Babiest Girl of All @bbgbonald - Tumblr Blog

BROKEN CLOCKS — jwy ⋆˙⟡

[ex-husband!wooyoung x ex-wife!reader] third & final part of the wifey series! (for real this time) smut minors dni 18+ | spoilers in the warnings: pregnant reader, mentions/thoughts about abortion, divorce, walking wooyoung like a dog, wooyoung being wooyoung lol, tooth rotting fluff, pinv, fingering, creampie, in-love sex | wc 19K thank you so much for reading and interacting with me during the stretch of this series, it's kept me motivated and excited to write, i am so grateful to every single person who reblogged or commented or sent me an ask. i love u fr and i will miss them BADDD

“Did you know mommy’s sick?”

Just past five thirty on a Tuesday night Wooyoung finished eating dinner with Kyungmin, a meal he threw together quick and easy after he picked his son up from after-school care. Standing at his kitchen sink, he turned around to eye his eight year old with a singular eyebrow raised. “Sick?”

“She keeps throwing up,” Kyungmin, eyes focused on his screen laid on top of the kitchen island counter, didn’t spare Wooyoung a glance as he spoke. “All. Day. Long. Yesterday, she threw up while she was driving me home from school.”

Wooyoung fully turned around at that, brows knitted together, kitchen sink still running, the titanium holding three more dishes he still had to wash. “While she was driving? Or did she pull over?”

His son looked at him with such an incredulous look it made Wooyoung feel a little stupid for asking the question. With a little giggle, Kyungmin answered, “She pulled over, duh.”

“Okay, attitude,” Wooyoung is always amused whenever he sees you in your son, even if he thinks Kyungmin is all him. Sitting in the same clothes he wore to school today, a tee shirt, loose jeans that Wooyoung bought him, his favorite Elsa and Anna socks, his eyes went right back to his tablet, the case bright green against the deep granite countertop. “Did she go to the doctor?”

His kid shrugged.

“Kyungmin,” Wooyoung’s tone was stronger, beckoning for his son’s attention. The boy lifted his eyes away from his screen as Wooyoung asked, “Has she said anything about it?”

“Just said she’s sick,” Kyungmin shrugged again, sounding irritated that Wooyoung was taking him away from his screen time, “she told me not to tell you.”

Wooyoung’s smirk was anything but involuntary. His son, indeed. “But you’re telling me anyway?”

“It’s stinky,” he uttered, crinkling his nose as he said it. A little quieter, a little smaller, he mumbled, “And it’s scary.”

“Don’t be scared,” Wooyoung soothed, turning off the kitchen sink before leaning his elbows on the granite, leaning over the countertop so he can be eye-to-eye with his son. “Mommy’s okay, I promise.”

Kyungmin lifted his eyes, a twinkle of fear swirling in whiskey, eyes that were identical to his own. He whispered, “How do you know?”

It made sense then, why he hasn’t been served papers. Even if it fills him with hope, he knows there’s a long fucking way to go before actual progress is made, although it’s already been over two months since that dreadful night on your living room floor. He expected to be served within two weeks, maybe three, but nine have passed and nothing, not a whisper about his least favorite word that starts with D.

God knows he hasn’t brought it up.

“Because daddy’s always right,” Wooyoung gleamed, and the smile made the corner of Kyungmin’s lips curve upward. Wooyoung’s head tilted, “Aren’t I?”

Kyungmin shook his head, “No.”

“Boo,” Wooyoung’s lip lifted, dragging out the word in a sneer. “Come on, I was right this morning when I said making bunny ears with your shoe laces is easier, right?” Kyungmin’s lips pursed like he was trying to fight his smile from growing. Wooyoung made his way around the kitchen counter, coming up behind Kyungmin, “And I was right earlier when I said you’re still ticklish, wasn’t I?”

His hands jumped for Kyungmin’s sides, and his heart sang listening to his son’s loud, wild giggles. He stopped tickling to wrap his arms around him in a tight hug, planting a kiss to the top of his head. “Daddy’s always right, and I said mommy’s gonna be just fine, so trust me, okay?”

Just fine. Nine weeks of pick-ups and drop-offs damn near silent, everything was so fucking far from fine he’s barely slept in weeks. He finally came clean with his therapist, who he hoped and prayed had something legally binding her from reporting his lawyer in some way, which might be the result of leftover anxiety from doing such a thing in the first place.

He should have waited. He probably shouldn’t have done it at all, but he did, and he should have fucking waited to tell you. If you’re pregnant, which he’d place a million dollar bet on if you’re throwing up–if this pregnancy was anything like your pregnancy with Kyungmin–he could have waited until you were farther along. Hell, he could have waited until the baby was born.

Any time would have been better than the time he chose. When you two were on better terms, smoother terms, he should have told you then. When it might’ve felt like everything was falling into place. Instead he ripped things apart all over again, and now they’re worse than they were to begin with and fuck he was back to square one or even something before that. Square negative ten.

His therapist wouldn’t agree with any of that, but whatever. He’s losing his mind. But the little boy in his arms is keeping that singular thread of rationality stronger than steel.

“Come on, stinky, shower time.”

“I’m not stinky,” Kyungmin huffs, “you’re stinky. You smell like… you smell like my butt.”

Wooyoung raises his brows at the little’s head tipped backward into his stomach, “So your butt is stinky?”

Kyungmin smiles, “No.”

“Okay, so maybe we’ll go to bed early tonight, since you forgot how to make sense,” he lifts his son by his armpits onto the floor, and the tablet dangles from his right hand, which Wooyoung scoops up with his own. “This screen is frying your stinky brain.”

“You have a stinky brain,” Kyungmin points, then turns on his heel, giggling just as wild and just as loud all the way to the bathroom.

“This stinky brain created you,” Wooyoung calls after him. “If I’m stinky, you’re stinky!”

“You’re the stinky one!”

Wooyoung can’t help the snort that rips from his nose as he throws the tablet onto his couch, making his way towards the bathroom in the middle of the singular hallway in his entire apartment. Almost-bachelor-pad, Yunho and Aurora had called it. “Then I’ll take a shower after you, stinky boy. Do you need help with the faucet?”

“Yes, please!”

His smile doesn’t leave the entire time he’s in the bathroom. Turning on the faucet to the right temperature, helping Kyungmin with his shirt that got stuck going over his head, even smelling Kyungmin’s stinky socks that really were fucking stinky. Hearing his son laugh again, his favorite sound in the world, he remembers the days he could hold the boy over one forearm like it was yesterday.

Fuck, and he might have another? Another shot at creating a life? Hearing his baby laugh for the first time? Take their first steps? Hear their first word? Another child to see himself in, to see you in, a life created by both of you, by the time he’s spread out on the couch half-listening to Kyungmin singing a song from Kpop Demon Hunters, somehow he mindlessly got his phone out, your contact information on the screen.

Somehow.

You don’t pick up on his first try. So he calls again.

“Is Kyungmin okay?”

You sound like summertime. Even if your voice is ebbed in panic, burnt at the edges like you’re trying to contain the flame, you sound like the morning of August twenty-third, the morning he met you, fifteen years ago.

“He’s fine–”

“What do you want?”

The flame burns freely once more.

He didn’t really think this far. Tongue-tied, he sputters over his next words, “I- um, just- uh–”

“Wooyoung,” your voice is stern, a warning. It doesn’t help how each one of his limbs has seemed to lock up. “What do you want?”

“You.” Fuck his brain and his vocal chords for not working as a team. He lets the following pause settle, hoping you’d take it as a joke, at least. If this was a month ago you would’ve hung up as soon as he said Kyungmin’s fine.

“Well you fucked that up,” you say matter-of-factly, as if he didn’t know it down to his very fucking soul. Closing his eyes, bringing his palm to his forehead, he sighs. “Is there anything in particular that requires you calling my phone at six o’clock on a Tuesday?”

“Am I allowed to talk to you?”

“No.”

“What?” There’s a part of him that feels like throwing the same tantrum Kyungmin threw yesterday. “Why not?”

“Because you’re a deceitful, selfish asshole, and a pain in my fucking ass.”

His lips thin, face going flat. Can he blame any of this on pregnancy hormones yet?

“Look–”

“No.”

“Please–”

“No.”

“Holy shit can I please just fucking–”

“No.”

And the line runs dead. Sighing, he runs a hand through his hair, throwing his phone on the couch beside him. He groans after watching it bounce to the floor, sinking deeper into the tough, barely broken-in cushions, knees spreading, he’s really fucking close to throwing that tantrum.

“About nine weeks.”

“Nine?!” Your eyes blow wide, staring at your doctor who’s brown hair curls deliciously around his ears. The word came out no prettier than a loud shriek of terror. “Jesus fucking Christ, I didn’t realize I was that far along.”

“You don’t sound particularly joyful,” Yeosang’s smile doesn’t quite reach his assessing eyes, your doctor but also one of your closest friends. “Which brings my next question, where’s your husband?”

Your eyes thin, “Where’s your wife?”

He lifts the probe from your stomach, popping a brow. He sounds like he’s choosing his words carefully, despite the spark of curiosity in the smooth rasp of his voice, “Got it, won’t ask any more questions in that department. She’s at home with the girls, by the way.”

“Yeah, yeah, happily married and whatever the fuck,” you huff, the paper beneath your head crinkling as it falls back onto the examination seat, chair, table, whatever it is that’s abhorrently uncomfortable beneath your body. “Please wipe the jelly off me before I flip shit.”

Yeosang laughs at that, a tiny giggle under his breath, “Does he even know you’re pregnant?”

“Hell no,” you respond, cringing as he takes a towel to your lower belly, wiping softly.

Yeosang’s head snaps to yours, “Is it his?”

You pull your shirt over your stomach, tugging the paper towels out of the waistband of your leggings, threatening to throw them at him by crumpling them up and holding them over your shoulder. “Whose else would it be, motherfucker?”

“Damn,” Yeosang mumbles, taking a step back, “you’re a bundle of sunshine right now.”

“I’m irritated,” you grind out. “I’m pregnant and still fucking married to my stupid fucking husband.”

“You don’t have to be pregnant,” Yeosang sits back on his stool, a small, blue cushion on wheels. He rolls toward the counter across the room, grabbing his clipboard, “You don’t have to be married, either.”

You sit up on the table, arms planted behind you, knees spread, head tilted. “I know.”

“I’m not gonna ask for details,” he looks up at you over his clipboard, eyes deep, comforting, radiating intelligence. Doctor’s eyes. “But you have options, and support. Obviously you have my silence, too.”

“Thanks,” you shoot him a grim smile before running your fingers through your hair. “Do you and Keni ever think about having more?”

“Two girls is enough,” Yeosang laughs a little. “Winnie is bad as hell. Nina’s good, though, she sleeps like a fuckin’ tank.”

“Kyungmin slept, too,” your smile is a little more genuine at the mention of Kyungmin, but knowing there’s more to discuss brings the frown right back. “I don’t know what I’m gonna do. I guess I should tell him first.”

Yeosang stands again, “You have some time, do whatever feels right. He doesn’t have to know, either, it’s your choice. Call me and I’ll write you a script if you need it, okay?”

“Thanks, Yeo,” your smile is so close so being real it almost surprises you–the amount of real smiles have been few and far between for the past nine weeks. “Do you need anything from me? Am I good to go?”

“Call me with a decision and then we’ll have the baby talk,” he nods, so sure of himself, so unlike the guy who’s lawn you used to loose your guts on after hazy nights at the bar. Anything before Wooyoung feels like nothing but a fever dream now, any life you had, any experiences.

You sure as hell haven’t gotten any more after him, if after him ever even existed.

