, just to lean in closer and smash your ample chest against his arm.

Jeno clicks his phone shut frustrated, balling his fist open and shut to watch the blood flow down and redden his skin.

It infuriates him how easily his father continues to win, after the divorce his view of the man he once admired could never be repaired. What he once respected and admired all came crumbling down as his mother broke down crying in his arms after years of pretending to act dumb and not notice late evenings at the office, extended company trips, or the stains of lipstick shades she’d never wear and remnants of musky oud that simply never complimented her skin.

Jeno rests his eyes, ignoring the itching ache in his chest. What could he do anyway? What did his dad have to lose that money couldn’t buy him a new and better version of.

A house? A car? More designer brands and jewelry to mark his status in the upper class?

It only took a month, one fucking month, and the answer became clear as his dad lifted you up by your trim waist hidden under ugly burly veiny paws. The smile across his face so arrogant and cocky, hoisting his young little play thing up in the pool just to watch your beautiful round chest bounce in his face beneath triangles of material hardly containing you.

Jeno can’t deny he gets something out of it too, something he stores away for later along with the cheerful sweet moaned giggles you let out after splashing his father’s face with water and demanding in the most helpless submissive tone to be put down. Bet his dad loves that, in fact, he knows he does. It didn’t even take a full two weeks before you moved in with a fat diamond rock on your ring finger. The sight of it nearly blinded him when it caught the glare of light.

Jeno knows he can’t keep up with his father’s wealth, not yet. Material things aren’t his strength either, but as he jerks off into his palm by his bedroom window facing the backyard where you’ve taken to performing your morning pilates, his eyes concentrate on your insane flexibility. The tip of your head near your feet keeping your taut ass up for him to salivate over, and now he knows one thing for sure.

He needs to fuck his step-mom.

Jeno’s usually a morning person, but leave it to his father to ruin that for him.

“Kiss kiss.”

Disgusting.

Heavily wrinkled lips pout in your face, his dad slithered around your waist from behind as you finished packing your new husband's lunch. Really, it’s repulsive to watch unfold every morning. The only perk being the smile you beam Jeno’s way with your much too chipper and excited ‘Good Morning!’ As you skip to the fridge to pour some of your lemon water into a glass, breasts all round and taunting from where he sits; nipples always hard, piercing through your collection of various nighties and tank tops.

“Anything for breakfast? I can whip up some pancakes real quick if you want.”

Jeno tries to hide his grin, as much as he wishes to act like a brat— he can’t. The thing is, you’re lovely in every sense of the word. Too lovely, doting, and appealing, never once causing him annoyance.

He wants to scoff, demand you whip up the most delicious fluffiest pancakes, take your top off and throw the batter down your bare chest before laughing in your face to clean it up; lifting up one breasts at a time with fat wads of tears in your eyes as you plead for him to stop— stop being mean, stop smearing more of the mess he’s caused you to make across your lips.

“Nothing for me.” Jeno motions to the protein shake resting in his grip. “I’m trying to lean out.”

“Lean out?” Your smiles too soft, lifting to one side with surprise. “I can’t imagine you have anything but muscle left, when's the last time you had your body fat measured?”

“Ah, you don’t know because you haven’t seen me shirtless, yet.” Jeno says, more as an invitation to get a rise out of you, having to swallow back a sigh at your lack of response; not even a hint of interest. “Need to slim down my waist a bit to really achieve the shape I want.”

“Well if you ask me..” Jeno waits, appreciating how lightly you float around the kitchen to gather your fruits and toppings to decorate your yogurt bowl with. “You look really fit, your waist is practically non-existent.”

“How much do you weigh?” He asks abruptly, evidently throwing you off by the way your gaze widens in shock and a stutter passes between your lips, quickly averting your attention back to the half chopped strawberry in front of you.

“Wha— uhm..”

“Sorry, that was rude.” Jeno smiles, awkwardly scratching his nape. “I was wondering if it’s less than what I can press.”

A dazed gleam coats your iris, staring back dumbfounded by the image of your step-son working his hips up with crossed eyebrows, using all the force and strength of his muscle mass to lift.

“How much can you do?” You ask, clearing your throat and refocusing on your breakfast. The question more to keep up with the conversation before you run off to hide in your bedroom.

Jeno lets out a breathy laugh. “I shouldn’t have asked, don’t know what I was thinking.” Pushing up from the kitchen island to stand, he pauses before making his way to exit; having taken to a grueling AM workout after downing his shakes. “I can definitely press double, if not more than what you weigh.”

He doesn’t miss the way your hands come to a halt, gripping around the knife in your hold, eyes silently falling shut with a deep breath.

“You should come join me some time, bet I can lift you easily.”

Jeno’s grateful at least that his father has no choice but to work morning to evening five days a week to earn the lavish lifestyle he’s achieved. He’s thankful because you love to perform your afternoon stretches in the backyard, the landscape his bedroom window coincidentally faces.

“So flexible.” He mumbles to himself, forehead resting against the window frame where he stands with his hand buried inside of his boxers, mindlessly thumbing at the slit of his cock for a hint of relief. Your mid-day sessions only last about over an hour, depending on how far you want to push yourself.

Sure, the splits always made his balls tighten up, having to slow down the pace and pull at his length, circling the base to quell the sudden urge to throw you up and down on his cock fully spread out.

But really, the extended puppy pose takes him over the edge every time.

Jerking off from his bedroom window has become unsatisfactory, the best part is really after when you walk in with your smile high off endorphins, gently patting the sweat that’s accumulated on your gorgeous décolleté.

“Oh Jeno, I thought you’d gone out.”

He hums, following your movements around the kitchen to replenish your hydration, noting the beads of sweat continuously rolling down between the dip in your back. His teeth bite down on the tip of his tongue, tempted to shove you up against the fridge and lick them all clean before falling to his knees to suck the dark patch between your thighs.

“Good workout?” Jeno never tries to hide that he’s checking you out, he makes it obvious everyday. “Looks like you really worked up a sweat.”

“Oh yeah, it’s so hot outside.” The lack of eye contact you’re able to maintain indicates discomfort, judging by the way you try to clean off your stomach and arms.

“My dad has a thing about sweat, right?” Jeno offhandedly mentions, not missing the awkward twitch in your cheek to hide a grimace. “That’s why you’re always so clean by the time he gets home? The water bill has to be through the roof with how often he has you doing laundry.. not that he cares.”

“I suppose his nose is a bit sensitive.”

“He always complained about how my mom smelled, her hair after a day of not washing, the smell of the dinner she cooked him on her hands still.” He continues, enjoying your lack of reply. “He’s picky about a lot of things, I’m sure you know what I mean.”

A fake smile shuts down the conversation, nodding toward the staircase. “It’s time for my shower.”

Jeno nods, shamelessly eyeing the stains of wetness under your large breasts, pushed together even tighter by the binding sports bra meant to keep you held in place through vigorous activity. “Wouldn’t want daddy to get mad now, would we?”

A wash of embarrassment has you scurrying away from your step-son quickly, leaving behind the small towel drenched in your sweat that immediately catches his attention.

Jeno definitely inherited the same sensitive sense of smell from his father, but unlike the old man he’d become more addicted to the different places his nose had led him to. A smirk lifts his lips, tucking the towel up above his mouth to deeply inhale. It’s mind-numbing how delectable you smell, he even sucks on the remnants of damp that hasn’t fully evaporated, quietly mewling within his chest.

The telltale sound of the upstairs shower from his father’s bedroom tears him from slipping into euphoric madness, cock already half-erect as he trudges up the stairs and finds himself tip-toeing into your bedroom, the bathroom door only softly creaking as he makes space to peer through. The daily routine of watching you scrub down every inch of skin, so smooth, hairless, meticulously shaving clean each short hint of stuble. His father must be real demanding of how his little stay at home house-wife should present herself, of course.

Bunching the nearly dried towel inside of his briefs, Jeno groans between clenched lips, rubbing the cotton fabric up and down his length, his heart rate pumping up to a high-speed when you lift a leg to reach deep between your thighs and leave the fleshy area hidden there completely bald.

That will change once he manages to infiltrate, he’ll make you change for him.

“You should go out son, I don’t want you hanging around the house.” Jeno’s dad doesn’t even bother to mask his disdain, shoving a wad of cash at his chest. “Scram.”

That would be too easy, it’s not as if his friends haven’t been blowing up his phone about some party tonight. He’ll plan to leave later and miss the sound of his father’s pig-like moaning squeals when he takes five minutes to fuck you. For now, his ass isn’t moving from one of the pool chairs, opting for the more shaded area under a large canopy to watch from.

Why would he want to miss out on the display you put on for his old man, stepping out in a tight little two piece bikini that does nothing to cover any of your curves. Jeno’s cock twitches as you slowly step out of your robe and his dad whistles making grabby hands at you to enter the pool. “Jump in, baby doll.”

Sick. God he hates hearing that old worn voice order your around. He hates how you giggle and enter from the steps, giving him a half-assed jump only for your breasts to lift up under your chin before the water immerses your perfect body, lifting back out pouring cascades of wet down your shoulders and arms before his dad snatches you up by the waist. “That’s my girl.”

Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. Five—

Jeno takes a deep breath through his nose, an irritating pinch forming between his eyebrows the more you indulge his father, dawning the smile only reserved for your husband: hugging him close between your mounds of breasts as he releases a deep moan and licks up your neck.

His stomach churns the longer he watches, shoving himself to stand and move to the jacuzzi where he can’t help but to still watch from, ignoring the daggers his father’s eyes shoot at him on his way in. He won’t dare enter the pool while the two of you canoodle in there, preferring to stay clueless as to what your lower halves could be up to, the sight of his dad’s thick ugly hands cupping your breasts from is behind already enough to make him gag.. maybe if not for the shocked moan you let out, wrapping around his wrists shyly. “Babe.. we’re not alone.”

You whisper, but Jeno traces the words from your lips, ducking lower into the jacuzzi until one of the jets rumbles against his stomach, chin grazing under the hot water.

“Ignore him.” His dad could give two fucks, squeezing under your chest with more firmness, pushing them together creating a long dip of cleavage.

Jeno can see the lack of comfort in your hidden gaze, keeping your eyelids lowered with a demure embarrassed smile, saving face only for your husband's pleasure. He knows if you couldn’t sense another pair of eyes on you, you’d be your usual bubbly coquettish self, flouncing around burying his dad’s face in your chest, giggling all loud and cute.

The thrill of watching your discomfort escalate makes his cock kick up, lowering down onto his knees for only his eyes to peer over the jacuzzi’s ledge, noticing the way your gaze skirts by quickly to not give him enough acknowledgment to feel seen, but to stay aware of just how much your step-son can see. It’s easy from the angle to remove his father’s existence behind you, especially when he shifts closer to the ledge and one of the jets blasts right against his groin.

A shiver runs up his chest, biting down on his bottom lip as he stays transfixed on your flimsily covered breasts abused and bounced around. He has to hold back a curse when he finally unties his swim trunks, tugging free his length right in front of the burst of bubbled water. The pressure pushing out of the jet breaks against his slit, choking down a groan when your gaze finally meets his, mouth tense and ashamed.

He can’t keep a smile off his face, tugging harder at himself as your forehead wrinkles together, breathily arched up by the force pushing your breasts up and down against the splash of blue chlorine water.

The water around him boils against his skin even hotter, short of breath under the heat, short of breath from the image of your lips parting open. Jeno imagines you can bend your neck forward and wrap around his girth passing between your tits, it wouldn't be hard to reach anyway. Jerking up, he pushes against the jet hole, cock instantly engulfed by an intense amount of pressure blowing out against him. The push and pull only causes his stomach to clench, sink in and hollow out his middle-section.

You were doing a better job at ignoring him before, unable to stop for seconds now to watch your step-son’s facial features contort together… he can’t, he wouldn’t..

Nostrils flare, shoulders hidden under the bubbly foam around him, jerking mindlessly into the jet. It’s like breaking a dam over and over again, the pressure of release spilling out against his thick size, the only thing missing being your convulsing slick warmth squeezing and fighting to push him free as he thrusts in harder, fucking you full beyond capacity you can handle.

Jeno could care less about the predicament he’s landed in here, stroking his cock without control like some wild animal, succumbing to his desires and needs to bend you into all kinds of positions. He knows he can too after weeks of watching you move your body bonelessly, get you twisted up like a pretzel, face down ass up, legs behind your head full-nelson you flat on your back with his dick full slotted inside, grinding down just to watch you fail to squirm away. He’d leave you with no room to move, let alone breathe, fat tits pushed up under your chin, jiggling up and down and up and down with each thrust.

“Fuck.” He’s close now, tongue lolling out at the gasp that hitches in your throat. Siren-like eyes glazed over from the constant manipulation your breasts have been put through. What a fucking pervert, watching you struggle to collect yourself and maintain your etiquette.

Does his dad even savor the way every inch of your body tastes? Does he suck on your tits until your nipples pebble up rock hard and dig into the roof of his mouth? Jeno never see’s a mark on you, no… daddy doesn’t play rough with his toys, does he.

Jeno would though, fuck he’d have you screaming to the high heavens. He can’t hide the bob of his head the closer he reaches, catching your fully widened eyes stuck on him, and your bikini top finally coming undone after minutes of tugging and kneading.

Hands too large to be yours come up just a second too late to cover over your exposed nipples allowing Jeno the chance to see how swollen and pert and big they’ve gotten, probably prodding at his dad’s hideous rough palms.

The wet bounce of fat under his control has him emptying out into the jet, most of his release blown away from the powerful stream mixing in with the rest of the ramped jacuzzi water.

He has to calm himself, overheated from the drop back down to reality, overheated from the sun burning down onto the already steamy hot tub of water. Taking his time, he’s lazy to exit, patting off his reddened chest and stinging skin to a somewhat dry finish. The heat hardly subsides with eyes on him, specifically yours..

“I said scram you damn brat.”

His father’s shrill tone gives him an excuse to glance over, most of your frame hidden by his wide back stretched around you to hug you against the pool wall for discretion to tie your top back up.

“Yeah yeah, don’t wait up for me.” Not that he would, Jeno didn’t really mean that for his father anyway. The lingering gaze grazing down his body taking in every crevice and dip of bare naked muscle though, part of him hopes that you will wait up. He means it though, even with one more glance your direction before heading inside, finding your eyes for only a millisecond.

Don’t wait up mommy, I’ll be too busy fucking any hole presented to me, maybe even multiple. Anything to curb the incessant growing need to get you alone, slam you down and fuck you until you’re ripping that ring off your finger.

Jeno has to admit, he’s impressed by how long you’ve held it together, managed to keep up your composure around him despite his best efforts to make you start to crack.

Soon. Real soon.

“You’re around the house way too much, either get a job or get out.” Jeno’s father barged into his bedroom after that little pool escapade. Throwing pamphlets for schools across the country at his face. “I put enough money in your bank account, it’s time for you to quit fucking around and make something of yourself.

Jeno knows deep down inside his father’s ulterior motivation came from an all too pretty adorable wife, evidently unhappy with the way his son has decided to forgo his gym membership in favor of walking around shirtless dripping in sweat after using the home equipment.

He couldn’t put up much of an argument with the old man. It’s not entirely your fault he found his ass on a train 7 hours away the next week, just in time for a new semester.

Sure, it’s not entirely your fault, he can’t put all of that insecure assholes blame on you.

But it is your fault, and that long silent train ride gave him all the time to ponder, reflect, plot, devise the next step. Work harder, fuck more, leave you with no choice but to wipe the drool from your chin at the mere sight of your step-son.

If only it could be that easy. He really can’t stand how reluctant you are to trip and fall, landing right into the palm of his hands breasts first. Can’t stand the way you still parade around town proudly introducing yourself as the Mrs. Lee. The side-eyes and whispers never affect you, too happy to give a damn with each guiltless swipe of your husband’s black American Express.

God, he can’t stand it. He can’t stand you.

Jeno really can’t stand his step-mom.

Not because you’re awful or even a bitch, no.. in fact, you’re perfect. Too perfect for his nasty cheater asshole father who could care less for his mother, now ex-wife.

“Ah Jeno, it’s so nice to have you home again.” Your sweet cheerful voice interrupts his fuming thoughts, the back of his head instantly relaxing in the mound of your breasts as you circle his neck and lean down to hug him. “You hungry? I stocked up on all of your favorites.”

Nuzzling back into your warm embrace, he sighs, eyes drifting shut to inhale the notes of peach and cucumber wafting from your freshly cleansed skin. Supple soft radiant skin he knows you spend meticulous hours of the day exfoliating, lotioning, massaging with oil only for your useless husband to rub his old disgusting rough hands upon.

“Missed cooking for me?” He mumbles, shifting to bury his nose in the column of your throat to fully immerse himself in your savory scent.

“Look how skinny you’ve come back, that school not feeding you properly or something?” You reprimand, patting over his flat stomach lightly. “I have to make sure to keep you full for the next couple of weeks before your break ends.”

Nudging the top of his head with your chin, you continue into the kitchen, still in your silky pajama set. Something short, hardly covering your abundant chest, dad wouldn’t have his young little trophy wife any other way, always ready for the taking.

Jeno can only imagine how many mornings his father has snuck up on you making breakfast, bending you over to fill you up before heading to work. Fucking bastard doesn’t deserve to even touch you, let alone any of those fake moans you must practice to please him.

“Are you worried about me?” Jeno’s chair scratches across the kitchen tile, slowly lifting up to get a better look at your buttcheeks squeezed by your panties, innocently bent over in search of a pan. “Maybe the school cafeteria doesn’t serve anything that satisfies my hunger.”

“I’ll fix that,” too distracted on your hunt for the right spices and oils, you fail to notice how close Jeno’s gotten, hovering behind you with a smirk as your robe slips from your shoulder. “You’re the one who wanted to go to school so far away. You could be eating my home cooking everyday if you’d just stayed local.”

“…is that so?” A grin teases at his lips, halting your hand from adjusting your robe to push it down left to fall at your feet.

A shiver runs up your spine sensing his breath fanning across your shoulder, palms smoothing down your waist to your hips. “Jeno?”

“I’m hungry, mommy.”

“Jeno? Wha—“ your hips stay locked in place, shoved against the kitchen counter by the stronger ones behind you knocking forward to trap you.

“I missed you too, mommy.” Shoving his hips forward, Jeno’s girth slots between your flimsily covered ass, rutting quickly to lodge between and create delicious friction against his cock. “You know what I really missed?”

“Je-Jeno.. what are you..”

“Last summer when you moved in, every different ridiculously tiny bikini you wore around the pool. Your fat tits barely contained, just how dad likes it huh? I guess we have that in common.” Keeping you held against the counter with his hips grinding in circles against your ass, hands find a way to your shoulders, swiftly dropping down the straps of your nightgown leaving your breast to bounce out freely. The morning crisp air circulating around the house breezes past your nipples, hardening the buds instantaneously.

“Sweetie, this.. this isn’t right, your dad—“

“Is an asshole.” Jeno bites, cupping your breasts that overflow in his hold, the fat squeezing between his digits pushing out a low groan from deep within his chest. “Fucking decrepit dickhead, bet he can’t even get hard from this alone? I’ve seen that erectile dysfunction prescription.. can’t even take care of you and fuck you right can he, mommy?”

To emphasize his point, Jeno’s hips swerve, fucking forward vigorously for the thick shape of his rod to slam between your panty covered behind, night gown bunched up over your hips from his incessant humping. “Can’t tell me a pretty young thing like you doesn’t miss it, hours and hours of getting the life fucked out of you.”

The kneading and massaging at your chest accompanied with your step-sons evidently large size has you panting, hands gripping the kitchen counter for some relief. Shaking your head, you try to ignore the way your hips rut back to find his, biting back a moan from escaping. “Jeno, please.. sweetie, d-don’t—your dad..”

A rough slap under your breast silences you, the fat rippling under Jeno’s strength as he delivers another slap, working in succession to bounce and smack each with his chin perched over your shoulder rambling on and on about how good you look like this. Perfectly pliant, needy, face full of ecstasy all thanks to your step-son.

“Dad has great taste, I’ll give the old fuck that.” Jeno snickers, teeth digging into the vein lining the side of your throat. “Had me hard as a rock fucking into my fist all summer, tried to get over you by filling up any hole.. couldn’t get your pretty body off my mind.”

“Jeno, baby.. w-we can’t. Your dad, he’ll.. he’ll kill you.”

Breath staggers against your neck at the term of endearment, hips fucking against you in earnest. “You think I fucking care about him? What about you? What about this mess you’ve made mommy? How can you do this to me? Tempt me all the time with these perfect fucking tits and expect me to leave you alone now?”

“I’m sorry, I’m s-sorry Jeno.. I didn’t—“

“Baby, I’m your baby.” Jeno pinches your nipples roughly, pulling and slapping forcing a loud echo of skin on skin to barrel across the kitchen. Jackhammering his hips faster against your ass. “Tell me to stop, don’t fucking tell me what dad wants. You tell me to stop.”

“B-baby… I-I…” a sad pathetic cry sounds, dropping forward loosely as your thighs tremble erratically, held up only the rough grip on your chest undoubtedly leaving behind marks of nails and bruising.

“Must be true.” Jeno grunts, shoving your underwear down. “Like father, like son.”

“Jeno, please, you can’t do this!” It’s harder now to fight him off, roughly taken by your chest, fondled like some little doll only there to pleasure him. “If—if he finds out—“

“Don’t worry about that senial bastard, he wouldn’t be able to read a sign even if it was spelled out for him.” Your step-son doesn’t relent, fucking against your panties roughly until the his stiffed up cock shoves the material between your ass. “You’re so wet for me, you feel that? Feel me?”

Jeno thrusts forward angling his size right between your poorly clenched thighs, ass bouncing back against his pelvic bone. “Think you can handle that? Too big for you mommy?” He reaches down to whip out his cock, expertly dragging his fully hard length out to slot against your soaked covered core. The contact makes his eyes roll up, long eyelashes fluttering rapidly impairing his vision for a minute as his size drags against the wet shape of your cunt.

“Oh fuck fuck.” Jeno refuses to cum like this, even if his stomach muscles contort and suck in viciously. He swallows down a hissed breath, jerking back to fuck against your drenched panties in earnest.

“J-Jeno.. please!”

“You want it, huh? Wanna get fucked by a big fat cock finally?” Jeno bites back a laugh, mostly a groan as the tip of his cock ruts against your clit. “Daddy can’t fuck you the way you need, can’t get you off. When’s the last time you had a real orgasm? Not that whiny shit you fake for him.”

Inner-turmoil loses to your arousal, forced to slide up and down what feels like a forearm between your thighs. Your good sense dissipates the more your cunt spreads around the girth pushing between your folds, aching to feel each pulsating vein lining your step-son’s length drag against your wet slick pussy.

“I’m… fuck Jeno..” between gasps and choked back moans, you weakly give him a thrusts back, faintly meeting his motion to rut against your clit and create a mind-numbing friction.

One of his palms lands against your ass like a crack of a whip, sending your chest to collide forward and press against the cool marble of the kitchen counter. “What did you call me?”

Gathering your underwear, Jeno pulls the material aside, sucking spit away that's gathered around his thirsty tongue upon seeing your cunt so ready to be wrecked and fucked. “Look at that tight hole, like a virgin. No way daddy’s fucking you right.”

You’re grateful that your brain hasn’t fully failed you yet, even with your step-son’s thick palms spreading your ass open continuing to spew nonsense out about the appearance of your perfect pussy. God knows you’d beg and confess how badly you need to cum— cum around your husband's son’s monster sized cock. “How am I going to fit in there mommy? I’m way too big for you.”

Jeno sounds sadistic, hawking out spit that lands and drips down to your entrance. “Should I be nice and prep you?” He laughs, a fake laugh, a mocking teasing laugh. “That would be too nice of me, wouldn’t it?”

He leans over your back, reaching for the basket of fruits and vegetables just past your head. “Should I be nice?”

Long fingers wrap around one of the cucumbers half hanging out of the basket, dragging the vegetable down to smack against your cheek. The solid food slaps your skin heavy and rough, making your step-son smile wide, highly pleased by the shame wrinkling your forehead together. “Mommy’s always so nice to me, always takes care of me so well.” Jeno taunts, leaning back and tapping the vegetable down your spine to run between your buttcheeks.

“I shouldn’t be too mean..” the thick tip of the cucumber meets your entrance, cold against your heated core making your hips shiver forward to get away.

“Baby..”

“Yeah, that’s right.” He presses in, cursing between gritted teeth as he watches you stretch open around the vegetable. It’s big, even then no competition for how wide the tip of his dick is alone. “Opening up so so pretty for me, mommy.”

He fucks the cucumber inside of you just half-way, sending your toes to arch up from the floor and scramble to grab at the kitchen counter; threatening to cut open your bottom lip with how hard you bite down to keep in a moan. The whole situation makes you feel dirty, disgusting, ashamed that you couldn’t stop him. That deep down inside you know you’d never stop him, you want it too much. Form the day you noticed your step-son watching you stretch from his bedroom window, to the time you caught a glimpse of him by the bathroom door as you scrubbed down and rinsed your naked body clean. You’ve always wanted him to make a move.

Maybe you’d been dreaming of this moment all along, adding your ingredients to the pot everyday until everything boiled over and spilled past the rim.

“So fucking nasty mommy.” Jeno keeps mumbling, thrusting the vegetable in and out of you, enthralled by the way it comes out stickier, coated with a thick layer of sheen. The wet dripping out past your cunt with each fill, spilling down your inner thighs to the kitchen floor like some whore that needs to be fucked and bred everyday. “Taking it so good, you’ll take me even better.”

His throbbing length slaps against your hip with each push and pull against your insides, hissing and groaning behind you the closer he reaches to stumbling over the edge. “You want that mommy? Want me to fuck you so good, make you forget about that huge rock weighing down your finger.”

Jeno doesn’t let you answer, not noticing the way you curl your hand into a fist to tuck away your wedding ring before discarding the cucumber as he rips you off the counter to shove you down to your knees.

“Fuck.” Gripping around his length he strokes quickly, reaching down to pull on one of your nipples and watch the fat perky mound jiggle under his ministrations.

“Gonna cum all over your perfect tits, push them together for me mommy.” Jeno slaps your breast impatiently, balls tight and tensed up between his thighs doing his best to stave off his orgasm from barreling out.

Eyes filled with big watery tears gaze up in a daze, cupping your substantial fat tits together making the perfect little pocket pussy for his cock to slide between. “Oh fuckkk.”

Jeno’s neck drops forward, slamming up between your squished breasts. Teeth grinding together to stop himself from screaming at the visual of your heavy perfect tits bouncing around his size, the tip of his length nearly hitting under your chin with each thrusts up against your chest. “So good mommy, so fucking good!”

Jeno reaches for your jaw, squeezing in roughly and smacking your cheek to pop open your lips. “Just like that, so fucking hot.” It’s everything he’s dreamt about. Nights stuck inside of his dorm room looking up milf porn, step-son breeding step-mom, juicy breasts bouncing on his computer screen that could never compare to how good this feels.

“Fuck, I’m gonna cum.” He cries out, thrusting against your chest harder, forcing the weight of your breasts up and back down into your palms, bouncing deliciously. Slapping your cheek again, digits dig into your cheeks and drop a wad of spit in. Pleased from his high up angle as you stay open and let him watch it glide down to the back of your throat. “Fuck fuck fuck!”

Jeno tugs away, cock slapping down on your parted lips before reaching for the tip to squeeze around and release into your mouth. “Swallow all of it.” He moans out, circling your throat with his other hand to feel himself slide down. “That’s it, so good for me mommy.”

The smug smile he gives you before hoisting you up to sit on the table you share meals with your husband at lets you know this is far from over. “Don’t be rude mommy.” Jeno pouts, pushing space for himself between your thighs. Soft palms stroke up and down almost like a warning. “Say thank you.”

He smirks, sinking down to bury between your thighs and proceed to use his tongue in ways your husband never has.

“Dinner looks great!” Your poor unsuspecting husband sits down right where his son had his meal with you mere hours ago(one that had your back split up in an arch and your eyes meeting the back of your skull), hands clasped together before the plate you serve him.

“Now now,” Jeno chimes in, moving to stand from the dinner table to grab a bowl from the fridge. “I see no greens on that plate, didn’t your doctor warn you about that high cholesterol?”

Your husband eyes his son suspiciously, too focused on the little brat to see the sheer panic running over your face behind his side. “I found this new cucumber salad recipe, I think you’ll really like it dad.”

He smiles, an endearing sweet genuine smile, a smile that could easily make you forget what type of evil menace you’re really dealing with here. “Here, try it out.”

To your absolute horror, Jeno sets down a bowl of seasoned, finely chopped, and wet cucumber before his father, nodding eagerly.

“You put poison in this or something?” He grumbles, stabbing at the slices before shoving a batch into his mouth and chomping with a pleased hum. “Not bad, not bad at all. What’s that flavor?”

His son grins wide, eyes large and full of mirth.

“I knew you’d like it, got a kick to it right?” He blinks up to meet your mortified gaze, biting down on your fingernails as your mind shouts frantically- he wouldn’t!.. he would!.. no, no, HE WOULDN’T.

As if he can read your thoughts, Jeno winks at you, clapping his father on the shoulder. “I guess we have the same taste, daddy.”

“Don’t dare bother to throw any parties while I’m gone.” Jeno’s father glares at him, pointer finger digging between his chest. “No funny business you hear me? You need to show your step-mom some respect.”

Jeno has a hard time hiding a smug smirk, having to bite down on the insides of his cheeks to contain himself. “Oh dad, trust me, I will show her nothing but the utmost respect. You have nothing to worry about.”

His father squints, skepticism crossing his wrinkled features as he takes in his son’s face once more before heading out to bid you a long goodbye filled with lingering wet kisses.

“Right. You know what? These vacation breaks from school really seem unnecessary. Why can’t you be normal and go on trips to different party cities like the rest of the guys your age?” He scoffs, waving him off flippantly, not even a hug? Jeno clutches his chest dramatically, following after to watch the two of you say your goodbyes from the top of the staircase.

“If he bothers you..” Thick calloused fingers hold your chin delicately, nothing like the nimble boney ones that dug into your face just a few days ago and forced your mouth open to spit past your tongue. Jeno doesn’t really care to tune in, more amused than anything by the little act you keep up. Such a cute young sweet house-wife, more dolled up than your usual for a morning session of pilates. The extra effort put into your appearance no doubt for his father’s benefit, a pretty vision for him to leave behind. It’s not as if the 2 minutes it took for him to fuck you this morning wasn’t enough for the old man.

Jeno hums to himself, catching your line of sight before you follow after his dad to say bye from the driveway as he enters his ride to the airport. Maybe that’s fear in your eye, but excitement builds up his chest nonetheless; you’ll have no arms to run to now. Nowhere to hide that he won’t be able to find you, no asshole of a father to whisk you away from him. At least not for the next foreseeable 24 hours.

That’s why he goes back to bed, his father rudely awoke him this morning with a loud cursed groan after climaxing out of breath and falling onto your bed with a loud thud. He’s surprised the old man hasn’t keeled over and died yet trying to get his rocks off with you. Jeno sighs thinking about the past few days as he lays back down and buries his face into his pillow, you really have been doing a great job of avoiding him.

That doesn’t mean he misses the silent glances and hesitant looks, or the stiffness in your spine whenever he so much as passes by. No, he notices everything you do, even how you’ve been locking your bedroom door when taking showers now. It’s cute really, a game more than anything now as he rests his eyes and hums, imagining you’ve come back inside and surveillanced the downstairs area for your big scary step-son, probably sighing in relief that he’s left you alone. For now.

He’ll let you get your lovely perfect morning routine on, build up a nice sweat that gets your heart racing, high off endorphins from stretching and straining your muscles with various exercises. He’d prefer it that way really, and judging from the time— soon, soon you’ll be on your way to the kitchen to refresh with a nice chill glass of electrolytes. What a pleasant easy life his father has granted you, all you have to grant him in return is your body. It’s no wonder you work daily to keep up appearances for the old man.

Jeno’s mother had never cared much to fulfill his father’s porngraphic ideals of how women should look and act, but you, ah he really struck gold with you. He can’t deny that if he had found you first, he would have ate you alive.

“Oh.”

Your step-son’s not surprised to see you exit the newly renovated makeshift room filled with gym equipment(that used to be for his gaming consoles), gently patting your sweat glistened skin off as the door opens and unveils him standing there across from you expectantly.

“Figured you wouldn’t want me to share such a small space with you.” Jeno says, making no effort to disguise his gaze, dragging down from your chest to your hips and stopping between your thighs to moisten his lips. “All sweaty, out of breath, making sounds that could read as inappropriate..”

Tight-lipped, you nod and ignore him before stepping out and motioning inside the gym room. “All yours.”

“Everything?”

Jeno’s arm launches forward before you can take another step, pausing you dead in your tracks against the hallway wall, a less than innocent grin stares back at you. He cocks an eyebrow, following the beads of sweat raining down your forehead at faster speed the closer he inches forward until you’re pressed up against the wall with little room to free yourself.

“You thought I’d make this easy, didn’t you?” He huffs through his nose, bending at his neck to perch his nostrils right above your throat and swallow down the fresh scent of your hard work. “Burned up a real good sweat for daddy?”

“Jeno, can we talk first at least?” You squirm, leaning back as much as you can with feet flat to the ground in an attempt to slither down the wall inconspicuously. “I don’t want your dad to suspect anything, what happened the other day..”

“When you came around my tongue and begged me to fuck you?” He interrupts, pressing his forehead forward to hold yours in place, voice gruff and deep. “Or when daddy enjoyed his meal? Were you scared mommy? Don’t worry, I won’t let him do anything to you.”

“That’s not it, I’m married to your father!” You smack his chest to push yourself free, digging your palms into his muscular pecs without much budge. The contact only riles him up more, releasing a growl and bumping his nose closer to yours. “Please! Jeno, I’m all sweaty and disgusting. Let me take a shower first at least.”

“Why would I let you do that? And ruin all of this for me?” This being the sweat Jeno proceeds to lick from the divet between your collarbone, slurping his way down to your ample breasts squeezed snuggly inside of a tight sports bra. “Fuck, you taste so fucking good.”

Hearing his praise only makes you squeamish, struggling more to shove him away and break free from his biceps bracketed around you. “Please, I smell! Don’t be gross!”

It’s laughable to even ask this of your step-son, especially after having to sit and watch your husband munch away on a phallic shaped vegetable that his son had just used to get you off with.

“I’m gonna need you to shut up mommy,” Jeno scoops the soaked fabric of your bra under your breasts, pushed up higher forming two round mounds perfect for sucking on. “Nothing gross about you, or this.” Teeth bury into the perky fat of your chests, sucking roughly, rough enough to hurt but not leave marks behind.

Jeno can’t stop his hips from rutting forward, grinding his aching thickening cock against your stomach. His basketball shorts don’t do much to conceal how hard he is already, having chubbed up in his room from the thought alone of what he planned to do to you today. He has enough respect for you to leave no signs of bruising behind on your chest, but that doesn’t mean he cares when you cry out to stop again and pull away with your weak nails scratching at the wall.

“You really want me to stop?” He asks, cock dragging up and down from between your pelvis to just above your navel. “Tell me the truth mommy, I know he can’t fuck you the way I can. Know you’re desperate for it, want your sweet little step-son to hang you off his fat 9 inch cock? Come on mommy.” Jeno’s drooling between each word, slathering your chest in spit between his muffled speech and consistently sucking. “Admit it, wanna get fucked so bad.”

“N-no.. please, baby, don’t—“

Jeno’s chest rumbles, groaning loudly as he reaches to pull your bra off, rolling the wet material up for your breasts to bounce out lewdly. The smack of your chest meeting the top of your ribcage and breasts clapping together makes you squeal, quickly shutting your eyes in shame.

“Fuck, so sexy mommy. Don’t hide from me, don’t hide any of this from me.” He squeezes your chest roughly, jutting your nipples out to form perfect taut pacifiers to suck on. Jeno’s tongue works feverishly, sucking and licking at your pert buds until they fully harden to a painful point under the vacuuming pull from his mouth.

Jeno leaves your chest swollen, blood rushed to the skin he’s sucked on viciously. He hums, examining how heavy they weigh down in his palms, gripping and kneading, shoving his face between your cleavage just to hear you squeal and struggle to inch away from him. So damn cute.

“That old assholes really manipulated you well,” he grumbles, licking up the trickles of sweat dripping down from your nape to your shoulders and chest. “Has you thinking this is gross? That you are gross? What the fuck is wrong with him, huh? I should kick his fucking ass.”

“Don’t talk about your dad like that..” you whimper, biting back a moan when he bites and tugs at one of your hard nipples, jiggling your other breast against his face. Even with your mind battling between lust and guilt, you can’t help but to feel bad.

“He doesn’t deserve you.” Jeno whispers, leaning in to plant a firm kiss on your lips to shut you up. “He doesn’t even appreciate you.”

His hand cups between your legs, making your thighs lock around his wrist as he cups your sweat soaked mound. Shorts still wet after your vigorous workout. “Baby, not there, please please.”

“Mommy, I’m not going to tell you to be fucking quiet again.” He grins, licking your lips before sliding down your body to his knees. Jeno peers up, eyes sparkling in a dreamy almost innocent way, like a kid in a candy store. “I’m nothing like him.”

To prove his point, his face drops forward between your legs. The fight you put up to keep him out is useless, overpowered by his much larger stronger size as his arms come to wrap around your thighs and pull you apart allowing for his nose to drag up and down your sweaty slick soaked workout shorts.

“Jeno!” Your neck drops back weakly, eyes rolling shut at the sensation of your step-son pulling the material of your shorts with the suction of his mouth alone. Tonguing and sucking on the fabric to absorb the remnants of sweat that poured down and collected between your thighs. Pulling on his hair serves you no advantage, completely under his control as he grinds your cunt against his face roughly.

The only resolution you find comes from covering your face to hide your moans of pleasure, whimpering into your hands the more he licks between your folds shaped by your thin shorts clinging to your center.

Jeno sounds like a rabid animal down there, devouring his way through the best meal he’s ever had. The first sound of a rip sends your spine to straighten out, reaching back down to pull on his hair. “What are you doing!”

He groans, more turned on by your hands digging into his scalp and pulling roughly. Scooping around your thighs for more leverage, Jeno pulls at your shorts and bites down the seam until they give, ripping enough of a hole for his digits to push through and expand. A growl vibrates against your center as he dives in, teething your thin underwear away to roll his tongue against your clit.

“Oh my Go—“ out of breath you arch against his mouth, head shaking side to side and banging into the wall behind you. “Jeno!”

His tongue hardens and swirls against your clit, stimulating each nerve until your feet kick against his back and your hips jerk forward enough to ride his face. He can hardly breathe between your thighs, unbothered by the lack of air reaching his brain as he strokes your clit in expert motion until your cunt spasms against his mouth. Shouting out with your palm hitting flat against the wall as you release down his chin, entrance rocking along the lower half of his face despite the sensitivity throbbing around your middle.

Jeno laps at his mouth like a thirsty dog, slapping your exposed core before moving to stand and wrap around your waist to ensure you can’t run. Not that you will.

“You ready for it.” Resting your hand on his groin, your step-son rushes you up the stairs, scooping under your thighs to reach your bedroom faster.

“In here?!?” You grimace, head shaking to begin pleading. “Not where we slee—“

“Hush.” Jeno doesn’t give you more of an opportunity to argue, immediately hooking into your shorts and underwear to pull them off, only throwing them aside after stuffing the wet fabric under his nose to get a deep inhale. “God damn.”

As much as he wants to let this moment wash over him, the reality of having his wildest fantasy come true, laid out flat in his prick of a father’s bed, legs spread open showing off the prettiest pussy he’s ever seen; Jeno can’t deny how badly he needs to fuck you before he cums in his pants. He’s never been this turned on before, slapping your thigh as he reaches to turn you over onto your stomach, cunt all shiny and raw from the back, squished between your legs making his head spin even more somehow. There’s no way in fucking hell his dad deserves you, not one bit.

Reaching to shove down his shorts, Jeno pats his pocket for his phone, swiping it out discreetly to hit record and perch the device against one of your pillows; making sure to keep it out of your sight before he adjusts between the backs of your thighs. “I’ll fuck your ass too.” He says with a stroke of his thumb between your buttcheeks. “Gonna need more cucumbers for that though.” He snickers, finding a photo from your honeymoon framed on your bedside table, the side you sleep on of course.

Flipping off his father’s cheesy grin, he reaches over to slam the photo down. This is his moment after all, no one else's.

He’d never let you know how raging hard his dick feels right now, lining up the tip to your waiting hole. Having to roll his tongue back to stop himself from blurting out the amount of times he’s busted a nut into his hand, on his stomach, fuck even the pool jacuzzi jets more than a few times by now. All thanks to his precious step-mom, so carelessly displaying every inch of skin, fueling his perverse brain more than you even realize

“Knew you’d take it so good for me,” it’s better than getting a taste of you, which he didn’t think was possible. The stretch of your cunt expanding around his wide girth, skin pulled over the head of his cock struggling to keep him out and somehow pull him in at the same time.

“Gonna fuck you like you’ve never been fucked before.” Jeno says in a more cocky tone, feeling more confident than ever now with half of his length inching inside of you. Pussy walls trembling around his size, sucking around the fat meat pulsing its way inside. No college slut, no amount of lotion to aid his palm, no graphic image available on a free adult website would ever come close to this.

Fully sheathed inside, he sounds out of breath, listening to your whimpers and moans you try to hide with your bedding tugged between your teeth. He glances at his phone quickly, positioning himself to pull out slowly and fall into a rapid pace, dropping his lower half to yours faster and faster until you’re screaming out. The way you scramble to grab onto something—arms flailing out to grab your bed for purchase only encourages him to fuck you faster. Slapping your ass with each powerful thrust.

“Best dick you’ve ever taken, don’t fucking lie to me.” Jeno demands, delivering another harsh slap to your ass before ramming forward balls deep. The collision of his palm cracks around your bedroom, knocking a loud cry from your chest. You nod rabidly in response, gasping deliriously with each pointed thrust. “Say it! Who fucks you this good!”

“You! You baby! Only you!” His phone’s camera stays angled filming your sides, albeit shaky and hard to capture the complete fucked out devestation that’s taken over your pretty face, it’s enough. Enough for him to get off to later, enough to get his way every single time if he needs to.

“That’s right,” Jeno angles his hips to fuck you full with each heavy land of his lower half, pushing your ass up with every clapping shout of skin on skin sounding out between your bodies. “Only me, only your baby.”

The camera tips over, screen gone black directed at the ceiling only recording the sounds of your moans and broken words between each other, Jeno’s gruff heavy panting breaths. The crash of your bodies rocking your headboard against your bedroom wall in a way he’s never once heard his father achieve.

“I’ll never stop fucking you now.” His bicep locks under your chin, forcing your waist to arch forward almost painfully; just enough to strain your lower back. “You’re mine.”

He follows with a growl, lips pressed up to your cheek, laving at whatever skin he’s able to reach. With another roll of his hips, he comes to a still, the thick muscle of his arm around your neck popping out in flex as his body tightens up and locks around your throat. Biting back a moan, Jeno’s release pours inside of you, hot and thick ropes of cum aimed deep inside of you before pulling out the rest of the way to spill between your ass and thighs. “Fuck!”

He sighs, kissing the top of your head to make sure your eyes have shut before reaching for his phone to record the beautiful mess left on your body. He wants to keep going on about how his dad will never fuck you to the point of nearly passing out, dragging his fingers through the mix of your releases before bringing them to his mouth to suck on.

One taste and Jeno knows he won’t stop fucking you until that ring slips off your finger for good.

“Hope he wasn’t too much to put up with while I was gone.” Your husband wraps around you from behind, chin resting on your shoulder. “Next break I’ll have him go stay with his mother.”

“It’s okay my love, he really doesn’t bother me..”

“Hmm, well he sure bothers me.” He sighs, burying his nose into your hair. “Trying a new shampoo?”

“No…” you hold back from making a face, not having had time to thoroughly clean yourself all squeaky clean thanks to your step-son fucking you through the night.

“Oh..” his nose scrunches, pulling away at the sensation of his phone vibrating against your hip. “God, what the hell can this kid want now?”

It has to be Jeno. As unsuspecting as you can, you shift to peer over your shoulder where your husband stands with his eyebrows twisted together. “Why did he send me a video.”

He presses play, immediately setting off your fight or flight response and mentally mumbling off a thank you for the kitchen counter keeping you steady on your feet. The sound of your moans blast from your husband’s phone accompanied by heavy deep grunts, skin clapping against skin and his phone screen covered by the image of your lower half rippling under the weight of your step-sons brutal unrelenting thrusts.

“What in the—“

“Oh my god!” You shriek, slapping a hand over your mouth to quiet your shock. Another text pops up at the top of the screen not even a minute later.

Jeno- ‘Sorry about that dad, meant to text that to my group chat. My mistake.’

“This fucking kid.” Your husband mutters, continuing to watch the video with squinted eyes. “The time stamp on this is from the other night?”

To your horror, he looks at you with an even more confused expression, swiping the video away before it comes to an end. “Did that little shit have someone over? After I made myself clear—“

“He went out!” You blurt out, nodding and catching yourself with a grip on the counter behind your back. “I didn’t think to mention it, but he went out that night. Don’t know when he came back.”

Your husband nods, glaring back at his phone. “I guess he got that insatiable sex drive from me.” He grins at that, humored by his own intrigue watching the girl his son was hooking up with. “Got my type too.” Leaving out the part about a tight little ass, he leans over to grab yours with a squeeze and plants a kiss on your cheek.

You offer a laugh, forcing it to sound less uncomfortable than you feel. “You should delete that text babe, I don’t like that you could be looking at other girls when I’m right here.”

“Is my sweet angel jealous?” He chuckles, slapping your butt and opening his phone to show you as he deletes the message. “My son could never land himself a woman that comes close to you, believe me. You have nothing to be worried about.” With a kiss to your lips he makes to exit and head to your bedroom to shower, leaving you alone to collapse against the counter and quell down the urge of panic trapped in your chest.

The buzz from your phone halts your breakdown, grasping over the kitchen island for it to see new messages from your step-son.

Jeno- ‘You think daddy may prefer these?’

Attached are different angles, showing off more of the bed you sleep in with your husband every night, catching peeks of your pleasured face. Jeno’s behind you in the thumbnails sharing an equal image of rolled up eyes and lips parted open. You don’t need to hit play to know how obscene each video must be.

Jeno- ‘You’ll be sure to keep your pretty mouth shut if you know what’s good for you, right? I know you’re a smart girl.’

An image of your legs parted open from behind sends next, backside covered in a mess of your step-son’s cum and wet arousal smeared around your thighs.

Jeno- ‘Be good for me mommy.’

BLUR. | N.JM (M)

SYNOPSIS: Waking up to the sunlight blazing onto your face and hungover was one thing. Waking up to the sunlight blazing onto your face, hungover and in a bed that wasn’t your own in nothing but a pair of sweatpants that were obviously not yours, was another and a punishment specifically made for you—your own personal hell.

CONTENT WARNINGS: MINORS DO NOT INTERACT. dub-con, Jaemin’s a freak and a little fucked in the head, afab!reader, (ex)boyfriend’s best friend, sex under the influence of alcohol, protected sex (wrap it before you tap it!), sex-tapes, nudes (but make it artsy), face/throat-fucking, dirty-talk, mild possessiveness, mild obsession, smidge of fluff surprisingly, voyeurism and exhibitionism (kinda?), open-ended.

WORD COUNT: 7.5K

note: first of all, happy birthday to one of my favorite leos, Jaemin 💖 idk how many times i’ve looped the song but i think it was enough for me to come up with a fic inspired by it 💀 originally, this was supposed to be posted sooner but hey! Better late than never! Heed the warnings i beg if you don’t like the sound of this then please, you are absolutely free to click off! Other than that, please enjoy the filth ~

“You’re every single thing that I deserve. Maybe that’s too boring. ‘Cause I might say some thing you’ve never heard. Like I did last night, what a blur.” — Blur by Lolo Zouaï

You

hyuck

oh my fucking god HYUCK

WAKE UP

haechan

ugh woman WHA T

You

HELP

haechan

?? are you dying

wait where did you even go last night?

i didnt see u anywhere after like

well i dont remember

You

home

haechan

.

ok how tf am i gonna help with that

You

but its not MY home

and im pretty sure i slept with whoever took me here

haechan

😟

i’ll be at ur place

“Jesus—the guy try to eat you or something?”

You winced, covering the marks left by whoever fucking psycho thought they were a vampire.

Seriously, was all that really necessary? Leaving obvious bite marks and bruises to the point it looked like an animal attempted to maul you beyond recognition? Anyone with a functioning brain would obviously veto that idea in a heartbeat. Anyone with a modicum of chivalry could have stopped themselves from making your neck look like it did.

You were a contributing member to society and the thought of facing endless questions about your otherwise wild night out, at work of all places, was mortifying enough as it is. You had places to be. You had people to meet. 

One of those ‘people you had to meet’ happened to be Donghyuck. A constant presence in your day-to-day life and was essentially your best friend. Your ride or die. There should be some bias for one another when it comes to this friendship built from finding each other in bathrooms of college parties with either one’s head stuck in the toilet bowl.

You’ve literally seen each other at your worst, but Donghyuck was a Gemini first through and through. You weren’t one to succumb to the belief of stereotypes, yet Donghyuck proudly wore being two-faced like a badge of honor. He was your best friend, but he was also your worst enemy and never would he miss the opportunity in making you squirm underneath the palpable judgment swimming side-by-side with the curiosity alight in his eyes.

“Does it look that bad?” you asked quietly, just as curious, but leaning more towards your own reassurance.

The loud, grating laughter he let spill past his lips was enough to tell you that, yeah, it’s pretty gnarly and the likelihood of you getting some weird looks was at a moderate high.

“All I’m saying is—” he said then cleared his throat, “—is you’re gonna have to like, use half a tube of your best concealer.” he jeered, taking his time to assess the damage with an amused twitch of his lips before picking up the remote.

Case in point.

Although Donghyuck spoke the truth and nothing but the truth, that didn’t stop you from flicking his ear in retaliation as the last thing you wanted to ruin your mood was Donghyuck’s super helpful (read: useless) input. As if he was any better. You couldn’t count the number of times he found himself in ‘sticky’ situations that even the most promiscuous of people would cover their mouths, scandalized at the many many recounts of (questionable) conquests of getting his dick wet as many times as he could.

(That’s not to say you were completely innocent. Your sexual appetite was at a healthy mid to high. Donghyuck was just shameless. You, on the other hand, were not).

The wounded noise from Donghyuck went ignored as you stood up, stretched your arms up high and headed to the kitchen to get something into your empty stomach.

Waking up to the sunlight blazing onto your face and hungover was one thing.

Waking up to the sunlight blazing onto your face, hungover and in a bed that wasn’t your own in nothing but a pair of sweatpants that were obviously not yours, was another and a punishment specifically made for you—your own personal hell. A thing to note was the sweatpants were from a brand that you haven’t even heard of. Ever. Either this guy’s a fashion snob, or he’s filthy fucking rich, though something in you persisted that he was probably the latter.

No. Scratch that. It’s a hundred percent the latter.

You’ve been here before. Sober during those very few times, to be frank, and you desperately wished that you didn’t know who lived in this pretentiously decorated bachelor’s pad.

You thought waking up in a stranger’s bed was bad? Try waking up in your ex-boyfriend’s best friend’s bed with no recollection of what happened last night. Trying to remember was proven useless when the memories were all but blurry, flashing images you couldn’t for the life of you sharpen with the power of your mind—that was still recovering from the hangover—alone.

It really wasn’t the best morning. It was arguably one of the worst.

Seeing one of his cats perched on top of the highest point of the cat tower in the far corner of the bedroom was already a bad omen in and of itself, slanted eyes locked on your every move and she (you had a faint idea that this was one of his girls) even followed you to the bathroom! Which, okay, wasn’t that awful considering she hadn’t meowed or hissed at you in warning (yet).

All the cat did was hop onto the marble counter of Jaemin’s bathroom, sat back primly and watched you get rid of the accumulated grime on your face before going crazy with the array of skincare the man had out in the open. It was really his fault for leaving you unattended.

Speaking of Jaemin, he was nowhere to be found.

There were no signs of him even as you padded into the wide expanse of the living area. No signs of life in the kitchen either aside from the two other cats Jaemin had in his care and strangely enough, they too didn’t seem to be alarmed by your presence. You’ve only been here a few times with your then boyfriend, Jeno. Played with them a little too. Maybe the cats had sharper memories than you gave them credit for.

All of that aside, Jaemin’s absence was a huge relief on your part. Being drunk five margaritas in around him was embarrassing though still salvageable by a brief but genuine apology. Conversing with him was rare, sure, but the few conversations with him were adequate for you to lump him with one of the good ones.

Yet.

Yet.

This—being in your ex-boyfriend’s best friend’s fucking apartment of all places—felt like there was more to what you initially thought could have happened that made you stay the night.

It’s been so long since you’ve last seen your ex, much less Jaemin, as he wasn’t exactly one to go out as often, but your alcohol-addled brain had momentarily lost its grasp on the supposed built-in survival instinct that you let yourself get whisked away by him. 

Possibly let him have his way with you (in your drunken haze) as you thought back to the mild soreness in between your legs.

Whatever the possibilities were, you had no luxury to narrow them down right now. Not when you had bigger problems.

You had to get out of here. Fast.

“Holy shit.”

Was what you heard the very second the grilled cheese and bacon sandwich you planned on sharing was placed on the plate.

At first, you didn’t think much of Donghyuck’s exclamation. Dramatics were his thing and you were used to being subjected to them so often that you barely blinked when Donghyuck followed it up with a sharp gasp. You were just about to write it off as ‘none of your business’—unlike Donghyuck who made sure to make his business everyone else’s—when what he said next made you pause.

“Y/N, you have got to see this.”

Now adding you to the mix got your attention. Picking up the urgent yet intrigued intonation from Donghyuck’s demand was enough to put brunch on the back burner as you rushed back to the small living area. The TV was put on mute. It was the first detail you noticed before pinning your gaze onto your best friend still on the couch and you immediately knew something was wrong with the way his shoulders almost touched his ears from sitting too stiffly.

Donghyuck had your phone in his hand when you sat down beside him which wasn't exactly new to you. He somehow figured out your pass-code (“it was your birth date,” Donghyuck clarified. “It wasn’t that hard to figure out. What do you have against Face ID anyway?”) and you couldn’t find the energy to change it. It wasn't like you had anything to hide. You lived a pretty uneventful life, completely juxtaposing with whatever he had going on at his end, so you didn’t really mind the nosiness.

One look at his face, however, made you reconsider the leniency towards your privacy.

Donghyuck had this innate talent of pissing off people by his many facial expressions alone. He looked like the cat that ate the canary; probably planning on swallowing it down with cream to egg you on further and you just know whatever he had to say—or show in this case—was bound to raise your blood pressure to new heights.

“What,” it was meant to be a question, and the annoyance that managed to creep into the mono-syllable was amusing enough to Donghyuck that the annoying grin grew into almost splitting his face in half.

You rolled your eyes so hard that you wondered why you weren’t stuck staring at your brain from how often you did this at his expense. “Seriously, what?”

Donghyuck silently handed your phone over, still looking like the devil’s incarnate that it was almost an eerie resemblance, yet you still humored him.

You soon found that there was no humor in this situation.

All the budding annoyance had come to a screeching halt the moment your phone found its rightful home in your grasp.

From your abysmal screen-time, you should be used to its lightness, yet the device felt heavier than it should. It was like having the weight of the world in your palms and what’s worse, you could feel your blood running cold in real time as you peered down at the small screen leering right back at you, taunting you.

What greeted you was the opened camera roll that somehow accumulated pictures upon pictures of you stripped down to your most promiscuous state of undress. The sight was daunting to say the least that some crazed part of you thought your phone had become sentient; goading you with each flick of your thumb to scroll through them, further stripping you of your modesty. As if it was a digital flip book of yourself, illustrating you and one of you rare conquests of hunting down warm body to fuck around with.

The sheer amount of them was almost laughable, just imagining the person on the other side of the lens doing their absolute damnedest in making sure no small detail was out of place; that you came out debauched, yet still gorgeous enough to overlook the depravity of their nature.

You weren’t sure if this could be compared to nudes. Not when there were some traces of artistry behind each photo that if you were less than sane, you would have your thanks at the ready for making the vision—whatever it was—come alive with an iPhone camera.

There was a joke begging to be voiced out somewhere. A joke your best friend would immensely appreciate knowing it was centered around you and your bad decisions, however, that thought was quickly forgotten when something else caught your eye.

A video. Videos, you’ve come to find out as you scrolled further. Almost never ending with the amount that it was overwhelming compared to that of the photos lacking depth and movement.

The state of the thumbnails didn’t help ease the heavy feeling in your gut either.

Each and every single one of them could very well belong on the number of porn platforms you were vaguely aware of. They left nothing to the imagination where you could just tell what obscenities you—namely drunk you—were up to despite having no recollection of this ever happening. Just how much alcohol did you let in your system that you blacked out the entire night? This was one of the many mysteries that will continue to haunt you unless you get some clarity soon.

It would be a lie if you said you weren’t the least bit curious of your own drunken thought process (you were still processing what you were seeing, actually) and it was obvious your best friend was just as curious, impatiently so that he snatched your phone back, chose one form the myriad of video clips and pressed play, all under a second or two.

“Dude, what the fuck?” Donghyuck earned an elbow to his side for his haste, but all he did was shush you and moved the phone closer for a better view. As if an almost seven-inch screen could grant a cinematic experience, but you’ll take what you could get.

“There you go.”

And there you go, body locking up the moment the awfully familiar, deep and roughened voice came out of the phone’s speakers.

A simple sentence spoken with a cadence so sluggish that you had to fight hard to remind yourself that he didn’t always sound like he was forcing you to unravel with his words alone. Jaemin just had this peculiar habit of putting half the effort into enunciating his words almost to the point where he sounded lazy and you assumed it was the alcohol that made this habit of his more pronounced than ever.

The alcohol turned him into someone, hell, some otherworldly being that the more you heard him speak, the likelihood of a blood vessel popping due to how wound up you’ve progressively become was at a high. It was downright ridiculous how instantaneous the effect was, and what followed would soon have you internally begging to be smite by God himself.

“It took you three tries to swallow me down without gagging.” Though you couldn’t see him, there was, no doubt, a smile on his face, listening to his delivery alone. All sharp and condescending that you couldn’t help but wince at the immediate reboot of your brain where you could vividly imagine the scrape of his teeth along your throat—specifically the places bruised with the indents; marks of his canines being the most prominent.

At least you got to confirm just who the ‘wild animal’ was behind the damage to your neck, yet you still couldn’t map the exact thought process justifying Jaemin’s carelessness.

“You’re that eager to please, aren’t you?”

Jaemin sounded like he was demanding an immediate answer, but there was just one problem.

He wasn’t going to get anything from you. How can he when his cock restricted you from talking? The most he was going to get was a series of garbled noises, just like the wet squelches from fucking into your mouth.

“Of course you are. I can see why Jeno kept you around for as long as he could.” Jaemin chuckled, moving his hand from where it previously rested on top of your head to cup your jaw. “Feeling full, huh?” and you could hear how smug he was, laughing quietly when all you could do was whine when his fingers tightened their grip on your bulging cheeks, no doubt wanting the wet heat of your mouth to squeeze around his dick tighter, or feel how imposing his size was for the sake of his ego.

“I could barely fit in your mouth a moment ago,” the groan he let out was deep from within his chest, guttural as if he was fighting to keep himself controlled while bullying himself deeper into your willing (?) throat until you gagged around his girth, shaky hands scrambling to find purchase on his thighs as if to keep yourself grounded. “Now here you are, taking it like it’s nothing. Like you were made for this. All you needed was a little push, didn’t you, baby?”

It took real talent to come off as an asshole through voice alone, and Jaemin was nothing short of talented. He really did fit the narrative. It’s always the ones with the (admittedly) pretty faces that have something to hide under the false pretense of pleasantry, and it just so happened that the ‘thing’ Jaemin wanted to keep under wraps was how much of a scheming freak he actually was.

Back then, you were just part of the majority who was ignorant to what lies underneath. Now here you are, experiencing Jaemin’s depraved fantasies first hand.

You should have known. The signs were quite literally there with the way he looked at you all night before you were consumed by the effects of alcohol. Even in the sea of people crowding the club, you‘ve managed to catch the intensity swirling in the darkness of his eyes stuck on you no matter where you ended up.

Jaemin was there. In the corners. In the shadows. Jaemin was everywhere. Watching and waiting to strike.

That thought alone should have been enough to unsettle you right to your very core, yet all it did was raise questions. Tons of them, considering this had been going on before you even got together with your then boyfriend, Jeno. You had thought that perhaps Jaemin had harbored some type of protectiveness over you seeing you got to know him first, but your prior naivety didn’t let you think much on it further. Not when you were swept up by the sweeter than sweet smiles and soon entranced by a pair of eyes that put the winking moon to shame.

Nevertheless Jaemin still kept a watchful eye, bid his time carefully and now that his best friend was out of the picture, perhaps it was the perfect time to strike.

And that he did, leaving the photos and videos behind in his wake.

“Jaemin?” Donghyuck hissed, completely ignoring the obscene noises blasting from your phone on full volume because apparently he wasn’t immersed enough with it half-way up. Where your apartment provided decent acoustics to amplify the sound. “Jaemin Na? Your ex's best friend? That Jaemin?”

You held your face in shame and groaned, trying to make it seem like you weren’t the least bit affected by Jaemin’s own mix of pleasured sounds going hand-in-hand with your muffled desperation. “Say ‘Jaemin’ one more time and I’ll punch you in the throat.” Your face was hot to the touch and you didn’t want to know just what you looked like to Donghyuck.

The memory of last night was faint, yes, but it did overwhelm you all the same to the point where you were starting to tear up from sheer embarrassment.

Donghyuck, ever so keen, caught the sign of distress and composed himself. “You were with Jaemin last night?” He asked, whispering.

“Oh, I don’t know,” you answered, sarcasm weighing heavily on each syllable as you aimed your grimace towards the video still playing (seriously, how long was it?). “Is that just my face deep-faked onto some poor random girl? You tell me.”

His pleased expression twisted at the snark, lips parting to refute you with the same vitriol until a rather loud, impossibly hard to ignore moan tore through the impending tension.

Both of you looked down just in time for Jaemin to pull out of your abused mouth with a wet, disgusting sound and lord, not only did he have an impressive size, his dick was pretty too. Pretty in a way it shouldn’t be, but it’s like Jaemin was solely born to go against what one should expect in men and their anatomy, which wasn’t much to begin with, let’s be real. Guess the universe did have its favorites and what misfortune it was that it had to be you stuck with one of them. Literally.

It was like a sick punishment pushed onto you, being faced with the harsh truth of Jaemin having his reasons backed up and giving him free reign to act and talk like he was the shit. His hands were just as big as everything about him from his stature to his personality. Made it seem like his cock was nothing to gawk at until you—you in the video—shuffled closer, having it stand ramrod straight right in front of your face.

As if the Jaemin in the video heard you, he laughed as he brought the camera closer to his cock and your face in tandem. You could tell he was getting close, the labored breaths and jostling of the footage were obvious signs amidst the borderline frantic strokes.

“Open up, sweetheart,” he grunted, tapping your puffy lips with his cockhead. “and stick your tongue out for me, will you—yeah. That’s good. Perfect. You’re perfect—fuck!” 

Thick ropes of pearly white painted your face as Jaemin let out a loud, drawn-out moan, forcing more out with rough strokes and most of it shooting into your awaiting mouth. You kept your eyes open for the entirety of it in spite of the obscene amount of cum dripping from your cheeks, nose and even an eyebrow. In fact, there was so much of it that even Donghyuck voiced his own astonishment right when you swallowed, only to pry your lips open once more and leave Jaemin to milk himself until the very last drop, not letting any of it go to waste.

It seemed you did good with the forethought, Jaemin making his appreciation known with a soft coo as if he wasn’t spouting filth while you were literally gagging for it.

God, you looked absolutely destroyed.

And eerily enough, sex-tape!Jaemin finished off the thought with a breathy, “you’ve never looked better.”

Inky tear-tracks of your mascara marred what was once the smoothed canvas of your face. You took much care in making sure your makeup was almost flawless and it was a shame that Jaemin thought the complete opposite and decided that smearing your lipstick along your mouth with a gross mix of your spit, tears and his cum was much more entertaining—as if this was all just a sick game to him; a game of how long would it take to strip you off of your dignity by making a mess out of you. Twice.

“Fuck. You look…” Jaemin trailed off as he held you by the jaw, damp skin easily caving underneath his fingertips to keep you in place and took his time to admire his masterpiece. It was deceptively tender, the way he went about tilting your head from side-to-side that just as you thought this was where the humiliation ended, realizing the extent of what you had done last night, the debauched version of you decided to speak.

“How—how do I look?” You slurred. Round, glazed up eyes peering up in earnest and that was all it took for Jaemin to let your phone tumble from his grasp in favor of hauling you up. The footage was all sorts of skewed, but by some odd law of physics involved, it made sure to show how Jaemin went in for a kiss that was all sorts of messy and heated, not minding the fact that he could taste himself with every push of your tongue against his.

He pulled back just for a moment, letting out a breathy chuckle and the last thing you heard before the video saw its end was a hoarse, “beautiful. Gorgeous. Unreal. Mine,” before it stopped and jumped back to show its thumbnail.

You let the both of you marinate in the silence that followed afterwards, with you gathering your wits as your worst half gently placed your phone down onto the coffee table.

“Oh my god.” you settled on saying, completely mortified.

“Oh my god.” Donghyuck repeated, sounding all too gleeful.

It almost looked like Donghyuck was impressed with what happened in the past five minutes when you slowly turned to face each other. “Wow,” he drawled, immediately raising your hackles at the god-awful sight of his self-righteous smirk. “and I thought I was the slut between us two.”

“Oh, you still are,” you bit back, not letting him get the upper-hand. “Three people in one night? I’m surprised your dick’s still attached to you.” or that he didn’t contract an STD for that matter, but small miracles could be given to anyone, you supposed. Even to a menace.

“You know what they say, the ‘s’ in slut stands for ‘safe’!”

“Literally no one has said that.”

“I literally just did.”

You dead-panned. “Get out.”

“You’re so boring,” he whined, getting up to head to the kitchen to probably gobble up the grilled sandwich you had made. “Well,” the muffled continuation said just as much. “maybe not since you fucked your ex-boyfriend’s best friend. Who would have thought you’d let Jaemin hit?”

You whirled around to glower at him, half for eating what was yours and half at his disguised jeering. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Y/N, I’m a dude,” he said slowly, like you were stupid. Maybe you were. “We can tell when a guy is interested.”

“You think Jaemin’s into me?”

Donghyuck’s initial reaction was to arch an eyebrow as he paused mid-chew, again, as if he could not believe you were this slow on the up-take. It was starting to piss you off, honestly, that he knew something you didn’t and was just waiting for you to piece everything together.

“You couldn’t tell?” He only gets an unimpressed stare to get on with it which he shrugged at. “Nevermind, you were too busy making googoo eyes at Jeno to pay attention. That worked at least, ‘cause soon enough, you were hanging off of his arm.”

You huffed, conceding with a roll of your eyes. “Fine. You got me there.”

Donghyuck scoffed, “‘course I do. Seriously though, we thought that you’d end up with Jaemin. He’s usually straight-forward with things like this, but since Jeno was there… well, y’know, bro-code or whatever the fuck.” He took a generous bite from the sandwich before placing it back down on the plate and dusting his hands from the crumbs. “Thing is though, he never really stopped looking at you? I’m sure you know how shameless he is with staring.”

Knew? You’ve caught him staring a handful times in the past and his shamelessness knew no bounds either. Not once did Jaemin appear remotely embarrassed meeting your eyes as he would smile each time, hold the eye contact for longer than what you would deem appropriate before moving his eyes elsewhere, and you knew that in no time, his gaze would be burning holes into your back again.

You’ve grown used to it anyway. It was strange, yes, but Jaemin never really did anything beyond what could make you uncomfortable. Even Jeno laughed it off when it was casually brought up during your past conversations, not really bothered by his best friend’s odd quirk.

“I can’t blame him,” you remembered him saying. “You’re really beautiful. I’d probably consider looking at you as one of my favorite past-times.” and safe to say, you did appreciate the comment, and Jeno definitely appreciated the soul-sucking blowjob you gave him if the strings of praises tangled with the ‘I love you’s’ were anything to go by.

None of that was relayed to Donghyuck though. Your knowledge on the matter wasn’t his business, nor did you think it was that of a big deal. So what if your ex-boyfriend’s best friend liked to keep his eyes on you? That didn’t mean anything. Just like what happened last night didn’t mean anything. It didn't have to mean anything.

It was a one-time thing and you were certain that it’ll take the Earth’s revolution around the sun to see him again. Perhaps never, if you played your cards right.

And watching your own sex-tape (accidental, or not) with Donghyuck won’t happen ever again when you made the mistake of trailing your eyes downwards.

You were very far from impressed, scowling at him. “I can see your dick through your pants, Hyuck. You’re gross.”

He at least had the decency to appear sheepish from you pointing out his body’s reaction. “Oh don’t like you weren’t the least bit turned on from that too.”

You flipped him off with both hands, face burning. 

Donghyuck cackled and then waved you over to finish half of the sandwich.

Clearly, there was something in you that refused to see the bigger picture.

You couldn’t help it. You weren’t exactly one to get swept up in the assumptions made by you or the other people in your life that had their rare times of indulging the delusions that came hand-in-hand with them. And that’s all they were. Harmless assumptions and delusions that would be forgotten by the end of the day. Sooner, if you could help it.

So why were you sitting in the middle of your bed, obsessively scrolling through the videos taken from last night?

Perhaps you could blame it all on the insatiable curiosity that never really left even as Donghyuck said his farewell an hour or so ago.

Jaemin’s motive for filming last night’s drunken rendezvous was still—is still—no doubt, a mystery. Starting from why did he use your phone? It would have made much more sense if he used his. There was the possibility that it might have been his phone and had the forethought of airdropping everything to you for reasons unknown, but with a quick check of the details, nope. It was yours. Jaemin’s phone model was the newest one on the market, while yours was at least two years due for an upgrade, pretty much debunking your theory.

Which landed you in this position, looking through your camera roll for any hints that could shed light on his possible motives. Anyone who would find themselves in this dilemma had every reason to be angry. It was normal to feel outraged going through what you did last night and you could only pray to whatever higher being was up there that no one else knew what went on and if Jaemin had his own duplicates.

But—well. Anger was far from what fueled all this. Confusion more like and it only grew when you skimmed through the videos until one caught your eye.

This time, it was you holding the phone, your grasp being significantly shakier, but Jaemin didn’t mind. Not when he was rather preoccupied with his head stuck in between your quivering thighs, eating you out to his heart’s content. No, really. It was like he made it his life’s mission to give you the best head of your life with the way you were letting out a cacophony of pleasured sounds to which Jaemin looked particularly proud off, evident with the way he was leering at you through the screen.

Jaemin had always come off as intimidating with his looks alone; a soft but angular face with strong eyebrows framing the dark pits of his eyes and a smile full of perfect white teeth so wicked it could even put the devil to shame if he tried harder. It was common to be put-off by his intensity at first. He had always sought out to give off a strong impression, but it wouldn’t be long before he opened up, gracing everyone with the sweet side of him.

And sweet he was, with the way he was looking at you with the mess of saliva and your wetness coating his lips and chin. Even the tip of nose was dripping of it, yet you thought he was absolutely breathtaking that the dazzling smile did nothing but make him so much more.

They say that eyes are the window to the soul. That you can guess what was going through someone’s head if you dare peer into them longer. It was purely for the sake of uncovering answers on your part, but you weren’t sure if that was what you were searching for anymore.

He was doing unspeakable things to you, yes. That much was apparent with his mindless slurping and the pleased moans reverberating when you so much as tugged at his hair, or squeezed his head with your thighs. It’s like he was getting off from you getting off and it was all sorts of filthy when a dollop of his spit caught onto your clit just for the sake of it.

But his eyes were telling the complete opposite of his ministrations. Dark as they were, they held something soft in them. Gentle. Tender—dare you say it, enamored. Completely taken by how you were blatantly using him, rutting against that sinful tongue while simultaneously fucking yourself onto his thick fingers as he did the absolute most to match the desperate pace you were setting to chase your release.

The soft spoken praises fell so easily from his mouth. Slickened lips covering your inner thighs with kisses and gentle, teasing nips as he spoke sweet-nothings that were no less still filthy, yet his eyes still remained the same. Darkened even more with his blown out pupils, but the softness remained swimming in those endless pits of coffee brown sweeter than its bitter aftertaste; warm when Jaemin graced you with a lipped smile.

Even as Jaemin had you face down and ass up, the warm glow in his gaze stayed. Hips slammed into you with reckless abandon that with each push, you hiked higher and higher up his sheets that you had to hold onto his headboard to keep yourself in place. You assumed the phone was placed somewhere on his end table for the clear view, or else you wouldn’t be able to see the warmth light up his face too.

It’s truly a wonder how you were able to witness how easy his emotions took over his features. More so when he took it upon himself to manhandle you on your back, then did you see how easily Jaemin shed that hardass exterior of his.

That didn’t mean he had let up though, oh no. He was still rough with his treatment as you watched his hand come down onto your thigh with a loud smack before pushing at the back of your knees and until your thighs were pressed against your chest to fuck you deeper, harder, now that he raised one leg to get more leverage.

Jaemin graced you with a cruel smirk when you cried out from a pointed jerk of his hips. “Imagine how fucking pissed I was when Jeno snatched you up before I did.” That was news to you and it was more shocking that the man admitted it himself just as you were about to piece things together. “I saw you first. I befriended you first—fuck, I thought I made it obvious that I wanted you.” You could only let out a helpless mewl when he slowed down to scowl at you. “We’re friends, right?”

When you didn’t answer right away, a hand wrapped tightly around your throat. “Answer me, sweetheart. While I’m still nice enough to give you what you want.”

“Yes,” you sobbed, holding onto his wrist and you were exactly sure if drunk you wanted to keep it there or not. “We’re friends.”

Jaemin smiled something mean, “then how come I was the last to know that you chose Jeno over me?”

“I didn’t know—“

“You didn’t know? I’ve—” he cuts himself off with an incredulous laugh. “Right, how silly of me. You were too busy giving Jeno your attention.” Jaemin leaned in closer. “Maybe I should send this to him,” he mused, gesturing towards the phone with his head. “How’s that sound?” And humiliate yourself even further? You would rather die a painless death.

“No! Please no!” You could see yourself struggle, yet Jaemin with his sheer size and strength had no problem in keeping you pinned down.

“Why not? It’s not like you’re together or anything. Will it be that humiliating for you? There’s no reason to be, not when you're this gorgeous. Nothing wrong with being a slut either.”

“I’m—I’m not.”

“Oh yes you are, baby. You let me fuck you, didn’t you? Your ex’s best friend? Showing him all this could make him realize why he wasn’t able to keep you. Jeno didn’t know what you wanted. He didn’t know what you needed either. Me? I could give you both and more.” He sounded so sure about it. Looked sure about it too as he picked up the pace and settled on a brutal rhythm, punching more moans out of you. “All you have to do is just ask for it.”

“You’re fuh—fu—cking crazy,” was all you could say. It seemed you were starting to get light headed with how Jaemin still had a tight grip around your neck. Like a necklace choker that won't ever come off.

“I know I am, sweetheart, but don’t worry. I wasn't being serious. I’d kill anyone who sees you like this,” It was a threat and a promise all molded into one and hearing that strangely made your heart skip a beat. His face was drawn into something serious and darkened when he said, “Jeno included. He had his chance and he fucked all that to hell, but me? I’m not making the same mistake.”

The footage kept on rolling after Jaemin spilled into the condom, just a few seconds after you knocked out-cold from what seemed to be the most intense orgasm you’ve ever had—not that you could remember—in your life. Kept on rolling as he kissed your forehead before getting up to cleanup in the en suite. And rolled, and rolled, and rolled.

You were fully convinced that your one-night stand completely forgot the existence of your phone recording the post-sex ritual happening right before your eyes. It was kind of funny though, like watching a risqué vlog illustrating the proper etiquette when it came to aftercare.

Jaemin did just that, with the same balmy look in his eyes and the inherent tenderness in his actions as he took care of you even in your slumbering state.

He could have done better with dressing you up though, but you could understand that the exhaustion probably crept up at him when he didn’t even question the sweatpants he swiped up from the laundry hamper. Still, he tucked you in and gently kissed your cheek before shuffling over and picking up your phone, only to switch to the front camera, smile and blow a kiss.

With a huff, you fell back onto your bed, ruminating what Jaemin left behind and burning in shame and something else that you wouldn’t want to acknowledge.

It was some sort of confession, wasn’t it? Unconventional definitely, but the idea was there, glaring at you in minute-long clips and you couldn’t really think of your next move. Jaemin was still an enigma for sure and calling him didn’t sound like a good idea. At least at the moment it didn’t. You really had no clue if you should simply wait for him to reach out himself, but that's besides the point.

What you did know was that some part of you thought it was a shame that last night’s memory was still quite the blur. You couldn’t recall how Jaemin made you feel with his touch and you weren’t sure if gratitude should be even considered for him leaving you of last night’s evidence.

This was all too much. Jaemin was too much and you couldn’t think much now when you have plans coming up soon.

And if you came on your fingers twice from simply looking at the unmistaken adoration lifting Jaemin’s face as he had his way with you, then that was between you and God alone.

“Couldn’t we do this some other time?”

Donghyuck clicked his tongue as he pulled out a chair for you. “You know how Giselle is and to be fair, she’s been begging for us to meet up. She mentioned she’s bringing someone with her too.”

“That’s fine.” Probably one of your acquaintances. “But she couldn’t choose another day where I don’t feel and look like shit?”

“Relax. No one in here knows that you’ve been fucked six ways ‘til Sunday last night.”

He said it like he was talking about the weather, all the while scanning the menu nonchalantly as you prayed that no one else heard him. Donghyuck was right though. You did make sure to hide all evidence (mainly the marks on your neck), and the slight limp in your steps and it was such a relief on your part that you haven’t received any odd looks as of yet. If you were to get some concerning looks, it would be because of how fidgety you were. As if you were just waiting for Jaemin to come out and strike. Ugh, perhaps your body did remember some of last night.

“You’re fine, Y/N,” Donghyuck reassured, patting your thigh gently. “What are you gonna get? I’m thinking of steak. We could share each other’s food or something too.”

“Yeah, sounds nice—“

“Y/N! Girl, it’s been so long!”

Both you and Donghyuck looked up just in time to see Giselle quickly making her way over to where you both sat with a dazzling smile.

“Gigi, hi!”

The man beside you rolled his eyes as you rose up and kissed Giselle on the cheek, “I’m here too, y’know.”

She laughed and sat on the seat right across from him. “Yes, yes, hello to you too, Hyuck.” Giselle looked as if she came alone, noticing that no one was trailing behind her.

“I thought you were with someone?” you asked, handing over the menu to her.

She thanked you with a quick smile and got to scanning it. “He’s still parking his car. He insisted I go in first.”

He?

“He?” trust your best friend to voice out exactly what you were thinking. “Who’s he?” You couldn’t remember the last time she brought someone for you to meet. Usually, this was her way of checking whether the person would be worth her time. As all close friends would do. You did the same with Jeno and what a shame you guys didn’t even last that long.

“Some guy I met recently,” Giselle hummed. “He’s nice, I promise.”

The conversation flowed smoothly after that and you decided to order for everybody after Giselle mentioned that her ‘friend’ would most likely get the same thing as Donghyuck. You really couldn’t follow along much—still reeling from everything, really—but it seemed to be a heated discussion from how worked up Donghyuck was slowly becoming at each of Giselle’s rebuttals.

Your attention moved to your phone at that point, looking through your socials while simultaneously reading through the work emails you might have missed.

“Took you long enough, Jaemin.”

You froze.

Jaemin?

From that second, you concluded that you were just hearing things. Maybe you misheard Giselle and that it was some guy that had a similar sounding name to him. He wasn’t the only guy with a given name starting with ‘Jae’, right? Jaemin wasn’t the only Jaemin in the world either.

However, the universe might as well bring your nightmares to life because looking up from your phone, the same Jaemin Na was there. Sitting across from you a polite tilt of his lips.

Though as he looked down, taking a gander at your phone with shining eyes before meeting your gaze head on, the smile grew sharper, sinister and you dread whatever was coming next.

“Guys, this is Jaemin. Jaemin, Donghyuck and Y/N.”

“Oh, we’ve met.” Jaemin leaned forward, resting his cheek on his palm while you swallowed thickly. “It’s nice to see you again, sweetheart.”

“Well,” Donghyuck started, breaking the silence. “It could have gone worse.”

“What’s worse than meeting your one-night stand the very next day?”

“Jaemin telling everyone that he slept with you?”

“You’re useless, actually,” you dead-panned, plopping heavily onto your couch. “Seriously, that was probably the most embarrassing dinner ever. Poor Giselle probably thought that I didn’t want to see her.” Your hands flew to your face to hide, moaning in despair.

To be fair, it wasn’t entirely the worst situation you’ve been in. At least Jaemin was cordial enough to act normal aside from the fact that he still tried to burn holes into your profile when you focused on either Donghyuck or Giselle as you talked over the food. Jaemin didn’t say much either, and spoke when spoken to, yet his presence was so domineering that even pretending that he didn't exist was rather difficult that you just settled on acknowledging him out of politeness.

Never mind the fact that he looked like he wanted to eat you up and swallow you whole right then and there. Then again, that’s how he looked most of the time so it brought comfort that there was a fifty-fifty chance that you were wrong.

Donghyuck gave you a sympathetic pat on the head, “don’t worry about it. You can say sorry to her and she’ll be fine, and it’s not like you’ll be seeing Jaemin any time soon.”

At that moment, your phone chimed and with the whole dinner fiasco, you immediately assumed it was probably Giselle checking up on you. You did act a little weird for everyone’s tastes and you were kind of waiting for her to bring it up so you could explain yourself and express your deepest apologies for acting out-of-character.

See, it wasn't Giselle and you cursed Donghyuck in your head for jinxing it.

Donghyuck took one good look at your face, the corner of his lips tilting downwards in concern. “What'd Giselle say?” 

You shook your head and handed it over to him.

“Oh my god.”

Jaemin Na

hey

can i come over?

:)

Shit.

note: this is dedicated to Aria for being just as insane as me when it comes to Jaemin 🫡

TAGLIST: @jaylaxies @celeste-hoon @en-myworld

young, dumb, and full of.. (l. hs, p. sh, s. jy, p. js)

pairing. female reader x heeseung x sunghoon x jake x jay

genre. what in the hentai is this? AU, I don’t know either, multiple partners, M/F, she works hard for the money, pwop

warnings. cnc(do not read if that makes you uncomfortable. thanks.), explicit smut.. pure filth, profanity, 🎥 and we’re rolling- in public, y/n is a famous pcorn star, hyung line are all pretty terrible, nct side characters, smut warnings under cut. minors DNI.

wc. 8000+

a/n. thank you for 10,000+ followers🩷

smut warnings. it’s porn- literally, it’s supposed to be unrealistic, dom hyung line, chikan(hyung line taking advantage of a sweet little angel on a train, that’s basically it), use of ‘little one/princess/slut/whore/baby’ etc, degradation, groping, fondling, forced handjob, fingering, breast play/torture, mind break, manhandling, spitting, oral, double penetration, anal(going in dry), choking, hair pulling, crying, rough sex, unprotected sex, cum shots galore. enjoy.