With a few waves to some nurses and technicians in goodbye, you trudged your pregnant ass back to your car. An SUV, one big as shit and black, the interior was a sauna after forty-five minutes inside Yeosang’s practice. You were lucky to have him, your friend of a decade now; you met him when he was still studying to get his PhD, when his wife was still his girlfriend, and the two were just happy to be out of their university and settled into something small while Yeosang finished out his schooling. Nights out at the local bars when you were still on the prowl for a man, before you ended up stuck with stupid fucking Wooyoung the moment you walked into corporate city.

It didn’t feel good, knowing there was a life forming inside you, and he wasn’t there to hold your hand through it all. That was easy to admit, but to get over the breach of trust, to ruin all the growth you thought you made with three words, we’re still married. You still spent a year alone, taking care of Kyungmin without any help from him, but you thought you were alone. No ties.

Just to find out you were still married the entire time.

Call me with a decision.

You sighed, feeling the sweat forming at the base of your neck, taking it as a sign to flip the engine and get out of Yeosang’s parking lot. A dim hum of music pours through the speakers, a stupid love song playing, you bare your teeth as a low curse sneaks from between your lips. Even the universe wanted you to call him.

He answers on the first ring.

On speaker, his already loud voice is amplified in your car, filling the cabin of the SUV. “Are you okay?”

You make a face, brows twisted, lips curled, not that he could see you. “Yes? I’m fine. What are you doing?”

“I’m working.” You could almost see him, making the same confused expression that you wore. “Why?”

You glance at the time at the top left corner of the screen before asking, “Can you meet me for an early lunch?”

“Ofcourseareyoukiddingme–”

You try to scowl, but your lips lift at the corners without you allowing them to. “‘Kay. You know where.”

“You know I do.”

It took every single second of your twenty-two minute drive from Yeosang’s practice to Genesis to calm your heart rate, to get all of your thoughts in order. You haven’t spoken to Wooyoung other than a few small arguments over the past nine weeks, all resulting in you hanging up the phone before he could get more than six words out. You didn’t want to hear his explanation, whatever reasoning he’s made up in his brain that’s convinced him any of this is okay.

He’s waiting in the same booth you always shared. And for a second, maybe less, he looks like he did fifteen years ago. Face smoothed out, not a line or a wrinkle to be seen, his hair is longer, his eyes are brighter– but the illusion is gone as soon as it's created.

Because he’s there, he’s smiling, he’s waiting for you. And fuck your heart for picking up speed, for the trickle of sweat at the back of your neck, fuck your brain for remembering that shred of hope you had nine weeks ago. For thinking everything would fall into place, that you could be normal again, that your divorce might’ve been a mistake.

“Hi, wifey.”

He’s surrounded by brown leather and sunshine, the worn, wrinkled booth making his two-piece suit look out of place. Tall windows douse him in warmth, whiskey eyes glowing amber where the sun catches, his skin so glossy it's almost wet. Fuck him, most of all, for being this fucking beautiful, for becoming impossibly more gorgeous with age.

Your top lip curls, “It’s not funny or cute anymore, Wooyoung.”

“There was a time when it was?” He wears a pretty smile, one corner of his mouth lifted in that sinful fucking smirk, showcasing his pointed teeth.

You slip into the other side of the booth and you wish the movement was more graceful, but after years of use the leather isn’t as flexible as it once was, and neither are you. You can remember coming here when you’d just started working three doors down, seeing Wooyoung morning after morning, you can still remember his coffee order, not that it's changed.

If the walls only knew what they created, what would become of the two of you. Maybe they would’ve whispered a secret to you, maybe they’d say don’t let the pretty boy buy you a coffee. Not that you would’ve listened.

“I’m not here to catch up,” you huff a breath, throwing your purse into the space beside you. He’s watching you intently, taking in every detail, every expression, every movement like he’s waiting for something.

“Okay.” It’s an absent-minded word, his eyes dancing around your face, your body, distracted.

Your brows knit together, “Hello?”

His eyes find yours, and like you’d pushed the on button, his smile returns. “Hi, beautiful.”

“We need to talk,” you cross your arms over the table in front of you, back slouched. He nods, face blank of any expression, ready for whatever you’d throw at him. Ball in hand, prepared to pitch, a waitress cuts you off before you even had the chance to speak, placing two plates between you.

Then you notice the water placed just to your left, the coffee already half-drank before Wooyoung. Your brows furrowed so fucking far together they might as well be considered a unibrow.

Thanking the waitress, Wooyoung looks at you warily for a second before he speaks. “I didn’t know if you… wanted coffee, so I just got you water. And what you always used to order when we came here for lunch.”

“The same trick won’t work twice,” your eyes thin, remembering the dinner you shared nine weeks ago. “But thank you.”

His smile is small, his lips mostly flat, pulled up ever so slightly at the edges. “Figured you needed a bite to eat, but I know you’re just here to talk. Go ahead.”

A meal you’ve eaten a thousand times, one that’s always smelled so fucking good your mouth watered, now smelled… wrong. Different, gross. You feel the familiar curling in your stomach, the same one you’ve felt four times a fucking day for the past two weeks, you grab the glass of water and bring it to your lips before your body forces you to gag.

Wooyoung, two hands already curled around his sandwich, halts his movement entirely, like someone pressed pause. “You okay?” You nodded mid-sip, swallowing down the water like it’d fix the issue. Slowly, Wooyoung lowers the sandwich back to his plate, “Are you sure?”

All you can get out is a measly “Yeah.” It wasn’t convincing.

The smell hit your nose again– worse, your stomach flipped, skin going hot, blood sizzling. Panic floods you, heartbeat picking up, you look over your shoulder, finding the bathroom where it’s always been, stored in the corner.

You can hear ceramic sliding against wood, Wooyoung sliding your plate toward himself. He juts his chin in the direction of the bathroom, “Go. It'll be gone when you come back out.”

You find his eye, being met with understanding so fucking clear you wonder if Yeosang called him. You know he didn’t, he wouldn’t break your trust– there was no time to think about it, you sprinted to the fucking corner with one thought on repeat in your mind: Hold it until you reach the bathroom.

You can barely feel your knees crunch against tile for the entire six minutes you’re in the clean, air-conditioned space. When the wave of nausea washes away and all that’s left is the lingering, mild dizziness and slight embarrassment from emptying your guts in a public bathroom, you wash your hands, cup some water into your mouth to wash out the taste of stomach acid, then take a few steadying breaths before walking outside again.

It feels brighter, somehow. Loud, music playing, people dressed in business casual keeping the place buzzing, servers running around, yelling orders over the counter. It eases you further, knowing that no one knows, that no one heard.

When you get back to the booth, he’s quick to let you know that one person knows. He knows.

With full confidence, he says it like he was the one telling you, “You’re pregnant.”

“Surprise” is all you can say, it’s flat, void of warmth or joy. You fall into the booth, bones heavy, forehead still sweaty. You reach for the water again, sucking down more of the ice-cold liquid, willing it to flush out the disgusting feeling that refuses to leave just yet.

“Holy shit,” he says under his breath, eyes widening as he sinks into the booth, drowning in brown leather. “How long have you known? How far along?”

You smack your teeth, “I’ve known for two weeks, but I’m nine weeks along.”

“Nine?!” His eyes nearly fall out of his head, leaning forward again, his upper half hanging over the now cleared-off wood. “Have you seen Yeosang yet?”

“I just left.” You prop an elbow onto the table, leaning your temple into your fist, your tone coming out casual.

Wooyoung’s breath catches, his voice shrinking. “You went without me?”

You nod, “We didn’t really talk about the baby, just that I’m pregnant with one. He told me to call him back with a decision and then we’d discuss.”

“A decision?” Wooyoung’s perfectly maintained brows furrow. “What kind of decision?”

“Whether I’m having my liar husband’s baby or not,” you answer quick, sharp. Your words land like a blow, you watch his face bend, softening into something less excited, less shocked.

He’s quiet for a moment, eyes finding the table, processing your words, letting them sink in. There's a beat of silence and you can hear the room again, the music, the chatter, dress shoes against the floor, servers yelling orders. You let him sit in the silence, in the thought.

He looks up again, voice small, nervous, curious, “Are you leaning a certain way, or…?”

You shrug. “I don’t know what the fuck to do, Wooyoung. I don’t want to have a baby alone, but I don’t want anything to do with you, either.”

“I know.” His elbows find the table, rubbing his face with his palms, heaving a rough breath into his hands. Finally sinking back into the booth, he takes another pause before he says, “I fucked up bad, and again, I’m sorry. I’ll be here for you no matter what you decide.”

Your face morphs into surprise. “Really?”

“Yes, really,” he nods, but he doesn’t smile. “Whatever you want, I want.”

“Damn, fuck you for being a good guy,” you smack your teeth, and his brows furrow, a smile daring to curl his lips. “You’re fucking stupid, but you’re like, morally good. And you’re not helping with my decision-making.”

A laugh pushes through his lips, one relieved and confused all at once. “Did you expect me to flip the table and demand you keep it?”

“I don’t know what I expected,” you shrug, shaking your head. “Not that, but I don’t know, maybe a little push back, I guess. Not that I want that, please don’t do that–”

“I had a friend,” he cuts himself off, “Aurora went through that, I went through it with her–”

“You went through it with her–?”

“No!” It comes out loud, sudden. “No, it was Yunho’s–”

“Yunho’s?”

“Jesus Christ let me get one sentence out.” He waits for your sheepish nod before he continues, “Yunho got her pregnant before she was ready to have a kid, we were still in school and really close at that time, I helped her through it, the whole thing. Decision-making, actually doing it, I was in the room with her, I was present for the whole process, start to finish. The choice is very much yours.”

You’re quiet for a moment. “How was she… after?”

“Not pregnant.”

“Wooyoung,” you warn.

He sighs, “Not good, but she didn’t regret it.”

You sit back in the booth, sweaty back hitting the cool leather. Your lips scrunch to one side, “It’s too heavy, all of it. I don’t know if I can forgive you for lying to me, Wooyoung.”

“I can’t blame you,” he answers simply with a shrug, like he knows he’s made in his bed and he’s willing to die in it. “I wouldn’t forgive me, either. But please just… don’t forget I didn’t have any bad intentions. I love you and Kyungmin so fucking much.”

Your face finds your palms, elbows propped up on the table, fingers sliding back into your hair. “I know you didn’t, I know, that makes everything so much more confusing. We’re not kids anymore.”

“Take your time, jagi,” he leans forward onto the table, one arm laying across the wood, fingers landing beside one of your elbows, ghosting your skin like he was scared to touch you. “You don’t have to make a decision today. Sleep on it, sleep on it for a few days, for as long as you can.”

Your eyes land on his palm laid open, wanting so badly to put your hand in his own, to feel the comfort only he can give you. You cross your arms over the table instead.

Throat feeling tight, you will your emotions to stay deep below the surface as you whisper, “I’m tired of making decisions by myself, Wooyoung.”

“I can’t help you with this one, baby,” he frowns, head tilting, keeping his open hand as close to you as he can without touching you. “You know where I stand, how I feel, and you know I’ll be beside you every step of the way with whatever you choose.”

Your face scrunches ever so slightly, “Will you? Because you not being beside me is what got us here in the first place, Woo.”

He pulls his arm back into himself and you can feel the loss of heat even if he hasn’t touched you. “I have a lot to make up for,” he sounds solemn, but not apprehensive. Confident like he knows he’ll have the opportunity to do it. “I meant everything I said when we went out to dinner that night, every single word. I still mean it, I still want to do everything I can to fix us.”

You swallow down your tears, but they still fill your waterline, heavy and hot and salty. “I don’t know if you can fix us, Woo. I don’t think… I don’t think you can.”

As if he wasn’t going back to work in less than a half hour, tears fill his waterline, too. He tightens his mouth to stop his bottom lip from quivering, but you catch it, and you understand the feeling so fucking deeply it makes your own tears fall.