—————————

“Pigtails?”

Scrunching your face up, you yawn as you get a look at the minimal makeup on your skin. A little brush of mascara, lipgloss that could appear to be merely chapstick, and a light wash of tint to awaken your tired appearance at this hour.

“Don’t I look a bit..”

“Young?” The stylist behind you cackles, nodding to the call sheet on her vanity. “Did you not read about today’s concept?”

“You know I never bother with looking over those anymore, just do what the boss tells me to do.”

Speaking of- Jaemin shows up right on time with coffee in hand to wake you up for today’s shoot. 

“Drink up, you’re going to need it.” He warns mischievously. 

“Oh great, is it that time of the month already?” Aggressively stirring your iced cold brew to melt together, you reach for the call sheet. “Another gangbang?”

“You know it.” He hums, waving over your appearance. “Anyway can add some fake braces? She’s supposed to be really innocent and virginal.”

“I could but they may not last through deep throating.” The stylist quips, adding ribbons to your pigtails. 

“Who’s working with me today?” 

“New guys.” Jaemin leans against the vanity, nodding toward the entrance. “They should be arriving soon, Johnny hand-picked them himself.”

“New guys for a group scene?” You frown. 

“They’re no amateurs, and they’ve been killing it with the streams.” He lets you know, diverting his attention to the door opening. “Here they come.”

Four new guys, great. These group shoots can be hard enough with your experienced costars, why the fuck would Johnny choose amateurs for this.

“Guys, over here!” Jaemin shouts, motioning for the four confused men to approach. 

Ah the nerves radiating off of them could induce a damn panic attack. Just great. The shortest of the bunch breaks out into a wide smile, dragging his palms down his hips to absorb the sweat that’s collected on them.

“Good to see you again guys,” Jaemin waves, peering over their clothing. “You know, I was going to have you fitted but what you all have on right now could work perfectly for this shoot. If you’re okay with getting a little messy?”

They shrug and nod, taking in what each is wearing. “I would have tried a little more if I had known..” 

“No no this is perfect.” Jaemin snaps, waving over the four. “This is even better than my original idea. The four of you look like hooligans.. menaces to society.”

“Oh that’s great.” The one with the big smile chuckles nervously, heavy Australian adding charm along with the continuous way he bounces on the balls of his feet. “We’re the bad boys in town.”

“That’s right, and the star of the show,” he turns back to face you, proudly framing your face to display a prize. “She’s the good girl, never been kissed, hasn’t ever taken a cock.” Peering over his shoulder, he winks at them. “Which we all know is a fucking lie.”

“Jaemin.” You whine, adjusting the robe that’s been slipping from your shoulders. “So the new boys are here to cause trouble?”

Their ears perk up faster than dogs when a can of food gets cracked open. Four alert eyes widen, throats bobbing up and down. “There’s that look, we have some fans here I see.” Jaemin chides. “You’re all familiar with the legend then.”

“Uhh,” mumbled sounds and a few whispered ‘yeah’s meld between the four, shifting their gazes away. 

“Don’t be shy, you’ll be getting to know each other from the inside out soon.” He winks again, motioning for them to step closer.

“You’re so vulgar.” You sneer, pinching his exposed bicep.

“Are you not the one with a golden dick award for most impressive anal gape sitting on your coffee table?” 

“Right next to my starlet of the year.” You smirk, returning your attention to the four newcomers forcing their nervous smiles to not chatter. 

“Nice to meet you guys, welcome to the team.”

“I’m Jake,” that smooth accent comes out more confidently now, despite the tremble racking down the hand that he holds out for you. “It’s an honor to have this opportunity to film with you.”

“I like him, he’s respectful.” Shaking Jake’s hand, you ignore the ‘for now’ Jaemin whispers. Turning to the next who introduces himself at Jay, more quiet and cold when he bows with his hands clenched behind his back.

“Sunghoon.” A sharp smile follows, bowing his head before taking your hand. “Very excited to work with you.”

The last of the group holds the most intense eye-contact, sleek gaze carrying a silent confidence as he takes your hand and lays a kiss against your knuckles. “My name's Heeseung, really hope we get to work more together in the future.”

“Wow, must be my lucky day.” You flirt calmly, scanning them up and down. “Maybe Johnny knew what he was doing.”

“Yeah, Heeseung here hit 500 million viewers on stream last week.”

“Wow that’s a lot.” You say surprised, taking time to look him up and down. “You must be giving them something worth watching.”

“All of them do really good in the polls too.” Jaemin continues, pulling on a hat that he insists on wearing while filming and directing. “Should be a really good video outcome, I think our audience is ready for some fresh meat. Specifically to watch you get pounded by some new blood.”

“Look up vulgarity sometime.” Rolling your eyes, you lean back in the makeup chair. “Should I get dressed now?”

“Yeah, let’s get this going soon. Don’t want to lose light and have to make it look less authentic.” Whispering to the stylist, he instructs to keep your school uniform a bit unrealistic, slutty. This is porn afterall.

“Boys, come with me. We all have to earn our stripes here unless you’re the one taking cock.” Ordering the new group to follow him to set, you smile and wave them off. The tallest one, Heeseung, pursing his lips at you before heading off.

“He’s trouble.” The stylist says with raised eyebrows.

“You know the rule, no fucking outside of work.” You sigh, moving to the rack of clothes to be fitted. 

“And I know those rules get broken around here.” 

Brushing off that comment, you adjust the plaid skirt hugging your waist tightly, dragging out a pair of white cotton panties. The look is supposed to be innocent of course, even if the skirts far too short to cover up the bottom half of your ass. Leaving the top buttons of your blouse open to show-off cleavage, you pull on knee high socks and loafers. It’s the typical naive sweet innocent school girl look- perfect for this scenario.

“You got a real bus for this?” Entering the set , you fix the backpack straps on your shoulders, walking up to Jaemin. “Talk about budget.”

“We’re big time now, and also it was the cheaper option.” He notes, messing with the camera lens. “Building an entire set would have wasted time.” 

“Alright, what’s the rundown?”

“Right,” he stands up straight, fixing his cap again. “Come here guys.”

The four stand up and huddle together, most trying to avoid looking at you. “Obviously we’re filming a chikan scene, so don’t worry about acting much. I just need you to fuck. We want cock sucking, a lot of groping, cover her mouth.” Motioning to you, he cups your jaw to use you as a prop. “I expect you to cum multiple times too, on her face, tits, ass, panties, make a fucking mess alright?”

Panic fills their faces as they nod along. You’ve become more than used to this after working under Jaemin’s directions for the past year. “I’ll have to intervene once in a while to change your positions for certain shots, we like to get some up close point of view ones. The viewers really love that, but for the most part I want you to do your thing.”

Letting you go, he directs where you’ll start off outside of the bus. “You’ll see her standing alone on the platform looking clueless, headphones on, playing on her phone, completely dumb and oblivious to her surroundings. That’s when you’ll set the plan in motion,” he points at Heeseung, fingers snapping. “You, the big one, you’ll be the ringleader. You’ll see her first, and tell your buddies that this is your conquest today. That’s when you’ll corner her on the bus and start harassing her, threatening her to succumb.”

Sunghoon hides a pout fast when Heeseung gets chosen. “We all get to fuck her right?”

“Of course.” Jaemin assures. “And don’t hesitate to stick it in her ass, use the fuck out of her. I want a lot of footage for this one.”

“If I can’t speak up I’ll pinch you to stop.” You add, knowing they’ve gone over the rules and do’s and don’ts with Johnny before being allowed to participate in one of his productions. 

“Yeah, she’s a pro.” Jaemin, being the proud director he is, flicks your chin. “No one in this industry can take cock like our little princess.”

“Well, when you put it that way, I can accept your vulgarity.” Doing a quick spin on your foot, you bounce excitedly. “I’m ready to go, oh and I’m all prepped too so don’t focus on foreplay too much.”

“We won’t be having a closed set today either, the extras will be coming in just a minute here so try not to focus on them. Concentrate on the scene, I want it to feel really raw and gritty. We’re here to make a depraved masterpiece, got it?”

Heeseung claps his hands, nodding, shooting a thumbs up at the director. “Won’t let you down.”

“Good, because if you do,” Jaemin grins manically, stepping back to get behind the camera. “Those contracts will be altered.”

It must be so nerve wracking to be a male performer entering the adult industry. All you had to do was fuck your boss on camera and you were the companies new starlet by the next week.. but then again, you’re being sold for much more than just your body. It’s all about the face, the moans, the pretty way you cry, how many dicks can be stuffed inside of one of your holes. Even the pigtails currently styled in your hair can make or break a scene. Whereas a man is simply viable for his giant cock- their careers in this world hold more longevity even if their pay hardly compares to yours.

Luckily you’ll never have to experience that, all you have to do is ride cock and look good enough to make horny losers cum off that alone. 

“Let’s get some shots of you first.” Jaemin instructs, filming you walking around with your favorite playlist turned on. Carelessly twirling your hair around your index finger as you walk back and forth in front of the bus doors and place one foot in-front of the other to walk along a painted line. 

“Pose right there, a little concern in the face.” 

Furrowing your eyebrows, you peer over your shoulder as if a group of feral young barbaric men are ready to eat you up when they see you turn and reveal the bare backs of your thighs. White cotton underwear tucked beautifully between your ass. The four onlookers watch you work, already building up a sweat off the way you taunt and tease the camera alone. 

“We’re really doing this.” Jay mutters, stealing a sneaking look at Jake next to him. The other dryly swallows, adjusting his dick to press against his stomach under his belt. 

“I really wanna fuck her.”

Sunghoon says lowly behind his hand, doing his best to ignore the extras that walk onto set. Harder to ignore when he estimates more than 30 men have entered the small area. 

“Let’s do our best, can’t be too different from jerking off on live in front of millions of strangers.” Heeseung encourages his friends, having met them when joining the streaming company a year ago that called for attractive young men desperate to make good and fast money. 

“Hee’s right, this is our big break.” Jake adds, straightening up when Jaemin points at the four of them. 

“Enter from over there and make your way to the platform.” Yelling loudly, he gets everyone on set in order before calling out ACTION! 

It’s time to turn it on, what you’re really known for. Connecting with the camera in a way that allows your fans to feel like they’re the ones getting to fuck you. That’s what they love about you, what keeps them coming back to your videos when they need a quick nut.

It helps that Johnny insists on only hiring attractive men to participate in his videos. Who doesn’t love to watch good looking people fuck? That’s why you made it a priority to audition for his company above any other. 

It’s hard not to get excited when you can feel four sets of eyes watching you, following each and every small step you take waiting for the bus to arrive. Each of them are too good looking in such unique ways. Jake has that eager to please smile, bright eyes that look ready to grant you any wish. Jay with that sharp jawline, straight nose and dark lethal gaze, terrifying how one look from him could scorch your feet to the ground. Sunghoon, clearly the perfect one, not a single minuscule flaw on his gorgeous face, built as if he came straight from a Ken doll manufacturing company(but well equipped with Ken’s missing part).

And Heeseung, the one with looks that could kill. Quickly you lock eyes with him before twisting away and anxiously swallowing. The short memory of his soft lifts grazing your knuckles tingles up your spine, thighs tightly pressing together where you stand recalling the way he peered up at you. That indescribable look behind his eyes that made your gut coil, spiked fear and a rush of arousal all at once. Of course he’d be appointed the main, his energy alone could get you on your knees faster before he could even finish bellowing out the order to do so.

It’s fitting how exhilarated and uneasy you feel, perfect to build up what’s about to happen as soon as you enter this bus. 

The four boys appear on camera looking exactly the way Jaemin envisioned. A group of delinquents decked down from head to toe in baggy clothes, worn hoodies, ripped jeans, bulky shoes covered in scuff marks from running around and eating shit off a skateboard. They look ready to get up to no good, emphasized by the way Heeseung nudges into Sunghoon’s side and nods toward your unaware figure. His chin tipping in to whisper and signal for Jay and Jake to follow their lead. 

From a viewers standpoint, this is the norm. An average after school activity of illegal reckless teenage behavior. Because this is such a busy route at this hour, more than easy to get away with murder in broad daylight amongst a full cart. 

Motioning to his friends, they make their way to get behind you. The headphones in your ears keep you clueless to the scheming taking place only a couple of steps away. Two men barricade your sides as you enter ahead of the rush onto the bus, ushered to the furthest back corner as too many pile in and force their weight to fit in, rather suffer the time squished together than wait longer for another ride. 

Jake and Jay manage to stay by your side despite the pushing and shoving to enter, keeping a close position next to you with their arms reaching up to grab onto the metal bars nearby. Sunghoon speaks silently with one look, shoulder to shoulder with Heeseung where they stand in front of you blocking your view of the rest of the occupants. It’s perfect on screen, a successful trap to leave you with no way to escape. 

The fear written all over your face only amplifies how terrifying all of this is for you. Grasping the straps of your backpack tight enough to leave indentations against the insides of your fingers, nibbling your bottom lip with your gaze trained on the pairs of shoes facing you. Swarmed by the scent of hair gel, cologne, minty mouthwash each time Jake breathes against your ear. It’s torturous to wait for the cart to fill up with each of them taking in your appearance, nodding in approval to each other that you’ll do just fine right now. A birds eye view gets the perfect shot of how small you look surrounded by them, helpless, a little prey counting down the seconds for your predators to pounce.

The shift of the cart has you stumbling forward, cheek crashing against Sunghoon’s chest in front of you. His tongue clicks disapprovingly, shoving your shoulders back to launch you into Jake’s chest who took the opportunity to stand in your place. Further suffocating you between their warm worn down clothing. 

“You should be careful little one.” His accent sounds huskier whispering against your earlobe, hands finding your waist to hold you in place.

“Ah-it’s okay,” you attempt to shimmy away, gripped tighter to not let you budge. 

“Stay your pretty little ass right there.” He says shortly, wrapping an arm around your torso to press you flat against him, his other hand rushing down to bunch the side of your skirt together. “Do you know how dangerous it is for you to be walking around like this by yourself?”

“You’re lucky we ended up on here with you.” Jay’s deep tone speaks quietly from your side, moving close to place his palm under Jake’s arm. “Imagine some of these old motherfuckers had gotten to you first and taken advantage of you.”

“He’s right.” Jake huffs against your ear, lips smoothing down to your earlobe. “Count your lucky stars that it will be us using you however we please instead.”

The same hinted at panic that had been worrying your face implodes, opening your mouth wide to call out for help only for Sunghoon’s palm to slap down and cut you off. “Don’t even fucking think about it.”

The muffled cry for help still manages to make it far enough for the hidden microphones set up around you to catch, something the viewers will really enjoy as your struggle begins. 

Jake squeezes in even closer somehow, breathing right into your ear as he scratches down your upper thigh. “I’m a big fan.” He whispers extra quietly, eyelids low. “Can’t wait to cum inside of you.”

Fuck. It’s a good thing Sunghoon has a grip hard enough to leave fingerprint marks behind over the lower half of your face. Having to wrinkle your eyes shut to stop them from rolling up, you’d moan given the chance. Risking this moment on the clock to admit that only makes the wetness trickling from your cunt rush out faster. Panties completely soaked through before you’ve even been properly touched. 

“I don’t know.” Jay chuckles softly, grazing his palm lower to cup between your clenched thighs. “I think she seriously can’t wait for us to use her.”

“Is that right?” Sunghoon glares at you viscously. “Here I thought we found ourselves a nice innocent little virgin. What type of virgin gets wet from this, huh?” 

“Nah, she’s soaking.” Lifting his hand up between your bodies, Jay shows off how glossy you’ve left his palm, further setting in how humiliated you should feel right now.

“What a darling angel.” Jake remarks, nibbling your earlobe between his plump lips. “Only a virgin could get that wet so easily. We’ve barely started with you.”

Sunghoon’s palm loosens off your mouth, dragging an index finger down the middle of your lips. “If you scream, I’ll make sure you never make another sound again. Got it?” He smiles, charming and handsome, but the sadistic tone he speaks in can hardly go unnoticed. Softly nodding, you whimper when Jake digs his blunt nails into your upper thigh, dragging them up to scratch at the hem of your pantyline. 

“Don’t be so mean,” he laughs raspily. “We can play nice if she cooperates. You’ll be a good girl for us right sweetie?”

Heeseung clears his throat, grabbing onto Sunghoon’s shoulder to tug him closer and whisper something. The same dark observant gaze traces over your face as his lips move, no doubt issuing orders as the leader of the crew. Nodding, Sunghoon reaches for his phone, angling the camera at your face before you can look away. “Let’s see that pretty smile.”

“You heard him.” Jay says annoyed, clutching your jaw to force you to look ahead. The sight of sharp teeth behind the phone twist your gut, wondering if he’ll leave bite marks behind to admire tomorrow when you roll out of bed after no doubt using half of the day to recover. “Give us a smile.”

“So cute baby.” Jake hums, dragging his fingers under your panties. 

“That’s a face I won’t forget anytime soon.” Sunghoon says menacingly, turning the phone around to display the photo. “None of us will.”

The silent threat is meant to keep your tongue hidden, lips trembling as you take in the distraught look on your face. Jake smiling over your shoulder, Jay leaning in with his nose dug into your cheek allowing his sharp jawline to shine. 

“That’s a good girl.” 

“Bet you’re always on time for class, never tardy.” Jake adds onto Jay’s commentary. The three of them throw out more degrading words as Heeseung stands guard with his arms crossed over his chest, stoic expression unwavering. 

“All these books.” Sunghoon grins, spilling your belongings from the backpack they managed to remove from your shoulders along with the embroidered uniform blazer you had on. “Real studious huh? Top of your class and shit.”

“Hope that means you’re a fast learner.”

Jake maneuvers you to face Jay, dipping his hand deeper inside of your underwear to cup your cunt. “Fuck you’re seriously dripping.”

Muffled whimpers escape under Jay’s burning gaze, sandwiched between the two making fast to feel up your body. The undone buttons give easy access to pop the rest free, one ripping off and hitting one of the cameras like a pingpong.

“That’s a money shot.” Jaemin whispers from his chair, chin in hand while focusing on the scene unfolding. Johnny was right, these new guys hardly needed any type of assistance.

“Can’t believe you can even fit these inside of that uniform.” Jay licks at his lips, rolling your flimsy bra down under your breasts to release your naked chest.

“Please don’t—“

“Shut the fuck up.” Sunghoon laughs breathily. “I don’t care how fucking cute you sound begging. Don’t make a God damn scene.”

“Don’t be shy baby.” Jay nearly salivates, slowly ducking forward with his eyes trained on your face. Pleased by the tears that have begun to well up at the rims. “These fat tits deserve to be seen.”

Soft lips wrap around one of your nipples, biting down roughly until it fully hardens. Jay’s mouth switches back and forth between your breasts, pinching and rolling whichever stiffened little bud his mouth can’t occupy. “Fuck you’re shaking so much.” He mumbles, continuing to assault your tits until the soft wrinkled flesh around your nipples swell. The stimulation shooting waves down to your knees until they lock and you fully slump back against Jake.

“Think she’s gonna cum from this alone.” He speaks up from behind you, amazed by the amount of wet arousal filling up his palm. “Fuck, I need to get inside this pussy.”

Biting down on your shoulder, his chest buries against your back to keep you held up. Freeing himself from the confines of his baggy jeans enough to get them just beneath his ass. He drags your ruined panties to one side, bending at his knees to shove his length against your swollen folds. “Holy fuck.” 

“Don’t fuck her without me.” Jay murmurs, mouth too busy leaving teeth marks and bruises on your chest. 

“N-no please!” You shriek as Jake ruts against your cunt, hard cock spreading your chubbed folds open. The glide seamless thanks to the amount of slick pouring from your hole. 

“That’s it.” Sunghoon grits loudly, bringing his palm back over your mouth. “Clearly you can’t listen for shit. You know what that makes you?”

“A bad girl.” Jake moans all too pleased, humping against your backside to fully soak his cock with your juices. The head smashing against the front of your underwear, stretching out the worn down cotton material with each rough push.

“And do you know what happens to bad little whores like you?” Jay kneads your chest, spitting at your breasts until they gleam with saliva. “They get fucked, hard.”

“N-need to fuck her right now.” Jake whines, holding down a hiss by biting down on the back of your neck. 

“Then fuck her already.” Sunghoon growls quietly, grabbing your hand to rub up and down the thick bulge protruding from his sweats. “We don’t have all day.”

“Keep these on.” Jay whispers heavily, yanking on the sides of your underwear until they stretch painfully and cut into your skin, pushing out the fleshy meat to shape the curves of your ass. 

A camera angled beneath your bodies captures everything perfectly, from Jay’s hand sweeping between your thighs to glide Jake’s length between your folds, to the aggressive way he hauls one of your legs up for easier access, visibly digging the tips of his fingers into your sensitive flesh.

“Oh fuckkk,” prodding the tip of his cock inside, Jake’s neck loosens letting out a long-winded groan. Eyes clenched shut as he inches in and Sunghoon maintains fierce eye contact with you, hiding a smile when your tears break and roll down to dampen his hand. 

“Tighter than a fucking virgin.” 

“Is she?” Sunghoon questions, leaning in closer to whisper. “Can’t wait to ruin your tight pretty cunt.”

Gripping onto your wrist harder, he forces your hand up and down over his bulge. The three of them close in on you until you feel like you can no longer breathe without inhaling their musky scents. Sweat mixes with the cologne and body wash clinging to their skin, each of them taking long showers to scrub down clean and smooth before their debut shoot. “The harder you try to put up a fight..” he hisses, unleashing his fully aroused length. “The harder I get.”

“It’s so fucking cute how you keep whining.” Jake agrees, building up a rhythm, hip bones crashing against your ass. “Seriously, I was so nervous.” He speaks extra quietly into your ear, panting short breaths between each word. “But you’re so fucking hot I’m losing my mind.”

The desperation dripping off his tongue causes your knees to buckle, gripping Jay’s chest with your free hand as Sunghoon’s much larger one forces you to wrap around his stiffened girth. Thick heated up flesh swipes back and forth against your palm, jerked forward by Jake’s eager thrust. The whole scene screams delinquent horny young men, as dark the whole scenario is supposed to come across, you can already sense a hit being made. Streams exploding, purchases breaking numbers, the four becoming regulars on future sets that could easily become highly favored by fans.

Hands swarm from your ass to your chest, Jay’s mouth working mercilessly until your breast look pained enough to burst. The nipples ramrod hard, bitten over, skin swollen and puffy around. With an all too pleased gleam passing his gaze, he reaches between your thighs to tease your hardened nub. Using the same effort to raise you onto your toes, digging deep into the cute faux-leather loafer with one leg dangling in the air hooked over his flexed arm. 

“You’re seriously such a whore.” He hisses, expertly grazing your clit between two digits. “Getting off to this, aren’t you?

“Uh-huh—“ you manage to mumble dumbly. Rocked back and forth onto Jake’s fat girth. Sunghoon controlling the way you jerk him off, and Jay torturing your clit into a frenzy. The heat budding from between your thighs rises, coiling from your gut to your sternum, chest caving in. 

“Cut cut!” Jaemin screams out loud abruptly, instructing everyone to stay put. “I need a good shot of this.”

Controlling the camera above your head, he works the crane to get closer. The shot aimed at the dead look behind your eyes, the typical dumb porn slut look. Only yours is special, what you’re most known for. The eye contact you manage to grab the viewer with through the camera, almost as if you’ve caught a peeping Tom. But instead of appearing angry or upset, you welcome them into this fantasy, living out every perverse sensation and need. This is the shot that breaks the third wall, removes any sense of guilt and reminds you that this is just porn and you should absolutely be getting off right now.

“Rolling!” He howls out, focused on the screen that’s zoned in on your sultry lust-filled gaze. The enjoyment behind the corners of you tweaked up lips, the tip of your tongue dragging across your teeth. Neck arched back allowing Sunghoon’s to grip around your throat, his palm starkly large and veiny in contrast to your delicate décolleté. It’s perfect and beautiful on screen, but really the best view for Heeseung.

Watching on this entire time, he could rip out his tongue by now. Suffering the more he waits and waits and waits. Balled up fist hidden inside the sleeves of his hoodie to keep a cool and calm stature. He knows it will be worth the wait after all this anticipation. Johnny had said when they finished all the paperwork and finalized contracts that most likely his first scene would be with you. Standing here now made it all so surreal, washing his mouth with spit the heavier his tongue grows, in disbelief at the display before him.

It’s a new feeling to get hard watching over his friends have their way with a girl he knows they’ve all beat off to numerous times. None too shy to drop links in the group chat to videos they deemed great for a fast stroke sesh, your face often appeared.

The same face fighting back pleasured moans, forcing your forehead to wrinkle together and scrunch your nose in disgust as tears roll down your cheeks. If he even accidentally brushed his dick up against something right now he’s sure he’d spill over and ruin his briefs. 

“Taking cock real good for a virgin aren’t you?” Jay smirks, pushing a finger in alongside Jake to stretch your hole open further. “He looks ready to explode back there.” Wasting no time to add another finger, he jokingly nods to his friend behind you. Tongue lolled out, slobbering over his chin like some starved animal. He thrusts deep, feeding you each inch of his big cock. “I’m going in, cover her mouth good.” He mumbles, chin pointed at Sunghoon.

The taller agrees, dipping his index and middle finger in past your lips. “Hope your mouth’s better than this shit handjob.”

Stretching his digits out as much as he can inside of you, he grunts and pulls out, using the wetness clinging to his skin to coat his cock. “Relax.” He hisses softly, gripping around the middle of his length to force the tip in past your filled hole. The prodding has you kicking off the floor, foot dangling in the air with gurgled yelps emitting around Sunghoon’s fingers. 

The position Jay’s managed to get you in makes the glide less painful, giving your entrance a few jabs before finally popping the tip of his cock inside. Wrinkles dig into the skin around his eyes as he passes along his friend's slippery length. The two releasing deep guttural groans when the tips meet inside of you. 

“Jesus fucking Christ.” Jake moans out raggedly, sounding torn by the grip that blankets around him with Jay’s cock nudged up against his. They move in opposite motions, Jay pulling out whenever Jake thrusts back in, the friction budding against your inner walls pinching at a tense heat in your stomach. Wrapping your lips around the fingers in your mouth to cut off a scream, you suck, hand lazily continued to be dragged by Sunghoon’s grip. His deep breaths resonate from your side, not as desperate as Jake’s blowing into your ear, but loud enough to pick up on.

“G-gonna cum.” Sunghoon says behind pursed lips, stripping your hand off his size to force his cock between you and Jay. “On her panties.”

“God damn.” Jay wouldn’t believe it given any other moment, not being the first time he’s ever fucked with the same girl his friends have. Kissing the backs of his teeth, he slows down to blink the blur away from his eyes and watch as Sunghoon tugs at his cock roughly, white strings shooting out onto your mound and the base of his own length. 

It should be gross to feel his friend’s warm gooey cum drip down to his balls as he bends his knees to throw you up and down on his and Jake’s swollen members, but he can’t deny the way his sack tightens up. Eyes rolling back letting out a howl that would without a doubt grab everyone’s attention on a full train in reality.

“Fuck—I’m cumming, I’m fucking cumming.” Jay groans, deep and rumbled. Wrapping his arms around your shoulders for better leverage to really make these last few sloppy thrusts count. Each aim of his slimy wet cock more frantic than the last, the friction of Jake’s size rubbing along the underside of his making his head spin faster. Between the grip on your waist from behind, you get bounced between the two of them. Hole stretched impossibly wide, ripping at the hair lining Jay’s nape to calm your need to shout.

Their ministrations are ruthless, running after sweet release in tandem, unbothered by the muffled shrieks emitting from beneath Sunghoon’s hand. 

Jake’s garbled uh-uhn-uh’s puffing against your ear twists through your brain, eyes rolled back desperately dying to get out a scream. Another wave of hot pleasure spills as your resistance shatters and you lick at Sunghoon’s palm, finally letting out a high-pitched scream.

“Take it.” Jay growls huskily, pumping his cock in deep despite Jake’s whining. He slams in one more time, shoving his seed deep enough inside to paint your cervix with the mess. 

Slapping at his chest, Jake shoves him away with one hand, fully taking advantage when his length slips out and he has complete free range to go wild inside your pussy. The little pained sounds he’d been letting out turn gruff, belting your waist to drag you up and down his size. The slip and slide on and off his cock even easier with Jay’s load coating him. He pants harshly along the column of your throat, letting out a shattered shout when the first flick of hot tongue laps against the underside of his size.

“Oh shit.” He simpers between grinding teeth. Jay looks up, from between your thighs, tongue dragging aimlessly from your clit to the thick girth burying inside your stretched hole. Sweat and wet slick meld together down his nose, lips dripping with a bit of his own release as he kisses along your pussy folds angrily wrapped around Jake’s cock.

“Shitshit—I’m gonna—c-cum,” he stutters, trembling against your back. The grip on your waist loosening as he topples over. 

“Move.” Sunghoon sounds near demonic, throwing an arm around your waist to snatch you away from the two. Ripping you off Jake’s length too fast, cum pours down your inner thighs, hole rapidly convulsing open. “Shhh, shut the fuck up.”

His reputation of being mouthy on stream precedes him, shoving you down onto your knees roughly between curses. “You wanna get caught acting like a fucking whore?”

“Nuh—no,” you shake, giant watery eyes blinking up pleadingly. Biting down harshly, his jaw twitches, resisting the urge to crumble and drag you back up. No one’s made a proper mess of your pretty face yet, and he’s not one to disappoint.

“Didn’t think so.” Pushing his sweats lower, he strokes his length back to full hardness. Sliding the width down the middle of your face, slapping the meat against your cheek until your mouth pops open. “Gonna fuck your little virgin ass.” He grins, popping the tip in and out between your parted lips. “So you better get me all nice and wet, or it’s going to hurt you real bad baby.” Resting the weight of his cock between your lips, he reaches for your pigtails to pull on. Using them like handlebars to hold onto and feed his cock in and out. Pulling the strands of hair between his digits each time your teeth barely scrape along his size.

Subtly reaching beneath yourself to glide the plug free from your hole, you agree to whatever he keeps spewing on about. Lapping up every inch, spitting out globs of messy saliva with a pained expression as if it disgusts you to do as he says. Half torn by your attraction to each of them and by how immoral and wrong this is all supposed to be.

“Never sucked a dick in your life have you?” He spits, looping under your arms to pull you onto your feet. Pressing the center of your chest against a pole, it’s clear for anyone watching at home in the future now that you can easily be seen by the other train occupants. It’s not as if you’re aiming to win an Oscar for best motion picture, maybe an Adult Video nomination for best gangbang at best.

“Nice and open for me.” He huffs against your ear, all of this being picked up by the microphones hidden around. Jaemin would have their horny fanboying edited out later before final production. “Exactly how I like it.”

The shot of the fat tip of his reddened girth testing your rim would make anyone cum by this point if they haven’t. Despite prepping yourself prior to entering the set, he’s big, as expected based on Johnny’s hiring requirements. The bulbous cockhead burns, splitting past your asshole, gripping onto the back of your waist to further arch your ass out. He hisses the whole way watching with intense burning focus as you suck in every last inch. 

Hiding his face away against your shoulder, he blinks in a rush, chest trembling against your spine. “Fuck, you’re seriously so tight.”

To mess with him, you subtly circle your hips. Eager to see if he’s all talk after cussing you out to shut up over and over again. “Come in, give me that dick. Ruin my hole.”

Sunghoon has to bite down on his lip to not let out the most pathetic moan. Clutching your waist tightly as he draws out to the tip and repeats the same motion. “Keep talking like that..” he mumbles, going in faster with each thrust. “I’ll seriously never let you walk again.”

“Yeah? Then do it.” Bending lower, the sight before him becomes even more obscene. Plaid skirt flipped all the way up. Ruined white cotton panties stretched out to one side. Cock throbbing pink with raging veins burying inside of your ass. 

“Nasty fuck hole.” He growls, slapping your exposed buttcheek. “Fucking whore taking all of it.”

The way you bend completely, ass up in the air for him to use makes his stomach twist. Muscles twitching under his shirt as his hips crash down and your backside ripples upon impact. He can’t pretend that the most revisited window living amongst his incognito tabs isn’t your first on-screen anal. Allegedly the first time you’d ever taken it up the ass, he even has his favorite timestamps memorized for those days he needs to get off in less than 10 minutes. Clasping onto your buttcheeks, he pulls them further apart and slowly sinks in deeper. 

Exactly like that part at 13 minutes and 37 seconds when the camera zoomed in on your obscenely stretched out rim, only better because his dick looks so good buried deep inside of your ass.

“Get up.” He rumbles lowly, arms wrapping over your chest. The sudden impact of his hips slamming against you cutting off your breath. Using one of his arms to circle your head, he traps your neck in a firm chokehold. Ramming his dick in deep, the glide in and out smooth with precum bursting from his tip. The warm heat gripped around him mind boggling, more euphoric because he’s been here in fantasies. He’s fucked this ass in place of his palm, but the real thing could only ruin him forever. 

“Fuckfuck.” Sunghoon grits thinking about it. Bicep flexing large and cutting off your breathing the tighter he coils around your throat. Cock twitching between your ass cheeks as release pours out, most of it dripping out past his size onto the backs of your thighs, landing in loud plopping puddles on the floor. He has to bite down on your jawline to stop himself from fanboying over getting to fuck your ass. In disbelief after months of jerking off to a handful of his favorite go-to videos that you just so happened to star in(not that he watched his collection 50 more times this week alone). The chance to work with you again in the future can’t be ruined by a moment of weakness, no matter how victorious he feels right now.

“You tighten up so good around my cock.” Licking up to your ear, he cups the sides of your ass to squeeze and bury his fingers into the fleshy meat. Drawing out slowly, inch by painful inch gliding out torturously. “Sucked me dry little one.”

“Fuck man, I’m getting hard again.” Jake laughs, eyeing the bulge forming inside of his jeans. 

“Too bad.” Heeseung pushes off one of the poles, arms that had been snuggly crossed on his chest falling to his sides. “Want you all to myself now.” He mostly mouths, making it hard to hear with the message that’s for your ears only. “Come here.”

Pulling your arms to wrap over his shoulders, you strain to grasp onto him, tingling from head to toe with pleasure. The remaining three make more space by creating a wall with their bodies to block any curious eyes, mostly having forgotten that they’re supposed to be acting. 

Rule number one: No kissing on the lips. Ever. Can lead to termination.

He gulps, thumbs swiping over the wet and dry tears on your cheeks. It’s not an outlandish or weird rule, of course not. But he can’t ignore how pouty and inviting your mouth looks right now. Glossy with spit, inflamed from taking Sunghoon’s massive width. 

He really takes a good minute or longer to touch over your stomach, hands snaking underneath your unbuttoned top. Kneading and squeezing at your soft skin, tracing down to your hips to caress over how round and supple your ass feels in his hands, spilling out between his digits. 

There’s nothing to say between the two of you, essentially strangers about to fuck for the first time after taking 3 dicks. You still have to hold back a smile, tucking your chin in when he hauls you closer and squats down to capture your thighs. Exerting more strength than he appears able to and catching you off guard, setting your arms to cling tightly behind his neck. Not many would be bold enough to sink your weight down onto their dick to ride for the first time. The confidence radiating off of him reignites your initial excitement, still heavily trickling wetness. 

As much as he wants to throw you up and down his length with nothing to hold him back, he needs to see the moment his cock pushes inside of you. Gently resting your back against the carts wall, he pulls back just enough to direct the tip of his length between your drenched folds. He’s never seen it so angrily engorged, full of blood, veins visibly beating. But he’s waited long enough for this. Pushing lower, he dips in, slit kissing just past your entrance.

“Oh—“ whispering under his breath, he blinks furiously. Tucking his bottom lip in to bite down on. Cockhead gleaming back at him coated with your wet slick. It’s too good already to feel the heat emitting from your cunt, taut skin sucking around him ready to never let go. 

“Please.” You whine out, face so fucked out with your head rolling against the wall. Tugging at his hair, you softly moan. “Put it in.”

Fuck.

That’s really all it takes to snap his tenacity in half. He slams forward, hips jolting against yours. A vigorous speed breaking out, hammering his cock in deep. Heeseung grunts wildly, keeping the backs of your knees hooked over his biceps for leverage as he fucks into you without abandon. The once impassive unreadable look on his face morphing to an animalistic rabid one. Eyebrows dripping with sweat, eyes large and fierce, lips pulled back tight bringing out a sharp jawline and cheekbones. 

The moans you let out only drive him to fuck into you more violently, filling you with each inch of his thick long cock. He crushes you in, lungs squished by your legs being completely folded. The position allowing him to hit balls deep. The clap of his sack loudly slapping against your gaped asshole, booming off the compacted space around you.

It’s the right angle for the tip to bulge just beneath your navel. Taking a step back from the wall he firmly cups your ass. Fingers digging in hard to keep up his pace, the clapping bounce slapping against his hips and thighs loud, roaring thunderously through the bus. The guys behind him watch on, swallowing to quench their drying throats. It’s so pornographic, the muffled whimpers coming from your mouth buried against Heeseung’s chest. The loud claps of skin meeting skin. The thick wet cock stretching your hole open wide, and the recoil your ass gives with each unrelenting thrust. 

“Yes! Fuck!” He groans out too loud, head tossed back. The muscles lining his arms burning with effort. Each squat clenching his ass. “Such. A. Good. Little. Fucking. Slut.”

Each word gets shouted out with a rough jab of his hips, accompanied by your stinging ass smacking against him. He stills, teeth gritted, face covered with sweat. It’s the hardest release he’s had in a long time, not recalling cumming this hard since edging himself for 3 hours during a lonely thunderstorm. 

The warm release spills out with your slick, having weakly cum at some point mid-thrust. You scrambled to hold on tight, fearful of losing balance and falling the faster he kept going somehow. Only slowing down to press his cock inside of you one more time before pulling out fully. 

It’s a perfect shot to finish off, held over the camera on full display with loads of semen dripping down your inner thighs, pussy lips engorged and wrecked. It’s the climax anyone paying to watch would dream of. To get a close up look at your spread apart legs as Heeseung holds your weight up off the ground with shaking arms. The orgasm still sending shockwaves through his limbs, weakening the last bit of strength he has left.

“AND CUT!” Jaemin’s voice bellows, shoving through the extras that make their way to exit the set. “That was great! You guys did an awesome job.”

Heeseung securely hoists your thighs around his waist, slumping back onto a now emptied seat to catch his breath. “I know uh, aftercare is against the rules..” he mumbles softly by your ear, lightly tracing up your spine. “But is there anything you need me to do?”

“I’ll handle this.” The assistant Jaemin had hired recently, Chenle, rushes over with clean towels and a robe in hand. “You can go off and get cleaned up now.” 

Still half-asleep against his chest you try to nod, in dire need of a hot bath to soak in and soothe your limbs after being stretched out in all kinds of directions. Heeseung does his best to help you get back on your feet and get yours arms inside of the robe, taking one of the towels to clean himself off before gathering his bottoms.

“Was nice to meet you, I really hope we’ll be able to work together again in the future.” Near future he wants to emphasize, maybe even his next shoot if he can be so lucky. A solo scene involving only the two of you ideally. Then he could really impress you..

“I’m sure we will.” You smile sleepily, wrapping an arm around Chenle’s shoulders to hold yourself up. “Real soon.”  —————————

Walking in Traffic [soulmate!mingyu x reader]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA alright, this is a ridiculous, dumb, silly thing that spawned from a weird inside joke, for the utterly marvelous @jeongguxks

Rated M for some smuttiness and language and mean kids. Whoops. Word count 6.4k.

It was any parent’s worst nightmare: their child had found their soulmate at the ripe age of three and a half.

Keep reading

THE BOY IS MINE ꔫ - JJK

synopsis: your big sister has a new boyfriend that you can’t wait to try

parings: jk x sister in law!reader

warnings: infidelity, reader is a heavy bitch, she doesn’t care at all, strained relationships, traumatic sibling rivalry, dom!jk, fat cock!jk, sneaking around, exhibitionism, voyeurism, penetrative sex, oral sex (m. and f. receiving), fingering, rough fucking, multiple positions, reader’s pussy is an OCEAN, all hyewon does is cry, reader is actually evil, jungkook is just as bad, if not worse

genre: smut, oneshot

word count: 5.4k

nothing could have prepared jungkook for the influx of strange events that would take place over the next month. his time starts as it usually does: hyewon, his girlfriend, freaking the fuck out about every interaction he’s had and will have with her family. however, something was different this time. hyewon’s usual dread of embarrassment had shifted into full blown panic and anxiety. he was utterly confused since she had never been this bad. did something happen? he was sure her parents liked him, no? why would they let them date for nearly a year if that was the case?

jungkook had come to know why on the three hour long drive to her parents lake house. after prying he had found out it was you, her baby sister who is supposedly the devil incarnate. “i’m sure this is just a normal sibling rivalry hye, baby, my brother and i are the same way.”

“jungkook,” she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “im telling you it’s not the same.”

she excused it when you were kids, but after a certain point of awareness she knew that this wasn’t a silly little rivalry, you hated her. despite you being younger by three years you had always went out of your way to make sure she was miserable. in your childhood years it started out as lying to your parents about her hitting you, or sneaking gum into her hair, breaking her dolls. these little things progressed to stealing her clothes and ruining her makeup products in middle school. once high school came around whatever she did you had to do it ten times better. clothes, shoes, sports, friends, boys. your parents had just seen it as a cute thing between a younger and older sister. little did your parents know that soon your behaviors turned cold with sinister intent, from ruining her friendships, straining her parental relationship, and fucking every single guy she’s ever bought home.

hyewon grew up with the same speech throughout her middle school and teenage years, even now in her 20s.

“she just admires you.”

“you’re her role model.”

“y/n has it all, have you ever thought that you’re the jealous one?”

bullshit.

your parents also weren’t shy about who was the favorite. although the two of you had done nearly every sport and form of hobby together, your awards were hung the highest, your interests were more funded, and you were taken more seriously. they insisted that it was just in her head for so many years, more like they were being heavily manipulated by you. now finally her boyfriend of 11 months was going go meet you in less than an hour to see for himself how fucked up you were.

the boyfriend that she so desperately has tried to keep away for so long. now her time was up.

hyewon was successful with that aspect for a while since you were dorming hours away at college. she successfully avoided holidays, family dinners, special occasions, all for almost a year. while she did limit how much she posted jungkook, she was never too sure with the extent you would go with things and has kept you blocked and hidden from all things him.

she could have avoided it for longer if this hadn’t been your first summer back from school in years and your parents were adamant on having the entire family together. usually you were able to make an excuse on why jungkook couldn’t come, work, family matters, etc. but everyone was to be at your family lake house for a full month, and that included jungkook.

“hye ill be there, all month. you have nothing to worry about.” he gave her thigh a soft squeeze and flashed his reassuring bunny smile.

“promise?”

“promise.”

jungkook couldn’t be more unaware about what exactly he was promising to. and as he rounded the corner and pulled into the hidden entrance and drove down the dirt road, hyewon grew more anxious and clammy. she felt her heart sink deeper as jungkook pulled into the driveway and parked. once she saw your sunglasses go up she knew she was fucked. skin tight red bikini, slurping on a melting strawberry popsicle, with her boyfriend ogling every curve of your body. she could have shot herself right there.

over the next month hyewon would watch her perfect relationship crumble to dust. if you were going to be trapped here all summer with your insufferable sister the least she could do was share her boyfriend. her first mistake was pulling you aside that night before bed for a talk. you followed her out to the patio and faced her, finally dropping the innocent facade you’re forced to have around others.

“what now hyewon?” you scoffed. “i haven’t seen you in a year and you’re already about to scold me about something?”

you were trying so hard not to laugh at her angry demeanor. “stay away from him. y/n i understand you can’t keep a man but that doesn’t mean you can help yourself to mine.“

you pouted at her, prying her folded arms open and taking her hands in yours. “but hyewonniee~ that’s not fair, we share everything, what would mommy and daddy say to you right now?” you tsked obnoxiously.

she snatched her hands away. “y/n, this isn’t the time to play your sick games. what the fuck don’t you get? i’m not asking you, im fucking telling your twisted ass to leave us alone.”

“come on sis live a little, i promise ill give him back,” she felt like she was going to throw up right into the lake beside you two.

“please y/n…” her voice cracked.

all you could do was give her that fuck ass smile as if you were clueless about every goddamn thing in the world. “i just wanna try him, no need to get fussy.”

that night at dinner she kept a close eye on you whenever you were near him. she allowed the small talk and conversations about his family and work, but was steadily getting annoyed when no one had been asking a single thing about what she’d been up to, obviously not you, not your parents, and not even jungkook, in fact her very far gone boyfriend was looking at you as if you had hung the stars and the moon with your bare hands. he hadn’t taken his eyes off of you as explained your college stories and travels. your sister on the other hand had her head down in her phone, earning a scowl from your parents and a few words from her own boyfriend.

“hyewon,” your father cleared his throat. “don’t you think it’s poor manners to not listen to what your sister has to say? she listens to you.”

“right, sorry.” she mumbled, putting her phone down to pick at her food.

“apologies jungkook, they’ve been this way since they were young. just a little squabble here and there.” your mother leaned over the table a squeezed his hand, to that he replied with a smile.

do little squabbles consist of fucking someone’s boyfriends and sending them the tapes of them doing so?

“trust me i understand, my older brother and i are sworn enemies but he’s my entire world.”

you decided to chimed in too. “hyewonnie doesn’t ever think i have anything interesting to say,” you pouted. “actually enough about me, sis how’s your desk job? still letting that old hag of a boss order you around?”

any normal boyfriend would take his girlfriends defense when a backhanded comment was made. instead jungkook, who was seated in between the both of you, pealed his eyes away from you for once and turned to his girlfriend. he was also waiting for her response to that. all eyes were now turned to her. you have her that knowing smirk, a smirk that knew since your lasting meeting a year ago, she had accomplished absolutely nothing but scoring a hot boyfriend. and even that was going to be ripped away from her shortly.

“i’m working on finding a new job.”

“work harder then hyewon, look at your sister.” ah here we go. your father was about to go on his comparison spiel. “y/n is set to graduate early after studying abroad and even has a job lined up for her after school, meanwhile you’ve been stuck at this little start up company for how long?”

“we love you honey, dearly. but it’s time to start being an adult.” your mom had delivered the final blow. hyewon stood up from her seat, fork clinging against the china plate.

“i need to use the restroom.”

no one tried to stop her, instead everyone fell back into a steady stream of conversation. jungkook however couldn’t even bring himself to have another thought other than you. he couldn’t have made his attraction to you more obvious. you were so fucking pretty, he hasn’t seen a being like you. sweet and delicate tone with hints of seduction. he wanted to feel bad for being more attracted to you than he was to your older sister, but fuck. your hair was pulled back into a neat bun and your dress had just reached below your ass. he tried his hardest to not stare for too long, but when you had suddenly dropped your fork and bent over to go get it he was in for quite the treat that couldn’t be passed up.

when you rose from your chair, slick trails followed behind. you hadn’t been wearing underwear and your pussy had been drooling all over the wooden chairs, leaving you with a pool of pussy juice in your seat. your cheeks burned, knowing his eyes were on you and your pretty pussy. he looked between you and your parents, hoping they weren’t seeing your antics so he could bask in it longer. luckily they were immersed in conversation.

“whoopsies, i’m so clumsy sometimes!” you sat down in your seat again, making sure he heard the wet plop! of your ass on the sticky chair. you flashed him flirty smile, once again starting small talk. “so you’re a personal trainer right?”

“mhm i am, you know anything about it?”

“enlighten me.”

“well it’s-“ his face dropped and went bright red at the feeling of your hands on him. your palm had sprawled out on his thigh, inching dangerously close to his hardening cock. “it’s um- it takes a while to um-“

“something the matter?” yes something was the fucking matter. your acrylic covered hand was now covering the growing tent in his pants. his girlfriends baby sister was palming his dick at the dining room table, in front of your fucking parents. “sounds like an easy job, maybe you could train me too, i’m a fast learner, and i haven’t worked out in ages…” your eyes narrowed, tone getting lower and heavier.

“hey we’re going to start cleaning up, you kiddos finished with your food?” your mom started confiscating the plates and dishes as you worked at jungkooks zipper, desperately wanting to get a look at the huge cock you were groping.

“we’re not kids mom, we’re in our early 20s.”

“oh fine fine, when your sister comes back from her mini temper tantrum tell her i put her food in the fridge if she wants to finish it.” once your parents were gone you could finally cut the small talk and get right to the point, except jungkook had halted your actions, removing your hand and holding it in his while you bit back a grin.

“what the fuck is wrong with you? do you know how much this would hurt your sister?”

“so?”

“so? are you out of your mind?”

you rolled your eyes. “oh now you wanna play moral police after you’ve been eye fucking me the entire night and almost came in your pants from my hand alone?” if he really didn’t want it you were going to back off. you pulled away completely and scooted your chair over.

jungkook leaned in closer, pining you against your chair. “you wanna feel up on my dick? go ahead sweetheart, but not at the same fucking table your parents are eating at. hyewon could walk in any second too, you really wanna risk her seeing this? risk her ending this before i get to ruin you?”

oh. oh.

“you wanna ruin me? your girlfriends little sister? you really don’t care about her do you?” your eyes lit up once again.

jungkook looked around, peering around the corners of the house to make sure it was clear before what he did next. lust was fully taken over, any thoughts of hyewon were gone, and it was only a few hours into knowing your little minx ass but he wanted to be consumed by you. his hand went around your neck, gripping it to the point where your circulation was almost severed. “i just wanna try you baby, see if i chose the wrong sister or not. and anyways, whatever hye doesn’t know won’t hurt her right? now c’mere pretty.”

the stars had aligned in that moment for you. you had jungkook right where you wanted him.

however she did. hyewon knew exactly what would happen once she left the table, it was her way of accepting defeat. as hyewon sobbed in the bathroom she knew her sister and boyfriend were exchanging more than holy words and touches. she knew how quick you worked. when it came to ruining everything she loved and desired you were always quick. luckily she couldn’t witness the vile things happening at that dining room table.

“gosh, this fucking pussy,” he landed a slap to your sopping cunt. poor baby was crying down there for some action, clenching that tight hole around nothing and pushing out more and more thick ropes of slick. “damn baby i knew you wanted this dick, but fucking hell.” he couldn’t believe how soaked you were, he knew he’d slip his cock in with ease, nothing like your sister.

“aw kook, you must be so bored with her if you feel this comfortable with playing in my pussy. look at you throwing a year down the drain.” and you couldn’t be happier about it.

“fucking tell me about it. love my baby to death but a man has needs you know?” he took another glance around before unzipping his pants fully this time and placing your hand over his fat cock once again. “hye never knows what to do with it, but i’m sure a slut like you will.”

he tugged his boxers down and you watched his angry member spring up, slapping against his stomach with a mean, red tip that was throbbing for attention. your mouth gaped open at the sight of the pretty thing. lengthy, girthy, veiny, and in need of a tight little pussy gripping around it. “make it quick and i’ll make sure to take good care of you later sweetheart.” he guided you to your knees, sat back, and enjoyed your mouth. all while hyewon sobbed her heart out a few feet away.

later that night after you were coming back from a late night jog, hyewon was ready in the living room for you. she needed to put her foot down for once. every other time was different, but this was her chance to salvage her relationship. once you stepped in the door she stood, to which you didn’t pay her a second glance. “the hell do you want? you’re stalking me now?”

“if you keep trying your luck with jungkook im telling mom and dad.”

you let out a mocking cackle as you made your way to grab a glass of water. “what are we? fucking five? maybe if you knew how to pleasure your boyfriend we wouldn’t be in this situation,”

her mouth went dry. “what?”

“oops… well cats out the bag. when you decided to go be dramatic and cry in the bathroom as if anyone cared, jungkook was very quick to say how much of a bad fuck you were.” you provoked her farther. you were younger, you were shorter, but still you loomed over her, in every aspect, in every way, of every day of your lives. “you always pick the easy ones. the ones who hate you more specifically.”

“jungkook loves me, something you’ll never experience.” she spat.

you grinned, leaning against the counter nonchalantly before breaking her heart in two. “and he’s gonna love this pussy even more. he already loves one of my holes. ask him about it.” you shot her a wink before leaving for bed.

there was still a month to go and as the weeks progressed she watched his eyes linger more as your clothes got tighter. she watched your touches get lower. she watched your hangouts go from the three of you to just you and her boyfriend. she watched how you two would talk for hours then get silent when she entered a room. she watched you press your ass up against him when squeezing around tight spaces. it was only a matter of time before she was phased out completely, but she still wouldn’t go down without a fight. jungkook was the greatest thing to ever happen to her, he was worth fighting for, she felt it, she knew it.

yet obviously he didn’t see her the same. he couldn’t care less about his relationship more than ever now since you had given him the best head of his life. now every night, just like this one, he was nose deep in your cunt, devouring you. jungkook waited until hyewon was sound asleep before he slipped himself into your room in the late hours of the night. thank goodness she picked the ones who were skilled with their tongue, because this was just the stress reliever you needed,

cumming down her boyfriends throat for the third time tonight.

“f-fffuck!” your back arched upwards from the feeling of his tongue dragging down your slit. he simply pushed you back down, using the weight of his hand to keep you there. “too much, ‘s too much koo!” you pulled at his hair roughly, making him groan deliciously. how the fuck did you taste like this? you were becoming his favorite flavor.

“oh yeah too much?” he took two fingers, plunging them inside of your cunt and watching the disappear deeper with every thrust. “so fucking wet for me doll, look at how you’re drenching my fingers.” he kept his voice low while your screams went wild. part of him even hoped your cries awoke your sister. he was so fucked up for wanting this, wanting her to see how good he fucked her pretty little sister. he wanted her to see how he fucked her sister in every way that he would never fuck her. he was sick as hell.

his fingers rammed against your g spot roughly. your mind fogged up, making your words start to come out in nothing but incoherent babbles. your body went limp from the amount of times he had dragged your nut out of you tonight. “c’mon princess, gimme one more, right on my fingers. be a good girl and cum baby, cum.”

“holy shiiiiii- awh fuck fuck, fuck i’m- jungkookk!” you whined with tears streaming down your face. with one more clench of your hole and a few more angry thrusts of his fingers you were soaking your sheets and his face. once jungkook removed his fingers you released everything he was keeping inside. he dove right back into you nose first to catch all of the creamy slick dripping from your hole. you couldn’t handle overstimulation, trying time and time again to get him away from your pussy before you came again.

“stop, stop stop- fucking hell stop!” trying to push him away was useless, you were starting to realize he did this shit for his own pleasure.

once he decided he was finished his meal he pulled back, looking up at your flustered and tear stained face. he smirked to himself when he saw your needy pussy still clenching around nothing. it took time for your body to shake off the after effects of your orgasm, but he stood by and waited for you to come back to earth. “better get back before your sister wakes up, you good mama?” he sucked your essence off of his fingers, making you lick your lips at the action.

“already? one more hour, please?”

“it’s starting to get harder to say no to you.” he laid between your legs, trying his hardest not to accidentally push against your sensitive clit. you admired him from this view, his soft features and the various piercings that graced his lip and ears. he was so goddamn handsome, you felt bad that he had to settle for your basic sister. “what are you thinking?” he chimed.

“nothing much, just about how glad i am hyewon bought you home, it’s like she just knew you were right for me.” fuck, you were twisted.

“you’re going to get me in so much trouble doll, what will your parents think of me if they find out?”

you shrugged. “they could care less. everyone knows she can’t keep a guy.”

“and i’m guessing that’s due to you?” he smirked.

you tried to fight your smile but it was useless. “i wouldn’t say that. it’s just that every guy reconsiders when they see she has a sister.”

that was exactly what was happening here now. jungkooks brain chemistry was being altered to only think of you, to only want you, and the month wasn’t even over yet. the way he had pulled away would be the reason for hyewon’s nagging every night after bed from now on. she garnered argument after argument every night in bed, trying desperately for jungkook to see where this behavior was wrong. he was too far gone by now, getting defensive when hyewon would state the obvious.

“you’re acting fucking crazy!” jungkook fumbled out of the bed angrily, snatching a pillow and extra blanket to take to the couch. “she’s your sister, do you hear yourself?” he yelled, as if you didn’t just have a face full of his cock for dessert under the dining room table two weeks ago, as if he wasn’t knuckles deep in you the night prior. he knew it was wrong, he knew it was disrespectful to do it while staying in the same house as your parents. but fucking hell.

he felt like needed you more after tasting you once. he felt sick for not even being attracted to his girlfriend anymore. he felt disappointed in himself for letting almost a year go down the drain. but you felt better than anything.

“jungkook she’s trying to steal you from me, she’s- do you not see? has she manipulated you that far already?” hyewon was on the verge of tears, lower limp trembling as she stared back at jungkook. he gave her an annoyed look and sighed, getting ready to pull out manipulative tactics of his own.

“i understand you might envy her, she’s younger, she gets along well with your parents, but when you start making shit up out of jealousy it doesn’t look good hye.” what the fuck could you have done to make him so far gone? what the fuck had you been spewing to him?

“do you fucking hear yourself? you’re defending a bitch you’ve known two weeks!” she was losing her mind, truly. “you’ve been so distant kook, you don’t hold me anymore, you barely kiss me, and it all started when we fucking got here! you told me you be on my side for this trip, mine, not hers.” her voice cracked but he still couldn’t find it in him to care.

“until you sort your hissy fit out, i’ll be on the couch.” he shut the door behind him and she could hear shuffling down the steps growing fainter. her head was pounding from all this nonsense. she hadn’t had one normal day since stepping in this lake house. her family was indifferent to her and now another boyfriend of hers was trying to convince her she was crazy. jungkook did a terrible job however, because once she heard your door creak open in the middle of the night, she knew exactly where you were going.

and she followed.

hyewon crept her way down the stairs, careful not to let anyone hear. she could hear jungkook’s raspy voice and your soft giggles, along with a very smacking noises followed after. even though she has witnessed you ruin her relationships time and time again, nothing could prepare her for what she was about to see. when she rounded the corner her heart dropped to the pit of her stomach. there you were, on all fours in front of her boyfriend, with your pants pulled over your ass, and a big, heavy dick fucking you into the pillow cushions. her boyfriend, the love of her life, fucking you into the pillow cushions.

her hand flew over her mouth and she bit back tears, watching you and jungkook fuck her over in plain sight. it was over. everything she worked to salvage, it was gone. yet she couldn’t peel her eyes away from the sight. from seeing how much more intimate he was with you. she flinched when he smacked your ass harshly. she needed to stop this, but why couldn’t she? hyewon was frozen in place, forced to watch jungkook give himself to you.

“shiiiiitt- pussy squeezing me baby, control that cunt so i don’t cum quick.” he pulled out, pumping your slick up and down his shaft. you wiggled your ass around, smacking it against his pelvis in desperation. you needed your cunt filled again. “calm down mama, fuck.”

“can’tttt,” you dragged. “hmph. fuck me or i’ll do it myself.” you should have never said that. jungkook pulled you back by your hair, his hand gripping your jaw and forcing you to look at him. your back arched in a painful way and your pussy was leaking on he cushions.

“spoiled fucking brat, think i’m obligated to fill your holes? don’t get this twisted.” he removed his hand from around his cock to smack your tits around, mesmerized with how the perky mounds looked. “making me cheat on my girlfriend, making me fall in love with this pussy. all this is your fault, now get down and throw that shit back.” without warning he slid in. the stretch was painfully addicting.

“koo! you’re so fucking big- nnnnghhh shiitt,” once you were used to the stretch you started to move back on him, when he saw your hand moving to circle your clit he yanked it back. he held it behind your back to ensure you didn’t make the same mistake again. of course your bratty ass couldn’t resist pissing him off even more and tried again. now both of your arms were folded behind you with half your face being smothered in the couch.

“you know- hmph-“ he started saying in between strokes. “one thing about your sister? she knows how to listen. trained her well. guess you need the same don’t you?” you nodded with a bright smile on your face that would soon be wiped. hyewon sobbed softly around the corner, listening to the way jungkook carelessly spoke about her. “fuck, you’re perfect. i wanna see you baby c’mere.” you were flipped on your back now, switching from one position to the other.

when you didn’t think it could get any better, jungkook dragged your legs up to his broad shoulders and he was now face to face with you. you shook your head no repeatedly, something that just provoked him more. his big brown eyes narrowed as he slammed himself into you. “ohhhhh-“ you were so fucking done for. he hit your soft spot repeatedly, abusing your mushy walls with his heavy cock. you tried keeping your whines to a minimum but once jungkook saw a certain someone lurking he wanted to hear more.

jungkook had looked up and made direct eye contact with hyewon, unfaltering eyes burning holes into her skull. he picked up his pace, slamming his hips into you and knocking the breath out of you every time. what a dumb bitch was all he could think. did she really expect him not to indulge in her minx of a sister? she trusted him to keep his composure while you were walking around in little to no clothes? pathetic. jungkook kept stroking you mainly because he knew hyewon wouldn’t do a fucking thing. she would sit right there and take it, just how you were taking him. “look princess, got a visitor.”

your head whipped around, seeing your sister trembling. if you were normal this would hurt you just as much, betraying her in such a foul manner. however, you hated her. you’ve hated her ever since you figured you weren’t the only child. you had been ruining her life forever to guarantee she would get the hint and leave the family. that was why you started targeting her boyfriends, if she kept getting them taken then naturally she would stay away. but she didn’t, and now here we were again, you wished you could say you hated to do this, but she needed to learn. after this you were going to guarantee she’d be far from not only you and your parents, but jungkook too.

“hyewonnie!” a squeal sounded from you. jungkook slowed his pace down. “god he’s so good, i’m so fucking glad you found him big sis,” your hands went up and stroked his round cheeks, running your acrylics over his skin. “after he fills me up with some babies we’re gonna get married and have a nice big wedding that you’ll never set foot on.”

blow after blow. you knew how to make her hurt.

“baby…” he panted on top of you. he buried his face in the crook of your neck and pressed kisses to the sweet spot before mumbling into your skin. “no need to be so harsh, i think she gets it love.”

“i fucking hate you both. you’re nothing to me, this entire family is nothing to me.” she finally spoke.

“mhmm, right there koo, so fucking deep-“ your eyes rolled back and you tuned her out, focusing only on the sensual way you were being fucked. “want you to cum in me, fill my cunt up baby, make me a mama.” something feral snapped in jungkook. as his speed picked up his kisses became rougher, biting up and down your shoulders and your neck to mark you. hyewon watched as you two shared such an intimate moment, hating herself for wishing she was you.

“cum with me doll.” that was all it took for you to release all over his cock. plop! plop! plop! was all that could be heard once he emptied his balls inside of you. jungkook struggled to catch his breath. once he pulled out you both watched the waterfall of cum drip from your fucked out hole. he took his cock in his hand and with the tip, pushed it all back inside. “can’t let that get away now can we?”

that had sent hyewon over the edge truly. she stomped up the stairs and barged into her room, starting to repack her suitcase early. yet she was trapped. jungkook was her ride here. she could ask your parents but it was such a long drive back to where she lived. she was stuck here with the both of you for two more weeks. how was she supposed to explain this to her friends, her co workers, everyone who thought jungkook would be her final. this was the icing on the cake that made her despise you. any love she had was far gone now. she sobbed and sobbed while listening to yours and jungkooks shared giggles, hearing him run you a shower and talk the night away.

once jungkook was asleep in your bed, you stood in her door way, basking at how much of a wreck she was. she didn’t need to look up to feel your presence. “what now? what y/n? you’ve done enough and after this consider me gone from all of your lives.”

“you’re so dramatic oh god. you’re acting like i didn’t warn you.” you welcomed yourself into her room. “think i might keep him around, i actually like him. thank you sis.” your hands went over your heart.

she backed up farther onto her bed. “stay away from me you evil fuck.”

“hyewonnie, i told you from the moment i saw him, the boy is mine.”

masterlist

HER | part one.

✧✎ synopsis: wonwoo, a heartbroken and burnt out writer nearing the end of his math degree, wants nothing to do with the seemingly perfect, intimidating girl who has everyone under her thumb. you. unfortunately, his literary talent has got him shoved him between a rock and a hard place when you want to write a book and require his expertise. you two are the furthest from compatible. wonwoo can’t see this going well. at all.

pairing: wonwoo x fem!reader word count: 23.5k genres/tropes: writer!wonwoo, university!au, plug!vernon + boyfriend!mingyu as prominent side characters, SLOWBURN (i am not fucking around this is my slowest burn yet), relationship drama, soul searching, strong angst/hurt (i’m coming for the jugular), comfort, romance, smut, a smoothie of every emotion on earth.

(!) warnings: drug use (weed, coke, ecstasy), wonwoo has anxiety + anxiety attacks + fairly dark thoughts, prescribed medication, gambling, intense language, infidelity, throwing up.

✧✎ a/n: just some quick things i want to make apparent!

the fic is told from wonwoo’s pov, not the reader’s! 

all major timeline events are organized through chronological dates

potentially triggering scenes within the fic are NOT MARKED in advance

the content is already quite mature, so pls heed the warnings!

bolded and italicized text implies characters are conversing in korean, tho it doesn’t happen often!

the fic in its entirety is 140k, so it has been split into 6 parts

everyone's patience and understanding has been endlessly appreciated! you have no idea ;_; i give you all shining stars 🌟

⇢ soundtrack for those curious! ⇢ read at ur own pace! :)

—MARCH 19TH.

“I have a relatively big favour to ask of you.”

 No. Wonwoo didn’t want anything to do with favours.

The fact that Seokmin had actively picked out his presence in the coffee shop like he was some shiny contortion of plastic had actually offended Wonwoo. He came here for two things: to not be bothered, which his friend knew, and to work on the book he was halfway through typing and had been halfway through typing for the past six months. Call it writer’s block, or an inspiration drought, or an absolutely depressing lack of drive—it had been hanging over the writer with an annoying persistence and it seemed that no number of lemony scones or cold coffees were going to make it vanish.

“Uh, Wonwoo?”

“Sorry… what?” He forced his gaze to shift from the blank page on his laptop to Seokmin’s apologetic, softly expressional face, slightly flushed from his time outdoors in the chilled March weather.

“I was just wondering if you’d be up for a favour—a pretty big one—and I know this is your special creativity spot, but she’s been like, breathing down my neck about it and I can’t put it off again.”

“Whose been breathing down your neck?”

At first, Seokmin didn’t say a word, or even make a sound. His lips twitched for a moment, but then he pressed them together and his chest visibly sucked in with a breath. God, Wonwoo hated the suspense and he hated Seokmin for interrupting him when he had been so stupidly close to putting a sentence down that he probably would have back-spaced in frustration a minute later.  

“Y’know…” he trailed off, “Her.”

Her.

No, not her, you.

But most people—if not everyone—referred to you by an alias that had seemed to stick so well the majority believed it actually was your name. When people said her they meant Her, and so in a confusing mess of finger-pointing they really meant you. Come to think of it, Wonwoo had no idea where the nickname even came from or who gave it to you or what it even meant.

And he was perfectly fine with never knowing.

“What?” Wonwoo deadpanned. “What on earth could she want to do with me? She doesn’t even know me.” He slid down in his chair, fingers pulling at his circle-lensed glasses so they tilted uncomfortably across his nose bridge. “Or, is this a joke?”

“Oh—no! Absolutely not!” His friend was insistent on proclaiming, vigorously shaking his head. “I’m being serious.”

“Why don’t I believe you then?”

“Okay, well, if you let me explain everything, it’ll all make sense. I said I know someone who writes really well—”

“Meaning me?”

“Yes, meaning you. And the only reason that was even brought up is because she wants to write a book.”

Wonwoo couldn’t help it. He laughed a very short disbelieving laugh that flashed a transient smile to his face as he readjusted his crooked glasses. You were the last person he would ever envision wanting to write a book. He then navigated the trackpad on his laptop, deciding to close the document simply titled, 01, that harboured the fleet of pages to his own current work in progress.

“Yeah,” Wonwoo disregarded, “sounds like bullshit.”

“I’m telling you the truth!” Seokmin exclaimed, gripping onto the metal back of the café chair like he was squeezing someone’s taunt shoulders. “She won’t tell me about what, okay? Just that she’s been thinking the idea for a while now. It’s not like I didn’t try to get details. But she refused—said the only person who can know is whoever’s going to help her. Look, y’have to understand, she was pestering me about it nonstop. And you’re my only writer friend!”

“Well, you’re about to have none.” He answered, reaching for his coffee cup but stopping it just short of his lips. “How serious is she about this, anyway?” Wonwoo sighed. “Do you know how much fucking time you need to dedicate to writing a book?”

He stomached a slow, somewhat grimacing sip as he tasted the coffee’s coldness, meanwhile Seokmin swallowed heavily, and at last pulled out the chair he’d been white-knuckling to take a seat.

“Yes, I’m aware it takes time. I know that. And she is serious or else I wouldn’t be here, bothering you. She takes everything seriously.” The boy began unbuttoning his sleek black jacket. “Really, who knows what’ll happen? Maybe you’ll meet her once and she’ll decide she can’t stand you, and then you’re off the hook for life.”

“Yeah, well have you ever considered what might happen if I can’t stand her? Are my feelings even being considered? Minutely?”

“Minutely, they are being considered.”

“Liar.”

It wasn’t that Wonwoo disliked you.

In actuality, you scared him more than anything. But to be associated with you was to be drawn into your life and caught like a firefly in a glass jelly jar. The proof was right in front of him—to Wonwoo’s eyes, Seokmin was basically your little mailman that scrambled around in hectic nature to do your bidding, because most tasks apparently weren’t worth the time or effort.

“I can’t believe you’re trying to rope me into this. You know I can hardly write my own shit, right?” Wonwoo said bitterly, wishing it was the opposite, “my mind is a desolate, blank canvas of fuck-all and if she thinks I’m writing it then she needs a reality check.”

“No, no—of course you won’t write it!” Seokmin reassured him with his big, opalescent smile. “Really, you’re just giving tips, maybe guiding her process, helping with the planning… you know, this could be facilitated so much easier if you spoke to Her yourself!”

“So, my nightmare?” Wonwoo huffed, shaking his leg.

In an instant, Seokmin had whipped out his phone, tapping around the screen quickly using his thin pointer finger.

“I’m just going to pull up her schedule. It’s always pretty packed, but more into the summer break, it thins out a little. “

Wonwoo exhaled, staring off into the warm, afternoon sunlight that hailed in through the windows, striking all the shimmering flecks and pieces of dust afloat in the café air. When he breathed in again, he could smell the luxurious coffees brewing in their rich and distinctive notes. It was such a beautiful day—still chilly as the snow outdoors began to thaw—but pleasant nonetheless.

“This is such a fucking waste.”

And Wonwoo spent it being miserable.

“No, it’ll be useful. Trust.” Seokmin chirped.

“You’re trying to dip me in your optimism gloss again.”

His friend smiled affectionately, tilting his head.

“This will be good. You’ve been a hermit since I’ve known you.”

“Yeah,” Wonwoo scoffed, “so you think it’s a good idea to shove me with the person I relate to least on the entire planet?”

“Really? The least? So, what you’re saying is, you relate more to serial killers? Or animal abusers? Or like, literal fasc—”

“Stop.”

“You want to do this. I can see it in your eyes. I’ll set you up.”

A part of Wonwoo knew there might be no wriggling out of the situation, especially with Seokmin sitting across from him, characteristically eager and brightly pushy as always, like a goddamn salesman. For now, it could be easier to let himself get cuffed.

“Can I at least have some time to think it over?”

“Uh… well… the thing is… the thing with that is—”

“You’ve cornered me?”

“I wouldn’t word it like that.”

“… Okay.” Wonwoo removed his glasses, shoved his knuckles tender but deep into his eye sockets, massaging through flashes of white as he came to accept a fate he didn’t know even existed in his astrology. “Just, I don’t know—fuck—schedule me in wherever.”

“Ha! It doesn’t exactly work like that.”

“I really don’t give a damn how it works, Seokmin.”

“Right,” his friend laughed nervously, “I promise that I’ll get back to you pronto. Sorry for the disturbance. And, uh, good luck.”

 “With what part?” Wonwoo grumbled, fixing his spectacles back on to clarify Seokmin’s sympathetic face, the light bouncing off his head of brassy hair like a disco ball. “My incapability to write a goddamn thing or the fact I have to help your perfectionist friend who’s probably going to chew me up and spit me out?”

 “Both parts.” Seokmin grinned. “It can only go up from here.”

Wonwoo had one very distinct memory of you: creative writing with Mr. T. It had been an elective class he took amongst all his compulsory maths, and at the time it was a much appreciated break when Wonwoo grew apathetically bored from looking at matrices and confidence intervals and equations that engulfed the length of his notebook. Professor T was late one day in the fall.

And that’s when Wonwoo remembered you walking in.

There was a sort of sharpness about your presence that pulled everyone’s spines straight. People tended to angle themselves away from you, though they did it subtly, feigning an adjustment in their seat or a plunge into their bookbag for something that wasn’t even there. Wonwoo lacked the words to describe you. To be honest, he most likely could if he put that infinitely expanding lexicon of his to work, but even then, he feared that everything would fall flat.

Some scruffy looking guy had made the mistake of sitting in your seat—someone who probably skipped most lectures and only happened to find himself near Gildan Hall purely by chance.

It was the seat squat in the middle of the small auditorium.

He remembered the hand propped on your hip as you sashayed up to him—you always sashayed places. Wonwoo found it funny, like there were paparazzi stuffed behind potted plants and vending machines waiting to spring out with their blinding flares, just to capture you picking up a half-empty bag of flavourless popcorn.

“Oh no. Oh no no no no no no no.”

“Hm?”

“Excuse me? Yes, hello. You—can you get up please?”

“Up...? Why?”

 “Who are you?”

  “I’m sorry… what’s this about?”

 “Are you a first-year or something? Never bothered going to class until now? All the moshing and beer pong and ending up in some random basement of a friend of a friend of a friend is done so you’re deciding to actually get your money’s worth? Well, let me tell you this—I’ve been showing up to class punctually, and this is my seat. I always sit here. It’s my unofficially-assigned-assigned seat, which seems to be a known fact to everyone in this room except for you. Everyone has one. Everyone knows you’re not supposed to sit in other people’s seats. I don't care who you are. You could be my own mother. You could be my best friend, even. President of the universe. That doesn't make it okay, 'cause it’s a respect thing. It's one of those assumed societal rules and you just fucking kicked dirt all over it.”

Whoever he was, he never came back to another lecture.

Since then, Wonwoo had dually made it his mission to never cross paths with you, look at you, or even so much as huff one single carbon-dioxide filled breath in your general direction, just in case that was some degree of unbeknownst personal law he might violate.

Seokmin had royally screwed it up for him.

What could you possibly want to write a book about, anyway?

—MARCH 26TH.

Wonwoo didn’t know how he was expected to find you in this gigantic mall. As he brushed through the streamlines of people, bumping their shoulders and mumbling the driest, most insincere apologies, he couldn’t stop looking at his phone. Seokmin had given him your number with the instruction that he could find you, here, on a busy Saturday afternoon. So far, Wonwoo had sent you four texts, none prompting a response or the grey-dotted bubble, even. Fuck, why did he agree to this? He couldn’t stop thinking it.

Why did he agree to help you, whom he was beginning to not even like, or want to be aquatinted with, write a book, when he’d been struggling to fill the same page of his own story for months?

Squeezing the phone tighter in his fingers, Wonwoo’s broad shoulder then smacked into someone else while he was busy steeping in his misfortune. It earned him a wildly disgusted look.

“Maybe watch where you’re going," the stranger grumbled, some man with an engrained scowl and big, bewildered eyes.

But Wonwoo ignored him.

He didn’t fucking care, and he was sick of wandering through this mall. It made him feel overstimulated, like his clothes were sticking to his skin differently, like the back of his head was swelling, and like all the smells in his nose were somehow making him warmer.

The stranger just stared at Wonwoo as he walked away.

Ding!

A text, but not from you—Seokmin, instead. Apparently, you were in some clothing store on the second floor. Wonwoo stepped onto the escalator, pressing himself into the barrier to make room for the especially speedy people who couldn’t simply stand and wait. He felt a random touch on the back of his head. Scrunching up the glasses on his nose and turning around, Wonwoo stared at the downward escalator, locking eyes with a pretty dark-haired girl he’d never seen before. She wiggled her fingers at him with a flirtatious smile, the scent of her perfume still lingering. Fresh roses, he thought.

He blinked at her once, twice, then turned back around.

Never in a million years.

It was funny, though.

Once Wonwoo stopped outside the clothing store you were supposedly inside, he felt the myriad of distractions and scents and noises dampen behind him. The irritability he couldn’t shake was slowly transforming into nerves. He’d never met you before, unless half-glances controlled by fear from across the small, basement auditorium that hosted creative writing counted.

Focusing on one breath, and then another, followed by a deep, self-soothing inhale, Wonwoo attempted to convince himself that he was in control, not the emotions quivering at his fingertips.

He cracked his neck and walked in.

After a minute or two of confused isle-pacing, Wonwoo rounded a corner, his eyes immediately fixating on a girl who was picking through a neatly assorted dress rack, her head tilted elegantly and her lipstick glimmering under the sterileness of the lights—you.

He gulped. Just suck it up.

She can’t be that bad. You can’t be that bad.

“Uh, sorry to bother you. I’m Wonwoo. I know we have a mutual friend in Seokmin. Lee Seokmin. He’s in one of your seminar classes or something, and, uh…. anyway. I believe I’m supposed to help you with a book you’re interested in writing… that’s what I was told, at the very least. And… I know we’ve never met but… um… I guess…” he trailed off upon noting your lack of acknowledgement.

Suddenly, he was taking a step back, letting you progress further along the clothing rack, your fingers hopping between each hanger and your eyes scanning their corresponding fabrics.

Wonwoo jerked on the inside with panic. He hated the situation already, though he somehow found the resounding courage, or perhaps, humility, to address you again, even if he’d rather die.

“So, I’m not sure if you—”

“Can you move, please? Over here or something? I want this dress.”

He kept his mouth shut in order to avoid spilling out any obtuse nonsense, instead watching with a nervous, analyzing gaze as you removed the hanger and shook out the purple, wine-coloured fabric, its sparkles rippling when you stroked your hand along it.

“Woah. This is too pretty.”

Wonwoo cleared his throat, unsure if you were speaking to him directly. You already had a bundle of dresses tossed over your arm. Why would you meet up with him when you were clearly busy?

“Hey, what did you say your name was?”

“Me?” He found himself echoing.

“No, the mannequin wearing that hideous plaid mini skirt. Of course I’m talking to you. Should I get you a q-tip or something?”

“No... I don't need a q-tip. It’s Wonwoo.”

“Wonwoo?” You exercised the name slowly on your tongue.

“Yeah.”

“Okay, well, just so you’re aware, it’s 11:35. You were supposed to meet me outside the boutique at 11:30. I can see you’re not very punctual, so that’s noted…” for a moment, you stood back, and the searing line of your gaze judgmentally raked him from top to bottom. “Anyway… you’ll have to assist me with some things now, thanks to your big delay. I got all bored waiting for you, so I decided to do a little self-indulgent shopping."

It could have been wiser to continue biting his tongue, but even Wonwoo, who had practically vowed to avoid you for all eternity  due to his fear, felt compelled to challenge your unorthodox logic.

“Big delay? I don’t mean to be rude, but I did take the bus to get here, and their timing is never right. I feel like five minutes is a reasonable time to wait. Not that I’m saying you’re impatient.”

“Well, here’s the thing…” your back turned to him as you took a few slow steps down the clothing rack, probing between the different, pricy materials for anything exuberant you might have missed. “That is what you said, isn’t it? That I’m impatient? I mean—jeez—why bother dancing around it when you can just say it?”

He watched you face him again, except he was keeping perfectly silent, clutching his hand into an anxious, balled fist.

“Well, I suspect you lack urgency, making you apathetic, so therefore you have no sense of initiative. I’m sure you’re already aware, anyway. I can be slow, too, with certain things. Like, when I’m icing a cake. Or painting my nails. But I don’t walk slow, ever. That’s for unmotivated, pointless people who will probably go nowhere in life.”

“… Pardon?”

“Hold this, please.”

Suddenly, you draped the wine-coloured dress over Wonwoo’s shoulder. And he left it there for a second, still gobsmacked, chest shuddering from the pressure of his pumping heart, and wondered how you were even a real person. Once you began walking elsewhere in the store, Wonwoo questioned a very understandable escape toward the exit, though, for some reason, he snapped from his stupor and quickly paced after you, now folding the dress more straightly over his arm. He realized he was too afraid to surrender.

“I’m supposed to help you write a book,” he stated, feeling his lungs dig deep for air, “Seokmin said you needed help.”

“Okay, I’m tired of holding these two. Here—” you again blanketed the dresses into his arms, “—please keep this olive one in good shape, no crinkles. I have yet to find this colour anywhere else.”

Swinging back around, you began heading toward the change rooms, your uncomfortably tall looking heels clicking with each step. Wonwoo stuttered, and he couldn’t stop doing it—just, absolutely baffled by you and your consuming sense of worth. He didn’t know what to say, he could only follow, producing bits and pieces of sentences that you were either ignoring or genuinely hadn’t heard in comparison to the monologues in your own head.

“At what point will we discuss why I’m here?”

Finally, he spat out something coherent.

You paused, and for a fleeting moment, flicked your very intense eyes up and down in an examination of Wonwoo, who felt like he was being intrusively picked apart under a microscope.

 He swallowed tautly, “I’m just wondering… that’s all.”

You pressed your wallet against the top of his shoulder, guiding him to sit down on the white leather stool placed just outside the fitting rooms. He sat, too, fighting the urge to wipe his clammy palms on his jeans—even worse, the dresses you’d dumped on him.

“Let’s talk after I try these on, ‘kay?”

There was something different about your voice. It fell lower, sweeter, and he shivered with the thought that you had quite possibly just hypnotized him. He looked up at you, nodding his head.

“Good. Everyone calls me Her, by the way.”

“I know.”

He held his breath as you reached out to take a dress, the wine-coloured one, which was more like a dark, nightly amethyst now that Wonwoo was observing the fabric up close. So, what the hell was he supposed to do? Just sit there, twiddling his thumbs and shaking his knee while you busied yourself with fitting into all those wildly sumptuous dresses? There was a plethora of other things he’d rather be doing—too many to name, in fact. But he wasn’t going to bother slithering away now, chiefly because you petrified him too much and he wasn’t in the mood to be further guilt-tripped by Seokmin.  

Throwing his head back, he blew out a tired huff and looked at the ceiling. Why the fuck was he doing this? He just couldn’t stop thinking it. What on earth could he possibly gain from being terrorized by your weird authority.

“Hey, I’ve been there, for sure.”

Wonwoo noticed an older man waltzing past him, probably in his early thirties or so, who’d spoken in a sympathetic tone. He seemed very polished and clean-cut, made apparent by his sleek suit, and as a university student who was routinely on the verge of going broke after most rents, Wonwoo knew money when he saw it.

“Pardon?”

The man stopped and smiled.

“Waiting for your girlfriend, aren’t you?”

“Oh, no. I’m just—”

He was interrupted by the squeak of the change room door.