You sit in silence, the world resuming around you all over again. Shouts and shoes and bass, filling the space between you, the wooden table feeling a mile long. Too far away, too much space, too much time spent in grief to come back together. Two people with a past and nothing more.

“Alright,” he says after a few minutes, voice distraught. Swallowing down his tears, ignoring the red that’s bloomed across his cheeks, his neck, he acts like you can’t see that you just shattered his entire world. “If you need anything, if you need me to take Kyungmin, whatever you need, I’m a phone call away.”

Guilt swirls, heavy and leaden and too similar to the nausea you’re nearly used to at this point. Immediately you want to take your words back, even if they’re true, even if you mean them, your heart fucking aches, everything aches. He gets up from his side of the booth, walking around to your side, leaning in with one knee digging into brown leather just to press a kiss on the top of your head.

It feels too much like goodbye.

“I love you,” he says quietly, small enough that you aren’t sure you were supposed to hear it.

Looking up at him, you can’t bring yourself to say it back. He waits for it, lingering just long enough, but he nods with the silence, with the finality of it all, and then he’s gone. Just like that.

Wooyoung stares at the stack of papers on his desk.

On the first read, his heart was so deep in his ass it almost emptied out on the desk chair beneath him. On the second read, tears fell, so many fucking tears he had to reschedule his one o’clock and his two o’clock meeting. On the third read, he decided you’re creative, serving him divorce papers with the same exact disclosures and framing of the fake-divorce Wooyoung curated over a year ago.

An hour later, he’s just pissed off that you served him. That you had some random fuck drop off legal documents at his job, where forty other people work in very close capacity. They can all go fuck themselves if they had anything to say about him, about his marriage, but for you to do that to him? You couldn’t have just handed them to him when he picked up Kyungmin yesterday? This must be why you hid from him, why you’ve been fucking hiding from him, sending Kyungmin out to his car before he had the chance to get out of the driver’s seat. It feels petty, childish. Maybe he deserves it.

His jaw clenches harder the longer he stares, molars grinding to the point of near-injury. His fists curl over his thighs, the rest of his body so locked up he isn’t sure if he can even move right now. He has thirty days to respond. Thirty days to process the fact that he’s no longer a married man. Thirty days to try and fix what he uprooted at his job almost four months ago, with the idea that all of his newfound spare time would be going to you. Thirty days to process that he ruined the best fucking thing that’s ever happened to him.

His anger’s gone straight to his head by the time he picks up his phone. Holding it up to his ear, he waits for it to go through before he says, “Can I ask a favor?”

There’s noise in the background, a baby crying, fabric or something rough bristling against the speaker. After a moment of nothing but noise, Aurora’s voice comes through, out of breath as she says, “What’s up?”

“Can you take Kyungmin home with you when you pick up Aden from school today? I’ll pick him up later.”

There’s a pause before she carefully responds, “Yo’s picking him up, but yeah, I’ll tell him. Can I ask why?”

“She served me papers. She’s divorcing me.”

Aurora gasps, “You’re fucking lying.”

Wooyoung runs his free hand over his face, groaning out his frustration, “I need to go over there and talk to her. I haven’t seen her, haven’t talked to her other than a few texts, I don’t even know if she’s still fucking pregnant, Ro.”

“Yes, absolutely, go over there.” Wooyoung can hear her nodding, her voice reassuring as ever, already in plan-mode, search and rescue. “I’m so sorry, Wooyo.”

His heart still laying heavy in the pit of his stomach, he sighs, sitting back in his chair, the tips of his fingers meeting his eyes. “I should’ve seen this coming, but it’s only been two weeks since I met with her at Genesis. Two weeks, and it’s been almost three months since the night I told her we were still married.”

“You said it felt like the end, though, didn’t it?”

Wooyoung deflates in his rickety office chair. “I did say that, didn’t I?”

“It’s either you fight for it, or let it end, Woo.” She sounds as sad as he feels, even if he can hear the thirteen other things she’s doing while talking to him. “But you should definitely talk to her before you do anything.”

He sits with the notion for a second: fight it, or let it end. He’s been fighting it, discreetly for over a year, he only got a chance to do it loud and proud for what, six weeks? Not long enough. There’s so much fight left in him that he nearly gets up from the chair and walks to your office building. Letting it end isn’t even a fucking option.

“I don’t want it to end,” he says, twirling the chair around, facing the floor-to-ceiling windows at the back of his office. Eyes landing on the building across the street, he stares at the tiny square that’s yours, wishing he could see you in the room behind the tinted window.

“I know.” She sighs, then mumbles something cheery to Sunnie before adding, “It might be what’s best for the two of you. Especially if she isn’t having the baby, you’ve already been co-parenting with Kyungmin for over a year, maybe this is best, Woo.”

“No,” the word comes out harsher than he intended. “It’s not about the baby or Kyung, it’s about us, and I’m not letting her go. I’m not giving up.”

Wooyoung can see her frown, her lips pinned to one side, knowing exactly where the giving up part came from. “Talk to her,” she keeps her voice light, positive before her mom-voice comes out, “but don’t go in there with guns blazing, Jung Wooyoung. Fill me in later when you pick up Kyungmin.”

“Thanks, Ro.”

“I mean it, Woo,” she warns. “Don’t flip out.”

“Got it.”

Easier to say than do, when the stack of papers on his desk was as thick as two of his fingers. His teeth grind again, jaw clenching, he decides he’s done with work today, he can finish whatever the fuck he didn’t do today, tomorrow. Work will be here tomorrow, but he won’t have a wife tomorrow if he doesn’t do something.

He’s already in your driveway when you get home from work. Pulling your car onto the blacktop, your heart pounds in your chest as you kill the engine, legs already shaky as you hop down from the lifted seat. You hear him before you see him, and not one word out of his mouth sounds happy.

“What is this?”

Comfortable clothes, basketball shorts on his legs, a hoodie over his chest, he holds up the thick file you sent directly to his office. His hair was already blowing in the breeze, long strands flipping over to the other side of his head, framing his face that’s angled in frustration.

“Papers,” you answer simply, walking around to the other side of your car, opening up the passenger side door for your purse. At least he hasn’t noticed yet.

“You’re divorcing me?” He follows, standing behind you, voice strained, edged in stress, anger.

You close the passenger side door behind you, “We’re already divorced, Wooyoung, I’m just making it official this time.”

He follows you up the side of your driveway, through the path leading up to your small porch, speaking with each step. “You couldn’t have just told me? Why the fuck did you serve me at my job?”

You’re the epitome of patience as you unlock your front door, walking inside like he wasn’t steaming behind you. “I didn’t want to speak to you, just like I haven’t wanted to speak to you for the past two months. Nothing new.”

He follows, you don’t stop him. “You could have talked to me about this. You didn’t need to make a spectacle out of me, you know how many people work in my building.”

You spin on your heel, spitting every single word, “You could have told me we weren’t really divorced. You could have told me Aurora named her kid after you and made you the godfather. You could have just been here in the first place and I never would have had to fucking divorce you!”

His jaw clenches, fist curling around the stack of papers at his side. “This could have been as amicable as it was the first time.”

“The first time wasn’t fucking real!” You turn again, heading toward your kitchen. “Leave, Wooyoung. Actually, sign the papers and leave them here.”

He stops on one side of the island, you on the other. He throws the stack on the marble countertop, “I’m not signing them.”

You put your purse down on the counter, staring at him over the space of the counter. “What do you mean, you’re not signing them?”

“I don’t want a divorce,” he says so simply it makes you laugh in disbelief.

“You don’t want one?” Your brows raise, the smile on your lips anything but amused, “Too fucking bad, I do. If you don’t sign then it’ll default and you can’t fight anything.”

“Then I’ll fight it,” he shrugs, whiskey eyes wide and wild, “I’ll fight all of it.”

You sigh, grabbing your water bottle, turning around to empty it into your sink behind you. With your free hand holding your back, one leg holding all your weight, you hear his shoes against the hardwood as he walks around the island.

“You’re fucking pregnant,” he says it like he can’t believe it. Looking over your shoulder, his eyes are glued to your middle, impossibly wider now, filled with shock, disbelief. He meets your gaze again, repeating himself, “You’re fucking pregnant.”

You look down, frowning as you realize the dress you put on this morning wasn’t the tiny, almost invisible bump from your insane fucking husband. Of course he noticed. “No shit,” you say as you flip your empty water bottle on the rack to let it dry, completely unphased. Turning to face him, you hold the fabric tight to your belly as you admit, “Eleven weeks now.”

Slowly, one of his hands covers his mouth, his brows furrowing as he stares at the tiny bump that could be confused with constipation beneath your dress. It’s only seconds before his eyes turn glossy, then he takes a step forward hesitantly, waiting for you to stop him.

He stops himself instead, voice shallow as he asks, “You’re keeping it?”

“Kyungmin wants a sibling,” you shrug. “He said he wants someone to play Fashion Runway with at home.”

Wooyoung’s smile is slow as it takes over his entire face. His eyes meet yours, still glossy, full of tears that you aren’t sure are fully happy. “Thank you,” he whispers before his voice gets louder, more sure, his hand still wrapped around his jaw in awe. “Thank you so fucking much. Thank you.”

“Touch,” you say as your arms find your lower back again, a smile threatening to creep across your cheeks. “I know you want to.”

He closes the distance between you, hands out as he takes two steps forward, softly laying them over your belly. “Holy shit,” he whispers. “I can’t believe we’re doing this again.”

“I’m doing this,” you remind him, voice firm, full of indignation, “by myself.” You point your chin towards the paper on the counter, “The papers are waiting for you.”

“You think I’m signing them now?” He pops his brows. “Can we at least talk about it? Especially now, you’re– that’s my kid inside you.”

Your face falls flat, his hands still on your belly. You swat him away as you snap, “There’s nothing to talk about, everything I want is in the packet. I think I’m being pretty fair.”

“You’re being a copier.” His top lip lifts. “Everything in that packet is what I decreed in the first place. At least be original.”

“Stop being funny.” You cross your arms. “Sign the papers.”

“No,” he responds, crossing his arms back. “Now what?”

“You’re a pain in my ass,” you huff, turning around, walking towards the living room.

He follows, “Can we wait? Put a pin in it or something? Come back to it later?”

“Wait for what?” You ask, plopping down on the couch casually, a relieved breath escaping you as you settle in the plush. “Wait for me to push the thing out?”

“It’s not a thing,” he argues as he sits on the opposite side, one leg bent up, his arm stretched along the back. “That’s my daughter in there. I don’t think you should do all of this alone.”

“Well that’s not really up to you, is it?” Your elbow meets the back of the couch, holding up your head. “How do you know it’s a girl? I haven't done the test to find out the gender yet.”

“Stop seeing Yeosang without me,” he frowns, “I want to come, I want to be there.”

“You had your chance to be here.”

“I was there for every appointment with Kyungmin and you know it,” Wooyoung argues, sitting a little straighter. “I’m serious. That’s my baby, too, and I want to be there.”

You groan, head falling back into the cushions. “Fine, Wooyoung. My next appointment is on Monday at nine.”

“Thank you,” he nods, “I’ll pick you up.” After a pause, a moment of silence from you, he adds, “I still don’t think you should do this alone.”

You pick your head up just to snap, “I’d rather do it alone then do it with you.”

“Ouch,” he winces, “I was good to you when you were pregnant with Kyungmin, don’t do that.”

“I’m sorry,” you mutter, followed by a tired groan, letting your head fall back into the cushions again, he’s right. “I know, I remember. I think all the meetings with my lawyer are getting to my head.”

“Why now?” He asks, voice softer, all the anger, amusement from earlier, reshaped into vulnerability. “You’ve had time to divorce me, why do it now?”