“Be honest. How does this look?”

You had stepped out to examine your silhouette in the large, full-body mirrors against the wall, taking advantage of the heavier lighting to scrutinize every divot and ruffle that textured the amethyst dress. Wonwoo wasn’t sure what to say in the moment, and the man he was explaining himself to had wandered off into another aisle to answer a phone call. He watched your fingers pick and pull at the material so it could be readjusted in certain places, your bottom lip pursed as you angled your hips and tensed a leg to make a pose.

There were at least three other dresses strewn in his lap, and you were most definitely going to make him sit there and judge each one. Now, he could be honest. The dress was glittery yet sophisticated, something like a gloaming, purple-stained sky and its first emergent stars encapsulated into fabric, though he wasn’t completely sold on it. But he also wanted to leave the mall as quick as time would allow, so rather than being verbose, he shaved it down.

“It’s pretty, not great. I don’t really know.”

“Hmm…” you mumbled, keeping your eyes fixated on the mirror, “not great? What’s not great about it? The frilly parts?”

“Yeah, the frilly parts.”

God, he wanted to go home so bad. Warm tea would be nice right now. There were crinkle-cut fries in his freezer.

“Ugh, but I love the colour. I’m getting conflicted. Maybe I’ll toss it aside and think about it again later. Yeah, I’ll do that... okay, let me get the white one next. It’s a little short but I can make it work.”

 Wonwoo carefully pulled out the white outfit from the bottom of the pile and handed it off to you. The skirt was notably cropped.

Again, you strode back into the change room and softly clicked the door shut behind you. Wonwoo pulled out his phone almost immediately, navigating to his texts with Seokmin. His thumbs blasted against the screen, tapping out literary warfare that expanded into a decent sized paragraph Seokmin would most likely respond to with an apologetic smiley face. It might take a day or two for Wonwoo to cool off, but he always forgave him. Mr. Sunshine.

When he heard the door rattle, Wonwoo quickly hid his phone back in his pants pocket; however, he severely regretted that decision because holy fuck—that vinyl white skirt was indeed short and tight and the winding, crossed straps of the top were just maintaining your cleavage. He needed something to help avert his eyes because Wonwoo felt them itch with the urge to stare at your body despite how uncomfortable he was. The floor tiles—count the floor tiles, or count the lights—something, anything to distract his brain.

“Okay, this is like—if I bend over, I’m flashing someone.”

He prayed you wouldn’t ask him his thoughts.

“But like—okay, I can make this work, right? This has potential. If I stand really straight, and proper, and, just… pull this down a bit here—okay, fuck, that was too much. Don’t look for a second… don’t look…. don’t look… m’kay, fixed it.”

Wonwoo wanted to cradle his head in his hands. And, right when he swore that the situation couldn’t sink much lower, the wealthy, black-suit man returned from his phone call. He paused the second he saw you in the mirror, watching intensely as you fiddled with the vinyl and attempted to adjust the x-shaped top a little higher over your cleavage. Except he wasn’t exactly modest about his gaze. It was drinking you in like some sort of insatiable alcohol.

“This is tough,” you huffed, pressing your hands against your chest, “the top is super sexy. I love how open the back is. But it’s such little fabric considering the price. It sucks that I look so hot in it.”

Horrendously, Wonwoo noticed a jewel bracelet slip off your wrist onto the tiled floor. Even more horrendously, he watched in the tensest position possible as you began to bend over and grab it.

No. No, no, no, no way.

The last two dresses spilled in a silk and cotton heap off his lap, nearly tripping him during his rush toward you. He managed to cover your backside in the most heart-hammering nick of time, his hands accidentally brushing in static sparks against yours to help you pull the tight fabric back down your hips. Knowing the man was still watching in the mirror, Wonwoo clasped onto your arm and dragged you back toward the fitting room, his cheeks turned to rubies.

“Fuck, you need to be more careful,” he rasped, “the skirt is too short for you to bending over like that, alright?”

“I’m not leaving a gifted two-hundred-dollar bracelet on the fucking ground. Should I have just kicked it into the change room?”

“Gosh…” Wonwoo rubbed along his neck with tire and lowered his voice. “Bending over in a skirt that short, especially when there’s a fucking weirdo watching you, is not the best procedure.”

“So, it’s my fault he’s a creep?”

“Okay—that wasn’t what I—um—”

“Do you even like this outfit?” You deadpanned.

Wonwoo chuckled in disbelief, “I’m not answering that.”

“This is useless." Your eyes agitatedly rolled. “I’m changing.”

“Great, whatever. Do that.”

He gently pushed you further into the change room and closed the door with a smooth, loud shutter. His heart was still racing.

“Yeah, I wouldn’t let my girlfriend wear that either.”

“She’s not my girlfriend.” Wonwoo didn’t care that his tone was snappish and clearly tired as he collapsed back onto the stool, making a point to ignore the perverted bastard until he left.

“Wonwoo!” You called his name after a few minutes of silence from the fitting room, “please bring me the green one!”

He wanted to utterly vanish, have the building collapse and crush him in a pile of dust plumes and rubble. Sliding the dress through the small gap in the changeroom door, Wonwoo found himself pausing.

“Why don’t I just hand all these to you?”

“Because, I’m using the hangers in here for my clothes.”

“Why can’t you just pu—”

“Thank you!”

Impatiently, you nabbed the dress and shut the door.

However, that dress was the last one you tried on, and Wonwoo couldn’t have been any more relieved. Talking to you seemed like it might give him heartburn or a hemorrhage.

He thought the shiny colour of olive green suited you best.

The dress was silken and long, slightly form-fitting, with a slit cut far up the right thigh and thin spaghetti straps at the shoulders.

You picked the first three dresses to take home, and left the last shimmery one on the rack.

“We’re leaving now?” Wonwoo asked, cracking his fingers.

“Yes, after I pay. Don’t seem so eager.”

“With all due respect, this place isn't really my scene.”

“Your attitude isn't really my scene.” You swiftly corrected him.

He stood next to you at the counter, observing as you zipped open your small black wallet to pull out a credit card. If you were shopping at a store like this, you must be making bank. But Wonwoo was somewhat nosey, and when you set the card on the countertop, he glanced at its embossed name. It definitely wasn’t your name.

Kim Mingyu.

It was your boyfriend’s.

[ Wonwoo | 1:15 pm ]: Goddammit Seokmin answer me

[ Wonwoo | 1:15 pm]: I’ve sent you at least ten texts

[ Wonwoo | 1:16 pm ]: Truly how do you do anything with this girl? I feel like she’s somewhat psychotic and you just fucking had to flash your sad mopey eyes at me in that café so I would break and help her write her book. I’m sitting here with dresses in my lap, pretty much acting as her unpaid personal assistant. Why the fuck is she asking me about dresses, anyway? Did you help her orchestrate this bullshit? I’m actually pissed at you. I want an entire paid lunch.

He wasn’t all that surprised you made him carry the matte silver shopping bag (with these twine handles that he absolutely hated because of how they suffocated around his fingers), and by a certain point, Wonwoo just didn’t give a damn any more. What little social battery he’d maintained since leaving his apartment had officially depleted, for he could feel it weighing in the plaza air around him like an imperceptible mist. Unfortunately, you weren’t lying about being a fast walker. He’d never seen someone stalk with such vigor.

It was nearly an endurance test to keep at your swaying hip, and the few times he fell behind, you would pause and beckon for him.

But Wonwoo discovered that even you needed to stop, to eat and drink like a normal human rather than the disguised cyborg he fleetingly speculated you were. Your touch was so abrupt—a hand had curled around his bicep and suddenly Wonwoo found himself being jerked into a café on the bottom floor of the mall. Of course, you had to pick the most expensive place to buy food in the entire fucking vicinity, and since Wonwoo was penny pinching at the moment, he opted to stand back and let you order.

But then he saw you flick open your wallet, waving Mingyu’s sleek yet flashy credit card between your fingers with blatant enticement.

“I can pay for you.”

He shook his head, muttering a careless, “no thanks.”

“Don't BS me. What do you want to eat?”

Wonwoo couldn’t stop staring at the credit card.

“What’s the limit on that thing?”

“Enough.”

“You haven’t burned through it already?”

“These openly snide comments you’re making aren’t appreciated, you know. Now, please give me an answer before I break off the temples to your glasses so I can use them to stir my drink.”

“… What?” Wonwoo mumbled, completely lost.

“Pick something!”

“Okay, fuck. I’ll just get a coffee, then.”

He took a step forward to examine the menu boards that the employees were wildly scuttling around underneath, browsing down their chalk-written cold brews until he picked one at random.

That was all Wonwoo asked for.

You bought a lemonade and some sandwich he didn’t catch the name of, toasted on panini bread. It felt amazing to sit down. Wonwoo let the silver bag slide completely off his arm and hit the floor, to which he could sense your gaze stinging over him in disapproval. He should have gotten a sandwich himself, but Wonwoo still wasn’t sure how he felt about using the money on your boyfriend’s credit card.

Wonwoo relaxed in his chair, angling a glance down at his phone that he kept below the table, checking for any Seokmin texts.

None. He was supposed to be Wonwoo’s stupid life preserver in this situation with you, and so far, he’d been left for dead. Taking a lengthy sip from his drink was the only way he could stomach it.

“You should put your phone on the table. Screen down.”

“For what reason?” Wonwoo responded in a dull tone, quickly checking his social media with impatient swipes of his thumb.

“So we can have a conversation.”

At that, he almost gagged, slapping down the coffee cup he’d just picked up.

“Now?” Wonwoo laughed, his deep voice reverberating louder than he intended around the café, “you want to talk now?”

“Uh, yes,” you answered, picking up one half of your sandwich and readying it before your mouth, “why is that shocking?”

“Because—you—ah, whatever.”

“You seem crabby. Is that your normal shtick or are you just hangry? Are you sure you don’t want anything to eat?”

He was in a worse mood than usual, but that could be blamed entirely on the mall and how exhausted it made him feel—everything about its environment sucked out his soul. It was most likely the reason he was even daring to act so impatient. You took another bite as you waited for him to answer, and the delicious crackling sound of the toasted bread managed to fissure something inside him.

“Your eyes tell all. Here’s the other half.” You offered.

Finally, he’d experienced his first flares of contentment that day, though he wasn’t expecting it to be from a panini sandwich with what he could taste to be lettuce, mayonnaise, tomato, and different types of melted cheese.

“Thanks.”

“Well, I’ll at least give us time to finish eating.”

[ Seokmin | 2:30pm ]: I can do one paid lunch :)

[ Seokmin | 2:30 pm ]: Her’s not psychotic she’s just uhh

[ Seokmin | 2:31 pm ]: She probs did it to mess with you 

[ Wonwoo | 2:37 pm ]: She thinks being 5 mins late warrants putting me through one of the worst experiences in my life.

[ Seokmin | 2:37 pm ]: Awwww

[ Seokmin | 2:37 pm ]: Who doesn’t like a little shopping??

[ Wonwoo | 2:39 pm ]: It wasn’t shopping it was torture. You owe me so much more than a fucking lunch.

—MARCH 29TH.

Unfortunately, Wonwoo never got the opportunity to discuss your book that Saturday. In the middle of eating, your phone buzzed with a brief call that had interrupted your peculiarly passionate rant on the different cup sizes at the movie theatre (Wonwoo had listened without saying anything, mostly because he dreaded the circumstances that may come from peeping a word when you were so fixated on explaining that ‘the medium is too much but the small is too little and they’re both obnoxiously priced’).

He then watched cluelessly as you launched up from the table, collecting every little belonging between your fingers, babbling about some wax appointment that had escaped you.

It was just that simple—you were gone.

In the beginning moments of your absence, Wonwoo had sat there without much inclination of what to do next.

He’d worried it was another test, and that he was supposed to dutifully follow you to said wax appointment and continue bending to your every endeavour with no retaliation throughout the day. He had also found the silence across from him unsettling, in a way.

Nonetheless, if you weren’t there, then Wonwoo figured he didn’t need to be there either. So he left, taking the fifty-six back to his apartment, and you hadn’t contacted him since.

Wonwoo actually knew his landlord quite well.

Her building was comprised of four apartments, which sat above her pottery shop on the ground floor. She wasn’t a very bothersome landlord and it was fairly easy to connect with her whenever something broke or caused problems.

When he first moved in three years ago, Wonwoo had ardently adored living there, constantly studying the shelves of shiny glazed vases in addition to the beautiful water colour paintings that were created by his landlord or her students. It had been an inspiration supernova in terms of his personal literature, and he was able to start writing his book. Though, at the time, Wonwoo hadn’t been living alone in his apartment, and it was an inescapable fact that the only reason he began writing his book was with the hope of eventually presenting it to his old girlfriend-slash-roommate.

Now, it was just him.

And as Wonwoo pushed up from his grave of rumpled bedsheets, feeling lethargic and empty, he tried concerningly hard to pinch those thoughts from his mind. It was nearly lunch. He knew damn well he shouldn’t have allowed himself to rot that long in bed, but the other half of himself, the self-sabotaging kind, just couldn’t be bothered to fucking care. Wonwoo reached for his glasses that lay half-opened on the nightstand, raking them onto his face while brushing the hair from his eyes. The first thing he properly saw was his tall, skinny, orange bottle of venlafaxine. No. He was ignoring it.

Wonwoo had been ignoring it for the past few months.

Whenever he got particularly sick of staring at the bottle, he’d shove it in his drawer, making sure to bury it deep under old, amply-scribbled notepads and inkless pens that he’d worn to the bone. At last getting up from the bed, Wonwoo experienced his entire body sway and he caught the room spinning at the distant edges of his peripheral. But he walked through it without a care in the world, utterly too used to the feeling of imminent nausea even without his medication. He decided on a shower, then dressing himself, one Poptart, a swig of water from the kitchen tap, and almost walked out the apartment door with the minty toothbrush still in his mouth.

After walking three blocks down from his apartment, Wonwoo stepped across the dead, spiky grass and into the lacklustre parking lot behind the bowling alley that always smelled like stale pizza.

He knew the vanilla Camry well enough to identify it—stalled smack and centre amongst the emptiness—the licence plate being chiselled into his head like his old locker combination from high school (16-12-24, because Wonwoo for some reason liked fixating on prehistoric details that were glaringly useless in his present).

Early two-thousands R&B was blasting from inside the outdated-looking car, though it was thankfully turned down once Wonwoo threw the door open and shimmied inside.

The odor permeated Wonwoo’s lungs in a heartbeat.

“I thought you were getting this dry-cleaned,” he sighed to his friend, Vernon, who was busy rifling through a backpack.

“Uh, didn’t happen. Didn’t wanna pay all that. M’gonna find someone else to do it that’s not taxin’ my ass. Air fresheners are all dried n’shit so you’re gonna have to deal. My bad, Glasses.”

Glasses. That nickname had always made Wonwoo huff a little half-chuckle, and almost instinctively, he pushed the glasses a bit higher back up his nose. He was introduced to Vernon at a New Year’s Eve party he was forced to attend back in December, though it had been difficult to speak with him because he was blitzed out of his fucking mind—not to mention the choking pain of ignoring the girl who had been sliding her hands along the divots of his shoulders and chest from behind, kissing at his neck.

But Vernon was branded in tattoos, and had all kinds of metal in his face, and was blessed with concupiscent, honey-burnish eyes magnetized every woman in the vicinity straight to him.

Somehow, Vernon had become Wonwoo’s plug in the mix.

“Now, what are you gettin’, Glasses? The usual quarter ounce, right?” Vernon’s tongue poked between his blistered lips as he dug a heavily-inked hand further into the backpack seated in his lap.

“Yeah, quarter ounce.”

“Oh, fuck yeah. Found it. This one.” Vernon exchanged the plastic-bagged ounces of weed with Wonwoo’s cash. “Gimme, gimme. I know it’s all here, but let me check… “ he flaked out the tinted bills with a satisfied head nod. “Prettier than a princess. You’re golden.”

“Did you just say princess?”

“Yeah. That’s what I said… what?”

“I’ve never heard that.”

“It’s not princess?”

“It’s picture, isn’t it? Prettier than a picture.”

“Really? Oh. That’s not how I remember—why the fuck are we even talkin’ about this? Doesn’t fuckin’ matter. Now, that’s gonna last you if you’re cute,” he said, throwing his notorious bag into the seat behind him, then tapping at his busted radio with a thick strip of tape across it, the next song rasping through the speakers, “don’t go crazy on it with your meds and shit. Do you still got enough papers?”

Wonwoo scoffed dryly at Vernon’s assumption while he hid the plastic bag within an inside pouch on his navy-blue jacket. A second later and his phone buzzed with a text message.

“Fuck the meds, honestly,” Wonwoo grunted, shifting his hips up in the seat to remove the phone from his back pocket.

Vernon itched his dark eyebrow. “Alright. Just askin’.”

Wonwoo opted to say nothing as he checked the text message without much expectation, and he was thankful that Vernon was the type to drop a subject easily. Instead his friend transitioned into a different conversation, something about another tattoo that he’d been debating, but in the kindest way possible, Wonwoo wasn’t listening to a goddamn word. You had texted him. Finally. For the first time. After three days of radio silence. And Wonwoo didn’t know why he’d suddenly exploded into such a fidgety, heart-pounding mess. You wanted to meet up again in order to discuss the book’s details.

“Who the fuck is that? Jesus Christ?”

“No,” Wonwoo laughed, clasping his right hand into an anxious fist, “um, I dunno. Just—Seokmin’s got me doing this thing with a friend of his. She’s trying to write a book and he kinda threw me into helping her. We’re supposed to meet up and talk about it.”

“Oh,” Vernon answered, leaning his elbow against the window and sweeping a hand through his black tresses, “do I know the chick?”

“Maybe?”

“She got any social media? An Instagram?”

“Yeah.”

“Ou, let me see.”

Wonwoo wasn’t following you. Then again, he was hardly following anyone. His Instagram had remained completely empty since his girlfriend left him, which had prompted Wonwoo to archive every single picture and delete all the ones that contained her, even the ones that captured mere traces of her in beaded bracelets and hair ties and white socks left on the carpet.

Wonwoo used Seokmin’s account to find you. Honestly, he hadn’t ever looked at your Instagram before. Without gleaning a single photo, Wonwoo thrust his phone at Vernon.

“Oh, yeah, I do know this chick,” Vernon chuckled, thumbing through your profile with a growing smirk, “Her, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Mm, yeah. Know her. Tried to fuck her. Didn’t work at all.”

Snapping his head to look at Vernon, Wonwoo gaped, “what?”

“Yeah, I mean—” Vernon adjusted himself in his seat, pulling up his knee to rest a tattoo-coated arm across it, “—ran into the chick at a party that some rich dude at your university threw. Sweet-talked her for a bit until I realized she had a stupid boyfriend. She told me a million different ways to kill myself. Yeah, she’s somethin’, for sure.”

“You’re lying.”

“Ha—a little. She didn’t tell me to kill myself,  just scolded me for about ten minutes. God, she was wired as fuck though. Her boyfriend—fuckin’, Mingyu, or whatever—he gets her coke. I’ve seen her take a line like it’s pixie dust, man. This was like, over a year ago, though. Dunno if she’s still that loopy. I don’t care. She’s pretty hot.”

Vernon then flashed him a picture from your account, a full body picture of you sprawled across sparkling white sand in a bikini, meanwhile Wonwoo could only stare at it with the blankest possible expression as his brain splattered with computing Vernon’s story.

“Is she still with him?” Vernon asked.

Wonwoo cleared his throat and sat with his spine rigid against the leather, nearly forgetting where he was and what he was doing.

“With who?”

“Lady Liberty. Mingyu.”

“Oh… yeah. They’re dating, still.”

“No fuckin’ way,” his friend lamented while he continuously plunged further into your pictures, thumb pressed to his chin, eyes glimmering, “you coulda flipped this book thing on its head and actually got some fuckin’ head, especially with that deep ass voice you got there. I know it’s gotta feel good. I mean, look at her lips—”

“You’re being gross as fuck,” Wonwoo groaned, swiping his phone back and stuffing it away, “get a girlfriend yourself, man.”

“I’m tryin’ to clean up my act a bit before I do that.”

“That’s definitely a work in progress, I’m assuming.”

“Asshole,” Vernon’s voice was gritty as he coughed into a fist, slipping his knee back under the steering wheel and proceeding to crank his stereo until the music was practically suffocating Wonwoo, “now get the fuck out. You’re not my only deal today. Sorry, Glasses.”

“Later.”

Wonwoo pushed open the door and stepped outside into the cold afternoon breeze. He sucked in a long, relieving breath. At times the fresh air disgusted him, especially when he cozied into one of his mental ruts and everything in the world seemed so grey it was soul-crushing, but Vernon’s car smelled like straight fucking cannabis.

Fresh air was heavenly.

“Don’t forget to text your girl!” Vernon laughed just before Wonwoo slammed the door shut to swallow up the melodic lyrics.

He wanted to make a snap comment before the boy drove off to his next endeavour, but he didn’t care enough to think of one.

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 1:35 pm ]: hey wonwoo, it’s her. I think we should finally settle a date to talk about this book thing. let me attach a pic of my schedule and you can pick any open slots

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 1:35 pm ]: 145_348.JPG

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 1:35 pm ]:  seokmin isn’t going to be our communicator anymore, so u can stop complaining to him about it

[ Wonwoo | 1:45 pm ]: Okay, thanks.

[ Wonwoo | 1:45 pm]: I’ll take a look soon.

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 1:45 pm ]: I’m excited to see you again

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 1:50 pm ]: no likewise?!

[ Wonwoo | 1:50 pm ]: Likewise.

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 1:50 pm ]: ugh. thx

—APRIL 1ST.

It was around six in the evening and Wonwoo was seated in the SRX building, the sky rolling with lambent, hazy-toned pastures of peach in the windows behind him. He had arrived about an hour ago, taking the staircase up to the third floor. It was much quieter there, making it easier for Wonwoo to endlessly stare with glazed, void eyes at his laptop screen and the cursed document he couldn’t finish. After tapping his fingernails in a bored, repetitious pattern against the shiny white table, he felt the urge to delete each and every paragraph as if he hadn’t poured months of earnest love into them.

You would be meeting him soon.

He could still remember looking at your schedule, pinching into the screen and examining all the different colour-coded blocks: dinner parties, SSA meetings, gym sessions, errands—how the fuck you managed to juggle those things and more left him marvelled yet terrified. You were pretty on point regarding your arrival time, to which Wonwoo could immediately identify you before even seeing your face due to the heel clicking and the sounds of tapping jewelry on your bag.

Emerging onto the floor with a very intense scowl and a notably crushing grip on your drink, you were to say the least, angry. Wonwoo gnawed slightly on his tongue as you sat down.

Your purse clunked like a cinderblock onto the table.

He watched you inhale a slow, shaky breath, raising your hand with the expansion of your chest in order to calm down.

 “I’m going to kill myself.”

Wonwoo leaned back in the chair, subtly trying to establish more distance between you. He flicked a glance at his laptop.

“Damn. Why is that?”

“Because of stupid, incompetent people.”

“Yeah?”

“I just—I don’t get it!” You laughed, though it wasn’t a particularly jovial sound and more than anything it seemed like you were going to start smashing glass. “I don’t get how people are unable to understand that we don’t do walk-ins unless one of the stylists are free—” you dug a hand into your purse, pulling out a straw, “—which in the salon’s case, is almost never! I tell them we can’t in my very sweet, established customer service voice: ‘I’m sorry, but the only way to receive a chair is to book online.'”

Wonwoo tilted his head, grinning a little.

“Blah, blah. I tell them the entire story in the kindest way I can, even though I want to grab them by their fucking neck and drag them over the counter to show them our website.” You slipped out your laptop next, accidentally dragging out a lanyard along with it that you agitatedly shoved back into the purse. “And then, they get all uptight and pissy when we can’t wriggle them in! Sorry, our makeup artists are busy! Working with people who made scheduled fucking appointments! The world doesn’t fucking revolve around you!”

You scraped the drink toward you, slamming the straw straight through the plastic film lid with such force that several people ended up turning their heads. After taking a long sip, you gulped and glared until they probably realized it was you and pretended not to care.

For a moment, Wonwoo didn’t know what to say, so he’d folded his arms instead. Considering that Wonwoo worked the late shift stocking shelves at the pharmacy department, your predicament sounded like an entirely new world to him.

“Ugh, I’m sorry to bring all this negativity with me,” you apologized, still exasperated, “I don’t need this fucking tea—I need straight vodka. I’m seriously frazzled.”

“Seriously frazzled?” Wonwoo repeated, finding your choice of words funny as he resumed leaning forward, arms still crossed.

“Very, seriously frazzled.”

“I’m sorry about your day.”

Again, you sighed deeply while removing your long, warm jacket to drape over the chair’s spine—it was a rather elegant reveal of the strapless pearl dress underneath, tinted by the evening light, peach-pink as it rained from the ceiling length windows and framed your body like you were some sort of resurrected angel. Tension at last started escaping your shoulders. Wonwoo quickly realized that he'd been staring, and his fingers curled into a nervous fist.

“You’re actually such a good listener.”

Wonwoo cleared his throat. “Um, thank you.”

“I like that you don’t interrupt me.”

Settling his elbows on the table and ruffling the back of his messy black locks, Wonwoo felt himself panic a little on the inside.

“Well,” he heaved in, “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

“I know," you chirped, posturing yourself confidently, “anyway, the book. We need to talk about it.”

“Table’s yours.”

Wonwoo’s knuckles pressed softly into his cheek while he waited for you to prepare your laptop. His own document was glowing at him, and he swore the emptiness of the page made the screen brighter (in the absolute worst, most mocking way).

“Okay, I’ve got my ideas and such pulled up.”

He expected you to continue and introduce the concept, but you had suddenly stopped, and Wonwoo thought you appeared almost smitten and somewhat timorous. It was strange, because from what he’d known and gauged so far, you were nothing akin to that.

“Well, promise that you won’t think it’s ridiculous.”

“I don’t even know what it is.”

“That’s why I want you to promise!”

Wonwoo pushed up his glasses and sighed, “I will need to be honest at some points you know, depending on what kind of help you want from me. Not that I’m going to be a straight-up dick.”

You scoured at him from over your laptop.

“Whatever.”

“I’ll promise if it makes you feel better.”

“Just—shut up." You wiggled your hand at him dismissively and proceeded to tug the laptop closer. “I don’t even care anymore.”

Once you spent a moment affirming the document to yourself, you looked up at him and smiled. “I’m going to write a book for Mingyu. Our fifth anniversary is coming up in the winter—it’s actually on Christmas Eve—the day he officially asked me to be his girlfriend. I just want to write him a little memoire thingy that tells our story. I want it to walk through the events of our lives, and how I remember them. First encounter, first date, first kiss, stuff like that. I’ve already collected some good memories to include. I have… somewhat of an outline? But my problem is the writing. I can spew nonsense from my mouth at a million miles an hour, but when I try to actually write? It’s crickets.”

You sat back, a hand poised thoughtfully at your cheek while one leg folded over the other. Wonwoo knew you were granting him the space to speak and at least offer a slice of his thoughts, yet, in that moment, he found himself to be drowning. He didn’t believe in fate or destiny or anything of the delusional like; however, hearing you explain the exact premise of a story that he had been successfully writing until a certain breakup—it had shaken him, and Wonwoo felt like the universe was smearing salt fresh into his unsewn wounds.

“So…” your head cocked to the side. “Can I at least an ‘okay’ or a head nod or some sign of life? Or are you just too disgusted?”

What could he say? What was he supposed to say?

Wonwoo was genuinely clueless on how to help you write a story that he’d been utterly failing at writing himself. And, sure, maybe Wonwoo should just give up completely. His ex-girlfriend had ripped out his heart without a single indication that it would happen, and then exited his life in the blink of an eye, disappearing so fucking abruptly that Wonwoo could have said she was a shadow that he imagined in pure lunacy. But he hadn’t dropped the story because there was this very stubborn, unwilling part of his being that could not move on from her—her, who had been his love, and breath, and bones.

He’d decided to finish the story as a manner of easing into closure. If that closure never came, then so be it.

“Are you seriously fucking ignoring me right now?”

His silence had promptly disturbed your peace, and now you were glaring at him with the beginning licks of fire and hell in your eyes.

“I don’t think I can help you.”

“What?” You pronounced sharply. “Are you kidding?”

“No, I’m sorry,” Wonwoo said while closing his laptop and sliding it back into his shoulder-sling bag, “I just—I’m not the right person to help you. I’m not, and you’ll have to take my word for it.”

“Seokmin told me you could write fucking anything. He made it out like you were some literature God with a golden quill. And—great, you’re just packing up fucking everything. Are you serious? Am I even allowed more of an explanation or are you gonna leave it at that? Wonwoo, you couldn’t have told me this at a worse time.”

“I didn’t plan for it to be like that.” He could hardly push the syllables up his diaphragm. “It can’t be me. I’m sorry.”

You didn’t lift a finger to stop him from leaving, though the wavelength of your incinerating stare was felt like a hot, melting scratch down his neck. This was terrible, he was terrible—Wonwoo already knew that about himself. He wanted to go home. He wanted to shut himself away in his room and sink straight through the sheets until he was swallowed. His anxiety was webbing around him. It was pulling him down into the soil and earth like he belonged there.

He truly hated this part of himself.

More than anything, he truly hated when other people saw it.

Especially people like you.

—APRIL 8TH.

Wonwoo didn’t think you would ever speak to him again, in person or over text message. In retrospect, he was fine with it. You were rather overwhelming and especially tiring for someone like Wonwoo who would be perfectly fine never seeing another human in his lifetime. Not to mention he was freed from helping you with your book, which he learned was a technical love letter to your boyfriend in addition to a romance he wanted a nonexistent part in. Going down that path once was already excruciating enough, and given his anxiety attack that saw him locked in a cold washroom stall last week, it was best you just forget about him. He assumed you already had, anyway.

After he stocked the last red bottle of sinus medicine onto the shelf, Wonwoo used his boxcutter to break down the cardboard package and fold it flat with the others he’d opened. It was time for his break, and then he would only have one more hour until the pharmacy section closed for the night. Once it hit ten o’clock, the store was automatically still and hardly anyone came in—minus the few student couples whom Wonwoo had to point in the direction of pregnancy tests or plan b. But it was a Tuesday night. He was at the bare minimum appeased he didn’t have to console a sobbing, snotty-nosed eighteen-year-old girl imploring for a First Response.

When he collapsed down at his favourite seat in the breakroom, Wonwoo pulled out his phone. He had sent Seokmin a text yesterday evening about going studying at the SRX building for their upcoming math midterm, though Seokmin had yet to respond and Wonwoo couldn’t evade wondering if you were pulling some strings behind the curtain.

He opened his bottle of juice and spent the remainder of his fifteen listening to music and jittering his knee.

Wonwoo took his earbuds with him back onto the floor, sneaking the wires under his shirt to pull out his collar. There were only a few boxes left on his cart that required stocking, and whatever didn’t fit would have to be scanned into storage. That shouldn't take long. Wonwoo could almost taste the crisp atmosphere of the night air and feel the gentle chilliness soon to ghost against his face.

However, halfway into shelving the cough drops there had been a polite tap on his shoulder, and Wonwoo wanted to wither up and lose his head right there on the tiles like a sundried rose.

He didn’t know who to expect when he turned around, pulling out a single earbud while the other continued to blast his music.  

“Oh, shit—I didn’t know you worked here.”

Fuck. He wanted to kill himself.

“Yeah, started a couple months ago, actually.”

Mingyu.

It’s not that Wonwoo didn’t like speaking with him, because they had definitely exchanged cordial conversations in the past, particularly when they both took that Probability Poker elective last semester and Wonwoo learned that Mingyu was a pretty decent bluffer. Unfortunately, Mingyu’s belief that he was a great bluffer was actually the one indication that he was indeed bluffing. It showed in his overly confident eyes before a twitch of the lips or a subtly shifted foot, meanwhile Wonwoo was able to sit there the entire time like he was an Easter Island statue incarnate.

Put simply, Wonwoo had always preferred to avoid Mingyu because he was your boyfriend, and per routine, he attempted to slip around most people that were associated with you.

“Cool.” Mingyu smiled and the flashes of his pointed teeth caught the light. “Stuff’s got switched around in here again.”

“New mods came out last week,” Wonwoo answered, placing the last cough drop box onto the shelf and facing it straight.

“Well, don’t know what the fuck that means,” his tone was brassy as he laughed, “I just came to ask where the plan b is now.”

 “Two aisles down, check the endcap.”

“Appreciate it, thanks—oh, condoms?”

“Next aisle.”

“Got it.”

“Just come get me when you’re done,” Wonwoo said, grabbing his boxcutter and running the blade along the taped seam of the cardboard to satisfyingly slice it open, “I’m the only one in pharmacy right now, so I have to ring you up.”

As soon as Mingyu disappeared around the corner, Wonwoo tossed the flattened cardboard onto his cart with the loudest, most life-draining sigh that could be harboured. He wasn’t the kind of person to cultivate those racing, panicky thoughts that consumed his brain like a merciless hurricane, rather it was typically one single thought that was an eternal black space to swallow him. But Wonwoo had to admit that seeing Mingyu had triggered something of the latter, and now he was feeling sick with the fact you possibly told Mingyu about his episode at the SRX building last week. To Wonwoo it had been the shackles of his anxiety, though it probably came across as a very ill-mannered, abrupt rejection from your perspective.

Mingyu didn’t take long picking out his items. It was clearly a run of the mill routine for him at this point—a mere grab and go.

At the register, Wonwoo mentally questioned why Mingyu had grabbed such a plethora of condoms. He didn’t mean to be vulgar in his thinking, but how often were you getting fucking railed?

Either that, or Mingyu preferred being well stocked.

Vernon would be bruising his knuckles on his steering wheel right now, considering how devotedly he attempted to seduce you.

As payment, Mingyu pulled out that godforsaken credit card that you had borrowed during the dress shopping. Wonwoo felt nauseous just looking at the damn thing. He swiped all of the items into a small plastic bag which he then handed to Mingyu with a notable impatience, wanting to whisk the boy out as quick as possible.

“G’night, man. Thanks for the help.”

“Night,” he answered in a deep, tired sigh, watching Mingyu’s head of thick and bouncy black hair disappear toward the aglow exit.

Well, clearly you weren’t wasting anytime thinking about him despite the dramatics pertaining to the situation last week, not even in the most marginal fraction. Mingyu must rail it out of you every night—not that Wonwoo would be surprised to learn such a thing considering the tall boy’s physique and your openly lascivious nature.

Well, good luck to you both, he supposed.

At least it was closing time.

Wonwoo had always suspected there was something ever so slightly off kilter about his body, especially in the way it reacted to certain situations and emotions. He knew it probably wasn’t the most mundane, ordinary act—locking himself in his aunt’s washroom the day of his sixteenth birthday, sliding down onto the cold, hard tiles, feeling his heart jolt, punch, and thump again his chest like a battering ram. There had been a pattern of rubber ducks on her eggshell blue shower curtain, and Wonwoo remembered counting them row by row, over and over, until his breath managed to steady.

Twenty-four ducks. He could still recall the number.

A doctor’s visit about three weeks later had granted him the diagnosis and a scribbled venlafaxine prescription. Wonwoo was already collecting his sweater off the tissue sheet bed, ready to leave.

In the beginning, he was strict about his medication. He organized them into pill cartridges and set alarms and always ate them with cooked, warm meals. Understandably, his habits dwindled every now and again, however, Wonwoo was quite pious to the routine for a good couple years. But then he met his most recent girlfriend in university. She was shy and reserved. All about the books.

Cute as buttons.

He fell in love.

And it was all such a rush of rose petals and sweet symphonies that Wonwoo became distracted from his healthy habits.

Of course, everything crashed and burned once she abandoned him. He capitulated in an instant, and the sight of the orange bottle made him paler than winter moonlight. It’s not like he wanted to suffer, or despise the way his body put him through a neural hell beyond his own control. The fact of the matter was that Wonwoo just couldn’t do it. He couldn’t take those stupid pills.

It was a mountain. Every. Single. Time.

And for the third time that week, Wonwoo found himself awake at an ungodly hour, rifling through the black lunchbox he kept in his closet with his glasses about to slip off the fine point of his nose.

He pulled out the baggie filled with the quarter-ounce, his silver grinder, and his rolling papers. Moving to his desk, Wonwoo clicked on the small overhead lamp to illuminate his space, in which he tapped some of the weed into his grinder and began twisting the lid until he was satisfied. He liked preparing joints to smoke on the roof. It wasn’t particularly hard to access, anyway. Right outside his bedroom window was a balcony with a short ladder attached to the brick, and once Wonwoo had discovered it, he made a habit of climbing up to spark his joints so that their pungent aroma could be carried away by the fresh winds usually stirred up at gloaming.

Honestly, it was the only thing he enjoyed.

Just before he slipped out the window, Wonwoo grabbed a pair of black jeans he’d worn earlier in the week, discovering the lighter he’d accidentally left in the back pocket.

The ladder shuddered slightly when Wonwoo gripped it, though if he were being candour, he didn’t care whatsoever if all the bolts suddenly loosened and he were to splatter against the sidewalk like an uncooked pancake. In fact, the fall probably wasn’t enough to kill him. Maybe a few broken bones and scrapes, some blood staining the street akin to little patterns of rain, bruises that signatured violets into his skin, but Wonwoo would still be painfully, vividly alive, enough to see the stars if the glasses didn’t snap off his face.

It was a colder night, so Wonwoo made sure to tuck on his beanie and huddle into his thicker-sized coat. He sat with one leg dangling over the building’s edge, feeling the wind whiplash against his back and crawl in these chilly, indecipherable whispers from his shoulders to his neck, almost tickling him, like it had missed him.

An orange flicker popped to life from the butane of his lighter, which he used to lightly singe the joint perched at his lips. Wonwoo then tilted his head back, blowing the cloud and its loose, airy curls straight into the sky’s deepest purples.

He loved being alone.

Even when his ex-girlfriend had moved in with him all those months ago, there was an unyielding part of him that hadn’t been ready to forfeit all his space and privacy.

But, over time, his love surmounted the sacrifice.

He would wake up to her sleeping face, and with thoughtful nudges, clear the hairs off her cheeks. He would spend an hour working on his homework or writing his story while waiting for her to stir so messily in the sheets that it became graceful. He would tease her with his cold hands as she boiled up tea in the kitchen, pinching at her hips with the utmost softness and giggling huskily into her neck when she would twist in the arms that bracketed her body against his chest. He would trap her between the counter, sunshine striking the room aglow in these nearly blinding seas of light, mouthing at her throat and tugging at her shorts and hitching his fingers so deep into her heat because all Wonwoo wanted to do was make her feel good.

Opening his eyes again, Wonwoo saw the stars rather than her face. The high was disseminating past his lungs and mingling with the pain that festered in his heart, concocting something that hurt so wonderfully, in all the right places, in all the right spots.

He was a fucking mess.

It wasn’t sustainable. But he didn’t care enough to fix himself.

 —APRIL 15TH.

Why did Wonwoo keep coming back to that café? The number of times he’d sat down with conviction that today would be fruitful—today, the eloquence would flow from his fingertips like perfectly pitched music notes and the symphony would read as beautiful and mellifluous as it sounded in his mind. Today, he was going to write.

Except, he accomplished nothing of the sort.

Repeatedly tapping his index finger against the space bar, he waited for the right adjective or phrase to leap out—to grasp him in a headlock even—whatever it took, Wonwoo was willing to sit there all afternoon until one fucking word conjured in the infinite blankness that was his imagination. He reached for his drink, only to take a sip of dry air that smelled like his earlier cocoa. Wonwoo realized the cup was empty. Had he wasted this much time already?

It pricked similarly to a bee sting. His passions felt impossible. A sigh upheaved from his chest and fingers curled into his hair, musing up the already disarrayed strands and slowly warping himself to look more and more like a mad scientist. Wonwoo removed his glasses and slumped back in the chair, rubbing at the reddish prints left on his nose. Writing had soaked itself in agony and he was going to remain in the storm of it until the bitter, ungratifying end.

‘Till death do us part.

 And then, something struck.

Though it wasn’t what Wonwoo had hoped for.

Literally—it was your hand hitting the glass of the café window, which had jerked Wonwoo out from his self-pitying.

He scrambled to fix his glasses back on, your face clarifying in an instant. You smiled at him with your glossed lips, and he didn’t like the nuance of your countenance one bit. Watching you enter the café was jarring and uncomfortable and his fist immediately clenched, his index nail picking at the ruined cuticle of his thumb. Two weeks ago—that was the last time you had spoken. At the SRX building.

“Hey!” You sounded friendly. “Can I sit here?”

“Well, uh—”

“Great, thank you.”

You pulled out the chair across from him, then set your bag delicately on the windowsill. Wonwoo watched with nervous, fluttering eyes as you smoothed out your cropped skirt before sitting down, ensuring it was tucked under yourself appropriately.

“How are you?”

Gulp.

“Fine.”

“Good. That’s really good. I’m glad.” Your nails drummed once against the table. “I actually didn’t plan on coming here, but I saw you as I was crossing the street, and I thought, ‘I should stop by and check in on him’ because, y’know, we haven’t been talking.”

Wonwoo furrowed his brow. “Do you always do that?”

“Do what?”

“Slap your hand against windows to get people’s attention.”

You swept something off the table with your palm, and this sunshine-like laugh turned your entire face to sweetness, but it wasn’t entirely earnest, and Wonwoo bit into his lip because you fucking terrified him. He caught your sparkling eye and wanted to melt.

“Did I scare you? I’m so sorry.”

“No, you’re good.”

“What are you working on?”

“A paper.”

Obviously, he was going to lie. Whether or not you could pick up on his lie was beyond Wonwoo’s control at that point. He didn’t know what you wanted, or why you were interrupting the flow of your very organized scheduling system to seemingly toy with him.

You didn’t respond to his paper comment. There was a thick silence between you despite the distant clattering of dishes, bubbling coffee machines, and conversations that coalesced into one big buzz.

Wonwoo bit the bullet.

“Something you want from me, yeah?”

“Not… exactly… I mean, after you left me at the SRX building, I wanted to get very angry about the whole situation. My day was terrible, and you responding to my idea with that sickly look on your face didn’t help. But I thought about it. You said no. I can’t ask anything more of you, y’know? I have to respect what you said.”

“Oh.” Wonwoo unclenched his fist, stretched out his long legs a bit more. “Yeah, sure. I get it. Thanks for understanding.”

“I just didn’t think my idea was that bad.”

“Well… no. It’s not bad. It’s not bad at all.”

A twitch to your lip suggested you didn’t believe him. Wanting to clear the air a bit, Wonwoo stopped slouching. He sat straighter and lowered the lid of his laptop, inviting the space between you.

His mouth opened, and then closed.

Fuck, just breathe you idiot—he cursed at himself.

You did that little head tilt thing, half-smiling at him, looking radiant underneath the café sunlight and so oddly patient with his tied-tongue that Wonwoo was miraculously able to find his words.

“There is nothing wrong with your idea. I made it seem like there was. I’m sorry. I just don’t want to help you write a romance story, for personal reasons that would be useless explaining. But you seem very confident in everything you do. I’m sure you’ll be fine.”

“Hm, well, thank you for believing in me. Romance can be a touchy subject—I didn’t think of that, and I get it… I guess I felt more insecure about your reaction because writing is the one thing I can’t ace. I do need help with my story, even if I don’t want it. Well, it’s just the truth, isn’t it? There are some things I can’t do!”

You chuckled at yourself, and Wonwoo thought it to be actually endearing. All your hard edges softened in that moment.

“So, I haven’t made any progress in my story, which sucks because I’m operating by deadline—” reaching into your bag, you unveiled a small, compact mirror, using it to remove something invisible from your eyelash, “—do you have any writer friends that would help me?”

Wonwoo scratched his nose.

“Uh, with the book?”

“Yes.”

“None.”

“What?” The mirror snapped shut as you gagged at him. “How do you have no writer friends? Isn’t that your major? Literature? Do you even have friends that aren’t Seokmin?”

“I’m a math major for fucks sake.”

“You’re fucking joking, Wonwoo. Please, tell me it’s a joke.”

He leaned back, folding his arms and propping an ankle onto his knee. You were still gaping at him, and he wanted to smirk.

“What’s wrong with math?”

“Nothing. Math is… math,” you gritted, shoving the mirror back into your expensive-looking, gold-buckled bag, “but why math? Why straight math? I thought you wanted to be a writer.”

“Man, Seokmin really didn’t tell you fucking anything, did he?” Wonwoo chuckled. Or, maybe you had only heard the things you wanted to hear, which was what Wonwoo assumed.

“Like I have space in my brain to remember the multiverse of information that constantly comes out of his mouth.”

“So what is there space for then?”

“You're toeing a dangerous line.”

“Well, I like math and writing.”

"And what kind of papers would you be required to work on as a math major? Did you stumble across some quintessential theorem that nobody else really cares about except for you and all the other pocket-protector wearers out there? Or is this a Good Will Hunting scenario? Even better—are you waiting for someone to walk by behind you and see all that really complicated mumbo-jumbo on your screen and think to themselves, 'woah, this guy is really smart. He's working on a paper with numbers, and I only work on papers with words. Where did I go wrong in my life?' so you can develop some sort of alternative complex that writing just isn't giving you?"

Wonwoo cocked his head at you, perplexed.

“What the absolute fuck are you talking about?” He felt a laugh in his chest, but he pushed it down. Wonwoo had never met anyone like you before. “You made up everything you just said.”

“Yes.”

“Yes, what?”

“I go on tangents. It’s just something I do.”

“Damn. I can tell.” Wonwoo rubbed at the corner of his eye and slipped the ankle off his knee, further spreading his legs. “You like hearing the sound of your own voice, yeah?”

He always hated when people bothered him at the café, especially when he was trying to write. Today, it was different.

“Well, that’s true.” You beamed at him so matter-of-factly, like it was obvious. “The most beautiful sound in the world, isn’t it?”

“Mm.”

“Thought so. Ugh, I just can’t believe you have no writer friends to hook me up with.” He watched you slouch forward, slapping your arms across the table. “I’ll have to go wait outside Gildan Hall and start ambushing all the smart-looking literature majors.”

Wonwoo found himself examining your perfect nail polish.

“Good luck with that.”

“Can you at least try to sound more sympathetic?”

“You don’t seem like a person who appreciates sympathy.”

“Pft. According to who? I like being comforted when the time is right, and you’re not being very comforting.” You groaned into the table.

“You like being comforted?” He scoffed.

Your head popped up, and you were pouting. “At certain times, yes. Most times, no. It’s a complicated system. No one’s really cared enough to learn it except for Mingyu, and that was by force, and I think even he hates it. But I’m not asking for the moon. Just a reasonably sized chunk of it. I have to be worth something, right?”

“What’s life without someone catering to your every whim at the drop of a hat, huh?” He couldn’t help but mutter with sarcasm.

“Yes, exactly! See—you read my mind.”

Wonwoo bit his tongue.

“Ugh, now where’s my stupid phone?”

It was in your purse. Immediately, your eyes lit up.

“Jesus Christ. I’m gonna be late to my electrolysis!”

Like a burst of lightning, you shot up from your seat and quickly fixed the cream-white purse back over your shoulder. It reminded him of that time at the mall. One second you were engrained into a tangent, and the next you were scrambling about, attempting to recover the lost time in your meticulous schedule.

“If you think of anyone, please text me!”

Wonwoo nodded his head.

Now, there was a vacant seat before him, left slightly tugged from the table due to your hectic departure. For a moment, he just sighed, feeling the breath emerge from somewhere so deep in his chest that it ached. That was the thing about you—in a confusing turmoil, you managed to fill him up when he felt empty, but then empty him once he felt full.

He didn’t know what kind of person you were.

But there was an odd thrill to it that Wonwoo couldn’t articulate.

—APRIL 18TH.

Sat with Seokmin at the boy’s dining room table, Wonwoo popped a purple grape into his mouth while flipping a pencil between his fingers. The two had been staring plainly at their last problem from the math homework, but the question was horribly long, and his handwriting had morphed from legible penmanship to the most slurred hieroglyphics. Wonwoo wanted to dump a ramen packet into some boiling water and call it a night. He’d devoured a whole stem of grapes. His head was pounding and his stomach growled for a meal.

“Oh! You see—this is what gets me every time!” Seokmin exclaimed, leaned over his scattered papers, shoulders hunched with strain, “I mess up one multiplication in a matrix, and it screws me all up! Now I have to go over—uh! My fucking pencil just snapped.”

“Good,” Wonwoo mumbled, pressing a hand along the groove of his stiff neck, cracking it, “take it as a sign to give up.”

“We’re so close.”

Scooting the chair back to stretch his legs, Wonwoo then snatched his phone off the table. It was nearly ten at night.

“I’m hungry, and I don’t care anymore.”

Seokmin sighed, “are you going to eat now?”

“Yeah. Any ramen left?”

“It’s in the box sitting on top of the fridge. Soup broth is in the cupboard beside the microwave. I think there’s some eggs, too.”

Wonwoo easily grabbed the noodle packet off the fridge. He asked his friend if he wanted a bowl as well, and Seokmin agreed, abandoning their math homework after his defeating pencil-snapping incident. While they waited for the water to start bubbling over the stovetop, Seokmin had joined Wonwoo in the kitchen, though he leaned against the counter, holding his phone six inches or so from his face. Wonwoo had never seen anyone text that fast.

Gosh—he didn’t even need to ask who it was.

Noticing a few smudges on his glasses, Wonwoo lowered them down to the hem of shirt, beginning to massage the marks away.

“Our math final is the twenty-eighth, right?” Seokmin asked.

“Should be, yeah.”

“Thanks. If it’s on the twenty-eighth then I can definitely go.”

Wonwoo slid the glasses back onto his nose.

“Go to what?

Taptaptaptap—Seokmin’s fingers were practically electric.

“Uh, this thing that Her is having… at her parents’ house… like… a big dinner party… I’m helping her plan it… just need to make sure… I’m free those days… there! Okay, all settled.”

At last, Seokmin had clicked off his phone and slid the device back into the pocket on his sweatpants. Wonwoo folded his arms, staring at his friend with a deeply furrowed yet confused brow.

He sucked in a helpless breath.

“I don’t get you, Seokmin.”

“What—why?”

A few hot droplets of water had leapt from the pot, slightly scalding Wonwoo’s arm. He promptly ripped open the ramen packet and submerged the noodle brick, poking at it with chopsticks.

Wonwoo cleared his throat, “are you obsessed with her?”

Seokmin laughed, sounding astounded.

“No, I’m not obsessed. I’m just helping. We’re friends.”

“Right.”

“You don’t believe me?”

Setting the chopsticks beside the stove, Wonwoo turned around again, habitually crossing his arms low along the chest.

“I guess I don’t understand what you get out of that relationship.” He admitted. “Why can’t she do shit herself?”

“Ha!—That’s an interesting question.”

“You don’t want to talk about it?”

“No, it’s not that.” Seokmin lifted himself onto the kitchen counter, his head thumping back against the wooden cupboard. “I just wasn’t expecting you to ask that. And—I meant it’s interesting to see your interpretation of it. Like, my friendship with Her.”

Wonwoo nodded. He wasn’t going to coax anything out of his friend that he wasn’t already willing to say. In fact, Wonwoo had only begun talking to Seokmin back in the early, rainy days of September, since they ended up in the same discrete mathematics course and happened to choose seats right next to each other. Their bond had formed fairly quick, but they never really conversed about topics more intimate than school work and their own interests.

“I’m sorry,” Wonwoo said, “I shouldn’t have asked.”

“No, don’t apologize. I mean, I totally get why you’re curious.”

Seokmin glanced down at his knees, scratched his chin.

“Uh—well, what did you say, anyway? Why can’t her do shit herself? I mean, her life is super busy. Her mom’s a writer and editor for that popular fashion and beauty magazine you always see at all those glamour stores—Stunning Monthly—something like that. Her’s dad is this business tycoon guy. He works with my dad, actually. I’ve known Her since high school. Our families are close, so naturally we’ve spent a lot of time together. Her family picked up all their stuff and moved into Hillcrest on account of her dad needing to relocate for work.”

Wonwoo remained silent at the revelation, even though he was urged by curiosity to badger Seokmin with questions.

“But, uh—without all my non-essential rambling—the relationship with her parents is tumultuous. Who doesn't have a shaky relationship with their parents, though? A few lucky souls, probably. But they've set things up for her quite well, in my opinion. Her mom got her a job at the Milestone—that fancy beauty place down Bank Street? She has a makeup chair from time to time and works reception. She’s definitely gonna graduate Cum Laude with some big fancy scholarship. Not to mention the little power couple thing she’s got going on with Mingyu. She just tends to be…” Seokmin winced, massaging his shoulder, “she’s just a bit unpredictable. It would be way too easy for things to start falling all over the place. She’s a busy girl so I figure it’s nice to help her out. Keep things organized.”

Wonwoo bobbed his head, thinking.

“I guess I’m curious about the book thing. I mean, if everything is so perfectly laid out for her, and she’s so busy all the time…. why write a book? That takes months, extreme dedication, planning out the ass… it’s loving everything you’ve written and then hating it so atrociously… I don’t know,” he sighed, shrugging with confusion, “if I were her, writing a book would be the last thing on my mind.”

Folding his arms, Seokmin leaned back against the cupboards and agreed. “I know. But sometimes she just lurches onto random things out of nowhere. One year she practically turned her entire living room into a freakin’ art studio and I slipped on an open tube of paint on the floor—nearly popped out my tail bone. To be fair, her passion projects never last long. She never has the time, as you said… I know you’re not helping her anymore. She’ll probably drop it without help.”

“Really? Just like that?”

“Yeah,” Seokmin answered, smiling, “just like that.”

For some reason, Wonwoo gritted his teeth. He would hate for you to discard the feat so readily, just because he couldn’t pitch in as initially planned. Yes, writing was not always a fruitful cherry blossom tree and sometimes chalking down one sentence was equivalent to a month of effort and squeezing out all the creative fibres in one’s brain, but there was so much worth and occulted beauty to it at the same time. It was the art of expression.

Wonwoo thought it was quite cruel to deprive oneself of the ability to express and articulate things as they coursed through the fragile skin and the warm veins, and chiefly, the heart.

“Anyway, maybe I didn’t really answer your question,” Seokmin laughed, “but, y’know, don’t worry too much about turning down the book. You’re right. She’s got more important things to focus on, as I was telling her over and over, and—oh! Fuck, the ramen’s bubbling!”

Wonwoo quickly twisted around as the water began spilling over the edge and sizzling like fried meat. He lifted the pot off the piping hot, orange element, to which Seokmin joined him, twisting the stove dial to a much lower heat. Blowing at the white froth, Wonwoo waited a precautionary minute before returning the pot.

Once dinner was ready, they gathered back at the dining table, entwining the noodles with their chopsticks and hardly allowing a second for the ramen to cool before they were shovelling in burning mouthful after mouthful. The bite in Wonwoo’s stomach was gradually appeased. He soon felt warm, and full, and less tempered.

“Seokmin.”

“Hm?” His friend glanced up from his phone.

“So…” Wonwoo leaned back in the chair, his fist clenched. “I guess what—from what I understand—if I don’t help Her, or if she doesn’t find someone who can, then the book just won’t happen ”

At his observation, Seokmin nodded, seeming unbothered.

“Uh, yeah. Pretty much.”

“That’s sad.”

“Hey, you two just aren’t destined for each other,” he replied, slurping his noodles, “you were right back at the café.”

Picking up the white and blue patterned bowl, Wonwoo prepared to drink the broth, feeling the delicious heat fan back against his face. Once he finished eating and helping Seokmin with the dishes, he planned to catch a late-night bus back to his apartment above the quaint pottery shop. He didn’t know if he would sleep or not.

Maybe, however, that would give him time to rethink some choices, even if he shouldn’t trust the musings his brain happened to curate past nine at night. Especially any musings concerning you.

[ Wonwoo | 11:45 pm ]: Sorry to message you this late.

[ Wonwoo | 11:45 pm ]: I’ll keep it brief: I’ve given your book idea some thought, and if the offer still stands, I’d like to help you write it. Though, I understand if you want someone else’s help.

[ Wonwoo | 11:50 pm ]: Goodnight.

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 6:35 am ]: AHHHHHHHHHHH

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 6:35 am ]: good morninggg

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 6:35 am ]: no that’s so perfect

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 6:37 am ]: okay. OMG. there’s just so much we have to sort out. I’m trying not to overwhelm myself lol

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 6:37 am ]: thank u for giving it more thought. I’m excited to plan everything and see u again ofc :)

[ Wonwoo | 12:55 pm ]: Likewise.

—APRIL 24TH.

Since last November, Wonwoo hadn’t invited many guests to his apartment—not even his older brother, who had never stepped foot into the building after Wonwoo originally signed the lease. Seokmin visited once or twice, but everything was curt, and while there had been one time that Vernon slept overnight on the couch, it was hardly notable.

Knowing that you were going to be at his apartment in a few hours was a very daunting thought. Consequently, Wonwoo had done something he hadn’t properly completed in months: clean.

It wasn’t like he just threw out the garbage and wiped down the kitchen counter either. He legitimately cleaned, picking over his apartment with a fine-tooth comb, not allowing one coffee cup or coaster to seem even vaguely incongruous. He fluffed out the couch pillows and vacuumed the floors. He went through his entire room, tidying up piles of clothes on the floor and aligning every book on his shelf. For the first time in months, Wonwoo threw open his heavy curtains, pure sunlight engulfing the space in such a bright glare that his eyes stung and he hardly recognized his own bedroom. Most importantly, he remembered to hide the pill bottle in his nightstand.

After all the anxiety-driven cleaning was done, Wonwoo collapsed onto the couch and stared plainly at the ceiling, the reality of what he just accomplished beginning to sink into his pores.

What the fuck?

He doubted you would care even microscopically if his apartment wasn’t perfectly swept and polished and artistic like a photo from an interior design catalogue. But at the same time, it would have been impossible for him to leave it alone. The burst of productivity undoubtedly left Wonwoo rather hot and sweaty, so he opted to take a shower before you arrived. Standing beneath the cool water and taking slow, languid breaths helped ease his nerves.

And, for the first time in what he imaged to be—months, Wonwoo dried himself off with this feeling that everything was okay.

Not good. Definitely not great. But okay.

While he buttoned up a pair of blue jeans, Wonwoo heard his phone ding from his desk. Reaching over, he tapped the screen.

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 12:05 pm ]: hi, I’m almost there

His chest fucking lurched.

Roughly jerking open his drawer, Wonwoo pulled out the first shirt he saw, tugging the white long-sleeve over his head before he wiggled his feet into a fresh pair of socks. Once Wonwoo found his glasses, he sat on the edge of his bed with his phone.

[ Wonwoo | 12:08 pm ]: Okay.

[ Wonwoo | 12:08 pm ]: Would you like me to come down?

God—he felt like his stomach was going to collapse.

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 12:08 pm ]: no that’s okay :)

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 12:09 pm ]: it’s really pretty down here

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 12:12 pm]: sorry I was looking at some of the pottery / painting stuff. it’s the staircase down the hall, right?

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 12:12 pm ]: unit 102?

[ Wonwoo | 12:12 pm ]: Yes.

He reminded himself to breathe. Calm and slow and lifting the pressure that dug so bluntly into his lungs. The webs began to burn away. It had been a narrow escape, but it was successful.

[ xxx-xxx-xxxx | 12:13 pm ]: heyy, I’m outside

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Wonwoo walked to the front door. His fingers brushed the knob in a flash of doubt, though his mind had already committed and now the door was pulled open and you were there, just as you said.

“Well, hello.”

He nodded at you, and then gestured for you to enter.

“Where should I take off my shoes?”

“There’s good,” Wonwoo answered, pointing to a textured mat in the corner that you proceeded to leave your simplistic heels on.

How absurd was this? Never in his life would Wonwoo imagine you at his apartment of all places—the one girl whom he adamantly tried to avoid because you were his gleaming opposite, and everything that you were, certain and in control, scared him. You were gazing around with your hands politely clasped together, ignited in the fulgurant sunlight, a small smile on your mouth.

“Wow, you’re very clean.”

Wonwoo stepped after you, maintaining a shy distance.

“It doesn’t normally look this neat,” he admitted, watching you readjust the strap of your tote bag, “I did clean for you.”

You turned to face him, and your laughter filled the space with a refreshing, long lost tone that made everything brighter. His fist clenched up anxiously and he knew his cheeks were pinkening.

“Um, cleaned or power-washed?”

He merely stared at you. Why couldn’t he fucking speak?

“Jeez, don’t look so afraid. I’m joking. And I obviously appreciate the effort.” You spun back around, continuing to walk past the coffee table and toward the kitchen. “It’s a lovely place, and it’s definitely got your personal touch. Oh—this is a cute mug.”

He breathed out, unfurling his hand and stretching his fingers until the air in his knuckles popped. You began wandering in the natural direction of the bedroom, and so Wonwoo followed, his eyes drifting up the jeans that hugged your legs and your sashaying hips, to back of your delicious-smelling hair. What was that scent, anyway?

Manuka honey?

But it was just a trivial glance, really.

Nothing meaningful.

“Is this your room?” You asked, stopping at the doorframe.

“It is.”

Biting your lip, you peaked inside and started to grin.

“Do you care if I go in?”

 “No.”

He tried not to crumble right there on the floor. Wonwoo’s room was his sanctuary, a fortress, something that barred out everyone but himself and granted him the freedom to do whatever he pleased (whether it was self-detrimental or not). The thought of others in his room was a gash in that perfect sanctuary, in which he could see the walls bleed out all their comfort and familiarity. His ex was the last person to be in his room, typically sprawled across the bed with a good novel in her hand.

It was a sour, sour reminder.

“Oh, and there’s the bookshelf,” you pointed out, “how fitting.” That penetrating gaze of yours roamed his desk and his bed and all his knickknacks in between. “Hey, why’s there a balcony outside?” You then asked, settling your hands onto the window frame and leaning out, the wind fluttering minimally through the layered curtains.

“Just a remodelling error,” Wonwoo explained, “it was supposed to be removed, I think. Never happened.”

Allured by curiosity, you leaned further out, examining the ladder that led up to the building’s roof. He looked at you again, specifically the arch in your back and the way your arms were planted so firm at the windowsill. He looked at the sunlight rippling on your cheek and your lips that appeared to sparkle, like you had kissed glitter.

“You definitely go up there, right?”

“Yeah.”

Half-shutting the window as to keep the breeze flowing, you chuckled. “I figured… so, I guess we should stop dawdling and get to the meat and potatoes. Is here a good spot? Or do you want to go back to the living room?”

“We’re in my room anyways,” Wonwoo commented, pulling out his desk chair and promptly sitting down, “so, why not.”

“Cool. Let me get my laptop.”

You slipped the tote bag off your arm and sat on the edge of his freshly made bed, being careful not to rumple the sheets.

“Okay!” Your hands echoed a series of soft claps. “I’m all ready now. I’ll try my best not to ramble—oh, and please, please don’t interrupt me until I’m done. I’m going to be very pissed if I lose my train of thought and I’d like this meeting to remain pleasant.”

Wonwoo nodded. “I know.”

You flashed him a brief smile.

“So, as you know, Mingyu and I’s fifth year anniversary is coming up in December. My gift to him is this so far nonexistent book. We’ve been through a lot as a couple, and as individuals, and I want the book to fully capture this journey we’ve been on and how much I… appreciate him. Also, I’m going to introduce a second, special element—” a hand plunged into your tote bag and suddenly a video camera was revealed, “—I want to record some of our brain sessions, and, like, our voyage of figuring this shit out. I like mementos. I hope that’s okay.”

“… Do I answer?”

“Yes.”

“Oh. Then, yeah. I’m okay with it.”

“Secondlyyy—” you lilted while scrolling a little ways down the notepad on your laptop, the video camera stuffed back into your flower-and-honeybee-patterned tote, “—there are a few places we’ll need to visit—not the actual places that Mingyu and I went to since we grew up nowhere near here—but places that more so have a strong resemblance to the ones in my memory. I feel like it will help me with visual aspects of the writing. I’m a very visual person. Y’know, setting up the scene and technical things like that. I like touching and feeling and seeing and breathing everything in. I want all my senses on fire, basically. Like… the way your lips feel after eating insanely hot noodles.”

“Yeah, that’s fine.”

Wonwoo didn’t really care. He just agreed.

“Lastly, I want to make a schedule for us. So, I’m kindly asking you to set up a schedule of your own—work shifts, doctor’s appointments, tests—the like, so I can incorporate them into my own hectic life and make us one colourful, super writing schedule.”

And then, with a big, winded sigh, you shut your laptop.

“That’s it. Done. Thoughts?”

Honestly, the entire premise didn’t sound all that terrible. He had braced himself for the worst, but you were unsurprisingly organized and had pinpointed all your desires quite clearly. Of course, he knew it was going to be sheer hell—flames up to his knees and desert sun beating on his skin like a hot skillet frying butter. You were structured and dedicated and Wonwoo was none of those things.

No doubt, Wonwoo would have to learn to deal with you.

You would either be his trigger or his pulse.

But, even worse, you would have to learn to deal with him.

“I’m just following your lead on this,” Wonwoo announced, lacklustre of much interest, resting his hands against his stomach while he rotated back and forth in the swivel chair, “whatever you want me to do, I’ll do it. How soon do you want the schedule thing?”

“Like, as soon as possible.”

“Okay.”

“Do you really have no questions?”

Wonwoo scratched the side of his head.

“Uh, have you got anything written down yet?”

“Yes,” you propped open your laptop again, “an intro.”

“Oh, really?”

“Don’t question me. It was already difficult enough to write it, and I agonized over it for hours.” You pouted, slumping slightly.

He shifted up straighter in the desk chair.

“I’m sorry. I was just wondering. It’s good you started.”

“Oh. Thank you.”

Wonwoo tilted his head at you. “Do I get to read it?”

Your feet crossed and twirled together. He didn’t think you had any nervous ticks, but that was something easy to pick up on.

“Um, not yet. Not until we officially start.”

“Okay.” He answered with a gentle voice, noticing your swaying feet still again and a bit of rigidity dissipate from your body.

Well, he didn’t really know what to do at this point. Wonwoo suspected you were constrained by more tasks for today and your time with him was limited. It’s not that you were sitting in an awkward, stifling silence, but he would rather occupy himself with something rather than nothing, because nothing left his heart to race.

“Are you hungry?” He asked.

Glancing up from the laptop, you shook your head. “I ate before I came here.”

“Are you going to be leaving soon?”

At that, your face crinkled with laughter. “Sick of me already?”

Wonwoo crossed his arms. “No. Just asking.”

“Well, I have a wax appointment soon. I’ll be leaving in ten minutes or so.” Finally, you looked up, and your eyes clicked with his in a way that made the fine hairs along his neck prickle coolly. “Does that answer your question?” A subtle grin pulled at your soft lips.

“It does, yes.”

“You don’t like having people in your room, do you?”

He huffed at the observation and delved a hand through his black hair, feeling the dampness slide against his fingers. “Not particularly.”

“You should have just said that.” Rising off his bed, you closed the laptop and shoved it back into the tote bag.

Wonwoo’s entire chest jerked. It felt like a ten-story drop.

“Are you leaving?”

“Mm, I don’t want to intrude.”

“You’re not intruding.”

Why did his throat close up just then? Why did his vocal cords abruptly feel so coarse and tight? Why was his heart hammering? He didn’t mean to project the wrong impression. He didn’t hate you in his room. It just felt misplaced, and new. Like picking up a puzzle piece from the box and attempting to jam it into a different puzzle.

“It’s fine. Seriously. I should be early, anyway.”

Wonwoo stood up, realizing he needed to breathe. “Um… would you like me to walk you down?”

You stopped on your way out, faced him with a pretty smile.

“That’s okay.”

But then you did something rather strange; your hand sank into his firm upper arm and suddenly you were leaning into him, so carelessly close that he could feel the fanning, light warmth of your breath against his neck. Wonwoo’s head started to spin, and he thought a cloud had enveloped the room because his vision fuzzed.

“Sorry,” you took a step back, removing your hand, “you just smell really good. Like an ocean or something. It reminds me of this beach in Puta Cana. But your hair’s all damp and fluffy so that’s probably why. That was weird. I’m sorry.” Again, you laughed.

Why the fuck did you do that? He was almost angry. But not at you. At himself. For reacting in such a giddy, stupid way. Your touch and breath had burned him and there was this sharp, cutting flare inside Wonwoo that didn’t want to let you leave.

“All good…” he mumbled, sounding groggy and slow.

“I’ll see myself out then. Bye!”

And with a final chirp, you left, the front door closing in the distance while he could only stand there, shuddering and strangely hot and beyond confused. Wonwoo moved to swing the heavy curtains shut, the entire room succumbing into its usual shadiness. He sat on the edge of his very neat bed, removed his glasses, and buckled over while rubbing his veiny, pale hands through his hair.

The feeling was so lost and suppressed to his memory.

Wonwoo didn’t even know what it was.

He was relieved you were gone, but he also wished that you were still there, leaning out his open window with the wind and sunshine in your face. It was a sight so sweet and equally intimate.

Who are you?

What are you doing in his meaningless life?

—APRIL 28TH.

Wonwoo had finished his math final with half an hour to generously spare, and now, he was sitting, bored, sketching his pencil against the last page of the thick packet. The professor wouldn’t care.

Hopefully.

On one hand, Wonwoo knew he  should really just stand up and hand the damn thing in, but on the other hand, he hated—no, abhorred being the first person to return a test, especially an exam at that. Wonwoo was pretty smart. He knew that about himself and he never bothered to maintain the guise he wasn’t. Still, Wonwoo wasn’t pretentious. If he had to wait until the final fucking minute to hand the packet in, solely to avoid being the first student up, then so be it.

Besides, there wasn’t anything too pressing that required his immediate attention—minus the pertinent schedule he was supposed to make and have sent to you approximately three days ago. You had called him last night, to which the phone crackled with a loud, static bark of his name as you admonished him for his lateness.

“I told you three days ago I wanted the schedule! Three days! I can’t believe this. What’s so hard about making a schedule? Beep boop, you press some buttons on your laptop and it’s done. It would take ten minutes tops! Ugh, I’m so done with you, Wonwoo. In fact, don’t call me back—don’t even text me until you have the schedule!”

And then the line had collapsed, leaving Wonwoo to stare rather expressionlessly at his phone screen, the boy huffing out a breath of tendrilled smoke while he relaxed on the apartment roof. That had been his first experience sat on the receiving end of your seasoned quips, and it left him with this very profound emptiness, like his insides had been scooped out and the shell of his body was nothing but a wooden nesting doll. It had been such a long time since he genuinely cared about disappointing someone. Wonwoo had grown far too complacent with the feeling of disappointing himself.

That would never motivate him to do anything.

But you were different. In the sense that Wonwoo mostly remained proactive out of fear you might bite his head off.

From somewhere near the back of the room, Wonwoo heard chair legs scraping, and he eagerly flexed his fingers while observing a girl with the slickest ponytail he’d ever seen march past him to the professor’s desk. She set her packet down. He thanked her. She left.

Jesus Christ. Finally.

“All finished, Wonwoo?” His professor mumbled in a tone that hardly escaped his own lips, glancing up at the boy expectantly.

Pushing up his glasses, Wonwoo nodded.

“I suppose it’s harder for you to sit there and wait than it is to write the actual exam, isn’t it?” The professor noted with an almost undetectable smirk as he slid the test packet inside a tan-coloured folder, to which Wonwoo turned January cold.

“I don’t know.” Wonwoo shrugged, pretending to feel unbothered when in reality his skin was slithering like a snake pit at the thought of being even marginally perceived. “Maybe.”

“You have a good summer, alright?”

“Thanks. You too.”

Wonwoo swept a quick glance over the classroom right before he left, noticing that Seokmin was sat beside the wall, one hand tangled tight into his black, ruffled tresses as his pencil scribbled all over the paper like he was writing pure nonsense. He probably was.

And Wonwoo meant that in a nice-this isn’t really your sweet spot, but you’ll manage nonetheless-way. After leaving the classroom, Wonwoo thought he might go home and plunge head first into his oasis of bedsheets and flat, foam pillows that he loved so much, and permit himself to decay until it was physically impossible to lie down any longer. But he decided against it at the last minute, turning up at the café instead with his shoulder-strung book bag and the timely urge for a scone. He then sat down at his favourite table.

Pulled out his laptop.

Opened the document he was at incessant war with.

The last scene he’d written was breakfast.

“Uh, okay. Orange juice… or orange juice?”

“Did you say orange juice?”

“I did.”

“So… chocolate milk?”

“Ha! Funny... is there any sort of correlation between being a complete nerd and making such well-woven jokes?”

“Not sure. But I’ll get back to you when I find out… thanks. Your tea is sitting on the island, by the way.”

“Thank you, Won. Oh—you even put it in my Woodstock mug!”

“Yes, why are you so surprised that I remember?”

“Because it’s always hidden at the back of our cupboard, behind ten other mugs that we certainly don’t need and all our plates. I mean, I guess it’s my fault. Half of them are from my mom.”

“It’s sweet.”

“It takes up too much space. But I can’t tell her no.”

“That, you’ve got to work on.”

“The Christmas thing isn’t happening anymore, if that helps. I think the thought of having to cram all my family into our living room for a night was what motivated me the most. My mom said she’ll send us poinsettias instead. I think that’s way easier.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yes. Believe it or not, I can assert myself. Sometimes.”

“No, no. I do believe you. I’m proud. Okay—bottoms up.”

“How’s the combination of venlafaxine and orange juice?”

“I don’t know. Juicy?”

“Better juicy than anxious?”

“You could say that.”

Right, back when Wonwoo actually had the willpower to make himself breakfast rather than slapping a mixed berry Poptart into the toaster or worse, nothing at all. Back when he could wake up before noon without feeling nauseous enough to curl into a ball and drape the sheets over his aching head. Back when he actually took his medicine. Her face beaming at him from across their table had always been like a glass of sunlight and citrus. She had been his own vitamin.

Wonwoo knew he wasn’t going to write. He was just going to stare and mope and ensnare himself in the pinwheel of memories that blew over him whenever he had the gall to reread his past literature.

The Woodstock mug. She’d taken that with her.  

He decided it was strange and sometimes irritating how love, broken or not, could suture itself into even the most mundane things. Orange juice was just that—juice—the carton he used to pick up and impetuously drop into his grocery cart every so often. Now, it wasn’t juice at all, but slow mornings, steaming tea kettles, and reading together on the couch with legs all tangled up until lunch time.

Now, Wonwoo couldn’t drink it at all.

Breaking the lemon raspberry scone in half, Wonwoo dropped a flaky piece into his mouth before it got too cold, and then proceeded to close the document. There was no way in hell he would write, and while he loved drowning in his own misery in order to snuff any glimpse of productivity more than the average individual, he thought it might be worthwhile to finally start that schedule.

[ Wonwoo | 8:20 pm ]: schedule.pdf

[ Her | 8:56 pm ]: thanks

[ Her | 8:56 pm ]: don’t piss me off again

—APRIL 30TH.

For an April morning, it was surprisingly bright. The sun was out in full and glistering warmth by the time Wonwoo stepped onto the sidewalk and began pacing down to the park, practically needing to squint the entire way. He almost hated it. Early mornings were not his friend, nor were the blades of light cutting across his glasses. But today was his first writing session with you and Wonwoo knew it was more than crucial that he was the furthest thing from tardy—it would be akin to willingly setting his hands inside a burning fire if not.

You agreed to meet at the park since it was roughly equal distance between Wonwoo’s apartment and some breakfast place you wanted to stop at. He thought it was uncharacteristically thoughtful of you to shoot him a text asking if he wanted anything, though Wonwoo declined nonetheless. It was damn near impossible for him to eat a bite of food until lunch time, hence his expression softening in confusion when he at last climbed into the passenger seat of your sleek silver car and was greeted by you passing him a cold tea.

“Am I… holding this for you?” He wondered, sitting still.

You shook your head. “No. It’s yours.”

“I didn’t ask for anything.”

“Yes, I realize that. I can read, thank you.”

Wonwoo wasn’t going to argue. He simply shut his mouth, clicked on his seatbelt, and set the tea into the cup holder. He then began looking around at your car’s interior. Everything was exceptionally clean and smelled sugary, like iced gingerbread.

The thing was, Wonwoo still wasn’t very sure how to talk to you, and most often there was the stiffest frog in his throat whenever he sat around you in silence for too long. Your thumbs were tapping against your phone at light speed. It reminded him of how Seokmin was texting you back at the boy’s apartment when they were studying for finals. Wonwoo couldn’t help but wonder if Seokmin was naturally more inclined to respond to you out of friendship or fear. Maybe even a pinch of both if that was possible. Another quiet minute passed by.

“Okay, fuck, sorry,” you suddenly spluttered at random, quickly slotting your phone into the GPS holder, “just some shit with my mom. Um, okay. Yeah. We can get going.”

“All good," Wonwoo answered.

“You know where we’re off to?”

“Vaguely. The track by Caldwell High School.”

He watched you flit him a smile. “That’s the place. I’ll explain more once we get there. And, by the way, I am expecting you to drink that tea. It’s not anything crazy. It’s oolong. Only a bit of caffeine.”

“I drink coffee, you know.”

“Yes, and it probably makes you jittery and insufferable.”

Wonwoo preferred not to comment.

The car ride wasn’t too long. Actually, Wonwoo did love a good car ride. He remembered the long trips he used to take with his family to the water park when he was a child, the sensation of the breeze blowing into his face and how different shades of green would scatter in through the windows as the sun hit the tree leaves like emeralds. There was something so limerent and sadly distant about the memory that Wonwoo felt his chest hurt. Even if he were to take that same road, and smell the same breeze, and see his skin glow with the same hues of the forest, he doubted it would feel the same.

His mouth had gone awfully dry. Wonwoo then reached for the cold tea sitting in the cup holder and took a sip, suddenly very appreciative that you had thought to get him something, anyway.

And while he couldn’t be too certain, Wonwoo wanted to think that maybe this would be a good memory, too.

After the half-hour long car ride, Wonwoo made sure to stretch when he stepped out into the empty parking lot. It was cloudier now, a bit more of a breeze to help counteract the warmth that remained in the air. You came around to join him, twisting out a cramp in your leg while adjusting the purse over your shoulder.

The walk to the track field wasn’t long, no more than a few minutes, and Wonwoo obediently trailed at your side until he witnessed the bleachers slowly coming into view. It resurfaced memories from his own high school days in PE, which Wonwoo had actually been quite successful at despite his distaste for sports and their atmosphere in general. He remembered liking kickball the best.

You sighed in a wistful tone while staring across the marked asphalt and fresh April grass. “All high school tracks look the same, don’t they?” Then, you carefully set your purse onto the bleachers.

Wonwoo rolled his shoulders, taking a more observant look around. It wasn’t strikingly different from the track at his high school.

“Sure. I guess.”

“I mean, there are some differences. We had ditches by our track. Come to think of it, I honestly believe they put them there for kids to hurl in from heat stroke or over-exertion… that’s what I did, anyway. It was right before I had to do triple jump. I hated it because you had to really build up speed. I didn’t want to run. So, even if I hadn’t thrown up from heat stroke, I probably would’ve made myself throw up some other way. Straight to the nurse. She gave me a popsicle.”

He glanced at you sideways. “Seriously?”

“Mmhm.”

“You’d rather throw up than hop, like, three times?”

“I said it was the running part I didn’t like.”

Wonwoo couldn’t imagine purposefully making himself upchuck in order to get out of something. If his anxiety was terrible enough, then he wouldn’t even have to worry about it, really.

That was its own mechanism of disaster.

“Running is eighty-percent of Activity Days," Wonwoo said.

You clicked your tongue at him. “Exactly. And I’d do anything to never run. I tried to sit in one time with the seventh graders. They were in their art block and they were doing painting under the trees; birdhouses or something. But their teacher kicked me out. And she didn’t even let me take the fucking birdhouse that I was painting.”

“The nerve,” Wonwoo answered, scratching his temple.

He proceeded to take a seat on the metal bench, rubbing his hands together. He still didn’t know how Mingyu fit into everything.

“So… what’s your plan, here?”

You sat next to him, folding one leg over your thigh and proceeding to reveal a journal that you had stuffed inside your expensive bag. The tips of your fingers skimmed through a few fluttering pages, until you stopped on one in particular that was ink-abused with cursive scribbles. Wonwoo assumed you did most of your planning on a laptop, hence his surprise to learn that you actually used a journal. He had a journal himself, though it hadn’t been touched in months. It mostly contained small poetic excerpts.

Next, you pulled out a pen.

“This is how I first ran into Mingyu. At my school’s track field. He was new and good at all the activities. I swear, his name spread like wildfire. Anyways, I haven’t figured out all the bits and bobs. I want to really soak in the feeling of—oh!” Suddenly, you grasped the journal back onto your lap, the pen hitting the paper in a cursive ribbon that Wonwoo could hardly read. “I just thought of a great line. His eyes, I wanted to soak in them, like an oasis.”

You stabbed the paper again to make a period.

“Not bad,” Wonwoo commented.

“Okay, here it is!” A black case was pulled from your purse, and once you unzipped it, Wonwoo realized it was the video camera that you had initially shown him at his apartment. “Okay, I want you to film some stuff. The field, obviously. I need it from different perspectives. It will help me with setting the scene later on.”

“Why do I have to film it?”

“Because, Seokmin told me you’re quite handy with film equipment stuff, and I don’t want to drop it. So just do it, please?”

Accepting the video camera from your hand, Wonwoo sighed in agreement. Flipping open the side-screen of the camera, Wonwoo began clicking some buttons and adjusting the focus. Luckily, he was familiar with the particular camcorder thanks to a film education course he’d taken outside of school.

While you busied yourself at the bleachers with starting up your laptop, Wonwoo began collecting footage, slowly panning the camera across the vast length of the gravel track and the grassy soccer fields situated beyond. He kept a concentrated eye on the side-screen to ensure the lighting wouldn’t change too drastically. A wind had picked up from over the forest, and he could see how the clouds were consequently being pushed along like herded sheep in the sky.

Once he brushed back the floppy, black hair that kept tickling his face, Wonwoo lowered the camera and turned to you.

“So, where else should I film?”

You were typing something, and didn’t bother looking up.

“Go across the field. Film from the other side.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah.”

“I have to go all the way over there?”

“Yes. Walk, crawl. Skip, hop. I don’t care. Just do it, please.”

“Jesus Christ,” he huffed out, feeling tired and yearning to go home, “I hate how seriously you’re taking this, y’know that?”

Your fingers continued blitzing against the keyboard.

“Nobody likes a complainer.”

Ironic, he thought, but obviously kept to himself.

There wasn’t a point in expecting any sympathy from you—that, he already knew—which engendered Wonwoo’s long, trudging walk from one side of the track to the other, the wind irritably blowing his grown-out locks over his glasses every time he attempted sweeping them back. Hoisting the camera back up, Wonwoo adjusted the side-screen and began his same ritual of steadily panning the camera along the landscape.

You appeared in the view, still sat on the bleachers, though nothing about your face or figure was too discernible. It felt like you were a background character in a painting, just a little glob of acrylic.

“All done?”

Finally, you had glanced up at him with a smile.

Wonwoo nodded. “Unless you need anything else filmed?”

“No, that should be enough. The track is most important.”

“Right.”

He tried giving back the camera.

“Actually, do you mind keeping it?”

“Um, okay. But how will you look at the footage?

“Dropbox. We’ll share one. Upload the clips there.”

Wonwoo plopped himself back down on the bench, fitting the camcorder into its black case. He pulled the zipper along the seam.

“How much longer do we need to be here?”

“Not that much. Just let me finish this paragraph.”

There was a dull pain throbbing at the front of his skull, edging down to his temples—across his nose bridge where his glasses pressed in more tightly than usual. He closed his eyes for a moment and inhaled a deep breath, trying to escape the feeling, the nausea, the chills that were beginning to seep up his neck as the wind blew turbulently against him. It would be embarrassing if this happened here, right in front of you. The hard lump had suddenly lurched forward in Wonwoo’s throat but he leaned his head down last minute and swallowed it despite the roughness. No, everything was okay.

“Hey, what’s wrong?”

Wonwoo opened his eyes, staring down at the trembling hands buried in his lap. Subtly, he pulled the sleeves of his cardigan over them. He assumed his face was reflecting a sheer, sickly opacity.

“Nothing.”

“Uh, sure. Now look me in the eyes and say that.”

Again, Wonwoo swallowed, but he managed nonetheless.

“Nothing’s wrong. I get headaches sometimes. That’s all.”

“… Oh. Well, I’m basically done here. I was gonna ask if you wanted to walk a lap around the track with me, but maybe we should just go home. I mean, how bad is it? Your headache?”

Yes, yes. Home. Wonwoo wanted to go home. He had only been away from his apartment for a solid two hours, and yet all his mind and body’s energy had completely drained. He felt dried out, withered, fragile as tempered glass. Going home sounded cosmic. 

“It’s getting better. I wouldn’t mind walking with you.”

“Oh! Cool. If it gets really bad, just tell me.” You then spent a minute collecting your belongings back into the cream purse.

Wonwoo immediately looked the other way, dragging a frustrated hand through his hair, mouthing a string of guttural curse words directed at his discombobulated head. Because what the hell was he doing? All his relief and peace had just suckled itself down an invisible drain. Why on earth did he agree? Why?

“I think this will help me, too," you said, having left the shiny bleachers behind, instead kicking the pebbles at your feet, “if we walk the entire track, then it’s like we did the four-hundred meter.”

“You’re supposed to run the four-hundred meter.”

“Well, I know that.”

“I’m surprised you hate running. I mean, you walk so fucking quickly sometimes.”

He heard you snort, clearly amused by his observation.

“It’s because I’ve mastered the art of sashaying. To have a perfect sashay, you can’t walk too slow, but you also can’t walk too fast. It’s like a strut. You need to have confidence while you do it. It lets people know that you’re serious and professional. I’m not dragging my feet, but I’m also not in a rush. It’s the perfect pace.”

Wonwoo sniffled and scrunched the glasses up his nose, continuing alongside you at a pace that was rather aimless.

“I didn’t realize there was a science behind sashaying.”

“Now you know,” you declared.

Wonwoo’s  upper lip quirked slightly, and a small grin appeared on his face, which was starting to dapple with colour.

“I don’t sashay, do I?”

At that, you laughed, “no, you amble.”

“Yeah, I’m an ambler… which basically means I’m an unmotivated, pointless person who will probably go nowhere in life.”

For a moment, you stopped walking, and you merely furrowed your brow at him while your forehead creased with thought. Wonwoo stopped as well. He raked back his fluttering, windswept hair and smirked, flashing his teeth. The behaviour was uncharacteristically snide and a bit of a dig at your bluntness, but he couldn’t help it.

“Don’t remember, huh?”

“No… but it sounds familiar.”

“You told me that, the day I met you—that people who walk slowly are unmotivated and pointless. Their life is a waste, basically.”

He noticed your eyes shift up toward the right, as though you were pulling the memory forward from the intricate files of your brain. And then you started to smile, and it made Wonwoo smile, too.

“Oh, I do believe I said that.” You started walking again, and he followed. “Ha! Wow, you’re right. I said that. I’m so funny. I mean, I was right. You only walk slow when you have nowhere to be.”

“I did have somewhere to be. I was going to meet you.”

“Well, then you just didn’t care.” He felt your elbow press shallowly into his rib. “See what I mean? Unmotivated and pointless. And, honestly, I would have taken your apathy as more of an insult if it wasn’t for the fact that you seem to treat most things like that.”

“So, I’m just supposed to accept that you’re calling me a loser? How do people normally react when you say things like that?”

“Things like what? They’re just my observations about the world. You are a person in this world. I was making an observation about you. Albeit, it came across strongly. But I don’t know. No one ever cared about being gentle or sugar-coating with me. Gives you tough skin, y’know? Metaphorically, of course! I always moisturize.”

 Wonwoo scoffed, smiling at your nonchalance. “The way you word things is honestly fascinating.”

“Psh. How do you even remember that?”

“I don’t know. Doesn’t seem that hard to remember. It was a pretty memorable, somewhat awful experience, to be fair.”

“Awful?” You retaliated in unprecedented disbelief, pushing into his arm until he allowed his tall frame to stumble. “Try again.”

“Interesting?” Wonwoo substituted, his heart thumping. 

Your eyes were narrowed at him, glimmering with a sharpness that made his fingers clench into anxious fists.

“… That’s a little better.”

He exhaled a soft breath of relief.

As you began nearing the full circle, Wonwoo realized his head had eased from its horrible aching and the chills dampening down his neck were gone. Everything didn’t feel as awful compared to before. He was still tired, and his energy was sputtering in tiny, dying sparks, but at least his desire to crawl under the earth and degrade to his bare bones had subsided into something less morose.

“I heard you were having a get together next week,” Wonwoo decided to ask, rounding the last bend in the track.

“Oh, the dinner party?”

“Yeah. Seokmin’s helping you plan it, right?”

“He is. Which I appreciate. My mom is usually the one in charge of everything, and she loathes it. But, I mean, when we try to help her, she just ends up fretting even more—says we’re basically getting in the way and ruining it. I don’t know. She’s such a snappy perfectionist. Seokmin can have fun dealing with that.”

Wonwoo almost made a thoughtless comment in response to your story—he’s probably had eons of practice with you—though the pieces connected just in time and his mouth sealed shut.

“Your dad can’t help either?” He questioned instead.

“Ha! No way. My dad helping is a recipe for fucking disaster if I’ve ever seen it. He’s painfully bad at decorating, can hardly be trusted to cook or invite anyone from the guest list. The most my mom allows him to do is set the table.” You then scoffed, shooting a pebble forward with the tip of your shoe. “I swear, he knows exactly how to push my mom’s buttons. The faster he does it, the quicker she kicks him out and he’s absolved of all chores. What a cheat, huh?”

“Hm, yeah… is Mingyu going?”

“Of course.” You smiled. “He always goes.”

At that point, you had circled back to the bleachers. Adjusting the bag strewn over your shoulder, you heaved out a longing sigh.

“Well, that’s four-hundred meters in the books.”

“Is it everything you hoped and dreamed it would be?”

You cackled, “not even close. I think I was right to avoid it.”

—MAY 3RD.

Wonwoo slid his pharmacy badge through the time-machine until he heard the beep. After an eight-hour shift, he was hungry and tired, but Wonwoo also knew the second that he got home, his urge to eat and desire to sleep would be gone. Instead, he would spend his midnight staring up at the ceiling, thinking. About anything and everything, and nothing at all. When the first cracks of dawn light would spill in from under his curtain, then he would close his eyes.

It was all very typical.

He stood outside the store, phone in hand, waiting for Vernon to pick him up because Wonwoo hadn’t felt like walking home despite the softness of the nighttime wind and the alabaster moon’s shining ambiance. The mirage was pretty and he enjoyed it, but his feet were too sore to inch him another step. Luckily, Vernon didn’t take long.

Luckily, he was the only one of Wonwoo’s few friends with a sleep schedule just as horridly fucked up as his. It was eleven at night, but on a weekday? The dead, empty street testified for him.

“Heyy, Glasses,” Vernon sang in his throaty voice as Wonwoo climbed into the passenger seat, “you look like a prostitute standin’ there, waitin’ for me to come get your ass. But a sophisticated one.”

The interior didn’t smell heavily of weed, he noted. Thank fucking god, Vernon had finally paid someone to dry clean it. Either that, or he took the initiative into his own hands.

“I highly doubt you have ever seen a prostitute in your entire life. And the fact you think they’d be standing outside a pharmacy at one of the quietest parts on this block attests to that.”

“God, I hate when you get all technical n’ shit. Such a stiff.”

“I’m tired.”

“Yeah, well. You’re always tired. N’ for the record, I have seen a prostitute, outside Room 319. It was a week before Christmas; she had this huge coat on, walkin’ up to people in her pink heels and this crazy eyeshadow that made her eyes pop. I bet she’s a nice girl.”

“Mhm. I bet she was.”

“Oh, you’re a cunt, yeah? You don’t believe me.”

“Does it matter?”

“I’ll take you one day. Room 319’s got a table with your name on it. They’ve got this one shot, the Stabilizer— it’ll put you down like a fuckin’ sick dog but it gets you the best drunk of your life. Maybe we’ll even run into Pink Heels lady. She’s our Halley’s Comet.”

“Halley’s Comet only comes once every seventy-five years. “

“You know what the fuck I meant.”

“Not interested.”

Vernon blinked at him for a moment in the dull light, and then he sighed, forfeiting. He placed the tip of the key in the ignition, but he quickly removed it as though he remembered something.

“Wait, I’ve gotta ask—how’s it going with Her?”

Biting down on the inside of his cheek, Wonwoo reached for the seatbelt and pulled it slowly across his chest, debating how intelligent of an idea it would be to entertain Vernon’s curiosity. But he could also understand the allure. You were like this enigmatic myth that people craved to know about, even if it frightened them.

Wonwoo’s head collapsed back against the seat.

“It’s going well.”

Vernon spat out a boisterous laugh, a hand slapping down on his knee. “Jesus Christ. You’re so dry, man. That’s it?”

“I mean, it’s true. We’ve started the book. Or, she has.”

“Okay, and?” Vernon attempted to engage him further.

“And, what?”

“What’s she like, obviously? Is she actually a fuckin’ psychopath? Is she normal? Can she walk on her hands? I dunno!”

Wonwoo rubbed underneath his glasses. He didn’t really want to talk about you when you weren’t there. It felt like a Bloody Mary situation, where you’d magically conjure in the backseat to sinch your cold hands around his neck and wrangle him limp and lifeless. But then there were Vernon’s shimmeringly prying eyes that just wouldn’t stop burning Wonwoo no matter how hard he bit his tongue.

“I have nothing to say. She’s cool.”

“Oh my fuckin’ God.” Vernon slacked back into his seat, clutching at his steering wheel. “You just don’t wanna talk about it… oh! Shit. I just remembered. She’s having a dinner party tonight, isn’t she? In Hill Crest. Or as I like to call it, Rich People Neighbourhood.”

“Yeah, that’s where her parents live… how do you know that?”

“Shit!” Vernon immediately shuffled up in his seat and delivered a hard smack into Wonwoo’s shoulder. “We should drive down and check it out! Right fuckin’ now!” He was lit up with excitement, even though Wonwoo considered it a terrible idea.

“No. Absolutely not. And answer my question.”

“Was sittin’ behind Seokmin at Solar Pop, he talks really loud, happened to overhear some things—doesn’t matter. I think we should go! C’mon, allow some spontaneity into your life! Why not?”

“What the fuck do you mean, why? It’s a family party. With some close friends, which—in case you haven’t noticed—neither of us are. You can’t fucking crash a family dinner party. Who does that? Not to mention the fact that it's eleven at night. They're probably washing up. Sending people home. By the time we get there, it's lights out."

“Aren’t you her friend?”

“No. I’m just someone who’s doing her a favour.”

“Favours are from friends.”

“We’re. Not. Friends.”

“Okay—fuck, Glasses. Fine. We won’t crash the stupid dinner party. But don’t you wanna go for a drive or something? I’m tellin’ you, the houses are insane. Last time I went down there, it was for a big fuckin’ party some dude at your university threw. I think I ran this by you already, when I talked about tryin’ to chat up Her. I stopped by with my old friend—y’know, Dots, the guy that died from the overdose and everything. That party was crazy. It was in a mansion.”

“Vernon,” Wonwoo had just finished massaging the throbs at his warm temples, “we are not going to Hill Crest.”

His friend swung his head in disapproval, making a tsking sound with his teeth. “Such a fuckin’ stiff.” He started the car. “It’s the fact I know you have jack shit to do tonight, or tomorrow.”

“I’m not gonna do some stalker drive-by on her house.”

“You don’t wanna do Room 319. You don’t wanna judge a bunch of richies sittin’ up in their ivory towers. I mean, it’s not like we’re eggin’ them or spray painting fuckin’ curse words on their eight-door garages. What do you wanna do?”

Wonwoo rolled down the window and leaned his face toward the moonlight, to which he could feel the wind brush up against his skin in feathery strokes, as though it were caressing him. He knew that Vernon meant in a general sense rather than in the heat of the moment. But in a general sense, Wonwoo would rather not be anywhere at all. He would rather do nothing, or even exist.

“Can you just take me home? Please?”

Vernon exhaled a defeated gust of breath and began to angle his tires away from the curb, the pharmacy lights pulled behind them.

“Yeah, ‘course. Mr. Boring.”

—01:49

Wonwoo hadn’t been able to fall asleep since Vernon dropped him off a couple hours ago. He’d anticipated that. Usually, Wonwoo wouldn’t do anything. He wouldn’t toss or turn, or pace circles around his bedroom, or count down from one-hundred, because even if he did, none of it would work. His mind would still be wide awake.

Hence Wonwoo’s decision to grab his phone. Staring at a lurid screen definitely wasn’t going to help, though he wasn’t trying to sleep, anyway. That conversation with Vernon was repeating in his head like a chattering bird, pushing him, pushing him, pushing him to find your Instagram and dig into your pictures because now Wonwoo was thinking of your dinner party and how vehemently you seemed to hate it. He saw that you had posted something quite recently, around the same time Wonwoo had left the pharmacy.

For a moment, his thumb hovered over the post.

He didn’t want to press it because he didn’t care.

Or, maybe he did.

There were multiple pictures in the set, and Wonwoo flicked through all of them. Some were of food, close-ups of your jewelry—you even included a picture with Seokmin. But then Wonwoo had settled on the last photo and something in his stomach convulsed.

He recognized the dress like a flash of light—the sapphire one with the glimmering detail that you had modelled for him at the expensive boutique in the mall. Of course, that arm hanging cheekily low around your hip belonged to your boyfriend, Mingyu. He had a champagne glass pressed to his lips, fitted in his black suit with his hair neatly combed and styled into place. The smugness in his face was stifling. Wonwoo rolled onto his stomach, his eyes refusing to drift from the picture for even an instant. He just kept staring.

Staring and thinking. Staring and thinking.

One minute spent staring at your smile.

The next minute at the low placement of Mingyu’s hand.

Another minute staring at your sparkling dress.

The next minute at Mingyu’s brutally cocky expression.

He would switch back and forth.

But Wonwoo didn’t really care. He was just bored.

And alone with his thoughts.

—END OF PART PART ONE.

NOTE! while i truly cherish & adore all comments, pls refrain from remarks such as "pls post part x" "i need part x" "when are you posting part x" while i do understand the sentiment, i find these comments very dismissive & kinda disrespectful! i don't prefer to post series fics and so i don't receive these often, but pls note that if you comment this i will delete the comment!

the fic itself is completely done, so all i have to do is get the parts ready for posting. however, bc this is the first part, i don't have a set posting schedule just yet. i think it will depend on roughly how long those who read the fic take to finish it! but i will be sure to make a post about it or include the schedule in part two once i figure it out!

again, thank u so much your ur patience :3

much luv!! 💕

We Were Destined To Fall (But I’ll Catch You) [Masterlist]

Pairing: Jeonghan x fem!reader, Seokmin x fem!reader

Featuring: Seokjin, Joshua

Synopsis: In which Yoon Jeonghan traded the fate of humanity for your love.

Genre: Angst, betrayal, greed, hint of fluff, greek myth!au, reincarnation, modern dystopia, historical, time jump/travel(?), one-sided pining/jealousy/implied love triangle (w/Seokmin), bestfriend!seokmin, fallen angel!jeonghan, sinner!reader, blacksmith!seokjin,  angel!joshua

Warnings: PG-13, may contain smut (pending), additional warnings specified per chapter. Contains inaccurate representations of history and time.

Disclaimer: Though the intent of this drabble seriesis not meant to be religious, there are religious references (e.g. angels, heaven vs hell, devil, Greek mythology, mentions of multiple deities rather than one). They are not accurate nor do they necessarily represent mine or SVT’s beliefs. All religions are welcomed here.

A/N: Important notes for this series under the cut!

Keep reading

raven unit I (m) jjk

Jeon Jungkook x Reader

‒ raven unit. (m) chapter one: gallaticus. ✎  [13k words]

genre: political!Au, taskforce!Au, warcrime!Au

warnings: eventual smut, angst, gore, violence, drug mentions, alcohol mention, graphic description of violence, death.  With your life at risk and several people around you dead, your loyal head of security makes sure your safety is taken care of when he’s out of the picture. Three ruthless, dangerous and deadly men take on the task to protect and hide you, Min Yoongi, Jung Hoseok and the one in command, Jeon Jungkook.  masterlist. chapter two. So, I would just like to mention I neglected my duties to write the requests sent my way because my good friend @diofulin​ had me thinking of this idea and when I knew it I had written 25k words and was looking at a small series. For what it’s worth, I hope you like it. Comment, reblog and I’ll be posting the nest chapter around Wednesday. 

Keep reading

a remedy for mondays 01 (m)

➾ 11.2k

➾ summary: all you wanted was just one day off work. but for that to happen, you need to invent a plausible reason. and then somehow, somewhere along the way, things get out of hand, and now people think you’re having a baby with your co-worker Park Jimin after a one-night stand. confused? join the club.

➾ warnings: impregnation kink (all that jazz, u guys should know by now), brief mention of pregnancy termination, future smut 

➾ a/n: this is written purely for fun & i hope you can understand my humour!!! please don’t go having babies just for some time off work. by the time i post this, it will be monday where i live. i hope this brings you all some joy :-) 

ps: thank you to @jimlingss, who always hears my crazy ideas out and encourages me to go for them. heck, sometimes she even brings it out of me. idk where i would be without you :”D

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💬🗯️💭 THOUGHTS ???

one shot smau’s about svt being horrifically down abysmal in chronological order

you might have some serious problems idk w jeonghan!

jeonghan plotting so that he can go on a date with the girl he saw in the library

there’s something seriously wrong with you too idk w joshua!

joshua fakes being a doctor so that the pretty girl in his class notices him

you might be an idiot idk w scoups!

scoups joins the basketball team so his crush notices him and his friends wingman for him

you need to get some help idk w jun!

jun pretending to be a tutor to get ask his crush out on a date

i think you need to have a discussion with a therapist idk w hoshi!

hoshi going the extra twenty miles to prove he should date you

ur still stupid idk w wonwoo

wonwoo wants to show you he’s your ideal guy that you tweet about

just tell her idk w woozi!

woozi helping your ‘little’ cousin with a music project because he’s scared of directly asking you out

i might’ve lost my mind idk w dokyeom!

dokyeom gets a dog bc the girl he likes wants one

you seem a little desperate idk w mingyu!

mingyu bothering the tl with his thirst traps for the girl he has a crush on

at least you’re determined idk w minghao!

minghao trying to make you confess after you guys had beef in high school

you make some poor decisions idk w seungkwan!

seungkwan says he’ll petsit for u

ur a little extra idk w vernon!

vernon starts a skincare brand to impress u

u need to get a grip idk w dino!

dino blowing his bank account to impress u

nocturnal | choi seungcheol [M]

summary ⇾ tipsy from after-work drinks, seungcheol returns home on friday night to find you asleep. he tries not to look, but his wandering eyes keep drifting over to your slumbering figure, and he knows rest won’t come easy when you seem to be tempting him even in your sleep. seungcheol could resolve his little predicament all by himself, but shouldn’t you be the one to take responsibility for making him feel this way?  

PAIRING // choi seungcheol x fem!reader

GENRE // some fluff, mostly smut, pwp (i mean it, I'm warning u), sub!reader, dom!seungcheol, fiancé!seungcheol

WARNING // 18+, explicit sexual content, established relationship, unprotected sex, somnophilia, consensual voyeurism, male masturbation, slight size kink, oral (m&f receiving), creampie, fingering (f receiving), edging, choking, thigh riding, talks about having kids, cheol is a teasing little sh*t

WORD COUNT // 13k

AUTHOR’S NOTE // 13k of just smut lol btw have yall seen GDA cheol? the all black fit and rolled up sleeves and the dark hair... moving on, happy new year to everyone who reads this, may 2024 bring us endless happiness and love ( ˊᵕˋ )♡.°⑅ do reblog if u enjoy this fic. I'm working on a wonwoo fic that has ten times more plot than this so pls stay tuned for that :) banner made by @/chosokei on tiktok & song rec is rock your body - clara la san

masterlist link

You're already in bed when your fiancé returns home from work, drifting in and out of sleep, wanting to wait for him to come home but unable to fight your weariness. Friday is always the busiest day at work, and the idea of being able to stay in bed until noon the next day only makes you want to wait up for him even more.

Seungcheol must think you're already asleep. It's reasonable that he thinks that way—you're a light sleeper and often go to bed early. He tries his best to stay quiet as he moves around. You had barely heard him enter the apartment, and only faint thuds of his sock-clad feet can be heard as he meanders around the house. 

When Seungcheol enters the bedroom, he's a little sceptical as to why the bedside lamp is still on, casting a dim, yellow glow across the room. His eyes search for you, finding you cocooned under the covers, lying on your left side with your back turned to him. He knows you can't sleep with any light on, but he deduces you must've been waiting for him and inevitably succumbed to sleep. 

Seungcheol moves toward the full-length mirror in the corner of the bedroom. He's slightly tipsy from downing a few beers with his co-workers after work. He feels light on his feet, and his once-gelled hair is no longer slicked back, some unruly strands now falling over his forehead. He hears you shift on the bed as he loosens his tie, but he doesn't think much of it, proceeding to unbutton his dress shirt.

Two buttons in, he hears movement from the bed again, and this time, he looks in your direction in the mirror, taken aback when his eyes meet your bleary ones. He turns his head to look at you, his mouth curling into a lazy smile. "I thought you were asleep," he says in a low voice. 

You say nothing, propping your elbow up on your pillow and leaning your head against it to get a better look at your fiancé. He turns back to the mirror, and you notice the rosy tint colouring his cheeks. You sigh dreamily, admiring him from the bed. Seungcheol is tall—that much is obvious—but those dress pants do his legs wonder. 

When he reaches for his belt, you can't help but stare. His dress shirt is still tucked into the pants, the first few buttons open, baring the soft skin of his chest. Your eyes wander, and you think Seungcheol does notice. The man does not miss a thing when it comes to you. 

The sound of his belt unbuckling makes your legs curl closer to your body, and Seungcheol definitely notices this time because he stops his movement, fingers hovering over the button of his pants. When he turns on his heels, your eyes finally snap back up to look at his face. He doesn't say anything as he approaches, coming to a stop beside the bed, towering over you.

He reaches one hand out to caress your cheek with the back of his fingers. It's a feathery touch, and your eyes naturally flutter close, head tilting into his touch just the slightest. Gentle fingers thread into your hair, brushing it back and tucking loose strands behind your ear.

Your eyes snap open when you feel his thumb against your bottom lip. At first, it's harmless, and he's only dragging the pad of his thumb across your lip, but then he starts to dip further into your mouth. He lets out a soft sigh when your lips part, allowing his thumb to rest against your tongue. Then, your mouth wraps around his finger, suckling at it softly, and his breath catches in his throat when he feels just how warm and wet your mouth is.

It's over before you want it to be. Seungcheol smiles a little too innocently, removing his thumb from your mouth and patting your cheek. "Get some rest, baby. I'm going to take a quick shower."

You don't stop him as he walks into the en suite bathroom, surprised that he hadn't immediately taken his clothes off and taken you right then and there. Seungcheol's self-control has always been immaculate when it comes to sex, but refusing to do it on a Friday night when neither he nor you have work tomorrow morning? You chalk it up to his exhaustion after working overtime, so you lie back in bed, eyes refusing to close even though your body is screaming at you to rest.

Seungcheol emerges from the bathroom not even a minute later, shirtless, belt discarded, pants unbuttoned. He takes off his silver Rolex, carefully setting it down on the bedside table near his side of the bed—as always. To your disappointment, he doesn't spare you even a glance before walking back into the bathroom.

You find yourself sighing, anticipating what seems to be an uneventful Friday night. You and Seungcheol usually spend Friday nights together— going out for dinner or unwinding with a movie on the couch. But if your lover is too tired to do anything other than sleep, you understand. You also have days when you feel too drained to do anything other than lie in bed and mull over your thoughts. Besides, it isn't like you don't have the entire weekend to make up for it—hell, you have your whole life to make up for it. 

Seungcheol leaves the bathroom door open behind him. It's not strange for either of you to keep the bathroom door open while showering. Privacy isn't much of an issue for both of you. 

You fall back asleep relatively quickly, not thinking much about the fact that the shower hasn't started running even though Seungcheol has been in the bathroom for at least five minutes.

You awaken again soon enough to the sound of soft sighs and some rustling from the direction of the couch placed near the bedroom door. At first, you try to ignore it, thinking Seungcheol might just be getting himself ready for bed. Then another sigh follows, and you peek an eye open to take a quick look. What you think will be a quick look turns into so much more. 

Your beloved fiancé sits with his legs spread on the white couch, still shirtless and wearing his dress pants. This time, however, his boxer has been pushed down just slightly, and he's lazily stroking his cock in his hand, his other arm splayed across the backrest of the couch. His skin is pale and milky, glowing in the golden light. He smiles when you prop yourself on your elbow, blinking blearily as if trying to comprehend what you are currently seeing.

He's rock hard, shaft glistening with pre-cum. You and Seungcheol have always loved trying new things in bed, pushing yourself to the limit, testing just how far each of you will go before you tap out. But this... the thought that Seungcheol was touching himself to the sight of you asleep—it stirs something in you. You've always loved waking up with Seungcheol's cock inside you. The drag of his cock feels especially good when you're still drowsy, trying to pull yourself together but failing each time because your lover just feels so good inside you. But this is different.

Seungcheol's hand speeds up, and the way he groans makes you lose your train of thought. The silver ring sits snugly on his little finger—the coolness of it must feel so good on his cock. You don't break eye contact, shifting onto your stomach and folding your arms underneath your head as you watch him. You wouldn't be able to look away even if you wanted to.

Seungcheol grits his jaw when he sees you smile. It's the last thing he expects. You look so sweet, and he starts to wonder about the sight he would be met with if he were to pull the covers away from your body. Are you wearing the sheer nightgown he always loves seeing on you? Or maybe you're wearing nothing, and he'd be able to spread your legs apart and slip himself right into the warmth of your needy cunt.

Seungcheol straightens his posture just a little, cock twitching in his hold at the sight of your smile. You look so at ease, enjoying this more than he had anticipated. He was half expecting to get an earful from you, thinking you would probably scold him for his bizarre behaviour, but this, he wasn't expecting at all, and that makes his cock harden, balls tightening almost painfully. Seungcheol feels as though he's about to burst from the inside. Your smile—as if you're taunting him, teasing him.

"Fuck, fuck..." he breathes out, head tilting back, eyes closing, savouring the feeling of his rough, calloused hand moving up and down his cock. The fact that you're most likely still watching him makes his abs tense up, trying to hold back from finishing too fast. It has barely been ten minutes since he started, but the sight of your smile feels like it's burned into the back of his eyelids. It makes his brain go haywire.

He risks another look at you and immediately realises he has made a grave mistake. Instantly, he's cumming hard, unable to hold himself back because you're looking at him so prettily—slow blinks and a sleepy smile. A loud groan rips from Seungcheol's chest, fist wrapped around the tip of his cock, stroking it just barely, trying to milk everything out. His cum trickles down his knuckles, down his shaft.

The intensity of your gaze, fixed squarely on his leaking cock, spurs Seungcheol to stand up. He rids himself off his dress pants and boxers, using the latter to wipe off most of his release before walking closer to you. Seungcheol stops on the side of the bed, stroking his softening cock almost languidly. He doesn't have to say anything, and you're already sitting up against the headboard, reaching a hand to grab at his wrist to pull him even closer. Seungcheol perches one knee on the bed, watching as you lick your lips at the sight of his cum. You're still fucking smiling, and he feels himself growing hard again.

"Enjoyed that, did we?" he says quietly, trying not to break the peace and quiet too much in case you feel like going back to sleep after his little 'show'. 

"Very much," you reply, voice slightly scratchy from sleep. 

Seungcheol is so thick everywhere, and it makes you dizzy. Your eyes roam over his chest, bulky arms, and firm thighs. Your lover has always been strong and filled in all the right places, and you love it. He has no problem picking you up, tossing you around, manhandling you into different positions. He doesn't struggle with keeping you steady when he's fucking you against the wall or any other surface.

You brush aside his hand from his cock, tongue lolling out to lick at the excess cum on his knuckles, cleaning it off his skin. The salty, bitter taste floods your tongue, and you immediately take him into your mouth. Seungcheol hisses when you do, loving the way your mouth envelopes him. You don't waste any time trying to take all of him in, mouth stretching almost painfully around the heavy girth that's starting to harden again, your thighs pressing together to get some friction. You must look pitiful to Seungcheol, trying to fit all of him in your mouth in your sleepy state, hips shifting slightly on the bed, trying to get some relief.

Breathing in, you look up—right into his eyes—before moving forward until the tip of your nose presses into his lower stomach. He breathes out a chuckle when you gag, throat constricting around his cock. Your eyes fill with tears, but you don't pull away until you're sputtering and the droplets of tears trickle down your cheeks. Seungcheol's quick to cup your jaw, thumb brushing against the pearling teardrops on your cheek. "Easy, baby... I know you're tired. Don't force it..."

Hearing Seungcheol's instructions, you stick to shallow motions, using your hand to stroke the rest of his length you can't fit in your mouth. Seungcheol's hip jerks forward a little when you drag your tongue along the underside of his cock, tracing the veins and circling the tip. Seungcheol mumbles an apology as he weaves a hand through your hair and starts to thrust his hips forward little by little, lost in the feeling of your mouth.

His cock glistens with your spit in the low light, and your eyes fall shut naturally, basking in the quiet noises Seungcheol is making. He doesn't force you to take all of him, pulling his hips back before the tip of his cock can reach your throat. You appreciate his sentiment, even if you feel awake enough to take whatever he gives you. 

Your eyes snap open when you feel the cold air against your bare legs. Seungcheol has yanked the blanket away from your body and is now peering down at your exposed form, clad in his grey shirt and a pair of white panties. Your panties are nothing special, but Seungcheol feels his cock twitch in your mouth when he sees the wet patch on the crotch of your underwear.

He can feel the vibration of your moan against his cock when his finger grazes over the damp spot on your panties. He can't resist using the tips of his fingers to rub over your clothed pussy, teasing up and down the slit, watching the way the drenched fabric sticks to your dripping cunt—thoroughly soaked and ruined before he has even done anything to you. 

When you pull away from his cock momentarily to take a much-needed breath, Seungcheol immediately leans down to capture your lips with his in a bruising kiss. He swallows all your moans, rolling his tongue over yours, dragging it against your lower lip. He doesn't pull away, even as he tugs the crotch of your panties to the side and starts to circle your clit with his fingers, which makes your legs snap shut, trapping his hand in between.

Seungcheol pulls away from the kiss, glancing down at his trapped hand before looking back at you almost expectedly. "Open," he commands. You don't need to be told twice, immediately parting your legs.

"Good girl..."

Seungcheol prods at your hole with two fingers, slipping both in only halfway. They slide in easily, slick from the wetness seeping out of your pulsing hole and the remnants of precum messily smeared all over his cock as he was jerking himself off.

"You got this wet from watching me? Or were you touching yourself before I got home?" Seungcheol grunts, gazing down at the way your pussy is fluttering around his fingers. The squelching sound is obscene, resounding throughout the bedroom. "Messy little thing..." he mumbles quietly, lost in thought as he lets his fingers dip into you right down to the knuckle. 

You gasp, pulling your mouth away from his cock to look up at his face. Seungcheol doesn't meet your eyes, seemingly entranced by the sight of his fingers between your legs. Bending one of your knees, you spread your legs wider. After dating Seungcheol for two years and being engaged for one and a half, you don't feel the need to hide from him nor the embarrassment of presenting yourself to him like you're his to own and use as he pleases. In all honesty, he possesses every part of you—your heart, your soul, every inch of your body. He is yours as much as you are his. 

When Seungcheol adds a third finger, he finally looks back at your face, not wanting to miss how your eyebrows furrow and mouth gape open at the tight fit. His fingers are thick—much more so than yours—but his cock is even more so, and he definitely needs to stretch you out to get you ready, or he will risk hurting you. There are occassions when a little bit of pain is most welcome, but tonight, his main objective is to give you pleasure.

With a trembling hand, you reach up to grasp at his cock, stroking him slowly, matching the pace of his fingers as they dip in and out of you. You know you won't be able to use your mouth properly, not when he's touching you so earnestly and looking down at you as though he hasn't ever seen you in such a position in your years of being together. 

"You touch yourself before I came home, sweetheart?"

You're quick to shake your head, slumping further down the headboard as he continues to play with your pussy. "No..." you whimper, jolting when he suddenly curls his fingers, tips of his fingers firmly pressing up against the spongy spot inside you that sends a current of pleasure darting up your spine. "I got so wet from watching you, Cheol," you sigh out, hips canting up to match the movement of his hand. "I love watching you..."

Seungcheol hums, grinning down at you, pleased with your response. "Aw, my baby always loves watching me, isn't that right?" 

His free hand envelopes the hand around his cock, urging you to keep stroking him. The ring on his middle finger glints in the light—it's the ring you gave him a week after his proposal. It serves as a reminder that no one else but him has the privilege to have you like this. No one else will ever get to touch you, kiss you, make love to you, and fuck you the way he intends to tonight. You're his, forever, and the idea has him grunting out your name breathlessly. 

With his hand atop yours, he guides your hand up and down his length at a pace that makes him hiss. Your hand is much smaller than his, fingertips barely meeting around his thick girth. His skin prickles whenever you tighten your hand around him just slightly every time your hand reaches just under the head of his cock, squeezing him just the way you know he likes it. 

"Fuck..." he exhales, sweat beading down his temple. "So good, sweetheart..."

"Cheol..."

"Hm? Tell me what's wrong."

You glance down at the hand between your legs, feeling short of breath from watching the way your slick seems to coat Seungcheol's fingers, some staining your thigh, some smeared on the palm of his hand. You suck in a big breath, stomach caving in. When you return your gaze to him, you're surprised to find he's already looking at you, the tip of his pink tongue peeking out to rest against his bottom lip. The way he's looking at you makes you feel sweltering hot. 

"My shirt, p-please," you stutter out, feeling suffocated in only one layer of clothing. 

Seungcheol immediately understands what you're asking, but he makes no move to take your shirt off. You whine when he suddenly retracts his fingers from your pussy, leaving you feeling so empty. He peels your hand off his cock, leaving you baffled and so goddamn frustrated. 

"Cheol, why'd—"

He hushes you, lowering himself onto the end of the bed. He grabs both your thighs, pulling you down from the headboard. His cock nudges against the back of your thigh, so close to where you want him the most. 

"Oh, God," you breathlessly pant. "Need you inside me," you tell him, feeling frenzied. You move to pull off your shirt, but he grunts, shaking his head. 

"Don't," he orders, using his grip on your thighs to spread your legs wide enough for him to be able to get a good view of your sloppy cunt, all slick and puffy from the onslaught of his fingers. "I like seeing you in my shirt," he says in a faraway voice, distracted by the sight of your pussy, hole clenching around nothing, almost inviting him to dive right in. 

You groan, propping yourself up onto your elbows, chest heaving. You lick at your dry lips, sending Seungcheol a pleading look, but he doesn't meet your eyes, too absorbed with the mess in between your legs. "Cheol, baby—"

Without warning, Seungcheol leans down, shoving his face into your pussy, mouth hungrily devouring your heat. You fall back onto the bed with a startled shout, jaw hanging open as you try to comprehend the sudden onslaught of pleasure that threatens to consume you whole. Seungcheol is good with his mouth and familiar enough with your body to know how to bring you close to the edge in only minutes. 

He's sucking at your clit noisily, manic with his movements like a starved man getting his first taste of food after days without it. He's greedy and ravenous, offering you no respite—not even a moment to catch your breath. 

You try to tell Seungcheol to slow down, to give you even a second to compose yourself, but only garbled moans of his name come out. By now, sleep is the last thing on your mind—only pleasure clouds it. You're trembling under him, helpless against the relentless assault of his mouth. 

When Seungcheol groans, the vibration on your most sensitive part makes you choke on air, lowering a hand down to grab the strands of his dark hair. When you try to move away from him, he clutches onto your thighs tighter, tongue teasing at your hole, swirling but never diving in. You're still trying to get away, overwhelmed. He notices this, and he brings both his arms around your thighs, hugging your legs close around his head. There's no room to move—he has you locked in. 

"Fuck, please, please, s-slow down! C-Cheol!"

He doesn't, lapping up all your juices, groaning at how your taste coats his tongue and how your smell overtakes his senses. He trusts you to say the safe word if it becomes too much. He also knows that you can take this—he has done far worse things to you before. 

The tip of his nose presses against your clit when he delves his tongue into your pussy, earning a rather rough pull of his hair from you. The pain shoots down his spine, making him slump down onto the bed to grind his bare cock on the bed. All of it makes him so light-headed. Your legs are tightening around his head, trapping him, but he doesn't mind, not even if your moans sound muffled this way. He'll get to hear you later when he fucks you silly into the mattress anyway. 

Tears brim in your eyes. Your tongue sticks to the roof of your mouth, dry from moaning so much. It's almost too much—how he is so ruthless with his mouth and tongue. He doesn't let up once, breathing in and out through his nose, delighted to be suffocated between your plush thighs. It's pure fucking torture, but it feels divine.

"Cheol... C-Close," you whisper, hoping he can hear you. 

He doesn't hear you, but he knows you enough by now. He knows the telltale sign of your orgasm approaching, knows how tight you get when you're about to cum, knows how your back arches and your toes curl. He looks at your face and reads your lips, repetitions of his name spilling past it. 

Then he's pulling your legs away from the sides of his head, ripping his mouth from your pussy. Your orgasm is brutally stolen from you, and the sheer frustration that surges through you makes you howl out his name. To make it worse, he only chuckles at you, hands rubbing comfortingly at the side of your thighs. The touch should be soothing, but it only leaves you angered. 

The sheer audacity of this man—

"You asshole," you spit out with all the venom you can muster, chest rising and falling rapidly. Tears of frustration trickle down your cheeks, and Seungcheol thinks the sight would be so lovely if he hadn't just been devouring you like you were his first meal in months. 

"Aw, don't be like that, baby..." he coos sweetly, lips and chin glossy with your juices. He wipes his face with the back of his hand before swiftly grabbing at your soiled panties, pulling them off you and tossing them somewhere in the room. He adjusts your legs, straightening both and letting them dangle over one of his shoulders. Holding his cock in his hand, he strokes it twice and then runs the tip up and down your slit.

"Choi Seungcheol, you're—you..." you trail off, finding yourself drawing a blank, still shocked by how he so meanly robbed you of your orgasm when it had been right at your fingertips. That, combined with how his cock is lightly dipping into your hole, leaves you feeling an untamed emotion, a sensation of chaos where you feel completely out of control, an experience both terrifying and exhilarating.

"Did you just call me Choi Seungcheol? We've been together for years, baby—let's not use full names now," he warns you before he sinks into you in one fell swoop, stuffing you full of every inch of him. There's a brief flash of pain as you try to adjust to the sudden stretch, hands tugging at the bedsheets and eyes rolling back. You hear him chuckle, prompting you to look up at him. You regret it almost immediately because the sight of him makes your hips lift off the bed, a strangled moan leaving you.

Your orgasm crashes into you like a freight train, sudden and jarring. You don't even register it yourself at first, at least not until the overwhelming ecstasy makes you go stiff in Seungcheol's hold, sobbing at the surge of pleasure that has striked you so abruptly. You had not had time to prepare yourself, so you try grounding yourself by grabbing his biceps and clawing at the smooth skin, leaving tender, red marks. 

"G-God, oh God, Cheollie," you whine, pinching your eyes shut because everything feels too fucking good, and you're struggling to bring yourself down from this euphoria and anchor yourself in the present. 

Seungcheol doesn't realise what's happening right away. He feels the way you clench hard around him, walls squeezing him so tight that he can't help but let out a small groan. He's caught off guard when he feels your nails digging into his arms. You're writhing underneath him—quivering, shaking—and finally, it dawns on him what has just unfolded. You just fucking came, all because he had eased his cock into your warm cunt. 

"Oh, baby..." he mutters, snickering quietly to himself. He coaxes you through your orgasm, pressing soft kisses on the side of your thigh. "Shh, good girl, that's it, ride it out for me, darling..." he murmurs against your skin, fighting back the urge to start moving his hips and fucking you through your orgasm. You've never been this sensitive before, and he knows he needs to approach this situation carefully. He doesn't want to overstimulate you too much and too soon, both for your sake and his. 

Seungcheol is equally perplexed and impressed at how little it had taken you to cum. All he had to do was slip himself into you, and you were coming undone under him? He feels his cock twitch at the thought. Seungcheol's only a man, and what you did has inflated his ego tenfold. He thinks nothing could ever top this moment, and he doesn't intend to let you live it down. 

You're not sure just how long it takes you to collect yourself. A gentle palm smoothes down your cheek, tucking your hair behind your ear. The soft voice is murmuring your name, pulling you back down, down, down from your drunken daze. 

"I'm sorry," you say, still a little disoriented, gaze unfocused. You see Seungcheol's outline and see his lips moving, but you don't hear anything except the pounding of your heart in your ears. You blink a few times, forcing yourself to adjust and snap out of whatever trance you were momentarily stuck in. "I'm sorry," you repeat after finally regaining your awareness. Your eyes zero in on Seungcheol—you can see him clearly now. 

"Darling, believe me, an apology is the last thing I need," he says, slightly relieved that you seem to be returning to your senses now. He carefully sets your legs to the side, leaning down and hovering over you with a leering smile. He has you caged in his arms, looming over you with his broad frame, making you feel small. "All I need—" he begins, nosing at your jaw, breathing in your smell, "—is for you to beg."

You let out a shuddering breath, feeling the tip of his cock nudge at the back of your thigh. Somewhere in the middle of your orgasm, Seungcheol had pulled himself out of your pussy, knowing he would most likely reach his own climax if you kept clamping down on him the way you did. 

"Beg?" you echoed back, tilting your head up, giving him more access to litter kisses on your neck. 

"Mhm..." He lets his teeth graze over the sensitive skin under your jaw, not biting, just gliding over your pulse point. "Beg me to make you cum again." He ends his sentence with a playful nip on your jaw, loving how you jolt under him in surprise. 

His request isn't unusual or odd in any way. Seungcheol has said worse things to you before—things so filthy and obscene it would make a sailor blush. His words carry an unfamiliar weight this time, provoking a shyness in you that you never anticipated would be caused by his words alone. 

Warmth begins to creep up your neck, and a lump forms in your throat as something akin to humiliation washes over you. The weight of the situation starts to dawn on you. Seungcheol hadn't even had the chance to move before you were creaming all over him like a bitch in heat. The thought of it makes you want to curl into yourself and hide until morning. 

Seungcheol must feel you tensing up because he's immediately pulling away from the crook of your neck, searching your face with his eyes. You avert your eyes to the side, unable to meet his gaze with the wild embarrassment coursing through you. 

"What's wrong?" he asks you. "Look at me, baby..."

You sigh, knowing he wouldn't just let this go. Still, as you drag your gaze back to his, you can't help the shameful furrow of your eyebrows. 

Seungcheol immediately knows. "Are you... embarrassed?" he asks, the corners of his mouth curling up just slightly. 

You groan, pushing at his chest to get him to roll over to his side of the bed. He doesn't resist, moving over to give you enough space to sit up on the bed. "Ugh... 'm not embarrassed," you grumble, tucking your feet under your legs so you're sitting cross-legged on the bed. You feel Seungcheol's hand on your back, palm warm over the shirt you're still wearing as he rubs up and down to soothe you. The gesture only makes you feel even more ashamed, especially since you can hear the quiet laughter he's emitting beside you. 

Seungcheol finds it so endearing when you press your hands to your face, hiding yourself from him. His grin widens when you whine into your hands. "What are you so embarrassed for?" he asks, fully knowing the answer but still baffled about how you're so flustered from doing something that he wants to keep stored in his memory until the end of his days. The way your bewildered face had morphed into one of pure ecstasy as your orgasm washed over you is something he wants to be able to replay in his mind again and again. 

His cock jerks at the memory, and he swiftly hauls the comforter up to the middle of his torso to cover himself up. He calls out your name softly, but you don't answer him, still hiding yourself with your hands. He lets out a small sigh, knowing he'll have to get your attention some other way. 

He soon notices your engagement ring sitting on the bedside table. He knows you avoid wearing it to bed, too worried that it might slip off during the night due to your restless sleeping habits. Then, he comes up with the perfect distraction. 

Reaching over, he swiftly grabs the ring from the table before settling back into his previous position. The movement makes you retract your hands from your face, curiously glancing at him.

Seungcheol is smiling, dimples on full display. You resist the urge to poke at the little dents on his cheeks, still feeling bashful about the incident. Then, you notice the small object he's fiddling with in his hand. He's tinkering with your ring, turning it over with his fingers, fitting it around his index, grinning when it doesn't even reach halfway down his digit. 

Seungcheol's eyes seem to darken when he returns his gaze back to yours. His teeth sink into his bottom lip as he grabs your left hand, fitting the ring on your finger. The way it fits so perfectly around your supple finger evokes something primal within him. How such a small thing can symbolise the commitment and love you both have for each other is such a wonder to him. He knows that no wealth or material possessions could ever encapsulate the depth of affection he holds for you, let alone this piece of jewellery.

"If this is your way of distracting me so I don't think about what happened earlier..."

Seungcheol rolls his eyes playfully. "You're welcome to forget about it all you want, but it's gonna keep playing in my mind like a broken record whether you like it or not."

You release a sigh but refrain from arguing because Seungcheol's words ring sincere, and you're aware he wouldn't acknowledge your embarrassment anyway. 

He brings your hand to his mouth, tenderly kissing the ring. The gesture is intimate, even if he feels something entirely more carnal stirring in his stomach. "You're so much smaller than me. Could barely even fit the ring on my finger," he comments, thumbing at the small diamond sitting prettily atop the ring. 

Through your blush, you manage a reserved smile. "That's because you're so thick everywhere."

You don't mean the sentence in a weird way, but judging from Seungcheol's booming laughter, he definitely misinterpreted your words. He squeezes your hand once before tugging you down to settle half of your body on top of his. He lets you join him under the covers before cupping your cheek, urging you to look at him. 

"I'm thick everywhere, hm?" he teases you, watching how red immediately stains your cheeks. 

"Don't be gross," you grumble, letting him trail kisses from your wrist, then up to your palm, and settling on your ring. "What's with you and the ring anyway?" you ask him, finding it sweet but slightly odd that he seems so fixated on it. 

"I just had a thought, that's all," he responds, kissing each of your fingertips. 

"Go on." 

"That one day—" he says, eyes burning into yours heatedly, "—there'll be a wedding band beside this one, and you'll finally be mine forever." He says it airily, as if it's the most natural proclamation, with unwavering certainty in his emotions. 

Your heart sings at the declaration. "You're wrong on the last part." You press a fleeting kiss on his mouth, smiling when his eyebrow raises questioningly. "I don't need to be married to you to be yours."

Seungcheol grins, one of his hands skimming down your back, grabbing a handful of your ass over the oversized shirt you're wearing. "You don't know half the things you do to me, do you?" 

"I do, actually, and I plan to abuse that power," you jest, beginning to sit up, throwing one leg over your lover's hips to straddle him. 

Seungcheol is awestruck at the sight of you on top of him. You, all beautiful and celestial, and all his. He wants to worship you, ruin you, and defile you all at the same time. He's not in the right mind to say anything yet, so he only watches, both hands gliding up and down your thighs, getting higher each time, hiking the fabric of your shirt higher up as well. 

He breathes out a sigh when he allows himself to look down. Your pretty pussy is on display, all for him, with remnants of your juices on it and some smeared on your inner thighs. He's about to touch when you grab his wrist, slowly guiding his hand towards where you need him the most. He knows what you're asking of him, and he'd be stupid to deny you your wish. 

You gasp when Seungcheol starts running two of his fingers up and down your slit, coating his fingers in the wetness of your cunt, unafraid to get messy. When he sinks both fingers into your hole, you can't help but mewl, one hand grabbing onto his bicep and the other still wrapped around his wrist. 

"So wet for me, darling... You're fucking dripping all over my fingers," he says once he finally regains his voice back. 

Seungcheol is much stronger than you, and he could easily rip away the hand on your wrist and finger fuck you to oblivion the way he usually does it. This time, however, he lets you guide him, allows you to move your hips to match the rhythm of his movements, and allows you tug his hand closer to reach deeper into you each time he buries the digits. He's still holding the reigns, and he knows that—even if you're the one sitting on top of him—but seeing you try to handle and manage your pleasure all by yourself is so fucking—"Cute."

"Oh... fuck," you breathe out, swallowing hard when Seungcheol folds his free arm and tucks it under his head. He's pretty—bicep bulging and veins crawling up his arms. 

He grins when your pussy tightens around his fingers. "Think you could cum like this?"

"Mhmm..." You sit up straighter, balancing yourself with both hands firmly planted on Seungcheol's shoulders. Slowly, you switch to bouncing on his fingers instead of rolling your hips, wincing slightly at the burn of your thighs. Still, you push through the pain, aching for release, pressure in your stomach tightening at the way his fingers seem to reach deeper inside you at the new angle.

"Pretty, pretty girl," Seungcheol mumbles, more to himself than to you, but you still hear it anyway. It makes you light-headed. You love Seungcheol degrading you during sex, but hearing his compliment brings out a visceral reaction in you. It makes you giddy and scatterbrained—as though every coherent thought in your head simply just... wilts away. 

You bite your lip at his praise, eyelids drooping slightly, a dreamy look settling over your gaze. Seungcheol thinks this is his favourite look on you. You're not saying anything, but your eyes tell a story of themselves. He can see it—the way you're practically begging for him and his cock. 

"Please," you whisper, continuing to fuck yourself on Seungcheol's fingers, moaning wantonly at the mix of pain and pleasure. You're squeezing his shoulders with your hands, nails occasionally digging into his skin whenever the pleasure becomes a little too much. You're so close, and you think Seungcheol knows it as well. 

"That's right, baby. Is my pretty girl close?" he asks, shifting slightly underneath you, cock throbbing at the lack of attention, hard as rock at the adorable sight of you bouncing on top of him. He loves the way you look in his shirt, but he thinks he'd much rather see your perky tits jiggling in his face as you ride him instead. 

"Mhm, c-close," you profess, hands restless, wandering down to his smooth chest before settling around the base of his neck. You don't squeeze, only letting your hands linger as you chase your high. 

Seungcheol chuckles when he notices the delicate grasp of your hands around his neck. He knows you won't put pressure—you're too meek for that. And no, he's not underestimating you. In fact, you might be the only person in the world capable of reducing him to his knees with a glance. But between the two of you, it has always been him who would dare to do such a courageous feat. 

Seungcheol does exactly that. He slips his hand from under his head and clasps it around your neck, watching your eyes widen when he applies the slightest pressure onto the sides of your throat. You always cum so much quicker when he has at least one hand around your neck. 

Your whole body stiffens at the contact, pussy fluttering wildly around his two digits. "O-Oh, f-fuck, fuck!" You let your head tip to the side, eyes fluttering close as you near your high. Your legs are starting to go numb, but that's the least of your concerns when your climax feels like it's looming right around the corner. 

"Attagirl... that's it," Seungcheol drawls, applying more pressure when he feels your pussy squeezing tight around him. At this point, you must be growing dizzy from the lack of air and blood. He's careful not to apply any more force than he currently is. "What a pretty necklace," he taunts, awed by how perfectly his hand wraps around your neck. You're so much smaller compared to him. "Pretty necklace for my pretty girl..."

"Ungh, 'm cumming," you manage to slur out, movements growing more frantic, rhythm getting more sporadic the closer you get.  

"Look at me, sweetheart." 

It takes you a few seconds to register what he is asking. Your eyes drag over to his face. It's torture knowing you could be riding his cock instead of his fingers, but you know he'll want you to finish what you started. His fingers are doing a heavenly job, but the stretch isn't quite enough. You don't say that to him, though, knowing he'd probably give you hell for voicing it. He'd say you're insatiable and edge you until there are no tears left for you to cry. 

"There you are..." he says once your eyes meet his. There's a hunger in his stare—an unspoken promise of the things he will do to you once you've finished fucking yourself on his fingers. Your whole body tenses, cheeks burning when he nods as though urging you to let go. "Can you look at me when you cum? Can you do that for me?"

When Seungcheol adds the smallest amount of pressure on the grip around your neck, you can't help the unadulterated moan that spills past your lips. You're so fucking dizzy, vision blurring on the edges. It's getting increasingly difficult to keep your eyes locked onto his when the world feels like it's about to crash down on you. 

You still have your hands on his neck, and for a moment, you're distracted by how your engagement ring sits on your ring finger. The fat, silver diamond is a stunning contrast to his golden complexion. 

"Come on, don't get distracted now. Cum for me so I can finally get you on my cock, hm?"

You come apart with a broken shout of his name, soaking his fingers with your cum, milky slick trickling down his knuckles and dripping on his stomach. At the height of your pleasure, Seungcheol decides to release his hold on your neck, letting the air and blood rush up to your brain. The sudden surge feels exhilarating, rendering you frozen in bliss as the feeling rips through you. 

"Fuck, sweetheart," he remarks, his free hand coming up to brush back the hair from your face, letting your head loll into his hand sluggishly as it braces the back of your head. You look exhausted, back slouched and chest heaving. Still, he notices the way you're slowly grinding on his fingers. He knows you need more. "That looked like it felt good."

You nod, letting him slip his fingers out of you, sucking in a sharp breath at the sudden emptiness. "So good. Thank you..." Everything feels like it's aching—your legs, your back, and your pussy most of all. You're far from done, but you allow yourself to rest, lowering yourself to lie on top of him, face buried into his neck. You breathe his scent and allow it to root you in the moment. 

Seungcheol wipes his stained fingers on your shirt, tsking you when you whine in protest. "It's literally your cum—why are you so grossed out about it?" he teases. 

"Because..." you say slowly. When you realise you have nothing to say, you pick your head up, blinking at him. 

Seungcheol hums, eyes amused when he looks down at you. "Mhm?"

You don't have an answer, so you kiss him instead. Seungcheol welcomes the kiss, letting his tongue meet with yours in a feverish kiss that makes your hands cling fervently to his hair. You're shifting on top of him restlessly, letting your pussy settle over the length of his cock, sighing heatedly into his mouth and letting his tongue swirl around yours sloppily. 

Seungcheol grunts at the way you let your pussy slip up and down his throbbing cock. Your cunt is hot and so fucking wet, and he feels like he might combust from how good you feel against him. 

Two orgasms should've been enough for you, but you know you won't feel fully sated without Seungcheol's cock dipping in and out of your pussy, leaving it all messy in a mix of your cum. You're not sure whether you can cum again, but you do know you want Seungcheol's cum inside of you, and soon. 

"Inside," you whisper against Seungcheol's lips, not letting him respond before you smash your lips to his again. Reaching down to grab at his cock, you're just about to line the tip with your hole when he shoves you away with a harsh grip on your arm. 

You yelp in surprise, the world turning into a blur, hardly comprehending that you're no longer sitting on top of him. You're now lying on your back, staring wide-eyed up at Seungcheol as he hauls your shirt off, leaving you just as naked as him. 

Seungcheol can't help how his eyes gravitate towards your tits, all on full display for his eyes to feast on. "Fucking perfect," he mutters, one hand jerking up and down his cock as his eyes roam up and down your body, taking everything in. The sight isn't foreign to him, but all the blood still rushes to his dick the same way every time. You're too fucking perfect. If ever comes a day that he ever sees a single flaw in your body, he'll fault his eyes instead. 

When you sigh, it comes out half a moan. "Hurry, Cheollie," you tell him, spreading your legs wider, holding yourself open with two hands on the back of your knees, baring yourself to him unashamedly. You're too desperate for his cock to worry about self-dignity now. 

Seungcheol groans, stomach flipping at the sweetness dripping from your lips when you say his name so endearingly. "Alright, alright..." He presses one hand on the back of your thigh while the other hand grips his cock, running the leaking head up and down your sloppy cunt. "Just don't cum on me too soon like last time, yeah?"

"Why are you bringing that up!"

"Actually... maybe I wouldn't mind. You always shut up so good after you cum." He chuckles at the deathly glare you give him, choosing that exact moment to sink into your awaiting heat, amused when your glare twists into an expression of utter bliss. Oh, he could die happy like this—cock snug in your warm, tight pussy. He allows you a few seconds to adjust, letting his hands travel all the places of your body that he can reach, leaving your skin prickling. 

"Move, Cheol...Please."

Seungcheol smirks at your pleading, watching the way you spread your legs even wider for him—inviting and beckoning him to take you like you're the sweetest and ripest forbidden fruit. "How do you want it, pretty?"

Your eyebrows knit in frustration. Surely , he's trying to tease you, purposely prolonging whatever this is when he could already be fucking you into the mattress by now. Still, you humour him, hoping he will give in. "Any way you want, I'll take it."

Seungcheol nods with a hum, nibbling at the insides of his cheeks as he glances down at the point where his cock disappears into your pussy. "Any way I want, hm?" he echoes back, swiping a thumb at your swollen clit, snickering when your hips jump, causing his cock to slip out, heavy girth springing up to smack against his stomach. 

You reach down with one hand, guiding his cock back to your pussy, desperate to be filled again. "Please, just please." The words come out frantic, almost distraught. "I need you."

Eventually, Seungcheol relents to your pleas. You look so pretty when you're begging for his cock, and that look you're giving him—you look delirious already, and he has barely done a thing.

"Shh, I've got you, sweetheart," he mutters, slipping back inside. Much to your delight, he doesn't dawdle this time. Although he does start off slow, pressing forward until his balls are pressed firmly against your ass each time he sinks in, earning a quiet sigh from you every time. "Pussy taking me so well, princess..."

At this pace, you're able to feel every slide of his cock against your pussy, the way the veins along his length rub against your walls so delectably. "God, f-fuck, fuck, Seungcheol..."

Your lover is watching your face closely, groaning now and then whenever your walls tighten around him, but amused for the most part. He doesn't want to seem arrogant, but he thinks it's incredibly flattering that you still react this way to his cock after years of being together. You're always so eager for him, shivering under his caresses as if you're starved of his touch, as if he has never sunk himself into your tight pussy again and again, only to come back for more. 

Even now, as he hooks his arms around your thighs, pulling you closer to him, you're sighing out his name so exquisitely, the syllables rolling off your tongue effortlessly. Your pussy drips for him, the sweet nectar leaking onto his cock, staining your inner thighs. 

A frustrated groan bubbles in your throat as you prop yourself up onto your elbows, scowling at the man who is currently not fucking you the way you both deserve it. The drag of his cock feels good, but you need more, and you know he does too. "Cheollie," you mewl in your sweetest voice, one hand grasping a handful of your breast, squeezing it in the hope of enticing him to go faster. "Need you to go faster, please..." 

Seungcheol doesn't try to hide his smirk, stopping the movement of his hips entirely. He knows you're trying to lure and tempt him, just like the seductress you are. He would be lying if he said your siren gaze and the sultry lilt of your voice don't make him feel as though he's spellbound. It's hard not to give in when you're looking up at him like you want him to wreck and pillage your body until you are practically ruined for everyone else but him.

When you flash him a saccharine smile, it's as if there is a magnetic pull drawing him down closer to you, mouth hovering over yours. He breathes you in, painfully aware of how his cock twitches inside you when you peer at him through your lashes.

"I thought you said you'd take anything I give you," Seungcheol mumbles, hot breath fanning against your lips. He pecks your lips once, angling his head to the side when you try to lean in for more, rejecting your kiss. He coos when you pout at his rejection. "So take what I'm giving you. That's what you promised me, isn't it?"

Then he swoops down lower to trail kisses down your jaw and neck, nipping at your collarbone. You're scowling at his statement, irked that he's using your words against you. Seungcheol doesn't seem to care about your current predicament, licking his way down to the slope of your breast, biting down on the skin with enough force to make it hurt. 

"Don't you want to feel good, Cheollie? Why are you making this longer than it should be?"

"Oh, don't you worry about me, darling. I'm very much enjoying myself," he murmurs, pressing tender kisses on the side of your breast. 

You're opening your mouth to retaliate but decide against it at the last second. Instead, you press your mouth together, saying nothing as you lie back on the bed. You'll let Seungcheol have his way with you for now. Whatever game he's playing right now won't last long, and his control will crumble eventually—at least, that's what you're hoping. 

When Seungcheol wraps his lips around your nipple, you let his name escape you in a sigh. His mouth is warm as he gently suckles, tongue circling the pebbled bud. You don't need to look down at him to know he's looking up at your face, taking in your reaction. "Feels good..." you pant when he stretches his jaw open further, taking more of your breast into his mouth, teeth skimming over tender skin. 

Your arms wrap around the back of his neck, pulling him in closer as you arch your back. The slight shift makes your brain short-circuit for a moment as his cock seems to burrow deeper inside of you, sending a flash of heat through your body. "Fuck, so big..."

Seungcheol hums against your chest, still sucking earnestly, lapping at your nipple with his tongue, pulling back now and then to look at the way your chest glistens with his spit. After some time, he switches to the other nipple, giving it the same treatment, making sure it's covered in his spit just the same as the other one. 

You're not sure whether Seungcheol realises it, but his hips have started moving again, cock pushing in and out with no precise pattern, only seeking the warmth of your cunt as it sinks in repeatedly. It's addicting but agonising as well because you want more, and you're not sure whether you can hold out any longer. "Cheol," you softly call out, hoping to gain his attention. You don't wait for him to respond before speaking again. "Need you to fuck me, please..."

He pulls back slightly, blowing cold air on your damp chest, making you shudder. "Aren't I already?" he asks as he litters kisses on the valley of your breasts, fucking into you less distractedly this time, the force of his thrust growing harder. 

You nod, breath stuttering when he finally gains speed, not as fast as you'd like but enough for your mind to go hazy. "Y-Yeah, just need—fuck—just need more..."

Seungcheol's laugh comes out a little shaky. He pushes himself back onto his knees, ignoring your whine at the loss of his warmth. "Are you being greedy, princess?" He gathers both your legs together, letting them dangle over one of his shoulders, rubbing his hands up and down your thighs soothingly when he hears your sigh of relief from the switch of position. 

"I'm not being greedy," you grit out, looking up at him, hissing when he delivers a notably hard thrust. "Please, please, just... faster..."

"See, what'd I say? That was you being greedy." Seungcheol admires you from this position, drinking in the quiet sounds you're emitting, savouring the fluttering of your pussy around his cock. 

Your eyes begin to brim with frustrated tears. You love the man with all your heart, but this is taking it a little far, even for you. You're yearning for him, blood pounding in your ears, skin aflame with desire and an insatiable hunger that threatens to swallow you entirely. How much longer do you have to wait? 

"I can't, Cheol," you sniff, tears spilling onto your cheeks. "P-Please, I really can't—"

Seungcheol shouldn't feel so satisfied with how you're crying from how overwhelming it is, but an undeniable sense of fulfilment washes over him at the sight of your tears. This is what he wanted, after all—to test your limit and push you to the edge. "Alright, sweetheart, don't cry, I've got you..."

With a kiss to your calf, Seungcheol finally grants you what you've been begging for all night, quickly finding a rhythm that immediately garners a loud cry out of you. He sighs, cock finally finding relief at the friction. He enjoyed the game while it lasted, but this—it makes him think that maybe he should've given in sooner. You could've been filled to the brim with his cum by now if it hadn't been for his stubbornness to see you pushed to your breaking point. With this thought in mind, Seungcheol fucks into you even harder, trying to make up for lost time. 

More tears escape your eyes, but it's not out of frustration this time. It's incredible how quickly the tiny sparks of pleasure can become something mighty—an unreckonable force that racks through your whole body, vicious and ruthless, almost cruel in a way.

"Still with me?" Seungcheol asks, gritting his teeth at how well you're taking him, his hands squeezing onto your thighs roughly, the hold almost painful. But you're too preoccupied with your own pleasure to care about whether or not his hands will leave bruises. 

"Baby, you still with me?" he repeats. 

"Hmm..."

Seungcheol shakes his head, not satisfied with your answer. "Talk to me, sweetheart."

"Y-Yeah," you respond, breathing in sharply. "With you..." Your words trail off into a low moan, a sound that makes Seungcheol's eyes flutter shut as he ruts into you faster. 

The sound of skin slapping against skin resonates through the bedroom. It's lewd and unmistakable. His balls slap against your puffy folds with each thrust, sending your slick splattering everywhere—on your ass, on the bed, some droplets even landing on his thighs. He loves it when you get all sloppy for him like this. 

Your hand claws at his own, nails digging into his wrist. Seungcheol lets you remove his hand from your thigh, a growl ripping in his chest when he realises your intention. Before he knows it, he has his palm splayed on your breast, one of your smaller hands resting atop his, guiding him to squeeze. He squeezes once, then twice, relishing the way you moan for him when he does. "That's it, always so good for me. You deserve this, yeah?"

"Don't stop, C-Cheol..." When you look up at him, he seems torn between looking at your face or down at the spot where his cock meets your pussy. He doesn't settle on one, letting his eyes flicker back and forth, breathing growing ragged when he notices your eyes on him. 

"Why would I stop, baby?" He lets his free hand settle on your unoccupied breast, kneading gently, enjoying how you writhe underneath him at the contact. Both hands pinch at your nipples, twisting just barely until they harden in his ministrations. "Why would I stop when you feel this good?"

You hadn't been sure at first whether you still had it in you to cum another time after doing it twice in a short span of time, but a single glance at Seungcheol has you disoriented. Something is churning in your stomach, coiling and winding like a tightly wound spring, poised to release if twisted a little further. The more you look at Seungcheol, the less focused your gaze becomes. Tiny beads of sweat trace a glistening path down his temple, and fine strands of hair cling to his forehead—a testament to the strenuous effort he has exerted thus far.

"Cheol..." you whine, tensing your thighs together, arching your chest up into his rough touches. 

"I know, I know... I can feel you tightening around me," he grits out, veins in his neck jutting out as he continues to strain himself through his thrusts, beginning to lose himself in the feeling of being buried inside your heat. He retracts his hands from your chest to grab each side of your hips. This way, he has more control of your body, able to pull you down onto his cock every time he thrusts in, pressing into you deeper. "Shit, you feel so good, princess. So fucking good, taking me so well. You love this cock, don't you?"

You don't know whether Seungcheol knows how much his words affect you, but you certainly feel the tingling shudder lick a path from the base of your back to the nape of your neck. You let him grapple at your hips move you however he pleases, using you for his pleasure. 

"Say you love this cock, princess."

"Love it—fill me up so well, love your cock..." you slur. 

"That's right, always so needy for it."

Seungcheol has been holding himself back for some time now, his balls heavy, ready for release. With the way your pussy envelopes him so nicely and the way you're moaning and whining out his name, he knows it will only be a matter of time before he finishes. "You close, baby?" he asks you, chest heaving with every laboured breath he takes. His eyes are screwed shut, afraid he'd cum too soon if he catches a glimpse of your fucked-out face and bouncing tits. 

"Mmph, feels s-so good..."

Seungcheol brings one hand down to the space between your legs, slipping his thumb through the tight press of your plush thighs, quickly finding your clit. He doesn't take into account, however, the way your pussy would tighten around his dick as soon as he starts drawing quick circles around the sensitive bud. He doesn't have the time to warn you, only letting out a strained growl of your name as he is thrown over the edge, emptying himself inside you, filling you up in ribbons of cum that seem never-ending. 

Taken by surprise, you can only squeal, wide eyes searching for his as you grab onto his wrist. Seungcheol keeps his hips pressed to yours, balls smearing slick over your ass as he fills you to the brim. You keen at the feeling, toes curling as you savour the warmth of his cum as it paints your walls white. 

He shudders as the last spurts finally spill inside you, his hips rocking gently on their own, riding out the last few seconds. "Fuck, baby," he groans. He's panting, trying to suck in as much air into his lungs as he can with each inhale, the impact of his orgasm hitting more forcefully since he had been unintentionally edging himself for the past hour or so.

He knows you will eventually ask for more, but he's relieved you're giving him time to recover. He leans his head against your calf and closes his eyes, trying to regulate his breathing. It's hard because the thought that you're still in front of him, naked, dripping his seed, makes him feel winded in a way that is obscene. 

"Cheol..."

"Yeah?" he grunts. 

"You okay?" 

He lets your legs fall from his shoulder, gently setting it down onto the bed, easing you to lie on your side. "Mhm... m' fine," he swallows, "just give me a minute."

When he slides out of you, you let slip a squeak that makes Seungcheol crack a small smile. He splays a hand on the back of your thigh, leaning back slightly to catch a glimpse of the mess between your legs. He can't help the stirring of his cock as he watches driblets of his cum leak out of you, seeping into the bedsheets.

Seungcheol finds it difficult to tear his eyes away from the glorious sight of your ruined cunt. He suddenly finds himself in a predicament. He knows he needs to take a breather, even if there is a part of him that aches to bury himself into you and fill you with his cum for the second time tonight.

Finally, he settles himself beside you, positioning himself so that he's spooning you from behind. He brushes his hand down from your shoulder to your arm and then down the enticing curve of your waist. Your skin is soft and supple against his palm. His caresses must tickle because your giggles fill his ears as you writhe away from his teasing touch. "Cheol..." your whine of his name makes a rush of affection wash over him. 

Seungcheol grins, pushing himself up onto his elbow to lean over you just enough to nestle his face into the crook of your neck. When he nips at your jaw, you let out a breathless sigh, and he knows it won't be long until you ask him for more. He would give you more if only he hadn't just finished twice over the course of an hour. He will have to find another way to satiate your hunger. 

Your eyes flutter shut, humming when you feel Seungcheol's lips on your shoulder blade. You don't say anything as you push your lower half into him, which earns a grunt from the man as his sensitive cock comes into contact with your ass. Much to your dismay, his hand immediately flies to your waist, gently moving you away from him. 

"Baby," he rasps, the strain discernible in his voice. He pecks your lips when you tilt your head to pout at him. "Turn over and face me, hm?"

Slightly confused, you do as he says anyway, gasping when he pulls you into him with a hand on your lower back. With your chest pressed into his and face only inches away, you give him a questioning look, circling your arms around his neck and pressing a brief kiss to his lips. "Now what?"

Seungcheol responds by kissing you. His kiss is hard and fierce, stealing your breath as he sinks his teeth into your lower lip, soothing the stinging bite with a fleeting sweep of his tongue. You arch into him, moaning into his mouth when you feel his free hand trail up your chest to settle on the nape of your neck, allowing him to have a better reign. 

Something presses against your aching cunt, and you have to break away with a dazed gasp, peering down between your bodies. Seungcheol has shoved his leg between yours, angling his thigh upward to press against you.

The hand on your back moves to the dip of your waist, encouraging you to roll your hips back and forth. The realisation of what he wants you to do makes you whimper. "Oh, God—"

"Shh, just focus on me, sweetheart. You can be a good girl and ride my thigh, yeah?"

When you try to respond, nothing comes out except a garbled moan. You must look so salacious to him—moving your hips back and forth like a desperate whore, dragging your wet pussy against his thigh, eyes rolling back from the simulation on your clit. You swear you see stars dancing in your vision, skin prickling as every thought in your mind withers into nothing. 

"That's it, I can feel how warm you are... So fucking warm and wet."

You try to kiss him again but find yourself pulling away shortly after, too dazed to keep up with the force of Seungcheol's kisses. His thigh is drenched and sticky from the mixture of your juices and his cum that has leaked out of your hole, but he keeps you stable with a firm grip on the back of your thigh. Whenever you roll your hips, the squelching sound from between your thighs is distinct, and it makes your whole face burn. 

With a sigh of his name, you weave your fingers through his hair, tugging when the stimulation becomes too intense for your liking. It feels fucking euphoric—the way his solid thigh feels against your soaked pussy as it drags up, down, up, down—but it's somehow not enough at the same time. 

Seungcheol thinks your moans sound like angels singing in his ears, and he eagerly drinks it all in, watching your face intently at the same time, relishing the way your eyes roll back during moments when the pleasure washes over you in waves. "So cute." 

"Fuck, Cheol, 's not enough..."

Seungcheol's mouth stretches into a grin, letting a few seconds pass in silence as he watches you rut desperately against his thigh, so keen to reach your long-awaited high. "Not enough? You're dripping all over me, though?" To prove his point, he withdraws his thigh from between your legs, shushing you when you whine in protest. "Let's see..."

Two of his fingers swipe at the sticky residue on his thigh. He lifts his hand to your face, showing the glossy remnant on his fingers. To further taunt you, he spreads the fingers apart, allowing a stringy thread of the creamy slick to bridge the gap between the two digits. He doesn't bother concealing his smirk when your sheepish face comes into focus, cheeks red from a combination of arousal and shame. 

You huff when he sticks his fingers into his mouth, tasting the slick that clings to it. The deep hum that rumbles in his chest kindles a fire in you that you know can only be doused by Seungcheol's touch alone. You can only watch, stunned, mind teeming with a flurry of wild thoughts as he finally removes his fingers from his mouth. 

"Now you choose, princess. It's either my thigh or nothing at all."

It takes you a moment to decipher his words. "But that's not fair..." you whine. 

"Just choose."

"I don't wanna..."

"Time's ticking."

You give in—of course you do. Knowing Seungcheol, he probably would stay true to his words. He wouldn't have any problem leaving you high and dry as he excuses himself to the bathroom to clean himself up. Then, he would come back to bed as if nothing had happened, and he wouldn't give in no matter how much you cling to him and beg for even an ounce of his attention. Then you'd have to wait until the morning to finally get some relief, either by his fingers or tongue, because he always insists on fucking you only after he has had his dose of morning coffee. It's infuriating, but it would be a lie if you said you didn't enjoy his pesky games. 

"Fine... Your thigh is fine."

"Use your big girl words."

"I need your thigh, please, Cheol. Pretty please..."

Seungcheol pauses briefly, letting your words sink in before he nods in approval. "Alright, if you insist." 

When he slots his thigh between your legs again, it's as if you've stumbled upon an oasis amid a scorching drought. The pleasure is liberating, and you're sighing his name against the crook of his neck, melting into his touch, going putty in his hold. You're grasping at both his shoulders, nails biting into his skin as the tautness in your stomach gradually builds again. It's slow, almost torturous, but the mounting tension from before has you trembling, and Seungcheol notices. He always does. 

"Breathe," he reminds you, tapping your cheek gently to ensure you hear him. "Take your time and breathe, 'm not going anywhere."

"Unghh, I don't know if I can—"

"You can, baby," he encourages softly.

Seungcheol pulls you even closer by your thigh, hitching your leg a little higher against his hips, spreading you open a little more. He can feel you throbbing against him, and the warmth emanating from between your legs makes him feel heady. 

"Fuck," he cusses, wishing so badly it was his cock that was making you writhe in his embrace and cry out his name so sweetly. "Stay with me. Are you close?"

You sob at the question. "I don't know. God, C-Cheol..."

"Hey, look at me, princess." Seungcheol nods when you finally compose yourself enough to look at him. "Breathe, and focus on me."

The movement of your hips doesn't stop as he mutters his instructions. 

"Uh-uh, keep your eyes on me," he reprimands when he notices your gaze flittering down to the glistening mess on his thigh. "That's right, keep those pretty eyes on me. That's it..."

You're sure you've lost all your ability to communicate effectively or conjure up a coherent sentence. The only word you manage to babble and stutter out is Seungcheol's name. No matter how much you try, you can't help the shaking of your legs or the ragged rise and fall of your chest as you try to gulp in enough air. It feels so fucking good—you want to tell him—but nothing comes out except choked moans and whimpers. 

"Don't worry about anything else. Just focus on the feeling..."

"C-Cheol, 'm close... I don't—I'm—"

"Shh, just relax. It's going to feel so good when you let go," Seungcheol says, hand still secure on the back of your thigh, helping you grind down against him. He thinks he might need a long, cold shower after this is all over. 

When you breathe in, the smell of Seungcheol's tantalising cologne fills your nose, and you can't help but cry out. The mix of patchouli and bergamot combined with the natural scent of his musk makes you tense against him. He smells heavenly. He smells like home. "Oh my God, ungh—"

"It's okay, you can cum. No one's stopping you."

Your eyes drift over his face, focusing on every feature and every detail, no matter how minuscule. Ultimately, it is precisely the look in his dark eyes that throws you over the edge. His eyes have an allure to them—filled with desire and longing that dance wildly in the shadows, luring you into their mysterious depth.  

The pleasure doesn't hit you all at once—it starts from the end of your toes, trailing up your legs, erupting into flurries of flames in your stomach, winding up your spine like an electric current that singes at every nerve. The euphoria builds like a crescendo, like a warmth that blossoms into an inferno and sweeps through your whole being. Your skin burns, but you feel as though you're drowning—chest tight, eyes glassy, mouth agape in a silent shout. Blood roars in your ears, and each heartbeat feels like a drumbeat, pounding against the confines of your ribcage, a relentless rhythm that drowns out every other sound. 

When the pleasure finally subsides, it leaves a lingering warmth that seems to simmer under your skin. It's a pleasant buzzing, one that makes you feel drowsy. You slump against Seungcheol, hiding your face in his bare chest, trying to hide your bashful smile that would give away how blissful you currently feel. You breathe in his perfume, grounding yourself, soaking in the heat of his body as he gently brushes a palm up and down your back. 

Seungcheol tenderly clasps your hand, lifting it delicately to plant a soft kiss on the inside of your wrist. His kisses trail down, mouth caressing each fingertip before turning your hand gently. With utmost reverence, he presses his lips against the glimmering engagement ring on your finger, bestowing it with two tender pecks, a silent promise sealed in each kiss.

"I love you," he whispers against your temple, nosing at your cheekbone. "But do you think you could cum that fast again?"

Still recovering from your high, you struggle to grasp his words. "What do you mean?"

"Like before. I mean, I was barely in you, and you were cumming all over me so fast I almost didn't realise—"

Your loud gasp cuts him off. "You are such a dick! Stop talking about that!"

"Never!" he objects, dimples showing when he grins. "It's going to make for the perfect story to tell to all our friends—"

Deciding your words won't effectively shut his blabbering mouth, you're left with no choice but to resort to slapping his arm instead, not stopping until he seizes your wrist, effectively thwarting your assault on him. 

"Okay, okay," he concedes with a laugh. "I'm just kidding. That story will forever stay with me and me only. I'm sorry, okay?"

"You don't look sorry."

"You're right, it was just so fucking hot—"

"You're insufferable. Break off our engagement right now."

The faux horror that overtakes his face is hilarious. "Alright, I'll stop. I really am sorry. Seriously."

You giggle at the admission. "You're stuck with me, you know? There's no backing out of a marriage with me."

He playfully sighs. "Hm, I'm not so sure about that.. I mean, it's not like we're already married—"

"Nice try, but I've already picked out my dress, and it's non-refundable."

"True, and I've just put a baby in you as well, so..."

You lean back, flashing him an incredulous look. "Again, nice try. Still on the pills, dummy."

"And what if they suddenly just... vanished?"

Snickering, you sit up, feeling unbearably icky and sweaty. "Why don't you marry me first, and then we can try having children. Deal?" You don't wait for his response, pushing yourself off the bed and shuffling your way to the bathroom. You can almost feel his eyes burning lasers into your bare ass. 

"Why don't you start calling me daddy from now on? You know, for practice?"

"Absolutely not."

"What do you think about having four children?" 

"I love you too, Seungcheol."

"Is that a yes?"

"You're cute."

There's a pause. "So, yes?"

"What should we do this weekend?" 

You hear him get off the bed, his thundering footsteps drawing nearer. "Stop changing the subject!"

© sweetlemontart — all rights reserved. ✮⋆˙

champagne problems: part two

pairing: jake sim x f reader

genre: enemies to lovers, rich kids au, fake dating au, college au, angst, fluff

part two word count: 33.2k

part two warnings: swearing, alcohol consumption, jealousy, a kiss or two, my incessant need to make sunghoon a figure skater in everything I write, family drama, use of the american (usa) university system

soundtrack: boom - dpr live / bad idea! - girl in red / blood on the floor - kuiper / calico - dpr ian / comme de garçons (like the boys) - rina sawayama / lust - chase atlantic

part 1 is linked on my masterlist for now!

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The second son of a wealthy family, Jake Sim has gotten used to always standing in the shadow of his older brother. From grades to girls to talks of becoming future CEO of the Sim Corporation, he’s no stranger to coming in second place. So when an opportunity arises for Jake to finally have the one thing his brother can’t and best him once and for all, he knows he’d be a fool not to take it.

There are only two problems. The first is that the thing his brother wants so badly isn’t a thing at all. It’s you, semi-estranged daughter of the Sims’ closest and most long-standing business partner.

The second is that Jake Sim can’t fucking stand you.

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PART TWO

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Jake Sim has been staring at his philosophy homework for the last twenty minutes when a stack of pastel pink papers slides across the table towards him. 

“What is this?” Much like most interactions he’s had with you, your sudden presence at Jake's favorite coffee shop is entirely unexplained. Hell, he’s not even sure how you found him here. He’d ask, if he thought you’d give him a straightforward answer. 

But Jake knows better at this point. So with a grumble, he takes out his headphones instead and prepares for a conversion that will probably put him in a worse mood than he started it in. 

Sliding down into the seat across from him without an invitation or the courtesy of an explanation, the only thing you say is, “You know, I really am starting to get a bit worried about your future success.” Nodding at the stack of papers you’ve just put on the table in front of him, you add, “How are you a third-year business major that still can’t recognize a contract?”

“I know what a contract is.” Jake defends, eyeing the papers warily, reaching out to pick them up. “But usually they’re not printed out on pink paper.” Really, who do you think you are? Elle Woods? And where did you even get this stuff? Jake doubts that this shade of pink cardstock came from the shelves of your local office supply store. Bringing the paper up closer to his nose, he levels you with a disbelieving look. “Hold on, is this paper scented?”

“Don’t put your gross nose on it! That paper is custom ordered.”

Of course it is. “Why the fuck did you print out a contract on custom ordered lavender-scented paper?”

You have the audacity to look affronted. “You should be thanking me.” With half a mind to snatch it out of his hands, you instead tell him with a glare, “Lavender is a very calming scent and probably the only thing stopping me from strangling you right now, y’know, since this entire thing is your fault.” 

Setting the papers back on the table with a little more force than necessary, Jake isn’t in the mood to play your favorite game of beating around the bush.“What entire thing? What kind of contract is this?” 