You turn your head to see him, what part of his face you could see over the cushion. “I thought we were in agreement the last time we spoke. I thought that was it, and we were moving on.”

“That was only two weeks ago, jagi,” his voice is still soft, comforting as he moves a little closer, inching himself toward you, using one hand to push the cushion down where it blocked your vision. His eyes are clear now, his expression level, serious. “Do you really want to do this by yourself?”

The slightest pout bends your bottom lip. “No,” you answer honestly, “I wish you never told me that we were still married. I could’ve gotten over the Aurora thing, you broke my trust, but that’s doable, y’know? I can get past that. Keeping our marital status a secret is… detrimental. I wish you never said anything. I want you here. I want to do this with you, Wooyoung.”

He’s shaking his head before you finish speaking, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry about all of it, and I wish I could take it all back, but I can’t.” His voice cracks as he says, “Please let me fix this. Please let me at least try.”

You stare at him for a second, seeing the determination behind his eyes, the heartache, the love he always wears like a loud accessory when he’s looking at you. Something that’s never changed in the fifteen years his eyes have spent on you. You have every intention of going through with the divorce, every fucking intention to be done with it. Be done with him.

You don’t know what part of you sighs and looks away. “I spent a lot of fucking money on that attorney, Wooyoung.”

He’s quick to answer, giddiness threaded in his words, “I’ll pay for it.”

Your palms meet your face, rubbing at your tired eyes. It’s so frustrating, him coming here and jumbling up everything you’ve been so confident about. Two weeks of meetings, of phone calls, of paperwork, of finally landing on the track of being actually divorced. Again. Hearing the seriousness in his voice, the confidence, knowing he meant everything he’s said in the past few months, all of that combined with the hormones swarming your body and the baby fucking growing inside you.

You groan out, “Fuck, I can’t believe this is happening again. You’re impossible to divorce.”

“You won’t regret it,” his words are excited, all jumbled together, “I swear to god you won’t regret it, I’ll be so good to you and Kyungmin and the baby oh my god we’re having another kid–”

Your hands leave your face, paused in mid-air, brows furrowed as you glance at the man who’s still your fucking husband, “Where is Kyungmin?”

“Aden’s,” he shrugs, “I needed to talk to you and he couldn’t be here for it, not when I didn’t know how it was going to go.”

“Good,” you say through a relieved breath. “He has fun there.”

“They’re good to him,” Wooyoung’s voice is smaller, apprehensive, “Yunho and Aurora.”

“I know,” you agree, “I don’t hate them, Wooyoung. I was pissed at you, big fat liar, not them. Your college girlfriend doesn’t make me jealous, either.”

He stifles a snort, looking down to his lap, “Sounds like something a jealous person would say.”

“Don’t piss me off,” you argue, but a smile tugs at your lips, “my hormones are raging and you’re the only person here to take it out on.”

He laughs at that, a genuine belly laugh, his body sinking into the cushions as he physically relaxes. “I missed you.”

You raise your brows, “Yeah? I don’t think I’ve said one nice thing to you in weeks. Months, maybe.”

He turns his head to you, a lazy grin on his cheeks, “You can say something nice now.”

You look up to the ceiling, lips scrunching in thought, “Hm, weird. Nothing’s coming to mind.”

“You’ll think of something eventually,” his smile doesn’t leave, his tone finally settling into something comfortable, casual as his gaze lands on the details of your living room across from him. After a moment of silence, his head turns to you again, “Are you actually gonna file to dismiss the divorce?”

It’s your turn to smile again, one as mischievous as his signature smirk, “You think it’s that easy? That I’m not gonna make you work for it?” You watch his face morph into something like fear before adding, “You have thirty days, Woo.”

The smell of coffee and food wakes you up.

And the sound of a tiny voice that’s suspiciously far away.

Fear surges through you, jumping out of your bed, racing out of your bedroom and down the main staircase of your house like you were still your high school’s track star. Calling your son’s name, panic searing through your tone, you come to a hard stop in the entryway to your kitchen at the sight before you.

“Morning, mommy,” Kyungmin grins, sitting in his Minecraft pajamas at your kitchen island, a full fucking breakfast half-eaten on the plate in front of him. Beside him is your husband, dressed for work, suit on his body, hair styled back, ready for the day like he’d gotten ready upstairs.

Your hand lands over your heart, adrenaline winding down, are you dreaming? Is this a dream?

“Morning, wifey,” Wooyoung grins, and all you can do is blink. He slides the mug of coffee in his hand over the kitchen island, toward where you stood, “Sorry for breaking in, but at least I made coffee. I brought over some stuff.”

Your brows furrow, slowly stepping closer until your hands wrap around the mug, assessing if you can feel the warmth. “I can’t tell if I’m awake right now.”

Wooyoung laughs, turning on his heel, grabbing the reusable grocery store bag you didn’t even notice sitting on your counter. “You’re very much awake.”

“Why are you here?” You ask before bringing the mug up to your lips, blinking away the crust in your eyes. Before taking a sip, you ask again, “What time is it?”

“Six forty-five,” Wooyoung says casually, so casually you feel confused like this was normal and you’re forgetting something so regular. He turns again, placing the bag between you.

“Daddy said he brought you gifts,” Kyungmin sounds too awake for it to be so early. He usually didn’t wake up for another fifteen minutes, and usually your alarm goes off at six-thirty. He made your coffee, even if he was drinking it already, it’s your coffee, how you make it, how you order it.

“Gifts?” You ask again, meeting Wooyoung’s warning eye, popping a brow.

“Gifts,” Wooyoung repeats with a roll of his eyes like they aren’t really gifts at all, that’s just what he told Kyungmin. “Groceries,” he says, wrapping his hands around the handle of the grocery bag, “I figured I’d come over and make dinner for you guys a few times this week, if that’s okay. Oh, and flowers.” He turns, grabbing the vase you didn’t even notice sitting beside the kitchen sink, an arrangement of all your favorite flowers, your favorite colors. “Spring is nearing, so… flowers.”

Lips parted, eyes wide and blinking, you don’t know what to say, there’s not a single word that comes to mind other than a very unconvincing, “Thank… you?”

Wooyoung looks like he’s trying to hide his grin, lips folded inward, cheeks straining not to show his giddiness. “Small stuff, nothing crazy. Effort.”

“Effort,” you repeat, paired with a slow nod. “Groceries.”

God, why was this like pulling teeth?

“Thirty days,” he points toward you to remind you of your deal before starting to pull groceries out of the bag, as if you’d forgotten. Part of you did, even if it happened three days ago.

“What to expect when you’re expecting,” you sing through a contented sigh, mindless as you pull out a stool to sit on, forgetting who else is in the room.

Kyungmin quickly reminds you he’s very much present by asking you, “What’s expecting?” He glances at Wooyoung, “What are we getting? Are we getting a dog?”

“No,” you respond quickly, “no dog. We’re getting…” You glance at Wooyoung with a look that says help.

You asked Kyungmin how he felt about having another sibling, not that he was getting one. It was too early in the morning to drop a bomb that huge, especially if he didn’t take it well.

Wooyoung’s forearms meet the counter, leaned over the island, eye to eye with your son who’s still glancing back and forth between you with curiosity twinkling in his eyes. “Want me to come over later? I’ll make dinner and help you with vocabulary homework. We can play the multiplication game again.”

“Yes!” Kyungmin shouts, piercing your still-asleep years. “Will you make my favorite?”

“Duh,” Wooyoung rolls his eyes with a smile, like he was already planning it. “Don’t tell mommy,” he whispers, “but there’s ice cream in the bag with your name on it.”

Your smile grows watching Kyungmin’s eyes light up, flaring with excitement and sheer fucking joy before he whispers his agreement. Heart wrenching at the sight of the two together, Wooyoung and his miniature twin, you have to look away to not fall into the rabbit hole of what it would’ve been like if you never separated.

A spiral you’ve been down too many times before.

You sip your coffee while watching Wooyoung maneuver around your kitchen like it was still his. Putting groceries away where they belonged, keeping conversation with you and Kyungmin about your day ahead, you tried to let yourself exist in the same space without feeling completely confused and slightly weirded out about the normalcy of it all.

Coming unannounced, bringing groceries, flowers, telling Kyungmin he’ll be here later without asking you but instead expecting you to be okay with it… as much as the rabbit hole of what-ifs calls to you, you have an eight year old son who doesn't need to be confused.

“Time to go get dressed,” you say to your son with a small smile that you know Wooyoung is seeing right through. Slowing his movements, coming to a standstill on the other side of the island in preparation for the conversation he knows is coming, he nods toward Kyungmin who looks at him like he’d keep him home from school.

After quickly realizing this wasn’t a special day and his father was just here for no apparent reason, he scoots off his stool and makes for the staircase with a gruff. He definitely thought you were going to keep him home, and the three of you were doing something today. The thought makes your chest feel heavier.

When he’s out of earshot, you quirk a brow at your husband, “What are you doing?”

He’s quick to respond, “You gave me thirty days. Today’s day one.”

“So you break into my house?” You whisper-shout.

“I still have a key,” he points to the hallway leading to the front of your house, where you know his key is sitting on the table beside the front door. “And technically it’s still my house, too.”

“Don’t give me technicality bullshit,” you huff, “it’s seven in the fucking morning and you woke up our son for breakfast completely unannounced. You don’t think that’ll confuse him?”

“Confused? I'm his dad,” he argues, “and he woke up on his own, I didn’t wake him up. My plan was to have you wake up first and be all excited that I was bringing you goodies.”

“Goodies,” you quirk a brow, “flowers and food?”

He smacks his lips. “I thought it was cute.”

The snort that escapes you is completely involuntary. Voice half-amused, the fight isn’t quite gone from your soul as you say, “You can’t just come here unannounced, Wooyoung.”

“You gave me thirty days,” he says, dumbfounded. “Are we gonna repeat last time? Fuck until you consider seeing me in daylight?” You scowl, but he doesn’t let up. “This is asking a lot, but just go with it, please. I know what I’m doing.”

“You know what you’re doing,” you repeat, mocking him, “my ass.”

“I thought the flowers would butter you up at least a little,” he turns, grabbing the vase, then places it in front of him, lowering his body so just his pouting face was visible on top of the colorful, blooming petals. “They’re pretty, just like you.”

That pulls a laugh straight from your chest, shaking your head, “You’re beyond helping, Jung Wooyoung. Down to your soul you’re batshit insane.”

“Only for you,” he’s grinning now. “Wouldn’t do this shit for anyone else and you know it.”

And you do know it, as much as part of you wishes he was bothering someone else at seven in the goddamn morning. Rolling your eyes, you turn, “I’m going to get ready for work.”

“Can I come watch?”

“No, but you can take Kyungmin to school.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Monday at nine came and went with surprising ease. Not that you thought Wooyoung would act ridiculous at your doctor’s appointment, but you didn’t think he’d be as normal as he was. A blood test, an NT scan, he stood by your side through the whole thing, nodding and joking with Yeosang as if the doctor didn’t know about anything going on between you. And technically, he didn’t– not the details, at least, the only surprise he showed was the glimmer of shock in his deep chocolate eyes upon opening the door and catching Wooyoung looking through his cabinets.

“Beautiful Monday,” Wooyoung sighs with nothing but unadulterated joy, grinning ear to fucking ear with his eyes closed, standing still on the sidewalk in front of his SUV as he lets the sunshine beat down on his skin. “Your levels are even, I’m gonna be a girl dad, I just found out I’m psychic, everything is good in the world.”

You snort, rolling your eyes, “Everything?”

He cracks one eye open, “Am I missing something?”

“An open civil case,” your lips are tied up on one side with an evil smirk.

Wooyoung opens his eyes to scowl, then pulls his keys from his pocket and unlocks the door. Before he moves to the driver’s side, he asks, “Do you need help getting in?”