“I’m so glad you asked.” Your tone says otherwise. “Since someone’s loser brother couldn’t keep his mouth shut, just like I predicted, and someone’s mother found out about someone’s unfortunate use of the B word–”

“Hold on,” Jake’s brow creases in confusion. “I never called anyone a bitch–”

“Boyfriend,” you clarify, cutting him off. “I figured we better lay out some ground rules. You know, if we’re really gonna go for this.”

“Go for what?” Jake is still lost. “It’s just a family dinner–”

Shaking your head, you paint a perfect picture of disappointment when you tell him, “Your lack of foresight is astounding. Truly. Forget econ, I’m surprised you managed to pass classes that involve basic logic or any kind of critical thinking skills.”

Across from you, Jake does his best to close his laptop screen inconspicuously, keeping his untouched philosophy homework hidden from view. 

Then he returns, “And you don’t think you’re overreacting? Like, at all? What do we need a contract for?” Not that the lavender-scented abomination looks particularly legally binding to begin with. “Like I said, it’s just dinner–”

“For now,” you interrupt. “It’s just dinner for now. But two days ago, it was just a fundraiser, and to the best of our families’ knowledge, you were just my plus-one.” Giving him your best fake smile, you add, “And like the person at this table who has an IQ higher than a goldfish predicted, things are already getting messy. This,” you nod to the contract, “will help us clean them up before James or my mother realize that everything about you and me is nothing but one big lie.”

Jake sighs. Tries to defend himself even though he knows it’s futile. “Look, how was I supposed to know that my brother would open his big mouth to my mom?” And it really is just terrible luck all around – that James couldn’t keep a secret, that he chose to divulge it to the one person that actually cares about Jake’s love life and not just its potential effects on the family business. 

In fact, in Jake's opinion, his mother cares a little too much. The messages that started Sunday morning haven’t stopped since then. It’s a big part of the reason why his phone is currently face-down on the table that separates the two of you. Jake is not about to let you see anything that could potentially inflate your ego any more. 

His mother, however, seems to have other ideas. Right now, his message thread with her looks more like a one-sided fan club.

Mom: I can’t wait to meet her! I remember her as a little kid. It’s been so long since I’ve seen her. Mom: Does she have any dietary restrictions or allergies? I’m starting to put together the menu for this weekend. Mom: Does she prefer white or red wine?  Mom: Never mind the last message. I’ll just pull out some of both.  Mom: I just stumbled across a recent picture of her. Wow, she’s even more beautiful than I remember! I hope you’re treating her well.  Mom: Can you send me your apartment address again? I want to mail you something. Mom: Oh, and what’s ___’s favorite kind of cookie? Mom: Forget it. I’ll just give them to you this weekend to take with you. 

Suppressing a wince, Jake decides to put his mother’s incessant prying to the side for the time being. Right now, he needs to build the most bulletproof defense of his intelligence and common sense as possible before you keep shooting holes in it. But contrary to his beliefs, you’re not here to argue with him about where the blame for your unfortunate situation lies, at least not for the most part. 

You tell him as much. “I’m not here to yell at you about how this is all your fault.”

Jake raises an eyebrow, lips flat. “Could’ve fooled me.”

“Don’t worry,” you assure him. “I got my anger out already. Your picture’s right in the middle of my dartboard.” Across the table from him, you smile sweetly, imitate throwing a dart directly at the center of his forehead. 

Jake can’t tell if you’re kidding or not, and somehow that’s more unnerving. 

“So what, you don’t need to hear me say that everything’s my fault? You’d rather get it in writing instead?” Jake glances at the forgotten contract. Suddenly, a wave of panic crests in his mind. “If you’re trying to sue me–”

You roll your eyes before he can finish the empty threat. “Again, that’s not what this is for.” Looking at the papers, you tilt your head, considering. “Although it’s not too late for an amendment…”

Jake cuts that train of thought off as quickly as he can. “Okay, what exactly is it for then?”

You don’t miss a beat. “Like I said, just like someone with more than two functioning brain cells predicted, your little slip of the tongue made things messy. So if I’m gonna save your ass and pretend to be your girlfriend in front of your family this weekend, we’re gonna need some kind of written agreement about how this is going to play out. Think of it as an agreement, something to outline the…” you pause, weighing your words, “expectations on both of our ends.”

A contract. A fake dating contract. It’s all Jake can do not to burst out laughing. He’s trying to egg you on a little, piss you off and push your buttons like you’re so good at doing to him when he tells you, “Y’know, it’s kind of funny how seriously you’re taking this.”

You don’t understand how he can be so blase about it all. Sure, maybe the contract was a little overkill, but the two of you are about to start pretending to be dating, to be a couple, in front of your families. It’s not something that you’re willing to walk into blindly. 

“Really? I think it’s kind of funny the whole reason I’m in this mess is because of you.” Suddenly, there’s a reignited fire in your eyes. Jake almost regrets his taunting. “In fact, I think it’s absolutely hilarious–”

“Okay, okay,” He can sense a losing battle when he sees it. Not wanting to rehash your argument from earlier or put himself at the center of any more dartboard target practices, Jake surrenders. And then he frowns. Reaching for the stack of papers again, he scans the first page. Trying to make sense of all the legal jargon and stylized formatting, he’s hesitant when he glances at you and slow to admit, “To be completely honest with you, I’m actually not that good with contracts–”

“Oh my god.”

“So, do you think you could go over the highlights for me?”

“You are absolutely insufferable.”

“I’m sorry,” Jake intones flatly. “Are you talking to me or the mirror you spend five hours a day looking into?”

You kind of have to hand it to him. Ever since your run in with his brother, his insults have been landing a lot better. That one was actually pretty good. Not that you’d ever admit it. 

“Anyway,” you glare instead. “The highlights.” Nodding to the contract you spent most of last night writing up, you explain, “The first page is just basic contract language. The actual content of our proposed agreement starts on the second page.”

Following your explanation, Jake sets the first page aside, makes quick work of skimming the second. Or at least he tries to. It proves a difficult task, however, when he gets a little caught up on the very first line. 

“Really?” You’re not quite sure what kind of expression is on his face when he looks up at you. It’s an odd mix of shock, disbelief, and perhaps, if the sudden flush on his cheekbones is anything to go by, embarrassment. “Rule number one is no kissing?”

Across from him, you just rest your chin in your palm. “I know I’m crushing your dreams and all, but don’t be so surprised.”

Jake’s glare is easier to read this time. “That is not what I meant. It’s just… I don’t know.” It seems so obvious. He didn’t think you’d feel the need to actually write it out like he’s about to start trying to plant ones on you every hour of the day. “It’s not what I was expecting.”

“I mean, I don’t know how family dinners work at your house, but mine usually don’t involve makeout sessions between courses.”

“Exactly,” Jake returns. “It hardly seems like something we need in writing when it’s more than easy to avoid.”

Still, you don’t back down. “Don’t blame me for erring on the side of caution. We’re pretending to be a couple in front of your brother. And we both know that you don’t exactly make the most rational decisions when he starts  pushing your buttons, boyfriend.”

The use of the pet name is intentional. It’s a reminder that Jake can’t be trusted where his older brother is concerned. Not when in the heat of the moment, he would say or do just about anything to get under James’ skin in the same way James has been getting under his for the last twenty-one odd years.  

“Point taken.” Jake can’t exactly argue that one. 

And in all honesty, Jake kinda feels like he’s getting off easy, at least with you. Not that he would ever tell you that. 

He’s feeling apprehensive about this dinner, yes, and now about being legally bound to you, but he supposes things could be a lot worse. For starters, you’d been much easier to convince than he initially thought. He wasn’t sure what kind of bribes would work on you, how he was going to get you to keep up the facade he started for one more dinner. 

Maybe, he thought,  he would be able to leverage your phone number against you in a new way. He could promise not to pass it along to James, but only as long as you did him the solid of playing the part of his girlfriend, this time at a dinner with his family. 

But that felt a little too much like blackmail, even for him. So instead, he had told you the truth. 

Listening to the phone ring after clicking on your number, it was all Jake could do not to throw his phone across the room in anticipation of your rage. But then you answered, and it all came spilling out. 

He told you that James could not be trusted with secrets but could absolutely be trusted to do everything in his power to ruin Jake’s life, even if unintentionally. He explained how his mother was now unfortunately involved, that your initial plan to just mention each other occasionally and claim that things fizzled by the time the clock struck midnight on New Year’s was no longer viable. 

You had remained completely silent for a long pause. Too long. Jake was suddenly very grateful that he took the precaution of having this conversation over the phone. Mostly because he was pretty sure if he tried to tell you face-to-face, you would cause him actual bodily harm. But instead of threats or curses or even sarcasm, Jake had listened as a long sigh came through the other line and then–

“Yeah, my mom has been asking me about you too.” Much to his shock, you were resigned to the fact, not angry at the news. And you had told him, “I’ll come to your family dinner. Just let me… Let me think about the best way to go about this.”

Less than twenty-four hours have passed since that phone conversation, and Jake shouldn’t be as surprised as he is that your idea of the best way to go about this is printed out for him on custom pink lavender-scented paper.  

Deciding to leave the kissing debacle alone for the moment, he reads through the rest of your so-called rules. With more of an idea as to what to expect, nothing shocks him quite as much as the initial line. 

He reads the second section wordlessly: Both parties will do everything in their power, to a reasonable extent, to maintain the image of a false relationship in the presence of family members and those with immediate connections to them (including, but not limited to employees, business partners, etc).

The third section covers another base: Friends and other acquaintances of both parties are not to be informed of the arrangement. Neither party is under obligation to maintain the lie of relationship with friends or acquaintances unless deemed necessary to maintain secrecy of the relationship. 

Jake glances up with a furrow in his brow. You clarify before he has the chance to ask, “Basically it’s saying that you don’t have to lie to your friends and tell them that we’re dating, unless they get suspicious or start asking. Just don’t tell them we aren’t. And absolutely do not tell them about the contract.”  

Jake nods, moves to the next line. 

Neither party may involve themself in a romantic relationship of any nature with another individual for the duration of this contract. Both parties are to avoid to the best of their ability any situation in which it could be interpreted that they are in a romantic relationship of any nature with another individual for the duration of this contract. 

“So essentially just no dating other people?” Jake asks. 

“Right.” You nod. “And try to avoid getting into situations that make it look like you might be dating someone else. I’m not gonna make you agree to stop hooking up with people or anything.” You look mildly ill at the mere proximity of Jake and the term ‘hooking up.’ “Just, y’know, be discreet about it.”

Jake looks up at you. “I’m not hooking up with other people.”

You cringe. “Thanks, but I really don’t need the gory details of your sex life. Do you understand the rule or not?”

Jake nods. “Yeah, I get it.”

“Great,” you move the contract aside, setting a new stack of papers down on the table. Also printed on pink paper, this pile is considerably thicker. “That’s about it for the contract, then. This,” you gesture to the new set of papers, “is for you to memorize.”

Jake would be a little less wary if it didn't look as dense as an encyclopedia. “What is it?”

“A list of everything a real boyfriend should know about me.” Jake waits for you to finish the joke, to land a punchline, but you’re entirely serious when you add, “Think of it as your ___ cheat sheet. I’ll need one for you too, of course. Preferably in the next couple of days so that I can get it down before dinner this weekend.” 

Hesitantly, Jake picks up the first page. Scanning over yet another meticulously formatted document printed on – he sniffs again – yep, lavender-scented paper, Jake privately thinks that this may actually come in handy. If nothing else, he’s sure he could reference it for some of his mom’s questions instead of needing to guess at your responses. 

It’ll help with the basics, at least. Jake is pretty sure you wouldn’t have bothered to include things like your favorite kind of cookie in there. 

But then he glances again at the stack of papers, and more specifically, how how thick it is. He looks a little closer at the page in his hand. Single spaced. He flips it over. Double sided. 

Looking over the back of the page in his hand, he forces himself to actually read some of what you’ve written. He doesn’t get far before he’s leveling you with a disbelieving look.

“Is this a prank?”

You have the gall to look confused. “Not even a little bit.”

Jake wants to tear his hair out. Because what the actual fuck? “I really don’t think anyone is going to ask me about your third favorite shade of Dior lip oil–”

“They might. And think of how suspicious it would be if you got me one as a Christmas gift or something and the color washed me out.”

Across from you, Jake’s eyes just widen. And then he’s weighing your words. 

Despite the ridiculousness, your argument does raise a point. Albeit not the one you intended. 

“Christmas gift,” Jake repeats slowly. As of now, you’re already over halfway through fall semester, which means the holidays will be approaching in just a couple of short months. Suddenly, they seem a lifetime away. “Does this contract of yours have an end date?”

“Oh, right.” Reaching for the contract again, you turn to the final page, lay it on the table in front of Jake. “Feel free to propose something else,” you offer, “but I put the termination date as January first of next year. I figured that we could use this arrangement to get us through all of the inevitable holiday parties. My family always hosts a giant one on New Year’s Eve, so I thought we could go to that together and then call it off the next day. What do you think?” You turn to him. “Too long?”

Jake discards your insane list of personal preferences for the time being and picks up the last page of the contract. At the bottom, he locates the verbiage in the final section, just above the two blank signature lines neither of you have filled yet. 

This contract will be terminated as of January 1 of the coming year. 

Jakes stares at the date for a moment. It feels odd to see an expiration date on your relationship, regardless of the fact that it’s all a facade. Seems strange to be starting something with the sole intention of ending it. But he can hardly voice those feelings, so instead he taunts, “You wanna be stuck with me that long, huh? Just can’t get enough?”

Your lips flatten as you reach for your phone. “I will literally text your brother right now.”

“Nice try,” Jake calls your bluff. “You just told me that you didn’t want your mom knowing that you lied about dating me either.”

“No,” you correct, dangling your phone between your fingers. “What I said was that I want her off my back when it comes to my dating life and who I spend my time with. It wouldn’t matter even a little bit to her whether that’s you or James. In fact, she would probably actually like him bet–”

“Whatever.” If Jake is suddenly sulking, he figures that no one needs to be aware of it. “I know you like me more than him.”

“Incorrect. I hate him more than I hate you.”

Jake stares at you blankly. “Is there a difference?”

“Obviously,” you scoff. 

“Whatever. You’re still willing to tolerate me until New Year’s.”

“Is that actually high praise to you? Do we need to start working on your self-confidence too?”

Insult aside, Jake supposes that your deadline does make sense. Although family obligations are intermittent in nature, it would be nice to have a go-to plan for every event and dinner and interaction with his older brother that he’s forced into between now and the New Year. 

Honestly, the thought of having you at his upcoming family dinner has made Jake’s steps the last two days feel a little lighter. If anything, he thinks that you’ll be a great distraction for his father. Something to talk about besides the gory details of Jake’s many failures. 

It’s a chance to be impressive in the eyes of his family, even if only in some small capacity, even if only until New Year’s. 

A moment later, Jake warily eyes the pen you hand him. “Let me guess, pink ink?”

“Obviously not.” You roll your eyes. “How would that show up on pink paper?”

So Jake’s signature is written on the first dotted line of the contract with the matte black ink of your shockingly normal ballpoint pen. Moments later, your name joins on the second line, right next to his. 

And it’s as if something shifts in the air, as if something suddenly feels a little heavier, slightly more weighted. The following silence that passes between the two of you feels like a finale of sorts. The end of something and the beginning of another. 

Looking at the boy across from you, it feels strange to say that for all intents and purposes, even if they’re fabricated, you’ll be dating him until the New Year. Showing up on his arm and laughing at his jokes and filling in the quiet moments with little displays of affection, practiced bouts of intimacy. 

It’s weird. It’s daunting. It’s not something you have any clue how to navigate, even if the contract gives you a false sense of security, of control. 

You break the moment by glancing at the clock that hangs above the front door of the coffee shop. Suddenly, your mind is elsewhere. On the other part of your original agreement. “Your first tutoring session is tonight, right?” Jungwon mentioned it to you in passing. 

“Yeah,” Jake nods. If his voice has an odd sudden hoarseness to it, you’ll both ignore it for now. “Why?”

“What time are you supposed to meet him?”

“Six-thirty.”

A second glance at the clock confirms, “It’s six thirty-five.”

“Shit!” Jake is suddenly frantic, panicked as he rushes to repack his bag and salvage what’s left of a good first impression on his tutor. 

It hardly registers when you remind him, “Don’t forget to make me a cheat sheet of things I should know about you!” Already halfway out the door, the only acknowledgement you get is a half hearted nod. 

Frowning at the mess of papers in front of you, scattered from Jake’s hasty exit, you make quick work of rearranging your newly minted contract in the correct order. 

“Men,” you whisper, to no one in particular. Even though it doesn’t land on the ears you want it to. Even though Jake is too far gone to hear it. 

…

Instead, what Jake hears a handful of minutes later, is a less than friendly reminder from the librarian at the front desk that the university library is a quiet area and that running is strictly prohibited. Still out of breath from the way he just bolted across the entire campus, all Jake can offer her is an apologetic nod. 

He pulls out his phone to double-check the brief message thread between him and Jungwon, to confirm the exact location of their first tutoring session. 

Yang Jungwon (Econ Tutor) [3:02 pm]: Study room 103 on the first floor

After that, there are only two other messages – one being Jake’s hasty, misspelled apology for being nearly fifteen minutes late, to which he received:

Yang Jungwon (Econ Tutor) [6:41 pm]: No problem! I’m here

After navigating his way to the reservable first floor study rooms, Jake finds himself in front of Room 103. Suddenly, a wave of self-consciousness sweeps away any adrenaline fueled by his lateness. Any lingering annoyance brought on by a conversation with you. 

Should he knock? Is there a certain etiquette to this? How embarrassed should he be that the person waiting for him with both better punctuality and significantly better grades is two years his junior, according to the sparse information you gave him?

In the end, Jake decides it would be weird to knock and chokes down all his other uncertainty. Opening the door slowly, he nods at the boy already inside. 

“Hi, Jungwon?”

If his tutor is at all put off by Jake’s lateness, he does a great job of hiding it. Jungwon is all smiles when he says, “That’s me. You must be Jake.” Jake is still stuck halfway in the door like he wants to hold onto the opportunity to bolt, just in case he needs it. Jungwon picks up on some of his hesitation. “Come on in.”

Jake does so quietly, setting his stuff down as he slides into the seat across from Jungwon. As he pulls out his laptop, Jake glances at his tutor. All smiles and friendliness, the oversized hoodie he wears looks comfortable enough to fall asleep in. Altogether, he kind of reminds him of an overeager puppy. Or at least he would, if his features weren’t so distinctly feline. 

“Sorry again for being late,” Jake mumbles, opening a Word document. “I completely lost track of time.” More like his time was completely overtaken by someone that does a great job of consuming all his senses and sends his mind spinning sideways, but Jake can hardly say that. 

Just like he did over text, Jungwon doesn’t appear bothered in the slightest by his tardiness. “It really is no problem. I’m glad you found the room alright. It’s kind of like a maze back here.”

He’s being nice again. It’s a single hallway with a handful of clearly labeled doors. But Jake isn’t one to look kindness in the mouth, especially when he’s still sitting on a pile of discomfort. Instead, he figures it’s as good a time as any to express his gratitude. 

“Thanks again for doing this, and for keeping it on the down low. ___ mentioned that you’re great at econ.”

Across from him, Jungwon shrugs. “I’m good with numbers and data and stuff like that. And I had to get good at studying pretty quick, since I’ve been on academic scholarships since middle school.”

That tidbit swirls in the air for a moment, falls through the room like a bad premonition before settling uncomfortably in Jake’s gut. It makes him wonder, makes him question a lot of things. 

What would he be like, Jake wonders, if his family name wasn’t a safety net, a security blanket in its own right? If he had to fight to earn things like the university admission letter he took for granted?  Resented, even, since it was yet another choice made for him by his father. 

Would he be like Jungwon, tutoring older students for extra cash? Forgiving people when they’re late and convincing himself that years of staring at math problems until his eyes felt like sandpaper is the same as being ‘good with numbers and stuff like that’? 

And Jake is assuming, of course. Maybe Jungwon is just good with numbers, has a natural inclination for economics. 

But the only thing Jake has ever had a natural inclination for is doing what he’s told and then blaming the world around him when he hates himself a little for it. 

All at once, he feels like an observer in his own life. An external force that does nothing but shake the snowglobe and wait to see where the dust settles, where everything lands. 

But his self-prescribed identity crisis is not Jungwon’s problem, and Jake is at least self-aware enough to know that any hardships in his life likely pale in comparison to Jungwon’s. It’s not like measuring misery has ever done Jake any good, and it feels unfair for him to be jumping to conclusions and stacking their lives against each other when all Jungwon is doing is trying to make conversation. 

So Jake decides to save the psychoanalysis for a sleepless night and is nothing but neutral when he chooses to reply to the first part of Jungwon’s comment, “Well, I’m grateful that you’re willing to help me. I’m kind of a disaster when it comes to econ.”

“So I hear,” Jungwon smiles, and Jake thinks that maybe him and Jungwon will get along just fine, whether they have the common ground of economics or not.  “Don’t let ___ tease you too hard about it, though. I used to help her, too. Back in high school.”

And if Jake was trying to stop himself from feeling sorry for Jungwon, he doesn’t have to try for very long. He suddenly thinks friendship will be a very hard thing to form. Mostly because he has the distinct sense Jungwon is reflecting on your high school days together rather fondly. Maybe a little too fondly. “Really?”

“Yeah,” Jungwon nods. “I’m a freshman, so I’m a couple years younger than you guys,” he sighs like it’s a terrible thing to be and Jake has never been more appreciative of his own birth date, “but she’s been friends with my older sister for years now. ___ was always pretty good at most subjects, but physics gave her a run for her money, so I helped her a bit when I could.”

It makes sense, he supposes. Jungwon was your physics tutor, so you knew you could recommend him with confidence. With all your first hand experience. 

“You two are close, then?” Jake hates the way he sounds almost defensive. Hates the way he doesn’t recognize the odd feeling that’s beginning to swirl in his gut unpleasantly.

“We’ve definitely gotten closer,” Jungwon nods. Jake doesn’t think he’s imagining the sudden flush on the younger boy’s cheeks. “Especially since I started university here. My sister decided to get her degree abroad, but ___ and I have still stayed in touch even without her around as the middleman, y’know?”

“Right,” Jake agrees. To what, he’s not sure. He has no idea if you have the same feelings towards your relationship with Jungwon, if you’d corroborate the fact that the two of you are getting closer, if your cheeks would get a little color in them while you talked about it. 

It strikes Jake then that he really doesn't know anything about you. At least not anything substantial. And while the dictionary of personal details you’ve compiled is still sitting in his bag, he doubts it will divulge things related to relationships. Things he’s suddenly curious about. 

He can at least feel confident in the fact that you’re not currently dating anyone. He wouldn’t have just signed a contract if you were. But that still leaves a lot of gray area, a lot of questions. 

Are there any recent exes he should know about? Messy situationships that would be glad to land a few punches on him if word of your supposed relationship were to accidentally get out? 

Jake has no idea, and even less of a clue as to how to find out. But he doesn’t like the way those uncertainties settle in his gut. And he doesn’t like the way Jungwon says your name. 

Jungwon must mistake Jake’s sudden silence as passion for fixing his grades, because the next thing he says is, “Sorry, I kind of went on a tangent there.” His apologetic smile does nothing to quell the riot in Jake’s mind. “Anyway,” he opens his laptop. “Economics. I figured we could start by looking at the upcoming assignment to see which parts are trickiest for you and go from there.” Glancing at the older boy, he asks, “Or did you have a different idea?”

“No,” Jake shakes his head. “That sounds good to me.” And he shouldn't say it, but, “I’ve got plans this weekend, so I’m hoping to get as much of this done as I can before then.”

“Oh,” Jungwon asks. It’s more of an effort to be polite than genuine curiosity. “Anything fun?”

Jake shouldn’t. Not considering the conversation you just had. Not considering the contract he just signed. 

“I don’t know. I can’t decide if I’m more nervous or excited.”

He really, really, shouldn’t. But–

“I’m taking ___ to officially meet my parents.” 

The way Jungwon falters is barely perceptible. Jake only notices because he’s watching for it. 

Jungwon’s brow creases for a moment, putting the pieces together until he realizes that they definitely only fit one way. “You two are dating?”

Jake tries not to be offended at the shock in his voice. “Is it that surprising?”

“I mean, kind of.” Jungwon is still reeling a bit. “When she mentioned that you were looking for a tutor, she said you were just a friend.”

And now Jake has to think of how to play his cards here. He needs to tread carefully, choose his words wisely. There are too many ways he could back himself into a corner, accidentally tell a lie he can’t talk his way out of. That’s probably, definitely, why you made the point of saying the two of you should leave your friends out of the arrangement entirely. Should only divulge the details if they start poking around first. Which Jungwon was definitely not doing. 

Ultimately, Jake decides to leave his explanation as vague as possible, hoping that the less he reveals, the less Jungwon will be able to poke at it until his lie crumbles and leaves nothing but the truth in its wake. 

Shrugging, he says, “We’ve been keeping it pretty quiet. You know how rumors can be.” They can catch fire at the first sign of wind. Can spread before there’s any chance of controlling them. Kind of like the one he’s single handedly spreading right now.

“Oh,” is all Jungwon says. And despite himself, Jake does feel kind of bad for the kid. He feels even worse when Jungwon finds his smile again a moment later and adds, “Well, I hope it all goes good for you. ___’s a great girl.”

But all that guilt is pushed to the side when that odd, unpleasant feeling at the bottom of Jake’s gut releases a little bit of tension, heaves a giant sigh of relief. 

“Yeah,” Jake nods without thinking. In his mind, he sees a gold dress, a black marker, his name in your handwriting. There’s a sliver of truth there, albeit a small one, when he agrees, “She is.”

…

Saturday night puts you back in the passenger seat of Jake’s car, a sense of deja vu overcoming you as he navigates out of your apartment building’s parking lot and onto the highway. Although this time, he did manage to avoid an argument with your doorman. Mostly because Jake Sim is now a name on your list of approved visitors. 

And there are more differences to be found. Tonight, you’ve traded your evening gown for a pair of dark wash jeans and a sweater that Jake insists his mother will love. The aged bottle of red wine you brought as a gift for his parents has a bow wrapped around its neck where it sits on the back seat of Jake’s car. 

If nothing else, Jake has to applaud your insistence that you not show up as an empty-handed guest. Your commitment to the facade is truly admirable, even if it is motivated by the contract you keep safe and sound in the top drawer of your desk. 

And finally, as opposed to the drive to your family’s fundraiser, this commute is far from silent. 

“Good,” you nod, praising Jake’s most recent answer. Despite his initial protests, he did his studying. And if his string of correct responses is anything to go by, you seem to be a subject he has an easier time grasping than economics. Or perhaps one he simply has more vested interest in. “And my top three favorite colors are?”

“One,” Jake answers seamlessly. “Gold, but only if it’s 24 karat. Two, the exact red of the Hermès Satin Lipstick in shade Rouge H. Three is pink. But not hot pink. You like softer shades, like baby pink.” Like that damn contract. 

“Nicely done. My major is?”

“Pre-law,” Jake fills in. “But you’re still undecided on if you’ll attend law school after graduation.”

It’s a tidbit that he finds mildly interesting. He’s not surprised that like him, like James, you’re following in your parents’ footsteps. As the daughter of ridiculously successful lawyers, it’s a career path that makes perfect sense for you. 

And the compassion also has him thankful for the partnership between your families, which has undoubtedly done you both some favors. First, Jake suspects that a few under-the-table deals have likely funded more than one of his childhood family vacations. And second, it adds credibility, at least from an outsider’s perspective, to the relationship the two of you are faking. 

He does wonder why you’re undecided on law school, though. If law is your field of choice, it seems like a natural progression. Not to mention that as third-year university students, the two of you are running out of time for indecision. Jake is well-acquainted with this particular reality, but it strikes him as out of character that you are as well.  

From the outside, at least, you’ve always been an image of perfection to him. Someone who has it all together, who has a ten-year plan and the actual conviction to see it through to the end. Unlike him, who’s still grasping at straws where all matters of his future are concerned. 

A fact that he’s reminded of when you say, “You know, I didn’t exactly have high hopes, considering your academic track record, but that was perfect.” You shift in your seat, preparing for a challenge. “Okay, your turn. Quiz me.” 

Your work has been undeniably easier. As opposed to the multi-page, double sided, single spaced abomination you handed him a few days ago, the Jake Sim cheat sheet still sitting on your night stand was nothing but a small assortment of facts that fit on a single sheet of paper. 

But now, the subject of your major takes Jake from thinking about your future to thinking about the classes you’re currently taking. Which makes him think of something he hasn’t been able to let go of since his first tutoring session a few nights ago. Instead of cooperating, he hands the reins to what’s been weighing on his mind. “Are you taking any physics classes?”

“Ugh,” you groan. “You were doing so well. And you literally just answered that one. I’m a pre-law major, remember?”

But Jake needs to know. Doesn’t quite have the room to think about anything else right now. “Just answer the question.”

The glance you give him is scathing, but you can sense that he’s not going to let it go until he gets his answer. “No, I’m not taking physics.” Jake hates the way that odd feeling in his gut makes a sudden reappearance, hates the way it unclenches at your response. “I haven’t since high school. I hate that stupid subject.”

Still, he can’t stop himself from offering, “Well, if you ever do–”

“Did you listen to anything I just said?”

“I was pretty good at it in high school.” He’s only kind of lying. He was pretty decent at it, at least the times he bothered to finish his homework. 

“... Okay?” You still don’t see a point to this sudden detour in the conversation. 

“So I could, uh, I could help you out. If you ever have to take it for some reason, I could help with your homework and stuff.”

“Right, because the first person I would go to for homework help is definitely Mr. I Failed Economics Twice.” Jake can hear the sarcasm. He thinks to himself, a little miserably, that if you were actually picking someone to go to, it would probably be the same person tutoring Jake now. Your old physics tutor from high school. 

Jake will pretend that the way that makes his blood pressure rise is only because he’s worried Jungwon won’t have as much time for their sessions if he picks you back up as a client. 

“Don’t hold econ against me. They’re entirely different subjects–”

“Whatever.” You cut him off. “Who gives a shit about physics? Just quiz me.”

Jake wants to press it. He really does. Wants to ask his real questions, which have a lot less to do with physics and a lot more to do with a certain econ tutor, but it’s not like you’d entertain his curiosity there either. So he relents. “Fine.” Trying to remember what he even wrote on the sheet he gave you, he starts with, “My major is?”

“Business.” Slightly quieter, you mumble, “A questionable choice, if you ask me.”

“Hey!” Jake protests. “I didn’t add any commentary to your ridiculous answers.” And some of them had been ridiculous, indeed. “I mean, seriously. You made me memorize your five favorite necklines.”

“Clearly not, since you put sweetheart and off-the-shoulder in the wrong order.”

Jake just blinks. How are you a real person? “You are actually the most annoying person I have ever met.”

The dig rolls right off your shoulders as you return one of your own. “That’s hardly even an insult, considering the size of your social circle. It’s not my fault you don’t get out much.”

“It’s like you want me to kick you out on the side of the highway–”

“And show up to your family dinner without me? Yeah, sure.”

“Besides, you know that means you’re admitting to being more annoying than Heeseung–”

“On second thought, the side of the highway sounds nice. Feel free to drop me at the next mile marker.”

“Yeah?” Jake taunts, glancing down at your choice in footwear. Another pair of heels so tall he’s impressed you can walk at all. “You think those shoes would be comfortable to walk home in?” Taking one hand off the wheel, he leans over menacingly. “In fact, why don’t I break them in for you now–”

“Okay,” you push back at him in a way that’s probably unwise, considering the fact that he’s driving. “Okay. No extra comments from me.” You mime zipping your lips with your finger. “You’re a business major. End of answer.”

Jake doesn’t believe you for a second. But after pausing to send you a withering glare for good measure, he continues anyway. “Sport I played growing up?”

Much to his surprise, your answer is genuine, concise. “Soccer.” And correct. 

“Pets?”

“Just a dog. Layla.”

As the road stretches on in front of you, back and forth quizzing takes you all the way to his parents’ house. As he pulls into the long driveway, Jake spares a glance in your direction. You wear an expression he hasn’t seen on you before. 

It confuses him a little, worries him even, until he realizes–

“Hold on. Are you… nervous?”

“What about it?” Even visibly tense, your gut reaction is to deny, to make excuses. Finally, you admit, “It’s been a while since I’ve met anyone’s mom.”

Jake almost considers telling you that he’s pretty sure she’d redecorate one of the guest bedrooms and put your name on the door if she thought you’d like that, but decides against it. 

“Hey,” he reaches for your hand instead, interlaces your fingers. “My mom will love you.” In fact, she probably already does. “It will be just fine.”

Jake supposes that divulging just one of her many messages from this week couldn’t hurt. Besides, he’s half afraid you’ll actually run back down the street the two of you just drove up if he doesn’t give you some sort of confidence boost. “She’s really excited to meet you. That cheat sheet of yours actually came in handy, because she asked me what your favorite kind of cookie is. She’s sending us back with a box of homemade snickerdoodles tonight.” What Jake doesn’t mention is the fact that he’s never been big on cinnamon. 

“Really?”

“Mhm. So there’s no need to wor–”

“What about your dad?”

“My dad is…” Jake trails off, searching for the right words. “He’s a businessman. In a lot of ways, he’s difficult. And very set in his ways, which makes him particular. But on the outside, he’s easy to get along with. He wants to make a good impression on people. And even if he didn’t, you really don’t have anything to worry about there either. His biggest concern is always how things will reflect on the company, and you’re pretty much as perfect as it gets in that regard.” Pausing for a moment, he adds, “And we both know my brother’s kind of obsessed with you.”

And he really did set himself up for it, he realizes, the second you turn to him with a wink and say, “Must run in the family.” Jake won’t even argue with you on that one for now. His mission was to get you out of your head and back to your usual self. The version of you that he knows and occasionally tolerates. The version of you that could probably win an Oscar for playing the role of is fake girlfriend, if you really put your mind to it. 

So before you can start to linger on your worries again, Jake steps out of the car. Makes quick work of walking around the front to open the passenger side door for you. 

When he offers you, and outstretched hand, you take it. This time, it’s you that initiates the interlacing of your fingers. Glancing at the expanse of the home in front of you – although mansion may be a better word for it – you take a deep breath. 

“Ready?” Jake echoes your words from your family’s fundraiser just a week ago. 

You’re a little less confident this go around. “As I’ll ever be.”

Jake, too caught up in his attempts to soothe your frayed nerves, forgets to warn you that Layla can be a bit of a jumper, especially with new people. Sure enough, the first person to greet the two of you as spoon as he turns the doorknob is his favorite family pet. Honestly, Jake is a little more concerned about the bottle of wine in your hands than anything. 

Especially when, just as he remembered a little too late, Layla makes quick work of giving you an overexcited greeting. 

When he does finally manage to get her mostly off of you, he’s relieved to note that the alcohol is unharmed. With a bit more trepidation, he lets his eyes wander up to your face. It’s a safe bet, he thinks, that someone with five favorite necklines isn’t a fan of obnoxious furry greetings.

To his surprise, however, the only expression he reads is pleasant surprise. 

“This is Layla?” You ask. Jake nods, still a bit strained from the way he’s preventing Layla from trying to lick at your face and leave paw prints on your jeans. 

But that’s not what you’re thinking about. No, you’ve suddenly been transported to an unfortunate forty-five minutes wasted in a restaurant all on your own. The catalyst of all of this. 

Because Layla is the same dog you saw while doom scrolling James’ social media profile. You thought she was cute, back then, sandwiched between gym selfies and other photos more telling of James’ awful personality. 

But now, looking at the way she almost seems to smile while Jake scratches her behind the ears, wraps her up in a big, warm hug, you think you just might like her even more. 

You’ve never seen your fake boyfriend look at anything with so much… fondness. It’s palpable, all of his pent up love, as he lets some of it loose to shower Layla with it. Everything about him is a little easier, a little more relaxed. You can see it in the set of his shoulders, the absence of tension in his jaw. 

Most of all, you see it in his smile. Bright, warm, genuine. You don’t think you’ve ever seen him wear that expression before. It suits him, you think, as you reach down to give her a greeting of your own. 

“Hi, Layla,” you smile, reaching down to pat her on the head. 

And if that makes Jake turn to look at you with a little too much fondness, you’ll assume it’s just lingering remnants of his reunion with his favorite girl. Layla, that is. 

You’re pretty sure the two of them could spend hours just catching up, especially when Layla turns onto her back in a silent demand for tummy rubs, but a voice from a nearby room cuts it short. 

“Jake?” A distinctly feminine voice calls. “Is that you?”

“Well,” Jake gives Layla one final pat for good measure, turns his eyes to you as he stands. “Shall we?”

You don’t mean to be, but you’re nervous again. This is his family, his space, his mother. Not only are you a stranger here, but one that’s been invited under false pretenses. There are too many things to fuck up, too many ways you could send this evening spinning sideways by accident. 

Here in the entryway, with just you, Jake, and Layla, things feel peaceful, simple. You know that just a few steps in the direction of his mother’s voice will turn that calm in your chest upside the head. You’re not ready for it. You’re not. 

You don’t respond to Jake’s invitation, but he reads your hesitation all the same. 

“Hey,” he whispers, all the hard edges gone from his voice as he steps a little closer. “She’s gonna love you.” Again, his hand finds yours, slides his fingers through your own and finds little resistance on your end. 

She. You don’t know how he knows, when you haven’t told him, but it’s true. You don’t care all that much about pleasing his father and even less so about making a good impression on his brother, but his mom… 

You care. You don’t know why, but you care. 

And you don’t know how, but Jake knows. 

You hope his words aren’t empty reassurances as you let him tug at your hand, pull you a little further into his home, wrap you a little more inextricably into the threads of his life. 

His mother waits for you in the living room. A head or two shorter than her youngest son, she has nothing but a smile for him as she pulls him into a hug, reaching up to wrap her hand around the back of his shoulders. 

Your hand is still linked with his. The angle makes it somewhat awkward, but neither of you is quite ready to let go. 

Looking over his shoulder, her eyes settle on you. Breath suddenly stuttering in your chest, your knees feel a little wobbly underneath you. 

Jake won’t let you fall. As soon as his mother releases her embrace, he’s tugging you closer. He undoes the bind of your hands only to wrap his arm around your shoulder, pulling you into his side. 

“Mom,” he introduces, smiling. “This is ___,” eyes locking with yours, he adds , “my girlfriend.” If you didn’t know any better, you’d think he was proud of the fact.

And then his mother is looking at you. Really looking at you. It’s hard not to wither under her stare, hard not to brace for the results of her inevitable appraisal. But where you expect to see scrutiny, judgment, disdain, you only see a smile. A warm one. A real one. 

“It’s lovely to meet you,” she says, and you almost have the feeling that she means it. 

Remembering yourself, your role for the evening, you give her a smile of your own. “It’s lovely to meet you too.” You hope your voice is more steady than it feels. “You have a beautiful home. Thank you for inviting me to it.” Remembering the bottle of wine still encased in your hold, you hold it out towards her. “And this is for you.”

“Oh,” she beams, accepting the gift. Reading the label, she admonishes lightly, “You shouldn’t have. How did you know this is my absolute favorite?”

Glancing at her son, you admit, “I may have had some help.”

“Well at least one of us got some guidance.” She leans towards you, pulling your arm into her own and leaving Jake behind the two of you. “Tell me, what do you prefer? White or red?”

“Usually white.” 

Jake rolls his eyes at your answer, or rather, the brevity of it. According to the stack of papers you made him memorize, your real answer is…

Chardonnay with poultry, sauvignon blanc with seafood, pinot grigio with dessert, pinot noir with red meat (unless it’s ribeye, then cabernet sauvignon)...

But it does make him smile, the way you fall into step at his mother’s side so naturally. The way she makes you flush when she gives you yet another compliment on your hair or your outfit or your beauty. 

Even the protest dies on his lips when he hears her whisper a little too loudly, “And how do you put up with him when he’s in one of his moods? You know, the one where he gets all cranky and can’t be reasoned with at all.”

At her side, you just giggle. Jake would be lying if he said he didn’t think it was kind of adorable. 

He likes it, watching you and his mom together. Watching her light up at the chance to finally have a pretty girl to fawn over. His mother loves her sons – Jake has never doubted this for a moment – but there’s a certain kind of connection that only comes with a daughter. 

It’s a shame, he thinks, that your own mother is in the habit of squandering it with criticism and shame and admonishment. 

Watching the two of you now, Jake isn’t sure if he’s ever seen his mom enjoy herself more. When the three of you reach the dining room, she insists that you take the seat directly across from her. Even in her excitement, she won’t let anyone fill the seat next to you except for your boyfriend. 

It’s sweet, the way she dotes on you. And Jake is content to just watch, for the time being, hoping you and her both enjoy it as long as you can. 

Until New Year’s, that voice in his head reminds him. And suddenly, even with the back half of a semester in front of him, the holidays don’t seem so far away. 

The conversation only dies down slightly when his father and brother enter the room. Even in the comfort of his own home, his father strikes an imposing presence. He’s not cold when he introduces himself to you, reaching out an arm for a firm handshake, but there is no extra warmth embedded in the action either. After sending his youngest son a nod, he takes his seat at the head of the table. 

James doesn’t bother with formalities. Sliding down next to his mother, he’s already a little smug when he says, “Hi Jake.” Pausing, he glances towards you. “___.”

“James,” you return, smile significantly faker than it was moments ago. 

Jake is debating how worth it it would be if he kicked his older brother under the table when the first course is brought out, interrupting that train of thought. 

After passing the first set of dishes around and filling your plates, his mother is the first to pose a question. To test your thorough preparation for the evening. 

“So,” she asks, taking a sip of wine. “How did you two meet?”

And it’s such an obvious question. Such a painfully straightforward inquiry and yet somehow, too wrapped up in getting a contract signed and memorizing each other’s fun facts, it’s something the two of you completely neglected to cover.  

You both freeze, absence of a mutually agreed-upon backstory making you look like twin deer in headlights where you sit next to each other. 

A beat passes. Two. 

You say, “a mutual friend” at the same exact moment he says, “a class.”

Passing each other panicked looks, you smooth things over with a shaky, “A mutual friend in our class.” After a steadying breath, you add, “We have a mutual friend in our class, and he introduced us.”

“Oh, how nice.” Jake’s mom smiles. Turning to her youngest son, she asks, “Which friend was it? Someone I know?”

“Heeseung,” Jake nods, just as you say, “Sunghoon.”

This time, Jake is the one to cover your tracks. 

“My friend Heeseung and her friend Sunghoon know each other,” he explains. “I guess it’s technically two mutual friends, since we met through them.”

“And all four of you are in the same class together,” Jake’s mom is still beaming. “That’s awfully lucky. What a coincidence.” 

“You could say that again,” James mumbles under his breath across the table, decidedly less enchanted by the false tale of your first meeting. And considerably more suspicious. His eyebrow is arched when he asks, “What class did you say it was, again?”

Your brain scrambles only for a second. “Econ,” you answer quickly. Jake’s struggles aside, you figure that it's your best bet, considering that at least two of the four people you’ve listed are actually in that class. 

The glare that strikes the side of your face from Jake’s seat is frigid enough to kill a houseplant. 

“Econ,” James echoes flatly. And then something a little sinister enters his eyes. His spine straightens, poised for offense, when he directs to you, “I hope Dr. Kang isn’t as much of a hardass as he was when I was in school.”

You open your mouth to reply, probably to bite back with something along the lines of the class actually being rather easy, or you having a stellar rapport with Dr. Kang.

But Jake spots the trap before you can fall into it and cuts you off just as quickly. “It’s Dr. Jeong, actually.” He’s not glaring at his brother, but there’s no extra kindness in his stare. “I’m sure you remember, since you always say that he was your favorite professor.”

“Oh.” James’ eyes slide to his little brother. “That’s right. My mistake.” But his words make you think the switch in names was intentional bait, not a lapse in memory. Bait you almost fell for. 

Before you can let the implications of that sink in, Jake’s father directs his attention towards you, speaking for the first time. “You’re a business major, too, then.” It’s not exactly a question, even though he doesn’t know for certain. Even though he’s wrong. But men like Jake’s father don’t get to where they are by asking questions. They get there by making assumptions and talking over everyone else in the room until wills bend to their whim and reality is what they’ve made it. 

Still, Jake’s voice is steady when he corrects, “No she’s a pre-law major.”

Something flashes in his father’s eyes, but he says nothing. 

His mother, on the other hand, passes her youngest son a look. “I think ___ can speak for herself.”

It’s under his breath, but just a little too audible for comfort when Jake argues, “Not after I just had to memorize–”

“The entire case with me!” The sudden volume of your outburst rings awkwardly in the air. Adjusting your voice, you add to your explanation, “We got a crazy complicated case assigned in criminal law a couple weeks ago.” If the elbow nudge you give Jake is a little too hard, no one bats an eye at the way he winces slightly. “I’ve been talking about it so much I’m sure Jake has practically memorized it.”

Jake’s father hears what he wants to. Picks through the pieces of what you say and paints his own picture. “It’s nice to see a young person so dedicated to their studies.” No one at the table misses the way his eyes slide over to his second son. “And the family business by extension. I’ve always liked your parents,” he nods to you. “And they’ve been excellent partners. You’re going to law school, then, I assume? After you graduate.”

Jake can practically see the answer you typed out for him, words stamped in his brain from the amount of times he forced himself to look over them. My major is pre-law, you’d written in a font that’s almost as high maintenance as you. I’m considering attending law school after finishing undergrad, but I’m still undecided. 

But then he hears you say, “That’s the plan.” 

Jake can’t quite help the way he glances over at you, a question on his face, written all over his features. The two responses can’t hold true at the same time. 

One of your answers, either the one you typed for him or the one you’ve just given his father, is a lie. If the way your shoulders round slightly is any indication, he thinks the packet you gave him must be the real one. 

But as his father nods at you approvingly across the table, you just smile at Jake. Then you shake your head slightly, almost imperceptibly. He reads it as you intend it – a silent signal to move on and act as if nothing’s amiss. A nonverbal request to just let it go. 

Across the table from the two of you, his mother is the one to speak next, to divert the conversation from one area of dangerous territory to another. “James tells me that you two were together at your family’s fundraiser event.” Like Jake considered earlier, it’s all you can do not to kick him under the table at the reminder. That gossipping little shit. “You’ll have to pass on my apology to your mother that we couldn’t make it. But I have to say, I’m surprised the two of you decided to announce your relationship by attending together.” She frowns, but there’s a lightness in her tone that tells you she’s not mad, not really. “And I still can’t believe you made me hear it from your brother!”

Jake, thankfully, handles that one with ease. “We’ve been keeping things pretty close to the chest these last few weeks.” He glances at you fondly, and you have to applaud him. From the outside, you think it must look quite genuine. “We just liked each other.” Under the table, he takes your hand back in his. You assume that he’s just caught in the moment, forgets the fact that there’s no way for his family to see the display of affection. “We wanted to see where things would go.” Turning back to his mother, he adds, somewhat apologetically, “It was never meant to be some big announcement. Of course, I would have told you, Mom, when we did actually announce our relationship.” Jake lets his eyes fall on his older brother. “If someone hadn’t beat me to it.”

You can see the way James’ hackles rise, and so can she. 

Sensing the potential for another argument to brew, his mother cuts in again, smoothing over the tension. “Well, what’s done is done.” Turning to you, she smiles. “And we’re very happy to have you here, ___. I hope my son is treating you well.”

Jake isn’t sure how you manage to do it without grimacing, without turning up your nose at the lie, but you assure his mother, “He is.” And your smile looks almost genuine. “The very best,” 

Jake isn’t the only one that seems to think that you mean it. Across the table, his mother swoons while James crumples a little. His father just looks mildly disinterested, if anything. 

And those expressions remain steady for the rest of the evening, more or less, as you and Jake take turns spinning tales of the early days of your romance. He divulges the details of the outfit you were wearing on your so-called first date (a top with a sweetheart neckline, not off-the-shoulder), and you supplement with a tall tale of the time Jake saved you from getting soaked to the bone when he showed up outside of your lecture hall with an umbrella after a torrential downpour began out of nowhere. 

After a while, even his beaming mother can only handle so much sappiness, and she begins the end of the evening by excusing herself, referencing an early morning tomorrow as her reason for leaving. After giving you both one final hug, she bids you both goodnight. His father follows soon after, sans hug, leaving the table to take an urgent business call. 

In an effort to escape James and his wandering eye, Jake is quick to excuse the two of you moments later, whispering some half hearted excuse about giving you a tour of the house. To his credit, he does actually lead you around a handful of rooms on the first floor, but the tour is cut short by the time the two of you go up the stairs and step out onto the outdoor balcony on the second floor. 

The cool autumn air is refreshing, washes away lingering anxieties from a few close calls, a handful of narrow escapes from certain fiascos. From keeping up your hastily constructed lies for an entire evening.

For long minutes, the two of you are content to say nothing at all. And Jake isn’t uncomfortable in the silence, but after a while, he still searches for something to fill it. Something to get a conversation going. Something to see where your head's at. He finally settles on, “I can’t believe we forgot to come up with a story of how we met.”

He half expects you to say something scathing. To use your wit to insult or blame him for the lack of foresight, but you don’t. Instead, you exhale. And then you agree, somewhat amused, “Me neither.”

“I think we did alright, though,” Jake reasons. He hates to admit it, but, “That cheat sheet idea of yours came in handy, after all.”

Again, he doesn’t get the sarcasm he expects. “No kidding.” And then you’re the one looking for ways to keep the interaction flowing. Something to fill the silence. “Your mom seems nice.”

“She is,” Jake nods. And he knew she would like you just as much. “She’s the person I’m closest to in my family.”

“Mm,” you hum. You can see why. She’s warm in a way that your own has never been. But it’s not like Jake exactly got dealt an easy hand when it comes to family members. You mean it when you tell him, “Your brother still sucks.”

Jake just laughs. “And I wouldn’t hold my breath for that to change anytime soon.”

A half smile pulls at your lips. It’s replaced by a small frown when you suppose it’s time to comment on the last guest of the evening. “You were right, in the car. Your dad is… intense.” It’s not like you exactly hit the jackpot of parental relationships, but you can’t imagine it’s easy for Jake to have a father like that, to have grown up with those expectations, those scrutinizing eyes, weighing on his shoulders. 

Instead of responding, Jake just looks at you for a moment. His eyes trace your profile, committing details to memory, as you look out at the night in front of you. And then he says, “Can I ask you something?”

You sigh. You’re still not looking at him, but you can sense the sudden sincerity in his voice. “Aren’t you going to anyway?”

Jake shakes his head even though you can’t see it. “I wouldn’t have asked for permission if I was going to anyway.”

A moment of silence rings in the air. And then, “Okay.”

Jake isn’t sure what you’re referring to. “Okay, you agree or okay, I can ask?”

At that, you turn to look at him. “Both, I guess.”

Jake meets your eye, considers the best way to ask what’s been weighing on his mind for the better part of the evening. “When my dad asked you about law school,” he starts, “why did you tell him that you’re planning to go? You wrote that you still aren’t sure on the paper you gave me.”

You only pause for a moment. “It’s what he wanted to hear.”

“What?” There’s no evasiveness in your words, but Jake is still looking for clarity.

Sighing, you elaborate, “Your dad didn’t want to hear about my indecisiveness when it comes to the future. He wanted to hear about the plan I have. One that would make sense to him. So I told him what he wanted to hear.” Breaking eye contact, you look back out at the stars. “Sometimes, it’s just easier that way.”

But Jake still has one other question. He might be pressing his luck, but he asks anyway, “Why haven’t you decided? About law school, I mean?”

Your gaze lands somewhere in the distance, somewhere it might take light years to reach. “What do you want to hear?”

For the second time, Jake asks,“What?”

It’s ironic, almost, how easily you’re able to rifle through his insecurities, his inner thoughts. “What do you want to hear? Something that will make you feel better about having questions about your future? Something that will make you believe you’ll have everything figured out soon?” The stars blink above you, and you ask him again, “What answer do you want to hear from me?”

Jake realizes it then, under the glow of fading moonlight, why you’ve always been an image of perfection to him. It’s not accidental, but it’s also not entirely honest. Perfection, he realizes, is your identity of choice – it’s what you think other people want from you. So you construct it, you practice it, you create it. And then you give it. You let people do what they want with it. 

But Jake isn’t asking about your future career plans because he’s trying to feel better about himself. He’s not trying to stack up your lives next to each other and see how his compares. He’s not trying to put cracks in the exterior you’ve worked so hard to maintain.

But he does want a glimpse of what’s underneath.  

So when he answers, he opts for a third option. “The truth.” Above you, the moon glows. “I want to hear the truth.”

If it catches you off guard, you recover quickly. You’re not sure what it is about this moment that has you wanting to spill your guts, but you can’t remember the last time someone asked. The last time someone cared.

So you tell him, with all your honesty, “I don’t want to go to law school. I never have. My mother has made it clear that that’s the expectation, though. So I can’t decide how willing I am to estrange myself completely. To potentially lose what’s left of our relationship.”

Jake listens. He hears you. He gets it. “What would you do?”

It’s another answer that comes easy, even though the question hasn’t been asked by anyone in a long, long time. “Architecture.” Your smile is small, but it’s real. “I had a great aunt who was an architect. And she always used to tell me, when I was kid, that the secret is to put a little love into everything you build. It doesn’t have to be actual buildings, of course. That was just her thing, y’know? The thing she could always put a little love into, even on the hard days.” You sigh. “Truth be told, I don’t hate law. It’s interesting, and I’m good at it. But it’s not something I’ve ever been able to put a little love into.”

You turn to him, words still ringing in the air. You ask, “What about you? Was business always your calling?”

If you can give him the truth, Jake supposes he ought to return the favor. “To be honest, I have no idea. It was never a question. It was always a given that I would study business and take on some kind of role in the company.” He turns over your great aunt’s words in his mind. “But I don’t think it’s something I have any love for. Not even a little.”

“So what would you do?” You echo his question back to him. “If you could do anything?”

Jake’s answer comes less easily. “I don’t know.” You raise an eyebrow. “I really don’t. To be honest, I don’t even think I could tell you most of the other majors that are offered at our university. It’s always been business. It’s what my whole family does. Even Jay, my closest friend, is a business major too.” Jake realizes how odd that must sound, but it’s true. “It’s all I really know.”

“Hm,” you muse. He can see the wheels spinning in your brain, the beginning of an idea. “Maybe it’s time for you to find your thing, then. Somewhere to put your love.”

“Yeah, right,” Jake scoffs. He doesn’t think that’s possible, and especially not at this point. “I may not ever be the CEO, but I still don’t want my dad to disown me. And besides, we’re in our third year. Not exactly the best time to change my major.”

“Yeah,” you agree, but Jake can tell you still haven’t quite let it go. “I suppose you’re right.”

This time, when the silence between you returns, you let it linger. With nothing but the pale glow of the night sky and quiet whispers of the wind, long moments bleed into each other. You take it all in, let it all wash over you – the stillness, the chill of an autumn breeze, the presence of the boy at your side.  

And it’s a long time before either of you moves again. 

…

At this point, Jake really should be used to ominous, slightly threatening messages from you. Still, he can’t help but stutter a bit when he checks his phone after another tutoring session with Jungwon the following week. 

Without any family events looming on the horizon, you and Jake have had a few days to yourselves without any fake dating facade to follow. Aside from the white lies Jake slips Jungwon every now and then, he hasn’t seen or mentioned you since e dropped you back off at your apartment after dinner at his parents’ house last weekend. 

His thoughts, however, are an entirely different matter. No matter where he is, what he’s doing, they have the very annoying habit of always straying back to the same scene. A moonlit balcony. A cool autumn breeze. The most scraps of truth he’s ever been given from you at once. A thousand misconceptions shattered and reconstructed all in a single moment. 

Still, Jake’ not quite sure how to interpret the message that greets him, other than as a very direct threat. 

You [7:48 pm]: Meet me at the far end of the quad next to the library tomorrow at 2:45 or I’m telling your brother we broke up and I have uncontrollable romantic feelings for him

Jake [8:02 pm]: Should I be scared?

He’s not reassured by your reply.

You [8:04 pm]: :)

So Jake is standing on the far end of the quad, beside the library, the next afternoon at 2:42 when he sees you approaching. 

The first thing you do when you finally reach him is swat at the baseball cap he’s wearing, knocking it askew. “What are you, a frat boy?”

“It’s sunny,” Jake defends, fixing his hat. Something you’re well aware of, if the obnoxiously large sunglasses balanced on the bridge of your nose are anything to go by.

“You know,” you tilt your head, giving it a second thought. “The hat might be kind of perfect, actually.” Deciding to divulge the reason for your message, you tell him, “I need you to come somewhere with me.”

“What?” Jake balks, suddenly thrown by the lack of details. He needs a little more warning than this, if he’s expected to play the role of your boyfriend convincingly. “Is this,” he leans in close, waits for a group of students to pass by before he whispers apprehensively, “a contract thing?”

“No,” you shake your head. “I mean, don’t like, start hitting on other girls in front of witnesses or anything, but we don’t have to act like a couple.”

Now, Jake is even more confused. “Then where are we going?”

Never one to give in easily, all you say is, “You’ll see.”

Jake crosses his arms over his chest. “I’m not going anywhere with you until you give me more information.”

“I literally have James’ phone number in my favorites.”

He holds his ground. “And I have the right to know where you’re taking me!”

“Ugh,” you roll your eyes. “Fine. We’re going to the Student Union Building.” A multipurpose building in the center of campus, it’s a typical place for events that are too large to be hosted anywhere else. Which really doesn’t give Jake much to work with.

“Why?” His question is slow, suspicious. 

“My god.” You throw your hands in annoyance. “I’m going to have to start paying Jungwon double if this is how annoying you are when you have a question about something. Just come with me,” you reiterate. “You’ll see what we’re doing soon enough.”

“But–”

It doesn’t matter, you’re already grabbing his hand in yours, more or less dragging him through the quad towards the Student Union Building before he can get his protest out. Jake’s eyebrows are still creased in confusion when you pull him through the front doors and he sees the unusually large crowd of people inside. 

Then, he sees the banner hanging from the ceiling. His lips flatten into a thin line. 

“Absolutely not.” But you’re already behind him, blocking his exit and pushing him towards the makeshift check-in counter. 

“Hi!” The student employee greets, far too cheerfully in Jake’s opinion. If she notices the way your knuckles are white around his arm, holding him in place, she doesn’t comment on it. Jake pulls his hat down further over his eyes. “Are you two here for the Explore Our Majors event?”

“Yep,” you beam. And Jake is actually going to kill you. “I’m in my third year here, but my friend Ja–”

“Jacob,” Jake intercedes. 

“Right.” You spare a glance at him. “My friend Jacob.” You’re still way too excited when you lie, “He’ll be a freshman soon, and he’s hoping to look around and see all the different programs that are offered here. Do we need to go in a certain order or anything? Or is there somewhere we need to sign in?” 

There better not be. Like hell is he putting the name Jake Sim on a sign-in sheet for a major exploration event for freshmen. It’s not like his father has time to poke around at things like this, but his claws and connections run deep where this school is concerned. And Jake imagines he would be less than pleased to find out his son is wasting his time doing something so frivolous. Or something that could signal any kind of disinterest in the future that’s been laid out for him, his eventual place at his father’s company.

“Nope,” she smiles. “Each major has its own table, and majors are grouped by college. So all the STEM tables are over there, for example,” she points over to where a group of high school seniors are flipping through pamphlets. “You can just wander around as you like and chat with the people at the tables. There’s a mix of students and faculty. Oh, and each major should have a pamphlet you can pick up too, if you’d like.”

“Great,” you grin back. “Thank you.”

Again, if she sees the way you practically have to yank Jake by the arm to get him to move, she doesn’t comment on it. But once you’re out of earshot, he does lean down to hiss in your ear, “Why the fuck are we at the Explore Our Majors event for incoming freshmen?”

“Why do you think?” Your voice is entirely too loud. He has half a mind to slap his palm over your mouth to prevent you from spilling his secrets here in the middle of the Student Union Building’s largest event hall. “We’re finding you somewhere to put your love.” The large group of girls that walks by do a double take and then proceed to take turns shooting him death glares. 

Jake panics. “Would you stop saying it like that?”

You roll your eyes, paying the group of girls and his worries no mind. “Don’t knock my great aunt. Anyway, where do you want to start? Should we go over to the STEM tables?” Pausing to consider, you ask, “Or is your performance in econ more indicative of your math and science skills in general? We could look for liberal ar–”

“I just told you this weekend that I was good at physics.” It may have been a white lie, but who’s keeping track? 

“Oh, right.” You nod, eyes already searching for the table in question. “Should we go there, then?”

“No,” Jake shakes his head immediately. “I was good at it.” Questionable. “But I didn’t really like it.” A lot more true. 

“Alright,” you agree. Spinning to look in the other direction, you take him with you “Humanities it is. Or we could always go the fine arts route.” You turn to look at him for a moment, assessing. “You know, I feel like you would actually be a great dancer. You have the face for it.”

“Has that ever made sense to anyone you’ve said it to?”

“Wouldn’t know.” You shrug. “You’re the first.” Trying not to read too much into that, Jake lets you pull him along until you’re standing in front of a table with a rather gaudy ‘Journalism’ banner hanging on the front. 

“Hi,” you smile at the students standing behind it. Jake pulls his hat down a little further. You don’t know a whole lot about journalism other than the basics, but you’re pretty sure they’re also in charge of student media on campus. “You guys run the student newspaper, right?” 

Picking up a pamphlet, you nod as the boy behind the table answers brightly, “Yeah, we do.” He’s proud when he adds, “Our last issue was one of our most read yet. We ran a really great article on the front page about the importance of understanding how economic trends affect our daily lives–”

Delicately setting the pamphlet back down on the table, you glance at Jake before apologizing to the overeager boy, “I’m sorry, but I think Jacob and I are gonna head to the next table.” 

ANd then you’re dragging him along again.

“Okay,” you turn to Jake once you’re out of earshot, “So that’s a veto for journalism. What about other kinds of writing? You point to a table a few rows away. There’s the creative writing table.”

Jake shakes his head. “Even discussion board posts are like pulling teeth.”

“Noted.” Your jaw sets with a little too much determination for his liking. “Minimal writing it is, then.” 

The two of you pass several more tables in the same fashion, Jake shutting each one down before you have a chance to so much as grab a pamphlet. 

There’s history, but who cares about dead people? English, but he’s seen the career outlook and he’d rather not study unemployment, thank you very much. Sociology, but he already lives in society. Why would he waste his time studying it?

Finally, you point out a major that he doesn't have anything scathing to say about within the first five seconds. “Graphic design,” you nod towards the table a few spots away. “That could be interesting.”

Jake hates to admit it, but he kind of thinks so too. He does think visual design is pretty interesting, and marketing and advertising have always been some of his favorite aspects of business. He’s about to say fuck it and fully embrace Jacob the incoming freshman when he notices one glaring problem. The graphic design table is set up right next to the business table. 

A nonissue, really, except for the fact that students are helping to run this event. And as you drag him closer, Jake realizes with mounting dread that he recognizes one of the faces spending an afternoon trying to convince high schoolers that choosing a business major will change their lives for the better. 

He turns to make a break for it before you can reinforce your grip on his arm and physically drag him with you, but it’s too late. 

“Jake?” he hears a horribly familiar voice call. “Is that you?” Turning around slowly, he knows he’ been caught. Jake kind of wishes the ground would open up and swallow him. The only thing he wants to do is melt into the floor. 

“It is you,” Jay says upon closer inspection. And because you seem so hellbent on making his life even more painful, you pull him with you until the two of you are right in front of his best friend. “What the hell are you doing here?” Jay asks him. “You said you had a date.”

Butting in on the conversation, your smile is entirely too smug when you turn to Jake. “You said what now?”

Glancing at you, Jay’s eyebrows furrow as he tries to connect the dots. “You were telling the truth? Dude, that’s even worse.” Jay looks at you almost like he’s trying to apologize on behalf of his friend. “You’re not exactly wine-ing and dining her, here.”

“Hi,” you introduce, extending a hand. Jay shakes it warily. “I’m ___. Jake’s…” you search for a good term to use, and finally, with a private smile, settle on, “plus-one.”

“To an Explore Our Majors event?” That clears up none of Jay’s confusion. He turns back to Jake. “What the hell? Are you going on dates with incoming freshmen–”

“This is my third year,” you interrupt again. “We’re just looking around.”

“Hold on,” Jay pauses, a flash of recognition crossing his features as he studies you for a moment. “You’re the ___ that Jake was trying to get a phone number from for his brother, right? Is that what’s going on? Are you making him do a bunch of stupid shit like this to get it?”

You shrug, glancing at Jake. “You could say that.”

Jake has to give it to you. You’re a lot better at beating around the bush, at avoiding giving straight answers about the nature of your relationship, than he is. Jay looks more confused than anything at your evasiveness. If James were to somehow hunt him down and inquire about the validity of your relationship, Jake is positive that his friend would have absolutely no idea how to answer. 

A reassuring idea, other than the fact that Jake is also sure Jay will be hunting him down after this to get the real story, since he couldn’t get it from you. Targeting the weaker prey, a classic strategy. 

“Anyway,” you build yourself an out. “We’re gonna go check out the graphic design table.”

You tug at Jake’s wrist, but he stands his ground this time. Thoroughly embarrassed and done letting you pull him around, he tries to back you into a corner with one of your tricks from the fundraiser. “We should get going, actually,” he argues pointedly. “Look at the time. We don’t want to be late for…” Unfortunately, he’s still no better at coming up with excuses, “that thing.”

You roll your eyes at the obvious trick. “Don’t worry.” Your smile is sugary, but your eyes flash with warning. “I canceled it. Let’s go.”

This time when you redouble your efforts to drag him to the graphic design table, he has no choice but to follow, a little miserably. Behind the business table, Jay has zero idea what to make of what he just witnessed.

As the students at the graphic design table start their spiel, Jake is glad at least one of you is paying attention. You nod along enthusiastically while the student representative talks your ear off about the pros and cons of various online photo editing programs, asking well-timed follow-up questions as you expertly skim the pamphlet you’re handed simultaneously. 

Jake, on the other hand, still coming down from the mortification of being caught, is suddenly a little caught up in the way your hand is still wrapped around his wrist. A light pressure he could easily work his way out of. But despite himself, he’s having a hard time coming up with any motivation to do so. 

Distantly, he concentrates on the sensation. Your skin is soft, warm. The gentle pressure of your fingers is a tether to you. And in this moment, it’s a reminder that out of everyone in his life, you’re the first to be so obnoxiously concerned with what his interests are, where his passions lie. 

Despite his rightful protests against attending this event, he can read your intentions behind bringing him here. And it would be a lie if he said he didn’t appreciate them, just a little. 

At this point in his life and academic career, he feels a little bit like a toddler you’ve thrown in a pool to try and teach to swim. It’s hard for him to tread water, to keep his head above the waves, when the solid ground he’s used to is suddenly replaced by new matter entirely. 

But if Jake is sure of one thing, it’s that he won’t drown. How could he, with the lifeline of your arm still reaching out towards him? With the steadiness of your fingers still wrapped around him? He thinks you just might save him too, if you saw him drowning. Would pull him in and teach him to float on his back. To work with the water instead of against it. 

To swim, even when the water gets rough. 

At your side, terms like visual communications and web design and typography all blur together. And Jake’s focus is still narrowed in on the pulse point on his wrist, the way his heartbeat is entrusted in your unwavering grip.

…

Jake has a well-practiced routine for checking his econ grade whenever results of a new assignment or exam are posted. 

First, he makes sure that anything fragile or breakable is out of his reach. Then, he lights a scented candle. Setting the new one he just bought a few days ago on his desk, he checks the label again. Lavender Dreams. It’s all he can do not to laugh, a little miserably. Well, he supposes, thinking back to your words a couple of weeks ago, time to find out if lavender is actually calming. 

Third, he makes sure he has no other important plans for the day. Nowhere else to be, nothing to do that he can’t show up for in a ruined mood. Because that is usually what happens during this little ritual of his.

Finally, his last step is to look up at the ceiling of his bedroom, imagine the sky above it, and whisper one, desperate, “Please.”

Then he sits at his desk and opens his laptop to greet his fate with a grimace and a racing heart. Today, Jake follows all the same steps until he’s navigating to his university’s learning management platform. He clicks on the Econ tab, slowly releases a breath he wasn’t meaning to hold. 

His shoulders tense at the notification of a newly inputted grade that pops up, the icon begging for his attention. He inhales deeply, letting the smell of lavender enter his nose and hopefully work some magic in his nervous system. 

Maybe he should adjust his ritual, he thinks, mouse hovering over the new grade notification. Maybe he should start burning incense or something, cleansing the air of any bad energy before he looks. In his indecision, his finger slips, presses, clicks. 

And Jake doesn’t quite have time to screw his eyes shut before the number flashes on his screen. 

Oh, he is so fucked.

So, so, so, terribly, absolutely, completely fucked. 

It shouldn’t be a surprise at this point, that the score of his latest homework problem set is a–

Wait. 

Jake opens his eyes, just barely, peeking at the screen again. 

82.

Jake pauses for a moment. His eyes open completely. His brow pulls down in confusion. 

82. He double checks to make sure he’s seeing the grade correctly, that the numbers haven’t somehow been reversed. 

They haven’t. 82. It’s his real, true, honest to god score. It’s a B. A low B, but that’s still the highest econ grade Jake has seen since his third round of the syllabus quiz.

Oh my god. Oh my god. 

Jake kind of doesn’t know what to do with his body, with all of the extra energy he suddenly has. In that moment, he thinks he could do anything. If Jungwon were here, Jake thinks he might actually kiss him on the mouth. 

82. It’s not enough to save his grade, not yet. But if it’s a trend that continues, Jake Sim just might finally pass econ. 

He goes to text his tutor the good news, to confirm their next session, but finds that Jungwon has beat him to it. Fingers still slightly shaky from the excess of nerves, he reads the new messages. 

Yang Jungwon (Econ Tutor) [7:03 pm]: Hey, I saw that the latest homework grades were released. Lmk how you did!

Yang Jungwon (Econ Tutor) [7:04 pm]: Also, sorry to do this kind of last minute, but I’m not gonna be able to meet you at our regular time tomorrow. We could reschedule if there’s another time that works for you? Or we could just wait and meet again next week. 

Frowning, Jake reads the message again. He’s still riding the high of a B- and is reluctant to do anything that might prevent it in the future, including missing a tutoring session. 

Jake [7:10 pm]: Is there any way we could still meet tomorrow? Maybe before our usual time. 

Jake [7:10 pm]: And I got an 82! You’re actually a lifesaver

Yang Jungwon (Econ Tutor) [7:12 pm]: That’s great! 

Yang Jungwon (Econ Tutor) [7:12 pm]: I’m sorry, but I don’t think tomorrow afternoon will work either. I’m going to the university skating competition to support a friend

Yang Jungwon (Econ Tutor) [7:12 pm]: You probably know him actually. Him and ___ are good friends too lol. It’s Park Sunghoon

Jake rereads the message, sighs. He supposes it makes sense. He can’t really fault his godsend of a tutor for wanting to support a long-time friend at one of the most important competitions of his season. Still, Jake’s a little slammed this week, and the thought of missing a tutoring session is enough to sober him from the thrill of his latest assignment grade. 

Park Sunghoon. Jake has only met him once – in search of you, or rather, your phone number – and he doubts Sunghoon remembers much of that interaction. Jake doesn’t really know anything about him, other than the fact that he’s rumored to be one of the best skaters to come through this school and that he’s apparently good friends with both you and Jungwon–

Wait. 

Oh no. Oh no. 

Jungwon can’t go to Sunghoon’s skating competition tomorrow. Because Jake is almost positive you’ll be there too, is pretty sure you and Jungwon are probably going together. If there’s a flare of jealousy in his gut, he’ll ignore it for now. He has bigger problems.

Namely, the fact that Jungwon is under the impression that you and Jake are dating. Officially dating, since he knows that Jake took you to meet his family this last weekend. Quite seriously dating, if the lovesick expression on Jake’s face every time he talks about you in front of Jungwon is anything to go by. 

And the sole reason Jungwon is under that impression is because Jake couldn’t keep his big mouth shut. Because he essentially told him, flat out, that the two of you are very much enjoying the honeymoon phase of your relationship. 

Still working in a cloud of panic, Jake leaves Jungwon on read for the time being and sends a message to you instead. 

Jake [7:17 pm]: What time is Sunghoon’s thing tomorrow? I’ll pick you up

You [7:18 pm]: ??? 

You [7:18 pm]: What the fuck?

Before he can think of a reply to type, Jake’s phone screen is overtaken by an incoming call notification. One that he knows better than to ignore, even as something in his shrivels a little. 

“Hello?” He answers, wheels in his brain spinning as he tries to come up with some sort of explanation on the spot. 

You don’t waste any time. “How do you even know about Sunghoon’s competition? And what do you mean you’ll pick me up?” On the bright side, you don’t sound angry, at least. Just very confused. 

“Jungwon mentioned it to me.” Jake decides he can at least be honest about that. “He had to cancel our tutoring session tomorrow.”

“So what?” Even through the phone, Jake can sense your exasperation. “You thought you could squeeze in some econ notes at the athletics center? My god, you are so persistent about the worst things. Leave poor Jungwon alone.”

Poor Jungwon. Poor Jungwon. 

Jake’s tone is a little less even when he clarifies, “No, it has nothing to do with econ. I just want to come with you. To, uh… to support Sunghoon.” It’s a weak explanation, even to his own ears. 

“You don’t know him.” Your voice is flat.

“We’ve talked,” Jake argues.

“You’ve had one conversation. He thought your name was Jacob.”

“Which turned out to be a very useful alias for me.” At the event for incoming freshmen you dragged him to unwillingly. “I owe him one.”

There’s an extended silence on your end. 

Jake begs a little more. “I let you drag me to that stupid event last week. You know, I had to run, actually, full on run, away from Jay the other day so he couldn’t ask me about it. Just let me come with you tomorrow.” 

You hesitate. “I might, if you tell me why you want to go so badl–”

“Fine,” Jake sighs. “You caught me. My secret passion in life is actually figure skating. I didn’t start training young enough, so now I have to live vicariously through–”

“You are so fucking annoying” But it works. “Fine.”

“Fine, as in, I can come?” Jake knows better than to sound too hopeful. 

You refuse to answer him directly. “Be at my apartment by four-thirty tomorrow. If you’re even a second late, I’m leaving without you.”

On the other line, Jake lets his fist fly into the air in silent celebration. Into the receiver of his phone, he says calmly, “Great. I’ll pick you up, then.”

You hang up without bothering to respond, and Jake returns Jungwon’s message. 

Jake [7:26 pm]: Let’s just plan to meet next week for tutoring. And thanks for the reminder. You kind of saved me again, actually. I’ll see you tomorrow at the competition

Sighing, Jake sets his phone down. 

For the moment, the crisis is averted, at least partially. But Jake knows he’ll have his real work cut out for him tomorrow. As he turns it around in his brain, the celebratory feeling in his chest slowly begins to morph into dread. 

How on earth is he going to sit through an entire evening with you and Jungwon without the illusion shattering one way or another? It feels like an impossible task. 

But then he takes a long inhale of lavender-scented air, looks back at the proud B- still displayed on his laptop screen. If he can pull that off, he thinks he just might be able to do anything. 

…

It’s a confidence that Jake is finding hard to rediscover the following afternoon. Just after three, every ounce of self-assuredness Jake has ever had is slowly draining from his body as the clock ticks closer and closer to four-thiry with every passing second. 

Standing in front of his mirror, Jake can’t decide how he feels about the black button-down he’s wearing. Is it too much? Not enough? 

He knows he’s probably overthinking it, but he’s about to spend an entire evening sitting with you and Jungwon, watching Sunghoon. If you don’t think he looks at least a little good in comparison, something in his pride is going to be very, very wounded. 

On the other side of his bedroom door, Jake can hear Jay poking around in his kitchen. After a few days of successfully dodging him, his best friend finally snuck his way into his apartment under the guise of delivering a package. Still a little terrified to face him and the questions he’ll inevitably ask, Jake has been hiding in his room since his arrival. 

He curses the situation now. If nothing else, Jay could at least provide a set of fashion-forward eyes to help him choose his outfit of the evening. But that would also involve explaining where he’s going, which would only send Jay’s suspicions about you and Jake skyrocketing. 

Unlike you, Jake is not particularly well-versed in avoiding leading questions. In fact, he regularly does the opposite, if his interactions with Jungwon are anything to go by. 

Somewhat regrettably, he decides he’ll have to use his own intuition for this one. 

That turns out to mean that Jake spends the next forty minutes trying on half of his closet, pulling out shirts that he hasn’t seen since middle school and watching the pile of rejected options pile up on his chair as uncertainties pile up in his gut. 

Finally, he lands on the black button-up he was wearing originally and decides to make the disaster of his room a problem for later. Glancing at the clock, he realizes with a bit of dread that he needs to head out soon if he doesn’t want to miss your threat of a deadline. But then his eyes land on the small handful of ornate bottles on top of his dresser, and he suddenly has a new problem. 

Running low on both steam and time, Jake decides that facing whatever Jay has in store for him is better than trying to make this last decision on his own. So he scans that array of bottles, picks his two favorite scents, and opens the door to his bedroom slowly, doing his best to delay the inevitable inquisition. 

Stepping out warily, he sees that Jay has moved from the kitchen to the living room and is currently snacking on a sandwich he made with whatever ingredients he found in Jake’s fridge as he watches something on the TV. 

“Hey, Jay?” Jake calls out, a little hesitantly. 

“What?” Jay doesn’t even turn to look at him. “Oh, you decided you’re talking to me again?”

“I’m sorry,” Jake searches for a feasible explanation for his avoidance. Finding nothing solid, he settles with the classically vague, “I’ve been busy.”

“Doing what? Training for a marathon? I can’t believe you actually ran from me–”

“I realized I forgot my computer at the library,” Jake lies. “I wanted to go back and grab it before it got stolen.”

“Whatever.” Jay doesn't buy it for a second. But he is eating Jake’s food, so he figures he owes him a little. “What do you want?” 

Jake moves to stand next to his couch, careful not to block Jay’s view of the TV and annoy him further. Tentatively, Jake holds out the two bottles of cologne. “Which one of these smells better?”

Jay sends Jake a look of disbelief, sets his sandwich down on the coffee table. “Do I look like a fucking Macy’s employee to you?”

“Just help me out,” Jake pleads. “Please,” he adds for good measure.

Jay stares at him blankly for a moment longer. “Well, it depends,” He finally concedes. “The Yves Saint Laurent has more of a causal vibe, and the Giorgio Armani feels like you’re trying a little harder, like you want to be impressive and you don’t care if people know that.” 

And then he takes a closer look at Jake. At the way his hair has been perfectly styled to look just the right amount of intentionally messy, at the outfit he’s wearing. 

“Hold on, what are you so worked up about?” Jay’s eyes narrow in on his shirt. “And is that Prada? It’s four in the afternoon on a Thursday. Where the hell are you going?”

“Nowhere,” Jake replies too quickly, already beginning to retreat to the safety of his bedroom before he can be questioned further. 

Jay turns in his seat, eyes following Jake accusingly the whole time. “You’re meeting ___, aren’t you? What’s going on between the two of you anyway? Why are you being so weird?”

Jake pretends not to hear his friend, closing the door behind him and he looks for his coat in the mess of his room. Finding it, he pulls his arms through the sleeves. Stopping at the mirror, he gives himself one final once-over before turning to leave again. Right before he does, he pauses, weighs his options as he weighs Jay’s advice. And then he reaches for the bottle of Giorgio Armani, sprays it twice for good measure. Before he can psych himself out again, he heads for the front door. 

He almost makes it, too, but before he can slip out, Jay asks him one last question. “Just answer this,” he bargains from his seat on the couch. “Are you meeting ___?”

“None of your business” is the only answer he gets as Jake leaves his apartment, quickly closing the door behind him to cut off any other opportunities for Jay to catch him in a white lie. 

And when Jake arrives at your apartment, he has seven minutes to spare. Sending you a message of his arrival, he makes his way to the lobby to greet you. 

“Mr. Sim,” your doorman nods coolly. 

“Elton,” Jake returns, equally as frigid as he reads the middle-aged man’s name tag. 

Thankfully, you don’t keep him waiting long. You make your way down to the lobby before Jake and your doorman have the chance to exchange a few more choice words.

Despite the initial turmoil and the current state of his bedroom, Jake is more than pleased with the clothing choices he landed on for the evening when he sees you. 

It would be hard to claim that the two of you are matching, exactly, considering how simple both of your outfits are. But as he watches you approach him in a black sweater and light jeans, Jake likes the way it almost looks as if the two of you did it by accident. Synced up so well that even your closets align without you meaning to. 

And he likes the way it looks like the two of you go together, two pieces of a matching set.

Giving your doorman one last parting wave, the walk to Jake’s car is short. He doesn’t offer to pull the car around this time, mostly because the white sneakers on your feet are a lot more conducive to walking that your heels for the fundraiser a couple of weeks ago.  

“I assume we’re heading to the Ice Sports Center,” Jake says, putting the car in reverse as he backs out of his parking spot. 

“Yeah,” you nod. Much to his relief, you’re not projecting any annoyance. At least not yet. “But we’re picking up Jungwon first.” 

“What?” Jake balks, suddenly reminded of the awful tightrope he’s about to be walking all evening. The way he’s somehow supposed to keep Jungwon thinking that the two of you are enamored with one another without you finding out that he divulged the nature of your fake relationship to your friend. 

Mistaking his apprehension for annoyance, you shake your head. “You’re so mean,” you accuse. “First you invade our evening and then you complain about picking him up? The poor guy already has to put up with you all night. The least you could do is spare him an Uber ride.”

Jake suddenly has another bone to pick. “First of all, why do the the two of you even need an evening–”

“Because I never get to see him!” A bit dejectedly, you add, “Between classes and tutoring and his internship, he never has any free time.”

Jake wonders, somewhat vindictively, if he could start requesting additional tutoring sessions. Burn up whatever remnants of time the kid has to dedicate to you. 

Instead, he relents. He’s not going to win any favor from you by doing anything to Jungwon. Not that he needs your favor, of course. Not that he even wants it. 

So Jake just asks you to give him Jungwon’s address and plots it into his phone’s GPS without another complaint. But as the estimated arrival time begins to dwindle, so does Jake’s confidence that he can pull this evening off. 

With just a few minutes to go, he decides that honestly might be his only way out of this mess. 

Turning to you slowly, he says, “So, I kind of have to tell you something.”

You groan. “I hate the way you just said that. Please tell me I’m not also going to hate whatever it is you’re about to tell me.”

Jake hesitates, “I mean, I can’t predict the future–”

You read his guilt like an open book. Flatly, you ask, “What did you do?”

Jake is quick to go on the defensive. “Why are you assuming it’s my fault–”

You’re not in the mood for his evasiveness. “What did you do?”

It comes out all in a rush, sounds like one long word as Jake lets the truth spill out. “I might have accidentally told Jungwon that you and I are dating.”

Somehow, you understand just as well as you would have if he enunciated clearly. Your voice is dangerously low. “How, pray tell, did you accidentally tell your econ tutor that you and I are dating?”