“I’m only twelve weeks.” You roll your eyes again, something you’ve done so many times in the past week you think your eye muscles are now made of steel. “She’s gonna be big, though, I can smell the back pain from here.”

You and Wooyoung climb into his car at the same time and you grimace when the stale heat engulfs you whole. “Holy shit, turn on the AC.”

“What’s the back pain feel like?” He asks, turning on the car, hands immediately shooting for the knobs to put the air conditioning on full blast. “Similar to standing on your feet all day?”

You pull your seatbelt over your chest, clicking it into place. “It’s usually in my lower back, kinda like boob-carrying back pain, but worse. Like having a watermelon strapped to your front all day, you’re in a constant arch, it burns and you can’t really do anything for it if you’re out and about.”

He winces like he can feel phantom pain in his back. Turning to you, face solemn, he asks, “Do you think it’ll be better or worse since it’s your second time?”

You shrug, “Give me a month or two and I’ll have the answer for you.”

The air finally turns somewhat cold and you sink into the seat like it was a blessing from the heavens, it starts washing the heat off you, dusting away the idle air. Eyes closed, head lolling towards your husband who starts pulling out of the parking spot, you ask, “What are you making for dinner tonight?”

Wooyoung snorts, “That’s all you care about? We aren’t gonna debrief how we’re having a girl and the fact that I was right?”

“First time being right in your life, you must be excited,” you peek an eye open to tease, and he looks at you with his face bent up in offense.

“Rude,” he scoffs in response, but it doesn’t hide the amusement in his tone. “I never even said I was coming over tonight. Should we tell Kyungminnie he’s gonna have a sister?”

You can feel the heat of shame crawling to the tips of your ears for assuming he’d be over tonight. He came over twice last week, and did just as he promised, made dinner, let Kyungmin have his ice cream, then helped him with homework and played the multiplication game that you found yourself inadequate at playing. It’s been a long time since you’ve done third grade math– Kyungmin multiplied the numbers faster than you did.

Wooyoung’s been… strangely aware. First and foremost, with what he’s been cooking the three of you for dinner. Balanced meals, healthy but still delicious, things you enjoy eating now that the wave of constant nausea has let up. Careful with what he says to Kyungmin, never hinting towards there being more to the picture than you’re letting on, reminding Kyungmin he was coming over for him and him only. In a kind way. In an unsuspecting way. A way that kind of made you feel sour, even if you knew the reason behind it, even if you didn’t want him to say anything else. Hormones.

It’s been too easy to slip into routine, to find comfort in him being around. Having eyes watching over you, your son, to feel safe in a way you haven’t felt in so long. It’s different than the weeks you spent sleeping with him, you haven’t so much as kissed him in the past week, you haven’t given him eyes, not a single sexual remark or joke has been made from either of you. It’s been strictly domestic, a husband coming home from work, a husband cooking dinner for his wife, a father doing homework with his son. You hate that you’ve been loving every goddamn second of it.

“Sure,” you respond with only half of your consciousness attached to it, too in your head to give him your full attention.

He side-eyes you, popping a brow. “Sure? You’re about to tell your son he’s gonna have a sibling, and all you can say is sure?”

“Well, are you even gonna come over?” It slips out before you can think about it, sounding impatient. Almost desperate. Irritable in the way that means you’re hopeful.

Coming to a stop at a red light, Wooyoung glances at you in the passenger seat with the quickest-spreaking smirk he’s ever worn. Like an accusation, all too proudly he says, “You want me to come over.”

There’s heat on the apples of your cheeks. Unconvincingly, you defend yourself, “No.”

“Yes,” he argues, his smile mischievous. “You like having me there. Admit it, you miss me.”

“No!” You sit a little straighter, brows furrowing, voice pitched and so obviously lying your entire body fills with embarrassment. “I just like not having to cook.”

“Sure,” he doesn’t sound like he agrees. Turning back to the road, to the light that turns green, he cruises forward with two hands on the wheel.

“You clean my kitchen.” You sound too defensive. “And you’re helping Kyungmin with his homework. And you did my laundry last night. Three things I no longer have to do if you’re there.”

“Right,” he nods, brows furrowing, bottom lip bending over, looking like he agrees but you both know it’s pretend. Sarcastic, even. Leaning his head towards you but not looking at you, he says, “Just say you miss me, baby. I won’t make fun of you for it. I miss you too.”

You swear under your breath, arms crossing, head turning to look out the window. You do miss him, you’ve missed this part of him for so long, the part you didn’t get to see the last time you were trying the whole Wooyoung-comes-around-again thing out. Maybe you should have started here last time, instead of getting caught up in the way it felt to have him inside of you again.

You might miss that most of all.

You shake off the thoughts, eyeing Wooyoung in the barely-there reflection in the window, his smirk still present. Still incriminating. Still proof that he knows you better than you know yourself.

“It’s still not enough to call it off,” you mumble, so quietly you aren’t sure if he’ll be able to hear you. But he does, with how his smirk falters, his lips settling into a line. It didn’t feel as good as you thought it would to say the words.

“I know,” he responds, voice softer now, all amusement gone. “Trust me.”

You frown, guilt settling into cracks you didn’t know were there. He lied to you, kept things from you, then threw them at you like a fucking bomb and expected you to come out of the other side unharmed. You shouldn’t feel guilty.

But you do. To soften the blow, you turn again, arms uncurling from your chest, hands landing in your lap with a sigh, toying with your fingers. Voice coming out uneasy, you ask, “So… you wanna tell Kyungmin?”

“If you’re ready for it,” he fakes a smile, a bending press of his lips that doesn’t reach his eyes. “We can wait a couple weeks, ‘til we’re out of the danger zone. You’ll be in your second trimester next week.”

Your cheeks heat at the awkwardness you created when there’s never fucking been awkwardness between you, like, ever. “That’s smart,” you say, not at all convincing, pulling your lips together. “Will you still come over tonight?”

His head turns to the left, arms crossing over one another as he makes a turn, and even though you know he’s driving the both of you to work, it still feels intentional. “To make you dinner, clean your kitchen and do your laundry?”

You tuck your bottom lip between your teeth. You deserved that one.

“To spend time with your son,” you try, turning your head to face him, sounding optimistic. “And your daughter… And your wife.”

His demeanor cracks with that, a smile blooming across his cheeks, and it settles something in your chest. Smiling back, you lean a little closer, “You can brag to everyone at work about your psychic abilities.”

“I hand-picked that fucking sperm,” he says, full of conviction, picking back up the discussion you’ve had twice now like you never put it down. “I knew exactly which one was fertilizing that egg, jagi. I knew it.”

And you really can’t stop–nor do you want to stop–the easygoing laugh that spills from your lips, nodding along, agreeing with him. “I know you did, I believe you.”

“I’m at the store.”

“What store?” You ask into your phone, twirling your hair around one finger, knees bent up to your chest on the couch.

“The store,” he responds like it was the only answer, his voice clipped through the speaker of your phone. “I’ll be there soon, let me check out.”

“What are you getting?” You ask again, lowering your hand in front of you, examining your nonexistent manicure. You need one.

“Things,” he answers, voice tight. Your top lip curls, eyes finding the ceiling. “I’m literally checking out now, I’ll be home in ten minutes.”

You sit up a little, sly grin curving your lips, “Well what if I need things from the store?”

He swears under his breath, “Baby, why do you think I’m here? I already know what you need.”

You watch Kyungmin on the living room floor, belly pressed flat to the rug, feet dangling in the air as his little fingers work his tablet better than you ever could.

Your cheeks heat, smile growing, “You have no idea what I need, Jung Wooyoung.”

Kyungmin whips his head around, “You’re talking to daddy? Is he coming over?”

“Yes, he’s coming over,” you answer Kyungmin just as Wooyoung barks into your ear, “You’re a fucking pervert.”

You laugh, picking up the same piece of hair to twirl around your finger again. “See you soon.”

“When I get there you better—”

You hang up the phone, sly smirk still warm, etched into your cheeks. All week it’s felt like you have an itch you can’t fucking scratch, an itch you want Wooyoung to scratch, but he won’t even try to reach it.

You think the hormones might be blinding you, maybe taking over your entire nervous system. Maybe your hormones were in charge of your brain entirely at this point.

Texts, phone calls, other than the three times he’s been over this week already, it’s like dangling a treat in front of a dog who doesn’t fucking want it. Close proximity is driving you insane, you think, or maybe it’s just the effect of having Wooyoung around, acting so normal and so domestic it’s sinking you deeper into the fantasy of what could be. What could’ve been this whole time. What you miss so badly.

You pick yourself up off the couch to the kitchen, needing something to do with your hands to get your mind out of the gutter, where it’s seemed to have taken permanent residence. Why doesn’t he want you? It’s the question you’ve been asking yourself since Monday night, like as soon as you noticed the lack of sexual tension, it showed itself like it’s been waiting in hiding.

Ten minutes of washing the dishes, all from Kyungmin’s school lunch and the lunch you brought to work, Wooyoung was walking through your front door as promised. You heard Kyungmin yell, Wooyoung’s excited greeting, and then your son’s following giggle that you’re convinced could cure anything.

It’s only seconds before he makes his way to the kitchen, you look over your shoulder as he sets two reusable grocery bags on the marble island, a soft smile already on his sculpted, bronzy cheeks.

“Wow,” he starts, already amused, “not leaving the dishes for me?”

You turn off the faucet, grabbing a dish towel to dry your hands on before turning around, your coy smile tucked to the side. “Thought you might want a break from scrubbing my Tupperware.”

Dressed in business casual, clothes a little wrinkled, hair disheveled like he ran his fingers through it forty five times today, you don’t hide the fact that your eyes are scanning every single inch of him. With the way his smile spreads, how his eyes lower, you know he can see right through you. It’s not like you’ve hidden it well— or tried to.

“If I didn’t know any better I’d think you were buttering me up now,” his thick brows wiggle over his mismatched eyes.

A small sound of amusement is all you can conjure before taking a step towards the island, pressing your forearms against the marble, leaning over your crossed arms. “What’s in the bags?”

“Things,” he answers, eyes sparkling with mischief. You thin your eyes, moving like you’d start opening them yourself, but he stops you with a palm facing you. “Stay away from my things, I know what you need and where they go. Go sit down or something.”

You stand up straight, crossing your arms over your chest, scowling. “No, I’m bored and I want to know what things are in the bags.”

He laughs under his breath, “You’re bored?”

“I’ve been waiting,” you huff, “you took a long time at the store.”

“Look at you,” he muses, “you’re pouting.”

“So?” Your head tilts. “Maybe I am pouting.”

His brows raise before he starts digging into the first bag, pulling out produce while he shakes his head, “Look how the turn tables.”

You’d laugh at the joke he’s made a thousand times if you didn’t know just how true it was. He’s supposed to be the one proving himself to you and with every passing day you’re losing the ability to hold onto your certainty, your hormones driving you to near insanity, your will as strong as thread at this point. There’s a tiny voice inside you that reminds you you’re not above begging for it.

And yet he gives you nothing.

“For you,” he says casually, pushing a bag towards you and two bottles. Quirking a brow, your hands find the things, holding them up to read the labels.

“You said you were running low on prenatals,” he explains as he continues emptying the bags, not even looking at you. “Plus epsom salts for a bath, I read online somewhere that the soap is good for pregnancy, there’s herbs in it that soothe aches and make you sleepy or something. Figured it could help the back pain before it really starts.”

Your eyes flicker upward, watching him as he empties the bags like it was no big deal. Thick, focused brows, veiny hands moving fluidly, a singular strand of hair thickened by product laying over his face, you can feel your heart beating. When your silence hits him, he glances upward, meeting your stare, and he pauses his movement to ask, “What?”