“It just came out, I swear!” Jake tries to dig himself out. “You came up somehow, and I mentioned the dinner at my parents house. One thing led to another, and now he thinks that we’re dating.”

You’re still livid, not accepting his threadbare explanation. “I could sue you, you know. You signed a legal document agreeing to not tell our friends and acquaintances anything about our agreement.”

Jake calls your bluff. “That thing is not legally binding, and you know it. Besides, the wording on that part is so vague, I’m sure there are a million loopholes. No judge would uphold that in court.”

“Oh, so now you’re a contract expert–”

“Look, I’m sorry,” Jake interrupts, deciding that neither defense or offense are likely to get him much of anywhere. Maybe an apology will do him one better. “I know we agreed to not get our friends involved, but it really wasn’t on purpose.” It kind of very much was, but he figures you don’t need to know that. “I just… Can we pretend, just for tonight?” It sounds reasonable enough to him. After all, “It’s no different than what we’ve done so far–”

“Yes it is,” you argue. Your fury has evaporated slightly, now just simmering in his passenger seat. But Jake still doesn't get it.  “Jungwon is my friend. He knows me, the real me. I’m not trying to keep up appearances around him. I don’t want to lie to him, and especially not about something like my relationships. Especially because he’s going to think that I’m the one that’s been lying to him about it.” The more you say, the worse Jake starts to feel. “I told him you were my friend.”

It wasn’t about you being embarrassed of Jake or not wanting Jungwon to think that you would ever consider dating him. It was because Jungwon is one of the few people that gets you, that really gets you. It’s because he’s one of your few real friends, someone you don’t have to lie to. Someone who accepts your truths as they come. 

“I know.” For the first time, Jake’s short-sighted solution to his jealousy doesn’t feel so satisfying. He hadn’t considered this, the potential fallout on your end. How you would feel about lying like this to someone that you’re genuinely close to. All he can say is, “I’m sorry. I know I fucked up.”

You just give him a long look, silence building between the two of you as you weigh a million responses on your tongue and let all of them die, one by one, before breathing life into any of them. 

“I…” you finally say. “It’s whatever.” It’s not. Jake can hear it in your tone of voice, can read it in the way your lips twist. “Let’s just do it,” you agree to his original request. Jake isn’t sure why he can’t find it in himself to feel good about it. “Let’s just pretend for tonight.” 

Jake doesn’t know what to say, can’t find the words to remedy the situation. Still, your name is a quiet whisper on his breath. He feels like he’s begging, pleading. For what, he’s not entirely sure. 

You just shake your head, looking out of the windshield. “We’re here.”

And you are. Jungwon, completely oblivious to your conversation, is all smiles where he waits outside his apartment building, sending you and Jake both a friendly wave before jogging over to the car and sliding into the back seat. 

“Hey Jake, ___,” he greets, unaware of the stifling tension he’s just walked into. “Thanks for picking me up, by the way. You have a really nice car.”

And Jungwon is so nice, Jake thinks. So nice and considerate and genuinely pleasant to be around. Things that he controls, things that Jungwon wakes up every day and decides to be. Things that make you like him, want to be his friend.

Things that Jake, as he glances to where you’re still nursing your wounds in his passenger seat, understands with a sickening realization that he has not been. At least not to you. 

And Jake could pin the blame on a million different excuses. His father or the tight constraints of his life or the way he feels like nothing has ever really belonged to him. But when he looks at you, at your hurt, he knows that his lack of consideration for your feelings is all of his own doing. 

Jakes turns back to Jungwon for a moment, tells him, “No problem. I’m glad we could all go together.” And then he puts his eyes back on the road ahead of him and makes the decision to take a little more ownership of the things he can control. To do his very best to be a little better. To try, really try, to put a little love into the things he builds.

So Jake doesn’t protest, when you arrive at the ice rink and slide down into the middle seat, next to both him and Jungwon. Doesn't let the unpleasant feeling that rises in his gut when you give Sunghoon a massive bouquet of flowers and a warm hug after his program do anything but simmer. Doesn’t make his feelings your problem, a fire for you to put out. 

When he excuses himself to the bathroom, he tries not to let the imagined possibilities of what you and Jungwon might be talking about in his absence make him do something stupid. 

Besides, everything he’s thinking of is far off the mark anyway. 

As soon as he’s out of earshot, Jungwon turns to you and smiles. “You and Jake, huh?” He nudges you with his elbow. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me. Actually,” he amends, “I can believe that. What I can believe is that you lied.” The accusation is light, teasing. It still hits you like a sucker punch. “You said you two were just friends.”

But your hurt feelings won’t help you here, and you have tracks to cover. Jake didn’t tell you what he told Jungwon, not exactly, so you’ll have to do your best not to unravel any of the lies he’s already spun. 

“It’s new,” you try to explain, thinking of something that would make sense, that would wound Jungwon the least. “I haven’t really told anyone.” You mean it when you say, “But I am sorry for lying.” You wish you weren’t doing it still. You wish you could tell him the truth.

“Fine.” It’s an apology Jungwon accepts easily, even if he pretends to hold onto it a little longer. “You’re forgiven. But only because his car is really nice.” And then, “He’s good to you?”

“Yeah,” you echo the same words you told his mother a handful of evenings ago. “The best.”

“Good.” Jungwon nods. If there’s wistfulness there, it’s overtaken by his genuine desire to see you happy. “You deserve that.”

You’re not sure why you feel like crying, why everything about this conversation, this situation, suddenly feels so wrong.

“Thanks, Wonie.” You melt a little at his earnestness, the childhood nickname slipping out with your fondness. This is what you were afraid of, what you wanted to avoid. It’s not fair for him, not okay with you that Jungwon is wasting his sincerity on a lie, a false relationship. It’s hollow when you say, “That means a lot.”

Whatever reply Jungwon has dies on his lips as Jake finds the two of you again, slides back into his seat. As the rest of the evening passes, your lingering hurt starts to make room for something else. You’re not sure what to make of how undeniably easy it all is. How natural it feels to be sat in between your childhood friend and your fake boyfriend, trading jokes and smiles and stories that take no effort and make the time fly by. 

When Jake finally drops you back off at your apartment a few hours later, your anger is mostly gone. And unlike him, you were never particularly good at physics, but you do remember the conservation of mass – how things can change and transform but are never truly destroyed. In the absence of anger, you’re not entirely sure what emotions are beginning to overflow in their stead. 

But when Jake whispers, “Goodnight” from the driver’s seat of his car, it’s a sentiment that’s easy to return. 

…

As the month just before the holidays tends to do, the rest of the semester passes in a blur of late night study sessions, half-finished assignments, and a concerning amount of caffeine. Both of you slammed with responsibilities of your own, Jake hardly even sees you in those last few weeks. Instead, the promise of the holidays and your family’s upcoming New Year’s Eve party are threats that loom on the rapidly approaching horizon. 

This, then, is a small time apart from each other before your fake-dating responsibilities kick into full gear. Before they eventually as soon as the clock strikes midnight on the last day of December and your contract dissolves just as the year does. 

And at this point, that’s a concern for the future. Right now, Jake is too busy trying to pass his classes to have any brainwidth left to worry about other things. Namely, his econ term paper. The hours that he spends alone with his laptop, forgetting to do much of anything else, veer towards a number that is more than a little concerning.

But thanks to his sessions with Jungwon, a report card without any Fs is looking like an actual possibility for him this semester. So Jake doubles down and presses onwards, goes hours and sometimes even days hardly talking to anyone, just to make sure that every last detail, every last word, is as impeccable as possible. 

And a few weeks later, just as the first half of December draws to a close, Jake finds himself back at his desk, lavender candle lit, pleading with invisible deities as he opens his laptop to check his final econ grade. 

He lets one breath pass. Another. 

Slowly, he opens one eye. 

And there it is, on the screen in front of him. His final econ grade. 

73. A solid C. A fucking C. 

He did it. He actually did it. On his third go around, Jake Sim passed econ. And that alone calls for celebration. 

It’s nearly the first time he’s seen you since Sunghoon’s competition when you and Jungwon show up at his apartment by surprise with a custom ordered cake the next day. 

Predict THIS trend, Wall Street, the royal blue icing reads. Jake Sim passed econ!!!!!!

And then it really is the end of the semester, and the three of you are parting ways for winter break. With nearly a month of rest from studies and schoolwork, you and Jake finalize the details of your last two public appearances as a couple. 

The first is set to be at Jake’s parents’ house. It’s not so much an event as it is the two of you exchanging gifts, making sure that there are witnesses around to corroborate your affection. And the second, of course, will be the New Year’s Eve party at your family's home. 

The timeline gives you about a week to finalize your gift to him, something that has proven to be much more difficult than you were hoping. Despite your suggestion that the two of you just pick out your own gifts in advance and say that they’re from each other, Jake has insisted on going the traditional route. On surprising you. 

So when you show up at his family's home a few days before Christmas, a small red gift bag in hand, it’s with a bit of trepidation that the present inside will fall flat of whatever expectations your fake boyfriend may have. 

Moments later, with the glow of the fireplace casting a cozy glow on his living room, Jake holds a self-warming coffee mug in his hands. 

You feel a bit foolish as you reach for your rehearsed explanation, cite the one time he’d complained about his coffee going cold before he had the chance to drink it. But Jake insists that he loves it, assures you that he’ll put it to good use. 

And when your turn comes to open his gift, you do your best to ignore the slight shake in your fingers as you untie the bow on the small jewelry box he hands you. 

Sliding the lid off, it’s all you can do for a moment to stare. 

“Oh.” The golden chain of the necklace is delicate, fragile. But it’s the charm at the center that has you suddenly breathless. It’s a tiny, intricate outline of a house, the same shimmery gold as the chain. The color he memorized as your favorite. And in the center of the miniature home is an impossibly smaller outline of a heart. “Oh.”

Your soft words ring in the air for a moment as your fingers hover over the gift, unmoving.

Mistaking your lack of feedback for distaste, Jake is quick to explain, somewhat sheepishly. “It’s, uh,” he scratches at the back of his neck. “It’s supposed to be like what your great aunt said. Y’know, ‘put a little love into everything you build.’ If you don’t like it, I can–”

You shake your head. “I love it.” It makes your gift to him pale in comparison. The truth rattles in your brain a little too harshly. You got him a coffee mug, and he got you this. Something so obviously wrapped up in thoughtfulness and care and affection. But comparison is the last thing on his mind. 

“I… You do?” His uncertainty is still written all over his face. “You don’t have to just say that. Really, it won’t offend me if–”

“Jake,” you look up at him, put your hand on his chest. Physical touch is the only way you can think to stop his rambling. “It’s perfect. I love it. I really, really do.” Glancing back down at his gift, you smile. His eyes are suddenly wide, from your sincerity or your touch, you’re not sure. “Help me put it on?

Jake nods, swallows audibly. You retract your hand from his chest, let it fall back to your side as you hand him the jewelry box. Carefully, delicately, intentionally,  he takes the necklace out, lets it dangle between long fingers. 

And then he’s moving to stand behind you. The sudden heat of his body is a lure for your senses, a focal point you can’t pull your thoughts away from. 

“I…” He breathes, words suddenly a little strained. You feel the warmth of his words along the length of your spine, deep in your bones. Settling somewhere in the pit of your stomach. “Could you move your hair?”

It makes you feel vulnerable, when you acquiesce to his request, exposing the bare skin of your neck as you pull your hair to the side. “Is that better?” It’s barely a whisper. He hears it regardless. 

“Yeah,” Jake returns, just as airy, just as flighty. “That’s perfect.” 

And then his fingertips are ghosting the edges of your collarbone, skimming the sensitive skin of your throat as he places his gift around your neck. You don’t think you imagine the tremble in his fingers while he fights with the clasp for a moment, drawing in a shaky breath as he finally snaps the mechanism into place. 

“There.” He exhales and it travels over your exposed nape. 

Letting your hair fall back into place, you take a steadying breath before turning to face him again. 

You mean it when you say, “Thank you.” 

Jake takes it in, all of it. The moment. The proximity. You. Warning bells are sounding in his mind as his gaze travels from your eyes to the bridge of your nose to the slight part between your lips. 

He wants it, he realizes. In this moment, there is no doubt in his mind. There’s nothing, in fact, but his desires, his wants. And what he wants is to feel your exhale against his own. To lean down and close the distance and let his fingers trace the skin of your throat again, for real this time. Without the excuse of a necklace. 

He could, he thinks. It’s a rule you both signed your agreement on, but what are rules, he reasons, if not things to be broken? And he thinks that if he kissed you, you might just let him. It’s a theory that he’s desperate to test, almost as desperate as he is to learn the exact taste of your mouth when it’s not trading insults with him. And he was never one to let hypotheses remain in limbo for long. 

There’s heat in his gaze and desire in his bones when he leans down, just a fraction of an inch. 

Your eyes widen. Your breath stutters. Under your skin, your heartbeat races. 

You say nothing. 

And then he’s inching closer. Slowly, steadily, until he’s right there, so much closer than he’s ever been. Invading your senses and mingling your exhales and clouding anything coherent left in your brain. 

His exhale ghosts across your lips. Your eyes flutter shut, and you’re nothing but a slave to sensation. 

It won’t be him that breaks the spell. Resolve slipping with every passing heartbeat, it won’t be you, either. 

In the end, it’s neither of those things. Instead, it’s the shrill ping of an incoming notification that has the two of you springing apart, cheeks flaming, heat of the moment settling in your chest like a shock from a live wire with nowhere to put all of its excess energy. 

“I…” Jake can barely breathe, much less form words. He still wears his desire in his eyes, his want across his lips. It’s a miracle he even manages to say, “I better check that.”

“Right,” you nod, as if he’s asking for permission, as if it’s in any way under your control. But you’re scrambling to fill the burning silence, to redirect whatever is still simmering in the air. “Yeah.”

Jake nearly stumbles over his own feet as he takes a step away from you, pulling his phone off the coffee table. You avert your eyes as he skims over the notification, hoping the heat in your cheeks will fade from sheer will alone. 

Glancing back at him, you notice the way he’s still reading the notification. Notice the way his brow is furrowed, 

Without really even meaning to, you ask, “Everything okay?”

“Yeah,” Jake nods, but he still looks unsure. His eyes are still on his phone screen. “I think so.”

You raise an eyebrow at the vague qualifier, and he sighs before he continues, “Apparently someone submitted an anonymous plagiarism claim on my econ term paper. It went to the dean, and they’re running an investigation to make sure it’s my original work. That was just the department head letting me know that they’re proceeding with the investigation and will reach out again if any additional action is needed on my part.”

“What?” You balk, earlier tension replaced with one of an entirely different sort. You’re still stuck on his first sentence. “Plagiarism? How is that possible? You spent literal days working on that stupid paper. Even Jungwon said he couldn’t believe how much effort you put into it.”

“Yeah.” Jake shrugs. “I know. That’s why I’m not really that nervous.” His expression begs to differ. “I mean, I know that I didn’t plagiarize my paper, so I’m sure the investigation won’t be able to find anything.”

Still, it can’t feel good. Not when it took him so long, so much concentrated effort to finally pass. Not when the relief of it all is now stained with the accusation that looms over his head, no matter how much it lacks in credibility. 

“Is there anything I can do?” You offer.

“No.” Jake shakes his head, won’t make you bear the weight or the worry of his burdens. “I’m sure they’re just going to run some more in-depth comparisons to past papers. I really don’t think I have anything to worry about.”

“Okay,” you concede, a little hesitantly. But it’s a worry that lingers, even as the afternoon ticks by. Even when Jake’s mother arrives home and wraps you up in a big hug. Even when she slips you another box of homemade snickerdoodles, this time wrapped up with a bow. 

It’s a worry that lingers when you say your parting words, wishing the two of them a Merry Christmas and telling your fake boyfriend that you’ll look forward to seeing him on New Year’s Eve. 

It’s a worry that you have no distraction from until you’re on your way out, and your least favorite Sim sibling catches you at the door. 

“Merry Christmas, ___,” James smiles, all pretenses and no sincerity. Despite his words, it’s like he’s begging for a fight when he asks, “Are you enjoying the holidays?” 

If his mother weren’t in the next room over, you might just take it upon yourself to wipe the smug grin off his face. Preferably with an uppercut. 

“Oh, you know,” you shrug, forcing a cordiality you don’t feel. “It’s the same as every year. Good but busy.” It’s more than a little vindictive when you add, “Your brother did get me the most thoughtful gift, though.”

“Did he?” James muses. He doesn’t rise to the bait as much as you’d hoped. “Looks like little Jake is all grown up. Seems like it’s a good Christmas for him too. Miracles all around. He has a girlfriend to spend it with.” Pausing a moment, he tacks on, “And I heard he even passed econ, too. It was about time.”

“Well we can’t all be stuck in our ways forever.” You smile. It’s a polite, family friendly way of letting him know you still think he’s a raging asshole. 

But if James is miffed, he doesn’t show it. You don’t like the way his satisfied grin doesn’t falter either, not even once. “No,” he agrees as you turn your back to him, leaving him behind as you walk out the front door. “I suppose we can’t.”

…

Christmas morning is an uneventful affair at your house. There are gifts, of course, ones that your mother watches you open expectantly. 

The jewelry box that sits in your hands is reminiscent of just a few days prior. A fleeting touch that leaves your collarbone scalding. A similar gift that you wear around your neck now. 

But lifting the lid on the present from your mother, the differences are stark. 

A pair of silver hoop earrings, beautiful in their own regard and undoubtedly expensive, but silver has never been your color. It’s something you wish she’d remember, something you thought she might know, after twenty-one long years. 

You thank her, words echoing hollowly in the vast expanse of your living room. 

On the table next to you, your phone lights up with a notification. 

Jake [9:23 am]: Merry Christmas, ___

You think it might be your favorite gift yet.

…

It’s three days after Christmas when you wake up to a series of texts from Jungwon.

Wonie [8:12 am]: Hey ___ did Jake ever work on his econ term paper with you? Like at your place or anything?

Wonie [8:12 am]: He asked me not to get you involved, but I’m getting really worried. This plagiarism claim isn’t going away, and he needs as much evidence as he can get that it was all his work

Despite the way your sleepiness usually lingers in the morning, your friend’s messages have you immediately feeling alert.  

Scanning the texts again, the whole thing really is such an awful twist of luck. Jake finally, finally passed econ and after turning down his brother’s proposal from months ago, he did it as a result of his own efforts. Jake might not have ever worked on his paper in your presence, but you know he didn’t plagiarize it. You can pay testament to the way he was practically a recluse the entire last three weeks of the semester, only ever taking breaks from that damn assignment to occasionally eat, sleep, or bathe. 

And it’s so bizarre, you think. Jake mentioned to you that everything blew up because of an anonymous accusation. It’s not like his paper was caught by some online plagiarism checker. No, someone intentionally went to his professor and claimed that the work was stolen. Someone who wanted to start this fire and watch Jake struggle with the flames. 

It makes no sense, none at all. Who on earth would–

Your train of thought cuts off abruptly. Alone in your childhood bedroom, you know exactly who would do that. 

And, one Google search later, you know exactly where to find him. 

…

You’re not exactly surprised that the Sim Corporation building is up and operational during the holidays. If anything, the employees’ end-of-the-year burnout works to your advantage as you sneak right by the secretary at the front desk, bypassing the appointment system that must surely be in place for the CEO-to-be. 

The elevator ride is slow. Agonizingly slow. And you should be using this time to think, just like you should have been doing on the drive here. You should be figuring out which cards you can play and how exactly you’re going to make Jake’s weasel of a brother admit to what he’s done and retract his idiotic, completely fake accusation against his younger sibling. 

But the only thing your brain has room for right now is rage. And as the elevator ascends, all your anger can do is heat further and further, releasing steam until it’s boiling over, clouding your judgment and making you see red. 

When the elevator finally lets you off on the thirty-sixth floor, your strides eat up the ground until you're standing in front of the door you’ve been looking for. 

You don't bother to knock. 

Unsurprisingly, James Sim’s office is as completely devoid of life and personality as its owner. Covered floor to ceiling with the stark furniture that wouldn’t look out of place in an upscale Ikea ad, there are little to no personal touches, no hints of anything that might make you think James has any kind of redeeming qualities. 

And the only acknowledgement your least favorite Sim brother gives you behind his desk are two slightly raised eyebrows. 

“___.” He jots something down on a notepad in front of him. Probably writing a reminder to fire the secretary that let you up without notifying him. “To what do I owe the pleasure”

You’re in no mood for games. “Cut the bullshit.”

James’ pen pauses. He glances up at you.“I’m afraid I don’t–”

You won’t hear it. “I said, cut the fucking bullshit, James. You and I both know exactly why I’m here.” Your chest is already heaving as you list your demands. “Back the fuck off from Jake, retract your stupid plagiarism claim, and let him enjoy the holidays in peace.”

James doesn’t give you the courtesy of acknowledging anything you just said. Instead, he demands firmly, “Break up with him.”

“What the fuck?” You’re not sure how it’s possible, but your annoyance multiplies tenfold. How dare he assume he has any say in your relationship, anything at all related to you or his brother. “Why would I listen to anything you tell me to do?”

“You want me to retract the claim,’ James echoes evenly, enunciating so slowly it’s patronizing. “Okay, fine.” He lays his hands out in front of him as if he’s offering some generous, benevolent deal. “Then end the relationship.”

You wonder how much damage it would do if you throw the chair sitting next to you at his head. “Are you actually threatening me right now?”

“Not a threat.” He shrugs, all too nonchalantly. “Just a deal.”

Your strides eat up the ground between the door of his office and his desk. Laying a palm down on the surface in front of you, you point an accusatory finger in his face. “Listen here, you little shit. You and I both know damn well he wrote every word of that term paper on his own, so I suggest you listen to me and back the fuck off while I’m still asking nicely, or–”

“Or what? Hate to break it to you sweetheart, but between my brother and I, there’s only one person Dr. Jeong is likely to believe.”

“What are you, a cartoon villain?” Even this angry, his stupidity is astounding. “You still need evidence. Which you don’t have. Because he didn’t plagiarize shit, and especially not from you.”

James doesn’t falter. “Interesting that you mention that, actually. You know, I asked Dr. Jeong about you as well, and he said you’re not a student in his class.” Despite yourself, your features slacken slightly. “I thought that was odd, considering that’s how the two of you said you met. There are a lot of things that don’t add up about the two of you, actually.”

There’s a threat there, when he meets your eye and says, “So it kind of seems like you know already, that evidence isn’t just found. It’s made. And Jake’s term paper is different from the one I submitted, yes, but I also have a copy of what he submitted on my personal computer. It’d be pretty easy to ask my secretary to adjust a few timestamps here and there. To make it look like it was written years ago. Stolen by the younger brother that’s always been horribly jealous of me.”

“What the fuck is it to you if he passes econ?” You still don’t understand why he’s doing this. “You graduated university three years ago. Your life is here now, in this office. You’re in the process of becoming CEO of a multi-billion dollar company. Seriously, don’t you have better things to waste your time on? I mean, this is what most people call ‘peaking in college’ and usually try to avoid–”

James reveals his motivation with two small words. “Why him?”

But you still don’t get it. “What?”

“Why him?” he repeats, and it sounds so, horribly, terribly jealous. “Like you said, I’m older, smarter, more successful. So why him?”

“Are you joking?” It’s all you can do to not drop your jaw. All of this because you never let him take you on a date? When it’s his fault he missed the first one? The sheer audacity of it all is astounding. “First of all,” you refute. “I did not say any of that. And second, if that’s actually all you have to say about yourself, then put that shit in your Tinder bio and see where it gets you. I have no interest in hearing it.”

James won’t let it go. “That’s not an answer.”

“Why do you even care–”

“Why him?” He won’t stop, not until he gets his answer. 

“Because I like him.” It’s spilling out before you can stop it, before you can give it permission. “Because he’s kind and funny and he listens to me and cares about what I have to say. Because I’m more than just a sum of my parts to him, and the last thing he cares about is my social status and how it stacks up against his. I’m not some tool to impress his parents or a topic of conversation to brag about with boys at Sunday morning golf.” All of the things you’re sure would be a part of any kind of relationship with James.  Because no matter what role he’s given in his father’s company or what grade he passed econ with, Jake is capable of something James never has been. “Because he treats me like a person.”

Across from you, James simmers with barely controlled rage. With the truth at his feet, he has nothing left to do but be angry with it. Destroy what he can in the wake of his fury, like a toddler throwing a tantrum. “Break up with him.”

“Wh–”

“Break up with him, or I swear to god I will submit plagiarism claims to every professor he’s had in the last three years.”

It’s a threat you know he’ll make good on. It’s a battle you’re afraid he’ll win, no matter how fake all of his so-called evidence is. And it will all be your fault. You will be the reason that Jake has to take econ again, and that’s only if he isn’t expelled on plagiarism claims. You will be the reason his father hands him another round of disappointment. You’ll be the reason Jake ends his day with a little more shame to tuck away and revisit on a sleepless night. 

And you were always on a timeline, anyway. This relationship was one that always came with an expiration date, even before it began. 

It should be easy to concede, given the stakes, given the alternative. You’ve known since the beginning that the rapidly approaching New Year would be the end of it all, that you and Jake would become entirely separate entities again in just a handful of days. Still, you have to force the words out through gritted teeth, “Give me until New Year’s.”

James scoffs. “I don’t think you’re in any position to be making demands–”

“I’ll do it.” You double down, agreeing to take Jake’s fate into your own hands. “I’ll end things. Just… just give me until New Year’s.” You can do it, you think. It was inevitable anyway. “And retract the claim now,” you stipulate. “If I go back on my word, you can resubmit with all your evidence once next semester starts.”

Across from you, behind his desk, James weighs your offer. He must sense the finality in your tone, the determination in your gaze. “Fine,” he finally says. “You have yourself a deal.”

You don’t take his outstretched hand, don’t seal your agreement with a handshake. He’ll have to trust your word.

It makes no difference to him. His smile is smug when you turn to leave. You hope his satisfaction burns on the way down. 

Your drive home is slightly blurry. Partially because of the rain that has begun to fall. Mostly because of the tears that gather at the corners of your eyes and threaten to fall. You won’t let them, but they cloud your vision anyway, demand your attention. 

That night, a message from Jake lights up your phone just as you’re sitting down for dinner. 

Jake [6:57 pm]: Good news! The whole plagiarism thing turned out to be nothing. Just got an email from the dean that they’re dropping the investigation. I’m officially freeeeee from econ (again)

If nothing else, you have to give James credit for efficiency. And it should feel like a war won, a job well done. But staring at the message on your phone, the only thing you can think of is how soon New Years is. How little time you have before you’ll have to say goodbye. 

…

There’s never much to do, in that liminal space between Christmas and New Year’s. Minutes and hours and days blur together as the end of the year passes by, preparing to give way to a new one. 

Jake, giddy with the recent resolution of his econ grade and desperate to get away from the stifling atmosphere of his family home, tries to fill some of that time by spending it with someone he’s starting to realize he cares a lot about. Contract or not. 

First, he sends you a message asking if you’ve been ice skating this winter yet. He does his best to only be a little hurt when your rejection comes quickly, claiming in your response to have another obligation that day. Second, he invites you to drive around and look at holiday lights with him. When you tell him you already have other plans, he passes another lazy afternoon alone instead. Again, it’s a little hard not to dwell. A little hard not to let it sting. And by your third rejection – this time to take Layla on a walk with him – his hurt starts to give way to suspicion. 

But it’s not like you can avoid him forever, not with your family’s annual New Year’s Eve party quickly approaching. The last big event before the termination of your contract, you’ve been counting on him to spare you from your mother’s scathing comments and attendees’ hushed wonderings about when you’ll find yourself a boyfriend. 

And then it will be a new year, a new semester, a fresh start. As the clock strikes midnight, the end of your contract. 

Privately, Jake is a little relieved that it will be over so soon. That he won’t have to keep up pretenses any longer. That he won’t have to stick to your rules. 

He’s not sure when it happened, not exactly. Somewhere between all the bickering and arguing and fighting, but he’s come to enjoy the way you swept into his life like a hurricane and set up a home for yourself right where his heart is. 

He hopes you’ll stick around long after the ink on your contract has dried. He hopes that the two of you will get a chance to figure out what exactly those feelings between you are without worrying about how they look from the outside. How they’re perceived by James or your mother or his father. 

So Jake will be patient if he needs to be. He’ll accept your excuses, real or not, and look forward to seeing you on New Year’s Eve, relishing the fact that it’s the last time his presence at your side will be based on a lie. 

And when New Year’s Eve finally comes, he adjusts the tightness of his tie, looking at himself in the mirror. 

Midnight, he thinks. It will be here soon, quicker than he knows. And all the emotions that he’s been tucking away, all those little moments between the two of you that have fizzled and sparked and ultimately ended in nothing, will fade away with it. 

In their place, he thinks the two of you just might manage to find something solid, something real. 

…

Halfway across the city, in your childhood bedroom, you turn to Sunghoon. “What do you think?”

“Yeah,” Sunghoon nods appreciatively from his seat on your bed. “Your fake boyfriend is gonna pee his pants.”

“Gross.” Your nose scrunches. “Why would you say it like that? And stop calling him my fake boyfriend.”

“Why?” Sunghoon ignores your first question. “That’s what he is, isn’t he?”

And that, you think, is another reason why you didn’t want your friends getting involved in this little scheme between you and Jake. But Sunghoon’s flight home was canceled due to inclement weather, and you weren’t about to make him spend New Year’s Eve alone. The only problem with him spending it at your family’s party is that he needs to be well-versed in the lies you and Jake have been spinning for the last couple of months to keep the last few hours of your fake relationship believable. So, a mimosa and an explanation of a contract later, Sunghoon is privy to all the gory details. But the last thing you need is reminders of that. 

Reminders of him. Reminders of what you’ll have to do in a few short hours. So you redirect the conversation. 

“Really?” You look at yourself in the mirror again. “Do you like this one better? Or should I wear the red dress?”

“No, definitely that one.” Sunghoon shakes his head. “It looks really good. And everyone knows that black is better for New Year’s anyway.”

As you give yourself another once over, Sunghoon raises an eyebrow. “Why are you so nervous, anyway? Trying to impress your faux beau?”

“Stop pretending to know French,” you threaten. “or you can actually be homeless for New Year’s for all I care.”

“C’mon,” Sunghoon sighs, ignoring the bluff. “You look great. I think so. You mom will think so. Jake’s definitely gonna think–”

“How many times do I h–”

“So stop worrying so much, and let’s head downstairs.” Sunghoon stands from your bed, nodding towards the door. “I’m sure he’ll be here soon, anyway. Do you really want to leave him to the mercy of your mother?”

Point taken. You absolutely do not. With one final swipe of lip gloss, you’re pulling on your heels. It’s just in time too. Barely is the second one strapped on before the message from Jake pings through. He’s here. 

“Is that him?” Sunghoon holds his arm out for you, jerks his chin towards your phone. “Shall we go save your man from the she-devil?”

You don’t even bother to correct him, to reiterate that Jake is most definitely not ‘your man,’ as you hook your hand around his elbow, letting him pull you out of your room and towards the stairs. 

At this point, Jake is not unused to the extravagance of your family’s events. But as he enters your childhood home, he can’t help but be a little floored. It’s a house that would be impressive in its own right. Spacious and luxurious down to every last detail, the place practically screams wealth. But tonight, it really outdoes itself. 

The black and gold decorations shimmer just the right amount – enough to catch the ambient light beautifully without being garish. Every available surface is impeccable, covered with drinks and food and decor so lavish it would be almost laughable if it weren’t so impeccably done. 

Jake strains his neck over the crowd of equally done-up party guests, tries to peer around all the gowns and evening wear until he finds the figure he has memorized. He thinks he might see your mom, over chatting with a group of attendees, but no matter where he looks,  he can’t seem to locate you. 

Not until he glances at the spiral staircase on the outskirts of the room, does a double take at where you make your way down the ornate steps in an evening gown. It’s the same inky, midnight black as his suit, hugging and flowing and cascading in all the right places. Letting his gaze linger, he would have a hard time keeping his jaw closed if it weren’t clenching so tightly. 

He doesn’t mean to let it happen, the flare of jealousy that starts deep in his gut and spreads the length of his spine like a disease. But he can’t help it. Not when you look like that, not when you’re making an entrance and you’re not alone. No, you’re walking down the stairs accompanied by, on the arm of, Park Sunghoon.

Jake decides then and there that he hates figure skating. The glass of champagne in his hand suddenly feels awfully breakable. 

But then you spot him too, and some of the tension simmers, brightens, turns to something else entirely. When your gaze lands on his, your wide, genuine smile is almost enough to set him at ease. Almost. 

Cutting through the crowd, you and your unwanted chaperone make your way over to Jake. 

“Hi,” you breathe. Your hand is still on Sunghoon’s arm. 

“Hi,” Jake returns. He can’t take his eyes off it. 

Gaze darting between the two of you, Sunghoon is the one to gently but firmly remove your grip from his elbow. If it’s any consolation, you hardly seem to notice. 

Still, Jake’s shoulders are unnaturally tense, something Sunghoon takes note of. He just rolls his eyes. It’s not like either of you are looking at him to see it, anyway. 

Finally, after the silence lingers a little too long, he says to Jake, “Yeah, you don’t have to do that around me.”

“Do what?” Jake spares him only a momentary glance before letting his gaze rest on you again. 

“The whole overprotective, jealous boyfriend thing.” Sunghoon calls his game in two seconds flat. “You’re pretty good at it, though. I’ll give you props for that.”

That grabs Jake’s full attention. “What are you–”

“I know about you and ___’s contract. Don’t worry,” he mimics pulling his lips shut like a zipper. “Your secret is safe with me.”

Jake looks to you again. “You told him?” He can’t decide if it makes him feel better or significantly worse. 

You shrug. “I wasn’t sure how else to make sure he didn’t blow our cover tonight.” Besides, you add silently, how much damage could it do? After all, it’s our last night. 

Sunghoon glances between the two of you again, decides he does not want to be a part of this particular interaction any longer. “I’ll see you two later. I’m gonna go check out the hors d'oeuvres.” Turning to leave, he claps a hand on Jake’s shoulder. “Your girl could probably use a glass of champagne.”

Sunghoon makes a beeline for the kebabs, and then it’s just the two of you. And Jake might be hesitant to follow advice from your friend, but he grabs a glass from the next waiter that passes anyway, hands it to you seamlessly as you offer him a quiet, “Thanks.”

It’s easy, just like always, to fall into your routine. His hand finds the small of your back, and you lean into his embrace just the right amount. You can tell it’s working, that the guests you mingle with are charmed by how smitten the two of you seem, that everything you do makes them reminisce on their own long passed days of young love. 

Even the brief conversation with your mother is painless as she offers a stilted compliment for your dress and wishes you both a happy semester ahead. 

But you can’t quite get your smile to reach your eyes, can’t quell the anxiety swelling in your stomach as the night marches on and the clock ticks closer and closer to midnight. 

Jake can sense your unease, your trepidation, but he has no idea what’s causing it, can only guess at what has your eyes darting around the room like a mouse watching for a cat. 

Incorrectly, he wonders if it’s the crowd that’s getting to you, the chaos of so many bodies all in one space. Trying to offer a reprieve, he asks if there’s anywhere quieter the two of you could go. 

It’s not exactly what you’re looking for, not the solution you need, but you still lead him to the second floor, out onto the balcony that overlooks your backyard gardens. It’s similar to the place you and Jake ended your night at his family dinner a handful of weeks ago. 

Even away from the crowd, the lines in your bare shoulders are tense, fraught with unvoiced worries. The inevitability of the end. 

The music is fainter out here, but the rhythm is still easy to track. Jake thinks you just need a distraction. So he holds out a hand in invitation. “Dance with me?” He asks. 

You shouldn’t, not when it will only make all of this worse. Not when there are no eyes out here, no one to convince you that you’re still just pretending. 

But resistance has always been futile. And you can’t find it in you to say no. 

Under the glow of this year’s last bit of moonlight, you intertwine your fingers with his, let him draw you close as he wraps your hands around the nape of his neck, links his own across the small of your back. 

It’s not dancing, not really. Not as the two of you draw nearer under the pretense of staying warm. Not as your bodies barely move through space, just swaying slightly, in time with the harmonies that spin and twist and crescendo and fall below you. 

Jake knows better than to press his luck. But the day is dying, and so is your contract. What are a few minutes anyway, in the grand scheme of things? 

Leaning closer, he lets his forehead rest against your own, noses millimeters apart. “It’s almost midnight,” he whispers. The end of it all. The start, he hopes, of something entirely new. Something that belongs only to the two of you. In just a few moments, he’ll get to let his desires lead his actions, not the agreement he signed his name to.

“Mm,” you hum in agreement. He feels where it vibrates in his chest. 

“Ten,” he hears the crowd inside chant in unison. The countdown has begun. The New Year is nearly here. 

“Nine.” He pulls you a little closer, hands pressed a little tighter to the small of your back.

“Eight. Seven. Six.” You sigh, and it’s lost somewhere against the skin of his throat. 

“Five. Four.” One of his hands begins to move, traces the length of your spine, finds a new home against the curve of your jaw. 

“Three.” Using the gentle guidance of his thumb, he angles your face, just slightly.

“Two.” Around you, the world holds its breath. The two of you do the same. 

“One.” And then he’s closing the distance, lips against yours as exclaims of “Happy New Years” are lost somewhere in the wind. 

He may have brought you here, but you’re just as greedy, hands around his neck pulling him down further until the angle has you reeling. His mouth parts against yours, and you’re not quite sure if your eyes are open or closed. You’re seeing stars either way. 

Jake pulls you closer, and it’s not enough. He’s desperate for it, for something, for closer, for more. It’s everything that he imagined. Countless times in the darkness behind closed eyelids in the privacy of his own thoughts. It’s a million times better. 

He can’t focus on anything, can’t do anything but feel, give way to the shape of sensation. He wants to let his senses drown, wants to die and be reincarnated back into this moment just for the chance to live it again. Wants to wash away anything that isn’t tethered to sensation, to the urgency in his gut, to you. 

The first in a series of fireworks lights up the sky behind you. The booming echo has you jumping in your own skin, giggling against his lips at the irrational fear. Jake thinks this must be heaven. He must have died doing something wonderful, and this must be his eternal reward. 

Your amusement lasts moments longer before he’s doubling down, pulling you in again until you’re both well and truly breathless. Lip gloss a mess on both of your mouths, chests heaving as you finally break for air. The space between your bodies is miniscule, meaningless. In this moment, you’re a single entity with nothing but the desire for more. 

Fireworks continue to burst behind you as the sun sets on the contract that bound you together. His hands are still pressed against the small of your back, and you think the fabric of your dress must be nothing but a figment of your imagination. The only real thing is the heat of his skin on yours. 

The sound of your name whispered against your skin is something you’re afraid you’ll remember for a long, long time. He sounds desperate, where he repeats it. Pleading. Longing. 

But the fireworks are a symbol of a new year. An expiration date on an agreement. A deadline on a deal. 

Jake whispers your name once more, and you savor it for just a moment longer. Then, you carefully disentangle yourself from his grip. Most of it, at least. The hands against your back allow you space, but don’t stray from your spine. 

Still encircled in the arms of feelings that were never given the chance to take flight, you try to turn blows into kisses by whispering them softly, “I think we should end this.”

It’s presumptuous, on your part, to think that there is anything to end. You feel a little ridiculous saying it when you both signed your agreement long months ago. But your head is still spinning and your heart is still hurting. This is what it feels like, you realize. To mourn for the future. To grieve all of the what ifs and maybes and almosts. 

Across from you, Jake stokes your fears. “What? End what?”

“This.” You sigh. You can’t look him in the eye. “All of it. It’s officially the New Year now. We can stop going to things as each other’s plus-ones. The fake dating. Everything.” You’re rambling now, but you can’t help it. You’re afraid that if you stop to think, you’ll propose something else entirely. Something you know you can’t have. Something that will only ruin everything Jake has worked so hard for. “We can tell our families it was mutual – fizzled, like you said.”

Jake releases his grip on you, severs that last bit of connection. It takes every ounce of your willpower to bite back your tears. 

“Woah, slow down.” His brow creases in confusion. His words are still gentle; he still handles you with care. “Where is this coming from?”

“I just…” You trail off, doing your best to find steadiness in your voice. “This was our agreement. And it’s served its purpose. Besides, it’s a new year, you know? No point in starting it off with lies.” No matter how much he searches for it, you’re still avoiding his gaze.

Jake’s cheeks are flushed – a combination of things. The taste of champagne that’s fading on his tongue, replaced by something sweeter. The gentle midnight breeze. The aftermath of a kiss that he still wears on his lips. “I…” Suddenly, he finds it very difficult to breathe. “That’s all this is to you? A lie?”

And you wish he would just let this be a clean break, would stop pressing, stop making you say things you don’t mean. But you need him to believe it. That this is well and truly done. “I mean, we got what we wanted, didn’t we? You passed econ, and I got my mother off my back for a bit. This was the date we agreed to end things on. It doesn’t make sense to keep dragging things out.”

Jake is suddenly unsure of many things, and most immediately, himself. He’s not sure how to explain it to you, here on the balcony, with the bitter taste of something that stings all too much like rejection sitting heavy in his throat. That he’s pictured it a million times. You and him, together because it lets you both breathe a little easier, because it feels a little bit like coming home. Not because of a contract or your family or his brother. 

He doesn’t know how to tell you that every time he goes to a cafe, he marks a mental note to ask you what your favorite kind of coffee is. Doesn’t know how to tell you that every time he passes the corner table on the third floor of the library or the Student Union Building, the only thing he sees is your face. 

Doesn’t know how to thank you for helping him pass econ, for being the boost of confidence he needed to finally stand up to his brother for once, for making him think that he might not be as much of a failure as everyone else seems to think he is. For believing in him.

He doesn’t know how to thank you for being in his life, for making it a little better. For putting a little love in the parts of him that he thought would always be consumed by anger and bitterness and resentment. 

Doesn’t know how to tell you that it’s not just a contract to him. Not just a lie. That it hasn’t been for a long, long time. 

Instead, he listens, motionless while you whisper, “Thank you for tonight.”

He knows your voice is wavering. He knows your resolve is crumbling. But he doesn’t know why. 

So he watches, still unmoving, as you turn to walk away from him. Left alone on the balcony with no company but the stars, Jake Sim has nothing but a million regrets and the horrible, irrevocable feeling that he’s done something terribly wrong. 

…

“You look terrible.”

“Thanks, Sungoon.” Your voice is flat, no energy for any real malice. Sarcasm, though, you can muster. “You really know how to make a girl feel good.”

“I’m just saying.” He’s still looking at you like you’re a particularly unsightly piece of roadkill he narrowly avoided colliding with. “Would it kill you to do something about those dark circles? I don’t know, maybe, like – and I’m just throwing out ideas here – sleep?”

You’ve tried. You have. But no matter what you do, rest can’t seem to find you easily these days. And aside from that, it’s the moments just before sleep that you’ve started to fear the most. In the dark, with your eyes closed, the only thing you see is the confusion, the unmistakable hurt on Jake’s face as you walk away from him for the last time.

“Look,” Sunghoon sighs, suddenly serious. “It’s just… I’m a little worried about you, to be honest. Did something happen on New Year’s? With you and–”

“I’m fine.” You cut him off. The last thing you want to hear is the sound of his name, the reminder of what you’ve done for the sake of preserving his future. “I’m just tired, really.” You try to smile, and it’s far from convincing. “It’s been a long few days.”

Sunghoon wears his doubts as plain as day, but he won’t press the issue for now. “If you say so.” He does need you to take care of yourself, though, at least a little. “At least come eat something.” Suddenly grinning, he whispers, “I snuck in some instant ramen behind your mom’s back. C’mon, we can go make some. We can even get fancy with it, if you want. I’ll fry you an egg and everything.” He’s pulling out all the stops, a testament to how terrible you really do look. 

But it works. Or it’s enough to get you out of your room, at least. Stomach grumbling, you’re about to tell Sunghoon to make it two fried eggs when the two of you are intercepted by your mother on the way to the kitchen. 

“Oh,” she intones, taking in your appearance. Her eyes travel from your sweatpants to your t-shirt to your lack of makeup, disapproval apparent in every glance. “You look…”

“Save it,” you grumble, not in the mood to be ridiculed. 

Pushing past her, she stops you again. “Hold on a minute. I have a question for you.”

You take a deep breath before you turn back to face her. Might as well get it over with. “Yes?”

Smoothing her hair, she tells you, “Your father and I are hosting a banquet to celebrate the firm’s most recent acquisitions. It’ll be the last weekend in January. We’d love it if you could come.” 

You suppress the urge to roll your eyes, not seeing where the question was anywhere in there. To you, it sounds more like a demand. 

Sensing your reluctance, she adds, “You’d be welcome to bring Jake, of course–”

“We broke up,” you inform flatly. At your side, Sunghoon stiffens. 

“Oh,” your mother says again, not missing a beat. There’s very little sympathy when she adds, “Well, I suppose that’s probably for the best. Don’t you think so? I mean, you’ll be so busy with law school applications soon, it’s probably better to not have a boy around to distract you.”

You don’t bother to dignify that with a reply. Instead, you turn your back to her, fully this time. Altering your course, you set your footsteps on a path towards the garage instead of the kitchen. “I’m going for a drive,” is the explanation you throw over your shoulder. 

When Sunghoon tries to follow, you just shake your head. “I want to be alone.”

“But–”

“Please.” 

There must be something desperate in your features, because Sunghoon only nods, doesn’t argue further as he watches you climb in the driver’s seat of your car. He’s still standing there, concern apparent on his features as you open the garage door behind you and reverse your car out of it. 

It’s been a long time since you’ve done this, driven without a destination in mind. Your playlist blares through the stereo, loud enough to drown out any thoughts that threaten to cross your mind, to consume you, to send you spiraling. 

It’s not until long minutes later, when the first drop of rain hits your windshield, that you even notice the way storm clouds gather menacingly above you in the sky. 

Whatever, you think, turning on your wipers and increasing the volume another notch. You’ve navigated worse. If anything, it’s a perfect match for your temper, for the way emotions swell and churn in your stomach. 

Mindlessly, you let nothing but intuition guide your way, turning down streets you’ve never seen on nothing but a whim and the desire to escape, even if just for a little bit. The rain continues to pour, and the storm clouds darken in time with your mood. 

By the time you do start to recognize some of the scenery around you, it’s already too late. And you’re not sure where to place your blame. Fate, your subconscious, the way you can’t seem to let him go? No matter where fault lies, you’re suddenly perfectly aware of your location. 

Mostly because you’ve been here twice in the span of a month. Because you’re only a handful of blocks, at most, from Jake’s family’s home. 

The realization makes you quick to pull over. The best course of action, you decide, is to plot your course home in your phone’s GPS, since clearly you can’t be trusted to wander. It’s in the middle of searching for a better signal that you see it. A flash of movement outside your window.

It’s hard to be sure, through the thick sheets of rain that fall from the sky. But then you see it again, see her again, and you would know that dog anywhere. 

“Shit.” Turning to scan the backseat of your car, you find neither a jacket nor an umbrella. Nothing to shield you from the wrath of nature outside. But it’s not like you can leave Layla alone in a storm. Gritting your teeth, you set your resolve. And then you open the car door, stepping outside into the rain. 

It’s the kind of downpour that’s unforgiving, that soaks you to the bone as soon as you’re in it. Hair sticking to your face and already so cold you think you might start shaking, you start Layla’s name, hoping it carries over the wind. 

“Layla!” It’s all you can do to hope she hears you over the storm. You lose her for a minute. Bringing up your hand as a makeshift visor, you force your eyes to focus. When you finally see a flash of tan again, you know it’s her. The relief is short lived. Frustrated, you watch her turn to run in the opposite direction. 

“Layla!” you call again, this time louder, so much so you’re sure your voice will be hoarse tomorrow. From the way rain soaks your clothes, you’ll no doubt be nursing a nasty cold along with it.Thankfully, though, your beckoning does the trick this time. At the sound of your voice, Layla spins around, makes a beeline straight towards your familiar figure.

“Layla,” you chide once she’s at your feet, still grinning at you like the two of you aren’t absolutely soaked through and freezing. “C’mon,” you open the back door of your car to let her inside. “Hop in.”

She does so without an argument, and you slide back into the driver’s seat just as soon as you shut the door behind her. Putting your car back into drive, you set your wipers to full speed and drive straight until you see the turn a few roads down, the one that you know leads straight to his house. 

Still, you pull over again a few houses away, hesitating. 

“Sorry, Layla,” you turn to the dog in question. She just tilts her head at you quizzically. “I’ll get you home. I just…”

Don’t want to see him. Don’t want to look at him and face his anger, his resentment, his bitterness. Surely those are the only emotions he has left for you. Besides, it would be nothing but disastrous if his older brother were home. James would assume that your presence in his home means you’ve neglected to uphold your end of the deal and as such, has no reason to honor his. 

There’s a lot of damage to be done here, if you don’t go about it wisely. 

Turning back to the dog in your backseat, you point at her house in front of you. “You can make it home from here, right?” Again, Layla offers nothing but the slight perking of her ears. “Your house is right there,” you point again. “Just go up to the front porch and whine or scratch at the door and they’ll let you in, alright?” You give her a scratch behind the ears for good measure. 

You know Layla likes it, know that it’s her favorite place to be scratched. You know it because you watched him do it a few short weeks ago. Suddenly, you wonder if he’s noticed that she’s missing. If he’s frantic, going crazy trying to find her. 

A new sense of urgency motivating your actions, you turn back to Layla one last time. “Alright, girl. I’ll watch from here. I’m gonna open the door, and I want you to go straight home, okay?” 

She wags her tail at you, and that will have to be confirmation enough. 

Opening your door, you slide out of the car first. You hold your arm above your head as a makeshift shield from the rain, but it’s of little use. Reaching for the handle of your car’s back door, you’re about to send Layla home on a wing and a prayer when a voice behind you calls out your name. 

At least you think that’s what you hear. You can’t quite tell, over the sound of pouring rain, the whistling of the wind. Still, you turn with trepidation in your gut. Rightfully so, when you peer into the car that’s just pulled over next to you and lock eyes with no one other than Jake’s mother. 

She repeats your name, this time a little more frantic. “Oh my god,” She exlaims, taking in your appearance. “You’re soaking wet. Quick, follow me home and we’ll get you warm and dry.”

“That’s okay,” you try to explain over the story, “I have Layla, actually. I saw her wandering a few blocks over, and I–”

“Layla? Oh my goodness.” Concern and gratitude color every word. “Thank you, ___. I’m sure Jake is going crazy. C’mon,” she reiterates. “Follow me, and let’s get you both inside.”

Not bothering to wait for a response, she rolls her window back up, driving away with the clear expectation that you follow. And it’s not like you have any other choice, not really. You can hardly drive away with her dog. And it’s not like you can let Layla out now, not when she’s seen you.  

So, hoping against all odds neither Sim brother is home, you climb back into your car and follow her command. 

“Oh my god,” she repeats when you pull into the driveway behind her, letting yourself and Layla out of your car. “You two are absolutely soaked. C’mon, quickly,” she ushers you towards the front door. 

Opening it, she steps inside first. 

And of course luck is not on your side. You hear him before you see him. “Mom,” he sounds panicked, horribly on edge. “Have you seen Layla? She’s been missing for almost an hour and I can’t find her anywhere. I called James, but he left on a business trip this morning.” He doesn’t leave room to breathe. “I’m worried she might have gotten outside–” 

Your rescue doesn’t remain a mystery for long. Layla bounds through the front door, jumping on her favorite sibling, wet paw prints staining his jeans as her sudden movement forces the door open wider. Reveals you. 

Relief washes over Jake’s features as he greets his dog just as affectionately, and then he glances upwards. He takes one look at you, soaked to the bone and shaking from the cold. Any other words he had die on his lips. 

“___ found her, actually,” his mom explains, reching behind you to usher you in fully and shut the door behind you. “A few blocks over, you said?” She clarifies, turning to you. 

Eyes not leaving Jake’s, you just nod. 

His mother glances between the two of you, your frozen, shocked stares. The tension is palpable, and she senses it as well. 

“I’m going to go get Layla dried off,” she offers. “Jake, why don’t you help ___ find a dry set of clothes.” Shuffling past the two of you, she brings Layla along with her. 

And then it’s just you and him. 

Both of you stand there a moment longer, neither of you saying anything.

When you do break the silence, it’s at the same time. “Are you okay?” Jake tries, just as you say, “I’m sorry.”

Another beat of silence passes between you. 

Jake nods towards you. “You go first.”

“I’m sorry,” you try to explain, words feeling jumbled as you give them life. “I was driving and I saw Layla all alone, and I didn’t know…” That you’d be here. That I would run into your mom. That it would hurt so much to see you again. You don’t know what exactly you’re apologizing for, but your presence feels like an intrusion. 

Jake begs to differ. “Don’t apologize.” He shakes his head. “I should be thanking you. I was worried out of my mind thinking I might never see her again.” He’s talking about Layla. You know he’s talking about Layla. But his eyes don’t leave you once. 

It feels like a moment that could stretch into forever, you and him. Masking your hurt, hiding wounded prides. Standing inches apart and the distance has never felt greater. 

The spell is only broken when you sneeze, an immediate reminder of the circumstances that brought you here. Of the fact that you’re trembling like a leaf in his entry way, soaked to the bone. 

It's enough to spur him to action. “Come on.” He jerks his head towards the staircase behind him, voice and features still carefully guarded. “ I’ll get you some dry clothes.”

You could argue, but you don’t see a point. Not now. Silently, you follow him, all the way up the stairs and down the hallway to the last door on the left. When he opens it, there is no doubt in your mind as to what this room is. 

It’s his. It has to be. You know it, from all the little pieces of himself he has on display. Pictures of him in his youth with friends that smile just as big and brightly as he does. Soccer trophies, a drawing of Layla done before he had well-developed fine-motor skills, a picture of him and his mother at the beach. 

All at once, you wonder what it would have been like to discover him naturally. How long it would have taken you to uncover all these little parts of him, one by one, if any part of your relationship had been given the chance to be real. 

And then you notice the mug sitting on his nightstand. The self-heating one you gave him for Christmas. There’s nothing special about it, and it’s not particularly attractive, design-wise. It’s practical. Almost impersonal. He has no reason to keep it displayed like this. Part of you wants to swell with unshed tears. The other wants to run and hide and face your shame alone. 

But Jake is already rummaging through a drawer, and a moment later, he turns to face you with a pair of gray sweatpants and a matching hoodie. 

“I’m sorry,” he apologizes preemptively, and you hate the uncertainty that lingers between you. The awkwardness. All the stilted pauses and unsure silences that were never there before. You hate that it’s your fault, that you have no clue how to fix it. “I’m not sure how they’ll fit.”

“That’s okay,” you shake your head, ignoring the way your heart stutters suddenly at the thought of wearing his clothes. “They’ll be dry. I appreciate it.”

“The bathroom is through there.” He nods towards the adjoining room. “There are clean towels under the sink, too, if you want to dry your hair or anything.” Pausing, he adds, “Take as long as you need.”

Nodding, you walk into his bathroom, shutting the door behind you. You know he meant it, when he told you to take your time, but part of you is hesitant to linger. Somehow, this space feels even more private, even more intimate than his bedroom. Again, you feel like an intruder. An unwanted presence in a place that’s entirely his. A place you lost the right to be when you struck a deal behind his back and took his future into your own hands.  

Sighs mingling with regrets you can’t voice, you trade your rain-soaked clothes for his dry ones. You look at yourself in the mirror, and then you tuck the necklace he gave you out of sight, underneath the collar of his gray hoodie. 

A minute later, you emerge from his bathroom slightly self-conscious and significantly drier. Across the room, Jake looks up at you. You watch as he swallows audibly, eyes tracing the planes of your body swallowed by his borrowed clothes. His throat bobs before he tears his eyes away. 

“I should…” Again, you hate this tension between you, this uncertainty. “I should go. Thank you for the clothes. I’ll wash them and give them back once the semester starts–”

“What happened?” Jake couldn’t care less about your upcoming laundry plans. You can keep his sweatshirt and sweatpants and whatever else you want from him forever, as far as he’s concerned. Instead he’s still stuck on–

“New Year’s Eve. I thought…” He shakes his head. “I thought things were… good between us.”

And you could continue to be evasive. For his sake, you probably should. 

You could continue to make his decisions for him and decide to preserve his econ grade instead of whatever unnamed feelings might still linger between the two of you. But, the quieter parts of you whisper, that would make you no different from anyone else in his life, from the people you’ve encouraged him to break free from. The people that have molded his decisions and guided his path with a heavy hand all in the name of doing what’s best for him. All because they think they know him better than he knows himself. 

You don’t want to do that. What you want, here in the privacy of his bedroom, in the comfort of his borrowed clothes and the legacy of his youth, is to tell him the truth. You want to let him do with it as he sees fit. Taking a deep breath, you make your decision. 

And then you brace yourself for his anger, the outrage he’ll surely have at your explanation. “Your brother–”

“My brother?” Jake’s face falls, misreading things entirely as he jumps to premature conclusions. But it’s not like he’s grasping at straws. Jake isn’t blind to the way James has been gloating more than usual as of late. To the way his mood started improving right around New Year’s Eve. And he assumes the worst. “Oh. Okay.” Jake is trying to smile, but his features are completely wilted when he says, “I guess he got that second chance after all, huh?” 

“What?” Your lips twist in disgust as the implication sinks in. “No.”

“No?” Now, Jake just looks confused. 

“No,” you reiterate. “Look,” you sigh, “I figured out that those plagiarism claims about your econ paper came from him.”

Across from you, Jake’s jaw drops as it sinks in. “James was the one who…”

You nod, lips tight. You still can’t believe it either. “I went to his office to confront him about it, and he told me he’d retract the accusation, but only if..”

Jake’s eyes are imploring. You have the feeling he already knows the answer. “Only if what?”

“Only if I promised to end things between us.” And there it is. The truth. Cold, hard, ugly, and Jake’s to interpret as he will. You brace for impact. 

Jake is silent for a moment, shocked into stillness. And then, “He what?”

Your smile doesn’t reach your eyes. “I can see why you have such a hard time getting along with him. He’s kind of the worst.”

“Wait,” the wheels in Jake’s mind start to spin. “Did you tell him, then? About our contract and everything?”

“No,” you shake your head. “He never realized our relationship wasn't real. I just asked him to give me until New Year’s. I told him I would break up with you then, as long as he retracted the accusation.”

Jake takes a step closer to you. “And he agreed?”

You nod. 

Jake pauses.Takes another step. “Why did you ask him to wait until then?”

There are a million things you could say, a million ways you could answer.

Because I couldn’t stand the thought of another New Year’s alone. Because the thought of being at a party hosted by my mother without you at my side made me want to crawl out of my own skin. Because I’m selfish. Because those butterflies in my stomach have a habit of making me do stupid things. Because everything I told your brother in his office that day was true.  

You can’t give him all of it, but you can at least offer scraps of your honesty. “Because I wanted to spend my New Year’s with you.”

Jake says nothing, but his feet are moving. Each step brings him closer and closer to you. It feels a bit like it’s playing out in slow motion, delaying the inevitable. You move backwards until you run out of places to go, until he’s crowding you against the door of his bathroom, invading your space and demanding all of your attention, your focus, you. 

There’s no hesitation this time around, not when he leans down, cupping your chin in one hand to adjust the angle to his liking.

“Wait,” you breathe, lips a hair's breadth from his own. “What about your brother–”

“Fuck my brother.”

And then his lips are on yours. In the sanctity of his bedroom, in the aftermath of revelations. It’s the second time in the span of a week, and it already feels familiar. A little bit like coming home. 

His palm finds a place to land against the sliver of skin exposed just about the waistband of your borrowed sweatpants. A shiver traces the length of your spine, this time not from the cold but from the unbearable, unmistakable heat that threatens to boil over with every touch of a fingertip, every ghost of a caress. 

When you pull back for air this time, you don’t use the moment to shatter what’s just beginning to build between you. For real this time. Instead you say, “You’re really good at that, you know.”

“Thanks,” Jake grins, still a little breathless. “I could use some more practice, though.”

And who are you to deny him an opportunity for improvement?

…

epilogue – one year later. 

“This looks pretty cute on you, you know.”

“Do not touch it,” you hiss, swatting Jake’s hand away from your graduation cap. “Do you know how long it took me to bobby pin it into place? You’ll rip out half my hair if you try to move it around.”

“Okay, okay. Sorry.” Jake raises his hands in mock surrender, puts them as far as he can from your immaculately done headwear. 

Unlike you, he’s dressed in jeans and a button-down. But it makes sense. After all, the only person celebrating a milestone today is you. Jake doesn’t find that he minds so much. He just submitted his final project for Advanced Typography a few days ago, and he received stellar marks on it. The best in his section, actually. Not to mention that the class has been one of his absolute favorites so far. 

Besides, his time will come soon enough. In another year or two, it’ll be his turn to have a graduation cap bobby pinned to his hair. And he thinks a Graphic Design diploma will lead him to much happier places than a Business one ever would have. Even if it does come a year or two behind the schedule he once cared a lot more about. 

For starters, it won’t let him or you fall into any more ridiculous traps set by his brother ever again. Turns out, things like photoshop and other image-altering softwares leave traces. Ones that Jake is now excellent at detecting and could use to easily work his way out of false plagiarism accusations the future may throw his way. 

Straightening your graduation gown, your eyes land on something behind Jake’s shoulder. There’s a crowd today, as to be expected at a graduation ceremony, but you’ve always been good at finding what you’re looking for. And even better at finding what you’re avoiding. 

“I think I see your family,” you nudge Jake. Even his father is here. Mostly, you suspect, because you never bothered to correct his assumption that you’re heading to law school after this. Next to him stands James, lips twisted in permanent disdain, no doubt dragged here against his will. 

Still, you propose, “Should we go say hi?” The only reason you suggest it is because you also see your second favorite Sim (and first favorite on the days that Jake is particularly annoying). Hand blocking the sun and eyes wandering, you can tell that his mother is looking for the two of you. 

Jake keeps his back to them, steps in front of you to block you both from their sight. “No,” he denies flatly. “My brother is still weirdly obsessed with you.”

You wink, nudge him as you tease, “Must run in the family.” It’s an echo of a past conversion and rings even more true this time around. 

“C’mon,” you grab his hand, tugging him along. “I promised your mom a picture. I’ll ignore him. Trust me, I’m good at it.” Glancing down at your feet, you reconsider. “Actually, I’ll step on his foot. These heels weren’t just made to look good, you know. They’re actually a pretty decent weapon if yielded properly.” 

So Jake relents, lets you pull him along. Towards an interaction he doesn't really want to have but knows he will come out of just fine. Towards a future that’s full of uncertainties and doubts, but is his alone to forge. 

He doesn’t know what life will look like in ten years or five years or even just one, but he knows that he likes the way it feels when he does his best to put a little love into everything he builds. To let it swell and overflow until it touches the world around him and smoothes over lingering remnants of the bitterness and resentment and anger that never did anything but make him miserable. 

And Jake likes the way it feels when you smile at him. He likes the way it feels when your hand is wrapped up in his own. 

And for now, he thinks that might just be all he needs. 

...

outtake – sixteen years ago. 

At the age of six, there is a lot you don’t know about the world around you yet. 

For starters, you don’t understand why it’s only grown-ups that get to drive. It seems awfully unfair that you’re always relegated to your car seat in the back when the front seems much more exciting, especially considering the way your mom is always yelling at the other cars. 

You’re also not sure why she always makes you wear itchy dresses whenever you go to places with a lot of other people. After all, your princess nightgown is way more comfortable, and you like the way it feels against your skin. But no matter how many times you begged, your mom still put you in one of those awful, scratchy dresses tonight. And by the time she finally finishes her first round of mingling at your family firm’s annual charity fundraiser and lets you sit down in the seat next to her for a brief break, you’ve already been poked and prodded by people you don’t know more times than you can count. 

Which is saying a lot, since you just learned your numbers up to one hundred last week.

And you’re really not sure what your mom means when she leans over to your father and whispers, “I think this could be the start of something extremely profitable. A contract with the Sims, exclusive rights to represent them legally, I mean, that’s huge.” 

You scratch at your shoulder. That’s the itchiest part of your dress. Your mom leans a little closer to your father. “I know you don’t like to, but suck up to him a little tonight, if you have to. And if he invites you to golf, you must say yes. We absolutely cannot blow this opportunity.”

At six, your interest is still a flighty thing, and grown-up conversations you can’t understand are usually quick to lose it. It’s not long before your eyes are wandering for something to entertain them, something to hold your focus. 

Finally, it settles on a boy halfway across the room from you. He’s small, just like you. You wonder if he’s six, too. If he can also count to one hundred now. 

Head tilting, you watch as he reaches for one of the delicately balanced centerpiece bouquets sitting on a table in the middle of the room.

“Jake,” you hear someone call, that edge of worry only mothers can manage clouding her voice. “Don’t touch that, sweetheart. It’s fragile.”

“Fragile?” The boy repeats.

“It could break easily,” she explains patiently, pulling his hand into hers as she guides him away from the fragile centerpiece. If he is six, you’re definitely smarter than him. After all, you already knew what fragile means. 

But watching his retreating back, you wonder some more. Wonder if he was made to wear an itchy outfit tonight too, wonder if he’s ever gotten to drive a car or if all mothers are thieves of fun, just like yours. Wonder if he also hates coming to these things, if people pinch and prod at him too. 

“Jake.” You try out his name, just to see how it feels in your mouth. 

Momentarily distracted by the reminder from your mother to keep your voice at a whisper level, you lose him in the crowd.

Jake, you think to yourself. Most of all, you wonder if he would be your friend. 

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THE END.

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note: THANK YOUUUUU for reading (seriously, this is so ridiculously long. oops). it is (mostly) edited, but by someone who just spent basically 48 hours straight writing 25k words, so you may have to be a little gentle with me in that regard for now. apologies for any grammatical errors or weirdness.

if you enjoyed this, I would love to know about it!! comments, tags, reblogs, and asks are treasured and motivating and so, so appreciated.

as always, thank you again for reading! all my best to you ♡

absolutely cutest otp

champagne problems: part one

pairing: jake sim x f reader

genre: enemies to lovers, rich kids au, fake dating au, college au, angst, fluff

part one word count: 15.6k

part one warnings: swearing, alcohol consumption, family drama, a fatal case of second son syndrome

soundtrack: boom - dpr live / bad idea! - girl in red / blood on the floor - kuiper / calico - dpr ian / comme de garçons (like the boys) - rina sawayama / lust - chase atlantic

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The second son of a wealthy family, Jake Sim has gotten used to always standing in the shadow of his older brother. From grades to girls to talks of becoming future CEO of the Sim Corporation, he’s no stranger to coming in second place. So when an opportunity arises for Jake to finally have the one thing his brother can’t and best him once and for all, he knows he’d be a fool not to take it.

There are only two problems. The first is that the thing his brother wants so badly isn’t a thing at all. It’s you, semi-estranged daughter of the Sims’ closest and most long-standing business partner.

The second is that Jake Sim can’t fucking stand you.

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PART ONE

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Fingers wrapping around the stem of your wine glass, you sigh. Punctuality may have been a steep order for someone who you suspect is running dangerously low on both common sense and regard for others, but twenty minutes? Really?

Your eyes land on the obnoxiously ornate grandfather clock next to the hostess stand. In a restaurant with ceilings so high you can barely see them and a carefully curated ambience that practically screams old money, it blends right in. It also gives you an updated timeframe on your would-be date’s tardiness. 

Scratch that – thirty minutes. 

Pulling out your phone, the absence of any new notifications is almost as annoying as whatever threadbare excuse you’re sure your date will offer you when he arrives. Glancing at the door, it remains devoid of any new patrons. Or perhaps rather if he arrives. 

You’re running near empty on both pinot noir and patience, and you use the distraction of your phone to make you seem a little less pathetic. As if this entire restaurant isn’t already privy to the fact that you’re actively being stood up. 

Well, you think wryly, at least you look good doing it. The off white ensemble you selected for the evening is Chanel, and vintage, at that. Usually you wouldn’t pull out all the stops like this for something as flimsy as a first date, but men like James Sim have an eye for this kind of thing. 

Four years your senior, he’s already carving out a name for himself at twenty-five. You suppose it is a little less impressive, though, when the name he was born with already carries a legacy of its own in the business world you usually do your very best to stay out of. Rumor has it he’s already a shoo-in for the next CEO of his father’s company. When nepotism is that blatant, you can’t do much but scoff and raise a glass to it. 

Scrambling for something to do to make your wasted time pass a bit quicker, you search up the social media profile of your would-be date. Honestly, you doubt you would learn anything more substantial about him if he actually bothered to show up than you will from scanning over his feed. In your experience, men like that tend to make up for their success on paper by lacking an actual personality and any sort of self-awareness. 

Gym selfie. Scroll. Gym selfie from a slightly different angle. Scroll. Dog photo. Pausing, you suppress a small smile. The dog in the picture is pretty cute, if nothing else. Zooming in slightly, your eyes crinkle at the way the dog’s tongue lolls out of its open mouth in a grin. Well, at least he’s got that going for him, you suppose. A cute dog is enough to bump any guy’s ranking up a few points in your book. 

If James Sim is nothing but a sum of his social media profile, it’s not like you expected anything else. After all, this is the heir to the Sim Corporation, a golden boy that was born with a crown on his head and a gold spoon in his mouth. Everything he’s earned has been laid out for him in painstakingly placed steps. His entire life has been guided by a heavy hand and the knowledge that he would one day inherit everything that makes his family worth knowing. 

You probably wouldn’t be too concerned with showing up to first dates on time, either. Especially since you doubt he’s ever been denied a second. 

Tonight is nothing but a blip on a radar, you’re sure. Something for a secretary to schedule and him to notice a day or five late. Maybe if you’re lucky, someone on his team will send a consolatory bouquet once he does realize the mistake. He is still building his reputation, after all, and you could use a fresh set of flowers for your apartment. 

With another slightly pitiful sigh and a final swig of wine, your glass is empty and your optimism is shot. A second glance at the clock says that thirty-eight minutes have now elapsed since your scheduled meeting time. And in your opinion, that’s thirty-nine too late for a first date. 

Retrieving your coat from the back of your chair, you figure tonight will be remembered as nothing but a waste of a good outfit. Besides, you suppose forty minutes of aimless scrolling is ultimately less painful than the inevitable headache this date surely would have been had he bothered to actually show up. 

Suddenly, you frown. You won’t complain if this date never actually happens, but you may end up with a slight problem. Although you haven’t been on the best of terms with your mother in a long time, tonight was meant to be the final bullet point on a list of favors you owe her. 

As you pull your coat on, you consider the best way to frame the events of the evening. Lean into the whole ‘getting stood up’ thing in an effort to earn some sympathy points? Lay out the facts in their most basic form, timestamps included? Emphasize the fact that you waited long past the obligatory twenty minutes for him to actually show up? Or leave your message chain as it currently is, tell her nothing at all, and let her assume what she wants?

They’re all equally iffy, you think. Risky in their own regard. 

Signing your name at the bottom of the check, you scribble in a generous tip for the waitress who did her best to check on you often without making it obvious that she knew you were expecting company that never arrived, expertly skirting that line between overbearing and empathetic. At least someone will go home happy, you think, adding an extra zero for good measure. 

Exiting the restaurant, you decide to make it two people. James Sim may be a hotshot at his father’s company, but you’ll be damned before you let him ruin your evening. Before you order the Uber back to your place, you add an extra stop at your favorite sushi place. Takeout in the comfort of your own home will certainly be easier to enjoy than whatever Michelin-Star concoction you would have ordered here anyway, eaten in small bites between forced conversation topics, awkward pauses, and too long sips of wine. 

And an hour later, you’re polishing off the last piece of an absolutely divine rainbow roll, wearing nothing but silk pajamas and a face mask, with old reruns of your favorite show playing on the TV when James Sim finally glances down at the Rolex on his wrist. He’s finally arrived at the tail end of a meeting that’s running so far behind schedule he has half a mind to just walk out of it. He would, too, if his father wouldn’t actually threaten his life for it. 

It’s late, James realizes. Stupid late. So late that he won’t have the time or energy to do anything but pass out by the time he gets home, which really sucks, because he was genuinely looking forward to his date tonight–

“Fuck.”

All he can do is curse, even as the shocked faces of a concerning number of top executives turn to look at him all at the same time. 

…

Jake Sim is about to fail his econ midterm. 

It will be at least a week before grades are released, but he already knows it. He can already feel it in the way the questions start to swim in his mind, making less and less sense the more he turns them over, in the way his gut fills with dread as the minute hand of the clock at the front of the lecture hall ticks closer and closer to the testing time limit. 

And it wouldn’t be that bad, if it weren’t his second time repeating this course. 

Oh, his father is going to have an absolute field day with this one. Jake can practically hear it now. 

“You failed your midterm? After already failing this course twice? You know, James was actually the top scoring student in his economic section. Dr. Jeong still mentions his term paper every time I see him at the university…”

And that’s if he’s in a good mood. Or rather, if things at the company are going well. Jake doesn’t even want to consider the comments he’ll be on the receiving end of if the news of his failure finds his father already agitated. 

Exhaling, he gives his exam one final once-over, scanning for completion more than accuracy. His brain is so fried that he knows it’s of little use to him now. For his own sake, the best thing to do at this point is turn his test in and send a silent prayer to whoever might be listening on his way out the door. 

Leaving the lecture hall behind him, Jake puts his phone out of airplane mode and frowns at the two notifications that pop up on his screen. The first is a missed call from his brother, and the second is a message from the same sender, requesting that he give him a call when he has the chance. 

Considering that it’s neither his birthday nor a major holiday, Jake is more than a little confused. Regardless, he honors the request, pressing his phone to his ear as he begins the walk back to his apartment. Although it’s significantly less spacious than his childhood home, he finds it far more welcoming in more ways than one. 

The outgoing call rings once, twice, three times. Jake is about to be annoyed at the missed connection, but his brother answers in the moments just before he’s sent to voicemail.

“Hey, Jake.” Shocking. He actually bothered to check the caller ID. 

“Hey.” Jake’s voice is careful, guarded. It’s not like his personal life is of any importance to his older brother, but he’s not in the mood to answer any questions. He won’t give James any reasons to ask. “I saw your message.”

“Right.” Jake can hear the shuffle of other voices, scattered movements coming from the other line. James sounds busy. Just like always. Usually, that would usually mean he’s distracted. But Jake has the odd feeling that he has his brother’s undivided attention when James adds, “I have a favor to ask you.”

Immediately, Jake’s stomach drops. There are very few things in this world that are not within James Sim’s grasp, and even less that are within Jake’s, relatively speaking. Whatever it is, he must be desperate, if he’s willing to enlist the help of his little brother. 

“Okay.” Jake’s voice betrays none of his sudden anxieties. “What is it?”

At least James spares him the agony of suspense. “You know ___, right?”

Jake frowns. Sure, he knows of you. Just like he has a vague idea of every one of his family’s business partners and their immediate kin. Particularly the ones that are the same age as him and attend the same university. But it’s not like he’s close with you, not like he’s ever had an actual conversation of any substance with you. 

Especially since the minimal interactions the two of you have had did not leave Jake wanting more. The only child of parents whose last name is on the front of the most successful law firm within a thousand mile radius, you strike him as everything he’d expect you to be. 

Spoiled. Entitled. Vapid. Out of touch with any version of reality that doesn’t consist of you getting everything you want at the exact moment you want it. He supposes it’s a bit like the pot calling the kettle black, considering his own upbringing, but he’d like to think that he’s earned what he’s been given, at least partially. Especially since most of it has been his brother’s hand-me-downs.  And it’s not like his father has ever been in the habit of doing him any favors that don’t come wrapped in criticism, comparison, and disdain.

Although rumor does have it you and your mother haven’t been on speaking terms since you left for university, Jake imagines it’s probably because you wanted to bring the limited edition Versace to campus with you, and she insisted it would be safer at home. 

Oh, well. Whatever designer dispute happened between you and your mother is no skin off his back. Jake has his own problems to worry about. 

One of them being his brother’s question that still lingers on the other line. 

Weighing responses in his head, Jake finally settles on, “I guess.” It’s his best attempt at being noncommittal. 

Unfortunately, it doesn’t do anything to dissuade his brother. “Do you have her number by chance? My secretary should have taken it down, but she can’t find it anywhere.”

Jake balks, footsteps faltering. An equally distracted student walking behind him nearly stumbles right into his back. Wordlessly, Jake sends them an apologetic look before clarifying, “Her number? Like, her personal phone number?”

“What other kind of number is there?” And there’s the James that Jake knows. Annoyed at the perceived incompetencies of his younger brother, just as always. 

Suddenly, Jake’s patience is running short too. James is the one asking for a favor and still has the gall to be annoyed with him. Typical. Jake’s words are clipped when he says, “No, I don’t have ___’s phone number.” 

Jake expects that to be the end of it, but his brother won’t let it go so easily. 

“Seriously? Don’t you two go to the same school?”

Jake rolls his eyes. “Right, because I have the entire student body on speed dial.”

There’s a pause on the other end. Jake half expects his brother to just hang up on him. After all, he’s never been able to take what he gets, to swallow what he dishes out. 

What Jake does not expect, however, is the way James sounds so tentative when he speaks again.  “Well…”

“Well what?” Patience already running thin, it’s all he can do not to snap. 

“Do you think you could get it for me?”

Jake must be dreaming. This must be a post-exam punishment, a hallucination brought on by over exerting his brain too far for too long. “Do I think I could get ___’s phone number for you?” he repeats flatly. 

“Is there an echo in here?” Asshole. At least he’s consistent. 

“Just an echo chamber,” Jake mutters away from the receiver. 

“What was that?”

“Nothing.” Jake stops for a moment to fiddle with his keyring as he walks up the stairs to his apartment. “No, I can’t get her phone number for you.” 

“Why not?”

The key won’t line up quite right. Jake tries again, frustration seeping through. “Because I have better things to do than run stupid errands for you. Why don’t you drive here and get it yourself?”

“Trust me, if I thought she’d give it to me, I’d be there in an hour.”

The lock on his door finally clicks open, and Jake all but throws his bag down after kicking off his shoes. “And what the hell makes you think she’d give it to me?”

“Well, you didn’t accidentally stand her up, for one.” James doesn’t sound embarrassed by it. Just matter-of-fact. Like a date is nothing but a business deal. Something to be rescheduled and redone if negotiations go sour the first time around. 

It is enough to stir up some of Jake’s curiosity, though. “You went on a date with ___?” He supposes it makes sense. Even if the rumor mill and its rumblings about your rocky relationship with your mother ring true, you’re still your parents’ daughter. Still a perfect match on paper for the future CEO of the Sim Corporation. The king of a company and princess of a law firm. It’s a match made in heaven, he thinks ruefully. 

“No, I didn’t. That’s kind of the whole point here.”

“Whatever.” Jake still doesn’t see what the hell he has to do with all this. “Why don’t you just look up her parents’ number in the company database and get it from them?”

Jake can practically feel his brother’s exasperation through the phone. “Right, because that would go over really well. Hi there," he imitates. “I’d like to make your daughter the mother of my future children. Care to pass along her phone number so I can get started on that?”

Jake suppresses a wince. “Jesus. I see why she stood you up.”

“She didn’t. I stood her up,” James clarifies. “On accident.”

Semantics. And not ones that Jake is interested in. “Either way. I’m not getting her number for you.”

“Yeah?” Jake is unsettled by the way there’s still no trace of defeat in his brother’s voice. There’s something almost sinister when he suddenly switches topics. “How are classes going?”

Jake’s lips pull into a taut line, disaster of an econ midterm still fresh on his mind. “Fine.”

“Really? Even econ? Third time’s the charm and all that?” Well, at least his brother can be counted on to consistently be an asshole.

“Why do you care?” The only thing Jake wants to do is end this call and crawl into bed for a well-deserved afternoon nap. Let his subconscious spare him from thoughts of his older brother and econ and you for at least a little bit. 

James has other plans. “You must have taken the midterm recently, right?” Jake’s silence is confirmation enough. “You know, the only thing Dr. Jeong weighs more heavily than the midterm is the final paper at the end of the semester.”

A minute ago, Jake thought you were the last thing he wanted to talk about. The sudden shift in direction in this conversation is starting to prove him wrong. If there’s one thing Jake would rather discuss even less than his older brother’s dating life, it’s school. “What does that have to do with a–”

“And I think I still have my copy of the paper that earned me the top score in my entire section.” The smugness is practically palpable. “I might have to do some digging, but I’m sure it’s in my old files somewhere.”

Jake rolls his eyes, wishes the immediate comparison weren’t the first thing to rise to the forefront of his mind. Wishes it didn’t find him so lacking. Wishes it wasn’t narrated in the voice of his disappointed father. “If you’re trying to gloat, it’s n–”

“I’m trying to strike a deal. Jesus, no wonder you’re on track to be a super senior getting a business degree.”

“This is my third year,” Jake defends indignantly. 

“And your third attempt at econ, which I passed in my first year.” He sounds like he’s settling a little too well into the CEO role when he proposes, “I’m trying to make it your last attempt.” 

Jake would be lying if he said his curiosity weren’t piqued, even just slightly. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying, little brother, that my term paper, my notes, all of it, are yours.” It sounds too good to be true. It has to be too good to be true. James is a lot of things, but generous and helpful are very rarely any of them. “As soon as you get me ___’s number.” And there it is. 

Jake hangs up without bothering to dignify that with a response and hopes it sends a strong enough signal of his refusal. Then, he falls into his bed face-first with a groan. 

And a week later, when his econ midterm results are finally posted, the first thing Jake does is let his head fall on his desk with an alarmingly loud thud that has Jay poking his head in the door to make sure everything’s okay. The second thing he does, a solid twenty minutes later, is send his older brother a text. 

Jake [7:21pm]: You better start digging through those old files. 

…

All things considered, you’re easier to track down than Jake expects. The university campus is big, and judging from the way he can’t remember ever seeing you in a class, the two of you don’t share a major. But the similarities in your social status mean you’re bound to run in some of the same circles, and Jake is able to use this to his advantage. 

Ultimately, it takes very little digging on his part. First, he mentions your name to Jay in the middle of an upper body superset in the university gym. Jay frowns, setting the weights back on the rack. 

“That name sounds familiar. I think maybe Heeseung knows her?”

That tidbit takes him to Wednesday night, which always finds Jake in the library at a statistics study group Heeseung also makes a habit of attending. On their way out for the evening, Jake stops him by the door. 

“___?” Heeseung pauses for a moment in contemplation. “I’m pretty sure she’s friends with Sunghoon.”

And the third piece of the puzzle proves a bit more difficult to click into place. Sunghoon is harder for Jake to find, at least in a way that comes across naturally. Much like yours, Park Sunghoon is a name Jake hears in passing more than anything. He’s a friend of friends, a mutual acquaintance that Jake has never really had a conversation with and certainly doesn’t know well enough to interrogate for your phone number. 

But his most recent midterm score is still looming over his head, and the thought of retaking econ again is so nightmarish it sends a shiver down his spine  every time he considers it. At this point, there isn’t much Jake wouldn’t put on the line to pass the damn class. Including his pride, apparently. 

So when Jake hears from Jay who hears from Heeseung that Sunghoon will probably be at the party Epsilon Nu Eta is throwing this Friday night, he starts to formulate a plan. 