You shake your head, just once, barely anything more than a small movement. “Nothing, I just… I’m lucky. And I appreciate you.”

One brow raises, smirk rising on the same side of his face, “Now you’re really buttering me up.”

You laugh because it’s funny, but your heart throbs in your chest like it knows that Wooyoung is in front of you, like it beats only for him and it’s waiting for your mind to catch up.

Your mind is far past catching up. You walk around the counter, steady feet bringing you to his side, and you force yourself between him and the counter to wrap your arms around his middle. Your arms squeeze tight, burying your head in his chest, forehead meeting right where his shirt is unbuttoned, your skin pressed against his.

Spicy, woodsy, a hint of outside… sweaty, just a little. In the way that makes you want to eat him. But you don’t let your mind drift just yet, savoring the smell of him, the feeling of his skin pressed against yours, how he feels in your arms.

It takes him a second to process, but his arms wrap around your back, engulfing you in his hold as he leans down to press a kiss to the top of your head in the same exact spot he did three weeks ago. When you thought it was over.

How the fuck could you ever think it was over?

Mumbling into his chest, coming out muffled, you say, “I love you.”

“I love you too.” He doesn’t need a second to process that, the words coming out before he could think about them, he doesn’t need to think about them. Never once did he have to think about them, not with you.

Your grip loosens a little, but you don’t let go. He seems perfectly content holding you to him, flat palms sliding up and down your back, a smile you can’t see quickly crawling across his cheeks.

Finally looking up, into his whiskey eyes burnt by the dim lighting of the kitchen, you whisper, “Thank you.”

He’s looking at you like you’re his entire world. Like nothing before this moment has ever mattered, and nothing after it will matter either, because right now it’s you and him and that’s all he’s ever wanted.

“Anything for you.” He leans down to press a small kiss to your forehead. “You know that.”

A smile tugs at your lips, “Anything?”

He smacks his lips, “Don’t ruin the moment, that was sweet.”

Your grin spreads, head dropping until your forehead meets his chest again, hands falling from around his back to drop down to his hips. “Why is it always me?” You look up again, lashes fluttering, “It’s always me who’s begging to get in your pants.”

His face morphs into cockiness, his shoulders shrugging casually, “Guess I’m that good.”

You try to scoff, but it comes out like a laugh as you smack your palm against his hip, “I’m serious, Wooyoung. Shouldn’t it be the other way around?”

His amused smile falls, hands sliding down to your hips, pushing your back against the counter. He keeps himself close, eyes scanning your face, gaze dropping down to your lips. Small, quiet yet full of lust, he asks, “You think I don’t want you?”

Your breath catches in your throat, eyes widening. Your hands fly up between you, pressed against his chest as you stutter over your thoughts, “A- um, a little, kinda.”

His head drops down to your neck, the curve of his nose ghosting against the shell of your ear and your whole body shivers in response, back arching against the counter.

He keeps his voice low, “You don’t realize that I think about fucking you every time we’re in this kitchen?”

Your heart picks up speed, breath going heavy and ragged, body twitching as he speaks like he’s fucking touching you. All you can mumble is his name, soft but drenched in arousal, fingers clutching onto his shirt.

“Lifting you up on this counter,” he drawls, voice like honey, hands reaching for the marble, arms caging you in. “Just like I did a few months ago, except I think about taking it slow this time, teasing you until you’re begging. Touching you until you’re crying for it.”

Your skin touches, his lip against the spot below your neck; his breath warm and inviting, making the hairs on the back of your neck stand, goosebumps raise on your skin. The smallest noise escapes you, pitched and needy, you’d be embarrassed by it if the arousal wasn’t intoxicating.

He brings his face back to yours, so close your foreheads are almost touching.

“Look at me.”

You do, eyes full of anticipation, his lips so close you could taste them. He grins.

Then he’s pressing a kiss to your cheek and moving off of you like nothing ever happened. Sliding the bags down the counter so he can keep unloading groceries, you blink at him, dumbfounded, terrorized.

“What the fuck?” You whisper-yell.

He looks at you casually over his shoulder, “What?”

“You’re an asshole,” you spit, “you’re such a fucking asshole.”

He cracks a smile at that, going back to his groceries, "Didn't I tell you to go sit down ten minutes ago?”

All you can do is scowl, all the way back to the fucking couch where you tuck your knees up to your chest.

Kyungmin looks over his shoulder from the floor, wearing raised, curious brows as he asks, “Wanna play with me?”

Friday has been your favorite day of the week since you could remember. In college, it meant classes were over, you had your weekends free to drink your bodyweight in liquor and party anywhere and everywhere without the looming dread of classes in the morning sitting on your shoulders. When you started working, Friday’s clockout time called to you at a mere seven in the morning, reminding you that when you go home, you get to change into a cocktail dress and your clubbing pumps and go out with the girls from your office. When you met Wooyoung, Friday meant that you got to spend your weekend with him, partying, fucking, learning each other down to the bone.

When you got pregnant the first time, Friday meant you got to go home and sleep.

Now you’re pregnant a second time, and Friday no longer means you get to go home and sleep.

You get to listen to your eight year old with a chronic case of the zoomies, especially after an abnormally warm day full of sunshine that radiates upcoming spring, instead of being tired, he’s ready to share all the adrenaline he’s felt all day with you. And you love it– every single second of him racing around your backyard with a widespread grin, shouting giggles that could cure any foul mood you’ve ever been in, but you’re especially tired today, and you don’t have it in you to do anything but sit in your patio chair and watch.

“Mommy, play with me!” He shouts across the lawn, the sound piercing your eardrums even if there’s yards of breeze intercepting it. “Let’s play Runway,” he starts, feet bringing him closer to you, dropping the bat he was just swinging against the tee you still owned because he aged out of tee ball just one year ago. “It’s like Fashion Runway, but instead of Fashion, we walk.”

You can’t help yourself, the snort that rips from your nose is inevitable. “You wanna walk with me?”

“Runway, mommy,” he corrects you, a hand on his denim-clad hip. Jeans and a tee shirt, one you realized an hour ago is stained with the condiments you put on the sandwich from his school lunch. “You have to walk like you’re walking down a runway, and I’ll judge it. One is bad, ten is good.”

Your brows raise over the sunglasses sitting on the bridge of your nose, amused and actually interested, “Oh, is it a competition?”

Kyungmin smirks, “Yeah, and I’m gonna win. You go first.”

“Excuse me, mister runway model,” you say, pushing yourself off the patio chair by the armrests. You think you’re nearing popping, your belly definitely… protruding now. Not big by any means, at your fourteen weeks of pregnancy, but you think you’re almost visible. Obvious. Maybe. You wonder how Kyungmin hasn’t said anything yet, when he usually asks a thousand questions if you style your hair differently.

Kyungmin sits in the patio chair after you’ve stood up, and claps his hands together as you walk through the lawn, standing facing him just a few feet away. “Okay mommy!” He yells from the chair, “You can walk now.”

Damn, impatient, too. You flip your hair over your shoulder, one hand on your hip, and conjure up the sassiest walk, imagining yourself on a runway, putting in effort for the sake of your kid. The same kid who loses his fucking shit, clapping and giggling like it was the funniest thing he’s ever seen.

When you walk up to the edge of the stone patio, Kyungmin is still giggling, but he says, “It’s good that you’re not a model, mommy.”

You scoff, standing straight, but the laughter that comes from your back door sliding open steals both of your attention before you have the chance to talk back to your son.

“Daddy!” Kyungmin squeals.

Wooyoung walks onto the patio, grinning like he knows he wasn’t supposed to see that but he loved every second of it. “What do you mean? That was the best model walk I’ve ever seen.” He’s eyeing up Kyungmin now as he says, “Tell mommy she could be a model before you hurt her feelings.”

You try to interject, “He didn’t–”

“You’re a good model, mommy,” Kyungmin says, and he almost sounds like he means it. “You should see Aden do it,” he pushes himself up off the patio chair, “he does it like this.”

You’re shaking your head as you walk towards Wooyoung, ready to greet him, but Kyungmin’s screech of “Look!” has you turning right back around.

Your jaw drops as your son puts his hand on his hip and sways his hips as he walks toward the patio. You scoff, “You just did exactly what I did!”

Wooyoung snorts from beside you, “He might’ve done it better than you, jagi.”

“What number?” Kyungmin asks, grin as wide as his eyes, his arms wrapping around your middle when his quick moving feet bring him right to you. “Judge time.”

You bend down and press a kiss to his sweaty hair, “Ten. What’s my number?”

Kyungmin’s eyes slide to Wooyoung, and out of your peripherals you can see Wooyoung holding up ten fingers. Your son giggles, looking back at you, “Nine.”

“Y’know what?” You bring your palms to his cheeks, squeezing, “I’ll take it.”

“Let’s play again,” Kyungmin squeezes you a little tighter, making you choke out a noise. “Daddy has to walk this time, too.”

“I think that’s a beautiful idea,” you smirk, side-eyeing your husband from beneath your shades. Expecting pushback, his grin turns feline. Your brows raise.

“Scared of a lil’ competition?” He wiggles his own brows, “I’m about to win, just so you know. Kyungmin, you’re going down.”

“I’m gonna win,” Kyungmin fights back. “Mommy’s gonna lose, though.”

“Damn, was my walk really that bad?” You ask, brows coming together as you turn to Wooyoung. “I didn’t think it was that bad.”

He leans closer when Kyungmin runs off into the lawn, pressing a kiss to your cheek. “I thought it was perfect. Hi, by the way.”

“Hi,” you’re smiling already, and you know the flush on your cheeks isn’t from the afternoon sun anymore. It’s his fourth time here this week and it’s only Friday, by this point there’s not a bone in your body that isn’t okay with it. The opposite, actually, staring at him in his business-casual clothes, dress pants loose and elongating his strong legs, dress shirt unbuttoned and untucked on one side, sleeves folded up to his elbows. His pants black, his shirt a deep gray color, the silhouette, the colors, it all contrasts against his build and his sickeningly sweet-looking skin, making you salivate.

This is the third day in a fucking row that just looking at him has made you weak in the knees. You’ve been curbing your cravings well enough since last week against your kitchen island, you’ve kept a safe distance since, not looking at him for too long, you don’t want to risk the rejection that you still aren’t sure was rejection, again. But the more insatiable your thirst grows, the more it feels fucking impossible, especially when he looks like that, when he’s doing tasks for you around the house, when he’s making dinner and eating it with you, when he’s showing up at your house right after work with his belt already off and his shirt halfway untucked.

You’re still not above begging. He’s still not giving you an inch.

Kyungmin walks first, as attitudey and sass-filled as you imagined it would be, and both you and Wooyoung shout ten. You walk next without an ounce of embarrassment, and Wooyoung shouts ten, but Kyungmin shouts eight. Then Wooyoung walks, using his hips like he had a rope attached through his belt loops pulling him forward, like a real fucking high-fashion model.

With your jaw pressed to the stone of the patio, you yell, “You motherfucker, why are you good at this?”

“Mommy!” Kyungmin shouts, disapproving of your swear.

A belly laugh leaves Wooyoung, head dipping down, palms clutching his stomach before they land on his knees in a doubled-over crouch. You scoff, “I’m serious, what the hell is going on? Do you have a history in modeling that I should know about? Something else you’re hiding?”

“I think… nine,” Kyungmin says from your side, ignoring you with his hands on his hips, brows slanted, hiding his smile like he knows Wooyoung’s walk was perfect but refuses to outright admit it.

You snort, “That was a ten if I’ve ever seen a fucking ten.”

Kyungmin shouts again, “Mommy!”