And he starts to regret said plan less than twenty-four hours later when he finds himself on the doorstep of a frat party. A frat party. He can’t remember the last time he came to one of these things. At twenty-one, he already feels geriatric as he tugs self-consciously at the sleeves of the plan black long sleeve he put on for the occasion. Something that will hopefully hide the questionable stains he’ll inevitably leave with. 

Entering through the front door with hinges that don’t align quite right, Jake has one mission in mind: find Park Sunghoon. Find him and somehow convince him to pass along your number. There’s a fine line to be walked there, Jake thinks. If he comes across as too eager, it will just be creepy. Nonchalance is the name of the game, but he’s never been good at keeping his cards close to his chest. 

For Jake, it’s a tall order, which means the only detour he’ll allow himself is grabbing a cup of lukewarm beer from the kitchen before he sets out looking for Sunghoon. The alcohol is an effort to break the barrier of his inhibitions more than anything. To make what he’s about to do feel a little less painful. 

Making his way out of the kitchen, Jake wanders aimlessly for a few minutes. He doesn’t know much about Sunghoon, other than the fact that he competes for your university’s figure skating team and is undeniably handsome. A good-looking figure skater, Jake thinks as he turns down yet another crowded hallway, narrowly avoiding spilling his drink. Where would one of those be hiding? 

He spends a few more awkward minutes asking around to no avail. Just when he’s on the verge of saying fuck it and making some sort of sacrifice to the econ gods instead, Jake bumps into the man of the hour on his way to the bathroom. 

In the chaos, Jake doesn’t recognize him until it’s almost too late. “Hey,” Jake calls out, bladder all but forgotten for now. He’s trying to fake an air of coolness when he adds, “Sunghoon, right?”

“Yeah.” Jake thanks his lucky stars that Sunghoon must be at least two drinks in, because he doesn’t seem weirded out at all by the sudden question from a near stranger. 

“I’m Jake.” He reaches his arm out for a handshake. Blinking, Sunghoon just stares at his outstretched hand as long, awkward moments bleed into each other. Eventually, Jake just lets it fall back to his side. “I’m, uh, in a statistics class with Heeseung.”

“Right on,” Sunghoon nods, still unsure if this conversation has a point to it. Luckily, the pleasant haze clouding his thoughts means he doesn’t mind too much either way. 

Jake figures there’s no point in dragging this out by exchanging more pleasantries, and he has the feeling Sunghoon might start forgetting his own name, much less yours, if he lets this continue for too long. 

“Listen,” Jake starts, trying to sound as not creepy as possible. “I heard that you know ___ pretty well.”

Sunghoon just shrugs. Jake can’t tell if he’s succeeded. “You could say that.”

“I know this is a strange request, but, uh,” Jake scratches the side of his head, “is there any chance I could get her number? I promise not to do anything weird.” Word vomiting, the extra details are spilling out before he can stop them. “It’s not even for me, actually–”

Sunghoon spares him the rest of a rambling explanation. “Sorry, bud. No can do.”

Jake’s stomach tightens in panic. He really, really just needs your phone number. It has him forgetting his earlier inhibitions, throwing caution to the wind even if he’s making a bit of a fool of himself in the process. “It’s for something important, actually. I’m kind of desperate–”

Sunghoon just puts a consolatory hand on Jake’s shoulder, interrupting his train of thought. “Look, man, it’s nothing against you personally, but I have literally never met you in my life. Besides, if I gave out ___’s number to every random guy that asked, I’m pretty sure she’d shave my head.” Sunghoon leans in close, like he’s about to share a secret. Jake’s nose twists at the scent of alcohol on his breath. “And between you and me, I don’t think I could pull off being bald.” 

Jake kind of begs to differ, but that’s neither here nor there. He opens his mouth to plead his case again, but Sunghoon doesn’t even let him get a word out. 

“Sorry, man, but I really can’t help you.” Pausing for a moment, he considers. “You said your name was Jacob, though, right?” He doesn’t pause long enough for Jake to correct him. “I could ask her if she’s cool with giving you her number–”

“Whose number are you giving out?” And if Jake thought this conversation wasn’t enough of a train wreck already, trust the timing of your entrance to be more disastrous than divine. 

Eyes turning to you and your sudden intrusion on the conversation, Jake’s mind goes blank for a minute.  And yeah, he kinda gets why his brother’s so hellbent on having a second chance at your time. Dressed in all black, your hair is loose around your face. Even though it likely costs more than most people’s monthly paycheck, there’s nothing inherently special about what you’re wearing. Still, Jake is finding it exceedingly difficult to look away. 

It’s something in your aura, he thinks. In the way you carry yourself. Something that money can’t buy. Something that makes his gaze want to linger. 

“___!” Sunghoon grins, wrapping an arm around your shoulder, wobbling slightly. You jostle at the sudden impact, inching away from where the contents of his cup slosh dangerously close to the rim. “What a coincidence. We were just talking about you.”

Your brow creases in confusion. Jake tracks the miniscule movement with parted lips. 

“You were?”

“Yeah,” Sunghoon confirms, just at the same moment Jake shakes his head, “No.”

Turning your mildly concerned gaze away from your friend, you glance at Jake for the first time. Brow furrowing further, you cock your head to the side as your lips part in partial recognition. He looks oddly familiar, but you can’t quite place him. “Do I know you?”

“No.” Jake shakes his head again, a little too fervently. “I don’t think we’ve ever met. At least not properly.”

It’s an odd way of putting it. You’re about to ask him to clarify when Sunghoon cuts in, clearing up the confusion for you. “It’s Jacob,” he says, as if that should mean anything to you. Turning back to the boy across from him, he adds, “Jacob Sim, right?”

And that clicks things into place.  

“Sim?” you echo, realization dawning on your features.

“Yep,” Sunghoon confirms. 

Across from you, Jake says nothing. He doesn’t think he could if he wanted to. In fact, he’s pretty sure his life is flashing before his eyes. 

“Sim,” you repeat one final time, jaw ticking in agitation as everything starts to settle. “I do know you.”

“Oh, really?” Sunghoon asks at your side, oblivious to the way your tone betrays obvious animosity. A distaste so palpable Jake can practically feel it radiating off of you. Turning back to Jake, he’s apologetic. “Sorry, Jacob. I guess I could have given you her number, then.” Sunghoon smiles sheepishly, as if he hasn’t just made things a million times worse. “My bad.”

Jake’s eyes widen in horror as he scrambles for some sort of defense, an explanation that will dig him out of this rapidly deepening hole, but you beat him to it. 

“My number?” The look you give him has a concerning amount of venom in it. “Seriously? God, why are all you Sim men so obsessed with me?”

“That’s not–” 

“First your brother views my LinkedIn profile twenty-three times after standing me up, and now you’re harassing my friends for my phone number?”

“Hold on. I’m not harassing anyone–”

“No,” Sunghoon agrees, nodding diplomatically. “Jacob was perfectly pleasant–”

“It’s Jake, actually.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah, just Jake.”

“Sorry,” Sunghoon apologizes. Turning to you, he tries mediating again. “Well, like I said, just Jake was perfectly pleasant–”

“I don’t care how pleasant he is.” Your glare somehow becomes icier. “Leave me alone, and tell your dickhead brother to do the same.” Muttering to yourself more than anything, you add, “The last thing I need right now is you practically stalking me–”

“Stalking you?” Jake flounders, an edge of annoyance creeping into his tone. He’s not surprised to learn that you really do think the world revolves around you, but really? Stalking?  “Don’t flatter yourself. It’s not like I’m enjoying this interaction any more than you are.”

You don’t back down, crossing your arms over your chest. The movement has Sunghoon teetering dangerously where he leans on you, but you pay him no mind, attention focused solely on the man in front of you. “Then why do you want my phone number so bad?”

“Like I was trying to say earlier when you wouldn’t let me get a word out sideways,” Jake bites, “it’s not for me. I made a deal with someone, and I told them I’d give them your number.”

Your gaze narrows. “Who?”

“What?”

“Who did you make a deal with?”

Jake hesitates, knowing how the truth will sound. Screw it – a lie would likely be just as damning. Still, it takes him another pregnant pause to eventually admit, “... My brother.”

Scoffing in disbelief, you double down on your ire. “Absolutely not.” Shaking Sunghoon off your shoulder, you turn to leave, dragging him with you. Jake’s eyes close; he can’t bear to watch his last chance at passing this semester leave him in the dust.  

So much so that he pleads again, “Wait, ___. Please.” Jake is begging now, and he feels a little pathetic for it. Still, he can’t help the way desperation drives him to continue. “You can block him for all I care. I can’t explain everything, but my life is quite literally in your hands right now. I just need–”

“No.” The single syllable vibrates with finality. “Do I have to spell it for you? N-” you bite, enunciating so sharply Jake thinks you might draw blood. “O. No. I’m not giving my number to you or your flake of  a brother or anyone else that so much as looks like they might have the name Sim.”

God, is the only think Jake can think as he miserably watches your retreating figure, Sunghoon stumbling along  as you drag him with you. I am so fucked. 

…

When Sunghoon finally emerges from your guest bedroom an hour before noon the next day, it’s to ask if you’d be kind enough to spare him some Advil. Even with a bad case of bedhead and the aftermath of overconsumption, he still manages to look good, albeit a little lifeless. 

“I’ll do you one better,” you tell him, but reach for the small white bottle anyway, shaking out a few tablets and offering them to your best friend along with a glass of cold water.

“Bagels and coffee?” Sunghoon asks over the rim of his glass, with a little more alertness in his eyes than there was moments before. 

“Bagels and coffee,” you confirm. A tried and true hangover cure, if there ever was one. And even though your head is feeling nice and clear, thanks to your trusty two drink limit that has yet to fail you, the local cafe a block from your apartment is very rarely something you turn down. 

Thirty minutes later and a change of clothes later, the two of you are trading gossip and stealing bites of each other’s orders when the other person isn’t looking at the table in the back corner of the cafe. Sunghoon is just about to stuff another piece of your bagel in his mouth when he notices yet another notification light up the screen of your phone. 

Sunghoon nods towards where it rests on the table, bagel suddenly forgotten. “Is that your mom again?”

“Yep.” Your lips stretch thin. You don’t even need to glance down at your phone to confirm. She’s been blowing up your notifications all weekend.  “She’s been on my ass about the upcoming fundraiser event for days now. And reminding me about the utmost importance of bringing an appropriate plus-one.”

Across from you, Sunghoon straightens his shoulders. “I suppose it is about time I bust out the trusty old prom suit again.”

You sigh, sending your half-eaten bagel a forlorn glance. “I wish. She told me if I ever bring you again, I lose half my trust fund.”

“What?” Sunghoon looks affronted. “Why?”

You level him with a look. “Does soap ring a bell?”

Sunghoon splutters in indignation. “That was one time,” he defends. “And anyone would have thought those were edible! They were shaped like candies, and they were on a platter–”

“Soap presentation aside, I don’t think that excuse will work on her.” The dejection in your voice is apparent. “Besides, she’s already made it very clear that you’re explicitly forbidden from attending any future family events as my plus-one.”

“Whatever,” Sunghoon grumbles. “Keep all your stupid inedible soaps.” Pausing for a moment, he realizes that still leaves a giant question hanging in the air. “Who are you gonna bring, then? You know, it kind of is too bad your date with Sim number one didn’t pan out.”

You shrug, pointedly ignoring the way your phone screen lights up yet again. It really is a bit of a shame James turned out to be an unreliable flake. One that still hasn’t bothered to apologize to you or even give any sort of indication that he remembered your scheduled date. Still, you can’t think of anyone that would earn your mother’s approval faster. “I’ll probably just fake a stomach flu.” After all, you’re kind of out of options. “I thought about asking Jungwon, but he’s got stuff going on for his internship that night. A big economics conference or something.”

“Speaking of economics,” Sunghoon leans in conspiratorially. “I think I might have some intel on our new friend from last night.”

“How was economics the segue you went with? We were literally just talking about his older brother.” Giving him a look of disbelief, you add, “And what about that interaction gave you the impression that we’re friends?”

“Whatever,” Sunghoon brushes you off before he continues, “Anyway, I heard from Heeseung who heard from Jay that apparently little Sim is hot garbage at economics. Rumor has it he’s already failed the class twice and is on track to do it again.”

You’re not sure why he’s deemed this information relevant to you, but you’d be lying if you said it weren’t a little amusing. 

“Really? Jungwon’s taking it now too, and he said that he sleeps through half the lectures and is still pulling an A.”

Sunghoon rolls his eyes. “Well, we can’t all be prodigies.”

Your lips flatten. “Pretty sure you don’t have to be a prodigy to not fail an entry level course three times.”

“Hey, cut him some slack,” Sunghoon argues. “He’s only failed it twice as of now.”

You scoff, entirely uninterested in the gory details of Jake Sim’s academic failures. “Whatever.”

“Either way,” Sunghoon says, “Jay told Heeseung who told me that’s why he’s so desperate for your number.” Confusion makes itself known on your features. You still don’t see the connection until Sunghoon adds, “Apparently he made some sort of deal with his brother that if he gets him your phone number, he’ll help him pass econ.”

A beat of silence passes between you. The barista at the counter calls out a customer’s name. It’s all you can do to not let your jaw physically drop open, mostly because–

“That is probably the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard in my life.” Glaring at Sunghoon, you can’t believe the theatrics of it all. “How many times have I told you to stop believing everything Heeseung says?”

“Technically, Jay said it,” Sunghoon corrects. “And I don’t know... It kind of makes sense when you think about it.”

You beg to differ. “It absolutely does not. What is this, middle school? Are we passing notes behind the teacher’s back and making our friends ask our crushes if they like us back?” It’s ridiculous. Absolutely, utterly ridiculous. 

There is no way. Absolutely no way that James Sim, heir to a multimillion dollar company, is wasting his time giving his little brother an economics cheat sheet in exchange for your phone number. 

Sunghoon raises his hands in mock surrender. “Don’t shoot the messenger. I just thought you might be curious.”

And you hate to admit it, but you kind of are. Even though every ounce of logic you’ve accumulated in twenty-one years of life tells you that Heeseung is a notorious gossip whose stories are just as much fiction as reality and your best friend is no better. Even though the whole thing makes absolutely no sense at all. 

Even though you repeat it to yourself over and over for the rest of the day, that damn curiosity is still there. Pestering you and disturbing your sleep and leaving you wondering if maybe, just maybe, some things are entirely too ridiculous to be anything but true. 

…

On Wednesday night, Jake and Heeseung are in the middle of a particularly brutal probability set when a sudden shadow looms over their favorite corner table on the third floor of the library. 

Glancing up, Jake finds Heeseung’s gaze already trained somewhere over his shoulder. Jake can’t quite tell if the look on his face is confusion or terror. 

“Mind if I join?” The request comes from behind him, posed in an oddly familiar voice. Heeseung is nodding in agreement before Jake has the chance to so much as turn around and identify the intruder. 

All is revealed soon enough, though, when you slide down into the seat next to him, ignoring the way Heeseung scrambles to move his things and make room for you in the seat next to him. Instead, you busy yourself with setting your bag on the floor and pulling out your laptop. 

It’s all Jake can do to stare at you blankly. This evening, you’ve traded the all black outfit from the other night’s party for something a bit more casual, something comfortable that blends in better to the background of a university library. The sudden proximity also means that the scent of your perfume is quick to waft over towards him. 

Jake does his best to hold his breath before his brain can trick him into thinking he likes it. 

“Stop looking at me like that.” A bold request for someone who just hijacked a study session and sat down with no explanation, but Jake wouldn’t expect anything less from you. 

“Like what?” The words are out before he gives them permission. Across the table, Heeseung is staring too, but all three of you know the command isn’t for him. 

“I don’t know.” Glancing at the battery bar hovering just above empty, you dig around in your bag for a moment for your laptop charger. Jake notes that you still have yet to look at him. Instead, you begin to busy yourself with typing something on your computer. “Just stop it.”

He hopes you can feel the way his eyes burn holes into the side of your head as his blank stare shifts into a glare. 

Heeseung glances between the two of you. His outburst is sudden. “Oh! I just remembered.” He hits his head for good measure. The acting is wasted on this audience, though. Neither of you pay him any mind or even bother to glance in his direction. “I have to go, uh…” he trails off, finishing lamely with a rather flat, “somewhere else.”

“Great.” Your eyes don’t leave your screen, fingers still flying on your keyboard. “See you later.”

As Heeseung scrambles to pack up his unfinished statistics homework and high tail it out of the library, the air that has suddenly become stifling, Jake glances down at where your fingers are still moving. 

Distractedly, he wonders how you can type so fast with nails that long, how you never seem to need the backspace key. How none of the pastel pink that coats your fingernails seems to be so much as chipped. A projection of perfection, he thinks, down to every last detail.  

Moments pass, neither of you saying anything.

You still haven’t looked at him by the time you do eventually break the impasse. “I heard you suck at econ.”

And Jake actually cannot believe you. “Did you seriously hunt me down just to rub it in?”

“Rub it in?” That at least earns him some of your attention, even if it is just a brief, confused glance as your fingers pause in their typing. “It’s not like I’m the reason you can’t pass.”

“Believe it or not, you quite literally are.”

You sigh, removing your hands from your keyboard entirely. Then, before he can blink, you spin your entire body in your chair, eyes, shoulders, and knees all directly trained on him. Jake can’t help the way he flinches back a few inches at the sudden change in pace. 

“Look,” you start. He can already tell by the way you wrap the single syllable sound in patronization that he’s not going to appreciate whatever you’re about to say. “I can tell that you’re not used to, like, having conversations with people, but usually what happens is you give someone enough information so that they know what you’re talking about.” He’s right. 

And he’s quick to defend himself. “Maybe I could, if you’d let me get three words out without interr–”

But you’ve moved on already. “Is the whole ‘deal with your brother’ thing true?”

Jake lets the silence linger for a moment, looking at you in disbelief. “You literally just proved my point.”

You roll your eyes. “I knew what you were going to say, so I sped things along. Now answer my question.” You lay it out for him again. This time, even more directly. “Did you try to get my number because of some deal you made with your brother?”

He’s not sure why it sounds so ridiculous, narrated back to him in your voice. It’s not like it was a brilliant, foolproof plan to begin with, but the way you present it has him feeling about five inches tall. 

“I…”

“It’s a yes or no question.” You really don’t beat around the bush, he thinks. 

“Yes, okay?”

Looking behind you, you suddenly lean in a little closer. It’s all Jake can do not to flinch back again. Bringing your hand up to cup your mouth, it’s like you’re about to divulge a terrible secret when you whisper, “You’re that bad at econ?”

Jake just sighs. “Worse, probably.”

Frowning, you pull back a few inches. “Aren’t you a business major? Isn’t econ, like, pretty important for you?” If he were thinking clearly, Jake might wonder how you know that. But that only thing his mind has space for right now is annoyance. At you, at this exchange, at the way you so easily pick through his flaws and seem to have no problem laying them bare at his feet like he doesn't already know them intimately.

“Yeah, well, it’s not like I got any say in my major,” Jake counters. He might have more patience for this conversation if he were having it with anyone but you, if you weren’t throwing his own insecurities back in his face with every follow-up question.

At that, something flickers through your eyes. Sympathy, maybe. “Fair enough.” Whatever it is, it’s gone before he can identify it. And it’s not enough to make you pull your punches. “Still though, that’s probably the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.” Jake doesn’t need the reminder. “Just get a tutor like everyone else.”

The thing is, Jake has thought about it. On more than one occasion. He’s even gotten so far as filling out the university tutor request form. He just could never quite bring himself to complete the ‘Name’ field without all of the potential consequences forcing him to hit backspace. 

He might not be his brother, but he’s not stupid enough to think that his family would ever be okay with the Sim name anywhere near a tutor form. He tells you as much. “And listen to my dad tell me how much of a disappointment I am for not being able to even take a class on my own?” Jake laughs humorlessly. “No thanks.”

A beat passes. Two. You’re not done yet, but you at least have the decency to sound a little apologetic, a little tentative when you say, “Not to kick you while you’re down or anything, but I mean, that has to be better than failing twice.”

Jake just shakes his head. “You don’t know my father.”

You shrug but don’t press the matter further. Truth be told, you don’t know his father, but you do know fathers like him. You have one of your own. The third floor of the library doesn’t seem like the place for that conversation, though, even if you’ve already uncovered more than your fair share of each other’s secrets in the last ten minutes. “I guess not.”

…

Your phone is buzzing far too incessantly for a Saturday morning, much less this early on a Saturday morning. Internally, you curse Friday night you, who forgot to switch it into do not disturb before falling asleep. Face still buried in your pillow, you reach around your nightstand blindly with the intention of remedying that particular mistake and enjoying a few more moments of peace.

Before you can make good on your plan, you make the fatal mistake of reading the message preview before silencing your phone. And suddenly, to your neverending annoyance, you’re wide awake. 

Mom [7:36 am]: Looking forward to seeing you next Saturday at the fundraiser. 

Mom [7:37 am]: I also noticed that you haven’t indicated who you’ll be bringing yet. Please fill out the RSVP form when you have a moment. 

Mom [7:45 am]: James Sim hasn’t RSVP’d yet. Are you bringing him? You should invite him if you haven’t already.

Mom [7:53 am]: I also never heard the update after your date a few weeks ago. Hoping no news is good news. I just spoke with his father the other day, and it sounds like he’s doing great things over at their company. 

Mom [8:01 am]: I also heard that he volunteered a few summers ago rebuilding turtle habitats. Wow! I think you two would get along very well.

Groaning, you flip your phone back over. That about sums up how well she knows her only daughter, you think ruefully. If she thought wooing you with turtles was a good idea, she must have forgotten that you’ve had a lingering phobia of the freaky little reptiles since your friend from elementary school had a pet turtle that bit your finger when you were at her house. 

Besides, you have serious doubts that’s actually how James Sim spent his last summer in university. 

If memories from your social media scrolling serve correctly, rebuilding turtle habitats was code for partying on a yacht for a month straight. You don’t care how he spends his free time, but the way he already has your mother wrapped around his stupid finger is enough to annoy any lingering sleepiness out of your system. 

Whatever. James Sim’s white lies are the least of your concerns now, and they certainly won’t solve your problems. If anything, you’re starting to regret not telling your mother anything about your failed attempt at a first date with him. Now, trying to explain that disaster of an evening would only sound like an excuse at best and a flimsy lie at worst. 

And even if she did believe you, you still have the glaring issue of next Saturday and your lack of a pre-approved plus-one.

With one final groan, you pull your blanket over your face, trying and failing to banish any thoughts of your mother, James Sim, and the certain disaster next weekend will be. 

Despite your best efforts, your worries linger. They follow you into Sunday; they start to make you desperate on Monday. With a diminishing handful of days left until the fundraiser, your anxiety only surges. 

By the time Wednesday rolls around, you’re so stressed out that you can barely force your eyes to focus on the nearly blank Word document in front of you, all of the legalese and case details you can usually sort through in your sleep jumbling into one incomprehensible blob. 

Halfway through your third reread of a paragraph that details the basics of copyright law, it strikes you. The seedling of an idea so utterly ridiculous it just might be your saving grace.  

Your mother probably, definitely, couldn’t care less about James Sim’s so-called affinity for wildlife rescue. No, the only thing that makes him an appropriate candidate in her eyes for this Saturday has nothing to do with his personality at all. 

It’s his name that she likes. His family name specifically. 

In the middle of your favorite cafe, it hits you. The seedling of an idea sprouts roots, begins to bloom. 

If one Sim is good enough to be your plus-one, then surely the other one would be too. 

And you know exactly where he’ll be tonight. Glancing down at the time on your phone, you force your brain to think. Now, all you need is a plan. A way to convince him. Something he can’t refuse.  

Closing the lid of your laptop, you smile. You know exactly what it is he wants. 

Before you leave the cafe, you send a quick message to a friend. Set your plan in place so that the details are polished, irrefutable when you present it to him.

And then you set out for the university library. 

When you find Jake and Heeseung sitting at the same exact table on the third floor of the library, Heeseung doesn’t even bother to stick around for the customary greetings. Instead, he takes one single look at you before offering another flimsy excuse about having somewhere to be. Or maybe something to do. You can’t remember, and it doesn’t really matter. 

After all, the only reason you’re here is because–

“I have a way for you to pass econ.” Sliding into the seat next to Jake, the same one you sat in last time, you don’t waste any time before divulging the reason for your presence. 

If Jake is startled, he doesn’t show it. Statistics homework forgotten on the table, the only thing you see on his face is pure, obvious relief as his shoulders relax. 

“Thank god.” Reaching for his phone, he unlocks it, tapping and swiping until he’s ready to enter a new contact. “Give me your number, and I’ll–”

You shake your head, interrupting his train of thoughts. The way you smile makes him suddenly uneasy. He thought this was over, but now he’s not so sure. You confirm his fears when you say, “A different way.”

Now Jake just looks exasperated. If you keep up this habit, he’s about to start failing statistics too. Never mind the fact that he got his hopes up for what he is sure will turn out to be a giant pile of nothing. Still, he humors you. “What do you mean, a different way?”

“I mean,” you start, folding your hands across your lap. Jake has the distinct impression that you’re trying your best to be as convincing as possible. If nothing else, it does pique his curiosity. He’s never seen you be anything but annoyed or uninterested. It’s an interesting change of pace.“I have a friend who’s also taking econ right now and hasn’t scored below a 98 on a single assignment.” Jesus, Jake thinks. Must be nice. 

And then you drop the bomb on him. “He said he’s more than willing to tutor you. For money, of course.” you specify, moving on so quickly he hardly has the chance to process what you’re saying. “And it’s not like you can’t afford it, but I’ll split the cost with you. For the principle of it all.” There’s a beat of silence as what you’ve just said settles into the air. “Oh,” you add, remembering the most important detail. “And he’ll be discreet. Under the table tutoring, if you will. No chance of word getting back to Daddy Sim.” 

You do your best to give him your most trustworthy smile. Jake just stares back at you, mildly horrified.

When he finally speaks again, it’s to say, “... Please, and I mean this with every single bone in my body, please never refer to my father like that again.”

Not even bothering to look sheepish, the only agreement you offer is a mock salute. 

Your poor taste in nicknames aside, it does seem like a pretty sweet deal from where Jake is sitting. He cannot fail economics again, and getting a tutor would mean that his brother couldn’t hold his success over his head, couldn’t claim to be the sole reason for it. And a discreet tutor would be even better. Not going through the official university system would mean a much lower chance of his father ever finding out he got some help along the way.

All things considered, and very much to his surprise, Jake is having a hard time seeing any downsides. 

He goes through the list again. First, he gets to pass economics. Second, he doesn’t have to deal with his older brother in the process. Third, he gets a tutor that won’t pop up on his father’s radar, and all Jake has to do in return is–

Wait.

“Hold on a minute.” There’s an unmistakable edge of suspicion in Jake’s voice. There’s no way you went out of your way to find him a tutor, to help pay for it, without getting something in return. The wheels in his mind are starting to spin when he asks, “What’s in it for you?”

Next to him, you smile. It’s small, and if he didn’t know any better, he’d think you almost look nervous. “It’s just a small favor, really.” The expression on your face is not reassuring in the slightest. Still, you insist, “It’ll be easy, I promise. Just a few hours of your time at most.”

Jake knows better than to agree without details. And especially to anything you’re proposing. He’s already preparing to kiss his dreams of passing econ goodbye when he asks slowly,“What is it?”

You sigh, pretenses dropping. If you’re going to convince him now, you might as well do it with honesty. “That annual charity fundraiser event my parents throw. Your parents are usually there, I think. I don’t know if you’ve ever gone?”

Jake shrugs, frowning as he tries to remember. He’s not entirely sure either. After a while, fundraisers and events and family obligations all start to blur together. Although the name does ring a bell, albeit a distant, faint one. 

“Anyway,” you continue, “my mother is insistent that I bring a date. Someone she considers appropriate company. You know, runs in the same circles and comes from what she would consider a good family.” Jake nods. He does know exactly what you mean. Picking up on his agreement, you add with a twinge of hopefulness, “Like I said, it would be easy. Especially for you, since you’re used to this kind of stuff. I wouldn’t have to train you–”

That has Jake rolling his eyes. “Let me guess. I get a treat for rolling over?”

The ice in your glare is half hearted. “You know what I mean. There are certain…” You weigh your words carefully. “expectations at these things.” Pausing for a moment, you add, “What I’m trying to say is that I don’t think you’ll eat the soap, even if it’s candy shaped and on a platter.”

If you were trying to clarify your point, you did a terrible job. Jake’s brow pulls downwards in confusion. “Is that supposed to be some kind of metaphor?”

“Unfortunately not.” You shake your head, but don’t explain any further. Sunghoon’s mishaps are not the point of this conversation. A mutually beneficial deal is. Which is why you ask him, “So, what do you say? Are you in or not?”

Is he? Jake says nothing, considering. Mentally, he goes through the list of pros and cons. Pros, he thinks. I get to finally pass econ, and I get to do it without my brother. He glances at you out of the corner of his eye, gaze tracking the movement as you nervously bite at your lower lip. Also, I get to show up at an event with the girl he’s been trying to get for weeks now. 

He’d be lying if that didn't spark a certain warm feeling in his chest, if it didn’t inspire a sudden bout of preemptive vindication. But there are other things to consider.

Cons, he continues internally. I have to spend an entire evening at an event hosted by your family and make them believe you don’t annoy the ever-loving shit out of me.

Weighing his options, Jake has one more question. “How long would it be?” he asks, and you try to stifle a grin, as if he’s already told you yes. 

“The event is technically four hours,” you say carefully, “but I’m sure we could manage to sneak out after a solid two and a half.”

Jake nods, thinking it over a moment longer. 

“Okay,” he finally breathes, hoping this isn’t some kind of terrible, elaborate trick, that he isn’t about to sign his life away on a dotted line. 

For econ, he thinks. For what’s left of his struggling GPA. He can manage a single night at a mind-numbingly boring high society function. Even if it’s with you. “I’m in.”

And it feels a bit strange, he has to admit, as he watches you type your contact information into his contact list. It feels odd to have your number in his phone with no intention of passing it on. To know that he’s the one who will be using it to confirm the details of this Saturday. To know that his brother will be none the wiser and not at all closer to having any kind of access to you.  

And if that strange surge of smugness makes another sudden appearance, well, Jake just figures that no one ever has to know about it. 

…

Frowning, you give yourself another once over in the full length mirror that sits next to your vanity. A shimmering, pale gold, the evening gown that flows over your figure was hand-selected by you for this very event. For some reason, you’re having a hard time rediscovering the magic you’d felt trying it on in the showroom here in the soft, ambient light of your bedroom. 

Objectively, you’re sure you must look good. The compliments the store attendants had given you were more than just customary, and gold has always been your color. Still, a slew of sudden uncertainties simmer in your gut. Is the slight sparkle too garish? Does the gold wash you out? Your worries feel too big for your bedroom, at too stark an opposition with the peaceful ambience as soft, instrumental music plays from your speaker.

But this particular Saturday evening has its ways of making you feel jumbled where you’d typically be steadfast. Insecure where you’d usually find confidence.  

It’s true that your mother has always had a critical eye, and especially where you’re concerned. If you were to search deep enough, however, you’d find that she’s not the person you’re most concerned about making a lasting impression on tonight. 

With no small effort, you resist the urge to smooth out invisible wrinkles in the bodice of your dress. A nervous habit more than anything, it’s only exacerbated by the way your phone is still devoid of notifications. The clock on your nightstand is a reminder that your date for the evening should be here any minute, should be sending a message as confirmation of his arrival at your apartment. But your phone is still silent, even as the hour of the fundraiser draws nearer and nearer. 

Maybe this was a terrible mistake, you think, a new bout of uncertainties beginning to brew. It shouldn't be a surprise, really. Trust him to be just as flakey as his brother, with absolutely no regard for previous commitments or anyone else’s time. It’s just your luck that you get stood up again, this time by the other Sim. 

You're in the middle of disguising your fears and distracting yourself by cursing him and his future bloodline when your phone finally pings with an incoming notification. Well, you think, grabbing your coat, feeling a bit ridiculous for the slight overreaction, you’ll have to look into removing generational curses when you have the time.

For now, you settle with pulling on your heels for the evening, ignoring the way you feel a bit wobbly despite the fact that you’ve walked in far worse. Locking your apartment behind you and striking a slightly unsteady pace towards the elevator down the hall, you whisper a silent plea that tonight isn’t as much of a disaster as you’re afraid it could be. 

You watch as the numbers on the elevator screen tick lower and lower, a swirling mix of dread and excitement starting to swim in your stomach. When you finally reach the first floor, you’re surprised to see a familiar face waiting for you in the lobby. Something in you softens, albeit just slightly. You’d incorrectly assumed he would just wait for you in the comfort of his car and spent the whole ride down preparing to awkwardly check license plates in the near dark till you found the right one. 

An overwhelming sense of  self-consciousness returns to you under the brightness of the lobby lights. Unconsciously, you tuck a strand of hair behind your ear, wondering how long it will take him to notice you as you begin to walk towards him. You’ve only made it a few steps when it strikes you that he’s already distracted by something else. 

Across the lobby, Jake Sim is engaged in a conversation with your doorman. One that looks slightly heated, by your judgment. 

As you get closer, their words become more audible. 

“Like I just told you,” The exasperation in your date’s voice is apparent. “I’m here to see ___.”

And you really should make your presence known, should step in and divert the brewing argument, especially since you seem to be the subject of it. 

But then you look at Jake. Really look at him. 

Realistically, you knew he would come well-dressed. That had been a big part of your reason for choosing him. The Sunghoon soap fiasco aside, you already knew Jake Sim wasn’t someone who needed you to put together a PowerPoint presentation on formal event dress code. He didn’t need you to explain the concept of complementary colors or the advantages of getting a suit tailored. Didn’t need you to explain that Converse were not an appropriate show or that no, a bolo tie is not acceptable attire. 

Up until now, you were grateful for his pre existing knowledge. It saved you a lot of time and effort that you could use to focus on other things, like getting ready yourself. But it also meant that you were entirely unprepared to see him like this. 

Eyes scanning him again, the immaculate fit of his suit is undeniable, as is the way his dark hair is perfectly mussed. It’s styled enough to avoid withering comments from elderly attendees who have the habit of asking how people see with their hair covering their eyes. But it’s also messy in a way that looks intentional, in a way that makes you want to run your fingers through it, tug at it just a little, just to tease. 

It’s not just that he’s dressed well, though, despite the fact that he undeniably is. 

No, what has you freezing in your footsteps is the fact that Jake looks good. 

“And like I just told you, you’re not on her guest list. So I’m sorry, sir.” There is not a single trace of apology in your doorman’s voice. “But I’m afraid I can’t let you up. You’ll have to contact her and ask her to add you to her guest list.” You’re not sure how he manages to do it without losing any professionality, but your doorman makes it very clear that he thinks that will happen just as soon as hell freezes over. 

Jake’s shoulders tense in visible frustration. You have to suppress an actual sigh at the way fabric stretches over the muscle there. “Again, I’m not asking you to. Could you please just let her know that I’m here? She’s not answering her messages–”

“How odd.” The sarcasm is unmistakable. 

Getting a little desperate, Jake ignores the slight and continues anyway. “And we’re on a bit of a time crunch, so–”

From here, you can see the way his features start to twist in panic. It’s sobering enough to snap you out of your trance.

Cutting in, you make your presence known. “It’s okay,” you tell your doorman first. “I know him.” Then, you turn to Jake, putting on an award-worthy performance of false nonchalance when you explain, “Sorry I didn’t respond to your message. I was just on my way down.”

You watch as some of the tension drains from his features. “That’s alright,” Jake concedes easily. “I just wanted to make sure we weren’t late.”

A funny feeling, a new one, stirs again. Something in you softens. “I appreciate that.” 

You can’t help the way you take another look at him. At his suit, his hair, his face. At him, at all of it. 

Mistaking your gaze for scrutiny, he asks, a bit self-consciously, “What do you think? Will your mother approve?”

She will. There’s no doubt in your mind. But you’re not looking at him through her eyes when you tell him, “Yeah, you look good. Really good.”

The last part probably wasn’t necessary, but the way he flushes makes it almost worth it. Casting your eyes downward in an effort to hide a smile, you notice a detail that you missed earlier. 

Jewelry. Gold jewelry. A handful of rings on his fingers and a delicate bracelet on his left wrist.  

Suddenly, his message from last night makes a little more sense.

Jake [9:02 pm]: What color is your dress for tomorrow?

You [9:08 pm]: Gold. Don’t worry about trying to match. A black suit will be just fine. 

Now, you’re grateful he didn’t fully listen to you, touched that he even bothered to ask.  

Across from you, Jake is suddenly having a bit of a hard time breathing. The earlier near-fiasco with your doorman all but forgotten, you’re still admiring his bracelet as his eyes scan the length of you, throat bobbing by the time his gaze makes its way back up to your face. 

“You, uh,” he coughs. “You look nice too.”

“Thank you.” You miss the way his gaze wanders, can’t seem to find a place to land that won’t dust the tops of his cheekbones an even deeper shade of crimson. “I’ve been looking forward to wearing this dress forever.”

And it is a nice dress, Jake thinks, but he’s not sure how to tell you that’s not what he meant. 

Eyes finally landing on your feet, or rather, on the stilettos you’re wearing, he frowns. “I had to park kind of far away.” Meeting your gaze, he adds, “Why don’t you wait here? I’ll pull the car around front.”

“Okay.” Something in you melts a bit at his consideration, at the fact that he even noticed. “Thank you.”

And it is nice, you think, to not be beginning the evening with your feet already sore. To have someone pick up on the little things, even if he’s being compensated for it in the form of half-price tutoring.

Sliding into the passenger seat, you try not to sigh like a lovesick schoolgirl when he opens the door for you, when he puts his hand on the back of your seat as he reverses the car out of its parking spot. Get it together, you think. You’ve turned up your nose at far more obvious attempts at wooing you, and it’s not like Jake is here with you out of his own volition. The thought is surprisingly disappointing, as he adjusts the stereo, soft music filling the silence.

The drive passes like that, in a quiet that’s only uncomfortable if you look at it too close. Eventually, the soft melodies filtering through the stereo become a pleasant sort of background noise as you watch the world blur outside the window. 

It would be smart, probably, to sort out your story for the evening and put together something coherent for when the two of you are inevitably asked invasive questions, but you can’t bring yourself to be the one to disturb the peace. 

So when you arrive at the fundraiser a handful of minutes later, you just have to hope that the image the two of you strike together will be enough to stave off any unwanted questions for the time being. 

Again, Jake opens your car door for you, offers a steadying hand as you step out of it. And when he gives you his arm as you enter through the front door of the venue, you take it, wrapping your fingers around his elbow. Pausing just outside the entrance, you watch as he takes a deep breath.  

“Ready?” You’re not sure if you’re asking him or yourself. 

Jake answers for the both of you. “Let’s do this.”

Walking through the lobby, you hand your jackets to the coat check attendant before entering the ballroom where the fundraiser is held. Despite your general distaste for this evening and everything it entails – you sneak a glance at your partner in crime. Well, mostly everything – you can’t help but admire the space around you.

Decorated immaculately down to every last element, your mother truly doesn’t spare any expense or detail when it comes to throwing parties. And like always, she somehow manages to have a sharp eye on everything and everyone, no matter how chaotic or busy. You’ve hardly taken two steps inside the ballroom when she finds you, approaches you will all the grace of a panther stalking its prey. 

Pulling you in for a quick hug, the warm greeting she gives you is more for the benefit of onlookers than for you. And it forces you to remove your hand from Jake’s arm.

Looking over your shoulder, her voice is sickeningly saccharine. “And this must be James,” she beams, making eye contact with the wrong brother. Directing her attention to him, she gushes, “My daughter has told me wonderful things about you.”

Your eyebrows raise in disbelief. Jake stifles a laugh, expertly turns it into a cough. 

Really? You think. She did all that digging on James’ so-called turtle philanthropy but never bothered to pull up a picture of the guy? And you mean, standard genetic similarities aside, it’s not like the two of them look that much alike.

“Actually, mom,” you spare him the expense of having to correct her mistake, “this is Jake Sim. James’ brother. We go to school together.”

“Oh,” her eyebrows fall at the slip, no doubt an unforgivable social faux pas in her mind. “You never filled out the RSVP form, sweetie,” she somehow makes the term of endearment sound like a curse, “so I wasn’t sure who you’d be bringing.” Trust her to find a way to make her mistake your fault. 

Turning back to your date, she tries to remedy her mistake. “Jake, then.” She offers him a smile so forced you’re surprised her cheeks aren’t aching. Looking back at you, she fishes, “And he’s your…?”

Her dangling bait goes untouched. “He’s my plus-one.” It’s an intentional choice of words on your part. In your mind, it’s a neutral enough term that will hopefully let you navigate the evening without too many rumors or invasive questions about your personal life from people you only speak to out of reluctant obligation.  

Jake is less used to the way your mother tends to poke and prod, the way she likes to examine the superficial details of your life with a microscope and make sure she can frame them in a way that will be pleasing for public perception. The way she doesn’t ask about your love life because it’s of any genuine interest to her, but because she wants sole control of the rumor mill’s production. 

Next to you, he stiffens, feels as though he’s already failed some kind of test he didn’t know he was taking, wasn’t given any materials to study for. 

There’s a lot to be said, probably, about the way you pick up on his discomfort so easily. The way your hand returns to the crook of his elbow wordlessly and gives a single, gentle squeeze. Reassuring him, putting his nerves at ease, as you begin to navigate your way out of this conversation. 

“We’d better find our seats,” you tell your mother. The only reason Jake can identify the icy edge hiding in the superficial sweetness of your voice is because he’s been on the receiving end of it. On multiple occasions. Directed at someone else, he finds it almost amusing. “Wouldn't want to miss anything.”

“Of course,” your mother concedes, but there’s an undertone there. Jake can tell that there’s a war being waged here, battles and skirmishes in subtext and stilted pauses. He’s no stranger to the way high society likes to wrap up insults in niceties and skirt around delicate topics, but his own family has never been anything but blunt when it comes to their distaste for him and his choices. 

He’s still not entirely sure what he just witnessed, but you’re dragging him by his arm to find your assigned table before he can sort through the offending slights and put on armor that may be of any use to you. 

Carefully arranged, the maze of tables is easy enough to navigate. Each seat has a white place card in front of it, embossed with a shimmery golden script that matches your dress and holds the name of the guest who’s been assigned to sit there. 

You drag Jake past a flurry of names and attendees he half recognizes, stopping only to grab two flutes of champagne from a passing waiter, handing one to Jake before you continue on your mission. After another minute of searching, you find your name at a table a few rows out from the far wall. Rolling your eyes, you can practically hear your mother’s reasoning: Not too close to the wall. Wouldn’t want people thinking I’m trying to hide her. But certainly not anywhere near the center of the room, in case she falls into that pesky habit of being an awful embarrassment.  

Standing behind your chair, your eyes find the place card stationed in front of the seat next to yours at the same time Jake’s do. 

“Oh my god.” The exasperation is apparent, even though your words are barely audible where you mutter them under your breath. 

Because of course this hasn’t already been enough of a train wreck. Because of course the place card next to yours doesn’t have Jake’s name on it. Nope, embossed in the same shimmery gold is the name of another person entirely. 

James Sim. 

You turn to your date, apologetic. “God, I’m sorry. I really didn’t fill out the RSVP form, but I didn’t think she’d just assume…”

“It’s okay.” Jake gives you some grace. “Really, it wouldn’t be the first time.” And all things considered, he kind of is in his brother’s seat tonight. Attending an event that’s better suited for the future head of the company than his forgotten younger brother. Accompanying the girl that public opinion surely dictates would be a better match for him. 

Still, you frown. Reaching for the small clutch that sits against your hip, you rummage for a moment before pulling out a black permanent marker. 

Jake glances at you sideways.Your bag of the evening is tiny, barely even big enough to hold your phone. He’s surprised you managed to fit the marker in there, much less prioritize it enough to bring it with you. “You carry that thing around with you all the time?”

You shrug. “Never know when you’ll need to do some DIY vandalism.”

It would be a lie if he said something in him doesn’t soften, just a bit, when he watches you reach for the place card in front of his seat and put a giant, bold X over his brother’s name. 

Your handwriting is no match for the computer-generated script, but Jake still likes the place card a little better when you’re done with it, likes the way his name looks next to yours when you set it back on the table, alterations completed. 

“There,” you say, looking entirely too satisfied with your handiwork. “All better.” This time, you slide down into your seat before Jake has the chance to pull it out for you. Turning to him as he tentatively takes the seat next to you, he finds a small frown on your lips. “Wait,” you pause, realization written across your features. “Your brother isn’t coming, right?”

Jake shakes his head. “I mean, I don’t know for sure, but I doubt it. He has no reason to come. My parents are on a business trip, so they won’t be here either. And that also probably means he’s more swamped than usual at the office.”

Nodding, you take a sip of champagne. “Good.” Pausing, your lips quirk. “Although it would be kind of funny if he–”

“I think you’re in my seat.” The sudden interruption is flat, leaves no room for arguments. 

Startled, the two of you spin in your chairs. 

James Sim, despite his brother’s predictions, is in fact not otherwise occupied at his office. Instead, he stands directly behind his younger sibling, strikes an imposing figure where his shadow blocks the chandelier light behind him and extends over his brother and his altered place card. 

Eyes flaming, he looks at where his name has been crossed out. Replaced. 

Next to Jake, you remain silent, figure that you’ll let Jake handle this one the way he let you handle your mother. Far be it from you to step in on a family matter.

But then you notice the way Jake shrinks a little in his seat, hides a little further in his brother’s shadow. Reaches for the place card like he wishes he could take it back.

Sliding your gaze back to your least favorite Sim sibling, your voice is even, albeit icy, when you point out the obvious, “It’s not actually. Can’t you read?” Jake’s hand stops in its tracks, falls back to his lap.

A quick look your way is the only indication James even hears you. Instead, he continues his one-sided conversation with his brother, a barely controlled sort of fury crossing over his expression. “Hm,” he muses, glancing between the two of you. “Sure seems like you two are awfully close.” Casting an accusatory glare at Jake, he adds, “That’s funny. I could have sworn you said you barely knew her.”

Her. You’re sitting right there, and you don’t even get a name. 

It doesn’t go unnoticed by Jake either. And it turns out to be just what he needs to find his voice. You’re almost proud of the sarcasm he manages to muster when he counters, “Yeah, well, this funny thing happens when you spend time together. You actually get to know each other.” Straightening his spine, there’s an unmistakable edge in his voice when he adds, “You know, when you actually bother to show up, that is.”

You hide a laugh behind your hand, albeit not very well. Glancing at Jake, a feeling swells in your chest that you can only identify as pride. You didn’t know he had it in him. 

Reassessing his strategy, James turns to you, forcing a nonchalance that is entirely contradicted by the way his cheeks are rapidly reddening. “Actually, ___,” he tries, acting as if the last thirty seconds faded out of existence at his will. “I was hoping to speak to you about something. I’d love to get you a drink if you–”

“Actually,” Jake cuts in, doubling down. “We already have drinks.” Behind you on the table, the two near full glasses of champagne are undeniable evidence. The laugh that spills out of you this time is impossible to hide. Yeah, you decide, between the two of them, you definitely hate James more. Entirely amused, the only thing you wish you had is a bowl of popcorn as you root for the underdog. Not that he needs it. Much to your satisfaction, he’s been landing his punches well. 

The giggle dies on your lips, though, when you feel the warmth of another hand suddenly cover the top of yours where it rests on your thigh. Gaze flaming, James follows the movement. Startled, your eyes fly to Jake. The only view you’re offered is of his profile as he keeps his gaze trained on his brother, the challenge in his features unmistakable. 

The only consolation he offers for your sudden shock is a small, reassuring squeeze against your knuckles. 

And then he says, “And I’d like to keep my girlfriend right here, actually.” At that, he does finally turn to you, eyes pleading, gaze imploring when he seeks your permission. Even though they’re performative in nature, his words aren’t solely for James’ benefit. “If that’s alright with you, that is.”

Girlfriend.

You were perfectly happy in the role of the observer, but now Jake has dragged you into the spotlight. Even though it pains you, you know you can’t leave him hanging. Not when that would mean a sure victory for his dickhead of a brother. 

Girlfriend. The word echoes in your head, has you feeling dizzy.

“Of course,” you return hollowly, barely recognizing the sound of your own voice over the sudden rushing in your ears. “Boyfriend.”

When you smile at him, you make sure it looks sickeningly sweet enough to deter James. Your eyes, however, flash with a warning only Jake can read. 

“You’re dating?” James can’t hide his shock, and his outrage is just as obvious. 

“Yep,” Jake passes you a panicked look. But you don’t need it, don’t need his convincing. You’ve already dug yourself a deep enough hole. Trying to climb out now would only mean everything crumbles. 

“Sure are,” you confirm with a tight smile. Turning back to Jake, you add, “Actually, sweetie, I need to talk to you about, uh…” you scramble for a moment. Finish vaguely with, “that thing.” 

“Right.” Jake picks up on the threat in your eyes seamlessly, knows there’s only one acceptable response. “That thing,” he echoes. 

“Yeah, so,” you turn back to James, barely acknowledging him as you start to stand. “We’re gonna step out for a minute.”

Jake is all but putty in your hands as you switch the positioning of your grip so that the hand that was resting on yours is now encased firmly between your fingers. 

“See you later,” are Jake’s breathless parting words to his brother. 

“Hopefully not, though,” you alter. 

And then you’re dragging him back through the crowd towards the exit, and it’s all Jake can do to not run into the other guests or knock over the delicately balanced trays of hors d’oeuvres waiters carry throughout the room. He’s at your mercy all the way through the double doors of the ballroom, and you pause only briefly to determine which hallway is less likely to have people in it before deciding on the one to the right, towing him along behind you.

Once you’re far enough away from unwanted eyes and ears, you start wiggling every door knob you come across, growing visibly more frustrated until you finally find an unlocked one. Huffing, you push Jake into the spare storage closet first. Following him in, you close the door behind you. 

The sudden change in space puts you in close proximity. Your nose is only a handful of inches away from his when you start laying out accusations. 

“What the hell?” With the same hand than just dragged him on a half marathon, you shove at his chest. “Boyfriend?” You have half a mind to grab the broom standing next to you and start whacking him with it. 

“I’m sorry!” Jake holds his hands up defensively. He doesn’t miss the way you’re eyeing every cleaning tool around you, no doubt deciding which would make the most effective weapon. “I panicked, okay? I just hate that smug little look he gets on his face–”

“Well you’re about to be seeing ‘that smug little look’ a lot more once he calls your bluff!” you half-shout, trying to convey your anger without alerting anyone to your presence.“The timeline barely lines up to begin with. It’s only been what, a few weeks since I was supposed to go on a date with him? And that’s not to mention the fact that there won’t be anyone to corroborate our story, because we don’t spend any time together, since, y’know, we’re not dating.”

Jake begs to differ. You’ve invaded more than one of his Wednesday night statistics study sessions. 

But before he can point this out, you’re continuing. “Which means you’re gonna have to come up with some sort of believable explanation for why we break up after, like, three days.”

“Ugh.” Jake drags an open palm down his face. He hates to admit it, but you do have a point there. 

Fingers running through his hair, his sudden stress is apparent. And you’re not trying to send him to an early grave, but would it have killed him to think before he spoke? Consider the consequences of starting the exact kind of rumor you’ve been hoping to dodge all evening? You get that his brother is not exactly an easy person to get along with, but was the short-lived victory really worth the potential fallout? 

Across from you, Jake seems to be having the same realizations. A million thoughts whirring through his brain, he’s not sure where to place his focus. 

After a moment, he settles on optimism. “Look, I think it will be fine.” The more he thinks about it, the more he convinces himself he believes it. “James has been up to his ass in company stuff since the second he graduated, so it’s not like he has extra time to check up on us or anything.” And even if he did, James would have no way of knowing who to ask. Jake has the sneaking suspicion his older brother couldn’t name a single one of his friends if his life depended on it. He would have no idea who to track down to corroborate your so-called romance. 

“We won’t have to do anything,” Jake reasons. “I’ll just mention you in passing for the next few weeks if he happens to ask.” Even that should be simple enough. After all, Jake seriously doubts he will. “And by the time the holidays roll around, I can just say things fizzled naturally.” Easy. Simple. Uncomplicated. Mutual, and your pride and his both remain intact. “No big deal.” 

Across from him, you weigh his words. It makes sense, yes, but there’s something starting to swirl in your gut that you don’t like. It feels a little too much like dread, like trepidation. Jake can read all of the uncertainty written across your face when you tell him, “I still don’t like it. My mother and your brother were both here tonight and already got different stories from us. This could get messy really quickly. I mean, what if our families start talking–”

“They won’t.” Jake shakes his head. “Your mom thinks I’m just a plus-one, and when my name comes up in James and my father’s conversations, it isn’t to discuss the ins and outs of my dating life.” Of this, at least, Jake is sure. His father couldn’t care less who he dates, as long as it’s not a liability to him, to the company. “Besides, we're university students.” Jake tries to lighten the mood, clear some of the tension. “Twenty-one and immature and all that.” For a moment, Jake imagines what life would feel like if that’s truly all he was, if that’s the only thing he got to be. No added pressure of a notorious last name and a reputation to maintain. Tucking that thought to the back of his mind, he decides he’ll mourn it later. “A short-lived relationship with a story that doesn’t quite add up is practically a right of passage. Not something to be suspicious of.” 

You remain silent for a moment, but your hand doesn’t get any closer to the broom.

“Okay.” Some of the tension seeps out of your shoulders as you turn his reasoning over in your brain, nodding as his logic starts to piece together. “Okay,” you reiterate. You still don’t like it, but he’s right about one thing: it is the best option you have. 

After all, there’s no way in hell you’re about to go tell your mother that your plus-one is actually your secret boyfriend, and you hate to admit it, but James’ little smirk is incredibly agitating. And it will all blow over, you’re sure. Like Jake said, James and your mother have no real reason to talk, and if Jake is convinced that his brother won’t be spreading this particular rumor, you’ll just have to believe him for the time being. 

Letting him out of the closet first, you only imitate hitting him upside the back of the head once before you catch up to him, linking arms again before reentering the ballroom. 

As the evening goes on, your worry starts to subside. Thankfully, every other part of the night goes perfectly to plan, even if you do have to force yourself to laugh a little too hard at one of Jake’s awful jokes when you catch James watching the two of you. The second glass of champagne you down helps, if nothing else. 

Exactly as you predicted, after two and a half hours have passed, you and Jake are sneaking out the back exit, tiptoeing to his car as the fourth speaker of the evening continues their droning speech inside the event. Your mother is none the wiser to your early departure, and you hope it’s the first in a series of victories for the evening. 

When Jake drops you off just outside the front doors of your apartment building, his smile is almost reassuring enough to put that lingering sense of unease to rest where it still sits in your gut. 

Makeup removed, hair washed, and evening gown traded for pajamas, sleep is slow to find you a handful of hours later. Eventually, though, it does, and your rest is undisturbed, dreamless. 

…

The next morning, with nothing but the pastel tones of sunrise and the sound of his brewing coffee maker to keep him company, Jake Sim stares at the message on his phone in abject horror. 

Mom [7:32 am]: I can’t believe I had to find out from your brother! Family dinner next weekend at our place. Bring your girlfriend. :) 

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CONTINUED IN PART 2

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note: thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed. part two still needs some love, and I'm hoping to have it out around this same time next week. I'll announce for sure when I have a release date & time. as always, I love hearing any thoughts/comments/screaming you may have. happy reading!

STAR STUDDED BAGGAGE [MASTERLIST].

SYNOPSIS. the saying “never meet your idols” exists for a reason. you just didn’t expect the reason to be because said idols would end up declaring that you’re their alleged lover from a past life (past lives, rather). now you have three big celebrities vying for your attention, and it’s not as dreamlike as you imagined it to be.

PAIRINGS. choi yeonjun, choi soobin, choi beomgyu x female! reader. GENRES. reincarnation! au, celebrity! au (soloist! yeonjun, actor! soobin, rock band member! beomgyu), slight college! au, slight historical! au, rom-com, angst if you squint, reverse harem woohoo. GENERAL WARNINGS. possible historical inaccuracies because light google searches are my best friends, swearing, secondhand stress and embarrassment, explicit jokes and mentions of sex (no smut! at least nothing explicit), loserboy behavior AND weirdo behavior because i don't like it when my male leads are normal! (check each chapter for specific warnings).

UPDATE SCHEDULE. there is none! so don’t ask me when/if i’ll be updating this. TAGLIST. open.

NOTE. impulsive decisions part 26473. haha. blurted out this idea at one point and somehow, for some mysterious reason, i suddenly have a word doc and wow! i actually started writing it!

feedback and questions about these three funky guys are very welcome. hope you enjoy!

CHAPTER 1 — working with a choi is definitely a curse. CHAPTER 2 — these meet-cutes aren’t cute at all. CHAPTER 3 — can we go back to when our relationships were still parasocial? ↳ CHAPTER 3.5 — speedrunning to disillusionment.

. . . more chapters tba!

tracking tag: #star studded baggage.

STAR STUDDED BAGGAGE. © hannie-dul-set, 2023-2024.

million dollar darling | jeon jungkook

summary: jeon jungkook is well aware of how privileged he is to have been born into the life he was given. it was glamorous and influential yet close-knit and suffocating, something he thought he wanted to escape from. a trip back home to the circle of wealth and snottiness for his best friend’s million dollar wedding has reminded him of all the reasons why he wanted to leave in the first place… and all the reasons he should stay — the main one being you, the spoiled rich girl he knew was utterly perfect for him.

➣ genre/au: jungkook x model!reader [she/her, female anatomy], old money au, smut, plot [soft on the e2l/f2l tropes]

[loosely inspired by ‘crazy rich asians’ movie/book by kevin kwan]

➣19.7k words

warnings: heavy plot. smut. model oc. jk is a wander but he’s really just a rich guy in disguise. oc and jk got heavy tension but good banter. oc is kinda snotty but not really? namjoon x oc [not y/n]. rich, old money snotty bts. sex on a yacht. teasing. foreplay. oral [f and m receiving]. jk goes to town on oc. cunnilingus. unprotected. missionary. oc on top. jk is tatted up in a polo. heavy makeout. breast play. fingering. dirty talk. oc goes down on jk while he’s on the phone with hobi 😭. jk’s villain arc as he slowly turns back into a cocky rich boy hehe. jk gets sex flashbacks at dolce and gabbana

“Come on, it’s my wedding and I want you as my best man. Do it for your best friend.”

The sky had been clear when he landed, a bright blue cloudless sky that resembled the clarity of the sea he had left behind. The air already seemed stiffer and the bleakness of the airport brought his mood down almost immediately.

The only thing to make him somewhat happy to be home was the sight of the person in front of him, a huge grin on his face as he saw him. The man was dressed casual in a pair of sweats and a hoodie but the small details of his watch matched with the luxury car parked outside brought unwelcome attention to Jungkook when people stared.

“I was worried you bailed last minute,” Namjoon said with a grin as he pulled him into a hug, “It’s good to see you.”

“I wouldn’t,” Jungkook reached into the pocket of his oversized black hoodie and slid his face mask off, taking a cigarette and lighting it once they were outside the airport, “It’s been too long without seeing your beautiful face.”

“Yeah, don’t tell Yeonwoo, but I’d marry you if you weren’t such a man,” Namjoon joked, playfully flirting which Jungkook just laughed off.

“Too bad you’re not my type,” Jungkook patted his shoulder apologetically, “Besides, where is the bride?”

“Getting her hair done for tonight,” Namjoon said as they got into a Bentley Mulssane, “Also, please drive, I’m scared.”

“Hyung,” Jungkook scoffed, taking the keys anyway, “If you hate driving so much why buy an expensive car?”

“Yeonwoo liked the color,” Namjoon said as he got in the passenger’s seat of his own car, “Are you staying with your parents? I could still find you an apartment.”

“For a week? Don’t bother, I’m staying at a hotel,” Jungkook said, turning the engine on and driving out.

Namjoon sighed, “So you really are leaving again?”

“Was there ever a doubt I was?” Jungkook asked in surprise.

“Duh, kid. We miss you, you rarely call, you never visit, you barely respond and we know nothing that goes on with you,” Namjoon said, “I thought once you got your fill of life experiences, you’d come back.”

Jungkook didn’t say anything at that, sniffling uncomfortably as he tried switching the subject, “So, who’s my partner?”

This time Namjoon was the one to freeze up, staring out the window with sunglasses on and his jaw locked. With a shy smile, he asked, “Are you gonna bring a date?”

His brows furrowed as he looked at his friend, “Who’s the Maid of Honor?”

Namjoon released a nervous laugh, “Y/n L/n.”

The silence in the car was loud and from the way Jungkook’s jaw tensed and his eyes narrowed, it was easy to see he wasn’t happy about that. You? You were the Maid of Honor and his partner down the aisle?

“You know, her and Yeonwoo are close and Yeonwoo’s always thinking about who looks the best next to her on camera and obviously she’s gonna choose the runway model but listen,” Namjoon could barely catch a breath, “Y/n’s matured more now and she’s going to be there tonight so please be on your best behavior.”

“Tonight? What’s tonight?” Jungkook’s tone was sharper now and Namjoon huffed in annoyance.

“The rehearsal dinner on the pier, it was all in the catalog I sent you,” Namjoon said, “It’s for press. Our parents want to get it on Forbes and Vogue, they want to make it the Wedding of the Year.”

They both laughed at that and Jungkook sighed, “So there’s gonna be cameras?”

“Yeah but don’t worry they won’t focus on you,” Namjoon said with a smirk, “The attention’s going on me.”

When Jungkook pulled up to the hotel he would be staying at for the week, Namjoon left him to settle in with a promise that he would make it tonight so he had no choice not to. A letter from a close friend was sitting on the coffee table and he set his things down to get it.

It was a big envelope with a card and a few things rattling inside that made him curious. Jungkook turned the envelope down so the contents would fall onto his palm and a roll of condoms slipped out.

‘Welcome home buddy, enjoy the penthouse and may all your frustrations come undone — Jung Hoseok.’

The note itself made him scoff in disbelief. His womanizing friend making jokes before they’ve actually reunited. He left the things on the table and left to shower, doing what he could to make himself look presentable for tonight.

Tonight was the beginning of a soon-to-be hectic week of photoshoots, brunches, parties and finally the wedding. You were one of the ones front and center, never taking the limelight from the bride but carrying your own sense of grace that had people turning heads when you walked into a room—or in this case riverwalk.

You vowed to appear your best tonight and opted for a silk, powder blue Prada dress paired with Swarovski crystals on your neck. You did your part as Maid of Honor, directing all attention to your friend, polite smile and gentle assurance when needed in front of a crowd. Yeonwoo found it comical how well you fit into character when you need to.

“The perfect friend,” Yeonwoo joked as you dabbed smeared lip gloss from her lips, “What would I do without you?”

“Oh, I hope you never have to find out,” You said in a gentle voice that feigned innocence and longing. Yeonwoo laughed as she was called toward other people and you let her go as you found the nearest server holding a glass of champagne. You took a glass, turning toward the railing overlooking the shore, tipping your glass back and chugging as much of the drink as possible.

“So this is where the Maid of Honor will be spending her night?” A familiar deep voice spoke up from behind you and a mischievous smile grew on your face. You set the glass down, straightened your posture and turned to him with a soft gaze.

“Now you know that’s not fair, Joon, I’ve been with Yeonwoo most of the night,” you told him, already motioning for another server to give you a glass, completely ignoring the man standing beside him.

“I believe you, darling, now why don’t you come say hi to the Best Man,” Namjoon pushed Jungkook forward who just glared at him in response, “You remember Jeon Jungkook, right?”

“It’s been two years, not ten,” You said, finally looking at Jungkook with a glimmer of annoyance in your eyes, matched by his stare of unamusement.

“Alright well why don’t you two get reacquainted while I search for the gorgeous love of my life,” Namjoon said, making his escape as quick as possible.

“You counted?” Jungkook asked, taking just one step toward you, trying to stop his eyes from trailing down your figure.

“Of course,” You said sarcastically, “I’ve just missed you so.”

He couldn’t stop the roll of his eyes as he turned to the water, “You knew we were partners?”

“Obviously, I know everything,” you said with a scoff that had his tongue pressing against his cheek, clearly annoyed, “Like how you’re staying at one of the Jung’s hotels instead of home. How you plan on leaving still, where you landed, how long you’ve been her—“

“So you’re stalking me?” Jungkook asked, only half joking.

“Don’t you wish,” you laughed, “You’re all over the news.”

His smile dropped. When he had nothing to say, you grew bored and left him behind, making sure to lightly graze your fingers against his arm as you said, “And just remember, you’re the one who despises me, not the other way around.”

With that, you left without looking back and he was left watching the sway of your hips when you walked away.

Money rules the world, even when people want to say it doesn’t. The people who have it are living the dream and the ones who don’t, want the dream. It doesn’t even have to be the luxurious wonders of the world, it could be as little as financial stability or surviving. At the end of the day, it was a Rich Man’s world and this group of individuals were born lucky.

First, the groom: Kim Namjoon. The man with it all, the money, the family, the education, son of millionaires with three hospitals in their name and a line of pharmacies all across the globe.

The bride: soon-to-be, Kim Yeonwoo. The heiress to half a dozen airlines, an airport funded by her family for decades and a beautiful island in her name off the coast.

Kim Seokjin, practically a prince, generations worth of politicians, the highest education and a trust fund worth millions. He was the one you’ll see with the president or in Australia, golfing with men in charge.

Jung Hoseok, the hotel heir to a chain of ten thousand hotels across the globe. He was the one you’ll most likely catch partying in Venice with a princess whose name he couldn’t actually remember—or maybe giving a waitress the night of her life.

Min Yoongi, eldest son of an elite banking firm formed a hundred years ago. He was private about his life, similar to Jungkook, he only came out when he was summoned by one of the others.

Kim Taehyung was wild as Hoseok but more quiet about it. He’ll soon be heir of the billion dollar empire his family built in the Art world of museums and curations and performing arts.

Now, Jungkook’s story was a bit different from the others. His family worked in land development, most of the country being built on the backs of the Jeon’s who brought cities to rural areas and avoided the public’s eye.

They had the kind of old money that everyone knew, even when they tried to stay out of the news.

It was the kind of old money, people could never stop talking about and you understood what that meant most.

There was a mystery to the fortune of your family, it was old money, so old nobody knew where it came from. Some say oil, some claim aristocrats but it was too far back, and too private for any to know. All the public knew were the generous and loving philanthropists and their perfect daughter, the Nation’s Sweetheart, you.

You really were loved by all, the camera, the press, everyone. They all saw the kind, innocent girl in the public’s eye but only a few saw the snotty, spoiled and downright disrespectful side of you that was real.

Where Jungkook craved independence and isolation from his family name, you soaked in it. The attention. The money. The dependence, you were the complete opposite of him and it drew him insane.

One might ask why he was around you if he really did despise you, but for a long time it wasn’t up to him. The group didn’t all become friends one magical night when you compared your family’s net worth.

No, this bond had grown between galas, private academies, horse riding lessons at the country club and family businesses. It was a very elite, classist society where only the ultra rich could really only trust in each other and keep a country afloat off of it.

Do you think Namjoon would have been allowed to marry Yeonwoo if her parents weren’t as rich as they were?

Do you think Seokjin would have married his wife that he met at Oxford if her family hadn’t been international shipping magnates?

It was like a spider web, they were all connected in some way, all controlled and that’s what Jungkook hated.

He loved his friends, truly, but he hated the control. Not a single one of them had real freedom and every little thing they did came with a price and he couldn’t live that way anymore. He understood his own privilege and how lucky he was to grow up in such a way but he knew there was more to life than just that. When he left home for the first time, he didn’t expect to feel so free. It was like a sense of independence he’s not sure any of his friends have felt and now that he’s back he’s reminded once again of how suffocating it all is.

There had to be at least a hundred guests in attendance tonight and he couldn’t find a moment of silence. The suit he wore felt uncomfortable and he hated the way it seemed to confine him, make him more rigid and stiff.

“Please Jungkook, I was only being funny. Did it bother you that much?” Hoseok asked with a tinge of mischief in his voice.

“No,” Jungkook shrugged as he looked around the banquet hall, “I just found it unnecessary.”

“Really? I would’ve assumed the opposite considering you’ll be spending a lot of time with Y/n this week,” Taehyung said with a shrug as the three of them stood off to the side, talking amongst themselves as the guests of the charity banquet focused on your parents who stood on stage making some speech about the importance of giving.

As if on cue, the spotlight turned toward you where you smiled politely and acted shyly for the cameras.

A scoff left his lips as he pulled his gaze away from you, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Hoseok chuckled, “Oh come on man, everyone knows you have a thing for her—you’re really bad at hiding it.”

With a roll of his eyes, Jungkook stepped away from his friends, “You guys don’t know anything.”

He didn’t have a thing for you.

Sure, you’ve known each other for a long time but that means nothing. He’s known them all for a long time and if anything he's made his distaste toward you pretty evident. When you were younger it was only because you were so spoiled and the attention had to always be on you. He hated watching everyone fall for your sweetness and do whatever you asked of them. He almost fell for it himself a couple times but then he would see the way you judged or looked down on people and he just despised you more.

There’s nothing about you that attracts him aside from your looks…

Tonight you were dressed more modestly in a Chanel sweater and skirt set that looked like you would soon be relaxing at the country club. You wore a black headband with a bow on it and satin gloves, looking as polite as ever while you talked to anyone who approached you.

You were the perfect, doting daughter and anyone with eyes could see that.

“So how mad are you?” Yeonwoo asked once you had settled back in your chair next to her and Namjoon. Even Namjoon seemed to listen in on the question, waiting to hear what you would say.

“What do I have to be mad at?” You asked with a tight smile as you reached toward her to fix a slight smudge on her cheek, “ Jungkook?”

“Well, we know you have some sort of disliking toward each other but…” Yeonwoo bit her lip nervously, “Joonie and Jungkook are really close.”

“We know you two don’t like each other but you should have expected this, right?” Namjoon chuckled nervously, “You’re both our best friends and…”

“Am I saying anything?” You asked.

They shared a look with each other, “I guess not.”

You smiled, “Okay, then let’s just make sure everything runs smoothly this week.”

You did in fact feel a type of way about Jeon Jungkook but you weren’t going to admit that right now surrounded by so many people always lingering around trying to listen. You’ve learned to be very careful about how you act in public and there’s no way your friends will get you to act out by asking about him.

Jungkook was not someone you wished to exhort so much energy on. He wasn’t worth anything to you and despite how many years you’ve known him, you’ve never wished to get to know him. You don’t care where he goes when he’s not home or who he talks to, nor what he does. He doesn’t cross your mind at all through your normal day to day and you surely weren’t going to let him in this week. All he has going for him is his money and his looks.

Ever since you learned he would be the Best Man you thought about what that would mean and accepted that he would be the one to walk with you down the aisle. Despite not being happy about it, you managed to hide your resentment quite well.

You know how he feels about you and over time that’s made you develop a disliking toward him which you find only fair. He might dislike you for being spoiled but you dislike him for being so entitled.

For some reason, he thinks distancing himself from this life means he’s better than everyone else and you hate that. He thinks that by moving away and making his own money suddenly makes him different than the rest of you but that’s not true. He just wants to act like he’s self made so he can feel superior to all of you trust fund babies and that is what annoyed you.

After some time third wheeling, you were getting tired and slightly annoyed watching the couple act lovey dovey. You hated couples, they grossed you out even if they were your best friends.

“Mind if I keep you company? You look like you need it.”

With a furrow in your brows, you turned to face the person who felt the need to whisper in your ear and get close to you without permission. A smile spread across your lips at the man standing directly behind you, his arm draping over your front and hugging you.

“Hello, darling, I’ve missed you,” Jimin’s voice was soft yet sultry and you gave each other kisses on the cheek in greeting as he moved to the empty seat beside you.

“I didn’t realize you were back,” You said to him, “How was Paris?”

He released a sigh, “Oh the usual, shopping… a few events here and there.”

“Mhm, and when’d you get back?” You asked, now intrigued by his presence.

“Just last night. I was planning on visiting you earlier but things came up,” Jimin said, adjusting the Swiss watch on his wrist, admiring the shine, “What has happened since I was gone?”

“Oh God, he’s back,” Hoseok rolled his eyes from across the room, “I ran into him in Marseille the other day and the guy wanted to act like he didn’t know me.”

“He’s been insufferable since Uni,” Taehyung muttered under his breath, “I don’t understand why Y/n puts up with him.”

“Who?” Jungkook asked, only half curious. He hadn’t been paying attention until he heard your name and his reason for hearing it was purely coincidental.

“Park Jimin,” Hoseok clarified, making Jungkook look closer at the man who sat very close to you, making you smile and touch his arms when you spoke.

“Am I supposed to know who that is?” Jungkook seemed indifferent as he looked down at his glass of champagne, trying to resist the urge to look back at you.

“Not at all,” Taehyung said, “He’s just some guy we went to Uni with here. I don’t know how he met Y/n though, probably at some shitty party but he’s nobody that matters.”

Well… Park Jimin was the son of starlets. His great grandmother, his grandmother was an actress, his mother was an actress and he’s been in a few independent films here and there. He spends most of his time sailing on yachts or speaking of the Cannes Film Festival. He’s insanely rich, but he’s still not rich enough despite his accumulated generational wealth.

Unlike Jungkook’s wealth which held actual value especially in real estate, Jimin’s just didn’t compare to his or any of his friends for that matter. So why did you seem captivated by him?

He is aware he shouldn’t think this way, it’s only him reverting back to his old self which was all arrogance and entitlement. He shouldn’t think about how much wealthier he was compared to Jimin.

Unfortunately, Jungkook couldn’t seem to drag his gaze away from the pair as he tipped his champagne glass back, liquid pouring down his throat.

“Do you think she’ll take him to the wedding? I doubt Namjoon or Yeonwoo would ever invite him themselves,” Hoseok said and the three seemed like a group of gossips, the way they huddled around each other.

In Jungkook’s defense, he was barely listening to his friends. He was too busy watching the interaction happening not far from where he stood, eyes narrowed trying to understand what was happening.

First, he didn’t like you. He found you unbearable and you were the epitome of everything he hated about the High Society he had been raised in.

Second, he was only looking because you were next to his best friends. Maybe he wanted to see how in love Namjoon and Yeonwoo were but he couldn’t see because of you and your… friend.

Third, he wanted to know how you managed to stand out in your outfit despite the room being filled with people in extravagant clothes.

“I’m not sure, actually, rumors say she might,” Taehyung said and Jungkook couldn’t help but look over.

“What?”

“We’re just wondering if the Maid of Honor would bring her little boy toy to the wedding,” Hoseok said, looking at Jungkook as his jaw tensed, “What do you think?”

“I don’t care if Y/n brings anyone, we’re just dates for the pictures and ceremony,” Jungkook said with a hint of annoyance in his voice.

“So are you going to take a date too then?” Taehyung asked.

“Maybe,” Jungkook said as a server came around holding a tray of champagne glasses and he switched his empty one out for a full one. He didn’t bother to look back at his friends as he began walking away, “I’ll be back.”

“It’s so hard for him to act like he doesn’t care.”

“Kook! Come here, man,” Namjoon said with a wide grin as he saw his best friend walking by them. Jungkook didn’t bother glancing down at you as he greeted his friend.

“Kooky, I haven’t seen you all night,” Yeonwoo stood up to hug him, “Please don’t seduce my future husband, everyone has already RSVP’d.”

“Oh Yeonie,” Jungkook softly caressed her cheek, tipping her chin up to look at him, “If I wanted him, I would have had him by now.”

“Joon!” Yeonwoo whined clinging to Namjoon who just winked at Jungkook, further amplifying his fiancé’s feigned sobs. Jungkook smiled watching her squirm and without him meaning to, he let his gaze fall toward you.

“Y/n.”

You met his intense stare with your own and you could hear Jimin say he was going to get a drink but you didn’t look at him. You looked down at what Jungkook was wearing—a plain black Prada suit, how boring. “Jungkook.”

“Is that who you’re bringing to the wedding?” Jungkook asked, looking back at the infamous Park Jimin who stood with Taehyung and Hoseok, all three of them pretending to enjoy each other’s company.

“Maybe, we do get along very well,” you said with a sly smile as you stood up, not yet reaching Jungkook’s height but he didn’t intimidate you, “Is that a problem?

“No,” Jungkook said, voice low and deep, “I was just curious.”

“And why were you curious?” You asked, a mocking tone in your voice that he didn’t like, “Do tell me, how often are you curious about what I do?”

A scoff left his lips as he looked away from you first, “It was just a question, don’t get ahead of yourself and think you matter to me more than you do.”

An evident pout appeared on your lips and for a second his expression changed with worry but the moment was fleeting. You just laughed [giggled, actually] and with a gentle touch to his arm, said, “No need to lie to yourself.”

His eyes narrowed, anger bubbling up inside him when he heard a shutter of cameras going off, flash in his face and without thinking, he took your hand in his and left.

“If you plan on kidnapping me, it won’t work,” You said teasingly as you left to some dark corner behind large pillars.

“I’m not going to put up with a week of your games,” Jungkook said as he let go of your hand, missing the way your eyes fell to the black ink on his knuckles—something you had never noticed before, not even on the yacht when it was dark out.

“Then stop playing into them,” you said with a laugh, “If I drive you crazy, why bother talking to me at all? I think we’re both very capable of ignoring each other enough to not have to say a single word.”

“What I mean is, you can put on this act of yours for the cameras but don’t drag me into it,” Jungkook told you, ignoring the idea you had thrown out there. He was referring to your strange smiles and touches you give him when in the public.

“I’m not dragging you into anything,” You rolled your eyes, “And you seem to forget all eyes have been on you since you got back—heir to the Jeon Corporation. What do you think people will say when they find out you dragged me out here all alone? The Big, Bad & Rebellious Jeon Jungkook and The Nation’s Sweetheart, me.”

His eyes shut with a hint of anger that he tried to subdue, “Sweetheart?”

“That’s what I said,” you smiled sweetly to prove your point making him scoff.

“You’re not a sweetheart, you’re a spoiled brat,” Jungkook said, looking down at you in your pretty clothes with your pretty jewelry and your pretty face.

“Nice of you to finally notice,” you said bitterly and with a roll of your eyes, you pushed into his shoulder on purpose as you walked past him, “But we’re all the same, aren’t we? Just some of us like to act all high and mighty because you leave home craving independence, ignoring your privilege to seem like better people.”

Jungkook felt the jab of your words but he let you walk past him without a rebuttal.

With a sense of frustration, he ran his fingers through his hair, trying to collect himself to rejoin High Society and finish the night with his head held high.

When Jungkook left his hotel the day of the Bachelor Party, he hadn’t been sure what to expect. Hoseok had done most of the planning for it since he had been abroad and when it comes to Hobi, you never know what to expect. It was almost two days of festivities and it was only toward the end that everyone would separate into their respective groups. That meant that once again he was forced into the same place as you.

The yacht sailed toward the private island the events would be at and as big as it was, he couldn’t escape you. There were the main group of friends that were always together and a few added guests, mostly Yeonwoo’s friends. Hoseok had already been hyping up the party tonight more than anything and everytime Namjoon would grow more worried. He didn’t need a big party thrown by his notorious womanizing friend.

“So what do the girls have planned?” Jungkook asked Namjoon as they sat at a table, looking at everyone aboard. Some people wore little clothing, others casual clothes, you wore something in between. It was casual yet attractive.

“ I don’t know, something probably calmer than what Hobi’s got for us,” Namjoon said but his friend had tuned him out after the first part, “Y/n planned it all and leant us the Yacht for the guests.”

“The yacht?” Jungkook asked, looking around at the luxury super yacht.

“14.7 million dollar yacht for Y/n’s birthday last year,” Namjoon explained to Jungkook, “She wanted a Booze Cruise.”

Jungkook couldn’t help but scoff, “So Y/n got a yacht?”

“It comes in handy, doesn’t it?” A soft voice spoke from behind him and his breath hitched. You looked over to Namjoon, “Yeonie is looking for you.”

“The wife calls,” Namjoon said with a cheesy smile as he left you two behind.

“So, are you ready to go party with Hobi tonight?” You asked with a laugh, “I heard he’s got some former Miss Universe models coming in.”

“Oh, fun,” Jungkook said, slightly sarcastic.

“Kook, you’re not old enough to not like partying with models,” You teased making him look over at you. For a moment he wondered if what you said had a double meaning considering you were a model but he didn’t want to speak up about it.

“I’m sorry, I’m not a party animal,” Jungkook said truthfully, only a hint of joking as he looked around at the packed floor, “I think even this is too much.”

“Wow, how could you be a former Socialite if you don’t like partying?” You asked, “Is it all that time in the jungle or desert you spent alone that changed you?”

Jungkook could hear the sarcasm in your tone but he knew it wasn’t in an offensive way. He had backpacked to a small village in Indonesia for a few weeks before leaving to Nevada or Dubai—and he hated that you knew it all. He enjoyed traveling alone and experiencing things alone; he doesn’t need parties with too loud of music or too many drunks. He’s like Namjoon, they want to celebrate with their small group of friends rather than a party full of strangers who don’t even know what the occasion is.

“It might’ve,” Jungkook said, clearing his throat and checked the time.

You didn’t say much else after that and he got the impression that you grew bored talking to him. He looked at you still waiting to see if you would say something else but instead, you just looked off into the distance, not bothering to hide the sudden boredom you must have felt.

He’s sure he could have found something else to say to you but it was no use when he could see you beginning to slip away when you looked down at your cellphone with a bright smile. You didn’t utter out a goodbye as you left him behind to answer your phone, “Chimmy, I’ve missed you. How’s Morocco?”

“Warm,” Jimin said, “I’ve just finished a shoot and I believe I’ll be back tomorrow.”

“Oh I won’t be home, remember?” You said as the final thing Jungkook was able to hear from you before you walked away.

Jungkook couldn’t help but look after you, thinking about who might’ve called you and how things were handled and he had to be honest, he was curious. He wasn’t attracted to you but he found you attractive… He thought you were charming and charismatic but not enough for him to want you, maybe…

The two of you just seem so different. He’s seen as the Black Sheep of the group, not because he’s not wealthy or attractive but because his past decisions have apparently been awful ones.

He was never one for parties so he wasn’t wild and defiant. He did make a declaration to leave all the money behind and pursue his dreams—something rich people were not allowed to do. Especially not if you were next in line to inherit it all like Jungkook was.

You are more free than he is and yet you like being in your bubble. You like the glamor and the responsibilities because unlike him, you know how to play both sides. Do your parents care that you’re out wasted at European raves or sailing on your yacht with a foreign prince? No, why? Because you know how to act like the innocent, perfect princess you’re supposed to be.

Jungkook can’t pretend that well. He can’t hide his tattoos or piercings or signs of nonconformity.

So, yes, he finds you attractive but he can’t let himself fall for you when he thinks you’re too different from each other. It just doesn’t stop his brain from thinking about you though.

“Have you seen Y/n?” Jungkook asked Taehyung who had been sandwiched between two women he couldn’t name.

Taehyung, evidently drunk, shook his head no, “Are you ready to confess your undying love for her?”

Jungkook rolled his eyes, scoffing as he said, “Fuck off.”

All Taehyung did was laugh, making the girls he had his arms around laugh too and Jungkook left feeling annoyed. He was just curious to know where you were, that’s all. Namjoon and Yeonwoo are busy making their rounds, greeting and thanking everyone on the boat and his other friends were off doing their own things. He’s already spent too much time sulking by the railing, staring down at the dark blue water that he can’t take it anymore. He doesn’t want to drink to the point that he’s drunk so really, his last hope is you.

“Have you seen Y/n?” Jungkook asked as he went to the rooftop where Hoseok was sitting in a hot tub full of strangers. Hoseok looked like such an asshole [something Jungkook had permission to say] with his designer sunglasses and Vacheron Constantin watch, just barely above the water surface.

Hoseok barely glanced his way as he said, “I don’t know, check downstairs.”

That was all Jungkook needed to know before he was heading down to find you. It took a while of asking any person he passed by, where you might be and through all this, he couldn’t remember why he was looking for you in the first place.

He had no idea where he was going, he just found himself walking down what felt like endless corridors of rooms, following the directions of whatever housekeeper he could find. The boat really was big, and he couldn’t wrap his mind around the fact that this was a simple birthday present.

“Now, who do we have here?” You looked down the empty hallway toward the man in front of you. It pained you to see just how attractive Jeon Jungkook really was.

You have to admit, he really knows how to dress for occasions. The rare times he’s photographed in some news article, he’s dressed casually, clearly trying to hide from the public eye but now that he’s back it seems his fashion has picked up. He wore a striped black flannel Dolce & Gabbana shirt tucked into cream colored slacks, and matching velvet black slippers from their newest collection.

“I’m just… wandering,” Jungkook cleared his throat, whatever excuse he had made up earlier, completely out of mind, “What happened to your dress?”

A large red stain adorned the front of your pink dress from the chest down your torso. You looked down at the stain with a roll of your eyes, “Some stupid bitch worker. She’s off the boat tomorrow.”

Jungkook widened his eyes, feeling you brush past him and down the hall, “So you’re firing someone for spilling a drink?”

“Um, this is Valento? Do you know how hard it is to get rid of a stain like this?” You asked with a slight scoff as you went to the door straight at the end, pushing your key card in to open it, “It took the dry cleaners ages last time.”

“I didn’t take you as an Outfit Repeater to be worrying about things like that,” he stopped at the door, already looking around at what was evidently the master cabin. The water out the windows was a dark, midnight blue and it reflected into the room of silver and gray. It had a walk-in closet, and king sized bed with a view of the open water and a private deck. He didn’t dare go in and put himself in personal quarters with you.

You gasped, stopping your movements of rummaging through your closet to say, “I am an environmentalist.”

He couldn’t tell if you were being serious or not and he had to fight back a grin at how un-woke you sounded considering you were ruining the planet with a private yacht of this size.

You pulled out an off-white dress, a Jaquemus piece, ‘La Robe Artichaut’, “Ugh, after this week, I am firing a lot of people.”

“What happened this time?” Jungkook asked, leaning against the doorframe watching you, waiting for you to kick him out but you just went toward the windows overlooking the dark blue ocean. As much as you claimed to not get along, you talked like old friends.

You reached your hands toward your back, attempting to undo the back of your dress on your own, “I told my assistant not to pack anything close to white and she packs this dress? I swear people can’t do anything right.”

“If people ask just say you’re supposed to match me,” Jungkook said referring to his slacks, “Yeonie won’t be mad her Maid of Honor is wearing off-white.”

“I guess,” you sighed, letting go of your dress and not bothering to look back at him as you said, “Undo the back.”

Jungkook stood silently at the door, staring at you with dark eyes. The fabric of your dress was thin and soft to the touch—he could just tell with the way your figure had so effortlessly shaped the dress. It is a real pity you had to change out of it, he’ll admit that, but now he’s been asked—no, demanded—to help you to take it off.

He has no idea why you think you could just boss him around but this seems to have always been the case. The two of you were never close in the past but the very few times you would run into each other… as much as he hated it, there was always some sort of tension there.

With your back to him, you hadn’t seen the way he silently made his way across the room, shutting the door behind him as he went right to you. You could sense his presence behind you, see his reflection in the dark window and feel his rough fingers brush against your back.

“I meant to tell you, I like your shoes,” You said casually, his fingers beginning to work the knot that tied the ribbon of your dress, “My friend wore them in Paris just a week ago.”

“Friend?” Jungkook raised a brow curiously, his eyes trained slowly on the ribbon he was ever so slowly pulling loose. His gaze shifted to your reflection in the window as he pulled a little rougher than earlier, “Is this the one you’re always running off on the phone with?”

“You mean Park Jimin?” You asked, not bothering to react at all to his roughness or his speed, “Yes, him.”

You could feel Jungkook’s deep exhale as he pulled it as loose as he could while still being appropriate, “Are you seeing him?”

A mischievous smile couldn’t help but make its way to your face as you turned to face him, holding your arms around yourself modestly, “Is that what you wanted to talk about all along? You could have asked me earlier instead of spending who knows how long looking for me.”

He had to bite the inside of his cheek to stop himself agreeing with you, and with a tense jaw he asked again, “Well, are you?”

“I’m going to get changed,” you motioned toward the door, telling him to leave, “Unless you want to help me with that too.”

A scoff left his lips as he took a step back, annoyed that you wouldn’t just answer his question and annoyed he even cared enough to ask. What did it matter to Jungkook if you took a date? He wasn’t in a relationship with you and he barely considered you a friend.

When he wasn’t here and he was traveling, he was perfectly fine not knowing a thing about you aside from whatever article or magazine you appeared in. Why now that he returns and he sees how… glamorously beautiful you are, is he curious about you?

“And just so we’re clear, no, I’m not seeing Jimin,” You told him as he walked toward the door, stopping midway to listen to you, “Because I know it would make you jealous.”

To be honest, you didn’t think he would actually be jealous, it’s just a joke. Something about you just gets under Jungkook’s skin and it wants you to push his buttons that much more. As obvious as it was that he wasn’t at all amused by your sweetness, it was your arrogant charm that seemed to get him every time.

You knew you were beautiful, you knew you had every right to be arrogant and as much as Jungkook could deny he’s attracted to you at all, it’s very noticeable. You’ve never been told no a day in your life. You’ve never been rejected either and you know Jungkook wouldn’t dare reject you if you actually went for it.

Despite how vocal he is about his distaste toward you, you can’t help but still get giddy in his presence. You just want to rile him up and know that he’s attainable to you. You’ve always had a thing for him, he was an absolute gorgeous man and he was wealthy, extremely wealthy. He was educated and had class but at the same time he was rugged and intimidating. You’ve seen the small glimpses of ink on his knuckles and you just know that under all his long sleeves, he had more to show.

Whether you felt seriously for him or if you just figured it’s a spur of the moment situation, you want him.

“Jealous?” Jungkook attempted to scoff but the word caught in his throat with some truth to it, “Why would I be jealous?”

“I don’t know,” You shrugged, sliding the strap of your down your shoulder, “Because then you would have to share my attention with someone else.”

Jungkook knows he should leave. You had asked him to leave yet you kept going back and forth, and it was stopping him from doing so.

He should go.

He needs to go before he does or say something he’ll regret.

If he caves in to your taunts then he’ll be disappointed in himself, like part of him was allowing his return to his old lifestyle of luxury and privilege.

“Y/n, you always say things you don’t know,” Jungkook asked you with a deep voice that had you smiling, practically feeling him give in. His gaze was dark and there was no hiding the growing tension, “And you must think you’re real cute trying to act out now that we’re alone.”

“No, I know I am,” you said, not backing away from the eye contact. “And you know it too.”

“I don’t,” Jungkook loomed over you, eyes tracing down the curve of your nose and to the slight part in your lips, “I think… I think you’re…”

You blinked up at him, “Well say it, or are you too busy thinking about kissing me?”

An annoyed huff left his lips as one of his hands pulled you toward him at your waist and the other tilted your chin up until his lips were grazing over yours. You reached toward him, making the first real press of your mouths together and there was no use in acting like he hadn’t been in fact thinking about kissing you.

Jungkook let his eyes fall shut as yours did and he pulled you closer into his chest with the hand on your jaw sliding down toward the curve of your neck, making sure you didn’t pull away just yet. You kept up with the pace he had set of slow yet hungry kisses, pulling on your lips or letting his tongue slide against yours tenderly.

“Well?” You gasped feeling his soft lips kiss along your jaw, his soft black hair brushing against your face, a light scent of his shampoo or cologne that left you feeling intoxicated. The hand he had on your waist tightened at your words, pulling away with a quiet grunt, he looked you in the eye.

“Don’t ask me any more questions,” Jungkook groaned, the taste of your lips still on his tongue and there was a light sheen of gloss coating his lips from yours.

It’s shameful for him to admit how easy it was for you to break him down into every other man who seems to fall at your feet when given the chance. This is exactly what he didn’t want and now he’s pulling the godforsaken stained dress he undid and watching it slip down your body, revealing your naked form to his hungry eyes.

Above your bedroom was a deck filled with people celebrating the soon-to-be newlyweds while the Best Man and Maid of Honor are in the master cabin, half undressed, and stumbling onto the bed.

Jungkook was gentle but firm, he wasted no time popping the buttons of his shirt open, exposing the toned muscles of his body and the ink covering most of his arm. Your eyes scanned the markings, surprise and wonder evident on your face with how well he managed to hide how much he’s gotten done since he left.

“Surprised?” Jungkook asked, eyes low when your hands ran over his slacks, pulling at his belt and nails lightly scratching at his abdomen. His voice dripped with arousal when you sat up from beneath him, pressing light butterfly kisses to his abs and tattoos.

“You always surprise me,” You admitted, not as teasing as before but with a hint of playfulness still there. You looked up from his chest, the height of your sitting form and his standing one looked endless as he towered over you. “For instance, I didn’t think it would be this easy to get you in my bed.”

You kissed along his neck now, sitting on your knees to reach him better and nipping at his sensitive spots. His hand tightened around the neck of your head, not pulling your hair but definitely getting your eyes on his, “Why do your words sound so dirty when you say them so… “

Jungkook couldn’t even finish his sentence before succumbing to you once more and kissing your lips. With little force applied, he was laying you back down on the bed with his tattooed and muscular body just melting into yours effortlessly. With one hand on your neck and the other sliding down to the curve of your thigh, it felt like he was all over you.

“Let’s take this off you,” Jungkook murmured between kisses down your neck as he began to finally take off the ruined dress that had been in his way since you got him to undo it in the first place, “You’ve been teasing me with this since earlier.”

“Maybe because I wanted to see you get worked up,” you sighed as you made yourself comfortable on the king side bed, your body slowly unveiled to his hungry eyes. Once he had pulled the dress off you completely and threw it to the side, sitting up between your spread legs and staring.

Jungkook didn’t bother with discreteness as he eyed down your naked body still in shock that he was seeing it before him. Your breasts were on full display and the only piece of fabric hiding you was a thin lace underwear that felt so nimble and soft under his fingertips, so easy for him to just tear off of you. You looked gorgeous laying so pliantly underneath him and he couldn’t help but let his hands slide down from your bent knees to your inner thighs.

“Did it work?” You asked just above a whisper as he hovered over you, leaving needy kisses between your breasts while he tugged at the hem of your panties until he was sliding them down your legs.

“It really fucking worked,” Jungkook groaned as he cupped your boobs in his hands, letting his tongue lick at your pert nipples and feeling the way they stiffened underneath him. Your hands went to his hair, legs nearly wrapping around his torso when you felt his teeth lightly press into your nipple, sucking and tugging when needed.

His kisses began to run down toward your navel with his hands replacing his lips and kneading your breasts in the palm of them while he moved down to lay between your legs, “I want a taste, pretty girl.”

“Then get one,” you said in a whiny tone that had his big rounded eyes turning to look at you with surprise. A knowing smirk falling on his lips as he lifted your knees and pulled your thighs apart as far as they could go until he was eye level with your pretty cunt. Jungkook was never one to stop and tease when he needed sex, he had a tendency to get a little rough and take what he wants but it’s so hard to move it along when he’s met with the sight of you laying so pretty for him. He could tell your patience was running thin with how long he was taking to do anything and just before he felt you close to snapping at him, he leaned into you.

“Oh fuck,” you gasped in surprise with the sudden swipe at your clit by Jungkook’a flattened, long tongue and you’ll admit it caused goosebumps to form on your skin. You couldn’t see the way he smiled as his hands circled around your thighs, repeating his teasing flick of his tongue, feeling the way your folds began to react to him.

He felt your fingers run through his soft hair for anchor and for some reason that slight grip you had on him had his eyes rolling to the back of his head as he let himself get lost in the taste of your pussy. No longer up for any sense of teasing, Jungkook lets his mouth fall open, kissing your wet heat with his tongue pressing between your folds and finding your clit. Your hips were slowly bucking into his face, showing him just how much you liked his tongue and he knew just what to do to have you coming undone underneath him.

He sucked your clit into his mouth, his lips wrapped around the hard bud while his tongue swiped against the tip of it. He began a repetition of that and grazing his teeth ever so softly against your sensitive folds knowing he found your weak spot when he sucked your labia into his mouth and had your soft moans filling the cabin.

“Jungkook,” you moaned softly, fingers tugging at his hair roughly, “Oh god.”

He didn’t dare pull his mouth off you to give you a response and instead let his actions grow rougher. He unwrapped a hand from around your thigh and slipped it down to your pussy where he let his finger begin to draw patterns into your labia, so close to your entrance that he could feel your arousal quite literally leak out of you.

Your body was filled by pleasure that Jungkook was bringing you and you couldn’t help but bring your free hand to your neglected chest, trying to fill the void that Jungkook’s hand had left as you groped your breasts. Jungkook looked up completely enamored with the way you played with yourself while he ate you out and without any second thoughts, he pressed his long middle finger into your waiting cunt.

“That’s it,” he whispered, pressing a light kiss along your pelvis, “Cum for me, darling.”

“Jungkook,” you whined as he pushed a second finger in, hooking them upwardward just past your pubic bone and finding that soft, spongy spot with ease. With the way your walls fluttered around his fingers, he knew you were close and all it took was his lips around your clit while thrusting into that pleasure spot of yours, for you to wrap your legs around his shoulders and shake with release, “Oh my god.”

“Mm,” Jungkook groaned with pleasure, feeling your arousal flood his fingers in your release. He looked down at his wet hand, bringing it to his lips where he licked off the release that threatened to drip down his forearm, “Sweet.”

You looked like a mess trying to catch your breath and come to understand what had just happened between you to think too long about the fact that he was pressing his fingers into your waiting mouth till you licked your own release off him. He lifted a brow as your tongue circled around his fingers while sucking on them with your cheeks hollowed in. It had his breath hitching, trying to pull his fingers back out before he came just from that and began to pull at his own pants.

“Condom?” He asked in an unusually low and raspy tone. You blinked, “It’s fine, I’m on the pill.”

He didn’t press for more as he kicked his slacks and briefs off, hard cock pointed up stiffly. You couldn’t tear your eyes away from it. You wanted to wrap your lips around him and take him deep in your mouth because his dick was surprisingly so fucking pretty you just needed it desperately.

With your mind decided, you attempted to sit up when he pushed you back down, cock in his hand as he gave himself a couple strokes to relieve some tension and pulled your legs apart, “I need you now.”

“Impatient, are we?” You asked with a laugh, making yourself relax when you felt his cock head brush against your exposed clit. Jungkook wasn’t paying attention to what you said as much as he was to the way his mushroom tip fit perfectly between your folds.

A soft gasp left your lips as he pushed it against your clit, playing with your labia and letting the clear liquid that dripped out of his tip, coat your clit.

“Fuck,” Jungkook took a deep breath as his cock nearly slipped inside of you, playing with your earlier release to cover his length in it, “Such a pretty pussy.”

With an annoyed roll of your eyes, you grew tired of his teasing and with a quick hook of your leg around his slim waist, you pushed his cock into you eliciting a deep groan [almost growl] to slip from his lips, “Fucking hell, Y/n.”

“You were taking too long,” you moaned, legs falling back again as you tried to ease the slight pain that came from his thick member entering your tight walls. Jungkook’s hair was brushing against your face as he looked down at the way you took him in, “I was trying to be gentle.”

“Did I ask you to be?” You asked with a scoff. Jungkook rolled his eyes, spreading his legs further apart and digging his knees into the bed for support as he covered you with his body, laying down to plant a quick kiss to your lips. “Brat.”

“Jeon Jungkook,” your manicured nails traced down his back until your hands were under his thighs as if ready to make him move on your own, “Are you going to fuck me yet?”

He couldn’t help but scoff in disbelief, an amused smile on his face and without saying a word, he pulled out until on his tip was past your ring of nerves, and suddenly pushed back in. Your lips fell open in a silent gasp as your eyes locked with his and he smirked.

“You need it that bad?” Jungkook asked as he pulled your legs up, pressing them toward your chest and holding them down with his arms as he kissed your neck, dragging his cock back out, “How bad?”

“Jungkook,” you groaned, trying to move your hips but in this position it was useless, “Start moving.”

“Make me,” he kissed the tip of your nose, slowly sliding himself back in just a little. You rolled your eyes, moving your hand to hide your face as you felt yourself getting annoyed.

Jungkook was smiling like this was all just so amusing to him and with his lip pulled between his teeth, he thrusted in with little restraint, starting a slow yet steady rhythm, “Don’t hide your face, darling. I wanna see the Y/n L/n moaning for me.”

“Fuck you,” you shook your head feeling your pussy tighten around him with your legs pulled to your chest unable to escape his thrusts that were becoming more rough by the second.

“Come on darling, you can do it,” Jungkook groaned, feeling like he was on cloud 9 from the way your pussy took him in. He doesn’t know how to explain it but he felt really fucking good right now. He’s not sure if it’s that he hasn’t had sex in a while, or if it had something to do with the fact that it was you, but he was fucking you with all his energy, letting himself relax and just feel good in the moment.

“Jungkook,” you moaned his name, hand slipping from your face so you could wrap it around his neck, “Kiss me.”

“Kiss?” He asked, out of breath as his rhythm faltered and without thinking, he let go of your legs and let them fall back onto the bed as he tilted your chin up with a hand to kiss you. He set his other hand down on the bed for support, getting lost between your lips and your tight pussy.

Jungkook’s tongue licked against yours swallowing your moans, “Y/n, it’s s’good.”

“Mhm,” you circled your legs around him, “Fuck.”

Jungkook kissed down your neck, hands sneaking down to your waist and with one swift movement, rolled onto his back with you on top. He needed a change of pace because if he kept going, he would cum sooner than he wanted to and he needed you to cum one more time for him so if that meant letting you get in top, he would.

And it had been such a good idea because the sight of you sitting on his cock, leaning back and placing your hands on his thighs instead of chest, made him more excited. Your knees dug into the bed and with your fingers scratching at his muscular thighs and raised your hips, lifting yourself off his cock before plunging him back in.

“Fucking hell,” Jungkook groaned throwing his head back into the pillows, a hand on your hip but not daring to take control, “That’s it darling, fuck yourself on my cock.”

“Jungkook,” the new position was having him reach newer parts inside you that had your thighs shaking, “I’m so close.”

“Take it,” Jungkook growled, holding you in place as he dug his feet into the mattress and began to fuck up into you, “Take my fucking dick, fuck.”

“Oh my god,” you fell forward, hands scratching at his chest, feeling the knot in your stomach tighten, “I—I can’t. Jungkook, baby, oh my—“

“Take it,” he groaned, grabbing your hips harshly and moving once again so he was on top, thrusting into you despite how hard it was getting to pull out of your tight walls, “Take it.”

“I—I,” your lips fell open in a loud cry, pinching his biceps for stability, and felt your walls come undone. For the second time in less than hour, your orgasm hit you hard. Jungkook released a string of grunts, feeling your pussy convulse around him and his cock was greeted with a flood of warmth that had his legs shaking, trying to support him but he couldn’t take it. He barely had time to slip out before he was letting go, his cum dribbling down to your thighs as he let out one final moan of your name.

His body seemed to collapse down next to yours, panting and out of breath, “Fuck.”

The two of you were a mess, sweaty and sore and all you wanted to do was lay down and possibly sleep but where you were did not go past you unnoticed. You searched around for your cellphone, knowing you set it down somewhere before trying to change and found it on your nightstand with six missed calls from the Bride-To-Be.

Jungkook took a deep breath, sitting up and looking down at the mess the two of you made on the bed. He got up, not bothering with covering himself up as he found a towel and tried cleaning himself off with it while you got on your phone.

“Duty calls,” you joked with a sigh as he came to your side and began to wipe down your thighs. Yeonwoo sent you a dozen messages talking about a midlife crisis of some sorts. You sat up carefully, thanking him for handing you your robe and you slipped it on.

“What happened?” Jungkook asked with an awkward clear of his throat as he began putting on his clothes again. He’ll admit he was taking his time getting dressed and you left to the bathroom to freshen up.

“I don’t know, something with the gift boxes for everyone. I think Yeonie’s assistant forgot them,” you told him as you found new underwear to wear, making sure you were cleaned before putting them on. You left the door to the bathroom open to talk to him but you still changed into the white Jacquemus dress from earlier.

You walked up to him and he got the memo about zipping your back up and this time he couldn’t help but lean down to press a kiss to your shoulder blade, “Are you going up yet?”

“I’m gonna touch up my makeup first,” you told him honestly, “You go ahead.”

When Jungkook reached upstairs again, finding the party just as he left it earlier, it’s like nobody noticed he had even left for so long. They were all too focused on your new dress — which Yeonwoo absolutely adored on you. He found a glass of champagne and tried to escape from the swarm of people trying to hold a conversation with him when he wasn’t thinking clearly at all.

Unfortunately for the two of you, the matching off-white shade of your clothing and the sudden mark on his neck wasn’t lost on anyone else. Soon, pictures from every angle possible would paint a story neither of you wanted.

There was a sense of guilt that came with disassociating yourself from your best friend’s wedding plans. Jungkook could barely remember what they had done once they got to the island after a surprising night of visiting your cabin.

He hasn’t had an actual conversation with you since that night and he has to be honest and say, he barely remembers the actual wedding. He hadn’t seen you since the yacht before being dragged away by Hoseok the following day to do some activities for Namjoon’s groomsmen. You had gone to do your Maid of Honor duties and he’s felt out-of-loop since.

The entire day had been packed with things to do and he’s aware he looked dashing in every photo the photographers took of him in his 12,000$ Kiton suit. The matching suits they all wore made the groomsmen look classy and cohesive while the Balmain dresses the bridesmaids wore made them elegant and surreal—well at least for you.

That’s what he thinks is the problem.

His best friends got married and yet all he was able to think about was you. It didn’t help that despite the wedding being on a private island, there was still press everywhere, capturing every angle of this beautiful matrimony between nepo babies.

The reception had been filled with various questions from various interviewers that left all your shared friends staring at you suspiciously—especially when questions of the hickey on his neck came forward.

As awful as it sounded considering the 46 million dollar wedding in the mountains of an island was stunning, he could barely remember half of what hadn’t been photographed. He left the day after the wedding with an excuse that he had things to take care of where he’s currently at and his friends bid him farewell.

He got to the mainland a day before the others and it gave him time to return home before he left on another voyage alone.

“How was the wedding?” His older brother asked, swinging his mallet just slightly, trying to find his nail before shooting the ball through the hoop, “I can't believe I was caught up in meetings all week in Tokyo.”

Jungkook looked oddly bright today compared to how he felt and he didn’t want to say it was because his casual and boring clothes he wore abroad stuck out here in ways he didn’t like. That’s why today—his last day home—he visited his family’s 150 acre estate for a game of Croquet and possibly tennis, wearing a matcha colored Loro Piana cashmere polo with short sleeves.

“Um, it was great,” Jungkook said as he brought his cigarette to his lips and lighting the end before inhaling.

“That’s it?” JungHyun asked with a scoff as he motioned for Jungkook to take his turn and he took his brother’s cigarette, “Did you have an orgy with any models or were you your usual gentleman self that won the crowd against me?”

His older brother had been well known in his younger days for many reasons, his partying, his charm, his youth and education. When he was in his mid twenties, you could always catch him in some article their parents tried taking down in regards to driving under the influence or insulting a server. Unlike Jungkook who preferred a quiet life he could escape to, his brother did not and now he’s some big shot finance guy because his attitude growing up had ruined his chance of inheriting everything from their grandparents. Now it will all go to Jungkook—something they’re all aware of—and maybe that’s why JungHyun makes snide remarks here and there.

He’s not asking about the wedding because he’s curious, he’s bitter that despite his perfect appearance and Jungkook’s more intimidating kind, Jungkook was still the most well-mannered of the two and therefore the favorite—if only he stayed and fulfilled his duties.

“No orgy,” Jungkook said with a hint of disgust as he finished his round of the game, one step closer to winning, “Just Y/n.”

JungHyun had been mid-swing when he mentioned you and his aim went astray making him miss the next ring, “What do you mean just Y/n?”

“I slept with her—“

A loud and annoying laugh cut him off as JungHyun let his mallet go, “Ah, so you can’t remember the events of your best friend’s wedding because you were too busy sleeping with the nation’s sweetheart? Oh I cannot wait till father hears about this, maybe your wedding is next and then you’ll finally step up to the plate.”

Jungkook scoffed, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means now that you’re back, and dating the richest girl in the country, there’s no way Father won’t hand you down the company now,” JungHyun said bitterly, “And everyone said you running away would be a bad thing, but clearly it’s reminded you of who you are.”

“I’m not… I’m not staying,” Jungkook said, “I leave tomorrow but I wanted to see you all. And Y/n and I aren’t going to date, it was a… um.”

“Mistake?” JungHyun asked, “Jungkook, don’t be an idiot. You’ve been obsessed with her for years.”

“I have not.”

“You have, you just don’t want to admit that all your talk about being independent and leaving the money behind to be free was complete bullshit,” JungHyun said with a scoff, “Or why would you mess around with her of all people. A relationship with Y/n is going to put you at the top once again and there’s nothing that won’t be handed to you—and she’s someone mother would approve.”

“You’re dramatic,” Jungkook huffed, “One night doesn’t mean we’re dating or getting married or any of that other shit. I still don’t want to run the business… I just want, I don’t know.”

“Yeah, you never know what you want,” JungHyun said, “But whatever, if you’re set on running away again, so be it. I’m tired of trying to make you see how you blindly follow along with everything you seem to hate.”

“Master, your wife is on line three and she’s wondering who is picking up the kids.”

“Fuck, I don’t know,” JungHyun groaned, annoyed and no longer interested in talking to his little brother, “The driver?”

Jungkook watched his brother leave him behind and with a defeated sigh, he left.

“So are you leaving?” Youngi asked him as he watched the bubbles in his pink champagne, “Or have you changed your mind?”

“I haven’t changed my mind,” Jungkook said stiffly as he fixed the suit jacket he was currently getting fit into, “I’m just postponing my leave but I have a few things to take care of here.”

“Like with you and Y/n?” Youngi asked, making sure the fitting room at Dolce & Gabbana was empty aside from just them two. Jungkook didn’t even flinch at the mention of you. Since the two arrived at this store his vision has been filled with large framed photos of you and your dear friend Park Jimin all over the store. Apparently you were one of the brand’s favorite Ambassadors and they made it known you modeled their products. Right now he’s facing the mirror with a picture of you modeling a satin baldonétte bra and high waisted panties. You looked beautiful and seductive and its been hard for him to not just stare at all your pictures since he got here. Now Yoongi is attempting to bring you up and he refuses to give in to the extent his relationship with you has gone.

You haven’t even spoken since the wedding and even that had just been an exchange of pleasantries and no real depth to either of your words.

“No, with my father,” Jungkook said stiffly as he shrugged off the suit jacket and called in the stylist to find something else. Yoongi sat up in his seat slightly more interested, “Really? About what? Don’t tell me you're back in the running.”

“We're going to discuss it,” Jungkook mumbled to himself.

He wanted to make one thing clear, his decision to seek out his father and work out some sort of plan where he can get back into the job he had been assigned to do, while also having freedom had absolutely nothing to do with you. It has nothing to do with the fact that you’re here, and he’s interested in you, and that it would be his parent’s dream for him to stay and be in a relationship with you and also take over the business finally…

This was his decision because his brother’s right. He can't just keep running away.

“And what do you mean, with Y/n?” Jungkook asked, clearing his throat awkwardly as he glanced up at your five foot photo framed above the mirror, remembering the shape of your body against his, moaning his name and tightening your walls around him.

“Haven’t you heard the rumors?” Youngi asked as he got on his phone, “It seems as though you have competition.”

Jungkook didn’t need to be told more as he took Yoongi’s phone from his outstretched hand and read what was on the screen with furrowed brows.

At the end of the article, in big, fat letters, the conclusion said: ‘Now the question is, will L/n choose the best friend, Park Jimin, or the elegant and influential Best Man, Jeon Jungkook—possibly as the country’s newest IT couple?’

When he gave Yoongi his phone back, there was no denying the sudden irritation that contorted his features. It’s not like he expected this to not happen but… he doesn’t like what they’re implying. Yoongi studied him closely to see if he would get a response, but Jungkook gave nothing away. Instead he just ordered the tailor to pack the two suits he tried on so he could buy both, “I’ll meet you out there.”

Yoongi left Jungkook to get changed and while he stood alone in the fitting room staring up at your boudoir photos framed around him, he took his phone and dialed your number.

“Hello?” Your end of the call sounded hectic, louder and busier than his did. You were in the middle of an interview for Vogue and were taking a short break. It seemed like he called at just the right time since you were getting your makeup touched up.

“Are you busy?” Jungkook asked with a sharp tone that fell on deaf ears when the call went silent for a moment. He really did admire the photo of you, remembering just what it was like to trace his hands along your figure.

“Who is this?” You finally asked, making his jaw clench slightly.

“Jeon Jungkook.”

“Oh you see, I wouldn’t have known that considering you didn’t even say a hello or anything,” You told him in a sarcastic tone that made him want to smile but also roll his eyes, “Besides, I am busy.”

As if on cue, the call of your name in the background made your claim concrete. He bit his lip in thought, wondering what it was you were doing and how long it would take, “When can I see you?”

A smile played on your lips as you held up a finger to your assistant who was trying to hurry you along, “Did you make an appointment with my assistant?”

He couldn’t help but scoff as his gaze turned toward a glare, practically imagining that picture of you smiling at him, “I didn’t know I needed one, darling. When can I schedule one?”

“I’m not sure, i'll let you know,” you said and before Jungkook could respond, the call ended and he was left in shock that you just hung up on him. He gathered his things and met Yoongi outside to pay, completely bewildered by the fact that you just hung up on him so easily. He knows you haven’t spoken since the night of the wedding where you were forced to speak but this is all he gets?

“What took you so long?” Yoongi asked as they left Dolce & Gabbana with new things.

xxx-xxx-xxxx: Appointment scheduled for, 6:30 pm today, L/n Residence @ the Northbrook Estates

Jungkook couldn’t help but laugh in disbelief at the confirmation of an appointed meeting with you tonight.

The night on the yacht had been unexpected yet also long-awaited and now that its done with, neither of you seemed to know what to do about it. You wont lie and say you didn’t enjoy that moment with him but you were also realistic. You and Jungkook would just never work out, you’re too different on the outside and that’s why you’re so confused now as to why he called you.

“So, Y/n, its been a busy season for you this year,” an interviewer said as the camera zoomed in on your expression as they continued, “Not only did you walk thirteen shows but I hear you also celebrated your close friends wedding. How was that? You must have been exhausted.”

“You know it was a lot but it was exciting, I hold my friends dearly and I’m just thankful I was able to make time for such an event,” you said and you’ll admit your response sounded scripted. You didn’t dive too deeply which is what you’re sure the interviewer wanted. You should have known that this stupid interview wouldn’t just be about your newly established modeling career.

Whether you’ve become Model of the Year for your catwalk, or for nepotism, you didn’t are much either way. All you cared about was the fact that the interviewer has found a way to slip in questions they didn’t need to know. It’s like you can just sense the things they’ll ask and have already prepared and calculated the exact responses you need to give.

“Of course, and what a star-studded party,” the interviewer continued, “The Best Man being Jeon Jungkook must have been exciting for you.”

“Well, we’ve all known each other for a long time now so…” You cleared your throat, looking a bit disinterested.

“Yes, of course,” the interviewer said with a nervous laugh, “And pardon me, Y/n, but I just have to ask, did anything happen between the two of you on this very intimate trip?”

Your smile strained but you never looked anything less than sweet as you said, “We are all just very close friends. Most of them have supported me in modeling.”

It was a clear attempt on your part to direct the conversation back to what it was supposed to be about. She ignored your last comment and said, “So… I guess we’re all curious, some pictures from the parties were released of the two of you awfully close in certain open waters, and an evident hickey on his neck—not to mention the matching clothes, please, is there something between you and the heir of Jeon Corporation?”

“Nothing that should concern you, no,” you smiled sweetly and the interviewer seemed to freeze up, unsure if she had gone too far in her questions.

Silence filled the space around them and there was no way to cut these parts out since it was a video shoot and after a while of the interviewer struggling to find which questions to ask, a person who worked for you stepped forward, “How about another short break?”

The interviewer released a shaky breath while the both of you made your way off camera and your glam team was quick to touch up your hair and makeup as the director of the shoot approached you, “Y/n darling, how are we feeling?”

“Annoyed,” you answered honestly, “I thought this was supposed to be about my modeling.”

“You’re absolutely right, darling, we apologize for any mistake we’ve done on our part, I—She must have taken it as an opportunity to ask her own questions and I promise you, we will have a deep conversation about this. We aren’t TMZ…” the director said and you rolled your eyes.

“I’m done filming if she’ll be the one continuing the interview,” You told him as you began to walk away from him, not caring for the excuses or whatever and you can hear your publicist repeat your words to him.

It wasn’t even that she was bad at her job or that she asked anything too deep but she just quickly got on your bad side with her persistence to not let the subject drop.

In the end you got your wish and filming ended smoothly before you were driven away to whatever was next in your schedule, trying not to think about the interview or the fact that there was a chance you would be seeing Jungkook later.

Things are evidently strange between you two and its not like you’ve been blind to the articles or posts about you but you don’t want to address anything. That night on the yacht seems like a fluke and like it shouldn’t have happened at all despite how you felt in the moment. Your parents aren’t the type to be invested in what is put in the tabloids but when their lifelong, country club going, friends call them and ask if there’s anything between you and Jeon Corporation’s Jungkook, they’re going to want answers.

It was just one night, one night where the two of you put aside whatever indifference you had toward each other just so you could release tension and this is the consequence for that. Of course everyone would want to know and of course no one was able to turn a blind eye to you. Even Yeonwoo managed to ask what you had been doing in the cabins withJungkook or so long that night and even when you tried to ignore her she kept pressing you for an answer.

In truth you had nothing to say. You were both adults and it didn’t matter if anyone else was dying to know if there was anything going on between you.

You resented each other.

You had sex.

Plus, he’s going to leave soon and you don’t think that bothers you?

When your driver pulled up to the tall skyscraper you called home, you headed inside alone.

“Good evening, Miss L/n,” the lobbyist held the door open for you, “You have a visitor waiting in the lobby.”

Your brows furrowed, checking the time before heading to the library where sure enough, Jeon Jungkook was sitting by the fireplace reading whatever magazine was set out for him. At the sound of your Miu Miu kitten heels, he turned staring at you with his big rounded eyes being the only thing you could see beside his face mask, “You’re early.”

Jungkook wrapped an arm around your waist as he pressed his lips to your cheek in greeting and you did the same, he joined you in the elevator and said, “I like to get to my appointments early.”

“You’re lucky my shoot ended early or else you might have had to wait outside like a dog,” you teased as you pushed the button for the top floor where your penthouse was located. As part of the infinite amount of wealth your family has, you also dabble in real estate, mostly in the country as luxury apartments but you do have some homes overseas: Paris, New York, Argentina, etc.

The place you call home is a top floor penthouse with terrace and rooftop. The floor in which it was located was completely shut off for just you and included a private gym, yoga studio, three walk-in closets, and on top of that an elevator parking garage with a Mary Kay Pink Rolls Royce sitting pretty inside it.

Jungkook has never stepped foot in your home before and it was overwhelmingly stunning with four bedrooms, two living rooms (one on the top floor and one on the main floor too), an open kitchen, poolside terrace, and five bathrooms. You lived in ultimate modern luxury with traditional themes throughout the home like its hand carved wooden furniture and expensive marble walls.

“Is this different from your little magic treehouse in the woods you ran off to?” You asked, tempted to push his buttons as you removed your coat and handed it to your housekeeper who waited at the door.

“Well, considering my magic treehouse is worth 2.6 million dollars, no I wouldn’t consider this that different from it,” Jungkook couldn’t help but boast, feeling like he’s competing. It’s like when he was in school and the students would brag about whatever exotic trip they got to go in the summer and he would have to make sure to tell them what he did was better. “Maybe I’ll bring you with someday.”

Fuck. Why did he say that? Why is he indulging in any of this in the first place? You and Jungkook should never be together, right?

“Speaking of which, I thought you would have ran off now that the wedding is over,” You said as you mumbled something to the housekeeper making her leave, “Drink?”

“Water is fine,” Jungkook said as he made his way down to your 70’s inspired talking pit of suede Anabei sectional couches, “And I thought I would have been gone by now too”

“What changed?” You skied curiously, “Don’t tell me it's because you would miss me.”

You held your hand to your chest as if to seem touched by the thought and Jungkook just rolled his eyes as you continued, “How would all the other girls feel knowing I’m keeping you here?”

Jungkook scoffed as he practically pushed your legs off his lap, “Can you not joke for just one second?”

You couldn’t help but laugh, even if part of you felt confused wondering if this was supposed to be a serious moment or not. Jungkook huffed, running his fingers through his black hair, “I’m here because I wanted to talk to you about all those articles. My parents are working on taking those down, are you okay?”

Your eyebrows knitted together with confusion, “Me? Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Because I’ve never seen anything bad written about you and suddenly you’re being painted as a two-timer by spending a night with me while also… doing whatever it is you do with that friend of yours.” He was not jealous. He swears.

To be clear, there really is nothing going on with you and Jimin. You’re just two friends in the modeling world who happen to like attending secret parties together and maybe making out drunkenly every now and then. That’s it. You’ve never slept with him and Jimin has too many girls on his line for you to ever consider him.

“I’ll survive,” You mumbled as you looked over at him, seeing him in deep thought.

“I’m thinking of staying a while longer,” Jungkook said suddenly with a clear of his throat.

Jungkook was not the shy type and to be honest he’s not even sure why he’s letting you know [as if it made a difference] but the words just slipped out.

He did not like you.

Well, he didn’t like you like that. It sounds harsh he’s well aware of that but he was never romantically attracted to you before so how is he going to suddenly feel that way after only a week in contact again. Maybe it was just unresolved sexual tension after years of feeling that way but that can’t be the only thing that’s making him want to revert back to what his life was like before he left to live on his own.

He escaped all this so that he could live somewhere quietly and do what he really wanted to do without worrying about anything else. Now he’s contemplating moving back and possibly involving himself with his father’s business again. Too much is going on for him to understand why.

“For how long?” you asked as your fingers began to softly run through the ends of his hair making him look at you. You couldn’t hide your curiosity and how close the two of you are.

When he had pulled you down to sit with him, it was with your legs thrown over his lap which he had been caressing every now and then.

An arrogant smirk formed on his lips as he licked them, tapping your calf lightly, “How long do you want me here?”

Fuck, Jungkook is staying to get back in business… not for you.

It’s not for you.

It’s not for yo—

His breath hitched as a sudden weight shifted to his lap, his hands immediately went to your waist, helping you get comfortable on him. It’s embarrassing the way Jungkook didn’t hesitate to reach for you when you sat on his lap feeling your arms thrown around his neck, “Here as in…”

You looked down at the short skirt you wore which rolled up a little from how your legs straddled his thighs and said, “Under me?”

A scoff in disbelief left his lips as he couldn’t help but laugh, sliding your hips closer, “Yeah.”

It was attractive the way your conversations never seemed to fall unless you wanted them to. It was a constant cat and mouse game, banter back and forth and he catches on quickly.

You couldn’t help it, okay. Anytime you would see pictures of Jungkook since he left, he was always in a hoodie and sweats or something that just hid his entire body. Right now he’s wearing this Christian Dior white button-up shirt [which he rolled the sleeves up at some point since he got here] and it was messily untucking from his black slacks and he looks so hot right now. His hair was messy in a sexy way and he looked just like he used to, except this time with tattoos and a different sense of maturity.

Without wasting another moment debating if you should or shouldn’t, you leaned down and kissed him. Jungkook’s lips parted against yours, stretching his neck to kiss you with more need. Unlike the first night you kissed, this one wasn’t as rushed and angry. He took his time longer, pulling your bottom lip between his and doing it over again.

You pressed your chest against his, with your tongue swiping against his lip teasingly until you met his. Jungkook’s hands pinched the satin fabric of your skirt, feeling it tighten and rise, unable to stop the growing desire he was feeling for you. His briefs were getting tighter every time you shifted on his lap and whatever he had been thinking before you started making out.

“You want to play?” He asked, shifting his head to deepen the kiss without bumping noses. You pulled away feeling desperate to catch your breath as his kisses began to travel down toward your exposed neck, licking and nipping under your jaw while beginning to make

“Maybe,” you sighed in pleasure, running your hands through his hair when you felt him kiss down your collarbone, closer and closer down the deep-v in your Miu Miu chiffon top. The strap to your shirt slipped down your shoulder as Jungkook’s rough fingers traced down the side of your arms.

You cupped his face in your hands, forcing him to go back to kiss your lips as you felt his growing erection press into you. It was hard for him to ignore the fact that the only thing covering what was under your skirt was a flimsy, thin piece of lace he shifted you closer until his bulge was tucked between your legs, placing your hips right over where he wanted them to be. Now that he moved you, his outline was more evident and had you grinding along him.

Jungkook released a groan with a sharp breath once he felt that sudden move and he couldn’t help but buck his hips against you, feeling the fabric of his briefs constrict his hardened cock. It was a frustrating feeling yet he felt so eager with his tongue down your throat and his covered dick tucked nicely between your covered folds that he couldn’t even think to stop and remove the layers.

His lips were feeling swollen against yours yet he didn’t want to pull away, the friction he was getting from the way you humped him was turning him on with how needy it felt. You kissed along his jaw, grinding against his aching dick while your nimble fingers began to unbutton his shirt.

“God damn,” Jungkook groaned as he threw his head back, relishing in the way your hips moved expertly against him while kissing down his naked chest. He slid his ass down your back, stopping over your butt and pulling your skirt out of the way for him to get a better feel of you underneath. With firm hands, he turned your sensual grinding into harsher and more deep movements that he met with his hips.

He’s not sure he could take just this any longer. Anytime he’s with you now it’s like he can’t do anything but fall for you and despite how annoying it is, he doesn’t do anything to stop it. Instead, he welcomes it and right now all he wants to do and rip off the remaining layers between you so he could have your legs wrapped around him once more. It’s only been days since the first time and he has not been able to stop thinking about it.

The day of the wedding he had been so distracted by you that he barely remembers any of it and now his best friends are on their honeymoon and he’s here thinking about you again.

Giving up on arguing how much he wants to have you, he wanted to get your clothes off and you were letting him. His hands had barely made it to the end of your top, ready to pull it off, when a loud ringtone cut through the living room, echoing off the walls and hard to ignore. The two of you looked at each other confused.

He sat up, reaching his hand into his pocket and pulling out his phone, annoyed that someone had thought to call him.

“Answer,” you said breathlessly as you looked at the caller, already sliding yourself off his lap.

“It’s just Hobi,” Jungkook said, letting out a huff in annoyance as he set his phone back down, turning to kiss you but it rang once again. Your eyes met his and he begrudgingly grabbed his phone and swiped to answer, “Hello?”

“Hey man, I just got off the phone with your Yoongi,” Hoseok said as he sat in a large closet filled with designer clothes, “And why am I always the last to know if you’re leaving or not?”

“What?” Jungkook looked visibly annoyed with his scrunched brows and tense jaw and for some reason that made him hotter to you. His shirt was undone completely and his belt was halfway pulled off and with his legs spread, it was very hard to ignore his hard on.

Your eyes softened with curiosity and you couldn’t help but bite down on your bottom lip as you decided to just go for it. First, your hand rested on his thigh as he listened to whatever Hoseok said, but slowly you made your way toward his bulge.

“You’re gonna start working with your dad again?” Hoseok asked, unaware of the way Jungkook’s attention had drifted down to the palm of your hand, right over his dick. Your fingers pressed against the underside of his member, massaging your palm into it and feeling the way his hips raised. “What happened to not caring about the money and the company and all that blah blah blah?”

Jungkook couldn’t help but roll his eyes, snapping back to his friend instead of what was going on. His fingers wrapped around your wrist, tightening their grip as if in warning. It was a useless attempt considering he tried helping you pull his belt off and saying, “Come on man, it was never like that.”

He could hear his own tone falter somewhere between lying and having his cock free from the confines of his tight briefs with your hand feeling him.

Hoseok laughed, debating what suit he should wear, “No, it’s exactly like that.”

Jungkook’s hand went to your head, softly caressing you as you kissed down his navel, your hand wet with spit, jerking him off while licking just above his dick. He didn’t bother with a response to his friend as he continued speaking anyway, “Is it true you and our princess are messing around? It’s all over the tabloids.”

Sarcasm was evident in Hoseok’s tone but Jungkook was too focused on your tongue licking up the length of his hard cock, wetting it with spit that made your hand movements smoother.

“Look I get it, you’ve had all this tension something was bound to happen but damn, why didn’t you tell me that either?” Hoseok asked with evident shock, unaware of the blowjob his friend was receiving on the other end. Your lips were wrapped tightly around his length and with your hand too, it was hard for Jungkook to keep his reactions to a minimum.

“Hobi, I—I, yknow I just,” Jungkook cleared his throat uncomfortably to hide an evident groan. He was beginning to fidget under your ministrations, especially when you squeezed under his cock, massaging his balls, “Sorry.”

“Sorry?! That’s all you gotta say after chewing me out for giving you condoms as a joke.” Hoseok was lying in a pile of Louis Vuitton suits on the floor, engrossed in his one-sided conversation, “Our friendship seems one-sided buddy. I thought when you came up to me… I thought, ‘Hey, maybe my good buddy Jungkook will get in this dandy hot tub with me’ but no, you know what you do instead? You ask where Y/n is! God I should’ve known—“

Jungkook threw his head back in a mixture of pleasure and obvious irritation that he couldn’t take it anymore. His finger pressed into the red button and the call was cut to end suddenly. As soon as his phone hit the couch, you pulled off his length with a deep huff for air, “That wasn’t very nice of you.”

“He’ll get over it,” Jungkook mumbled as he reached for your hand to pull you toward him, “Come here.”

“I’m not done,” you leaned away from the kiss he was trying to give you but his hand held your head in place, not caring to kiss the lips that had just been around his hard dick. Jungkook wasn’t as gentle as his need grew heavier and with a strategic pull at your top, it ripped down the back, “Jungkook!”

“What?” He asked with a giddy smile, tempted to be playful, “It was in my way.”

You rolled your eyes, sitting up to take your skirt off yourself and prevent another hazard while Jungkook finished undressing himself. “It was custom, asshole.”

Jungkook’s smile dropped with worry, lips parted in surprise until you burst out into a laugh and fell onto his lap, “You should see the look on your face.”

“Ha ha, don’t scare me like that,” Jungkook chuckled, “I was already thinking about the fortune I would have to pay to fix that.”

“Jungkook,” you ignored the fact that the two of you were naked, in the middle of an intimate moment and asked, “What did you mean earlier?”

“When?” Jungkook asked, caressing your leg, “About staying? Yeah, I’m serious.”

“You are?” You crossed your arms over your bare chest, “Why?”

“Why?” He was visibly taken back, “What do you mean why?”

“I mean… just a few days ago you were adamant on leaving right after the wedding and when you left the resort before everyone else we all kind of figured you had left but you’re here now and…” You took a deep breath in thought.

“Do you want me to leave?” Jungkook asked, sounding more hurt than he intended to. All this time pushing and pulling his feelings for how he felt about being here and seeing you was getting to him. He’s very aware how confusing he is and spending a night with you shouldn’t have changed his mind this quickly while he also refused to admit.

“We didn’t talk about what happened at the party,” you said suddenly, feeling Jungkook drape his shirt over your naked figure as the conversation shifted drastically.

“I know,” he dropped his head, “I’m sorry, I was really confused and I couldn’t tell what I was feeling or how you were feeling and I was mad and… I thought you probably didn’t care.”

“I mean, I didn’t,” you shrugged, “But because I figured it was just a one time thing since you were very obvious with how little you thought of me and now you’re saying you’re staying longer while visiting me at home and it just… I don’t get it.”

“Fuck, I’m sorry,” Jungkook was in his slacks again, trying to fix whatever mess he might have made over time, “I just… I was just being dumb. I wanted to act like I wasn’t into you at all because I was mad at everyone else and it wasn’t fair that I took it out on you but I thought you didn’t like me either.”

“And you’re right, you were mean to me,” you nudged him with your foot, “So really, I shouldn’t even be in this position with you right now.”

Jungkook didn’t dare argue when you called him out, “You always pretended to hate me even when you’d get jealous if someone else talked to me and you could never take your eyes off me.”

His brows furrowed, reminded of the trip and how everyone always joked that he wanted you when he was so stubborn on saying he didn’t. He didn’t like how predictable his life was.

“Because I knew everyone thought you were perfect,” Jungkook tried pulling you toward him, “And they didn’t know how you liked to push my buttons and say things you knew would get to my head and how you were actually so unbelievably perfect that it pissed me off everytime I let you get to me.”

“Don’t sweet talk me now,” you teased when he leaned over to lay between your legs, content with the sight of you in his Dior shirt, “How are you gonna repay me for being such a dick?”

“Whatever you want,” Jungkook admitted, “Say the word and I’ll give you whatever you want.”

“I have everything I want,” you ran your fingers through his hair.

“Come on Y/n, don’t make this hard on me,” he whined playfully, “Everyone else is already making it hard and I just want to spend the night with you. I’ll let you use me.”

Your brow raised and with a soft laugh you pulled him toward you for a kiss, “I get to use the Jeon Jungkook? What will everyone say?”

“That they saw it coming,” Jungkook chuckled as he pressed his lips to yours, “So don’t stop the inevitable.”

You rolled your eyes, feeling your arousal from earlier slowly make its return, “You’re so spoiled.”

“I know.”

Jeon Jungkook now knows what an awful liar he’s been these last couple of years. All of this talk about wanting to be different, break free from his family’s influences and the world of money and power, was meaningless in the end. He tried, he really did but his rebellion of running off and doing whatever he pleased, refusing to acknowledge the company, the wealth and the people in it was short lived because he never actually wanted to escape it.

He was still going to be friends with the people he grew up with and fall back to his old routine of country clubs and parading on yachts or private islands.

He was still going to take over his share of his father’s company and dress himself up in designer Kiton suits that he used to despise wearing.

He was still going to fall for you, the person he despised simply for being an exact reflection of himself. You were perfect for him in every way on paper and that made him want to push you away but in the end, he still fell for you like he knew he would.

Some people dream about having the life he does, or growing up the way he did and yet here he was selfishly wishing it all away. It was perfect, it was so insanely perfect and unfair that Jungkook ever thought he wouldn’t be happy with what he had been handed down to him for simply being born.

“This person gathered valuable experiences in the world and has shown such a strong will to portray it all into commitment for the company and that makes me a proud father,” A deep voice spoke from behind a podium with an echoing mic that had the attention of over a hundred people, “Please, welcome the newest V.P. for Jeon Corporation, my youngest son, Jeon Jungkook.”

Jungkook had an arrogant smile on his lips as he walked onto stage, thanking everyone for congratulating him on his quick and easy advance in the company—even surpassing his older brother.

“Honestly, it is a big thank you to everyone close to me, for helping me see how ready I am to step into this role and fulfill my duty as a member of this corporation,” Jungkook said confidently, looking at all his friends who had a mixture of confused yet knowing smiles on their faces.

“What a brat,” Hoseok joked with Namjoon, “And I blame you for this.”

“Yeah, I’ve never seen someone get pulled back into the country’s good graces so easily,” Namjoon laughed, remembering all the articles about how my ridiculous Jungkook was for publicly stating he would never be a part of the company.

“That’s because he’s spoiled,” Jungkook’s older brother chimed in, “Even after he says he’s gonna walk away from it, he’s still gonna be welcomed back with open arms.”

Taehyung released a playful sigh, “I want to be Jeon Jungkook when I grow up, the perfect life just handed to me and I’m just too blind to appreciate it.”

“Tae, you’re rich,” Yeonwoo whispered to him, Taehyung grinning at her reminder and sitting up straighter.

“How was it?” Jungkook asked his friends as he looked around the table.

“Well rehearsed,” Taehyung gave him the thumbs up, “Also, where’s Y/n? I thought she’d be here.”

Jungkook checked the time on his watch, his leg already bouncing underneath the table, “Yeah, I thought so too.”

It shouldn’t be that big of a deal to him. This was all just some flashy way for his father to make Jungkook’s debut in the business widely anticipated and you had other things to do than be here. The two of you aren’t even officially together yet so it’s not like you owe it to him or anything.

“Y/n,” Jimin whined as he watched the valet open the limo door for you, “Please don’t ditch me. I’m your best friend, imagine how much fun we could be having. Everyone’s going to ask where you ran off to after the dinner.”

“Well you can tell them,” you hurried to finish applying your lip gloss, “That I had more important things to do than get drunk at some fashion party.”

“Right, just throw me to the side like I mean nothing,” Jimin said dramatically, “Is this how you treat friends now?”

You couldn’t help but laugh, knowing he was only trying to cause a scene. Jimin knew you would be calling it an early night but he just wanted it to be difficult. With a small sigh, you double checked that you looked fine in the mirror and said, “Okay, wish me luck, I’m hoping I get laid tonight.”

“I also hope you get laid tonight so that I don’t have to listen to you talk about how much you want to see him,” Jimin said as you made your way out the car, “Goodnight.”

By the time you got to the banquet, the cameras had been long gone from the entrance and so you were able to make your appearance quietly. You would have been here earlier if there hadn’t been an ambassador dinner tonight that you had already agreed to do before Jungkook decided on staying and you just couldn’t miss it.

You felt bad because Jungkook had asked you to come be his date but he understood why you couldn’t make it right away. If anything he should be happy that you hurried over from dinner to the banquet without an outfit change. Despite the number of attendants, it was really a private affair with only a couple people from the press but nothing too grand and over the top. It made arriving late less miserable and finding Jungkook and your friends much easier.

And when you first involved yourself with Jungkook in this way, you should have known it wouldn’t all be easy. You were now somewhat seeing the most eligible bachelor in the country and nobody knows about it aside from speculation. Speculation won’t stop spoiled rich girls who want him to themselves and that’s what you saw when you found him.

“It’s so great to have you back Kooky, it’s like… the best thing to ever happen,” some girl gushed at him from the once empty seat to his left. She seemed unaffected by the stares she received from around the table and didn’t care at all that Jungkook wasn’t even glancing her way. He doesn’t know her, she’s probably just the daughter of some wealthy couple who thinks she has a chance with him.

Jungkook stared forward, watching his friends’ faces as their eyes softened, no longer listening to the girl who said, “Maybe we can get together some time.”

A gentle hand touched his shoulder, soft lips brushing against his ear as you said, “Maybe we can get together some time too.”

There was no denying the smile that grew on his face as he turned to look at you and how close you were to him. Jungkook’s lips parted in pleasant surprise, ready to talk to you when someone else spoke up.

“Excuse us, sweetheart,” Namjoon said to the girl, “It seems our table is full, maybe you can try somewhere else?”

She left with an annoyed scoff, making room for you to sit down, “Sorry I’m late, did any of you miss me?”

You had a sweet smile on your face, a camera clicked somewhere else in the distance surely capturing how close you were to Jungkook specifically, who was tracing his hand along your thigh.

“Dearly,” Jungkook said as he leaned into you for a quick kiss on the lips, “Thanks for coming.”

“I told you I’d try and make it,” you said to him, “I missed the speech didn’t I?”

“It was nothing special,” Jungkook’s hand began to slide down the space between your legs—or at least as far as your dress would let it, “Just the usual talk about how amazing I am, it was all very boring.”

“But I love talking about you,” Your tone was sarcastic yet flirty, your hand falling over his in warning when he began to pull up your dress just a little. You were sitting at a table with a large draped tablecloth that hid your legs underneath but you were still very aware of the fact that your friends were all around the table.

“Y/n,” Hoseok called for you from across the table, “How does it feel to have the Jeon Jungkook wrapped around your finger?”

Jungkook turned to his friend with a harsh glare, knowing he was just poking fun at it all but still managing to get under his skin. You looked at Jungkook with a knowing grin, “Like nothing I didn’t expect.”

He scoffed, squeezing your thigh possessively, “I think the feelings are mutual, darling.”

You leaned into him, not caring for being around so many important people with cameras trying to capture whatever moment they can, “They are.”

::.

a/n omg it took me literally forever to write this and idk how I feel about it but yknow what 😭it’s finished and that’s what matters. I was in the mood for some rich kdrama feel fic and I hope I managed to pull that off at least a litttlleeeeeeere

thanks for everyone that waited patiently and please feel free to lmk what you think <3

permanent taglist: @notmyfaultbutours @rerefundslocals @fandems @sugaluvmyg @guvgguk @kimyishin @libra04 @kooromiwrld @classycreationcupcake-blog @cherrymonlightt @nikkiordonez12 @asking4-sanity @thvlover @saweetspoiled @shaybts-blog @babycandy111 @jeonninja @yellowcupid08 @02010802faves @skzthinker @unnatae @beautywine @lilliankoo @annenakamura @lesoleile @burnahtsw @kooloveys @ku-ku @chaelvrx @minnie-mouser22 @whoa-jo @marvelbun @sunnikthv @kochycooky @acielelyseen @giselleswifeee @ilikeitlikethatt @bangmechanpls @lvr2seok @badbyeyoongi @jaerisdiction @watermelonjuice15 @artmsmaid @xyahrinx @angeleen777 @jooniesxbby @dream-cvtcher @jksjx @kissyfacekoo @joyjunk @caro134340lina @hyunjinswifeee @oldermenluverrr @caro134340lina @olivialeesstuff [taglist is too long so I’ll have to make two versions of it]

Always // Soonyoung x Reader - bonus part

DESCRIPTION: When Soonyoung told her he would always be there, he meant it. The days of pining for the girl he had fallen for freshman year had finally paid off.

PAIRING: Soonyoung x Reader

GENRE: A little fluff treat for my team soonyoung girlies out there.

Sorry for making yall cry in right where you left me. &lt;3

(ALWAYS)

He kept his promise.

That night when he had confessed his feelings to her, he truly meant what he said.

"I'm here. As a friend or whatever you need me to be. I'm here."

Soonyoung didn't care if he was the second choice or the twelveth – he remained by y/n side. He was the first person she called when anything happened; whether it was when Mingyu and her broke it off or when she finally found the sold out bag from Marge Sherwood. Soonyoung was the first to know.

He had become her best friend. Over throwing Jeonghan.

Though, if anyone were to ask y/n, it wasn't the case... Only because Jeonghan would make a scene, claiming that after all the years they have known each other he would be dethroned by someone he had introduced her to.

Many called him a fool for this choice – pining for a girl who was clearly not going to give him the time of day. But Soonyoung didn't care.

Because despite what everyone thought, he wasn't praying for her and Mingyu's downfall so that he could finally get the girl.

As long as she was happy.

He'd get over it one day.

But that was the thing, just when he thought his feelings for her were slowly diminishing, welcoming the idea of possibly dating... there was a glimmer of hope.

"Sorry I'm late, got caught up at the office." He apologized to his friends, taking the only empty seat available.

Next to an intoxicated y/n.

"Catch up!" She messily poured a shot of soju for him, earning hoots and hollers from the other two sat across the table – Jeonghan and Seokmin.

Soonyoung happily took the small glass from the girl's hand with a chuckle – throwing the drink back with ease.

"Okay you need about four more." She began to pour another only to be stopped by Soonyoung's hand. "Boo!!"

"It's only been an hour since you guys got here, how are you all so drunk?" He grabbed the pitcher of beer from the middle of the table.

"We're celebrating the end of a work week." Seokmin snickered.

"That I'll I drink to." He sighed; recalling to the emails, that seemed to never end, that he had to send throughout the week. Not to mention the outburst his team leader had on Tuesday.

To say the week ran him over like a semi-truck was an understatement.

Being part of the corporate world was no joke, each one of them taking turns complaining about their bosses and deadlines in their groupchats.

Who would have thought the real world would be this draining?

It had almost been a weekly ritual for them to meet every Friday for Happy Hour, whether as a semi-complete group or as a whole. It was their own way of tapping back to their hey-days in the midst of their now very grown lives.

"Take my glass." Y/n handed him her empty pint glass as she watched him look for a clean one.

"You're not gonna–"

She shook her head. "I'm getting the burps."

"Do you want another drink? I'll pay."

"They do have ice blended makgeolli." Y/n trailed off, a smile on her face growing – recalling to the menu that was handed to them when they were seated.

It wasn't part of the pub's happy hour menu – the three opting for the bottomless pitcher of beer and four bottle of soju special instead.

But since he had offered... she wasn't going to decline.

Soonyoung called over the waiter, motioning for her to place her order once he arrived at the table.

"One ice blended yogurt makgeolli–"

"Four." He interjected, knowing that the other two would whine about wanting some the minute it arrived at the table.

"Four, please."

"Must be nice having a finance bro as a boyfriend." Jeonghan sighed loudly, earning a laugh from Seokmin. He had been observing the two from across the table as they seemed to be in their own little world. Again.

She and Soonyoung have gotten used to Jeonghan's teasing, paying no mind to his comment. It had been a running joke for him since y/n and Mingyu had broken up – joking any time he caught either Soonyoung or y/n doting on one another.

It was just a joke, anyways.

"Han, please you're scaring the hoes." Soonyoung replied without missing a beat.

"Oh please, y/n is doing enough of that herself." Seokmin laughed.

It was no secret that the two had gotten very close – effortlessly navigating around one another like an old couple. They knew each other better than they knew themselves.

Soonyoung knew what made her tick, her coffee order, her favorite places to shop, and so on.

And she was the same.

Anyone could easily mistake the two as a long term couple, making the jokes from their group so easy to come.

"As if he has any." Y/n rolled her eyes.

"Because you scare them away!" Soonyoung laughed.

One iced blended makgeolli turned into three more and soon the group, aside for Soonyoung, were absolutely wasted; drunkenly singing along to the music that blasted throughout the pub. Earning looks from those sat around them.

"Alright, I think it's time to call it." Soonyoung placed two one hundred bills on the table. "I'm taking y/n home."

"I'm-" Hiccup. "Fine."

"No you're not, come on let's go." He chuckled standing from his seat, grabbing her oversized leather jacket that hung on the back of her chair along with her purse – holding out his hand.

"Boring!!!" Seokmin protested. Slurred to be exact.

He raised his brows at his friend, turning to a more coherent Jeonghan. "Are you guys good to make it home or do I need to call an uber too?"

"No, we're okay." Jeonghan shook his head slowly.

Soonyoung knew they weren't okay, but he was far too worried about the girl who was still sat in her seat – sipping on the watered down drink in front of her.

He nodded, reaching to take the drink from her hand; earning a pout before she took his hand; using it to help her up.

"Whoa." Y/n's eyes grew wide, feeling all the alcohol she had consumed take over her whole body.

Soongoyung stifled a laugh, holding her hand tighter as he felt her sway as she tried to find her balance.

"Request me on zelle if that doesn't cover it." He nodded to the two before exiting the building and straight into the uber he had requested minutes ago.

The second her and Seokmin began passing their make shift soju and spoon mic, he had secretly requested for a ride out of the establishment. He knew if he had waited any longer, y/n would have probably ordered another round for the group.

It was a short ride from the pub to her apartment, the two sitting in the back of the SUV in silence.

Mostly because he knew she was on the verge of throwing up.

Y/n could handle her alcohol pretty well. She just needed to throw up after each night out.

Nothing out of the ordinary.

Y/n threw her body on her couch, groaning as her head hit the throw pillow. "I did pretty good. Didn't puke once."

"I'm so proud of you." He chuckled, unzipping her knee high boots. "Want to keep your socks on?"

"Please."

"Water?"

She shook her head. Her stomach was filled to the brim with liquids and she knew that if she took even a sip, she may just burst.

He watched as she remained laying still in a fetal position, admiring her beauty. She wasn't do anything but breathing. Yet somehow, he couldn't help but feel his heart fill with warmth as he scanned her – her hair perfectly framing her face, despite the fact that the curls she spent nearly an hour this morning doing had fallen, her make up was still in it's place, aside from her now faded lipstick. She looked perfect as ever.

Though, he may be biased.

Soonyoung took one last look at her before walking into her room to grab a hoodie from her closet. "Sit up."

He didn't have to ask twice, allowing him to assist her put on the black hoodie. Her favorite piece to wear when she was simply lounging around her apartment or running errands.

His hoodie from the day he rescued her in the rain.

She never did return it.

...And he never asked for it back.

"Maybe I am scaring your hoes away." She hiccuped, her eyes trained on his face as he adjusted the strings.

"I don't have hoes. I was kidding."

Maybe it was the alcohol.

Or maybe it was the close proximity.

But y/n found herself replying. "Good."

"Good?" He raised his brows, absentmindedly tucking the strands that fell in front of her face behind her ears.

She hated when her hair was a mess.

"I don't like sharing."

He felt his heart skip a beat.

Y/n had never vocalized how she felt about him; and up until now, he never though she would ever. Soonyoung began to have some sort of inkling a few months ago that she may have felt the same way he does, but he never wanted to read too much into this.

Y/n had been newly single and maybe she could have just been projecting her old lingering feelings for his best friend towards him.

Besides, she was like this with Jeonghan. At least, that's what he chose to believe.

"You're really drunk." He mumbled.

"Is it so bad that I have feelings for you?"

He felt like the air in his lungs was not enough; unable to fully process her sudden confession of feelings. "N-no. But you're also about eight drinks in."

"Drunk mind is an honest one."

She was right.

As much as he had waited for this moment, which only seemed possible in his dreams, he knew it wasn't right. She was drunk and though he was coherent, he too had a slight buzz.

Soonyoung wanted to be sober when they had this conversation.

"We'll talk about this tomorrow. During breakfast."

"Do you not believe me?" She pressed.

Ninety percent of him does.

The ten percent was his demons, telling him that he would never hold a place in her heart. Not the way Mingyu did.

While he crouched in front of her in silence, trying to silence the voice in his head; he noticed her inching closer – her eyes eyeing his lips. For a split second, he allowed himself to lean in; capturing her lips.

This was their first kiss, and as much as he has been waiting for this – it felt wrong. He didn't picture the first time he kissed the girl he had been in love with for almost six years to be in her living room while she was most likely drunk out of her mind.

Not like this.

It was quick kiss, and god did they both want it to last longer.

"Tomorrow." He breathed, placing a kiss on her forehead. "I promise."

Y/n didn't care to protest anymore, knowing that he wasn't going to change his answer and allowed him to tuck her into bed.

She may be drunk, but she wasn't out of her mind. The alcohol had simply gave her the confidence to finally say what had been plaguing her mind for the past month and half.

A secret she had only disclosed to Jeonghan. Who seemed to be very thrilled of the news – claiming that the reason why he had introduced her to his frat brothers during their freshman year was because he fully expected her to hit it off with Soonyoung.

Not with Mingyu.

He had spent the last month and a half encouraging her to finally let Soonyoung know how she felt. Annoying her to be exact.

Everyone had called that somehow and at some point, she would end up falling for Soonyoung.

She couldn't pin point the exact moment when she began to allow her heart to soften to the idea of possibly seeing a future with her friend.

The one moment in her apartment while she was still dating Mingyu didn't count.

It happened so slowly that y/n did not realize that she began to yearn for his presence. He had become a part of her daily life that when he had gone away for an overseas vacation with his family, she realized how much she had missed having him blowing up her phone with all sorts of random messages and memes.

Not that he wasn't texting her while he was away; no he made sure to keep her updated. Sending her images of the activities they were doing and all the meals was eating – and she was doing the same.

It was just that, due to the time difference and lack of proper cell service, he wasn't able to reply right away.

The minute she caught herself constantly checking her phone, to see if his name had popped up in her notifications, she knew she was done for.

The inevitable had finally come and she was fully welcoming it.

He knew he didn't have to ask for permission. Especially not if it was Mingyu that ended things.

Yet, there he was, standing at his best friend's apartment door – nervously shifting his weight from one leg to another, debating whether he had made the right choice or not.

Soonyoung's head had been a mess since he left y/n's apartment, unable to complete a single thought.

All except one. He needed to make things right, starting by giving Mingyu a heads up.

If what she had said was true, he wanted to start their relationship properly.

He knew he had already overstepped the rules of the bro code; that line was far in the distance, he could no longer see it. And despite the anger he once felt for his friend, for making the girl he loves cry and breaking her heart, he didn't want to cause any ill feelings that could possibly bring tension to the whole group.

He cared far too much for the twelve boys he had spent all his college days with. A girl nearly ruined their dynamics once, he wasn't going to allow this to happen again.

Especially if he could help it.

He was willing to let go anyways. If Mingyu says no, he'll walk away.

It would be painful as hell, but he didn't care. A simple no and he would do it in a heartbeat.

Finally mustering up the courage to knock on the door, Soonyoung reached up to unbutton another button from his white collared shirt – the sounds of Mingyu's footstep approaching the door all of a sudden made him feel as though the fabric around his neck was constricting him.

"Hey, Hosh." He greeted, almost sounding like a question.

Soonyoung cleared his throat.

Here goes nothing.

"I'm not asking for permission, I think we're too grown for that but– it's been a year and you're okay and she's okay a–and–" He stammered. He was far more nervous than he had expected himself to be.

"Spit it out, dude." Mingyu chuckled.

"I'm going to try it out with y/n." Soonyoung blurted.

Mingyu blinked. "That's it?"

That was not the reaction he expected.

Y/n had always been a touchy subject between the two. Especially after that night at the gym when he nearly landed a fist on Mingyu's face.

The two avoided any topic that involved y/n. Not unless someone else in the group brought it up.

"Well, yeah– you're my best friend and she's your ex–"

Mingyu shook his head. "Like you said. We're adults. Do what makes you happy, man."

He felt like the weight on his shoulder has been lifted, a smile forming on his lips. "Thank you, dude. It really means a lot."

"I guess this is me passing the baton." Mingyu joked. "Don't fuck it up."

"Trust me, I won't." Soonyoung chuckled, feeling at ease that his friend was able to make a joke out of the situation. He was fully prepared for Mingyu to put up a fight, or at least give him a hard time.

But then again, he was dating again; having brought a girl around when they went out as a group for Seungcheol's birthday.

Unlike the previous time Mingyu had done this, he noticed that y/n had barely bat an eye at his actions.

Things had shifted.

War was over.

Soonyoung had let himself in to her apartment, grateful for the spare key she had given him when she had first moved in.

Just like all his other promises to her, he kept his word and showed up the following day to her place; ready to pick up where they had left off the night before. This time fully sober.

He had felt like he had been floating on cloud nine since last night and was not able to sleep since coming home from Mingyu's apartment. He had gotten the greenlight from both parties and now it was his time to make a move.

Soonyoung had always respected y/n, he could have easily jumped the gun the second she was single but he knew that would have been a dirty move. He knew what his friends and her friends said about him, and he didn't want to prove those rumors true.

Four years with someone was a long time, and he knew there was no way he could erase that. Soonyoung knew that if he did stand a chance in capturing her heart, it would be when y/n was fully healed from all the pain and heartache that her previous relationship has brought her.

And he waited.

Not intentionally.

He enjoyed staying right by her side with no return in his investment.

It just so happened that she managed to fall for him during this time.

He quietly began setting up her small dining table with her favorite breakfast from the restaurant they had become regulars at when they needed to nurse their hangovers.

Cinnamon french toast and lavender iced latte.

He was in the middle of filling the pink vase he had purchased along with the bouquet of white peonies when he heard the hard wood behind him creak – signaling that she had woken up.

"Morning." She croaked, rubbing her eyes with the back of her hand.

"No, no. Go back to your room." He turned his head to face her.

"Wha- no!" She laughed, trying to peer over his shoulder to see what he was up to.

"I'm trying to make a grand romantic gesture here." Soonyoung cried, moving his body to hide the flowers.

"Are those flowers?"

"Can't a guy surprise the girl he likes?" He reached to turn the tap off.

"Not when he's making so much noise!"

"I was being quiet!"

"Please, that word is not even in your dictionary. I heard you stub your toe the second you walked in."

"Who puts a fucking cabinet at the entry way!?"

"It's a shoe cabinet and you have been here so many times you still– Oh my god it's so pretty!" She gasped when he fully turned around, walking over to place the vase in the middle of the table.

Soonyoung was taken by surprise when he felt her arms wrap around his waist; feeling her warm body press up against him. It wasn't that he had never hugged her, nor have they never done this before – having been a little too clingy with one another over the past few years.

They've had their fair shares of unconscious cuddling on her couch, hand holding, and lingering hugs.

But this time it was different.

He now knows that her feelings for him was mutual, and somehow he had become very aware of her touch; feeling his cheeks grow hot.

"Thank you." She smiled up at him as he turned his head to meet her gaze.

"Did you mean what you said last night?" He asked.

"Ask one more time, and I'm taking it back."

"I was just making sure so that I could do this." Soonyoung moved his body to face her, leaning down to press a kiss on her lips – smiling instantly when he felt her melt against his touch.

"That was nice."

"We can keep kissing." He said quickly.

Y/n threw her head back and laughed, playfully hitting his chest. "You're dumb."

"You fell for it."

"Yeah, don't make me regret it."

"I'll fill this whole place with flowers, don't threaten me." He shook his finger at her. "You'll be coughing petals until you die."

"I know that was supposed to be romantic, but I'm scared."

Over time, she had learned to keep up with his jokes; almost as if they had become the same person. She had soon become quick to jump along with his bits and humor, at times egging him on.

Seungkwan's worst nightmare.

He rolled his eyes. "You're annoying."

"You fell for it."

"Yeah." He hummed happily. "Let's eat?"

The two happily ate their breakfast, welcoming the new change in the air between them. They have shared meals alone together countless times, this was nothing new.

But the unspoken words that they had yet to discuss had all of a sudden made them feel as though they were two young high schoolers who were left alone with their crush for the very first time.

In the midst of their meal, y/n couldn't help but catch him staring at her – trying her best to calm the butterflies that caused a riot in her stomach. Something that had been happening quiet often in the past month that she had been around him. But of course, this time, they seemed to have multiplied.

"Hey," Soonyoung reached over to place a hand over hers, halting her movement. "I haven't said it in a while but, always okay?"

Always had been their word to each other. It started off as a playful joke, telling each other that they would be there to always be annoying, be the butt of the joke, be there to accompany each other to any mindless errands....

It had been a minute since she had heard him say it, taking her back to the days when she had felt low and he had been there to rescue the day; bringing light into her dark days.

She tilted her head to the side. "Huh?"

"I'm always going to be here."

"I never doubted you one bit."

And it was true.

here hasn't been a day that Soonyoung had missed a call, text, or special day of hers – whether this was something minor like finally finding the Sonny Angel she had been on the hunt for or finally securing a job at the PR company she had been working so hard to interview for.

He had always been there and there was not a single ounce of doubt in her body that he would miss any in the future.

In all the mess going on around in her world, he was her only constant.

"I'm just reassuring you."

"Thank you."

tag list: @leah-rose03 @yoonzinuhh @musingsofananxiouspotato @woofie-nctzen-fanarts @hanniebanggi

«« [an]

hi friends, thank you so so so much for the love and feedback for the last two parts of the always!au.

always was meant to just be all pain and heartache but i feel like i owe my team hoshi girlies some fluff. &lt;;3

i'm currently working on one LAST installation to this au and then i promise i'll have other painful au in line. lol

disclaimer: these are writings for mature readers only. MINORS DO NOT INTERACT. don’t like it. don’t read it.

I only write for Enhypen members Heeseung/Jake/Jay/Sunghoon. you can find my NCT writing on @neopuppy

do not repost, translate, or plagiarize any of my writings.

Masterlist By Member

Heeseung:

No Panties(the boys next door)

Let Me In(the boys next door)

Given Taken(ft Jake/Jay/Sunghoon)

Creep

Crush(Creep follow up)

Like Hot Summer(ft Jake)

Just A Little Bit

Blessed Cursed(ft Sunghoon)

Give Me Fever

Bite Me

Gods & Monsters(ft Sunghoon)

Cross The Line(ft Sunghoon)

Sweet Venom(ft Jay)

Jake:

Sugar Coated(the boys next door)

Let Me In(the boys next door)

Like Hot Summer(ft Heeseung)

Jay:

Hard(the boys next door)

Eat Me Up(ft Jake)

Sweet Venom(ft Heeseung)

Sunghoon:

Hard(the boys next door)

Blessed Cursed(ft Heeseung)

Freak

Scream(Freak follow up)

Gods & Monsters(ft Heeseung)

Release Me, Embrace Me

Cross The Line(ft Heeseung)

Series

The Boys Next Door: featuring Heeseung/Jake/Jay/Sunghoon

Loves The Death of Peace of Mind: idol Heeseung x stylist female reader(one shot)

He’s a young, talented, ambitious idol with so much left to show the world, so many lives and careers riding on his existence.

And you, you are replaceable. You are just another stylist, one of many. Nothing spectacular, nothing unique to set you above the rest, despite what your insistent boss may say.

Boss. That’s what he called himself whenever you’d disagree or demand he find someone else to assist him through the next comeback.

‘You’re the only one who chooses clothing that flatters me right, no one else ever understands my body the way you do.’

The implication was subtle, but enough. Enough to make your skin crawl and lurch away from his sneaking fingers trailing up the side of your thigh. 

‘Now now, you know better than to do that.’

Brat. A God damn insolent brat.

‘This is inappropriate work behavior.’ Heeseung smiled sweetly, gaze softened as he fiddled with the hem of your skirt. “This is inappropriate work behavior.” He says, pulling you closer to stay put between his thighs. “I’ve already told you multiple times, it’s better if you stand here while doing my makeup.”

Weird Science: nerd Heeseung x female reader x nerd Jake(one shot)

“At this rate the next solar eclipse will pass before we lose our virginities.” Jake sighs, dropping the binoculars hung from his neck to lay back down by Heeseung’s side.

“That’s not too bad? What? Another two? Four years?”

“Heeseung, please! I can't even stand another few months! My palms starting to form painful callouses!” Jake snaps, shooting back up to glare at his relaxed best friend. “We need to get laid this summer.”

Heeseung grunts, propping up onto his elbows. “Remember that 80’s movie? Weird Science?”

“The one where they created a girl?” Jake’s eyebrows furrow as he tries to recall. “Yeah, that was ridiculous.”

“Ridiculous, or brilliant.” Heeseung fully sits up, sharing a curious look with his friend. “I mean, maybe it’s ridiculous but it’s not like we have anything better to do.”

“You want to create a girl?” Jake would slap him if he didn’t fear losing his balance on the rooftop, sporting a displeased expression instead. “Is this a side effect of jerking off 5 times a day?”

“Only 5?” Heeseung grins, nudging into his side. “We create a girl and your little sore hand problem can be solved, think about it.”

Here.. Kitty Kitty: puppy hybrid Jake x female kitten hybrid reader(one shot)

many households took to owning hybrids as nothing more than simply companions, in rare instances for sexual pleasure.

you’d lucked out tremendously as a Persian hybrid kitten auctioned at a high-end buyer’s event to garner the attention of a very wealthy couple.

life in a penthouse with your own bedroom fully equipped with every toy and treat you desire couldn’t have been more dreamy. from fluffing your tail up and decorating it with designer bows to trolloping around town freely, you had nothing to complain about.

until Jake showed up.

“he’s a golden retriever hybrid.” Mr. Sim informed as he scratched the backs of a rambunctious mutt's ears. “have been on a waiting list to acquire this breed for months now.”

“his name is Jake, kitten.” your owner went on, pinching the bouncy pup’s cheek before offering him a treat. “for now he’ll be staying in your room.”

“MY bedroom?!” you squaked, sniffing the air around you in a disgusted manner, ignored as your owner departed leaving you alone with the newly purchased puppy hybrid.

sporting a much too large smile with his canines on full display, Jake hoists a bag onto his shoulder, nudging into your side roughly. “looks like you’re going to have to make room for me on that bed, kitty.”

Sk8r Boi: jake x female reader(the boys next door)

“stare much?”

Jake blinks, looking off to his side when you glare at him as you smoothly swoop past him on your board. 

he wasn’t staring, not really. maybe just a little bit. especially when his knee stung at the sight of you breezing around ramps with a cocky gleam in your eye. he silently wished you’d lose your poised balance and fall so he could laugh at you as you had just the day before.

mostly, he silently wished you would push him down again.

Cum Undone: sunghoon x female reader(the boys next door)

“I was serious when I said you should workout with me!”

Sunghoon calls out, catching you sneaking out to grab the mail with a hoodie pulled over your head to avoid his attention.

“no thanks.” you say quietly, waving him off.

“aw come on! scared of getting a little sweaty?” he pauses curling weights to fix you with a shit- eating grin. “you didn’t seem to mind it yesterday! or maybe, you don’t care about making a mess with my cock filling you up.”

“Sunghoon!!” 

Drip: jay x female reader(the boys next door)

“Jay? you’re.. a lifeguard?”

a displeased huff and sharp side profile serve you lack of response and a cold shoulder; illuminated by bright sunlight surrounding his statuesque figure up on his raised chair, making it even easier to ignore you.

“is this why you haven’t been around lately?”

he grunts, glaring at you from above with a white strip of sunscreen painted on the bridge of his nose reducing intimidation from his scowl. “maybe you’d know that if you weren’t too busy getting your back blown out by Sunghoon.”

The More I Hurt The More I Want You: heeseung x female reader(one shot)

“I suppose Yeonjun will always be the one that got away, won’t he dear?”

humiliation lodges your throat, stroking a finger against the condensation collecting on the side of the champagne flute you’ve been nursing throughout the evening. firmly lifting your chin with a tight smile, a laugh worthy of being nominated for an Academy Award exits to feign off your initial surprise.

“forever a bridesmaid, never the bride.” another voice chortles. the crowd of elders surrounding you falling into a discussion of potential suitors they have in mind for you.

“that won’t be necessary.” Heeseung approaches, gently placing his arm around your shoulders, tipping the glass of bubbly fluid in his hold toward yours to clink together.

“Heeseung?” 

“we’ve been dating for about 5 months now?” he replies to his mother, a soft smirk playing on his lips. 

“wha—“

“no better time to announce my relationship than at my older brother’s engagement party, right?”

Bodies Bodies Bodies: heeseung/jake/jay/sunghoon x female reader(one shot)

“who wants to play bodies bodies bodies?”

the whites of Sunghoon’s eyes are full of red broken lines coated with moisture. he’s light-headed already, glancing around the circle you’ve formed with an amused smirk. 

“hate that game.” Heeseung says next to him, peeling at the label on a warm bottle in his hand. “I never get to be the killer.”

“what’s bodies bodies bodies?” you question, gaining the attention from 4 sets of eyes filling up with excitement.

“glad you asked.”