“Stop swearing, you’re bothering the boy,” Wooyoung ushers a hand in Kyungmin’s direction, face still bent up in laughter, tight from trying to hide his smile. Just a moment passes of his lips tucked between his teeth before he laughs again, “I’m sorry– I’m sorry, that was so fucking funny.”

Kyungmin’s voice is stern as he warns, “Daddy.”

“I’m sorry!” Wooyoung shouts, his palms flying up in defense, laughter still laced in his words. “Come on, let’s go inside.”

Kyungmin makes for the door first, mumbling like he didn’t think you’d hear, “I told you mommy would lose.”

Wooyoung catches up to you in a light jog, one hand pressed to the small of your back as you cross the threshold to walk inside your kitchen. Your head snaps sideways at the touch and he looks blissfully unaware at how the heat from his palm shoots electricity up your spine, reminding you of just short of a week ago, his arms on the counter behind you, caging you in, whispering nasty shit in your ear…

There’s happiness in the air, bleeding between you and him and your son, even the girl growing steadily in your belly. You don’t want to ruin it by sinking your mind to the gutter, where it was a week ago, how you sulked the entire night and yet he still left your house with a kiss to your cheek and a smirk on his lips. He won’t fucking give in and your body is reacting to every look, every touch like a livewire.

He meets your eye, mischief twinkling in chocolate, he knows. You take a quick step forward, too fast for his hand to stay on your body, it’s purposeful.

“Homework, dinner, showers, bedtime,” you mumble under your breath as if you needed to remind yourself of the schedule, using it like a bucket of cool water, the words ice in your veins.

And that schedule you continued to repeat to yourself all night. Homework was swift with Wooyoung’s quick-working mind helping Kyungmin, and other than making dinner, having him here to help with math was something you desperately needed and never even thought of. Third-grade math was a nuisance to you, mortifyingly irritating, and sometimes you remember that it's just going to get worse. More complicated. It’s been a long time since you’ve attempted long-division and you’ll avoid it at all costs if you can.

You ended up ordering takeout, the three of you sat on the floor of your living room, eating from containers on the coffee table, watching the movie playing on the TV across the room. Frozen, again, for the thirteen-millionth time, more than once Kyungmin began singing along, and you instinctively sang along with him, then Wooyoung, too. You think the three of you might know this movie word for word.

By the time the end credits were rolling onto your screen, your back was pressed to the edge of the couch, your head lolled onto the cushions, eyes half open. You supposed singing along to the movie took the last bit of energy right out of you, exhaustion sitting heavy on your chest, your shoulders.

Kyungmin was still wide awake, bouncing from watching his favorite movie yet another time. Sitting beside Wooyoung on the floor, his legs thrown over Wooyoung’s lap, his head turned sideways, towards the screen across the room, you could barely hear his fast-moving mouth about how much he loves Elsa. How he wanted to be her, have her magic, ice powers, how he wanted a sister like Anna– all things you’ve heard a thousand times before, but they landed differently this time, and as Wooyoung’s head turned sideways to look at you, you know you were both thinking that you hope to give him a sister like Anna.

His gaze lingered, though, taking in your half-awake state, low-lidded eyes, slouched body that you’re sure did not look comfortable. It was, at least, as comfortable as it could be for movie watching on the floor.

“Shower time,” Wooyoung rips his gaze from you to look at Kyungmin. Your son whines, pulling his legs from Wooyoung’s lap to roll over on the floor. Wooyoung’s face stays straight, an unmovable force, “Come on, you’ll feel better when you’re clean.”

“I already feel good,” Kyungmin whines, “I’m clean. I showered last night.”

“Are we gonna have the stinky conversation again?” Wooyoung asks, amusement playing in the line of his lips. “Mommy’s gonna cry if she gets a whiff of you.”

You crack a grin at that, even if Kyungmin refuses to take the bait. He sits up, arms stretched out behind him, brows slanted downward as he asks, “Can’t I shower in the morning?”

“No,” you interject, “you already don’t want to wake up in the morning, I’m not fighting you to shower.”

“I won’t fight!” Kyungmin counters. “I’ll get up, mommy, I promise.”

“I don’t even believe that,” Wooyoung reaches forward, grabbing him by his ankles and tugging the boy towards him. “Go shower.”

Kyungmin giggles as his butt slides against the floor, toward his father. “Can I eat ice cream after?”

“Sure,” Wooyoung nods. “But only if you smell clean. Remember to wash your hair twice, with shampoo.”

Kyungmin stands from the floor just to scowl at his father, “I know how to wash my hair.”

Wooyoung just raises his brows like this was an argument they’ve had before, one you have no knowledge of. He doesn’t respond, though, and Kyungmin doesn’t argue as he turns for the staircase, running two steps at a time so he can get to his dessert as fast as humanly possible.

Wooyoung wastes no time as soon as the shower turns on. He slides closer to you, eyes zeroed in on your tired expression as he asks, “Why don’t you go take a bath?”

You pop a brow, “Are you saying I smell, too?”

“I’m saying you look like you need to relax,” he says smoothly, easing you with a soft smile. “I’ll get him ready for bed, ice cream and all.”

Like it was meant to be or something, you yawn. Your back arches, arms stretching over your head, neck turning away from Wooyoung. “I don’t feel like walking all the way up there.”

“I’ll carry you?” You turn back to see him grinning, playful, eyes flaring amusement. You can see his collarbones beneath the collar of his shirt, fully untucked now, his pants that were once pressed now wrinkled and littered with tiny balls of fuzz. “I’ll even start running the water for you. Use the new soaps I got you, see if you like ‘em.”

“I’ll wait until Kyungie goes to bed–”

“I’ll put him to bed,” Wooyoung cuts you off. “And by put him to bed I mean I’m gonna close the door and let him fall asleep on his own, like a big boy.”

You roll your eyes, smile growing, “Are you gonna drill that into me forever?”

“I’m not drilling anything else into you,” he responds, too quick for him not to have been waiting to use that response.

Your face falls, lips bending into a frown. “I know,” you respond, a bite to the words, sounding like that’s the worst thing that’s ever happened to you. “Why not?”

“Because we tried it the other way already,” he slides down on the floor, head lolling backward, mimicking the way you’re sitting. “That didn’t work, so I’m using my thirty days wisely. No sex until you have a ring on your finger again.”

“They’re upstairs, on my dresser,” you say, jutting your chin towards the staircase. “Go get them, I’ll put them on.”

He side-eyes you. “You know what I mean, asshole.”

“Oh, now I’m the asshole?” You sit up a little. “You’re the one who won’t fuck your wife.”

“Because you’re only my wife legally,” he mumbles, voice quieter. “I want to have sex when you want your husband, because I’m your husband, not because you just want to have sex. Does that make sense? I think I confused myself.”

Your palms find the floor on either side of you, pushing upward until your legs are under you before you stand up straight. Tilting your head, ignoring his rambling, you ask, “Has your lawyer called you?”

“No,” his brows furrow as he lifts his head. “Why?”

You shrug, “Just wondering.”

He was right, you did need to fucking relax.

The smell of lavender and chamomile fills your bathroom, steam fogging the white gold-lined mirror on your marble vanity, turning the once crystal-clear glass shower door cloudy. Bubbles surround you, popping every few seconds, swirling with each slight movement of your body. Your neck stretches over the back end, eyes closed, body submerged beneath the water that teeters on the edge of hot. You’ve already drained some water and refilled the white, ceramic tub once, not wanting to escape serenity just yet. It’s been too long since you’ve properly relaxed without worrying about work, your husband, your son, anything. Everything.

You were content on staying here, letting your body soak in the water, in the sweet smells, for as long as you possibly could. The first your eyes have opened is when you hear a hand on the door handle, pushing it open quickly and then closing it even quicker. Wooyoung walks in, eyes on you as soon as you’re in view, silently crossing the bathroom in a few long strides before crouching beside the tub.

“Care to join?” You ask, head turned toward him.

He cracks a smile, head dropping down to huff a laugh under his breath. It’s empty, like he had something on his mind. His hands reach over the side of the tub, bronzy fingers playing in the warm water, “Do you like the soaps? The salts?”

You nod, “Mhm, ‘m very relaxed.”

“Good,” he nods, lips scrunching to one side. He had more to say.

“What’s up?” You ask, searching his face for the answer before he had a chance to verbalize it.

He takes a beat. “We haven’t talked about it,” he finally says, eyes meeting yours, pupils big and dilated. “Us. At all, not once during these past few weeks.”

“Okay,” you say assuredly, then readjust. Sitting up a little taller, using your hands pushing against the bottom of the tub, the water covers just above the apex of your breasts. “Let’s talk.”

He swallows, eyes dancing across your face, your shoulders, like he’s fighting for his life to not let his gaze drop past your collarbones. You smile.

“Where’s your head at?” he asks, forcing his gaze upward. “Do you wanna do this?”

You lean over the side, throwing an arm along the edge of the tub, laying your cheek on your forearm to look up at him. “Do I wanna do what?”

He shifts, sitting on the floor, legs bent, criss-crossed. He keeps his face close to yours, just slightly below you. “Be with me,” he wonders, “have another baby with me.”

You crack another smile, one so genuine it takes over your entire face. “I’ve wanted to the whole time, dummy.”

“Don’t toy with me, jagi,” his lips fall to a line. “Be serious. Are we doing this or are we not?”

You sigh. “You know,” you start, twisting your legs, the fluid noise of water sloshing following. “That day you brought me the soaps, the gummies, things I didn’t ask for but you know I needed…” Wooyoung nods, eyes twinkling with optimism. “It reminded me what kind of man you are. Who you used to be, before your priority became work–”

“I told you–”

“Let me finish,” you cut him off, eyes stern. He nods. “Even though you weren’t here, I know it was for Kyung, for me. I knew it, and even though I divorced you–the first time–I hoped you’d fight it. That you’d fix everything as soon as I brought up divorce, admit your wrongs and fucking grovel or something.” He frowns, but you don’t give him a second to respond. “I’ve missed this part of you. I’ve missed the part that’s present, that supports me as a partner and not just a checkbook. That’s what matters to me.” His frown deepens, eyes glazing over. You lift your head, reaching for humor, “Crybaby.”

“You’re the crybaby,” he counters, but a smile tugs at his lips. He wipes two thumbs under his eyes as he says, “Don’t forget we have to send two kids to college.”

You bark out a laugh, a genuine laugh. “We’ll figure it out. I just want— all I’ve ever wanted is you here, Wooyoung.”

He leans forward, pressing a short, sweet kiss to your lips. Keeping himself close, barely a millimeter between your faces, he whispers, “I will be.”

“Good,” your smile grows, “because I called my lawyer like, two days ago. I think we need your signature before the judge can sign off on the motion.”

He snaps his head backward, eyes wide. “Are you serious?”

“Why would I lie?” You laugh a little, leaning your chin on your forearm again. “Are you really that surprised? I thought I’ve been making it pretty clear.”

He shakes his head ever so slightly in disbelief as he stutters, “I don’t– I guess, I don’t know. You’re pregnant.”

Your eyes droop in a scowl, “Are you about to call me horny and hormonal?”

His lips tighten, trapping his smile, “No.”

You laugh again, leaning back into the tub, letting your head lay against the ceramic. “I love you, idiot. I don’t want to do this without you, you’re my best friend.”

“You’re my best friend, too,” his bottom lip bends over in a pout, eyes glossy all over again. “I’m sorry for everything I put you through, baby. I swear to God I never had bad intentions with any of it.”

“I know,” you mumble, reaching your hand over the side of the tub. He tangles his fingers with yours, squeezing your wet palm, reveling in the silence, the shifting, the togetherness both of you fucking ached for. You smile, eyes twinkling with the idea, “Do you wanna go get my rings?”

He beams, muttering an excited yes before he pushes himself upward. It takes him all of seven seconds to run out to your bedroom, connected to your bathroom, to grab your wedding band and your engagement ring from the ceramic box atop your dresser and to run back into the bathroom. The movement was so Kyungmin you couldn’t help but laugh when he knelt beside the tub again.

Wordlessly, you hold your left hand out, and he slides your wedding band on your ring finger first, a silver ring encrusted with diamonds. Then your engagement ring, a simple silver band, at the center a recently polished diamond set with four prongs. You hold it up to the dim light of the bathroom, admiring how the diamonds catch the amber hue, sparkling, shining, immediately regretting ever taking them off.

“You really did a good job,” your head tilts in admiration. “I’ve missed this fuckin’ rock.”

He snorts, lifting himself up and over you, planting both hands on either side of the tub as his upper half stretches over the side, pressing his lips against yours. Your other hand leaves the water to cup his cheek, savoring the taste of him, home. Knowing it was real this time, knowing you were choosing this. Him, all over again. You deepen the kiss as the feeling blooms, pushing your tongue between his lips, using your hand on his cheek to bring him closer.

“I love you,” he says into your mouth, voice cushioned by the remnants of relief.

You moan the softest sound of pleasure into his parted lips, “I love you.”

You feel him smile against you, one mischievous and him. “Should we consummate our renewed marital status?”

Keeping your hand on his cheek, you push him away a singular inch, popping a brow. “You really have to ask me that?”

“Mm, I know,” he leans forward to kiss you again, his outstretched arm leaving the ceramic to hold your cheek, running a thumb over your skin. “All that blood pumping down there, I’ve been so mean, denying my pregnant wife.”

His hand falls to your neck and you gasp, legs twitching in the water. You don’t have it in you to respond, already lost in the way his touch feels, just a few months without him should be nothing compared to the year you spent apart. But you weren’t pregnant then.

“Come to bed,” he purrs against your lips. “As much as I’d love to fuck my wife in the bath, I’d rather spread your legs as wide as I can get ‘em.”

The idea makes you snort, “How flexible do you think I am?”

He plants another kiss to your lips before responding. “Doesn’t matter. I’m stretching you out anyway, aren’t I?”

You pull the plug from the drain with a roll of your eyes before Wooyoung helps you up by your arms, then grabs the white towel that sat folded on the toilet lid. Holding it open for you, he wraps you in white cotton until your back is pressed to his chest, his arms snug around your front, fingers still holding the towel closed.

Leaning into him, his scent, his warmth, even if you’re already standing in your home, it’s never felt more like it. Quietly, you mutter, “I missed you.”

He presses a kiss to the side of your head instead of responding. You tilt it to the side, looking up at him, his beautiful, sculpted face you’ve spent fifteen years loving. Clear skin, soft and smooth, whiskey eyes, the freckle perfectly centered beneath one of them, there’s a wrench in your gut and it hurts. You love him so much it aches.

Wordlessly, you press your lips against his, and it relives the ache ever so slightly. Til’ death do you part, he’s yours, he always has been, he always will be. And like he’s confirming it, his tongue slips into your mouth, his hands leaving the towel to turn you by your hips, the cotton falling to the floor. Your arms reach over his shoulders, back arching into him, your bare front pressing into his clothed one, you didn’t care.

“Easy,” he mumbles into your mouth. “Let me get you on the bed first.”

You respond by kissing him harder. Your mouths move melodically, your fingers finding the soft, ebony locks on his head, his palms leaving your hips just to start undoing the buttons on his shirt. You help him push it off his shoulders, panting into his mouth as your fingers dart for the button at the hem of his slacks, fingers sliding the zipper down.

He grunts when your palm meets his clothed length. “Jagi,” he grits out, chest heaving. “Baby, fuck– wait.”

“No,” you huff, kissing him again. Fingers meeting the elastic of his briefs, you push them over his hips, gripping the base of his length and tugging.

He groans, breaking away just to suck in a harsh breath, his abdomen flexing.

“Fuck me.” You’re staring up at him, and you’re positive you look crazed; eyes wide, unblinking, lips swollen and wet, chest heaving.

He doesn’t seem to care. He pulls your wrist from his cock, bending at his knees to scoop his other arm under your legs, lifting you in one quick motion. You stop yourself from yelping, arms swinging around his neck, holding on for dear fucking life as he opens the door with the hand that was supposed to be cradling your back.

So strong, the realization shoots straight to your throbbing clit. He lays you down on the bed, wet body soaking the comforter, neither of you care as he gets his pants, his briefs off his body, crawling over you. He keeps his voice quiet, barely above a whisper as he says, “What do you want?”

“You,” you quip, breathless. “Inside, inside, please.”

He studies you for a millisecond before he moves. Palms splayed over the underside of your thighs, he pushes them upward as he leans down between them, tongue poking out to lick a stripe through your folds. Hissing quietly, you watch his mouth bend, angled cheeks sucking in before he parts his lips in the smallest O to land a glob of spit on your core.

Grip loosening on your thighs, he sits on his calves, taking one hand to the base of his cock, smearing the spit along your folds. You release a breath, eyes screwing shut, fingers curling into the sheets, reminding yourself you need to be silent.

“Take a breath,” his voice is damn near silent, too. You obey, sucking in deep as he prods at your entrance, releasing the breath as he pushes in, agonizingly slow. You open your eyes to see his face twisted up in pleasure, jaw slack, muscles flexed, veins protruding in his sculpted arms.

You curse under your breath and he opens his eyes. “So good,” he whispers, sheathing himself fully, cock buried to the hilt. “Nothing fuckin’ feels like you.”

Your head tilts a singular degree, “You have much to compare me to?”

His lips flatten, eyes following suit. “Don’t ask stupid questions.”

Your lips bend in a smirk, legs spreading further. “Move.”

“Be nice,” he mutters, cock twitching inside you. “Been awhile.”

“Gonna cum if I’m mean?”

He bends at the hips, elbows landing on either side of your head, arms close enough that you might as well be scooped beneath his elbows. His forehead pressed against yours, he whispers, “Gonna cum if you’re nice, too.”

“Then what do I do?”

“Lay there,” he smiles, then presses a short kiss to your lips. “Let me take care of you.”

When he starts moving, it takes everything in you not to moan. Not to squeal, not to squeak, not to cry. Jaw falling open, brows furrowing, your fingers fly to his arms, nails cutting crescents into his skin.

“Oh my god,” his voice is low, quiet and ragged, his head dipping into the pocket of your shoulder. Your legs wrap around him, the smallest whimper escaping your mouth, in chorus to the slick sounds of his cock sliding in and out. Instead of the loud slapping of skin against skin, it was raw, a quiet, creamy noise filling the quiet room, each grind of his hips to the same beat as your breathing.

It’s almost worse than being fucked mercilessly. Caged beneath him, body a livewire, arching and jerking just for every movement to be stopped, forced into stillness, it’s almost worse. You’re panting, hips fucking back into him, toes curling over the expanse of his back, the pit of pleasure in the base of your gut spreads heat through each limb.

“Woo,” you pant, “I need, I need– oh my god.”

His lips find your neck, but he doesn’t pick up speed. Cock curving upward, massaging against your walls, his tongue spreads flat against the curve of your neck, lips closing over the stripe of spit. Mumbling, so quiet it’s a murmur, he says, “You need me.”

“Yes,” you whisper, eyes screwing shut, fingers clawing into his arms harder. Your body tightens, muscles strained, but he rocks into you with the same rhythm, unbothered by your body clenching. “I need you– I, I love you.”

His teeth find your skin, a rumble of a groan melting into your neck. “I love you.”

“No,” you urge through a hiss. “I love you.”

His hips rock a little harsher, a twitch in his rhythm. “Say it again.”

“I love you,” you’re whimpering, “I love you, I love you.”

He picks up speed, cock still brushing the spot on the inside of your walls. “Say you’re mine, jagi, ‘h my god.”

Your hips tilt, breath turning ragged, voice rising in pitch as your pleasure blooms. “I’m y-yours, I’m yours. Always will be.”

He lifts his head to press his lips against yours messily, tongue slipping into your mouth, hips grinding into you, pulling you closer to the line he drew for you. The one he made for you, because you’ve always been his, and he’ll always be yours.

His hands cup your cheeks, pulling his lips from yours, hips never once breaking their rhythm. His cheeks cave again, lips pursing, and you open your mouth in waiting. A droplet of spit dribbles slowly from his mouth and you catch it on your tongue, never once taking your eyes off of him, unblinking, letting him see that you’d take anything he gave. He watches your throat bob as you swallow.

“Mine.” He sounds on the brink, his voice a quiet, hardened thing. “Cum for me.”

It doesn’t take long, not when your feet hit the mattress, pushing your hips upward, allowing him to hit that spot in perfect rhythm. After a week or two of denial, you’ve been on the cusp since he’d walked inside the bathroom.

“So perfect,” he says. It’s primal, how he stares at you coming undone around his cock, jaw pried open and eyebrows knitted together. “I fucking love you.”

You can feel him twitching as you clench around the width of him, nails slicing into his skin, hips jerking wildlessly under his own. He keeps you pinned as he reaches down, picking up a thigh to push it upward, knees spreading to fuck into you harder without slapping his hips against you.

You whimper, overstimulation looming, pleasure unending and all-consuming. “Wooyoung– Wooyoung.”

“Close,” he grinds his teeth. “Fuck, need to fill you up, jagi. Need to fill you up.”

His words make your hips rise to meet his, small squeaks escaping as his other hand finds your hair, knuckles finding purchase in your roots. Not hard, but enough, claim in another form; he needed it, needed you, in any way he could get you. Any way he could have you.

“Cum,” you cry. “Please, please please. I need it.”

“Say you love me.”

“I love you!” Your fingers find the duvet beneath you, curling into the plush, nerves beyond fried. Rambling, your voice a winded whine, “I love you, please fill me up, cum inside me until I’m leaking, made me feel so good, Woo. Need it inside.”

He moans, and it’s small, but it’s verbal. Cock twitching, hips losing rhythm, his abdomen clenches as he finally unravels, painting your insides with ropes of white-hot heavy warmth. You sigh in relief, in the warmth, the comfort of his release like an embrace.

He lets go of your thigh to reach for your cheek, pressing his lips against yours. Whispering into each other’s mouths, mumbles of I love you and thank you and I missed you, over and over and over, all between kisses and tastes of each other’s tongues.

It feels like forever that you stay like that, far past his cock softening inside you, his release leaking out, ignoring the tickle as it races for the duvet beneath. You didn’t care, not with his lips on yours, your hands in his hair, his scent in your nose, the world could end around you and you still wouldn’t fucking care. Like stitching time back together, seam by seam, when you’re both wearing flushed cheeks and swollen lips, you finally part with lazy grins and cheeks aching from giggling. He kisses down your chest, two of his palms splayed over your tummy, peppering a hundred, a thousand kisses to the skin circling your belly-button.

“I’m so excited,” he says, like he’d been waiting to say it. “I can’t wait to see you bursting, belly all full ‘n round. I can’t wait to have another.”

He lays his head on your stomach, body stretched out on the bed. Your hand finds his hair, scratching at his scalp as an easy sigh falls from your lips. “Me too,” you smile, and you mean it. “And I’m excited for you to be here. Normalcy.”

His fingers dance over your skin, featherlight, his cheek pressed to your tummy. “Can I move back in tomorrow?”

A quiet laugh tumbles off your lips. “We’ll take it slow, we have an eight year old who notices things, Wooyoung.”

“He literally wants me to live here,” his eyes slide upward. “He’ll be happy.”

“We’ll talk to him,” you nod in confirmation, fingers continuing to scratch in his hair.

He purrs, the vibration tickling your belly, making you twitch. “I love you,” he says softly, a pause before he adds, “wifey.”

Your grin spreads at the nickname. “I love you too.”

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